As grateful as Zach was that Seth was trying to adopt him into his friend group — despite Zach’s general reluctance to be part of any group — the invitation lighting up his phone made him uneasy.
Seth
After the awkwardness at the end of their date, Zach wasn’t sure he could bear to see Camila. Sure, they’d texted a fair bit in the week and a half since their date, but it was all so casual, so noncommittal. They’d had one spectacular makeout that had maybe been a one-off, and then a very confusing peck the last time they saw each other. Maybe she’d decided against pursuing things further, and was trying to let him off easy. He asked her if she’d be at bowling, and he’d been relieved when she was working that night.
Zach had made stuffed shells and had a rushed dinner with Irene. She seemed in high spirits, chatting happily about a bust she wanted to sculpt and the painting she’d found at a thrift shop. He thought of broaching Dad’s request for her to visit for a few weeks before summer ended, but he didn’t want to piss her off when she was being so pleasant. Maybe later. Or maybe he’d force the old man to actually show enough interest to have a conversation himself with his nearly grown daughter, instead of making him do it as if he were a low-rent henchman.
At bowling, Seth caught his eye immediately and waved him over. No Camila in sight and no Liam, either. Ivy was there, talking to a statuesque blonde who could have been her doppelganger. A couple of guys he didn’t know were there, too. The muscular one looked South Asian, maybe Indian, and had thick-framed glasses and a Pirates cap, and the other was a tall white guy who looked straight out of a J. Crew catalogue, save for the many visible tattoos on his arms.
“Hey Zach, this is Rahul,” Seth said. “He’s a lawyer who does some work for the foundation.”
“Until I steal him away full time,” Ivy said.
Shaking Zach’s hand, Rahul volunteered, “I’m also a trainer at Ivy’s gym.”
Seth shook his head and pointed at J. Crew. “And this is Jason. He works with Era.”
“For,” Jason said, smirking. “I’m her executive assistant.”
He made small talk with the guys as Ivy turned to laugh at something the other woman said. He soon learned she was named Vanessa and was a TV actress on some superhero show who was visiting Ivy from Vancouver during a season hiatus.
That explained the teenagers trying to snap photos of her covertly.
They bowled for a while. Sipping his cheap beer, he finally started to relax.
“Ya llego la fiesta!”
Zach felt his stomach sink to his toes at the voice behind him. Everyone else turned toward Camila, who had Era in tow. They had bowling shoes in hand, so there was no hope this was a drive-by hello and goodbye situation.
There was no hope for him at all. Because the moment he heard her voice and saw her face, he knew he’d keep wanting her, knew he’d thank her for any texts and pecks she’d deign to give him even as he longed for more.
“Hey! I thought both of you were working late tonight,” Seth said, kissing his fiancée.
“My last client canceled, so I sweet-talked Era to stop working and come pick me up.”
Jason groaned and gave Camila the evil eye. “How many calls am I going to have to push back tomorrow morning?” he asked his boss.
Era waved dismissively. “I couldn’t look at a screen for one more second,” she said, before checking her phone and sliding it back just as quickly.
Camila made small talk with the rest of the group while stealing glances and casting smiles at Zach. He pretended not to notice while he focused on Era.
“I never asked, but what does your company do, exactly?” he said, leaving out who told him that. “I know it’s video game related.”
Era grinned while tying her bowling shoelaces. “It’s a game development studio based on the premise of play for personal growth. We create educational games, leadership and team building programs, self-help apps. Basically, I want to gameify being a better human being.”
“She’s a beautiful fucking genius.” Camila had come up and draped her arm around Era’s shoulders and grinned at her adoringly.
Zach took a deep gulp to empty his plastic beer cup. “Can I get you both drinks?” he asked.
“Ginger ale, please,” Camila said.
“Rum and coke, thanks,” Era said.
“Yup. Be right back.”
He was grateful that the bartender took her time getting him Era’s cocktail and his and Camila’s sodas. He had decided to switch to DrPepper. He needed his wits about him.
He handed the women their drinks. Camila smiled at him and opened her mouth to say something. Her hair was braided to the side and she fidgeted with the end.
“Zach, your turn,” Rahul said, walking back up the lane after a spare.
They held uncomfortable eye contact for a moment. Zach took his turn. He knocked eight pins down and gutter-balled on his second try.
“Not bad, man, not bad,” Seth said, patting his shoulder. “Camila, I added you and you’re up.”
She strolled up to the line and looked over her shoulder — right at Zach. He felt a tug at his sternum when she looked at him.
He was impressed by how awful her bowling was. Camila had terrible form and only managed to knock down one pin on the far right. But damn her, she looked so cute regardless.
“Jim needs bumpers to bowl, babe,” Era said to Seth. Camila flipped her off.
“No I don’t, I just need to get centered,” she said. She took a deep breath, widened her stance, and moved the ball forward and back between her legs before releasing. Her skinny black pants squeezed her round ass and generous thighs in all the places Zach wanted to put his mouth and hands. Zach drowned the groan that almost escaped his lips with a harsh gulp of soda, the bubbles burning his nostrils.
He returned to reality to see her porntastic version of a granny roll netted her five pins, for which she acted wildly triumphant. He hadn’t taken his eyes off her, from her rolling to her sitting right next to him.
“Hey kid,” she said, tapping her shoulder against his. Then she winced and brought her hand to her shoulder.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Freezer burn,” she said.
He huffed, but he couldn’t help smiling. “I’m not trying to be cold. I just, you know. Don’t want to overstep.” She nodded but didn’t say anything. “Um, I’m going to play a round of Pac-Man, I think. Do you want to come? Maybe talk?”
She hesitated. “Sure. Obviously I can’t bowl worth shit.”
