The Boy From Hot Ice

Lunch. It's such a simple thing, so commonplace, so ordinary, so... dull. Unless you're eating lunch with Jeremy while attempting to mend a rough relationship.
We had always been so comfortable with each other from the start. I never had the goose bumps when I thought about eating with him or hanging out with him or whatever. That was one of the things that made me feel so sure about him actually. But now I was so sick, I could have thrown up. I just didn't want to have to fight this anymore. I wanted it to be as easy as it had always been.
For a while we just sat there pretending we were hungry but both of us mostly just picking at our food. Occasionally we would accidentally look at each other, but we would quickly give a smile before looking back at our plates. Worst part was that we both knew we were doing it, but we both acted like we had no clue.
I decided at once not to look away the next time he glanced up at me. With the next flash of polar blue, I asked him something I had wondered about - something I hadn't had the nerve to bring up until now.
"Why haven't you asked me about my dad?"
His fingers, already awkwardly twirling a fry between them, released their contents and wiped themselves against his napkin. "I don't know," he mumbled.
"Didn't you wonder what happened? Or how I was doing? You didn't even call." I was speaking calmly, no longer angry about it. Now I just wanted to know. I needed to know what could have been more important than me.
"Sure," he said. "I wondered. I - I didn't really know... I didn't know what to say."
"You could have just said you were thinking about me."
"I coulda, yeah," he sighed. "But I've never been had that kind of thing happen to anyone close to me, and it was... it was weird."
"I just wish you had called," I told him. "I waited for your call, and you never called."
His head dropped and his hands moved to his lap in Sunday school posture. Maybe I was being too harsh. "I'm sorry," he spoke softly. "I - I didn't mean to hurt you."
I bit the corner of my mouth, maybe a subconscious punishment. I kicked my toes onto his shins gently, playfully even. When he looked up at me, waiting for a smile, I gave it to him. "It's really okay," I said.
"So you're okay?"
I smiled because I had to with him. "I'm getting there," I said. "It's easier without mom around to talk shit about him, that's for sure."
"I wish I could have met him. He sounded like a great guy."
"He was," I nodded. And as I explained how my dad cared for me, the way he tried to be a good dad, his sacrifices, his mannerisms, my first and last memories of him, I noticed Jeremy's hands holding mine, swallowing them. When they had moved there, I'm not quite sure. But I didn't question it, I didn't bring it up, and for god's sake I didn't want it to ever stop.

Easter had come and gone before I realized it. Neither of us had any big plans as our families were not overly religious. Of course, there was a family dinner at his house, and he even invited me, but I didn't want to explain my situation to his family. I barely knew them.
I stayed at home and watched TV I think, although it was mostly just televangelists and Roman Catholic services and movies about the crucifixion. I was bored out of my mind, and purely out of boredom I began organizing the things that had been left in my old room. I had since been living in the master bedroom, but when I opened the door to my room, the door that I had avoided opening since I'd been back, I remembered why it had been such a pariah.
There was my bed, a bed I had fallen asleep in with Jeremy so many times before. It was where I fell in love with him, where we shared our most intimate moments. I brushed my hand along the sheets and up to the pillows. I even bent down onto it to see if I could still smell him, but of course I couldn't. Even though Mom promised none of the tenants had lived in my room, I'm pretty sure they did.
I opened my closet to see that all my old clothes were still there. Now they were clothes I wouldn't be caught dead in. Thick, ugly belts, garish colors, wide-brimmed hats - sickening stuff to me now. I pulled down the shoeboxes and admired my collection, which included every single pair of tap shoes I'd ever owned. None of them fit of course - it had been well over a year since I had cut myself of that habit. Now I remembered my silly dream and I sighed. How childish I had been.
The doorbell certainly caught me off guard. I only heard it the one time, though Jeremy said he had been ringing it for ten minutes.
"What's up?" I asked when I let him in.
"I just thought maybe I could visit," he smiled. "Here, have a lily."
I accepted the flower and placed it in a vase. "So sweet!" I gushed.
"Oh, we had a butt load of them at the house," he grinned. "Thought one might cheer you up."
"I don't need cheering up," I lied. "I'm fine."
"Are you really?"
I sighed. "No, but I have to say I am, don't I?"
He laughed so lightly and I couldn't help but smile along. His eyes, so much older than they should have been, so much wiser, so much more intuitive, caught mine and he gripped my hand. "I'm here for you," he reminded me, as if he needed to.
"I know what's different about you!" I laughed. "Oh my god, you're wearing a fucking tie!"
He blushed, which is something I'd never seen him do before. "Oh, um," he stuttered, "Yeah, I guess I am."
"What gives?" I laughed. And you would have laughed too.
He tugged at it uncomfortably, and he ceased his grinning. "It's awful, isn't it?"
"Pure crap!"
"Yeah, my mom wanted me to dress up. She - she had a whole thing she was going for and - I really do hate it."
I stepped toward him and reached for the knot, pulling it apart slowly as I looked at him. His arms and hands remained motionless, though I expected (hoped, perhaps) that they would make their way to my hips or face. I pulled back on the brown paisley tie, pulling his neck more than I needed to, doing everything but begging him to kiss me. But he didn't. He just looked at me. And that was better.
"Wanna go to the lake?" he asked.
I always wanted to go to the lake.

