To Love and Be Loved

I snuck a glance at the man lying on his back on the grass next to me, trying to hide the obvious fact that I was, in fact, staring at him. I don’t recall either of us saying a word for at least the past twenty minutes; this was probably better, as my mind was racing to the speeding tempo of my loudly beating heart. I know it sounds cliché, but I was amazed that he couldn’t hear the rhythm of my heart that was filling my ears. How could I fall in love with Dominic of all people, my best friend since we were infants? We had made a pact never to stop being best friends, no matter what. Love, as an unspoken footnote, would ultimately break that pact. I’d rather have what I had now than nothing at all.
I tore my eyes away from him and focused on the clouds rolling on pure blue canvas. What does that cloud look like? This had been my favorite game when I was a kid – was that one more of a bunny or a cat? Was that a house or was it a pine tree? As I watched these clouds float by, taking their sweet time, I couldn’t believe that no matter how hard I stared, the clouds above me were just that – clouds. No longer could I make out rabbits or trees. I suppose this is the price of being a teenager. Whether I wanted to or not, I was growing up and losing the imagination that any kid under the age of nine is installed with.
“Loh?” Dominic’s deep, soothing voice cut through the silence. Shiloh, that’s me. Hebrew for ‘his gift.’ On my bad days, Dom told me sincerely that I was named this because I literally was his gift. On my good days, he teased that I was really his curse. So many people called me ‘Shi’ that Dominic saw it as overused and had created his own nickname for me back when I was six and he was seven. Was it really ten years ago that he came up with Loh and I dubbed him Dom? He was always more creative than I was. Turning to him once more, my eyes slid from tan, muscular arms crossed over his equally muscular chest to the dark beginnings of stubble that indicated that he was a few days in need of a shave. Light brown eyes with a hint of green around the edges stared back at me with an emotion that I had never experienced from the gaze that I had spent all of my life looking into.
“Dom?” I echoed his tone with an almost undetectable smirk on my face, although by the identical look on his face, I knew he had seen it. He pushed himself up to a sitting position and I did the same, oblivious to the way that we leaned towards each other, our legs out to one side, our hands almost touching, pressed against the ground. This was the way we had been sitting for years and neither of us took anything meaningful from it other than that we were good friends. Together, we stared up at the clouds above us just as I had been doing before.
“Have you ever kissed a guy?” He sounded like he was asking me if I knew if it was going to rain tomorrow. Caught off guard, laughter burst from my lips and the hand that wasn’t supporting me against the cool earth covered my mouth in attempt to stifle them.
“Of course I haven’t. If I had, I would’ve told you about it. Why? Have you ever kissed a girl?” Suspicion that my closest companion was keeping something from me crept into my voice. I hadn’t meant to let it show, but I was never that good at hiding or faking my emotions to begin with.
Immediately, he saw how I had drawn this conclusion and he hurriedly shook his head. “No, no, nothing like that. I was just wondering. Have you ever found a guy you’d wanna kiss?” Again with that is-it-going-to-rain-tomorrow tone. I took a moment to think; what was up with him? Sure, we talked about love, but not like this. Not quite sure what to say, I shrugged awkwardly in response and opened my mouth to return the question when his hand lifted and silenced me.
With gentle fingers, Dominic pushed my long brunette hair away from his face as he had done countless times before. By now, I was so used to it that I would’ve been surprised if he didn’t do it for me. Since my hair reached all the way down to the small of my back, it got in the way constantly. Even so, I think Dom cared more about this than I did. But this time when he tucked my hair behind my ear, this was different. This time, he kept his hand behind my head. This time, he leaned close to me.
This time, he kissed me.