The Naked Fisherman (Fisherman 1)

“Sure.” He stood and tossed the folder back onto the pile on the floor. “Well, I’m out of here. I’ll catch you later.”

It killed me, as in physical pain clawing at my chest, to not say more to him.

Where was he?

Did he sleep with her?

If so, why?

Was it his MO to sleep with women on first dates?

Was he planning on seeing her—having sex with her—again?

So many crazy, irrational, and completely inappropriate questions chased each other in my head. But all I could do was smile like a sane person, like the adult teenager I was, even if a streak of insanity buzzed just beneath the surface.

Over the next week, Fisher tortured me by mowing the lawn without a shirt, eyeing me way too long in all the wrong places, and dropping slightly crude remarks at every chance. Then he’d buy me coffee and treat me like an equal for two seconds before the torture started all over again. I looked forward to every morning, even if all we did was banter and sling questionably appropriate comments at each other. (He was such a bad influence). And I liked the evenings when I’d take a walk only to return to him washing something in the driveway or watering plants—sans a shirt.

The wandering eyes.

The cocky smiles.

The slow wetting and rubbing of his lips together.

It felt like a game of cat and mouse, but I wasn’t always sure who was the cat and who was the mouse.

The evenings I didn’t like were the ones when he was gone … the nights I assumed he was with the orthodontist. Every cell in my eighteen-year-old brain hyper-focused on my new crush in bed with another woman. Despite its extreme irrationality, it sucked.

And it sucked the most at my first party. Well, my first adult party at Hailey’s house on Friday night. There must have been fifty people there, and she called it a small gathering. A lot of the guys from work showed up, some with wives, girlfriends, and even a few with boyfriends. That made me a little uneasy, and I hated that it made me uneasy. Fisher’s words replayed in my head. Now you can fucking think for yourself.

That was hard for me. All my beliefs seemed to be interwoven with scripture, parental lectures, or sermons.

“Hey, you came.” Jason playfully elbowed me before taking a swig of beer as we stood on the deck overlooking the backyard cluttered with people, yard games, kegs, and loud music.

“Hey, yeah. Good to see you again.”

He wore cleaner jeans and a crisp white tee hugging his monstrous chest and arms covered in tattoos. “How’s the hand?”

I laughed a little, holding up my hand with the tiny Band-aid. “Fine. Clumsy me.”

“Drink?” He held his beer bottle toward me.

More shared germs? Did I want to swap saliva with Jason?

“Bossman!” Hailey hollered from the backyard.

I glanced over the railing to Fisher … and his date. Hailey handed both of them red plastic cups of beer. Dr. Smile was a petite blonde with normal sized arms and legs—and of course perfect teeth. Mine were fairly perfect, but a few lower teeth had shifted after I stopped wearing my retainer. And she was at least a solid C-cup.

“Where did you get the bottled beer?” I asked Jason, feeling out of sorts with my emotions. I shouldn’t have hopped on the back of Fisher’s bike. That trip to the mountains messed with me.

“I brought my own beer. Don’t care much for keg piss.”

Staring at the amber bottle in his hand, I battled wrong and right in my head. Then I gave Fisher and his date another quick glance. She slid her hand around his waist.

“Maybe just a sip.” I took the bottle from Jason’s hand and brought it to my lips taking a whiff. It smelled like beer. I had no idea if beers had different aromas like wine. Taking a hesitant sip, I let the slow mingling of carbonation and alcohol coat my mouth. It didn’t burn like I’d imagined. Maybe that was just hard liquor. It didn’t exactly taste great either.

“Let’s head down,” Jason said as he nodded toward the stairs.

I held the bottle out to him.

“Keep it. I’ll get another from my cooler.”

“I don’t need it.”

He chuckled, descending the stairs. “Nobody does, but it’s a party, Reese.”

My grip on the bottleneck tightened as I followed him down the stairs. Most of the other women were wearing nicer sun dresses or sexy shorts and cute sandals. I wore shorts that nearly hit my knees and a T-shirt that I was pretty sure was a unisex shirt with a big smiley face on it.

Minimal makeup.

No nail polish.

And my hair looked like I’d done nothing more than comb it and let it air dry after a shower … because that’s what I did.

Straight brown hair doing nothing special. No body. No highlights. No funky pink streaks. Could I have been more basic?