After breakfast, we walked aimlessly through town. The entire town was barely five miles from one end to the other, surrounded on three sides by mountains almost always visible above the tops of the buildings. Most of the businesses were in the center of town, with a few exceptions. Houses surrounded that. The larger homes sat along the winding roads in the hills that led up toward the mountains, looking down on everyone else, much like many of their occupants. Our trailer park was on the outskirts of everything on the seldom used old highway road with only the desert beyond us. Best to keep the poor people on the periphery, I suppose.
We'd reached the historic section of town where brick roads replaced asphalt. Trees lined the narrow lane, dotted with wooden benches and iron lampposts. If someone wanted to make a postcard for our townâGod only knows why anyone would want thatâthis would be the picture on the cover.
I pointed out where to get the best of everything to Elian as we passed each building. "That place has amazing ice cream." I nodded to Olde Sam's Sweet Shop beneath the red and white striped awning. "It's all homemade."
"Since 1933," Elian recited, reading off the sign. "Must be good to have stuck around so long."
"I'd ask if you want to get a cone, but you made your opinion on dessert in the morning quite clear."
Elian rolled his eyes. "I don't think it's that weird to not want that much sugar at ten o'clock in the morning."
"I'm just messing with you." I gave him a pat on the back. I wished I could just leave my hand there. Or, better yet, put my arm around him, to hold him close as we strolled down these streets that I'd traveled alone for so long.
Despite the sidewalks being wide, he and I walked so close that our arms and hands and shoulders kept brushing together. I realized my shoulders were higher than his. I'm not sure how I hadn't noticed that he was shorter than me. Only by a couple inches, but somehow I'd imagined him as the taller of us. Maybe that was my mind building him up to make him more mythic.
I studied his profile as he told a story about eating six Eggo waffles before school when he was ten. "I literally spilled my guts all over my teacher."
I burst out laughing. "Seriously?"
Elian sounded defensive when he said, "She didn't believe me when I told her I felt sick. I asked if I could go to the nurse. I even asked if I could just go to the bathroom, but she wouldn't let me. She thought I was faking it to get out of a spelling test. I still feel bad sometimes when I remember that."
"You shouldn't. It was her own fault." I said. "I always hated teachers who don't listen to kids. Or the ones who act like going to the bathroom is some kind of privilege. Like, bitch, it's a biological function that I can't control."
He didn't laugh, but I could tell he wanted to. "Well, anyway, I haven't been able to stomach the idea of eating sweet food for breakfast ever since."
"See, that I get. I had a similar experience with broccoli." I shuddered just thinking about it. "One time, my neighbor was babysitting me and wouldn't let me leave the table until I ate every bit of my broccoli, but I was already full, so the more I ate the worse it tasted. I mean, I didn't achieve the same level of epic-ness as you by barfing on her, but I can't even smell broccoli anymore without wanting to vomit."
"I'll have to remember that. No eating broccoli around Steven."
"I mean, you could eat raw broccoli. It's just that sulfuric stench of cooked broccoli. Blech." I stuck my tongue out.
Elian's laugh gave me butterflies. It was so warm and genuine. "Noted. I'll keep that in mind for when we have dinner together." He said that so casually, as if it was a foregone conclusion.
I stopped in my tracks. It took him a few steps before he noticed. He turned to me with a puzzled expression. "What?"
I stared at him. "Are we having dinner together?"
"Oh." He reached up to rub his neck. "I was going to ask you out again. If that's something you'd be interested in."
"Ask me out... again? Does that mean this is a date?" I circled my finger in the air between us.
Elian shrugged, nonchalant, oblivious to the fact that he had just thrown me for a loop. "I was kind of thinking of it as one. We've basically done everything you do on a first date."
A first date? My first date! I could deal with that.
But there was one thing we had yet to do that happened on every first date I'd ever seen in a movie or on TV.
He must've had the same thought as me, because he said, "The only thing we haven't done is kiss."
I gulped, suddenly terrified under his gaze, those lovely hazel eyes watching me intently. "We haven't even held hands yet." I don't know why that came out. It was dumb. Holding hands seemed like a benchmark for a teenage relationship. We weren't teenagers.
His lips stretched into a small smile. "We can hold hands if you want." He raised his hand between us.
