Bane was giggling like a kid eating the rest of her melted shave ice. She offered the last drops to me, but I let her drink them. Her lips were plump and red from the icy treat, her tongue equally red when she stuck it out.
I didn’t know why, but I wasn’t particularly interested in getting back to the group or even to the villa.
“You ready to go?” Bane asked, licking her lips. I wondered if they tasted sweet, if they tasted like cherry syrup and ube ice cream. If her tongue was cold like the ice she’d just consumed.
I cleared my throat. “Whenever you’re ready. Do you want to go to the villa or…a hospital? Although they’d probably wonder why you had time to stop for shave ice.”
“No one wonders that.”
“Hmm. Tell me where to go.”
“We have to pick up your friends anyway, right? They can’t all fit into the other car.”
“Sure they can.”
Bane twisted in her seat. “Why don’t you want to spend time with your friends?”
Could it be being surrounded by happy couples, including my ex? Seeing Sejal reminded me of how perfectly she fit into my family. And how crushed I was knowing that my parents still talked to her, called her, chatted with her about everything. Although she hadn’t gotten into details with them the way she had with her friends, I’d never felt so abandoned. All I’d heard for months from my parents was why not her? Why couldn’t I make it work? Why couldn’t I do better? Why had I ruined things?
It was never her fault. Always mine, and always mine to amend.
It made seeing my parents hard when all I wanted was for them to be happy.
The smart thing would be to say something. Tell my parents the truth and how things would never work out with her, how them bringing her up every conversation killed me a little each time. But therein lay the initial problem that had triggered Sejal. I didn’t speak. I let things float away because I couldn’t figure out how to express my emotions. But if I couldn’t chat freely with my own parents, then how could I do so with anyone else?
Speaking of which, I checked my phone out of habit. No updates on Papa.
“Why are you always on the phone?” Bane cut through my thoughts. “Can’t be work. They don’t call me.”
“You sound offended.”
“That you’re always on the phone or that work doesn’t call me?”
“Well, it’s you…so the latter.”
She shivered and for a second I panicked, thinking her heat exhaustion had returned, when she turned the vents toward me and crossed her arms.
“Are you cold now?”
“You’re not?”
I turned the AC down from full blast. “I was freezing, but you needed it.”
“Aw, you do care about me.”
“It’s more about how to dispose of your body in the case of your demise…”
She faced forward again. “Fine. Don’t tell me about the text slash call that you’re waiting for, or why you don’t want to be around your friends, or your breakup. I get it. We’re not friends.”
It wasn’t that. It was me. It really was; just ask Sejal.
I pulled out of the parking lot, remembering the two turns it took to get here along long stretches of highways, and returned to pick up half the group.
After Aamar and Maya slid into the back seat, since I was not allowing anyone to displace Bane, we headed to the monument.
“Are you feeling okay?” Maya asked, clearly worried.
“Yes, thank you. Much better,” Bane replied.
She explained heat exhaustion to them and how imperative it was to always carry water.
I pulled into one of many empty parking spots and touched the scorching dashboard. I looked at Bane and silently asked if she was okay to go out in this blistering heat with one rise of my brows.
She shook her head. “You go ahead. I’ll sit under a tree at Spencer Beach, right there.”
She cocked her chin at the bottom of the parking lot where it curved into a different parking lot leading to a small beach with plenty of shade.
“Are you sure?” Maya asked from the back seat. “We don’t want you to feel like we’re ditching you.”
Bane laughed. “No, it’s fine. I’ve been here plenty of times and I don’t want to slow you down or worry anyone. But it will be hot. I don’t remember there being any trees, so be careful.”
Aamar placed a hand on my shoulder, as if indicating it was understandable if I stayed with Bane. “Why don’t you park down there so Bhanu doesn’t have to walk?”
“I’m fine, really,” she began to say as I replied, “Was planning to.”
She watched me, her expression pleading with me to go with my friends. Instead, I told Aamar, “Text me when you’re ready to go and I’ll drive back over.”
“That’s okay. We should walk down to the beach. Didn’t realize one was so close.”
“I know!” Maya added. “Would be so nice to get into the water.”
“Maybe we can make this quick?”
She grinned at him. “They don’t need us, right?”
