“Oh Ty,” she said to me. There was a mix of emotions in her tone. Lust mixed with fear. Wasn’t that what falling in love was? The initial lust and the fear of what happens when the lust turns into something more. The fear that you’re putting yourself out there for a person, handing them everything you are and hoping they don’t ruin it.
In this mountain valley, our fear was apparent and out there for everyone to see. The good part was that we were the only two souls to see it. The fear and the lust were all are own at this moment. It was all there for both of us to see.
I didn’t have to say it.
Instead I told her dinner was ready and it was time to eat. We sat next to each on a log, eating our dinner with our knees touching and our gazes catching each other’s. The lust and fear and all the emotions we couldn’t even name right now filled the valley. We let it. I pulled out the bottle of whiskey I had packed and took a swig of it, passing it to Jolene wordlessly. She took a swig, thought about it and then took another. I smirked and took another.
We passed the bottle between us as the sun set and the fire burned. We made small talk, but nothing serious. That was until half the bottle was gone and we were both slightly tipsy. Actually, I think we more than tipsy because we were snuggled up to each other and Jo couldn’t keep her hands off me, which I didn’t mind at all.
“Truth or dare?” she asked me.
I laughed. “I think we might be too drunk for that. I’m afraid to stand up.”
“Okay, we can just play Truth then.”
I thought about it, but knew there was nothing I wouldn’t tell her. I wanted her to know me, know my truths.
“Sure,” I told her. I did stand up to throw more wood on the fire, feeling the effects of the whiskey course through me. Yeah, I was not sober.
“You go first,” Jo said.
“It was your idea, but okay, I’ll appease you at this moment.”
Jo looked at me. “What?” I asked her.
“You annunciate better after drinking.”
I thought about it. I didn’t drink a whole lot but thinking back, maybe she had a point.
“Anyways, sorry, back to the game. Go first and ask me a question.”
I grabbed her leg, rubbing her upper thigh. I couldn’t help myself; I never wanted to stop touching her.
“Do you like me?” She was also not sober and I wanted to know point blank, rather than the mixed signals she sent me.
“Clarify
like?
As in, yes I like you as a friend, or I like
like
you as in how you liked the boy in the 4th grade that you tackled on the playground and kissed on the lips. Then, you had to sit on the wall for the rest of recess because of what you did.”
I gave Jo a deep laugh as I looked at her. She looked dead serious. “Wait, you really held a boy down at recess to kiss him?”
She gave me a sly smile, but instead of answering the question said, “Option one or option two?”
I would love for Jolene to tackle me down and kiss the lights out of me. “Option two.”
“Okay then. Going with option two would lead to the answer that yes, I do like you. I like
like
you. And here’s another truth. That scares the shit out of me. Truth number three? I’ve never really like liked someone, even when I thought I did in the fourth grade. I’ve never liked someone enough to think beyond myself, to think about how my actions might affect another person. I’ve always been pretty selfish when it comes to liking boys and toying with them.”
My mind was trying to catch up with everything she had just said. “That was a lot of truth.” I told her.
She nodded. “Yeah. Yeah it was.” A bit of sadness filled her tone.
I got up and grabbed the blanket I kept in my plane, throwing it over us as the chill set in. “Your turn,” I told her.
She set her hands out on the blanket and I grabbed them, wrapped my larger ones around hers, letting her silently know she could ask me anything.
She didn’t hold back either. “What was the first thought that went through your head when Brooke told you she was pregnant?”
I took a deep breath. “That my was life was over. That I had fucked up. That my parents were going to kill me. That I had no idea how to take care of a small child when I was only a child myself. I think all those thoughts ran threw my head instantly when Brooke told me.”
“And when she was born? Your first thought?”
“That never had I seen such a perfect little person. That I never knew I could fall in love so fast and so hard when I held my daughter in my arms for the first time. Every thought that ran threw my head when Brooke told me flew out the door. I knew I would do everything in my power to keep her safe and to make sure she knew every single day that she was loved. That was my life goal then, to transfer all my love to this child in my arms because she deserved it. She deserves the world. God Jo, she deserves more than the world. I would give her the sky and the stars and the moon if I could.”