I stared at his delicate hand. Such long, slender fingers. There was a jagged pink line on the heel of his palm that didn't look like the other crease lines. Maybe a scar.
It seemed like a long time passed. In reality, it was probably only a few seconds.
Before he could change his mind, my hand shot out and grabbed his.
Elian laughed. "It's gonna be kinda difficult to walk with our hands like this." He looked down.
I followed his gaze, only to realize I'd grabbed his right hand with my right hand. Maybe because it was my dominant hand. Maybe because I was used to shaking a man's hand when he offered it to me, rather than holding it.
I jerked my hand back, mortified by my blunder. I was such a bumbling disaster around him.
To his credit, Elian didn't recoil from my stupid ass and run the other way, as I suspected many would. Instead, he took hold of my left hand, lacing our fingers together.
Elian watched me, wariness in his eyes. "Steven, I want to ask you something... but I don't want to offend you."
I couldn't feel any worse about myself than I already did, so I said, "Shoot."
"Have you ever had a relationship with a guy before? Like any kindâeven just a casual one."
I turned my eyes down to the ground, staring at weeds that grew up through a crack in the sidewalk. I tried to pull my hand away, but he gripped it tighter.
"I'm not judging," he quickly added. "Just trying to understand you better."
I licked my lips and sighed before glancing up to meet his eyes. I shook my head. "It's so embarrassing."
"No, Steven." He stepped closer, giving my hand a small squeeze. "Everyone goes at their own pace. Just because one is faster than another doesn't make it better. Or more correct."
"It's not for lack of wanting. Believe me! I've just never had the option. The only out gay guys I know even close to my age have been dating since before I met them in high school."
"Well, I'm twenty-one, and I've only had one serious boyfriend. Some of my friends who are my ageâor youngerâhave had two or three. Or more."
I stared at him with narrowed eyes, skeptical. "I feel like you're lying to save my feelings."
His face became quite serious. "Something you should know about me: I don't like lying. I did enough of that when I was younger. Especially to myself. I try not to if I can help it."
I nodded. "I respect that."
"Thank you."
We both startled at the sound of my alarm. I took out my phone to end the horrible screeching bird sounds I'd downloaded as this week's ear splitting horror. I changed my alarm tone every week so I couldn't get used to the sound and sleep through it, as I used to do in school.
"It's time for me to go to work."
His face turned melancholic, a slight frown turning down one side of his mouth. "All good things must come to an end."
I smiled, glad he thought this was a good thing. I certainly did.
When I tried to disentangle my hand from his, he laid his other hand on top of mine to stop me. "Hey, how would you feel about a goodnight kissâor I guess a good afternoon kiss?"
"I've neverâ" I couldn't bring myself to say the humiliating truth. That I was a twenty-year-old who'd never been kissed (sort of).
"What? Kissed a guy?" He didn't sound shocked. And I'm not sure how I felt about that.
Words suddenly came tumbling out of my mouth in a deluge that wouldn't stop: "I've only had one kiss in my entire life. I was like five-years-old. She was my neighbor, and she always invited me over to play Barbies. One day we were watching a movie, and they kissed, and she wanted to try it. So, I let her."
I didn't think he needed to know all that, but there it was.
"That's adorable."
"It's pathetic and sad."
"It's not." Elian reached up and brushed away the hair that had fallen across my forehead. "We don't have to do anything you aren't comfortable with."
I somehow found the courage to place my hand on his waist. "I want to. I just thought I should mention it. In case I'm terrible."
"We can keep it simple." He moved closer, cupping his hand on my face as he slowly leaned in. I closed my eyes (because that's what everyone does in the movies). His lips met mine. Barely a whisper of a touch, only lasting for a few seconds.
After he pulled away, I opened my eyes to see him smiling at me. His hazel eyes glowed with golden flecks from the sunlight. "How was that?"
"Good." I nodded. "Yeah."
I wanted to kiss him again. To find out the true depths of passion a kiss could achieve. I wanted to reenact my dream from last night. But, for now, this was enough.
"I'll see you later," I said.
He nodded and rubbed a hand down my arm. "So long, Steven."
As I walked away, holding my fingers to my freshly kissed lips, it occurred to me that Elian said my name a lot. He must have said it twenty or thirty times in the last few hours. I'll admit, I liked the way he said it, always with a hint of a smile, like he savored it.