by Mila Gray
‘I saw the photograph over by your dad’s workbench,’ I say.
Kit frowns. ‘What picture?’
‘The old one.’
It was framed and hanging on a nail over the lathe. At first I thought I had to be seeing things, but closer inspection revealed that it was my dad in the photograph standing beside Kit’s dad. They were both in uniform and they both looked so young, as young as Kit and Riley. They were smiling at the camera, my dad half turned towards Kit’s dad as though laughing at a joke he’d just made, and Kit’s father grinning much the same way Kit does. Kit’s father was film-star good-looking when he was younger. Even today some of the people who knew him back then call him by his nickname McQueen, after the actor Steve McQueen, because of his mesmerically blue eyes. Like Kit’s.
‘I thought your dad and my dad hated each other,’ I say.
Kit smirks. ‘No. Your dad hates my dad. You forget my dad is a man of the cloth. He doesn’t hate anyone. Or so he says.’
I frown. ‘So what happened between them then? Do you know? Has he ever told you? My dad won’t talk about it.’
Kit shoots a quick glance my way. ‘No. I’m not totally sure of the story. Have you tried asking your mom?’
‘She won’t tell me. She said it’s too sad and there’s no point dredging up old memories.’
‘Well, there you go, then,’ Kit says. ‘Maybe we should leave it alone. Let them figure it out by themselves.’
‘It’s been twenty years – I’m not sure they’re ever going to figure it out.’
Kit looks at me curiously. ‘Why are you worrying about it? Some things you just have to let go of.’
I sigh and look out the window.
‘What’s the matter?’ Kit says, putting his hand back on my knee.
I turn towards him. ‘Just . . . um . . . It doesn’t matter.’ Kit looks at me, his eyebrows raised. I take a deep breath. ‘Just . . . I wish my dad didn’t . . .’ I tail off.
‘Hate me so much?’ he finishes for me.
‘Yeah,’ I admit.
Kit shrugs. ‘I can live with it.’
‘But it sucks, you know?’ I say, my voice rising. ‘It isn’t fair. You didn’t do anything.’
Kit’s voice is quiet and soft when he answers. ‘Life’s not about fair, Jessa.’ When I huff again he adds, ‘It’s cool.’
‘But it makes things harder,’ I murmur.
‘What things?’ Kit asks.
‘This – us – ’ I say, gesturing at his hand on my knee, then I stop. ‘Why are you grinning?’
‘Because you said us.’
My cheeks flare and my insides squirm like live bait. Have I been way too presumptuous? Is he teasing me, or did he like the sound of it?
‘Let’s not worry about it now,’ Kit says quietly.
I press my lips together. Easy for him to say – he doesn’t live with my dad. If he finds out I’m dating Kit . . . hang on, I’m not dating Kit. Jump ahead much, Jessa? Well, if my dad finds out I’ve skipped out in the middle of the night to spend time with Kit, just the two of us, then I don’t want to imagine what he’ll do. Or Riley. Crap. I grip the edge of the seat so hard my knuckles turn white. I’d been so worried thinking about what my dad would do if he found out that I didn’t think about Riley. But that’s almost as bad to contemplate. Riley’s been protective of me since we were kids. He’s had to stand between me and my dad’s rage on more than one occasion, and I guess the role of protector has stuck.
I’ve never had a boyfriend so I wouldn’t know how Riley would react, but one time he thought a guy looked funny at me and almost hit him. Riley’s hot-headed, and more than once my parents were called to the principal’s office because he’d got into a playground fight, but since he joined the military he seems to have mellowed. Ironic, I know. He controls his temper a lot better, that’s for sure. I think the fear of becoming like our dad has something to do with it. Though I think discovering Kit and I have hooked up might test that theory.
‘Hey, put some music on,’ Kit says, interrupting my thoughts. He tosses me his phone.
I connect it to the radio speakers and start to flick through his iTunes. There’s a lot of hip hop, but also, surprisingly, a lot of blues and jazz.
‘There’s a playlist called “road trip”,’ he says.
I find it and press play and Joni Mitchell starts blasting through the speakers. I raise my eyebrows.
