10. Baxter

CHAPTER 10

BAXTER

The summer before senior year…

"Ah! Stop it!" Tammy laughs, lifting her hands to cover her face as I push another wave of water at her.

As soon as I stop, she retaliates, and the water fight continues until we're both spluttering and wiping droplets out of our eyes.

"Okay, truce! Truce!" I call it, swimming over to her and lifting my hands so she knows I meant it.

She laughs, coughs up some more water, then jumps on my back. Her slippery legs wrap around my waist, and I try not to notice how hot her boobs feel squished against my back as I swim us to shore.

It's the perfect summer afternoon.

We have the swimming hole all to ourselves. The sun is shining, the sky cloudless, the breeze just cool enough to make the heat bearable. I couldn't have picked a better way to spend my last afternoon before I go visit my grandparents out of state.

I'll be gone for nine whole days.

I moaned and complained about spending my last week of the summer break that way, but Mom wouldn't let me get away with it.

"You can leave Tammy for one week!" She'd thrown her hands up and gotten all exasperated. "I told you she can come with us."

"Her parents won't let her." I'd frowned and gotten a sympathetic smile.

"You two can survive without hanging out. Knowing you, you'll be texting each other the whole time anyway. Or messaging or snapping or whatever it is you do."

I didn't try to correct her, still too caught up in being annoyed that my grandparents lived so far away.

"You'll see her the night before school goes back and then drive her in the next morning." After that, she cupped my cheeks and got all mushy. "My big boy, your last year of high school. I can't believe it."

I endured the attention, because I'm an only child, and I knew Mom needed to lavish me with all her motherly love. It also got me out of lunch with the Johnsons and meant I could spend the afternoon chilling with my favorite person.

"Where do you want to go, TT?" I ask over my shoulder.

"Over there." She points to a patch of grass just below the boulder we like to jump off.

I breaststroke until my feet hit the bottom, then keep her on my back. Water cascades off our bodies, the breeze making her legs ripple with goose bumps.

Placing her down, I plonk beside her when she takes a seat and stretches her body out. She's gotten taller, leaner, yet curvier in the last year. Her boobs have popped. It's impossible not to notice, and it takes maximum effort not to stare at them any chance I can get.

The blue bikini she's wearing is so not helping. I mean, she's definitely not as big as some of the girls in our grade, but those triangular bits of fabric are housing some pretty sweet melons. Or mangoes. That's what Heston called them at junior prom. I thumped him with the back of my hand and told him to stop being a dick.

"So fucking protective all the time," he grumbled, straightening his jacket and giving Tammy one more look before frowning at me. "It's not like she's your girlfriend."

But I wanted her to be.

Oh man, I've wanted that ever since I've been old enough to understand the concept.

Do you think I've found the courage to do anything about it, though?

I hate what a coward I am, but I can't risk losing Tammy. She's my best friend—my only real friend—and I'd be lost without her. I can't go making a move and screwing things up.

"Aw, man, I want this day to last forever." Tammy tips her face up to the sun.

I follow the line of her neck, rolling to my side and leaning on my elbow so I can pick grass blades and look at her.

She's stretched out like a swimwear model, and I snap a bunch of mental pictures that will no doubt keep me company in bed tonight.

I want to skim the pads of my fingers up her glistening leg, wipe the last of the water drops away, and then suck the end of my finger. Maybe then I'll know what she tastes like.

Would she freak out if I did that?

We touch each other all the time, but it's always just a friendly hug or playful tussle.

Although, this summer has been a bit more… I don't know… flirty?

Our hugs have lasted a beat longer than they used to. Our excuses to bump into each other or brush hands seem to be more frequent. Or am I just imagining it?

Sucking in a breath, I try to still my racing heartbeat.

"What time do you have to go?"

"Not sure." I shrug. "I don't even know what the time is… and I don't care."

She giggles, popping her eyes open and looking at me. "Doesn't it feel like we're the only two people on Earth right now?"

"Imagine if we were." I lie back, gazing up at the trees above us. The leaves are rustling in the wind. It's a gentle music—a lullaby that could rock me to sleep. The sun is a lazy drug heating my skin, but there's no way I'll fall asleep. Not with Tammy beside me in that blue bikini. Not with my pulse racing and my senses heightened to her softest breath and smallest movement.

"Well…" Tammy wriggles her butt down so she can lie next to me. "I guess we'd eventually have to find ourselves some food."

"I brought snacks," I murmur.

She laughs, nudging me with her hand. "Where's the fun in that? I think we should make ourselves a bow and arrow and go hunting."

"A bow and arrow?" I give her a skeptical frown. "Okay, let me just whip one of those up for you."

"Thanks." She giggles again. "And I'd like deer for dinner."

"You don't even like red meat." I snort and nudge her back. "I'd have to hunt this forest for some kind of chicken."

"Or we could go fishing."

"Or catch you a frog or lizard."

"Ew!" She sticks out her tongue. It's perfect and pink, and I want to suck it between my lips.

The image makes me flush. I dart my eyes away from her.

"I know they eat that stuff in France, but can you imagine how slimy and gross they are to prepare?"

"Fish can be slimy."

"That's why you'd be catching it, deboning it, and cooking it for me. I'm not touching raw fish."

"Oh, really? And what are you going to do?" I sit up on my elbow and mock-glare down at her. "Work me like some slave while you sit there getting a tan?" Without thinking, I rest my hand on her flat belly, then give it a very light slap.

She gasps, sitting up with a jerk and trying to slap me back. I laugh and catch her wrists, and so begins one of our standard wrestling matches.

She tries to knee me, so I roll over her, parting her legs so those lethal knees don't get me in the gonads. She wriggles beneath me with a little grunt and fights a giggle while I loosen my grip and let her push me back over. Before I know it, she's straddling me, and then I'm staring up at her body, my mouth hanging open when I notice that her bikini top has shifted and I can see her right nipple.

I should tell her, but won't that be awkward?

I swallow, wondering if she can feel me growing hard beneath her.

If she does, she doesn't say anything.

In fact, I don't know what the hell is going on right now, because she's still holding my wrists and giving me this weird look.

Breaths are punching out of both of us, like all we're capable of doing is breathing. Her brown eyes dart across my face, her eyebrows dipping together.

What? The word is on the tip of my tongue, but I can't seem to say it.

Because now her eyebrows are rising, her expression opening with a look I can't decipher. She's leaning closer to me, her wet hair brushing my chest as her mouth inches toward mine.

Closer.

And closer.

Her breath skims me, and I lose the ability to think.

Then my brain short-circuits completely when her soft lips brush over mine, then return with a delicate pressure that is…

I don't know what it is, but holy shit!

Tamara Tan is kissing me.

What do I do?

What do I?—

The question slips away as instincts take over and I tentatively part my lips.

The tip of my tongue skims out for a taste, and that's when I finally get to live out one of my longest running fantasies.

Her tongue greets mine in a tentative touch, her grip on my wrists tightening. Then she lets out this soft sound, her tongue thrusting forward with an energy that's easy to match. I shake my wrists loose and cup the back of her head, leaning into the kiss and, for the first time in my life, experiencing what it means to make out.

After all this time, I know what Tammy tastes like. I know what she feels like pressed against my body.

And I want more.