Bright Midnight

He’s watching me, grinning lazily, and takes a swig from the bottle of rum. Hands it to me. “Finish it off.”

I down it, trying not to cough it up, and lick my lips.

He mutters something in Norwegian, a glazed look coming over his eyes. He puts his hands into my hair, to the back of my head, and pulls me to him.

“Ever had sex in a pool?” he asks huskily.

My skin tingles from the question. I shake my head. “You know I’ve only slept with you.”

He grins and kisses me softly on the lips. “Just checking.” He nods at the fence. “Come on.”

He starts to climb and I follow suit. I’ve never scaled a giant chain-link fence before and it’s kind of scary. The wires are freezing and burn into the balls of my feet, the bottoms of my fingers. But I go up and up and up, fueled by my love for him and desperate for his affection.

The fact is, we haven’t had sex once in the last month. We’ve barely seen each other. He’s become so withdrawn and moody, drunk more often than not, even in class. He got suspended last week for smoking and then mouthing off to the teacher who caught him. I have no idea what he was doing while gone from school, and he only came back today, slipping into my chemistry class like a ghost.

I feel like I don’t really know him anymore and I’m growing more and more paranoid that I’m not good enough for him, that he doesn’t love me anymore, that there’s something—someone—else.

I don’t want to think about my doubts. I want to believe in his love for me, even if he hasn’t said it lately. Anders is the best thing that ever happened to me, the only thing in my life that keeps me going through the days. He’s the only one that makes me feel wanted, that makes me feel needed. With my mom coming back only for Christmas and then jetting back to India, choosing dad over me and Hannah again, Anders is the only constant in my life. He’s my north star, my Nordic star.

So that passion fuels my climb and, before I know it, I’m climbing over the top and down the other side.

“That’s my sparrow,” he says to me, grabbing me by the waist and lifting me in the air.

I giggle, thrilled at his touch, his embrace. I feel in this moment, under the stars, among the electricity of his heart and mine, that all is well. I’m whole and happy again. It’s the old Anders, before we started fighting, before I started crying at night, afraid for our future together.

I love you, I want to say to him. I want to yell it. But he always insisted that it was his words to give me and not the other way around, and he gets so weird when I say it.

So I keep it inside and do what I can to make sure he feels it, knows it. He’s the only boy for me. Now and forever.

“Ladies first,” he says, after he puts me back down, gesturing to the water that glows faintly under the lone light of the closed community center.

“Yeah right,” I tell him, smacking him on the arm. “You know they turn the heat down at night.”

“Well, why don’t you go check,” he says.

I give him a suspicious look and he raises his palm.

“I promise I won’t push you,” he says.

So I take his word for it. I walk over to the edge, the concrete rough on my feet and peer over at the water, light wafts of steam rising from it. It can’t be that cold then, can it?

Before I can even register it, Anders is moving, running toward me. He grabs my hand and leaps into the air, pulling me with him.

For a moment I’m weightless. It’s horrible and freeing at the same time. If I was a sparrow I would keep flying, but I fall, holding onto Anders until the water cuts into us.

I sink, open my mouth to scream and nearly swallow a bucket of cold chlorine. When my head breaks the surface, I’m gasping. The water is a lot warmer than the air, but it’s still a shock to my system.

I paddle frantically, trying to get oriented, and glare at Anders.

“You asshole, you promised!” I yell, spitting out water.

“I promised I wouldn’t push you,” he says, swimming toward me, his long hair back from his forehead. He looks sexy as fuck, even though I hate him at the moment. “I pulled you in, that’s different.”

“You’re an ass,” I tell him again.

“And you’re gorgeous when you’re wet.” He wags his eyebrows and wraps his arms around my waist, his skin sliding like silk against mine.

He swims forward until my back is against the edge of the pool, then one hand is disappearing down my bikini bottoms and his mouth is on mine, tasting like chemicals and rum. His tongue is hot but I’m still so mad at him, and at the same time my body is responding like I’m being brought back to life. I’m hungry, insatiable, for every part of him. For him to just be mine again, every inch, body and soul.