‘Joni Mitchell?’ I say.
Kit smiles and shrugs. ‘What’s wrong with Joni?’
‘Just not what I expected from you.’
‘I have a soft and sweet side. You just haven’t discovered it yet.’
I smile at him. ‘Yes I have. You might think you’re a badass soldier, but I’ve known you since you were fourteen, Kit. You can’t fool me. I know who you are.’
He looks across at me, his mouth pulling up at one side, a curious look on his face.
One of the reasons I fell for Kit in the first place is because he’s not like normal guys. For a start, not many twenty-one-year-olds are as physically fit as him or Riley. The Marine Corps training is the toughest in the military, and by the time they finished their sixteen-week basic training they were both unrecognizable. They’d both been fit before, but when they came home my jaw hit the ground. They were pure, solid muscle, leaner, sharper-angled somehow, their eyes quicker, their posture more rigid, their bearing more confident.
But it’s not Kit’s physique that I’m talking about. It’s the way he is, the confidence he has that’s beyond his years. He speaks softly – I’ve never seen him lose his temper or shout – and when he walks into a room it’s like he’s a magnet and everything, including the air, is drawn towards him. Although I know he can strip an automatic weapon in under ten seconds and is trained to lead men into battle, I’ve also seen him singing lullabies to his baby nieces while he cradles them in his arms, and jump off a pier to save a drowning dog.
‘You remember the time you and Riley took me to the movies?’ I ask.
Kit frowns, trying to recall it. I guess the memory isn’t as deeply embedded in his brain as it is in mine. It was a night my dad was throwing a fit – about dinner being late or something equally trivial – and Riley and Kit bundled me out the house and took me for a burger and a movie. In my head I pretended I was on a date (handily ignoring Riley’s presence).
‘You guys wanted to see Iron Man 2 but it was sold out so you took me to see Eclipse instead,’ I remind him.
Kit grimaces instantly. ‘Oh yeah, how could I forget the sparkly vampires.’
‘Don’t give me that. You totally cried at the end. I saw you.’
Kit opens his mouth to protest but then shuts it. ‘Well, you know, I’m a little partial to stories about forbidden love,’ he says. ‘Give a guy a break.’
We drive for another hour except it doesn’t feel like an hour because we spend the whole time laughing and talking, and it’s only when I glance at the watch on Kit’s wrist and see that it’s nearly midnight that I bother to look out at the dark stretch of road we’re on and ask, ‘Are we driving all the way across the country?’
‘No ma’am,’ Kit answers. ‘Five more miles and we’re there.’
I look out at the empty dark desert on either side of the car. It’s impossible to see anything beyond the twenty or so metres that are lit up by the truck headlights. A buzz of excitement hits me. I settle back in my seat, cocooning myself inside his sweater, and he looks across at me. ‘That’s better,’ he says, taking my hand and squeezing it.
‘What’s better?’
‘You didn’t ask where we were going.’
I frown at him but he just keeps smiling.
‘You’re starting to trust me,’ he says.
9
Kit
I guide the truck slowly over the rutted ground and kill the engine. The sudden silence that fills the cab is louder than television static. I glance across at Jessa who’s staring out the window expectantly, a little
line furrowing her brow. I know she really wants to ask where we are and is desperately trying not to. I put her out of her misery by killing the headlights. Immediately blackness envelops us, rushing in like a wave, swallowing the car whole. Jessa gasps. The sky above us is lit up like a chandelier.
I crack open the door and get out the truck. ‘Wait there,’ I tell her, but she doesn’t answer; she’s staring at the sky with a look of total wonder on her face.
I hop up onto the flatbed of the truck and lay out the blankets I brought, regretting not bringing pillows. Not for me – I’ve slept on far harder ground than this – but for Jessa. I hope it’s not too cold. The desert’s freezing at night, even at this time of year.
Once I’m done I hop down and head around to the passenger side to open the door. I take Jessa’s hand and she slips down from the truck. She doesn’t say a word. Her head is cricked backwards staring up at the night sky. Putting my hands on her waist I lift her up so she can scramble onto the flat bed of the truck, then climb up after her. Jessa’s kneeling down on the blanket and I lie down on my side beside her.
