Him Read online

  It is the first day of spring break. Will is picking me up, and I won’t have to deal with Jessica anymore. It is opening day for the amusement waterpark. Since it’s spring break, most of the kids at our school are going. I have my very first bikini on under my tank top and cut offs. I throw a towel, some sunscreen, my wallet, and cell phone in a small pull-close backpack and run outside when I hear Will honk, only to turn around and run back inside for my keys and sunglasses.

  He’s shaking his head at me as I climb into his Jetta. "Got everything, Miller Lite?"

  I punch his arm. "Shut up."

  "Someday I'm going to pick you up, and you will have everything you need the first time."

  I roll my eyes and put on my sunglasses before pulling my hair up into a ponytail.

  "Alright, William. Whatcha waiting for?"

  He gives me a strange look before shifting to reverse and backing out of my driveway. He hates it when I called him William.

  "Can I open the sunroof?"

  He laughs, nodding. I don’t know why, but I love pressing the button.

  "Are we picking up anyone else?"

  "Nope. You’re stuck with me. I expect you to be entertaining the whole drive."

  I lean my seat back and put my feet up on the front of the glove box. "God, too much pressure. Just put on some music."

  "Actually." He reaches over, pushes my feet down, and opens the glove box, pulling out a CD before shutting it. "My dad got me something to practice my Italian."

  He pops the CD in as I put my feet back up. Italy. I don’t even want to think about it. His mother's family is originally from Naples. She grew up in the States but goes back once a year to visit family. This year, Will and his dad are going with. They will be gone for a whole month. The CD is an Italian basics language course.

  “Hello. Ciao. Hello. Ciao. How are you? Come stai? How are you? Come stai?”

  "Do we have to listen to this?" I groan.

  He gives me a lopsided grin. "You're just pissed because you're going to miss me."

  "Like a hole in the head," I grumble, looking out the window. I don’t want to look at him in that moment because he’s right. I am kind of devastated he’s going away.

  He puts his hand on my knee and shakes it. I bite my lip at the contact. "It's still months away."

  The rest of the drive, we repeat common Italian phrases. I try to ignore how hot Will sounds when he rolls his r's. When we get to the park, we head straight for the Z section of the parking lot. This is where everyone is supposed to be meeting up. When we get out, I can’t help but notice Jessica three cars over, standing really close to Kyle Nelson. Like something is clearly up with them close. I look up at Will. His jaw seems tense. I try and distract him. All I can think is she sure rebounded fast, and I can’t help but feel a bit offended that it’s with Kyle. Our double date wasn’t that long ago.

  "So rides first or waterpark?" I already know what he'll say. Will takes his theme parks seriously.

  He puts his arm around my shoulders as we walk over to everyone. "Rides first. Always rides first."

  Jessica sees us and rolls her eyes. Yep, never liked her. We wait for some more of our classmates to show before descending on the park. Will and I have season passes so we don’t have to wait in line with everyone else. He got me my pass as my birthday present this year. I have two presents, funnel cake and my pass. Funnel cake is my favorite and definitely on the agenda for today. Before meeting Will, I had never gone on a roller coaster. I sometimes get motion sickness. Doesn’t stop Will from dragging me on every ride, and miraculously, I've never thrown up. I would follow him just about anywhere.

  Since school is out, the lines are bad. There seems to be some other schools meeting up here today too. We are waiting in line for one roller coaster. When the line moves, he grabs my hand, pulling me forward to catch up. When we are caught up, though, he doesn’t let go. He keeps holding my hand. I have my sunglasses on, so I know he can't see my eyes. I stare at my hand in his. It's not like he never touches me. He does, but in the past, if he had ever grabbed my hand he would have let go by now. He pulls me towards the queue for the first car. That is my Will, a bit of an adrenaline junkie. And he still hasn’t let go of my hand.

  "So after this one, want to grab some funnel cake?" he asks, leaning down.

  I'm not short. He’s just tall. Maybe 6' 2” to my 5' 7”. "Hells yeah."

