Sam was different after Mason’s visit. Reserved. Sometimes our eyes would meet across the kitchen or when we were hanging out in the basement, and the air would crackle. But otherwise, it was like he had put a lid on his feelings for me, which was exactly what I’d asked for. But as it got closer to the end of summer, I realized it wasn’t what I wanted. I wanted to crack the lid open.
I broke up with Mason the last week of summer break in an awkward You’re a great guy! phone call. He was surprised but took it better than Delilah, who pouted about the end of our double dates before I reminded her she was planning to pause things with Patel for the school year.
Sam and I were sitting on his bed reading in our damp bathing suits the last day before I’d be heading back to the city with my parents. It was hot, and Charlie and Anita had annexed our usual basement hideaway. Sue had refused to put on the AC, so Sam closed his bedroom blinds and set up a fan to oscillate between us, he at the end of the bed, his back pressed to the wall, and me at the head facing him, knees drawn up toward my chest. He was studying a diagram in one of his anatomy textbooks while I was reading The Stand. Or I was trying to. I hadn’t managed to make it through a page in the past ten minutes. I couldn’t stop looking at Sam: the tan line around his ankles, the muscles of his calves, the bracelet around his wrist. I stretched my leg out to rest it on his thigh, and as soon as my foot made contact, he jolted.
“You okay, weirdo?” I asked. He eyed me and then sprung off the bed and dug through his dresser drawer.
“Do me a favor,” he said, throwing me his old Weezer T-shirt. I pulled it over my head while he sat down, his nose back in the textbook.
I prodded his leg with my toe and noticed an apple blush creeping into his cheeks. Getting a rise out of Sam was one of my top three favorite things to do, and it was a rare thrill these days. But something had punctured a hole in his calm reserve, and I wanted to rip it wide open with my teeth.
“And you’re kicking me because . . .” he said in a deep monotone, not looking up from the page, brows knit. I put both feet on his lap, feeling his whole body stiffen.
“That must be a fascinating book—you’ve been reading it all summer.”
“Mmm.”
“Really good plotline?”
“Riveting,” he deadpanned. “You know, I can usually count on you not to give me shit about studying.”
“No shit-giving here,” I swore, then dug my heel into his thigh. “Lots of sexy parts, huh?” He finally looked at me from the corner of his eye, shook his head, and then returned to the book.
“Actually,” I said, moving my feet off his lap and sitting up with my knees bent out in front of me, pressing my toes into his thigh, “the human body is pretty sexy. I mean, not the picture of that skinless man you’re looking at . . .”
“It’s a diagram of the muscular system, Percy,” he said, turning his face to me. “This”—he put one hand around the back of my leg—“is a calf muscle.” His voice was sarcastic, but it felt like someone had replaced the blood in my veins with caffeine. I wanted his hand on me. I wanted his hands on me.
He looked down at where he gripped my leg and back to me. His eyes were a question mark.
“Calf muscle?” I said. “Good to know . . . I’ll be sure to try to use it one day. I’ve heard of this thing called running.” I laughed, and he moved his hand away.
We sat with our books open for several minutes, neither of us turning a page. I felt the promise of something more between us slipping, to be tucked away like the old box of embroidery floss in my desk drawer. So I tried to hold on.
I pushed my toes under his thigh.
“Learn anything else from that book of yours?” I asked. His eyes snapped to mine. He nodded slowly.
“Want to enlighten me, genius?” I made my best attempt to sound playful, but my voice was shaky.
“Percy . . .” It took every ounce of confidence I had to not break eye contact.
“I guess I’ll just have to get some other future doctor to educate me,” I teased, and he blinked rapidly. And then I knew. I knew that this was his weak spot. He hated the idea of someone else touching me. When he moved his hand back to my calf, I wanted to scream in triumph.
He didn’t grip it this time. Instead, he ran his fingers back and forth over the muscle, shooting electricity through my body, every nerve ending sparking to life. Sam’s lips were set in a serious, straight line, his face a mask of concentration. We both watched his hand moving over my calf and then slowly down my leg. He grasped it at the bottom. He looked up at me with a grin.