‘This is amazing,’ she says, still not taking her eyes off the sky.
‘It’s one of the best places in California for stargazing,’ I say, though I’m yet to look at the stars. Next to Jessa they kind of pale.
‘I can’t believe I’ve never been here before,’ she says, resting back on her elbows and stretching her legs out. I take a deep breath, trying to tear my eyes off the smooth, tempting length of them. I snatch the spare blanket and throw it over us, then lie down beside her. After a moment she rolls gently against me. I lift my arm and she scoots even closer, resting her head on my shoulder. For a long while neither of us moves, and I’m not sure about Jessa, but I know that I’m not thinking about stars. All I can concentrate on is the feel of Jessa’s body relaxing against mine, the warmth of her bare legs pressed against my thigh, the feel of her breasts against my side and the cool silk of her hair tickling my neck.
The tension in her body gradually seeps away as my hand gently strokes her shoulder and arm beneath the blanket. Goosebumps prickle her skin and my gut tightens in answer. I want nothing more than to kiss her, but I don’t. I don’t want her to think I brought her all this way just so I could make out with her. I mean, I do want to make out with her, but I also want to take things slowly, make sure she knows I’m not putting any pressure on her. If all we did was lie here and look up at the stars, that would be enough.
‘That’s the big dipper,’ I say, pointing out the plough shape of stars in the sky. ‘And this little one here, that’s the little dipper, Ursa Minor. See the brightest star in it? At the end of the handle? That’s the North Star.’
Jessa follows my hand with her eyes.
‘It’s always there, all night. Doesn’t rise, doesn’t set. All the other stars revolve around it. It’s the one you look for if you’re lost. It’ll take you home.’
Jessa is quiet for a moment. ‘How do you know all this?’ she finally asks.
‘They taught us in basic training. We have to be able to navigate without a compass at night.’
Jessa tenses a little and then her hand moves beneath the blanket and comes to rest on my stomach. Oh man. I hope to God it stays there and doesn’t wander any lower, because I’m barely managing to stay cool as it is.
‘What else did they teach you?’ she asks, her fingertips gently and slowly smoothing their way across my T-shirt, tracing the bottom line of my ribs and then my stomach muscles. Blood pounds in my ears like a hammer against an anvil.
‘To iron. I have mad ironing skills,’ I practically stammer. ‘And I also know which spoon to use for soup and which to use for dessert.’
‘Useful in the heat of battle,’ she laughs. ‘Why do you need to know about place settings?’
‘We work in an embassy. We’re guarding diplomats.
They give us etiquette lessons before they send us into the field so we don’t go embarrassing ourselves at all the fancy functions and act like grunts who’ve never seen a knife and fork before.’
Jessa leans up on one shoulder and looks at me strangely, as though she’s checking if I’m kidding or not. I’m not. ‘You get to go to parties?’ she asks.
I shrug, pulling her back down so her head rests on my shoulder. I like feeling the weight of it there. ‘Yeah, sometimes. I mean, embassy functions, socials, that kind of thing.’
‘And there I was imagining you living in a dorm with a dozen guys, standing sentry all night and living on rat packs.’
She’s talking about the foil pouches containing what some guy with no taste buds who works in supply believes constitutes food – the packs marines are forced to eat in combat zones. ‘Nah,’ I tell her. ‘No rat packs for us. We have our own chef.’
She tries to sit up again but I tickle her under the arm and she collapses back down, this time almost right on top of me.
‘You get your own chef?’ she asks, incredulous. ‘No wonder you and Riley both wanted to become embassy guards.’
It’s true. Both Riley and I trained hard and sat numerous tests so we could be selected for embassy duty. They’re pretty choosy, but we both made the rank of corporal and then made the grade. But right now, it must be said, I couldn’t pass a simple English proficiency test. Jessa’s thigh is flung across my legs, her stomach resting on my hip, and I can feel my body responding automatically. I try to think of my old drill sergeant screaming in my face, to picture myself in the pit doing push-ups until my body cramps, but when Jessa leans her weight on her arms and looks down at me, her hair trailing down on either side of my face, her lips just an inch from my own, all those images vanish, replaced with just one – her naked beneath me.
