5. CODY

CODY

A few days later, I knocked on the door sometime after dinner, knowing I might get her in more trouble than she was already in for spending time with me. When the door swung open, and she shooed me back off the porch down onto the steps, I knew I had fucked up.

“What are you doing?” She questioned in the most adorable, whispered, angry voice.

“I just wanted to know if I loved you more on Saturdays,” I shrugged, letting it slip out before I could stop myself. I couldn’t help it. I craved the blossom pink color, saying it always turned her freckle-stained face. I could tell she had been eating cherries; her lips were darker than usual, and her fingertips were a funny-tinged color.

“Ryan!” She growled.

“I came to take you for a walk. I got out of my chores and wanted more homework done. The second paper is calling our name.” I insisted.

She watched me momentarily, gauging my words with the weight of what she knew about me. A walk felt too innocent, and my wanting to do homework on a Saturday felt even less. On a surface level, the request was odd, but if she knew how fast my heart thudded in my chest every time I saw her, she wouldn’t question my motives. I wanted to be around her constantly, even if it meant doing homework.

“Are you sure?” She asked him.

“Positive,” I said.

She chewed on her cherry-stained bottom lip for a moment longer, tucking a strand of her dark hair back off her face. I opened my mouth to argue the point and convince her further, but she cut me off with a simple “Okay.” Before she shuffled back inside, she left me on the step.

I fiddled with the sleeves of my shirt, tugging at the loose threads while my heart tried to claw its way out of my chest. I fixed my unruly hair in the window, taking note of the pristine white-washed living room on the other side of the blurred reflection.

My dirty baseball T-shirt and mud-stained jeans stood out like a sore thumb. I was painfully aware that a guy like me could never be good enough for a girl like Lorraine Field, but if she would even allow me in her orbit just for a little while, I would take all the time I could get.

“Are you ready?” She asked, breaking me from my trance. I hadn’t heard her come back outside, but her hair was pulled into a ponytail, and she had slipped into a pair of jeans and an oversized sweater that hid her from me.

“Let me,” I surged forward as she went to throw her backpack on. Our hands brushed together as I reached for the strap, and she flinched back from me. I flexed my hand tightly, slowly reducing my movements so I didn’t spook her, and slipped the strap from her shoulder.

“Can I?” I asked, holding up my loose binder. She nodded, allowing me to stuff it in her little bag before I hoisted it over my shoulders and stood up straight. “Come on, I want to show you something.”

Lorraine hesitated initially but eventually followed me as we walked down the street away from her house and out of the gated community she was sequestered in. She looked nervous. The way she crossed and uncrossed her arms gave her away worse than the worried look on her face.

“I promise you’ll like it,” I told her, trying to close the gap and ease the trees' silence filling the air. We crossed down through town, where most of the shops were closing up for the evening. The streets emptied, and the sky became heavy with oranges and purples.

“Absolutely not,” she stopped dead when she saw the entry to the path. “I might not get out much, but I know where that goes.” Lorraine shook her head.

I had known that getting her to go down the path that led to the infamous make-out spot would be difficult, so I had come prepared with reasoning.

“We aren’t going to the make-out spot,” I told her, and she narrowed those pretty blue eyes at me like they could inflict damage. “There’s a separate path halfway down that takes you up the hill to the other side. It's covered, and no one knows, but I want to show you something. So don’t be such a coward.”

“A coward?” She gawked at me.

“I am not a coward, Mr. Cody. I’m sorry if traipsing around in the dark with a boy whose reputation is anything but gentlemanly is concerning.” She shook her head and crossed her arms again.

“Rae, I’m not trying to steal your innocence,” I laughed and extended my hand to her, wiggling my fingers at her. “I promise you’ll enjoy it. Just take a chance.”

Lorraine pressed her lips together in a thin line and looked around at the woods that engulfed us before she blew a small breath. “I have a pocket knife in my backpack, and I swear I’ll use it on you, " she said with conviction.

“I believe it,” I laughed as she took my hand, and I pulled her down onto the path. As I said, the path broke off into a smaller trail blocked by a slight covering of tree branches. I lifted them gently and allowed her to pass beneath my arm, smelling the fruity shampoo that wafted up from her air as she did. I stayed close behind her, our bodies bumping into each other occasionally as she got nervous or unsure about the path ahead. “And for the record, I’m a perfect gentleman and never kiss a girl unless she asks me to.”

Her body stiffened slightly at my joke but continued moving down the trail.

“Just a little further,” I pointed over her shoulder, leaning down to whisper in her ear; I felt her body tense at the closeness.

Lorraine nodded and continued on steady, tiny steps toward the small opening in the trees ahead of us. As we approached, I heard her small gasp as she realized that the fear and nervousness was all worth it.

The overlook was empty, surrounded by thick trees, and completely hidden from the town. We stood on a small cliff side that looked down over the twinkling lights of small-town Texas, and Lorraine’s eyes were alight with wonder.

“I didn’t think—“ She stopped, inhaled gently as she stepped forward.