We stepped out of the car and unto the slick soil, still wet from the rain two days before. He held my hand, leading me over the muddiest parts, and once we reached the rim, he flung his arm around my shoulder and pulled me to him. "Can you believe they're getting rid of all this?"
"What?" I asked in alarm. "They can't! They just can't! Isn't it a forest preserve? Isn't it against the law to build here?"
"City needed money," he told me. "Yeah, I couldn't believe it either."
"Well, we'd better make this time count," I told him. "I turned around to be in front of him, and I reached up for his face. As I touched his cheeks, he stopped me quite suddenly but putting his hands on my wrists and pulling them down.
"Go to prom with me," he said, not asking. He didn't need to ask I guess. Still, it would have been nice for him to try to observe at least one tradition.
"Okay," I agreed as I made a second attempt to kiss him.
"Liz," he said sadly as he pulled away. "We probably shouldn't."
"Well, why the hell not?" I asked.
He chuckled. "Because we're still figuring this out, aren't we?"
"Maybe you are. I know what I want."
"You want me?" he asked as if he would never believe such a thing.
"Kiss me and find out," I said.
He leaned down to me, and I was so happy he needed to now. And softly he set his lips to mine like music. The unkempt sides of his hair fell against my face and I brushed them away, wrapping my fingers around every lock of his hair, gently pulling the kiss closer. His hands finally found their place on my hips, and he slowly dragged them up my blouse and grazed his nails against my skin. Our noses flinched against one another as our heads took turns in one direction or another, and his tongue, now tasting the roof of my mouth, took hold my lips for a moment before he drew back.
"Are we in love?" he asked.
I would never have expected this question from him. First of all, it seemed so deep. It was so serious, and seriously worded. He didn't ask me if I loved him. He just asked if we were in love. And even I didn't know the answer to that, After all, I couldn't speak for him, could I?
I simply shot my eyes up to meet his, hoping he could judge for himself. But he asked again. Not in a needy, desperate way, but in a curious state of mind. His eyes stayed affixed on mine until I spoke at last.
"I don't know," I said. "Does it matter?"
"I don't know," he answered. And after we stood there another moment, I pulled him forward for another kiss.
In our commotion, we fell to the ground, sliding on the very smooth mud beneath us. It shouldn't have come as such a surprise but it did, and still we continued making out. But his kisses were different, and only becoming more so as we continued on. I could see (anyone could have) that he was trying to prove something. Perhaps he was trying to prove to me that he loved me, or prove it to himself, or maybe just prove that he was capable of love and deserving of it. Truth be told, I didn't really care. I just wanted it to continue. I had something to prove as well.
He laid me on the ground and buried his face into mine. I could feel the mud and smell the earth as I was ground into it. His eyes were closed now, focused on this moment, and when I noticed I did the same.
I pulled him down beside me, then quickly traded places so that I was now on top. As I sat atop him, I kissed him, caressed him, and pleasured him on the soil before the lake. And for a glorious moment I was making love to him, and him to me, and there were no complications.
When we finished, we lay there, filthy with sex and soil, and we heaved to catch our breath before we finally stood again.
He brought me to the car and grabbed a blanket from inside, wrapping it around me. I can't remember a time it had been so cold there. But he held me for a while and I cried. I cried because I realized yet another moment we had shared would never, ever happen again. And this was happening way too much.
"We should head back," he told me, seeing that the sky was turning darker by the second.
"I don't want to," I muttered.
He pulled me into the car. "At least get out of the wind."
When he had walked around to his side and sat beside me, he started the car. "No, I don't want to leave yet," I said.
He smiled to me, then pulled away from the grass. "It's getting late. My mom will freak out."
"Are you - are you sure you love me?" I asked him.
"I'll always love you, Liz. In one way or another." He had both answered my question and created more.
"I know you're sweet deep down inside," I told him. "When you want to be."
"I always want to be. When I'm with you, anyway."