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Authors: Suki Fleet

Wild Summer (6 page)

BOOK: Wild Summer
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“Christopher suits you, though, and I like it.”

Summer had pulled back so his words could be seen, but right then Christopher didn’t care about the words, only the mouth that spoke them and the boy who thought them up and caused the firework display of sparks that charged the air between them.

“But in my head I’ve been calling you something else….”

Christopher raised an eyebrow and smiled because his heart was now too fucking big inside his chest. He was too weak to stop the electric current running from his heart to his balls, causing his cock to jut up hard as a rock against his stomach. Too weak to care if Summer noticed.

“Because of the way we met, you know. It was almost a fucking car crash. So in my head that’s what I’ve been calling you, and now I don’t think I can stop.” Summer swallowed, looking almost apologetic, eyes closed, dark eyelashes fanning against his cheekbones. “Crash.”

He was, without doubt, the most beautiful person Christopher had ever met. The world was blowing apart inside him. He’d never felt wound so tight and yet pulled so wide apart. It was terrifying and exhilarating.

“Then I’ll be Crash,” Christopher said, tilting his head. He paused for just a moment, flooded with heart-stopping anticipation. “For you,” he mouthed as their lips touched, and Summer slowly climbed onto his lap.

For a moment they just breathed each other in, not moving beyond the gentle press of their lips, as if they both needed a moment to adjust. Christopher gripped the soft material of Summer’s T-shirt, wanting to feel the smooth skin beneath.

Gently, Summer nipped Christopher’s lower lip, pulling it with his teeth. “Fuck. You’re driving me a little bit crazy, you know?” he mouthed, frowning and flicking his lip ring with his tongue.

Christopher nodded; there was no doubt he was being driven a little bit crazy himself. He wanted to flick that lip ring with his own tongue.

They were so close. Being swallowed by desire, Christopher leaned forward and followed Summer’s lips with his, kissing him again, a bit more fully this time, but still Summer held back.

Taking a deep breath, Summer made a frustrated face. “I really, really want to but… for starters, you’re really young.”

“I’m fifteen, nearly sixteen.”


Exactly
.”

Yet Summer made no move to get off Christopher’s lap; in fact it felt as though their bodies were pressed even more closely. Christopher thought he could feel the heat of Summer’s erection poking into his stomach low down, but he wasn’t sure.

“You don’t look much older,” Christopher said, wanting Summer to see how much he wanted this. He wasn’t a kid.

“I’m nearly eighteen… but it’s not just that…. I don’t want to get you involved in this.” He sagged a little as he spoke, and the glorious chest-to-chest contact was lost. “I belong to someone else.”

The way Summer said it unnerved Christopher, because no one should
belong
to anyone else. But being fifteen he had little experience in such matters. He took it to mean Summer was in a relationship with someone, and though he hated himself a little bit, the guilt didn’t stop him from practically goading Summer into being unfaithful.

“But you don’t love them, or you wouldn’t be doing this.” They weren’t just empty words, at that moment Christopher really thought they were true. “If you loved them, you wouldn’t even look twice at me.”

“Oh God, stop talking,” Summer mouthed before he kissed him. Properly this time, all tongues and teeth and warm breath. It was wonderful. But when Christopher slid his hand under the hem of Summer’s T-shirt and stroked the fine hairs at the base of Summer’s spine, just within the low waistband of his jeans, Summer pulled back and shook his head.

“Just kissing. That’s as far as this goes, okay? I can’t afford to….”

He stopped, and Christopher finished the sentence in his head.
I can’t afford to
like you too much.
Because, whether Christopher accepted it or not, Summer
was
taken.

They lay pressed against each other on Summer’s tiny bed, kissing slow and deep, as though they needed to remember every detail, and losing themselves in the exploration. Each time things threatened to go too far, Summer pulled back as he said he would, showing more self-control than anyone Christopher had ever met.

An hour passed. The sun had dipped. The world was shadows.

Dark-eyed and pensive, Summer leaned up on his elbow and drew Christopher’s arm around him.

