I’m ready to sleep with him.
The thought hits me out of nowhere and has my heart behaving erratically again, so I force my attention back to my sauce.
I’ve finished adding the milk and tomatoes and spices and have left the sauce to simmer while I clean up when the knock comes at the door. My hands are covered in the remnants of my ingredients, and my stomach swoops so low I could swear it settles somewhere around my knees. I nudge the sink faucet with my forearm and start washing my hands as I call out, “Come in.”
I hear the door open, and I close my eyes and take a few quick, steadying breaths as I soap up my hands. I tell myself to open my eyes. That he’s going to come around the corner any second, and I’m going to look ridiculous washing my hands with my eyes closed, but everything inside of me is in a frenzy. And I know . . . know that “butterflies in your stomach” is just an expression, just something parents say to their kids, but all the same, I could swear that I feel every flap of their wings.
My eyes are still closed when I feel the buzz of his presence at my back, then his large hands settle onto my hips, curling around to stretch across my lower belly. I feel something ghost over the skin at my neck. His lips? His nose? And then he murmurs against my ear, “Something smells delicious.”
I swallow, fighting off a shiver. This is . . . it’s . . . so strange. And yet, somehow not. It shouldn’t feel natural to have him in my house with me while I do everyday things like cook. He’s from this other world, and in my head he’s so intertwined with the list that is so not me. He shouldn’t fit here.
But I’m learning that the difference between what should be and what is matters very little where he is concerned.
“I’m making tortellini,” I tell him, belatedly realizing I should have asked him if he had any allergies or dislikes or—
“Sounds great.”
I finally open my eyes as he wraps his arms fully around my middle and noses some of my hair to the side to kiss the corner of my jaw.
“Do you need me to do anything?” he asks.
Make me feel like you did the other night. Put me out of the misery I’ve been in the last several days without you.
“No, the sauce is pretty much done. I’m about to put the pasta on to boil. When that’s done we’ll be good to go. I might throw together a salad.”
He turns me around and presses me back against the sink. “So what you’re telling me is that we’ll have a little time to kill while the pasta is cooking?”
He leans down to kiss me, but I put my hand up to block him. “I haven’t put the pasta on yet.”
“Well, do that so we can get to killing time.” He punctuates the command with a swat to my bum, and I gape at him.
“You did not just do that.”
“I did. And I liked it.” He rubs his hands together like some cheesy movie villain and says, “In fact, I think I might want to do it again.”
I dart away from him, spinning so that he’s nowhere near my ass.
“You stay there,” I order, opening the fridge to get the tortellini. Even though inside I’m thinking, Screw the pasta. Screw everything. Clearly I’m not the only one craving the next course after the other night, and I’m so very tempted just to abandon dinner to drag him back to my bedroom.
“You’ve got one minute, woman. And then pasta or no, I’m coming for you.”
My heart thumps with nerves or anticipation or something else I can’t identify. Something that has only ever happened with him, so I don’t know what to call it.
I start opening the package of tortellini and say, “I can’t put it in until the water is boiling. And even then, I’ll still have to stir it occasionally.”
“Fifty seconds.”
“If I don’t watch the pot, they could stick to the bottom or stick together.”
“Forty-five seconds.”
“Torres!”
“Five-second penalty. It’s Mateo to you.”
I glare at him, and rush to fill a pot with water. By the time I put it on the stove, I only have a few seconds left. I get the burner turned on, and then I’m practically tackled by a six-foot-two (maybe six-foot-three) overgrown child. He crowds me against one side of the archway that separates the kitchen from the little dining nook, and his hands slide unabashedly down to cup my ass. He kisses me, but I break away, turning my face to the side so I can laugh.
“You are ridiculous. And you can’t blame me if the food ends up being horrible.”
“I won’t blame you for that. I’ll just blame you for torture.”
“Torture, is it? Really?”
He catches my bottom lip between his thumb and forefinger, tugging lightly. “Keeping me away from this,” he says. “Definitely qualifies as cruel and unusual.”
I close my eyes. How am I supposed to remain cool around him when he says things like that? How?
“One minute,” I tell him. “You’ve got one minute. Then I need to check on the sauce and start on a salad.”
Cockily, he lifts one dark brow and says, “Guess I better make that minute count.”
His hands slide from my ass down to the tops of my thighs, and he heaves me up so that I’m forced to wrap my legs around his waist. I throw my arms over his shoulders to hold on, but he keeps me up with just his hands and the crush of his body against mine as if I weigh nothing at all.
“Fifty seconds,” I tell him. I mean for it to sound sarcastic, but instead it comes out breathy and soft, and he groans in response.
“Cruel and unusual,” he says again before slanting his mouth over mine.
I expect the kiss to be fiery and hot and fast, but instead it’s teasing and sensual. He seduces me one stroke of his tongue at a time. Quick. Slow. Quick. Quick. Slow. And every time he withdraws, I arch up into him, trying to keep him with me. In seconds, the kitchen disappears, and it’s only me and him and all the places our bodies are touching and all the places they aren’t. His fingers dig into my thighs, and the small bite of pain somehow heightens everything else. I drag my hands over the slopes of his shoulders, down to his muscled biceps and back up again, and when he slows the kiss, it’s my turn to dig my fingernails into his skin. Because I don’t want slow. I want everything.
