I wonder what he’s afraid of?

“God dammit,” he rasps as his body stills inside me. “Fuck.”

He drops his forehead to mine and his lips gently graze across my full ones. He gently pulls out and rolls off me. We lay side by side, and there’s so much I want to say. I want to ask to see him again. I want to know that there’s a chance. We connected; sure, we don’t know each other that well, but there’s something between us. I wonder if he feels it as strongly as I do.

“Answer my questions,” I say softly.

“What questions?”

“Favorite color?”

“Blue.”

I smile. “Favorite car?”

“Anything that’s old and beautiful. I particularly love Mustangs.”

“Nice choice.” I shift closer. “Favorite state?”

“Colorado.”

“Great place.” I grin. “Favorite food?”

“Pasta, anything pasta.”

I beam. That’s mine, too. “Favorite place you’ve visited?”

He tucks me into his side and I melt. “We went to Australia when I was a kid. I fucking loved it there.”

“Oh, I’m jealous. I’d love to go to Australia. Where did you go?”

“Cairns. It was beautiful. So green and tropical. Great place.”

Damn. I wish I could have seen that. “Okay, now I’m officially jealous. All right, favorite childhood memory?”

He stares at the ceiling. “When my brother broke his leg.”

I giggle unexpectedly. “That’s your favorite memory?”

He chuckles. “Not that he broke his leg, just that he did it because he was chasing a bully down the road.”

“A bully?”

“Yep, this dude was tryin’ to bash me. My younger brother has always been boisterous. He saw what happened and he chased this guy down the road. He ran across the road after him and got hit by a car.”

I gasp. “Oh my God!”

“It wasn’t funny at the time, but after, we all laughed so hard about it.”

“You sound like you adore your family.”

He nods. “Yeah, they’re pretty awesome.”

“I’m glad.”

“What about you?”

“What about me?”

“Are you going to answer my questions?”

“I’m not done yet,” I say.

“All right, you get five more.”

I close my eyes. Here goes. This is either going to go really bad or really good. I won’t know until I speak. “Have you been in love?”

He flinches. “Not yet.”

“Do you want to be?”

He’s stiff. God, he hates this and that hurts. It hurts because it means he doesn’t want this as much as I do. “Sure, when I’m older. Right now, I’m young and I want to enjoy being young. I’ve seen marriages go wrong, and that shit isn’t something I want for myself. I just want to live before I’m tied down.”

Wrong answer.

Yet a true answer.

“I understand,” I say gently. “I’m the opposite; I know life can end suddenly, so I don’t want to wait.”

“Fair enough,” he says, but his voice is distant.

I take a breath and say, “And this? You don’t want to see where it could go?”

He’s silent for so long I wonder if he heard me, then he says, “I’m not sure. Let’s go to sleep. I’m buggered.”

I’m not sure.

Well, at least it’s not a no.

I snuggle into him and let my eyes flutter closed, holding hope in my heart that he might just give this a chance. Right before I go to sleep, I whisper, “What’s your name?”

“I’ll tell you tomorrow.”

He lies.

Because tomorrow when I wake up, he’s gone and so are all his things.

He left me alone, with no explanation and no reason.

And in doing that, he broke my heart.

~*~*~*~

NOW

Brody and I have managed to get our hands on a bottle of alcohol. We’ve been drinking since this morning, and it’s now two in the afternoon and we’re both smashed. I’m enjoying my time with him, because he’s opening up to me and I’m seeing a really great side to him. We’re hidden well in the trees, so no one can find us. We don’t want to be found right now.

“So,” I slur. “Has Blade always been such a jerk?”

I know the answer to that; I know it because the Blade I met more than a year earlier was a really good guy. He didn’t want a relationship, but he wasn’t a pig. He had a good personality. This Blade? He’s angry and he’s bitter. I want to know why.

“Nah,” Brody says, swallowing more alcohol. “That only happened about a year ago. He went away for a weekend and came back a fuckin’ jerk. Not sure what happened, but I ’spect a girl.”

Oh. God.

He’s been like that . . . since me?

“Why would a girl cause him to become such a prick?”

He shrugs. “He was always easy, running around with girls and livin’ hard. He enjoyed being young and was determined to stay that way. He was a good guy, don’t get me wrong—the girls loved him because he laid the charm on thick with them. After that weekend, he was different. He became a jerk, and I think it’s because whoever that girl was, she made him feel and he threw it all away. He thought it was what he wanted, but it wasn’t, and he fucked up.”