“Stay here with me tonight?” he asked cautiously, his eyes not quite meeting Christopher’s, but looking at something just beyond him, something far away. “I don’t want to go and see Ren. I just want to lie here with you and pretend we’re all that exists.”

It wasn’t just caution, Christopher realized. It was a plea. He wondered if Ren was the one Summer was in a relationship with. And if he was, Summer did not seem completely committed if he wanted to pretend he and Christopher were all that existed.

“I promise I’ll get your stuff tomorrow. I promise.” Squeezing his eyes shut, Summer collapsed down, his head resting on Christopher’s chest, his arms winding tighter around Christopher’s body as Christopher returned the hug.

I think I’m falling for you,
Christopher thought helplessly as Summer’s breathing slowed and deepened with sleep, suddenly understanding why it was called
falling,
because falling was what it felt like, and he couldn’t stop himself or even slow down his descent—it would be like trying to stop time. And not knowing how Summer felt was terrifying. Yet the thought of leaving tomorrow was even worse.

Chapter 9

 

Now… (four years later)

 

I
T
WAS
early morning when Crash left Romeo and Julian’s cottage—though he’d been awake for hours before that, staring up at the dawn’s pale light on the cobwebbed ceiling of the converted attic bedroom.

Romeo walked across the fields to the train station with him, the hazy morning sunlight making the world dreamlike and unreal.

If you need me, promise me you’ll text me, and I’ll come. I want to. I want to be there for you,
Romeo signed after they had hugged, holding each other long enough to make some people on the platform stare.
And I know you think you can handle this on your own, but you don’t have to, okay? You were there for me once. I want to do the same.

Okay,
Crash signed. He squeezed Romeo’s hand. Romeo was the closest friend he’d ever had. Once, at the beginning of their friendship, he’d thought they could be more than friends, but not now. Now he saw Romeo more as a brother, family, and there were no sparks at all. There never really had been—just a lot of love.

The six-hour train journey was a blur. Crash rested his head against the window and slept in reluctant bursts, trying to stay awake as much as he could, because the dreams he swam through now were the most painful. These were the ones that threatened to drown him if he fell in too deep.

The quick bright flashes he had of Summer gasping in pain, of Ren hissing that Summer liked it that way.

Of Summer’s tearstained face pleading
Stop! Let him out of here. He’s just a baby!

Of Ren laughing.

The pain of what happened hadn’t lessened over the years. If anything it had deepened, taken root.

Once Crash exited the train at Paddington, he stood outside the overcrowded London station to text Kay, telling her he was all right, but he needed to go see a friend in Essex whom he hadn’t seen for a long time, and he hoped to be back sometime tomorrow.

Just like Romeo had, Kay knew something was wrong, but she seemed to understand he needed to work out whatever it was for himself and told him she wished she could give him a hug and to have a safe journey.

Crash didn’t delay any longer. He went back inside the station, bought a ticket to Essex, and got on the train.

 

 

T
HE
RUN
-
DOWN
station led out onto the high street. It looked the same, and yet different, everything a hundred years old and faded in the sun.

Slinging his backpack over his shoulder, Crash set off toward the playing fields. Halfway down the high street, he passed the narrow alleyway that led to Ren’s club and ignored the prickling sensation he felt against his skin. He would go there later, if he had to. He just hoped it wouldn’t be necessary, and if he found Summer at his old house, it wouldn’t be.

After circling the block of run-down maisonettes that was imprinted on his memory and trying to rid himself of some anxiety, he forced his feet to stop walking, closed his eyes, and balling his hand into a fist, he thumped the wood of the front door and waited.

And waited.

He knocked again. Nothing. Taking care not to tread on the weedy flowerbeds, Crash tried to peer in at the front window, but the curtains were drawn. It was the same around the back.

Unsure what to do, he knocked one more time on the front door. He was just about to walk away when, out of the corner of his eye, he saw an elderly lady step out of the house next door.

“They’re long gone, love,” she said when he looked at her.

His heart sank. The disappointment must have shown on his face as the woman smiled pityingly.

“When?” he asked.

“Terrible business. Mother took an overdose about a month ago, and she’s still in hospital. The little girl, Sky, got taken into care.”

