I feel like I don’t really know him anymore and I’m growing more and more paranoid that I’m not good enough for him, that he doesn’t love me anymore, that there’s something—someone—else.
I don’t want to think about my doubts. I want to believe in his love for me, even if he hasn’t said it lately. Anders is the best thing that ever happened to me, the only thing in my life that keeps me going through the days. He’s the only one that makes me feel wanted, that makes me feel needed. With my mom coming back only for Christmas and then jetting back to India, choosing dad over me and Hannah again, Anders is the only constant in my life. He’s my north star, my Nordic star.
So that passion fuels my climb and, before I know it, I’m climbing over the top and down the other side.
“That’s my sparrow,” he says to me, grabbing me by the waist and lifting me in the air.
I giggle, thrilled at his touch, his embrace. I feel in this moment, under the stars, among the electricity of his heart and mine, that all is well. I’m whole and happy again. It’s the old Anders, before we started fighting, before I started crying at night, afraid for our future together.
I love you, I want to say to him. I want to yell it. But he always insisted that it was his words to give me and not the other way around, and he gets so weird when I say it.
So I keep it inside and do what I can to make sure he feels it, knows it. He’s the only boy for me. Now and forever.
“Ladies first,” he says, after he puts me back down, gesturing to the water that glows faintly under the lone light of the closed community center.
“Yeah right,” I tell him, smacking him on the arm. “You know they turn the heat down at night.”
“Well, why don’t you go check,” he says.
I give him a suspicious look and he raises his palm.
“I promise I won’t push you,” he says.
So I take his word for it. I walk over to the edge, the concrete rough on my feet and peer over at the water, light wafts of steam rising from it. It can’t be that cold then, can it?
Before I can even register it, Anders is moving, running toward me. He grabs my hand and leaps into the air, pulling me with him.
For a moment I’m weightless. It’s horrible and freeing at the same time. If I was a sparrow I would keep flying, but I fall, holding onto Anders until the water cuts into us.
I sink, open my mouth to scream and nearly swallow a bucket of cold chlorine. When my head breaks the surface, I’m gasping. The water is a lot warmer than the air, but it’s still a shock to my system.
I paddle frantically, trying to get oriented, and glare at Anders.
“You asshole, you promised!” I yell, spitting out water.
“I promised I wouldn’t push you,” he says, swimming toward me, his long hair back from his forehead. He looks sexy as fuck, even though I hate him at the moment. “I pulled you in, that’s different.”
“You’re an ass,” I tell him again.
“And you’re gorgeous when you’re wet.” He wags his eyebrows and wraps his arms around my waist, his skin sliding like silk against mine.
He swims forward until my back is against the edge of the pool, then one hand is disappearing down my bikini bottoms and his mouth is on mine, tasting like chemicals and rum. His tongue is hot but I’m still so mad at him, and at the same time my body is responding like I’m being brought back to life. I’m hungry, insatiable, for every part of him. For him to just be mine again, every inch, body and soul.
My neck cranes back as his wet lips suck down my neck, and I pray he leaves hickeys on me like he used to, when we used to mark each other and everyone at school would know just how madly in love we were. It would stop Everly asking me why she hasn’t seen Anders around me anymore, why I’ve stopped talking about him, gushing like I used to. It would stop all those girls from looking at him, if they see he’s still mine and I’m still his.
I open my eyes to the stars and his mouth is at my breast, freed from the bikini top and I’m wrapping my legs around his waist while he pushes my bottoms aside.
I’ve never wanted him, needed him, more.
He whispers something in Norwegian, voice raspy, and I gasp loudly as he pushes himself inside. The water makes the friction feel ten-fold, and not in a good way. It hurts.
But he pulls out slowly and then back in again and I grip him tighter and as he works himself in and out, the easier it gets. I open myself to him, nails clawing down his back, one hand at the back of my neck. The more he thrusts into me, the more my back rubs raw against the edge of the pool. It hurts, the concrete scraping skin, but in the best way possible.
I can’t wait to show Everly the marks tomorrow. I’ll wear the scars proudly.
“Oh, Shay,” Anders groans into my neck before meeting my lips. Our mouths are hot, wet, tongues are dancing, fueling the fire.
I’m so wicked, I think to myself. We’re so bad. Having sex in a public pool. I don’t know anyone at my school that’s done that. Maybe we’ll