My gaze was transfixed on the fire in front of me as I remembered what it was like to hold Annabelle in my arms for the first time. As I glanced over to Jolene I could see tears in her eyes and they never left mine.
“How do I compete with that?” she whispered, and I felt my heart break. Those words hit me hard, because if anything Annabelle showed me that I had room for more love than I could ever imagine.
“Jo. It’s not a competition. Never. Having my daughter showed me how much I have to give. When it comes down to it, though, was I knew love was precious and I didn’t want to give to just anyone. I knew that whomever I loved, it would affect Annabelle. I was cautious and worked toward making sure I could support her. Now I realized that I can open myself up again and maybe I’ll get lucky like Brooke and find love. Maybe I think I already found it.”
Silence so loud even the roar of the fire was lost. I had said that. I had practically told Jo that I was falling for her. It didn’t make sense. It had only been a couple months from the first time I met her.
“Say something,” I urged her.
Jo opened her mouth but nothing came out. She couldn’t look at me. I had ruined it all.
“Ty,” she started. “How do I let go of everything I know and take this direction? How do I know it’s real and not words flung out? I’ve heard it all. Maybe that’s why I feel jaded at times. I’ve heard the words of affection and love said in my ear when guys are above me. I know what it’s like to fall in quick lust and mistake it for something else, to only wake up the next day and find it was only a fleeting moment, this high that came down as quickly as it shot up it. I have no experience in having a man tell me that he sees more than a month with me. I never let them tell me they see more, because by then I’ve hightailed it out of there and moved on. That’s the plan. This is only a summer and then fall comes and I go back to Boise and you go back to your family and we remember this summer fondly on those days when our souls are lonely. That’s what this summer is for.”
She was determined to push me way. Jo was holding on tight to this notion that, I don’t know, maybe she didn’t deserve more. She deserved more and I wanted to give it to her.
“Why?” I was starting to loose my patience with this all. Not with Jo exactly, but the situation. I was annoyed at whatever had hurt Jo in the past. It was ruining her future and her ability to find love.
I started again. “Why can’t we be together past this summer? Why does it have to end? Because from my point of view, I can see it being a wonderful thing. We can figure out what the next step in the fall is. We don’t have to figure it out all now and you don’t need to run away. I know it’s hard to trust me only on my word but I’ll keep you safe.”
“I want to believe you.”
That hurt. I wasn’t sure what to do, how to convince her. My words didn’t seem to be enough. At this point, I was afraid if I kept talking I would only make it worse. She was right and probably had multiple men promise her everything to either scare her off or they didn’t follow through. I was starting to realize maybe it wasn’t words I needed but action. If that meant never leaving her side, showing her time and time again I was right for her I would.
“I think it’s time for bed.” I kissed her gently on the forehead, holding her for only a moment and taking in her scent tainted with the forest around her.
We crawled into the tent, into our separate sleeping bags and fell asleep, both of us emotionally exhausted after our conversation.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Jolene
“The stars in the wilderness told stories. I found myself simply standing, searching for the stories spread across the sky. The white hot burning stars never burned like this in the city.”–From the diary of Maggie Brown, September 1891
I was wide awake. I had been for about twenty minutes. When we had crawled into the tent, I practically passed out. The whiskey mixed with the way too deep conversation had me falling fast asleep. It was now five hours later, the middle of the night, and I was wide-awake, sober, and had a small headache. It was also freezing. Clara had let me borrow her sleeping bag, but I felt like I couldn’t move and I was twisted in the sleeping bag. The ground was hard and I was focused on what I had told Ty, the words replaying in my mind. I couldn’t shut it off.
I was also a little scared. I started to think about the fact that we were literally miles away from another human. If something happened out here, I didn’t know what to do or how to get help. There was definitely no cell service. There were also animals out here. I think what woke me was a howl. Wolves? Were there wolves out here? Bears? Was a bear going to attack our tent? My heart started to race and I moved around again, each time making loud crinkly sounds from the goddamn sleeping bag.
I lout out a small sound of frustration. I tried to kick the sleeping bag off of me, but that didn’t work which pissed me off more.
“Stop taking it out on the sleeping bag. It’s there to keep you warm.” The deep sleepy male voice carried in the tent and I glared at Ty.
“Fuck this sleeping bag.”
Ty chuckled and turned over to face me. He looked perfect in his. I glared again.
