Enemies With Benefits (Loveless Brothers 1)

“Such as?”

“Such as people thinking I’ve got a Harpo Marx fetish.”

I find the camera on my phone and open it.

“Which one was he, and what are you doing?” she asks. She pulls me closer.

Times like this I don’t know what to make of Violet, of the way she tells me one thing with her mouth and something else with her body. I don’t know what to make of the fact that everyone knows what we’re doing, that we’re together in some kind of way, and she wouldn’t kiss me in public.

I want that. I want her to kiss me in front of people, admit what we are, whatever that is.

I didn’t even know I wanted that until she wouldn’t do it.

“He was the boring one, and I’m taking a selfie,” I say. I reverse the camera, but it’s so dark that there’s nothing more than vague shapes on the screen.

“I’ve never seen a Marx Brothers movie,” she says.

I snap a picture, but it’s nothing.

“You need the flash,” Violet points out like I don’t know.

“My dad loved the Marx Brothers,” I say, flipping my phone around. “A Night at the Opera was his favorite movie.”

Violet draws an arm across her breasts, but she doesn’t move.

“Not Duck Soup?”

“You’ve seen it?”

I hit the button. The flash goes off, and Violet turns her head into my chest.

“Ow. No, I’ve just heard of it. Why are you taking selfies?”

I take another one. I’m sure they’re terrible — dark, shaky, my thumb probably in the frame somewhere — but I don’t really care. I just want to document this moment, because I have a feeling that someday I’ll want proof that it happened.

“I need a new profile picture on Facebook,” I tell her.

“Not funny,” she says.

“Everyone already knows,” I point out, taking another one.

“I don’t have anything worth blackmailing me for,” she says.

Snap. Snap. Snap.

“Kiss me,” I say.

Her face turns upward. I can barely see the outline of it, flash-blind.

“Don’t argue about it, just kiss me,” I say.

She does. I take a picture. I take five, and then I put my phone down and just kiss her back.

It’s good. It’s nice. It’s better than nice; it’s a thousand things that I don’t want to admit to myself. It’s enough to make me wish that I was someone else, or that she was. It’s enough to make me wish this could actually work.

I kiss her long and slow. I kiss her like we’re in love. She kisses back the same way, her hand soft against my face, her lips gentle.

The kiss ends. I press our faces together, say nothing. I’m trying to formulate a thought into words, something like what if this was really what it feels like it could be, but it’s not working.

“I don’t want to leave,” she murmurs.

“Any reason we can’t sleep here?” I ask.

“About a thousand,” she says. She traces one finger along my collarbone, my whole attention suddenly focused on that singular point of contact.

“You’re coming over, right?” she says.

“That wasn’t enough?” I tease, and Violet laughs.

“Just come over,” she says. “I need someone to make me breakfast in the morning.”

I kiss her hair one more time, my arms back around her.

“Sure,” I say. “I’ve got two skills, may as well —”

I stop. I listen. There’s a wail in the distance, rising and falling. Getting louder. Violet tenses.

They’re sirens, getting closer.

“Shit,” I whisper.* * *The good thing about the pandemonium is that no one sees us leave the barn together.

The bad thing is everything else. When we come out there’s already a fire truck in the parking lot by the Lodge, a herd of people milling and running around, everyone looking slightly worried and unsure.

“Is there a fire?” Violet breathes.

“How am I supposed to know?” I ask her. “There’s a fire truck.”

We start walking toward the Lodge. Despite the truck, it doesn’t look like anything’s on fire.

“Sometimes they just send whatever first responder they’ve got,” she says, walking faster. “A lot of times that’s the fire department.”

“If you know everything about this, why’d you ask me if there’s a fire?”

There’s another siren in the distance. We walk faster toward the Lodge, where it doesn’t look like there’s a fire and no one is acting like anything’s on fire.

An ambulance winds its way up the driveway. The sirens are turned off, but the lights keep flashing as it pulls up near the fire truck. People are standing around in swimsuits and towels, dripping wet in the warm night.

“Oh no,” Violet whispers, and breaks into a jog.

There’s a heavy, sickly feeling in the pit of my stomach as I follow her. We skirt the parking lot. Paramedics jump out of the ambulance, head toward the pool area.

“It wasn’t even supposed to be open,” Violet says, slowing to a walk. “It was locked, we didn’t have a lifeguard on duty or anything, and with all these kids around there’s so much liability…”