Until It Hurts To Stop

Until It Hurts To Stop - Chapter 10

Ten

By the time I get home from Sylvie’s house, in the pit of the afternoon, I still haven’t heard anything from Nick. It’s rare for us to go a whole day without talking; now I know he’s avoiding me.

I can’t live with my guts knotted up this way. If this is what it’s like for us to try being more than friends—this tension, this uncertainty, this teetering on the verge of losing everything—then I don’t need it. I’d rather stick with the friendship we already have.

Obviously, kissing was a huge mistake. Whatever attraction I thought there was—either it was only on my side, or maybe he felt it for a minute but then had second thoughts. Maybe he was just curious. After all, I am the only girl he spends much time with. But it’s clear by now that we’re going nowhere.

How could I forget Raleigh’s words about how I make guys gag? How could I forget that no guy ever showed the slightest interest in me before Carl Gurney’s “kiss-and-run,” and then it was almost three years before anyone kissed me again?

Time to undo, to backspace.

If we can.

I send Nick a message:

can we please forget it ever happened? can we stay friends?

Then I spend forty-five minutes pounding away at the piano, making the walls ring with stormy Beethoven.

Finally, Nick’s reply comes in. When my phone chirps, I grab it and stare at the screen, the notes still echoing in the air around me.

yes. good idea

.

And I exhale completely, for the first time in twenty-four hours.

I ride my bike over to Nick’s and find him shooting baskets in his driveway. The asphalt is gooey with the heat, yet he’s pounding up and down, taking shots as if the NBA championship is on the line.

I drop my bike and stand on the strip of grass that borders the driveway. Bending forward, I flip my hair up, to give my neck some air. Nick keeps dribbling and I don’t interrupt, even though I think basketball is the most boring game on earth. Every minute of it that I’ve ever watched—every long, long minute—is out of loyalty to Nick, who would probably wither into a catatonic strip of jerky if he had to live without it. The hoop rattles and rings; I can tell he’s made the shot.

“Hey, Maggie,” he pants.

I come out from under my hair. “Ready for a break?”

“In a minute.”

I watch him through a veil of stray hair wisps. Nick stops at an imaginary foul line, focusing not only with his eyes but with his hands, arms, head, toes pointing to the basket. He lets the ball fly, and it sinks through the net with a thunk. Then he turns to me, gasping, sweat splashing from his skin onto the tar.

“God, it’s hot out here,” he says.

“Oh, you noticed.”

“Just to the extent that my shoes are melting.”

He doesn’t quite meet my eyes. I don’t know what to do with my hands. I itch inside my skin. And here I thought the awkwardness would be over with.

“Look, Maggie.” He scoops the ball from the ground and straightens up. “I wanted to tell you . . . I’m sorry.”

“Um, you don’t have to do that.” I doubt he can tell I’m blushing, because I was probably already lobster-colored from the ride over here. “It just—happened. And it’s over now.”

He rolls the ball around between his palms. I want to touch his hands, quiet that restless movement, get him to relax. Get us both to relax, if that’s possible. But I don’t know how he would take that.

It’s safer not to touch.

It’s better to talk about practical matters.

“I forgot to take some of my stuff home yesterday,” I say. “I came to pick it up. And I brought your shirt back.” I wave it at him.

“Oh, right.” He bounces the ball once, twice. “You want some iced tea while you’re here?”

“Yeah, okay.”

I follow him inside, where he drops the ball into its usual spot beside the door, on top of a pile of grocery bags, boots, and umbrellas. He opens the refrigerator.

Sitting at the table where I’ve sat so many times makes me think we really will be able to return to the way things were. I know this kitchen as well as I know my own. The clean dishes piled in the drainer; the scarred cutting board where Perry often chops vegetables for stir-fry; the broken blender and the only-used-once bread maker shoved in a corner. The town map on the wall. The burn on the counter where Nick once set down a red-hot pan.

Nick plunks a spoon and a glass in front of me, and sits down with his own glass. Iced tea slops over the brim and puddles on the table.

I search for something to say, while he rubs his glass with his thumb. There’s something comforting about the familiarity of his hands, his ragged nails and the dirt in the creases of his knuckles.

“So when’s our next hike?” I say, scooping sugar into my glass. We might as well get back to the woods as soon as possible. Back to our old snake-fighting, mountain-climbing selves.

“I don’t know.”

Since when has Nick ever hesitated about getting out onto the trail? I sip my tea, bitter and sweet swirling together in my mouth. “If you don’t want to hike with me anymore—” I begin, though it’s like stabbing myself in the throat to say it.

“That’s not it. It’s just—I was thinking about another mountain. A harder one. Is that something you’d want to do?” A glance at me, the slightest flash when our eyes meet.

“Harder than Eagle? That’ll be a long day.” Especially if we’re still off-kilter like this, our gears not quite back in sync.

“Yeah, I know. Mountains take a lot out of you, but that’s kind of the point, right?” He talks to his drink, one hand wrapped around the dripping glass. “You have the summit to work for, and you put everything into the hike. . . .”

I get what he’s saying. A climb will sand off the remaining sharp edges between us, will give us a place to focus all our energy. “Which mountain?” I ask.

“Crystal.”

It’s the one pictured on his bedroom wall, with the summit as cold and sharp as a fang. “That’s in the Cinnamon Range, isn’t it?”

“Yep. What do you say, Maggie?”

“I say okay.”

He clinks his glass against mine, more tea slopping onto the table.

I do want to climb. I feel the same hunger, the same upward momentum, that he does.

But I have another longing to drag around with me, too. Because even though I’m relieved that he’s giving me exactly what I asked for—he’s treating me like a friend again—I still want more.