K. Bromberg - Driven

“Shall we?” he asks nodding toward the steps that lead off the patio and on to the beach. I smile at him as he places a hand on the small of my back and ushers me down the stairway, pulling me quickly aside as Baxter bounds down the steps in unfettered excitement.

Barefoot, we walk side by side along the juncture where the wet sand meets the dry sand. Colton throws a ball intermittently for Baxter and his boundless energy while we chat idly about this and that.

“You know, my sister was surprised to see you at the track the other day.”

“Really? I couldn’t tell. She seemed so warm and inviting when I met her.”

Colton smiles ruefully at my sardonic tone. “I apologize. She’s usually not like that.”

“Hmm-hmm,” I murmur, my expression telling him I find it hard to believe. “It’s okay though, because I thought she was another of the BBB.”

“BBB?”

“Your Bevy of Blonde Beauties club.”

“Oh, come on,” he laughs, “I’m not that bad!”

“C’mon, Ace, have you googled yourself lately? All the pictures of you with your gaggle of women?” He goes quiet and for the first time I think I see embarrassment wash through his cheeks. I’m not too happy of the thought either, considering the fact that I’m now part of that horde. Not sure how I feel about that.

“No, I don’t google myself,” he says finally, “but it’s kind of hot knowing that you’re looking at me when you’re not with me.” I turn my head from him and look at the houses on our right, hiding my blush from him.

We walk a bit further, each lost in our own thoughts until I stop to absently dig up a shell with my big toe that is lying partially in the sand. Colton breaks the silence. “I lied to you the other day.”

My foot stops digging at his words, curious where he is going with this. I look over at him. “Go on,” I prompt.

“Well you asked me if I ever fear crashing.” Oh. Okay. Nothing bad . “And I thought about it the other night when I was lying in bed. I mean we all fear crashing, but we try to push it out of our minds or it will affect our driving. I guess it’s a knee-jerk reaction to say that I don’t.”

“Have you ever had a bad crash?” I envision him in a mangled car, and I don’t like the feeling that it evokes within me.

“Once or twice where it’s shaken me up,” he admits as he stops and stares out at Baxter biting at the tiny waves in the water. “So yeah, it scares the shit out of me. All it takes is that one time, but the minute I start driving like I have that fear…the minute I start letting up because of it…is the day that I need to quit.”

“That makes sense,” I offer up, although I can’t fathom hurling myself around a track that fast. Can’t comprehend experiencing that horrible disoriented and dizzying tumbling feeling more than once in my lifetime.

“Besides, I’ve feared much worse things in my life,” he shrugs, still looking out toward the shoreline. “At least on the track, it’s me that puts myself in danger … no one else. My whole team has got my back.”

And you’re not used to that . Not used to depending on others or needing anything from any body.

I hear a distant voice off to the right of us shout in a feeble-sounding voice. “Hi, dear!”

Colton looks over and a huge grin fills his face as he sees a figure standing in the second story window of the clapboard house we are passing. “Hi, Bette!” he responds waving to her as we pass by before grabbing my hand. “That’s Bette Steiner. Her husband was some software tycoon. He died last year so she calls me sometimes if she needs help with anything.” He stoops down to scratch a wiggling Baxter before picking up the ball and throwing it toward the water again.

So the rebellious bad boy takes care of his elderly neighbors. Isn’t he full of unexpected surprises?

We walk for a little while longer in comfortable silence, our fingers intertwined, hands swinging playfully. The houses are beautiful and the mixture of sun on my face, sand on my feet, and Colton beside me warms my heart. We follow a bend in the beach where the bluffs start to rise so that the houses are raised some rather than sitting right on the sand, and Colton pulls me toward a little alcove. A rather large rock with a flat top sits at the base of a small hill layered in various types of greenery that looks out at the ocean.

“I’ll let you in on a little secret,” he tells me as he helps me up onto the rock, before hopping up so that he can sit beside me.

“Oh?”

“This spot, right here, is my little slice of heaven. My place to go and sit when I need a break from everything.”

I lean my head on his shoulder, watching Baxter crash into the waves, pleased that he’s shared something with me. “Your happy place,” I murmur looking up at him. God, he looks gorgeous with his wind-blown hair and yet still a little aloof with his eyes hidden behind his sunglasses. He smiles at me and places a soft kiss onto my forehead.

He is silent for a moment before speaking. “When I was little, I always had this image in my head, my happy place to use your term, where I’d go to in when …”

With his silence, I can feel his body tense up at some memory I’m sure I will never be able to fathom. I reach out and put a hand on his knee, drawing lazy lines with my fingernails. I know I shouldn’t, but “the fixer” in me prevails. “When what, Colton?” I can feel him shake his head back and forth. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“Babe, it’s old news,” he says shrugging his shoulders, effectively pushing me away before hopping abruptly off the rock. “I’m not the only kid who’s had a rough go of things.” Emotion clouds his voice as he walks a couple of feet away from me. I start to speak when he talks over me. “Don’t bother, Rylee,” he chuckles a self-deprecating laugh, “I’ve been picked apart and put back together by the best of them. A waste of my parents’ money if you ask me, seeing as none of them fixed or erased anything.” His next words are barely audible above the sound of the surf, and I’m not sure if he means for me to hear them anyway, but they bring a chill to my skin when he speaks. “I’m damaged goods.”

I want to reach out to him. To tell him that a person who is damaged goods doesn’t help elderly women with chores and make neglected boys feel special by standing up for them. I want to tell him that he is worthy of love and a real relationship for I can see it in his eyes and feel it behind his unspoken words when he is with me. To tell him that what happened as a child—whatever horrible, unimaginable thing it was, does not define who he is today or where he is going. But I say nothing. Instead, I trace the lines of his body with my eyes, wanting to reach out, but unsure how he’d take it.

I am so focused on Colton, that I don’t see Baxter bound up in my periphery until he decides to shake his wet fur all over me. I screech out loud at the bite of the cold water hitting my skin. Colton whirls around to see what happened and lifts his head up to the sky laughing at me. A deep, sincere laughter that lights up his face and eases the tension in his shoulders.

“Baxter!” I shout as Colton walks back to me, removing his sunglasses and hooking them onto the back of his t-shirt’s neckline. I look up to him, a false pout on my lips, “I’m all wet now.”

Colton presses his thighs between mine so that he stands in front of me while I stay seated. The rock’s height brings us to almost eye level with each other. A slow, salacious grin spreads across his lips and he raises an eyebrow at me. “All wet, huh?” he asks as he places his hands on my hips and pulls me into him, his hips between the apex of my thighs. “I like it when you’re all wet, Ryles.”