Iwatch from my window as James crosses the long pasture between barn and house three times. Pacing, but with a field of distance instead of a room’s worth.
I rode Daphine home instead of getting back in the car. The perfect excuse, or, better put, escape. I needed to process. With Colm’s actions and Willa’s offer, my head is swimming. I also didn’t want anyone seeing us together, especially James’s father. Again.
After what happened today, I don’t know what to even say to James. But I do have questions and my emotions keep bouncing from fear to anger and back again.
So, I wrap a sweater over my brown plaid dress and I meet him halfway. James stops his trudging upon noticing me, a statue in the grass. “We need—I mean, I want to talk to you,” he calls out, a few feet away.
“I know a place. Follow me.” I move in a diagonal, toward the cliffs.
“Where?” he asks as he jogs to my side.
I glance at him. Realize his face is too much for me right now and look back to my destination. “Not far.”
Toward Jeffrey and Shelly’s new home the cliffs become riddled with smaller caves, the perfect locale for Feyling dragon colonies. As we approach the murky property line and the cliffs, a light show begins off the coast as a flutter of Feylings emerges to hunt for bugs. Hundreds of tiny dragons whizz across the open ocean, glowing like the twinkling of stars, coating the skyline in blues, greens, and pinks.
James halts. “Wow.”
“Pretty right?”
James nods in appreciation, watching the Feylings whirl and sparkle. My breath catches as hundreds of dragons flock together in unison. In a moment’s notice the grouping transforms from the random twinkling like firefly lights to a wash of color, like paint across the sky.
I settle down in the grass. James sits right next to me and in the silence and darkness I am alert to his every movement. We do need to talk. I just… Today feels too big, too awful.
I sense when James turns toward me. “Are you okay?”
I grab a fistful of grass so cool it feels damp. “No,” I answer honestly.
“Yeah, bad question.” He waits a beat. I can tell he wants me to look at him. But I’m so ashamed of how everything unfolded. “Farren, you need to know. I didn’t tell Colm to ‘go for it.’ Not in the way he implied. I said, if he liked being rejected to go for it. I thought he’d ask you out and you’d shut him up better than I could, since…” He practically stammers at the end. He’s nervous. Just as nervous as me. “Since our deal,” he finishes.
“Pretending to hate each other.”
He sighs. “Yes.”
I blow out a breath, wondering if I should admit this next bit. “That was my first kiss,” I blurt into my hands so I can’t see his confusion, or worse—his pity.
When I do glance at him, it’s not confusion or pity though. Anger lays plain across his face. “I’m sorry. I think… I think he noticed me come into the tent. You know how I told you some of the guystalkedabout you and I’d tried to stop it—”
“By calling me worthless? Yes, I remember.”
James winces. “I think he kissed you to get revenge after losing the race so badly.”
At first, I want to deny that accusation, but it makes sense. The way Colm switched from yelling at me to kissing me—it wasn’t just me not being able to read him. Yet, I still feel foolish and used. “That doesn’t make me feel any better.”
James catches me looking at him and suddenly we’re staring at one another.
“I’m so sorry, Farren.” His eyes soften as he studies me. It amazes me how different staring at James Murphy now is, how I desire his attention more than anything. His warm eyes, all those freckles, his reddish-brown hair even longer than when he arrived. The darkness reminds me of the night the hatchlings were born. The sky is calmer, but my heart thunders.
I break first, eyes flicking back to watch the Feylings. “I’m so embarrassed I admitted that was my first kiss.”
He rubs the back of his neck. “If it makes you feel better, I’ve never kissed anyone.”
“What?” I tumble through my memories. Never did I think we would be equally inexperienced. There were countless girls in our year who talked about wanting to make out with James. Had none of them actually kissed him? Back then it wasn’t like I cared about that information, at least not like I care now.
“Walsh, I’ve never dated anyone. All I do—or did—was training, school, homework, and more training.”
Much like my schedule, taking care of dragons in lieu of training. But dating isn’t a prerequisite for kissing. Not for most people anyway.
“Don’t count Colm,” James says, so quiet I barely catch the words.