The woman carried on talking, but Crash looked away. He didn’t mean to be rude, but he was shocked and having difficulty accepting this new information. The fact that the old woman hadn’t mentioned Summer must mean he wasn’t living here anymore, but Crash would have bet money on Summer doing everything he could to stop Sky being put into care, especially if he was living independently somewhere.

But perhaps Summer wasn’t in a position to offer Sky a home.

Thoughts like this did nothing to ease Crash’s worry. But worrying helped no one. Doing something was the only thing that ever helped.

“What about Summer?” he asked.

“Oh, the boy? Think the mother chucked him out. It was after that she really went downhill. He was such a nice kid too. Used to bring me papers and check on me if the weather was bad and I couldn’t get out.”

Crash nodded as she wittered on. Hearing about Summer made him feel weightless and untethered, and he didn’t want her to stop talking.

“Light went out of him, though, few years ago now. I don’t know what happened, but he just didn’t seem happy anymore. When he left, I hoped he’d get it back. I reckon being around that mother was what did it—that, and the bad crowd he fell in with.”

Her expression darkened, and Crash felt it too, knew she meant Ren and the club.

“Do you know where he went?”

“Not a clue, love.”

With a sunken feeling in his chest, Crash thought about Ren’s club. It was the only other place he knew to look for Summer. He would go there tonight. The knowledge made him feel a little queasy.

It didn’t open until 8:00 p.m. Until then he needed to put aside the many baseless possibilities—of what had happened, and where Summer might be—that sought purchase in his mind.

“Thank you,” Crash called out as he walked away, hoping the old woman heard him.

Retracing the footsteps of a long-past summer day, Crash walked toward the sea wall, seeking out the path that descended down the cliff to the bay. He found it overgrown from disuse, and after obstinately picking his way through the overgrowth for a couple of minutes, he saw the bottom half of the cliff face had crumbled away into the sea, leaving no way down. Resting on a lump of rock, Crash let the sea air wash over him.

He’d meant to book himself into one of those cheap hotels near the train station so he was certain he had somewhere to stay—it was a hang-up from being on the street, he supposed. He still liked to know where he was going to sleep, especially if he was going out. But exhausted by the day’s journey, he told himself there was no rush. He would head back in a bit. Within minutes he was falling asleep, dozing there in the deepening afternoon light, lulled by the scent of the sea.

Chapter 10

 

Before….

 

D
AWN

S
ROSE
glow filtered through Summer’s thin curtains. As gently as he could, Christopher eased his slightly deadened arm out from beneath Summer’s side and crept, in what he hoped was a quiet fashion, over to the window, opening it a tiny bit to let the scent of the sea fill his lungs. Everything was still and newly beautiful. He’d never felt as alive as he did right then, as if his life before now had been spent just sleeping. It was all so exactly right.

A warm arm encircled his waist, startling him, but then thrilling him to the core when the shock passed. Perhaps he needed to work on the creeping. Summer’s sharp chin rested on his shoulder—he must have been standing on the very tips of his toes to reach.

“I’m sorry I woke you,” Christopher said, turning around and pulling Summer loosely into his arms.

“Missed you, that’s all.” Summer smiled. “Want to go for a walk? The sunrise looks amazing over the sea.”

Shoeless and still in the clothes they slept in, they climbed out Summer’s window, leaving it wedged open with a folded piece of paper, and walked hand in hand down to the cliff edge.

If everything stopped right now—if time, the world, paused in this moment—Christopher knew he wouldn’t have minded.

Sitting on the sea wall, they watched the pink glow expand like a slow explosion of light across the horizon. They didn’t kiss, but Christopher held Summer close and hoped with everything inside him that what he felt was not one-sided.

Back in Summer’s room, Christopher helped Summer shift his wardrobe in front of his door so they wouldn’t be disturbed, and they fell straight back into bed. Summer didn’t pull back this time when Christopher slipped his hands beneath his T-shirt. With a look of slightly fearful determination in his eyes, Summer pulled his T-shirt off over his head.

BOOK: Wild Summer
6.71Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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