Truth or Dare : Falling Part II

“Now? You want to play Truth or Dare now? We’re perched 30 feet up a tree.”

“Got a better idea?” The white flash of his smile was enough for me to consent.

“Fine, whatever. Truth, I guess.”

He folded his fingers across his stomach and wiggled himself into a more comfortable position.

“Did you really think I was gonna fall?”

I rolled my eyes, “Really?”

“Yeah, really.”

“Yes, I thought you were gonna fall. Happy?”

He said nothing. He didn’t have to. I could see the pleasure written all over his smug face. Fine. I narrowed my eyes, “Truth or Dare?”

“Truth.”

“Did you really think I was gonna fall? Is that why you stopped faking it?” He snapped a sharp look my way, and I grinned. Gotcha, I thought. Wiggle out of that if you can.

“Well…” He seemed uncomfortable.

I waited.

“Partly, yeah.”

“Only partly? You mean you were really slipping? Is that why you stopped?” my stomach did a somersault and I sat up from my safe perch, scared all over again.

“What? No! I wasn’t slipping. I was… I saw… I felt guilty, okay?”

“Guilty? Why?”

“For scaring you.”

The words were so unexpected, I almost missed them.

“Oh.” I sat back and got settled again to cover my sudden awkwardness. I slipped a glance his way and met his eyes as he did the same. Butterflies took flight in my abdomen as he turned it into a full-on look. I cleared my throat and said the first thing that came to mind.

“I have to pee.”

His laughter came slowly, but when it did, it broke the awkwardness and my stomach finally calmed.

Fifteen minutes later we were safely on the ground and my bladder was taken care of. We got settled beneath the tree, the sun hitting our faces and forcing us to close our eyes or be blinded.

“Dare” I said.

“I dare you to read the last story you wrote out loud.”

“Wh… The whole thing? It’s 10 pages!”

He shrugged, “Not my problem.”

I sighed and squinted while I rummaged in my backpack for the right notebook. I was both seriously annoyed and secretly pleased. But mostly annoyed. I found the notebook and faced him, my back to the sun so I could see.

“The lake house was the perfect place to keep his victims…” I began.

When I finished, he grinned and poked my calf with his toe. “You should let Mrs. Johnston read that. I’ll bet she would like it.”

“Please. Mrs. Johnston is an English teacher. She’s all about grammar and punctuation. She’d probably hand it back with a red C scrawled across the first page and lines drawn through every adjective. No thanks.”

He started to argue, but I cut him off.

“Your turn. I dare you to show me your last picture.”

“Hey, don’t I get to choose?”

“Nope, I showed you mine, now show me yours.”

He sighed and stabbed a finger at his drawing folder propped against the tree trunk. “It’s in there, first page.”

I scooted closer and snagged the black folio leaning against the tree. He leaned up and watched as I opened it and carefully removed the cover paper from the sketch. It was a pencil sketch of a woman in profile. She looked so lifelike that I almost expected her to turn towards me. She was older and somehow familiar, with every carefully drawn line oozing sadness and regret. My heart squeezed in my chest.

I felt him shift and lean over my shoulder. My skin was full of funny prickles from where his body was suddenly shading mine from the hot afternoon sun, and his voice was soft and warm in my ear.

“Mr. Rickerts says the lines aren’t clean, and it’s too ‘overt’ whatever that means. I have until tomorrow to correct it.”

“Mr. Rickerts is an idiot, Jamie. This is beautiful. And so sad. Who is she?”

“My mom.”

I turned my face to him. My lips almost brushed his cheek and that fluttery feeling started in my stomach again, “Have you seen her or…?”

He shook his head, and I could see the muscle in his jaw twitch, “She’s still gone. I guess it’s more how I imagine my mom would be after she left us.”

I looked down at the picture again. I shook my head, “Don’t change it. Do a different one for the assignment if you have to, but don’t change this one. It’s perfect the way it is.”

He smiled and reached to pull out the page hiding beneath the first, “That’s exactly what I did. Here’s the one I’ll turn in. The assignment was realism, so I figured Buster would be a better subject.”

I giggled at the boxer puppy laying on his back with his tongue lolling out from around a tennis ball.

“Perfect.”

I felt him looking at me and realized we were still just a breath away from one another. If I turned my face now, I would have to lean backward to keep my eyes from crossing. His breath puffed across my cheek as he answered, “Yeah. Perfect.”

My back straightened as I tensed slightly. Was he talking about the picture, or me? While the thought wasn’t unwelcome, it was a little disconcerting. I fixed my unseeing eyes on the picture in front of me and forced a laugh, “A little full of yourself, aren’t you?”

The silence only lasted a few seconds, but it felt like full minutes before he answered.

“I dare you to kiss me.”

I swallowed hard. “Where?” It was the first thing that came to mind, and I immediately regretted it. Who says that? What if he laughed? What if he answered? What if he said…

“Lady’s choice.”

Oh.

He leaned away, and I felt the sun biting through my shirt into the skin of my back again. I looked at him and was caught by the warmth in his eyes. There was a full kaleidoscope of butterflies taking flight in my stomach now, but as the seconds drew out and his gaze held steady, they calmed and my back loosened.

“Okay.”

I broke his gaze and my look traveled down to his hands. They rested over his knees and I reached out to take hold of one. I flipped it over to study his palm. The lines there temporarily mesmerized me, they were so different from my own. I traced all of them and lingered over the short stubby lifeline. I moved on to his fingers and realized how well suited they were to the art he loved so much. I found a small cut on the side of his index finger and without thinking leaned down to kiss it.

My lips grazed his skin briefly before I turned my cheek into the cup of his hand. I stayed like that for a moment. It felt nice. Normal. Safe. He was holding perfectly still, like he didn’t want to scare me, and I was comforted. I didn’t want the contact to end.

I set his hand back into his lap and leaned closer. I could feel the tenseness in his body, but I was more relaxed. I dropped a small kiss on his cheek and, before my heart had pounded another beat, his face was turning towards mine. It was the most natural thing in the world. Even though the kiss lasted only seconds, the sweetness lingered.

I pulled away and settled in my former spot, reclining against the tree, eyes closed, with the sun blinding me through my eyelids. He rolled over onto his stomach and turned his backpack into an impromptu pillow. As he got comfortable and turned his face towards me, I opened one eye and looked over at him. His grin turned into a look of false chagrin as I reminded him, “Payback is a bitch.”