It’s been almost a year since I’ve been with a girl. Usually marine security guards have the easiest time when it comes to getting girls. We’re based in cities, guarding embassies, we’re not infantry on deployment, so we go to parties, find ways to sneak girls into our dorms, flirt with embassy staff and have affairs, even though we’re not supposed to. I’ve had several casual flings over the years while based overseas, and a few here in between deployments, but in Sudan there wasn’t much in the way of nightlife and all the embassy staff were male. Even if they hadn’t been, though, I know I wouldn’t have been looking, not with Jessa so much on my mind.
She presses her lips to mine and I have to suppress a groan. I hold her hips lightly and then stroke a hand up her back between her shoulder blades. My tongue explores her mouth and even though I’m longing to explore more than that, to run my hands over every curve of her body, kiss every bare inch of her, I don’t. I’m happy to go at whatever pace she wants to set. Besides, kissing her is plenty. I bite her bottom lip and she lets out a gasp and digs her fingers into my waist. I’m so hard that the pressure of her weight is making things painful.
Eventually, unable to take it much more, I roll her off my chest and onto her side, turning to face her. My pulse is so elevated you’d think I’d just run a three-minute mile, and I have to take a long, deep breath to try to steady it. Jessa’s cheeks are flushed and she’s breathing fast. She places a hand on my face, grazing her palm across my jaw, then traces the shape of my lips. I kiss her fingertips and watch her as she takes in a sharp breath. Her eyelids become heavy, her lips part. My mind fills with the image of her lying naked in my arms, her head thrown back with abandon. My imagination is most definitely making up for lost time.
‘So,’ she whispers. ‘Are you going to tell me then?’
‘Tell you what?’ I ask.
She smiles slyly, her fingers delicately tapping my collar bone. ‘Your dad asked if you were going to tell me how you feel.’
I stare at her. Put me on the spot much? ‘Still thinking about it,’ I tell her, enjoying the disappointment that flares across her face. I wink at her. ‘Don’t want to mess things up.’
Jessa’s disappointment gives way to a smile. I kiss her once more, then draw away, rolling onto
my back and pulling her under my arm. She sighs contentedly and rests her head on my chest, just below my chin.
I think about what she said earlier, about how she sees through me, how she knows me. Her words struck me hard as a kick to the ribs, jolting something free inside of me – a truth I’d been avoiding. Ever since I became a marine I’ve felt like I belong to a different tribe, always on the outside looking back in at the rest of the world, playing a role that I put on the first time I wore my uniform.
But with Jessa, I don’t ever feel that way. Lying with her right now, under this endless sky, it feels like we’re the only two people in the world, and for once I’m not on the outside, I’m right on the inside, exactly where I belong. When I’m in uniform, I feel like I’m pretending at being someone – someone I’m not sure I really am. When Jessa looks at me, my body lets go of all the tension it’s been holding, all the pretence, and just relaxes, and it feels good. It feels better than good. It feels like freedom.
I like the way she sees me, I think to myself as I stare up at the million dead and dying stars above us. It’s someone worth striving to be.
10
Jessa
All he does is hold me, his hand gently stroking my waist, occasionally pressing his lips to my forehead, but I have never felt so connected to anyone before in my life. My lips still burn, my cheeks are stinging from where they scraped his stubble, and my heart is beating super-naturally fast.
I was nervous – stupidly nervous – when he lay down beside me, that, being way more experienced than me, he’d have expectations, but now I smile to myself. I should have known Kit would never push. I smile wider when I remember how he felt when I lay down on top of him. He was definitely turned on. And the fact he hasn’t tried to go faster than I want to ironically makes me want him even more. Last summer I had a fling with a guy which ended because he kept trying to convince me to do stuff I wasn’t ready to do. If he’d just played it cool and not put any pressure on me, then maybe I wouldn’t still be a virgin. Half of me wishes I wasn’t because Kit’s so obviously not, but half of me is also glad because if I had to choose anyone in the world to lose my virginity to, other than say Ryan Gosling, it would be Kit.