“Careful, that’s a far drop.” I reached out for her arm and tugged her back a bit, setting down her bag and coming to stand next to her. “That’s not even the best part,” I laughed. The sun was swallowed by the horizon, and above us, the sky had started to go dark, truly dark. Without the bothersome buzz of street lamps and town lights, the sky was left to illuminate the forest on its own.

“The stars,” she gasped, her head tilting up so far that I thought she might fall over if she didn't stop straining. My hand gently pressed against her lower back. She was too busy enjoying the stars to notice my hot gaze on the side of her face, taking in every moment of pure, unbridled wonder.

“They’re so bright,” she whispered to the sky.

“You’re always staring up at the sky through that telescope,” I said, like it mattered.

Lorraine was lost in the stars.

She stared there, frozen in place, as the rest of the sun disappeared, leaving the valley in darkness, and I just let her. I often came up here just to escape from my Dad screaming across the ranch, angry at the cows for being cows and the grass growing sideways. Sometimes I felt like that grass. It was exhausting, and most days, I needed to clear my head before ball games to even concentrate.

“You can see Eta Carinae from here,” she whispered, her eyes trailing to the sky. “It’s hard to see; for a long time, it wasn’t visible at all, but recently, it’s started to shine brighter in the sky, and soon you’ll be able to see it so clearly.”

“Where?” I asked her over her shoulder, and she lifted her hand, pushing on my chin until I was looking at what she could see. “That star?” I asked.

“It’s not just one star. It’s two; they’ve been unstable for years, and if all the information we have on her is correct, the two stars will eventually supernova together and die.”

“That’s sad,” I whispered, and she turned to look up at me, her face so close to mine.

“It’s not if they collide and supernova. They’ll be together forever. It’s romantic.”

I couldn’t think straight with her lips so close to mine, and I had never been in a position where the thought of kissing a girl made me nervous. I inhaled slowly, “you’ll have to explain to me how two stars dying is romantic, Mouse.”

She pressed her lips into a thin line, “don’t mock me.”

“I’m not,” I said so quietly that only she and the stars heard me. “Tell me.”

“It’s romantic because even the most unstable star found someone to share the sky with.”

We watched each other for the longest minute of my life, simple and soft, before her brows pulled in tightly, and she went back to being irritated by my presence.

“How are you supposed to do a paper in the dark?” She finally asked, and it pulled a genuine loud laugh from my chest. “I’m not doing homework on a Saturday.”

“Ryan,” she scolded.

“I had to get you away from that museum you call a mansion and into the fresh air.” I shrugged. “Lying was the only way you were going to trust me.”

“That’s contradicting.” Lorraine shook her head and stepped back from me.

“But God, was it worth it,” I said, staring at her framed in the soft purples of the darkening sky and the twinkling lights of the shining stars. I let out a tiny huff of air at her beauty, brighter than any of the stars in competition. I had walked down that street looking for a party and a drunken night but stumbled straight into love. Stupid as it sounded, I knew it was love because I had never felt that way about anything in my entire seventeen years of life. Not even about baseball. Lorraine Field was the only thing that mattered.

“I don’t understand you, Ryan Cody.” She scowled at me. “One moment you’re insufferable, loud, and annoying, and the next…”

“The next what?”

“You’re quiet and charming, it’s…”

“Contradicting?” I offered with a small smile.

“Extremely,” she said with a scrunch of her nose, and my hands flexed at my side, resisting the urge to smooth out the lines of her worried face. “Our relationship is a forced transaction, Ryan. I have to tutor you, and you have to pass English. I don’t know why you’re trying so hard to make something of that. I don’t need your attention even if you’re disguising it for friendship, and I don’t know what you’re trying to get at, but I’m not like those girls that fawn over you. I never will be.”

She watched me momentarily, waiting for me to argue with her, maybe? Or tell her everything she wanted to hear, maybe even spin some version of the truth she was digging for? But there weren’t any ulterior motives. There wasn’t a secret plan to get in her pants or embarrass her. There was just her and the incessant need to be around her.

“You don’t need the attention, but you deserve it, Rae,” I said with a slight nod.

“I don’t understand how you came to that conclusion,” she said.

“You could have told me to go away that day on your porch,” I said.

“I did,” she scoffed. “ Twice .”

“You could have meant it, but you didn’t. And you didn’t again when I came to you for help or when you fed me dinner…” I licked my bottom lip and stepped closer to her. “It’s okay to enjoy the company of others for something other than a transaction; you aren’t wasting time or potential when you stop to enjoy the stars.”

I could see the thoughts swirling behind her glassy blue eyes. Her life had been perfectly curated around her but never for her. She had a perfect house with a perfect little family, but deeper down, somewhere inside her, a girl needed fun and freedom.

Just like the boy in me needed kindness and structure, we fit together like a sharded piece of glass—or, instead, two unstable stars colliding.

“You are a very confusing boy, Ryan.”

“You’ll get used to it, Rae.”