If You Told Me To

The rain pounded on the roof of the barn above them, so strong and powerful that Sarah almost had a hard time believing that it was just droplets of water and not something much more substantial, like cement bricks or full-grown woolly mammoths. She took a breath, brushing the top of her head against Harry’s as the two lied on the barn floor, facing the ceiling. The rainy day had been an inspiration-killer for the both of them, and neither teenager had anything better to do than lie down and make small talk.

“Let’s play a game,” Harry suggested finally, shifting his position so Sarah felt his curls sliding against her scalp. His hair was surprisingly soft. “And I think this will be more fun not being able to see each other’s expressions.”

“This game already scares me,” Sarah laughed. “But pitch it anyway.”

“We should play Truth. You know, the game where we just ask each other questions, and we have to answer with the truth, no matter how embarrassing or humiliating or terrible it is?”

Sarah swallowed. “I know the game. Are you sure you want to play it?”

“I trust you with my secrets,” he stated plainly, like it should have been a given. “Don’t you trust me?”

Really, Sarah wasn’t even sure she trusted herself with her secrets. But saying that out loud would hurt Harry’s feelings, so instead, she just said, “Alright, let’s play. You ask first.”

Harry started almost immediately. “What’s your middle name?”

Sarah couldn’t help but chuckle a little. If all the questions were that straightforward, then she had been freaking out over nothing. “Elise,” she told him. “Sarah Elise Richards is my full name.”

“I really like the sound of Sarah Elise. You know, in case you wanted my opinion on the subject.”

“I feel whole now that I’ve gotten your approval.”

“I figured. Now you ask a question.”

Sarah stared at a crack in a piece of wood along the top of the wall and sighed. She didn’t want to be the one to turn the game from innocent to scandalous, and she was having more trouble than she figured she would coming up with a question as G-rated as Harry’s. “What’s your best friend’s name?” she finally asked, wanting to high-five herself for her selection.

“I have two. Niall and Louis. They both play baseball with me.”

Niall and Louis. She’d never met anyone with either of those names before. Maybe people just had different names up north, though she’d never thought of it as almost a different country. Maybe it was.

“Okay, um, how was your first kiss?”

Sarah felt her face heat up. “A little awkward,” she answered honestly. “But perfect at the same time.”

“You’re cheesy,” Harry teased, twisting his body and face so he could pinch Sarah’s cheek.

She swatted him away and pretended to groan. “Stop it! You were totally setting that up to be a cheesy answer, so don’t even start with me.”

“In case you were wondering, I’m supplying this information without you having to ask: I didn’t think you were awkward with the kiss. If I hadn’t known better, I probably wouldn’t have known it was your first.”

“I feel strangely flattered,” Sarah joked, even though her entire body was burning with humiliation. “Now that we’ve decided I have satisfactory making-out skills, can we move on? When did you realize you liked me?”

Harry was quiet for a while, which made Sarah’s heart palpitate in her chest and her stomach tighten like it was going on strike. Finally, slowly, he said, “I’m not exactly sure, but I think it was when you looked at me with awe at the dinner table when I said I couldn’t take off my beanie because I was having a bad hair day. But if you mean when my like turned into romantic feelings, you can thank your lemonade. I think that may be seventy-five percent of the reason why I like you right now.”

“You sure know how to charm a girl,” Sarah replied in a deadpan voice, trying to sound angry, but she eventually snorted with laughter and gave herself away. “I knew that lemonade would win you over.”

“So manipulative. So when did you decide you liked me?”

“You already know this answer. The first time I saw you, I knew that I wanted to be friends with you. But I think me liking you like I do now was a gradual process, something that came from me spending so much time with you and realizing you’re only horrible when you really, really want to be.”

“I have no idea whether that’s an insult or a compliment, so I’m just going to say thank you and give you the floor.”

Sarah gnawed on her lip, which was free from lip gloss that day, although she was wearing the rest of the makeup. She had been serious when she had told her father that she intended on getting her technique perfect by the start of school. She truly did want to look like a high school girl when she walked through the hallways on the first day. She wanted to stand out for once, be someone that people couldn’t help but notice. Then, finally, Sarah had her question: “Did you really not notice my makeup the first day I wore it?”

“Honestly?” Sarah was silent because the answer was obvious. “Um, not really. I’m a guy, Sarah. Unless you’re made up like a movie star, I’m not going to notice. Plus, I think you look pretty either way.”

“Fair enough.” She just found it hard to believe, since she thought she looked so different to herself. But then again, she saw herself in the mirror and other miscellaneous places of reflection more than anyone else saw her, really.

“What are you most afraid of, being in a relationship with me?”

Sarah tensed up. But it was truth, and she couldn’t lie to him. Not without having a terrible nagging conscience for the rest of her life, anyway. “The thing I’m most afraid of is that there will come a point where we won’t do dumb things like talk and play silly games and kid around with one another, and all we’ll want to do is make-out or, um, other things, and our whole relationship will revolve around the physical stuff.”

She could have sworn she heard Harry take in a sharp breath, but she was too embarrassed to call him out on it. She couldn’t believe she’d said that, and she wondered if she’d hurt Harry’s feelings, that he hoped their relationship would progress in that direction. Maybe she should have taken the guilty conscious over being rude to him.

“What makes you think that’s going to happen?”

“I don’t know. It’s just that, when I think of relationships, that’s just what I think of. The beginning is all flirting and joking and getting to know each other, and then there comes a time where all the flirting has been done, and the two parties just jump on each other all the time and rip their clothes off.”

“That would be a terrible relationship,” Harry replied, a tone of amusement in his voice. Sarah felt herself relax, since thinking she was ridiculous was much better than being injured by her words. “There’d be no substance to it, and it would ruin the whole point of a relationship. Don’t worry. That won’t happen with us. I don’t think I could live without our banter.”

Sarah laughed and felt her embarrassment melt out of her. Once she’d calmed down, she tried to think of her own question, but the only one plaguing her head was kind of cruel. Still, Harry’s turn had been kind of intrusive, so she figured she couldn’t hurt anything. “If we weren’t the only two people out here, stuck together by fate, would you still be interested in me? Like, if we just were in the same class at your school, and I was just another girl behind a desk in a room you also happened to occupy.”

There was a long, tense silence. “I don’t have to be in a relationship with you, Sarah,” Harry snapped, sitting up, which Sarah could only tell from the lack of pressure on the crown of her head and the sound of his shorts pockets scraping against the floor. “If I wanted to, I could hide out in Aunt Tony’s house all the time, and I’d have left you to sketch in your barn all alone. We’re not actually stuck together.”

“It was just a question, Harry,” Sarah muttered, adjusting into a cross-legged position and tugging at the frayed bottom hem of her shorts nervously. “I didn’t mean to offend you.”

“Well, you’re insulting me. Like, the only reason I even decided to consider you is because I didn’t have anyone else to look at. Like I’m some horny, hormone-driven idiot who can’t be without a female presence for a few weeks. If that were the case, don’t you think I would have tried to have sex with you already? Multiple times already?”

“I guess,” Sarah agreed, but Harry didn’t seem to hear her. He just picked up his laptop and shoved it under his shirt, shaking his head.

“I’m going back to Aunt Tony’s. I’ll see you later.”

And then he was gone, out into the sheets of rain, and Sarah felt like she was going to be sick.