He pulls back, grazing his lips over mine again and again without actually kissing me. I groan in frustration, and he says, “Minute’s up.”
I tighten my legs around him and breathe, “Have another minute.”
When we finally come up for air, I’ve boiled half my water away and have to refill the pot. This time I manage to resist him long enough to make a salad, get the water back to boiling, and toss in the tortellini. Fifteen minutes later, we fill our plates and head for the table. Once we’re sitting, I realize that I’d been so ridiculously worried about what I was going to say when I saw him or how I was going to look and how the night would end that I didn’t even think to be nervous about the other scary part of the evening.
Dinner. Like an actual dinner date. With conversation. And awkward silences. And more awkward silences. I pick up a fork and push at my food, trying to think of what we could possibly talk about. Then he groans.
“Good?” I ask hopefully.
He gestures with his fork while making another series of appreciative noises that despite not being words somehow read as Oh my God, yes.
“It’s my mother’s recipe.”
“It’s amazing. You’re amazing.”
I look down at my plate, hiding a small, satisfied smile. “Thank you. But it’s just pasta. It’s not as if I made the tortellini from scratch.”
“None of that,” he says, pointing his fork at me. “This is excellent. The end. Full stop.”
“Okay. Thank you,” I say again.
“One thing, though. You have to promise me never to cook for any of our friends.”
My stomach clenches at the word “our.” I still haven’t checked off that particular item—“Make new friends”—despite the Frisbee game and the party. I’m wait
ing for it to feel right. For it to feel like I belong to them and they belong to me. But I realize then that Torres counts. Whatever else he might be . . . we’re friends.
“Why can’t I cook for them?”
“Because then they’ll always want you to cook. And this . . .” He circles his fork over his plate. “This is mine.”
I smile and shake my head. “So selfish.”
“With you? Hell yes.”
“With my food, you mean.”
He suddenly looks serious. “With you. No more calling that ginger dude to help you with your list. I don’t like him.”
“You don’t know him.”
“Sure, I do. Matty something or other. He came to a few parties earlier this year with Dylan. And what kind of name is Matty anyway?”
“Selfish and jealous. You’re not doing so hot tonight.” I lift my eyebrows in mock disapproval. “Anyway, Matty is just a friend. And it’s not like you have to do everything on the list with me.”
“It is like that.”
“No, Mateo. It isn’t. Besides, you’re busy. You have practice and games and classes. You might not always be around. School is out in about a month, and then . . .”
“ And then what?”
“And then I graduate.”
When a stunned silence follows, I realize I maybe should have broached that particular topic with a bit more finesse. Until now, he’d been continually shoving pasta into his mouth and still managing to hold up his end of the conversation. Now he does neither.
“You’re twenty,” he says finally. “You can’t be graduating.”
“I am. I came in with all my requirements pretty much out of the way. And since I don’t have a job, I petitioned to take more than eighteen hours each semester.”
“So that’s what the list is. One last hurrah. And then what?” He fiddles with the napkin beside his plate for a second, and then continues: “You leave?”
Am I imagining the tension around his mouth and his shoulders?
“Not immediately. None of the graduate programs I’m applying to allow me to start in the spring semester, so I got a job as a research assistant for one of my professors. That will last me through the end of the school year. I’ve applied for a few summer internships, and hopefully one of them will work out, and then after that, theoretically, graduate school.”
“Damn. You never stop, do you? It’s one thing after another. Now I get why . . .”
He trails off, and all my worst fears are coming true. We’ve barely been at the table for ten minutes and the differences between us are already abundantly clear. We do fine when we’re just joking or flirting or kissing, but beyond that? What do we have?
“Now you get why I need a list just to have a life?” I finish for him. “I did warn you that I’m usually pretty boring.”
“No, that’s not it at all. And you’re not boring. Stop saying that.” He places his fork down on the table forcefully enough to make a thud. After a pause, he continues, “I was going to say that now I get why you’re . . . starving.”
I squint at him and shake my head in confusion. “I’m starving?”
“Yeah. For adventure. For connection. I saw your face when you were sitting up on the Rusk statue. It was such a little thing, but your expression was like you were on top of a mountain, like you were taking a break and opening your eyes for the very first time in your life. I get it now. I understand. That list? I don’t think you’re doing it to have a life. I think you’re doing it as a last resort, like those shock paddles they use at hospitals. I think you’re trying to wake yourself up. Before it’s too late.”
It’s as if he’s just reached into my chest and handed my heart to me, and all I can think is . . . touché. I tore him down when we first met, pinpointed his flaws, so I suppose turnabout is fair play.
“You’re giving me too much credit. You’re right . . . I have missed out on a lot, and it has made me eager to make up for what I’ve lost. But that list is just a list. It’s a challenge to myself to explore a different side of life. Not a cry for help.”