He led her to the glow of the empty arcade room, not missing the distance she kept between them.
Searching through his wallet, he found a couple of dollars and exchanged them for tokens. The cheerful frenzy of the game’s sound and color soothed him. Zach had always loved video games. He had nimble, restless hands and a brain to match. And this one was one of his favorites because it was simple. Eat, avoid your ghosts, never stop moving. His life philosophy.
Camila watched the game off to his side. After a few rounds, his unease with her subsided.
“Think you can beat my score?”
Her smile was so damn cute. “Ooh, you must think I’m as bad at Pac-Man as I am at bowling.”
“I’m sure bowling is the thing you’re worst at. It would be pretty messed up of God if you were that bad at anything else.”
He dangled a token in front of her. She snatched it.
“He’s got jokes and good looks,” she said. “Allow me to humble you, Hoult.”
Camila wasn’t bluffing. She was really good. He watched her dunk on his score and keep going.
Once she finally hit “Game Over,” she turned to face him, triumphant.
“Consider me humbled,” he said, bowing.
She leaned against the machine and shook the cup of tokens at him. “Want to try to redeem yourself?”
Before he knew what he was doing, he’d taken the cup from her and set it on top of the game. He was fully in her space, pinning her against the machine.
She looked down, hooking her index finger through one of his belt loops. His breath caught at her directness, her hand’s nearness to exactly where he wanted her even in this public place. “You’re a sore loser,” she whispered.
Her hips pressed into his. His body responded as if under her spell, and he had a vivid flash of lifting her onto a pinball machine and giving her what they both clearly wanted. He leaned down, his lips about to brush her plump, pink mouth.
And she pulled back. Not far — she didn’t have much room against the machine — but the tiny tilt back and away of her face was undeniable.
He stepped away from her as if she had burned him. And hadn’t she?
“Ouch,” he said, his voice a croak. “That’s a fatality.”
She cast her eyes down toward his crotch. “Seems like your heart is pumping just fine.”
“Did I misread all this?”
She laughed, but it was brittle and sad. “No, not at all. It’s just, I have this… tendency.”
“To do what?” he asked when she didn’t elaborate after a few seconds.
Sighing, she said, “I tend to mistake me wanting to fuck someone with them being a good and decent person I won’t regret fucking.”
“So you’re saying you want to fuck me?” He knew he was giving her his most devastating grin.
“And the thing is,” she said, ignoring the question, “at best you are a good and decent person, and then I end up screwing you over because I think I’m kinda done with relationships. Like, maybe I think dying alone wouldn’t be so bad?”
She looked at him like she expected him to be taken aback or weirded out, but he just shrugged. “I think relationships have been done with me for a while. So yeah, I get what you’re saying.”
“And anyway, you said you might not stick around Pittsburgh. I just don’t like mess, you know? But I wouldn’t mind getting to know you, though,” she said. “If you want. And if not, that’s OK, too.”
He felt the shadows in the room closing in on him. He had all these feelings that he didn’t know how to categorize, what box to put them in. He didn’t know where all that mental clutter had come from, and he needed to clear it.
“Do you want to go somewhere?” he asked her.
“Where?” Camila asked.
“Do you have a place that just makes you feel like a person again?” Zach asked.
Camila looked confused but nodded.
“I have one. That’s where I want to go.”
* * *
A few minutes later, they were in Zach’s car and pulling into a car wash, Zach extending his arms in front of him like he was unveiling some miracle invention.
“A car wash makes you feel like a person again?” Camila asked.
“Listen, I know it’s weird, but when I was in high school, my best friend and I used to go through the car wash to kill time. We’d vent about our parents and school and girls, mostly. Sometimes we’d get fast food and down it in the car during the deluxe wash.” He looked at her as the purple foam wrapped them in darkness. “It helps me think.”
“And what are you thinking about right now?”
“Mostly how fun it would be to fuck you in the backseat of my car in a parking lot and hold on to that adorable braid of yours for dear life.”
He heard her shaky exhale. “You should roll down your window. Wash that mouth out with soap.”
They watched the rollers polish his car, the rhythmic squeaks and running water building to a crescendo. He felt Camila relax next to him. “It’s kind of like ASMR. I like it.”
“This is my favorite part,” Zach said. “The water-repelling coating. When I was a little kid, I thought it was magic.”
“Oh, so car washes have been a lifelong fixation for you?” Camila teased.
“We all have our weird interests. Do you want me to take you back to the bowling alley, or do you need a ride home?”
“I’m good with calling it a night if you are,” she said.
He switched on his music, and after the car wash the rest of the drive was silent save for the sounds of Bo Burnham and Camila’s occasional directions. Soon he was pulling up into her driveway.
“It’ll pass, you know,” she said.
“What will?”
“Wanting me,” she said. “It always does.”
He scowled at her. “Listen, Camila, if you and I are going to be friends, I’m going to need you to not talk so much nonsense.”
She snorted — actually snorted! Then she collected herself.
“I’d like to be friends, asterisk,” she said.
“What’s the asterisk?”
“To be determined. Thanks for the ride and the weird detour.”
“Anytime,” he said. “See you around?”
He didn’t mean it to sound so hopeful, and the intensity of her gaze made him cringe internally. He remembered her eyeing his boner derisively in the arcade room and burned with shame.
Right as he was about to scream for the earth to swallow him whole, Camila shocked him by pulling his face to hers by his T-shirt collar. She closed the distance she’d put between them earlier. Her lips were soft and so warm against his. His hands found her hair, one wrapped around that braid and the other caressing the back of her neck. He didn’t miss that her hands were against his chest, putting a barrier between them. She ended the embrace with a breathy laugh. “Yeah, I’ll see you around.”