“What’s the problem? Why are you tossing and turning over there?” Ty yawned. He was super cute when he was sleepy with his dark hair sticking every which way.
“I woke up and can’t fall back asleep.”
“Has anyone ever told you that you’re kind of violent in your sleep?” Ty leaned up on his elbow.
June used to tell me when she shared a dorm room. She would say that usually in the mornings she got up before me, she would find me with half a blanket covering up one leg and rest would be on the floor. June always covered me before she left.
“Might want to get used to that,” I said.
Ty smiled and rubbed his hand through his hair, which made it look even more disheveled. Not that I minded one bit.
“I hope I do have to get used to it.”
And then every word that was spoken tonight came rushing back. Fuck. As we laid there, I heard a rustling in the distance. I stiffened, thinking of every possibility of what was out there. Bigfoot was the image running through my mind.
“Are there animals out there?” I asked out loud.
Ty flopped back down and laid on this stomach as he curled his arms underneath his head. Even through the long sleeve thermal shirt he was wearing I could still the outline of his strong muscles.
“Probably Jo. It’s the wilderness.”
“Oh,” I said. I sunk deeper in the bag.
“Jo . . .” Ty started. He reached out and wrapped his hand around my braid, well if you could call the hair that was really a tangled mess a braid. He tugged light and said, “Are you okay? I’m sure it’s just a deer or something. Nothing to worry about.”
I had sunk so deep in that only my nose was sticking out. I looked over to Ty. “Are you sure?”
“Are you scared?”
I sighed in frustration. I didn’t want to admit it, even if I was. Hello, where was the fearless Jolene everyone else knew. I really needed her right now to fight Bigfoot, who I was sure was camping out and probably drinking the beer I had left out.
“A little bit,” I told Ty.
“Hey,” he said softly, running his hand over my hair in a soothing manner. “Why don’t you come here.”
“I don’t think we’ll both fit.” Ty started to unzip my sleeping bag. “What are you doing?” I asked him.
“I’m going to zip up our sleeping bags together, okay? Then I can hold you when you get scared. Sound good?”
He unzipped his and zipped ours together. Ty also took off his shirt. He totally saw me staring at him, even though the only light was the low dim from the half moon outside. He winked at me. “This way I can keep you warm, too. Body heat is a good source of that.”
Ty grabbed me so I was facing his chest. I snuggled in tighter, hiding from the dark outside. This was not my most proudest or bravest moment but damn it felt good to be in Ty’s arms and I could admit it did make me feel a little safer.
A little safer by a whole lot. “Better?” Ty asked.
I squirmed, trying to get closer to him, even though there really was no room between us. I heard the deep breaths Ty was taking in a steady rhythm. That was until I moved in closer and there was a misstep in his breathing. I could feel him between us, how hard he was. I smiled and said, “No. I think you might need to distract me.”
Ty’s answer was to move his arms up and under my shirt, taking it off and throwing it to the other side of the tent. “I think I can do that.” His mouth took mine in this sweet kiss. This man could kiss. He kissed like it was an art form and he was the artist who spent hours of time on his craft. I kissed him back and as usual, everything faded around us.
In the past it was like we got to one point but stopped. I didn’t want to stop. I turned, putting Ty on his back and I was on top of him, my breasts pushing into his chest. I moved up as I kissed him, which gave me a deep gravely moan from Ty, a glorious sound. This time I moved down. I figured it was my time to repay. I kissed him on his flat stomach as I took the band of his boxer briefs and moved them slowly down his legs. He helped and kicked them off. I kissed him again, a little lower as my hand gripped him, the heat from his hard cock radiating in my hand. I moved my hand up once and then twice before I flicked my tongue out on his head. The moans coming from him made it sound like torture and bliss rolled into one. I loved it. I took him into my mouth and that moan turned into a heated, “Oh fuck Jolene.” He lifted his hips up and I took him in more fully. Now, I was no prude and this not my first time giving head, but I loved giving it to Ty. The power I felt with him in my hands and knowing those sounds of pure pleasure were by my doing gave me a real rush. I felt Ty bring his hands around my elbows as he lifted me up and captured my mouth, tasting himself on me. That enticed another moan but this time I didn’t know where it was coming from.