CHAPTER 9

 

 

 

do I bleed blue because of birth

or genus?

will I die soon

or never?

will they remember me as I intend

or as they painted me?

-on the canvas,

in the hall,

next to the coat rack

-Kip

 

 

 

KIP

 

“Who was your grown-up visitor last night?” Bo asked while pretending to peruse the contents of the refrigerator.

Kip paused chewing his avocado toast. There were numerous layers to that one question and he had no idea where to begin.

Bo closed the fridge door and leaned a hip against the counter, crossing his arms and arching an eyebrow.

“Tessa was here last night,” Kip responded, knowing there would be follow-up questions.

Bo narrowed his eyes but the one eyebrow remained arched, making him look like a blond Dwayne Johnson.

“She was the one in the bank clothes? Huh. I didn’t recognize her.”

Kip almost choked on his toast. “Bank clothes?” he asked.

Bo blinked once like he thought Kip was slow on the uptake. “Yeah. Like she works in a bank.”

Kip wanted to ask how he’d come to that sort of comparison, but he’d learned long ago that knowing how Bo got from point A to point B wasn’t in his best interest.

“She came over for dinner after work.”

She’d been coming over after work every Friday for two weeks now. After the night when he told her about the cancer, they’d become more anchored in their connection.

But secret traumas often did that.

Bo, satisfied with his simple explanation, turned to get a coffee mug out of the cupboards. As he worked the Keurig he spoke, “I’m going out of town for a few days. Will you be okay while I’m gone?”

Kip paused before answering. This wasn’t the first time Bo had casually asked if Kip would be fine while alone. It didn’t happen often, but it happened.

If Kip had been a less observant person, maybe he wouldn’t have noticed that Bo only asked that question of Kip—never Brady or Steve.

“Of course,” he responded as the uncomfortable thought that perhaps Bo knew rolled around in his mind. “When are you leaving?”

Bo glanced at him over his shoulder and nodded once, seemingly satisfied with his answer. “Before lunch. But I should be back Sunday night.”

“And where are you off to this time?”

Bo didn’t answer as he took milk from the fridge and added it to his coffee. He opened a drawer and extracted a spoon which he used to stir the liquids together in his chosen mug—a large novelty one with a superhero on it.

It wasn’t until after he’d left the spoon on the counter and gone back to his room that Kip realized Bo had never answered his question.

 

***

 

TESSA

 

The past two weeks had been a blur of yoga on the beach, longboarding by the pier, and sushi three to four nights out of seven.

The sushi was often fed to her by Kip as she skated past him. For every successful turn she made without running him over, he was there to reward her with the perfect bite of salmon, or tuna, or rice.

At first, she felt super dorky about the system. But that was short-lived. And now she found herself craving sushi and longboarding on the daily, and wondering why it had taken her so long to get into both.

With zero regret, Tessa grafted Kip into her life.

They hadn’t spoken of the cancer since that night, but it was never far from Tessa’s mind. Sometimes, she’d look over at Kip and wondered about the man he would have become if his life hadn’t been interrupted.

But she was careful to keep those kinds of thoughts to herself.

“Bo thinks you’re a grown up,” Kip said, a smirk hiding on his lips.

Tessa cocked her head to one side. “Newsflash for Bo, he’s also technically a grown up.”

Kip shuddered. “That doesn’t seem right somehow.”

Tessa brought the longboard to a stop by dragging her foot on the pavement and picked it up. She took a seat on the curb beside Kip and leaned over for her reward. He dropped a spicy tuna roll into her mouth from his chopsticks.

It melted in her mouth and she hummed in contentment.

“You’re a dork,” Kip chuckled.

“You’re an enabler,” she countered around her mouthful.

Normally, speaking with a mouthful of food in front of a cute boy would be enough to cause her to go into a full-fledged flop sweat.

But with Kip it was barely a blip on her self-conscious radar. And not because she no longer regarded him as a “cute boy.” He was cute as hell. Sometimes more than she could stand.

With Kip, she cared more about what he thought of her ideas and less about how he perceived her humanness.

Some things she wouldn’t ever be able to control—her age, genetics, imperfections, whether or not she was a mess most of the time. Her thoughts, ideas, dreams—that was soul stuff. And it mattered to her what he thought of those things.

But she didn’t know why.

“I was thinking about that, uh…” Kip scraped the bottom of his shoe against the sand gathered near the gutter and set the food container off to the side. “About that conversation we had about visiting the National Parks.”

