Perfect Couple (Superlatives 2)

At least, that’s what had happened in practice, and that’s what sports reporters had been so excited about when they hyped the season. But the article went on to say that Brody had lost his mojo. During the game, he’d gotten rid of the ball as fast as he could, like an inexperienced quarterback running scared.

No wonder he and Noah had seemed so down after the game.

I couldn’t imagine what had gone wrong.

Strangely, that one negative article about a guy I hardly knew threatened to ruin my whole holiday. That and Kennedy giving me the cold shoulder, and Mom’s comment on my outfit. But once I’d passed the second batch of rolls around the table, shouldered the strap of my camera bag, and escaped from the B & B, my mood improved. Just around the corner, the town square had been blocked off to traffic. The sidewalks teemed with laughing people of all ages. They watched down the street for the first finishers of the 5K race.

I ducked under the retaining rope—not over, which would have been awkward in my tight skirt—and walked into the middle of the street, a few yards in front of the finish line. Mom had made me doubt the wisdom of what I was wearing. I guessed her opinion bothered me so much because I was afraid she was right. I was sweating already underneath my waistband and my bra. But dressing this way made me feel as beautiful as Lois Lane and as talented behind my camera as Jimmy Olsen, but with the strength of Superman. I had no identifying badge that said I belonged on the participants’ side of the ropes, but nobody challenged me. I looked like I meant business.

Down the street, the crowd noise swelled and moved in my direction as the first finishers ran closer. I brought up my camera and prepared to focus. My goal was to snap at least one clear picture of every runner. I would use the runners’ numbers pinned to their shirts to label the photos for purchase on my website. But that was a tall order: nearly perfect photos of hundreds of people in the space of a few minutes. I took a deep, calming breath.

The crowd noise spiked as the leaders of the race came around the corner and entered the town square. The thirty front-runners were experienced athletes, led by the owner of the running-shoe store who’d sponsored the race and arranged for me to photograph it. I needed a perfect picture of him, at least. I focused as well as I could and set the continuous feed to snap a number of frames in quick succession. As soon as the runners had passed, another wave bore down on me. I kept up as best I could, heart hammering in my chest.

And then, oh. There, centered in my viewfinder, was Brody.

4

TINGLES OF EXCITEMENT SPREAD DOWN my neck and across my chest before I even consciously understood I’d recognized Brody. And I hadn’t recognized his face. He was still too far away, even through my zoom lens. I recognized his running stride. I’d been looking out the window of English class, watching him run wind sprints for football practice in the parking lot, way too often in the past two weeks.

Remembering what I was standing in the road for, I opened the shutter and snapped a picture of him shoving the guy jogging next to him, who laughed and shoved Brody right back. It was Tia’s boyfriend, Will, I realized as they came closer. I snapped photos of every runner I could see clearly, then focused on Brody through my viewfinder again.

His sun-streaked brown hair, long enough to fall into his eyes, was held back with the same sort of headband he used on the football field. I watched the defined muscles in his legs move as he sprinted toward me at top speed. He wore red gym shorts and no shirt, showing off his six-pack abs. Strong as he looked, I was surprised at how thin he was compared with his apparent mass when he wore a football uniform and pads. After the newspaper’s hype, I’d expected him to be more muscle-bound. Maybe all athletic high school boys looked like this, and they bulked up in college.

The number 300 was printed across his chest in marker—which meant he’d been the last runner to register, because that was the total number I’d been told to expect. But the 3 had smeared into more of an 8 during his shoving match with Will. The two of them galloped toward the finish, gaining speed, cackling as one and then the other got a long arm in front of the other’s body.

Suddenly another runner broke from the pack behind them—Noah. His shirt was off too, and his body gleamed in the sunlight as he found an even faster gear and tore past them. Though they were still down the street from me and I was seeing all this through my telephoto lens, I could hear Brody’s and Will’s moans of dismay at being beaten.

And watching them, something happened to me.

I’d never thought of guys in the same way other girls seemed to. Kaye was devoted to Aidan, but we occasionally caught her following another guy with her eyes. She would let slip a remark about his fine ass that made clear she wasn’t about to cheat on her boyfriend but she did appreciate the male physique. Tia offered a constant stream of the same kind of commentary. She was a sexual being and not the least ashamed. I admired her for this, though I didn’t tell her. She certainly didn’t need any encouragement. In comparison, I didn’t consider myself sexual. I wasn’t gay, I wasn’t bi, I was just disconnected from the entire scene.

So out of it, in fact, that I was gay guys’ go-to girl when they weren’t ready to come out and wanted to put their friends off their trail a little longer. They figured I wouldn’t mind too much because I wasn’t that interested in the opposite sex anyway.

Until now. Maybe it was because I’d thought about Brody constantly and planned what I would say to him when I told him we needed to take our Superlatives photo. But I didn’t think so. The pure sight of his beautiful body, shining with sunscreen and sweat in the morning sun, running toward me, made me realize I was a part of this scene after all.