Becoming Calder (A Sign of Love Novel)(34)
"Well, you're just as sweet as those sugar cubes. You get sweeter every day. And if I bring you out in the rain, you'll melt away, just like sugar."
Her eyes widened, but then she laughed. "That's not true!"
I winked. "Well, the part about you being as sweet as sugar is. Come on though, if you bundle up, we can sit under the porch and I'll draw you something in the dirt."
"Do I get to guess what it is?" She clapped.
"Yup. I won't tell you."
I helped her put on a sweater and a pair of warm socks, and then we sat under the roof overhang as I drew small pictures in the dirt and she guessed what they were.
When I looked up toward Eden's room, I saw her outline in the window. And I swore that despite the distance and the rain, for a brief second, our eyes met.
**********
The rain stopped the next day. I bounded down the trail, even faster than I usually went, my calf muscles burning with the exertion. I had a strange feeling I couldn't even explain swirling through me from not seeing Eden these past few days. Was it protectiveness? Maybe. I wanted to know she was okay. I wanted to know she was being cared for, happy. Those feelings were friendly, right? Only, I had never felt anything remotely similar for Xander. I pushed that aside.
When I squeezed through the rocks, at first I didn't think she was there. Disappointment, swift and strong, hit me. But then her head surfaced from the spring and she took in a big breath of air.
She caught sight of me and grinned.
"What are you doing?"
"Swimming," she answered, smiling happily.
I walked closer until I was just at the edge of the spring.
"Well yes, I can see that. Why exactly?"
She squinted at me, sunlight hitting her face, making the water droplets on her skin sparkle and dance. Her hair, although wet, was still golden and it cast a halo around her delicately beautiful face. She looked like an angel or a mermaid—a magical, mythical creature. I took a mental photo of her, meaning to draw her later, just like that.
"Well, I've decided this," she waved her hand around, indicating our spring and the surrounding rocks, "is my school. And I mean to learn every little thing I can while I'm here. I mean to soak up every piece of knowledge possible. And I didn't know how to swim. And now I do. Sort of."
I raised an eyebrow. "You taught yourself to swim in the last," I looked up at the sky to see how far past noon it was, when I assumed she'd arrived, "fifteen minutes?"
She nodded, leaning down and taking some water in her mouth and then spitting it out. Something about that had my body stirring in ways that, again, didn't feel friendly.
"Do you know how to swim?" she asked.
I nodded, willing my body to cooperate. "Yeah. I bathe in the river. Us worker kids have been swimming since we were young."
She paused, staring at me for a second and then nodded. "Come on in then. The water's nice." It was almost winter, but the temperature was still in the seventies. I'd bet it did feel nice.
I hesitated. This felt dangerous in ways that had nothing to do with drowning or stubbing my toe on a rock under the water. Nonetheless, I took off my shirt and waded into the water in my pants. I moved to the other side of the spring and regarded Eden. I noticed she was fully submerged, but she was still wearing her long, modest dress. Although it would be less modest now that it would be sticking to her skin. Lust spiked through my body, leaving a fierce longing in its wake.
I moved away a little farther and Eden rolled her eyes. "You don't have to be afraid of me, Calder. Friends, remember? And actually, I've been up in my room thinking about it these past few rainy days and you're right. It's better this way. Not just for the community as a whole, but for me, too. I've been too fixated on you these past few years. Silly, really. I mean, think of all the things I could have been teaching myself if I had had a different focus. There's knowledge everywhere! And instead, I've been wasting time staring at your muscles." She laughed. I frowned.
"Well, I wouldn't call it a complete waste of time," I muttered.
Eden laughed again, but then went serious. The swell of her breasts was just barely showing over the surface of the water. "No, but really . . ." She swirled her arm across the water, causing it to ripple. I watched as the ripples moved away from her, reaching toward me as if she meant to span the distance between us, using the water as an extension of her. When the first small wave hit my naked belly, I almost groaned as if it was her hand stroking my skin. Oh for the love of the gods, what's wrong with me? "When the rain hit my window, it fogged up. I remembered your lesson about the states of matter, and I was able to figure out the window fogged because of the different temperature of the glass on the inside and the outside." Her eyes lit up, like she had just solved the mystery of the universe. I couldn't help but smile.