Tessa’s heart fluttered.

Ah, yes, she remembered it well. Though she’d been hoping he would forget.

No such luck.

Kip laced his fingers together and rested his forearms on the tops of his bent knees. Those sea green eyes focused on something in the distance and the ends of his dark hair moved in the gentle breeze.

Tessa couldn’t take her eyes off him.

Kip was one of those people you just loved to look at. Whether he was crouched low in a curve on his longboard or sitting unreasonably still. His vibrancy demanded recognition. Color and sunshine in all facets of his existence.

“I think I’m going to take some vacation days and head up to Yosemite in a few weeks. I still need to work out the details of the dates with Clarke.”

She blinked as she regained her footing in the conversation. National Parks. Yes. Okay. She was back.

“I’ve given it some thought and…” He took a deep breath, the sole of his shoe scraping into the sand again. He swiveled his head her direction and locked eyes with her. “I’d like you to come with.”

Tessa blinked rapidly, assuming she’d misheard. “Say again?”

Kip’s lips twitched and he tilted his head as he observed her. His eyes ran over her features with a new familiarity that made her chest constrict.

“Please?” he asked, not repeating the same request exactly. But that one word seemed to hold more.

 

***

 

Tessa turned the blender off and stuck the wooden spoon inside to push the ice down.

She needed to stop thinking.

Or think in a different direction.

Maybe she wasn’t thinking at all. Maybe this was what it felt like to be near catatonic.

She hadn’t really given Kip an answer earlier that day. Instead, she’d stuttered through some words about having to check her work calendar and see if she had all her proper vaccinations.

Yeah.

Really.

She hadn’t said no.

Spencer breezed into the kitchen just as Tessa started the blender again.

Wearing her jacket?

And putting on her shoes?

Tessa shut off the blender.

“Are you leaving?” she asked, caught between wanting to be upset and already feeling relieved.

On one hand, she knew she needed to talk to her girl about all the things happening in her head. On the other, she wasn’t sure she was ready to talk about it at all.

With anyone.

Spencer straightened and her periwinkle eyes flitted between the blender to Tessa to the door. “Oh man, Tessa, I totally forgot we had plans.”

Uh-huh.

“I volunteered to cover a shift tonight at the gym. I’m so sorry.”

Three weeks ago, Tessa probably would have gone cross-eyed with those words. But she was semi-relieved. She held up the spatula and licked it.

“Okay,” she said, shrugging.

“Okay?” Spencer asked with a confused frown.

See? There was no way Tessa would be able to split a pitcher of ‘Ritas with Spencer and be able to keep her off the scent. That woman was like a bloodhound when it came to secrets. By the end of the night Tessa would have told her everything and probably confessed to a few crimes in her misguided youth.

No. She needed more time to process…

What was she even supposed to call what was happening?

Her new special friendship?

She was hanging out nearly every day with a guy she was absolutely attracted to, but they were just friends. But he was gorgeous. But he wasn’t interested in her like that. But he sometimes acted like he might be. But she wasn’t interested in ruining their friendship. But it was so new and sweet and shit.

Pain flashed in her mind as she tried to put her swirling thoughts in order and failed.

“Yeah. I mean, I was looking forward to tonight, but we’ll do it some other time.” Tessa said, trying to sound breezy and unconcerned.

Spencer eyed her suspiciously. “You sure you’re fine?”

Tessa nodded slowly, holding eye contact. “Absolutely. It’s work, what can you do? It’s not like you’re blowing me off to go see a guy or something.” She chuckled.

Did Spencer’s cheeks turn a bit pink?

“Right. Okay, well tomorrow for sure.”

“Not a problem, babe.” Tessa tossed the cleaned off spatula in the sink. She poured a margarita for herself in the already salted glasses.

“See you later!” Spencer called, closing the door behind her.

“Yeah!” Tessa picked up her phone to text Kip. But he had gotten there first.

KIP: you left your sweater in my van. I’m bringing it by. See you soon.

Well, that made it official. Tessa was definitely in love with him.

Guess that meant she needed to move to Nepal and invest in a water buffalo farm. Then she’d be too busy to have these irrational fantasies about cute boys.

Plus, she’d smell like water buffalo, which would keep any potential suitors away.

She opened her browser on her phone to search for flights to Kathmandu, but just as she pressed “search,” Kip knocked on her door.

And she forgot everything else.