Crash Into Me | ✓

twenty-five

One of the few pluses of being unemployed (or as Brooklyn called it, funemployed) was being able to go to the beach during the week, avoiding all of the chaos of drunk teenagers and families with 10 kids. We placed our chairs where the tide met the grainy white sand of the shoreline, letting water lap up to our ankles.

We had invited Nikki, but she refused, saying she'd rather swallow a live goldfish than come with us. The bitterness in her voice was more than enough to send a message.

I globbed sunscreen all over my arms and legs, desperate to shield my fair complexion. Brooklyn was already lazily sprawled out in his chair, with sunglasses on and his feed buried in the sand.

"You should put some of this on," I said, hanging the bottle of sunscreen to him. He waved me off.

"I'm fine," he muttered, slouching down in his chair even more. "I don't burn. It's cute that you care, though."

I gave him a slight chuckle. "I guess that's sort of my job."

A cool breeze came in from the ocean, and with it came the smell of the sea. I thought back to what Nikki had said to me when we first moved here - that salt water was the cure to everything. I didn't know how much I believed it at first, but looking over at Brooklyn, half asleep with a faint smile, I realized how much I wanted to believe it. He hummed along quietly to the music playing from his phone, and I let my nerves unwind, listening to all the sounds of things finally being at peace.

"It's weird, I feel like a little kid," he said softly, reaching over for my hand. "You're like the girl I used to chase around on the playground in 3rd grade. Her name was Leia, like Princess Leia from Star Wars, even though she hated when I called her that. She had long, pretty hair like yours, too. She thought I hated her, but I just had a huge crush on her."

"Did you ever catch her?" I asked. "When you used to chase her around, I mean."

"No," Brooklyn replied. "Not once."

"I think maybe that means you were meant to catch someone else," I said, slowly running my fingers over his knuckles.

"The problem is, every time I catch her, my dumb ass lets her go." He chuckled dryly and shook his head. "But she keeps coming back...and I don't understand why."

"Because she cares." I gave him a soft smile. "And you know how the saying goes - if you let something go and it comes back, that just means it's meant to be yours."

Brooklyn looked at me over the tops of his sunglasses. My eyes met his, and Brooklyn's darkened into the color only the deepest parts of the ocean would be. But it wasn't that terrible, lonely haze I was used to. They flickered with such a pure desire, that it made lust surge through me like a storm.

"Is that how the saying goes?" he asked with a coy smirk.

"Something like that." I returned his smirk.

He sighed and leaned back into the chair. "Sometimes...I look at you and I think I'm dreaming." He grinned that charming, boyish grin of his again.

"I think the heat has made you delusional," I replied with a chuckle.

"Not any more than I already was."