  He grins, pulling on my ponytail.

  "So you two finally hook up?"

  We both turn at the sound. It’s Jessica and Kyle. She stands twirling a piece of her blonde hair as Kyle fidgets next to her, his hand hesitating before resting on her shoulder.

  Will lets go of my hand. "Shut up, Jessica."

  "What, you can't tell she's hot for you?" she goes on.

  I feel my cheeks redden as I turn around, putting my hands on the gate.

  Will looks down at me. "Just leave her alone, Jessica. You know we're just friends."

  He can't see my face, but I wince. The next car comes, and I open the gate. He follows me. We sit down and lower the bar.

  As the car slowly makes its way up the first drop, he turns to me. "She's such a bitch. You okay?"

  I nod, not saying anything.

  We're almost at the top. He turns my head to face him. "Come on. Talk to me."

  I give him a weak smile. "I'm good." What I don’t say is. I'm in love with you.

  He shrugs, chewing on the side of his bottom lip. He always does that when he's thinking.

  We crest the hill, and he lifts his arms as we take off. He always makes fun of me for always holding on to the safety bar. It's like me in life, too scared to let go.

  At the end, we go look at the pictures taken during the ride. The camera is at the bottom of the first hill. Will is looking at me, chewing on his lip. I look sad. He buys it. He has a whole album at home of us on roller coasters. I don’t like this picture, but I don’t say anything as he slips it into his backpack.

  "I'm going to run to the bathroom." My voice is thick as I hurry away from him.

  Sunglasses are good for hiding tears. I sit on the toilet, sniffling and blowing my nose. After washing my hands, I splash water on my face and dry my eyes. I reapply sunblock and lip gloss before I walk out. He's sitting on a ledge by some water fountains and stands as I walk over to him. He puts his arm around my shoulders, and we walk over to the funnel cake place.

  "My treat."

  "Twist my arm." I just don’t want him to take his arm away.

  He does, though, when the clerk passes us our order. One bottle of water, one cake. We always split them.

  "You sure you're good?"

  I have a mouthful of cake and wait for it to dissolve before answering. We are sitting in the shade. Our sunglasses are off so I have no way of avoiding his blue eyes.

  "I'm good." I lie.

  He chews his lip but doesn’t say anything else.

  We've already gone on all of his favorite rides. "Waterpark?" I ask.

  He shakes his head. "When was the last time we rode bumper cars?"

  "Like a billion years ago." I laugh.

  He's trying to cheer me up. I love bumper cars.

  "Well, what are we waiting for?"

  I throw away our trash, and we make our way to that end of the park. Halfway, he drapes his arm around my shoulder again. I shiver, and he looks down at me. It's really hot out to get the chills. There is no one in line when we get there so we have the whole track to ourselves. I bee line for a pink car as he calmly strolls over to a green one at the other end.

  "I'm coming for you," he teases, pulling the strap over his head.

  "You can't catch me," I shout back.

  He gives me his lopsided grin and rubs his hands together ominously.

  I shiver again, my arms covered in goose bumps.

  The music turns on as the cars come alive. I take off only to back track and turn away when he goes the opposite direction that I expect. With all of the empty ca
rs on the track, I have to fight my way through them as he barrels towards me. I scream but manage to get away. I look back at him, and he winks at me. That boy. He comes right up behind me, and I cut over to the right, turning the opposite direction before he can get me again. Now I'm behind him. He grimaces as he tries to get away from me, but it's no use. I laugh loudly as I bump him into the tires lined up the middle of the track. He hangs his head in shame before whipping around to come after me again. This time, I have nowhere to run, and we're nose to nose while he bumps his car into mine. We're both grinning as the music and cars turn off.

  "Waterpark?” he asks as we walk out.

  "Waterpark!"

  We're at a bank of lockers inside the entrance of all the water rides, changing.

  When I take off my tank top, he stares at me. "You're wearing a bikini."

  I cross my arms over my chest, suddenly shy.

