Two Birds, One Stone

19. Love Labor

if i see one fucking frozen reference i'm deleting my wattpad

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     Jamie gasped as I grabbed him from behind, tucking my arms around his waist and sending the both of us stumbling several steps. He turned around to face me, hooking his arms around my neck, and kissed me up on his toes.

     It was a Friday night, and it was raining. I had asked Jamie to meet me on the football field -- for old times' sake.

     I needed the getaway. He did, too. Because, in all honesty, things had been getting bad for us lately. For both of us, individually.

     Jamie was doing better in school, but the tole it took on him was obvious, and his fading withdrawal symptoms didn't help. I knew that when he was alone, sometimes he sank really, really low. My situation sure as hell hadn't gotten any better, either. It seemed to get worse every week, and I still hadn't told a soul what I was dealing with. We were both spiraling, and we could both see it happening, but there wasn't much either of us could do. On our own, we were pretty damn miserable.

     But in moments like these -- when together was all we had to be for a few seconds or minutes or hours -- we put two bads side-by-side and made a good. I always felt like I was at an all time high when I was alone with Jamie, and I was certain he felt the same with me, so we stole these little moments whenever we could, using them as an escape from all of the low that followed us the second we separated. And we made these moments as happy as we could -- stupid and giddy and easy -- because we wouldn't get much happy once they ended.

     I caught Jamie by surprise, lifting him off the ground like we were in Dirty Dancing and singing (screaming), "I . . . haaad the time of my liiiife!" Jamie yelped, then laughed, then demanded I put him down, then laughed some more when I didn't, giving in and wrapping his legs around my hips. "No I neeever felt this way before!"

     "You're crazy!" he huffed, running his hands into my rain-soaked hair and pushing his smiling lips against mine.

    "Crazy for you," I said cheekily, earning a snort and a push at my chest in response. "You're so smiley today," I pointed out as I set him down. As if to prove my point, I brought my hand up to hold his cheek, and my thumb traced the grinning outline of his lips. "I wonder why . . . Am I breaking the bad boy?"

     Jamie scoffed. "I'm still, like, ninety-eight percent jackass," he said, and he tried to force down his smile, but when that failed, he gave in and said, "But yeah, you might be, a little bit. You do this . . . this thing."

     "What thing?" I mused, kissing the corner of his mouth.

     "Fuck you," Jamie groaned. "That," he said, nodding his head. "You're you, and that's so annoying, because you make me feel all gross and cheesy and shit, like . . . like, I fucking hate poetry, but I feel like I'd write a whole goddamn song about you. That kind of thing. The lovey shit."

     Jamie's mouth snapped shut as soon as that last part came out. 

     I felt myself frown. Jamie had been so on edge ever since his I love you confession. I could have sworn he'd almost said it again a few times, but he'd caught himself, like he was scared that saying it more than once was pushing his luck. He got all tense and cagey whenever the word came up at all. He even averted his eyes when Vanessa and Bryan said it to each other at lunch.

     He didn't need to be so scared. I wasn't, because his prediction had been right; I didn't believe him. I hadn't said that to him, though. I hadn't said anything at all. Maybe that was why he was so nervous: he didn't know what I was thinking. But, in the most selfish way possible, I wanted him to be nervous. Not enough to hurt . . . just enough to refrain from saying it again. Because then he couldn't fool himself further.