Chapter 17: Lemonade and Ink

Carrie spent the late morning talking me back into the pool. I let her, which was either growth or a lack of better ideas. The same too-small suit came out for me because it was the most modest one she owned. Yesterday I had wrapped a towel around it like the towel was a legal document. Today I still felt the air on the parts the fabric declined to cover, but the panic had thinned. We swam. We talked. We gossiped about people who were not Justin, which was a kindness I did not say thank you for out loud. I started to feel better in the cheap, physical way chlorine and sun can fake if you let them.

We got out and took the lounges. Heat on wet skin. The fence. The ordinary backyard. I started to doze with my face turned toward the towel, and then Andrew’s voice arrived over the water.

“Mom asked me to bring these to you two and join you.” I looked up.

He had two tall glasses of what looked like iced lemonade. He also had almost no clothes on. Swim trunks. Nothing else. The tattoos I had been stealing glances at under sleeves were all the way out in the daylight. His right arm was nearly a full sleeve from the wrist up, Celtic knots and crosses in dark ink that made the muscle under it stand out in a way I couldn’t help but inspect. The left arm was almost as full. His chest had more of it, not a wall of pictures, just enough that my eyes had somewhere to get stuck. He was not ripped, but he had what appeared to be the start of a six-pack and the kind of arms and chest that said he had been going to a gym without turning it into a religion. I felt a tingle start low and spread, stupid and immediate, and I mumbled a thanks that did not qualify as English and buried my face in the towel so the blush would have somewhere to hide.