  "I've just never seen you in one before," he continues.

  "Stop looking at me."

  "Sorry." He looks away, putting his hand out for my tank top.

  I step out of my shorts and hand him those as well. He pulls his shirt off, and I mentally drool just looking at his chest. I bend down to pull my towel and flip flops out of my bag when I feel a hand smack my ass.

  "Who knew Miller had a nice rack?" Josh Jamison, one of Will's friends, jokes.

  "JJ, touch my ass again, and I'll chop off your hand," I huff.

  "He touched your ass?" Will looks at me. He doesn’t give me a chance to answer and gets in JJ's face. "You touched her ass?"

  "Chill, man," he says, taking a step back.

  "That's not cool. Say you're sorry."

  "What?" JJ and I both say at the same time.

  Will takes another step towards him, and JJ shrugs.

  "Ah, sorry, Sarah. I was only joking."

  I peer around Will. "Don’t do it again." I shake my finger at him, but I'm smiling so he can tell I'm not really mad.

  He smiles but frowns when he looks back at Will. "I'll see you guys later," he says, taking off.

  Will still has his back to me. I grab his arm, surprised by how tense it seems, and pull him back over to the locker. His whole stance and face are just hard, like he's furious.

  I tug on his arm. "Will?" He doesn't react. "William."

  I see the corner of his mouth pull up a little bit.

  "I think I like you better in a one piece."

  "What the hell does that mean?" I pick up my backpack and shove it into the locker.

  "You just look really nice. I'm seriously thinking about kicking his ass."

  "Oh." I knock the side of my hip into his. "It's just JJ. He's harmless."

  "He still shouldn’t be touching you."

  I groan and roll my eyes.

  He shrugs. "Just saying."

  "Whatever. Slides, wave pool, or lazy river?"

  He chews on the side of his lip. "It was a long," he dips his head on the word long, "walk over here."

  "Lazy river it is." I grin. He knows it's my favorite.

  We wade into the water, tubes in hand. Once we're floating, he rests his foot on my tube so we stay right by each other. He's never done that before. I'm trying not to read anything into his actions, but I am. It just seems like he's touching me more than normal, and the way he freaked out on JJ, I can't help but feel a tiny spark of something in the pit of my stomach. I'm lost in my own little day dream. I don’t even hear him.

  "Sarah."

  "Yep, sorry."

  "What are you going to do when I'm in Italy?"

  "Ugh. I don’t even want to think about it."

  He grins. "You're going miss me."

  "Shut up." I look away.

  "I wish you could come with."

  "What?" My mouth drops, and I look back at him.

  "It'd be fun."

  "I'm sure your mom would love that."

  His mom is not my biggest fan. Probably has more to do with the neighborhood I live in than me but still. Before he had his Jetta, she used to give him crap for riding his skateboard or bike over. She just didn’t think it was safe. I offered to go to him, but he didn’t like hanging out at his house. It was always kind of weird over there.

  "My mom likes you," he halfheartedly argues.

  And while I can admit she does not actively dislike me, she most certainly does not like me.

  "Doesn't matter. Not going. You'll have to eat extra gelato for me, per favore." I throw please in Italian at the end, remembering his CD.

  He drags his fingertips through the water, then flicks some onto me. I wrinkle up my nose at him and remind him this is the lazy river. I know it probably drives him nuts. He's usually always moving, always tapping his fingers, or chewing the side of his bottom lip. He needs to relax. As the river curves around the park, we pass under a small footbridge that leads to the inner part of the park. A group of guys from our school is hanging out on it as we pass under it.

  "Hey, Will. Who's that girl?" One of them calls out.

  Squinting, I lower my sunglasses to see who it is.

  "Oh, shit! That's Sarah Miller."

  My cheeks redden as I push my sunglasses back up and cover my face.

  "Will, you hitting that?"

  He takes his leg off my raft and my mouth drops, but before I can say anything, he reaches out and grabs my hand in front of all of them.

  He looks back at them and smirks.

