Lily exits the door of the bed-and-breakfast wearing a strapless dress that’s white with an exotic black and blue pattern. The loose dress shows off her long legs and seems to move and shift with each step she takes.
She tells you she’s going to drive and you can barely catch your breath to say okay.
You’re not hungry but make it through dinner anyway.
Soon you find you’re laughing.
A lot.
Like the silly, stupid teenage boy that you are.
Some things shouldn’t be laughed at but you laugh anyway because you feel unlocked and unhinged. You feel unleashed like a tiger in the night.
You know you’re a pup but she makes you feel like a raging animal.
She laughs because she seems to be able to read your thoughts.
You’re a fool but that’s okay because you can’t help yourself.
She holds your hand and leads you through the rain.
The storms swell above and the thunder cracks and you take shelter under a small alcove and then you feel her cradle herself close to you and you forget the day or the time or your age.
All this.
Every little bit.
Where did that gloom go?
Where did that scary story drift off to?
Did the writer suddenly take happy pills?
Or did the skies open up and she came down like a beautiful flower? A flower named Lily.
Opening and freeing and beautiful and intoxicating.
A year older and a decade wiser.
That’s you and that’s how you feel.
And when the storms pass and streetlamps are on and the moments seem to inch by, she asks you what you want to do.
“I want to go home,” you tell her.
She just looks at you, serious and searching eyes. “You sure about that?”
You nod, but of course deep down you’re not sure. You’re not sure about anything anymore except this feeling deep down that never seems to go away.
“Okay, let’s go.”
You hold her hand as she drives in the darkness. And you don’t even notice the SUV in the driveway of the cabin until she mentions it.
And in one short gasp of breath, you realize that your night has changed.
That everything has changed.
That this risky business has suddenly been found out.
And that somewhere up in the cabin above you, with the lights already on inside, your father is waiting for you.