Hopeful Undertone

Chapter 16: Hands, Lips, Breath

Are you awake?

The chime and illumination of an incoming text woke me up.

It was darker than it should've been. For a moment I felt disoriented, but then I remembered that we had pushed the beds together. Next to me, Carrie lay sprawled and snoring on her side of the mega-bed, the sheets we fastened to the ceiling still enclosing us all in a makeshift tent. I looked back at my phone.

It's Tyler, he wrote.

Barely, I replied, wondering who he'd asked for my number.

Wanna go for a walk? he texted.

Sure. Give me ten

I meant to add minutes, but in my grogginess I dropped the phone on my face and the message sent early. Oh well. He'd know what I meant.

I slipped out from under my blanket and climbed sloth-like down the side of the bed. On the second bunk, Becka and Lyla were sleeping at head to foot, Lyla's magnificent hair fanned out around her and Becka's mouth hanging wide open. I stifled a chuckle. When I reached the ground, the floorboards creaked under my foot, and for a second I thought Carrie and Faye would wake up, but they resettled themselves and kept sleeping.

I changed clothes silently, brushed my teeth, washed my face, and slipped out the door before the sun had even gotten a chance to blast its rays through the smudgy little window.

The air was fresh and dewy, and in places with lots of tree coverage, it looked like it could be twilight instead of dawn. I crossed over the main lawn and past the fire pit, making my way toward the trail entrance where Tyler stood waiting .

He was dressed in a beanie, tee, and basketball shorts, which made for an adorably tacky outfit altogether. His smile when he saw me approaching was contagious.

"Hey you," he said.

"Morning," I replied.

"Shall we walk?"

"Yes, let's."

The forest was a-twitter with early-morning birdsong. As we passed into the woods, the world became shady and cool, almost tropical in its springtime freshness.

"I've missed you," Tyler said, not looking up at me.

"You've missed me since twelve hours ago?"

"Yeah," he said with a slight laugh.

"Well, that's funny because I've missed you too."

"All right," Tyler said in the way boys do when things go triumphantly to plan.

We walked on for another minute or two, and then he stopped abruptly, taking my hand. "I'm sorry, can I just—"

Suddenly his lips were on mine, his other hand in my hair. I stumbled backward into a tree, drowning in his impossibly gorgeous scent and the warm softness of his mouth until he stopped, just as suddenly as he'd begun, and started walking again.

He spun around once as if drunk, then took my hand back in his.

"Dang, girl."

"Yeah, same."

"You know I like you, right?" he said.

"I was beginning to suspect," I said, smiling.

"Well I just want to make it clear to you." He ran his thumb along my finger as we walked, hands intertwined. "I'm interested."

"Interested?" I repeated, hoping desperately that he would elaborate. It felt like a piece of me that had been buried in a glacier all week was on the verge of melting.

"Yeah," he said, kicking a pinecone. "I see how other guys look at you. I just don't want there to be any confusion." He looked away toward the lake, pulling his beanie off his head and then shoving it back on. 

"I don't even know if I wanna say it..." He sucked in a breath, possibly figuring that he had already come this far and might as well go on.

"I don't just like you, Tessa. I mean, I don't open up to anyone. I love the way your hair smells and how you phrase things and how you just, like, challenge assumptions I've held for years in one conversation... I'm... I'm crazy about you. And if this is just a fun week for you, or if I'm interrupting something between you and Abram—"

This was too much. 

"Tyler, there's nothing between me and Abram."

"Really?" he asked in a cracking voice so fragile it made me want to tackle him.

"Absolutely nothing," I said emphatically. "That ship sailed long ago. And were never, like, an item—he's just a very flirty and possessive friend."

"Hm," Tyler grunted.

"And this isn't just a 'fun week' for me," I continued, looking up into his brown eyes with what felt like extraordinary boldness. "I'm... I'm pretty sure I'm in love with you."

Everything before now had been mere practice, preamble, a table read for the Broadway play that was about to unfold. 

Tyler grabbed my face and kissed me as if the world were ending and it was the last thing he would ever do. I held on to his sides to steady myself as his eruption of relief and affection and elation fused us into one person. It was like waves slamming into a shore again and again. As soon as each wave broke, the chilly awareness that he could pull away, that we could ever not be this close would force us together more intensely than before. 

We didn't come out of the woods again until the bugs and sun were out in full force. 

I went about my morning responsibilities, and he went about his. Lunch happened—still I daydreamed. His face against mine, his mouth, his hands, his breath, the urgency of it. I was living a dream. 

That afternoon, my kids put on a hilarious performance of three different fables. After that, Tyler and Josh led the littlest kids in the most adorable concert I'm sure their parents had ever seen. Everyone clapped, and at the end, of course, there were popsicles. 

I floated through the day, magnanimous and invincible. Was this what being high felt like? 

At dinner, the highlight reel of the morning's events that had not ceased playing since I walked out of the woods was replaced by reality: Camp was ending. 

Tomorrow morning, we'd all head home to our separate lives. I would go back to a heavily restricted existence and an unbearably boring school year, and Tyler would go back to filling venues and baring his heart onstage for thousands of strangers. 

I don't open up to anyone. 

He had said that, right? I wasn't making it up? That had to count for something. Things couldn't just go back to how they'd been before. 

But we hadn't discussed it yet. And time was running out.