“Don’t forget your waters!” Bane called after them and then said to me, “I forgot I needed to use the restroom. Be right back!”
“Be careful!” I called after her, not wanting her to pass out in the heat between the car and the restrooms.
Aamar waved at me from the sidewalk as Maya walked with Bane to the restroom and back.
She plopped into her seat. “You guys act like I’m still in danger.”
“We don’t know.” I shrugged and found a spot in a shaded area closer to the ocean.
I followed Bane to the beach, letting her pick out an area. She sat down right on the sand, covered in shade, and a few feet from lapping water. The breeze, paired with the shade, was enough to stay comfortably cool. And isolated. The crowds had sectioned off into clusters of couples, families, or small groups.
“Are you going to sit? The ocean won’t snatch you from here.”
“Haha,” I replied dryly and sat beside her.
She removed her shoes and dug her feet into the sand, water lapping closer and closer to her feet.
“You’re fine now?”
She nodded. “So tell me about yourself, Mr. Sunshine.”
I groaned. “Why?”
She looked at me from over her shoulder. “We shared shave ice. We’re practically one being now.”
“Tell me more about your family.”
“Do you really want to know, or are you just wanting me to fill up time so you don’t have to talk about your family?”
“Both.”
“I’ll tell you something, and you tell me something?”
“No.”
She turned to the water. “Then may the ocean swells snatch you whole.”
“Oh my god.”
“And may you suffer in your watery tomb.”
“Fine. But just so you’re aware, you’re breaking the first rule.”
“What are my consequences?”
I looked skyward before replying, “Being bored.”
She grinned, moving windblown hair from her face. A wave hit farther up her leg than before and she yelped. “My shoe!”
I jumped to my feet and stomped into the shoreline, grabbing it before the current snatched it away. Water was frighteningly powerful. In another second, her shoe would’ve been gone. Imagine if that were a pet or a child! This was why I didn’t mess with the ocean.
I jogged back, thumping her shoe in the air to get the water out, and sat in front of her. She’d moved away from the water’s reach, her cheeks flushed in anticipation of her nearly lost shoe…or from the sun.
“I thought you put on sunscreen?”
“Is my face red?” Bane gently touched her cheeks, frowning. “I better not peel.”
“Beautiful imagery.”
She stuck out a red-stained tongue. I bet it still tasted like cherry syrup.
“Careful with that tongue.”
She pushed my hip with a foot. “Or what?”
“Or put it to use.”
We both stilled with nothing but a stare in between us. Her cheeks flushed redder than before and mine grew hot. Hmm. Shit. That was definitely not something I’d meant to say aloud, and now all I could think about was what the hell her tongue tasted like. Cherries. Cherry like the color of her plump lips, like the sweet flavored shave ice. And ube. A potato dessert. Why? Because I was beginning to like something that I’d never thought I’d like.
“You’re so full of it. Can’t even think of a better comeback,” she snickered, breaking the tension.
“Like you have one?” I watched the waves.
“Yeah. Watch it. Or I’ll put it to use. Ha!”
I looked Bane right in the eye, cocked a brow, and asked, “How would you like me to put my tongue to use?”
Her mouth hung open. A strangled stutter.
I smirked. “Checkmate.”
Except now my entire thinking capabilities were drowning in images of using my tongue on her. How would Bane like me to put it to use? Kisses? Licks? A lot of licks? On her mouth? Her neck? Her chest? Her stomach? Lower?
No. Oh, hell no. Brain, get your act together. We are not going there. Not with Bane.
“Think you’re so smart,” she muttered, pushing her foot against my hip again.
I grabbed her foot and swiped my thumb across the arch. “You better watch it.”
I glanced back at Bane when she didn’t respond. She was biting her lower lip and staring at the water, her fists clenched around the sand. I immediately released her foot. “Sorry.”
“What?” She stared at me, almost stunned.
“Your foot. Didn’t mean to touch you…”
Her eyes were dazed, her chest heaving with a pant. “Oh…no. That’s…fine.”
Hold on. Was she blushing? No, couldn’t be. Logically, the sun was causing that rosy glow. Therefore, as deductive reasoning would conclude, Bane was simply sunburned.
Bane was not turned on.