These Thorn Kisses (St. Mary’s Rebels 3)

He lets a second pass in silence before he asks, “What color is it? A wallflower.”

“Oh. Uh, blue. And purple and pink and red. Orange.” Then, “Oh, and yellow.”

The color I wore the night I met him.

“Yellow,” he murmurs, staring into my eyes.

“Yes,” I whisper, staring back, willing him to remember.

For a second it looks like he does, when things flicker across his gaze, but then he breaks the connection, takes another step back before commanding, “Just wear the fucking hoodie.”

I do.

I wear his hoodie that drowns me, that goes even more against my plans of moving on, but I don’t care.

I don’t care at all, because I smell him.

For the first time ever.

He’s always been at a distance from me, at arm’s length, and so this is the first time I get to discover his scent.

He smells of spices. Warm and wintery. And of something sweet.

Something like roses.

I realize then that this is what thorns must smell like: edgy and biting but with a hint of sweet flowers.

Despite my resolve and good judgement, I think about this all day and all night.

I think about this the next day too while I’m in the library during my free period. I’m trying to get a book on French Impressionism and I almost have it.

It’s high up on the shelf and I’ve stretched myself enough that my fingers are almost touching it.

Almost.

Until someone else reaches up and snatches the book off the shelf.

I drop back down to the floor and spin around.

And there he is.

My thorn. Just something I’ve gotten to call him now that I know what his name is.

The color of his t-shirt today is unusual, the darkest color of all, black, and somehow it makes everything on him even more vivid — his tanned skin, the navy blue of his eyes, even the dirty blond of his hair — and with the winter sun streaming through the large windows behind me, he looks like a painting.

He’s got my book in his hand and he glances down at it for a second before looking up at me. And like yesterday when he surprised me on the soccer field, I say, “Hi.”

And again like yesterday, he doesn’t greet me back.

Although his words don’t carry the same venom as he murmurs, “Another book.”

“Yes.” I smooth my hands down my skirt. “It’s on French Impressionism. The origin, the early years.” Then, “It’s a nineteenth-century art movement. The name Impressionism is derived from Claude Monet’s painting, Impression, Soleil Levant. It means sunrise. In French. It was super radical at the time. Started by a handful of artists in Paris. And obviously people didn’t like that. They didn’t like that a group of people were violating the typical rules of art at the time and coming up with something new. So yeah.” I nod. “Anyway, it’s very interesting. You know, for a little light reading.”

He glances down at the book again — a black hardcover with the title written in gold — before coming back up. “Light reading.”

“Before bed.”

Something passes through his features, making them look even more beautiful and slightly… soft. Especially with the light playing over them as he asks, “What about a ladder?”

“What?”

“Is there something about that, in this?” He offers me the book then. “The thing that you should use while grabbing a book from high up on the bookshelf. Because you can’t reach it. Because you’re short as fuck.”

I grab the book from his hand and, like the hoodie from yesterday, I hug it to my chest. “I’m not short as fuck.” Danger flashes through his eyes at my fuck because for some reason he’s obsessed with correcting my language. I narrow mine in response as I continue, “I’m five foot four.”

He flicks his eyes up and down my body.

I’m afraid to say that I look the same as I always do: messy clothes and messier braid. But I don’t feel as self-conscious about it as I did the first time in his office.

Maybe because when he finishes and looks into my eyes, his are even darker and prettier. “If you say so.”

I raise my chin. “I’m also eighteen.” He frowns and I explain, “Years old.”

“Random,” he murmurs. “But okay.”

“Now it’s your turn,” I say, waving a hand at him.

“My turn for what?”

“To tell me things. Your height for example. And how old are you?”

I’m not sure why I asked him these things, especially his age.

When I really know now. I know that he’s thirty-three. I know that he’s the tallest of all his brothers at six foot four.

But I think this is our thing.

Even if he doesn’t know it. Or remember it.

“Older,” he replies.

“How much older?”

I expect him to come back with something evasive or distracting because that’s his thing. For some reason.

But this time he bores his eyes into mine and replies, “I’m much closer to your dad in age than I am to you.” Then, “Have a good day, Bronwyn.”