Washed Up (Bayside Heroes)

Everyone thinks we just love pumpkin spice everything, when really…

I bite the inside of my lower lip as my eyes trail down over his ass, cataloging every firm curve, but when he turns around, the bulge that appears in the same line of view makes me choke on my wine.

“You okay?” Greg asks as I fight to catch a breath, reaching for a napkin to wipe my chin with.

“Fine,” I manage, and before his hand can reach my back to soothe me, I wiggle away. “Going to find a movie.”

With that excuse, I duck out of the kitchen and into the safe zone of the living room, smacking myself in the forehead on the way.

“Son’s friend, Amanda,” I whisper-yell at myself. “He’s a kid.”

Except he’s not — not anymore.

That eighteen-year-old I stupidly kissed when I was thirty-one is now all grown up, tall and stout and manly. His boyish features are dead and gone, replaced with a chin covered in stubble, eyes that crinkle a bit at the edges when he smiles, a chest like a whiskey barrel, and abs no young man could achieve — complete with a dashing of hair, if I remember right from when he was sprawled under my sink.

No, he’s definitely not a boy anymore.

And I’m all too aware of that fact when he joins me in the living room with a bowl of popcorn littered with different kinds of chocolate candy, a crooked grin on his handsome face.

“What’d you land on?” he asks, plopping down beside me and tossing a small handful of popcorn in his mouth.

There’s plenty of room on the couch, but he sits right in the middle seat, his thigh touching mine as I do my best to keep my focus on the television screen and the remote in my hand.

“Well, while my personal choice would be Hocus Pocus, you said you wanted scary, so I went with the classic. Friday the 13th.”

“Jason. Nice,” he says, and then he kicks back on the couch like it’s no big deal, like he doesn’t look like he belongs on a Calvin Klein ad in Times Square, like his leg isn’t warming every centimeter where it touches mine.

“Why did you have this on your list anyway?” I ask. “A movie night. Seems kind of…”

He waits for me to finish, and when I grimace instead, he laughs. “Lame. It’s okay, you can say it.” He houses another handful of popcorn on a shrug. “I’ve watched movies, of course. But I’ve never made a night of it. I’ve never made plans with someone solely to sit and watch a movie together.” He frowns. “Probably because I can’t wrangle anyone else into watching documentaries with me.”

I wrinkle my nose. “Documentaries?”

“I love learning, and I especially love learning about something I never would otherwise.”

“Like?”

A shrug. “Space. The things that exist in the very depth of the ocean. Crypto currency. Serial killers.”

I laugh at that one. “Hey, that’s kind of Halloween-ish. We can pick one of those next.”

He balks. “You’d really watch one with me?”

“Sure. I like getting inside the mind of a twisted sonofabitch as much as the next person.” I shiver, settling back in the couch with my eyes on the screen. “As long as they stay far away from me.”

“I’d kill anyone who tried before they could so much as tap you on the shoulder.”

“You’d be the one in jail then.”

“Worth it.”

I smirk, pushing play and reaching over to turn out the only lamp on in the living room before sitting back, hugging the arm of the couch, and trying to put distance between us. With the way his body wash is mixing with his natural scent, I feel like the most dangerous thing in this living room isn’t Jason, but Greg.

We keep the movie volume low, mostly so we don’t wake Tucker, and partly because I hate how loud it gets during the jumpy parts. We chat and chomp on popcorn for most of the first half, and then slowly, we both grow quieter, letting the storyline pull us in.

I don’t even realize how relaxed I’ve become until Greg gets up to use the restroom, and the second he leaves, all his warmth goes with him.

I pause the movie and note every part of me that feels chilly in his absence, all the places I hadn’t realized we’d been touching.

My thigh, my knee, my arm, my hip…

I check on Tucker, smiling at the bit of drool he’s left on the sheet before I settle back in on the couch.

When Greg returns, he frowns at me. “You cold? You’ve got goosebumps.”

I glance down at where he’s staring, internally cursing at my traitorous arms.

“A little,” I confess.

Greg doesn’t hesitate. He grabs my largest, softest blanket folded over the wooden ladder by the TV, spreading it out over us when he sits back down.