  "Damn. Go Price is right, man," another one calls after him.

  I pull my hand out of his, and he looks at me like, what?

  "You just made them all think we were together."

  He drops his head back so the top of it gets wet before sitting back up and looking at me. "I'm just trying to look out for you."

  "I don’t think I need to be looked after," I grumble.

  "God, I wish you wore a one piece. When did you even buy that?"

  I feel tears threatening. I am trying so hard not to cry.

  "Well?"

  "I thought you said I looked nice before."

  He flips over on to his stomach and doggy paddles over to me before resting his chin on the edge of my tube, right by my chest. He lowers his sunglasses so I can see his eyes. "You don’t look nice. You look fucking hot."

  Holy shit.

  Chapter 7

  Present

  "Isn't the point for them to be separate parties?" I lift a brow.

  Christine is applying her eye makeup in the bathroom mirror. I was in the shower when she got to the house. Seeing as how I've only known my future sister-in-law for three hours, I know without a doubt she is a doll and perfect for my big brother. She's gorgeous, all willowy with her pale complexion, hair, and blue eyes, almost ethereal looking, especially next to Brian with his perma tan and dark hair. My brother and parents clearly adore her, and it's hard not to. She's confident without being forceful and warm without making it feel overly familiar. She'd thrown me for a loop, though, when she informed me we were going out tonight for her and Brian's joint stag party.

  "Just think of it as a rehearsal dinner only for the bridesmaids and groomsmen."

  Great, I thought. That means Will would be there. I tap my mouth, looking at the clothes I brought, trying to decide what to wear. I want to look nice, but I don’t want to look like I’m trying too hard. I think back to my call with Sawyer, annoyed she talked me out of booking the first flight home. It's only a week, she said. You’ll be fine she said. Tonight is going to be my first time seeing him again, and I'm already about to panic. Christine comes to stand next to me. Of course she looks like a goddess in a light grey sheath dress that hugs her small frame. I like a sheath-style dress on top, but I'm too hippy to pull them off on the bottom.

  "I think you should wear this one," she says, pulling down a cream wrap dress.

  "You don’t think it looks too casual?" I argue, gesturing to her dress.

  "We'll add a chunky statement necklace. You'll look amazing."

  "You wouldn’t happ
en to have a necklace like that with you?" I know I don’t.

  "Brian gave one to your mom for Christmas that would look perfect with this. I'll go beg her for it."

  I laugh, doubting very much that Christine will have to beg. While she's gone, I slip on the dress. It is one of my absolute favorites and fits like a dream. When she comes back to my room with the necklace, my mouth drops. It’s beautiful.

  "I know, right?" She laughs, taking in my expression as I turn and lift my hair for her to fasten it around my neck.

  I turn to take in my reflection. Wow. The dress is simple. The necklace makes it look elegant. The necklace is four golden chains of clear glass beads. I have some simple gold hoops that will look great with it.

  "So how are you doing your hair?"

  "Um, probably down. Maybe with the ends curled under. I'm bringing a clip in my purse, though, because I'll probably want to pull it up before the night is over."

  "I can curl it while you do your makeup," she offers.

  My spidey sense is going off. "Is there a reason I should look so nice tonight?" I ask as innocently as I can.

  I can see her stifle a smile, but she shrugs noncommittally. Interesting. This feels like a set up. My only hope is that their intended target isn’t Will. I finish applying my makeup before she's done with my hair. While she works, I ask her about how she met my brother. I'm curious what Will's part in the whole thing was.

  Her eyes take on a dreamy, faraway look. She was new in town and had befriended Will. They were meeting for coffee one day when Brian saw her. Once he confirmed with Will that she was single, he asked for Will's help with an introduction. They ended up setting up a rouse where Will would meet Christine for dinner only to be called away for some made up emergency, and Brian would step in and have dinner with her instead. That night, after Will left, there were sparks between them from the moment they met. She laughs, telling me how nervous Brian was that night. She didn’t learn it was a set up until maybe three months into their relationship.