Heart Bones

He doesn’t answer. Another question that’s off limits, I guess. “Okay, too private. I’ll think of an easier question.”

“No, I’m going to answer that one,” he says. “I’m just trying to figure out how.” He lowers himself until the water is level with his chin. I do the same. I like that all we can focus on right now are each other’s eyes. Although his aren’t very telling.

“I don’t trust easily.”

I wasn’t expecting that answer. I was expecting him to say he likes being single, or something equally stereotypical.

“Why? Did you get your heart broken?”

He presses his lips together while he ponders that question. “Yeah,” he says flatly. “Crushed me. Her name was Darya.”

The fact that he said her name out loud causes an unexpected, tiny sliver of jealousy to poke at me from the inside. I want to ask him what happened, but I don’t really want the answer.

“What’s it like?” I ask him.

“Having my heart broken?”

I nod.

He pushes a floating piece of seaweed away from us. “Have you never been in love?”

I laugh. “No. Not even close. I’ve never loved anyone, nor have I ever been loved by anyone.”

“Yes you have,” he says. “Family counts.”

I shake my head again, because even if family counted, my answer would remain the same. My father barely knows me. My mother wasn’t capable of loving me.

I look away from him and stare out at the open water. “I don’t have that kind of family,” I say quietly. “Not a lot of people have mothers like mine. I don’t even remember her hugging me. Not once.” I cut my eyes back to his. “Now that I think about it, I’m not even sure I’ve ever been hugged.”

“How is that possible?”

“I mean, I’ve hugged people as a greeting. A quick hello or a quick goodbye hug. But I’ve never been…I don’t know how to put it.”

“Held?”

I nod. “Yeah. That’s a better description, I guess. I’ve never been held by anyone. I don’t know what that’s like. I try to avoid it, actually. It seems like it would be weird.”

“I guess it depends on who’s holding you.”

My throat feels thick. I swallow and nod in agreement, but say nothing.

“It surprises me that you don’t think your father loves you. He seems like a nice guy.”

“He doesn’t know me. This is the first time I’ve seen him in since I was sixteen. I know more about you than I do about him.”

“That’s not very much.”

“Exactly,” I say, facing him full-on again.

Samson’s knee brushes high up on my inner thighs this time and I’m glad he can’t see anything from my chin down, because my body is covered in chills right now.

“I didn’t think there were many people in the world like me,” he says.

“You think we’re alike?” I want to laugh at that comparison, but there’s not an ounce of humor in his expression.

“I believe we have a lot more in common than you think we do, Beyah.”

“You think you’re as alone in this world as I am?”

He folds his lips together and nods his head, and it’s the most honest thing I’ve ever seen. I never would have thought someone so well off could have a life as shitty as mine, but I can see it in the way he’s looking at me. Everything about him suddenly seems familiar to me.

He’s right. We are alike, but only in the saddest ways.

My voice comes out in a whisper when I say, “When I first met you on that ferry, I could tell you were damaged.”

There’s a flicker of something in his eyes as he tilts his head to the right. “You think I’m damaged?”

“Yes.”

He moves even closer in the water, but there wasn’t much space left between us to begin with. It’s deliberate, and so much of me is touching so much of him now. “You’re right,” he says quietly, slipping a hand around the back of my left knee. “There’s nothing left of me but a fucking pile of debris.” He pulls me to him, wrapping both my legs around him. That’s all he does, though. He doesn’t try to kiss me. He just connects us together as if that’s enough while our arms keep us both afloat.

I’m swiftly succumbing to him. I don’t know in what way. All of them, maybe. Because right now, I need him to do something else. Anything else. Taste me. Touch me. Drag me under.

We watch each other for a moment and it’s almost like looking into a broken mirror. He leans in slowly, but not toward my mouth. He presses his lips against my shoulder, so gentle it feels like a graze.

I close my eyes and inhale.

I’ve never felt anything so sensual. So perfect.

One of his hands disappears under the water and finds my waist. When I open my eyes, his face is just a couple of inches from mine.