“You’re a smart girl, Nell. You don’t think it’s possible that you latched on to that list as a lifeline because a part of you needed it? Otherwise, if it was just about having a little fun before you graduated, why step so far outside of your comfort zone? You could have just made more of an effort to hang out with Dylan and stupid-name Matty. You could have done things you already know you enjoy. There’s a middle ground here, and you jumped right over it into the deep end. No one does that unless they’re already drowning in some other way.”
I think a tiny piece of me falls in love with him then. Because despite how different we are, despite the fact that he’s known me just two weeks (two crazy and overwhelming weeks), he’s managed to put words to the choking feeling that had me crying to my mother not long ago. My life has always been about forward motion. From the first time I walked into a cafeteria alone and realized I didn’t have anywhere to sit. In elementary school, we were seated in alphabetical order, according to our last names. It didn’t even occur to me that middle school would be different until I stood there, tray in hand, and realized that there was no one I wanted to sit with, and no one who wanted to sit with me. So lunch became a time to focus. To study. Then it was that way after school, too, while I waited for the bus. Then it was Saturday nights. As long as I stayed busy, I didn’t have to acknowledge that I had no other options. It was work and study or . . . nothing. That was all I had.
I only function when my mind is focused on a goal, and I’m driving toward it. And yet, for the past few weeks, I keep getting sidetracked. And maybe he’s right. Maybe that list is my way of putting on the brakes. I’d thought as long as my schedule was overflowing with assignments and commitments and projects, it meant that I was full. That there were no holes in me. But all those goals are just temporary distractions. Sand through a sieve. The minute the sand has passed, the holes are visible again.
“I like my major,” I tell him, my tone defensive not because of anything he’s said, but because of the way I can feel my thoughts pulling back to that place I try to avoid. “I like the idea of being on the edge of the future. There are so many possibilities in biomech. One of the summer internships I applied for involves biomedical research with NASA that could completely revolutionize space travel. NASA. I think that’s so cool, and it sounds right up my alley. Most of the time, I’m eager to get started.”
“And the rest of the time?”
I take a deep breath, brace myself, and say, “The rest of the time I doubt everything.”
He pushes his plate aside and scoots his chair a little closer to mine. His hands slide halfway across the table toward mine before stopping.
“You know, yesterday my coach said he thinks I stand a chance at going pro. I can’t tell you how long I’ve been waiting to hear someone besides me say that. It’s all I’ve ever wanted. When I figured out I was good at football . . . it gave me an identity. It gave me definition. I have sisters, have I mentioned that? Six of them actually. I was the only guy in this huge family of women.”
“That explains why you’re so comfortable around them.”
He reaches one hand out then and snags mine, pressing my knuckles on the table and drawing his fingers over my palm.
“It’s hard to live in a house with that many people. I was smack-dab in the middle. Not the oldest. Not the youngest. And for a long time, I felt like just one in a crowd. I had my sister Victoria’s eyes, and Sofia’s nose, and my personality was mixed and matched and patched together from other people in my family. And I just kind of . . . was. Until I found football. It was something that was mine. I didn’t have to share it with any of my siblings. And Fridays were the one night a week when my big family got to revolve around me. It gave me confidence. Pride. Purpose. Football gave me everything.”
He hesitates, drawing his fingers from my palm, closing them over my own, and then folding my hand into a fist. “But that was
then. I was just a kid, and now I’m not. And over the years, I’ve given up so much for football. Things that I can never get back, things that have changed me as a person. And I can’t help but wonder what else I’ll have to give up before all is said and done. And as amazing as it was to hear someone else bring up going pro, a part of me wishes Coach hadn’t said anything. Because it’s a lot easier to be certain from afar, but when things get real, when they’re within your grasp . . . it’s a totally different story.”
“That’s it exactly. I’ve always been so sure. I’ve never wavered. I decided what I wanted to do, and I put my head down, and I got to work. But now . . .”
“It’s real.”
I nod. “It’s real.”
And so I went searching for something that wasn’t. Something that was so completely different from my life that it might balance the scales and stave off reality.
I look at Mateo then, his big body folded onto our measly kitchen chairs. His eyes are so warm and open and understanding. And it occurs to me that I went searching for something artificial with my list and found far more truth than I know what to do with.
I don’t know what I’m doing when I stand up from the table and hold out my hand to him. Our plates are still sitting there, and normally I would go straight to washing them and cleaning up after dinner, but I’ve already waited days for him.
And I’m tired of waiting. Time to really jump in the deep end.
Chapter 20
Mateo
I can’t read Nell’s expression when she stands up next to me. It’s not a look she’s ever given me, but just like everything else where she’s concerned, it makes me want her. I take the hand she offers and am shocked when she begins pulling me down the hallway in the direction of her bedroom.
I try to control my reaction, to stop all my blood from rushing south. She could just want to show me something. She could . . . fuck. I’m sure there are any number of reasons she could be taking me back to her room, but I can only think of one. And her bed, and her skin, and her taste on my tongue, and the cries I’m determined to wring out of her.