Cool for the Summer by Dahlia Adler (the read aloud family .txt) 📕

“So, not done yet, I see.”

“Uh, no, sir.”

Jasmine snorts. I have not called Declan “sir” once the entire summer. In fact, I have carefully avoided referring to him as anything at all, except to thank him for having me. And when I did call him Mr. Killary, he immediately told me to call him Declan.

I did not.

“There’s still time,” he says with a wink, and he walks out.

“Uh, no, sir,” Jasmine mocks me, and I elbow her in the side. She bursts out laughing, and so do I, and we get to work.

It takes us twenty minutes of working side by side, with zero fooling around, to finish and clean up enough not to leave a gross mess for the crew that’ll be taking care of it at the end of the night. By the time we head to our respective showers, I positively reek.

As I scrub the smells of onion, garlic, and bell pepper from my skin, I can’t help thinking how funny it is that Jasmine comes off as the most dauntingly sophisticated seventeen-year-old girl on the planet, but when it’s only us, she’s somebody else entirely. She’s playful and warm and has the patience of a saint when she’s teaching me about exposures and light meters and how to get the best angles in selfies. She’s like her dad in her excitement to get me to try new things, and like her mom in how much joy she gets from fashion, makeup, and styling. Yesterday, she finally pulled me into her closet and demanded I let her give me some things she never wears, things she swears are too small, and before I know it, I’m wearing an entirely new outfit from earrings to anklet. (Her having dinky-size feet like mine was too much to hope for, unfortunately.)

And later at night, especially nights when Mom and Declan are at events, or traveling to meetings, or even nights where Mom passes out early and Declan locks himself in his suite, far away from the rest of us … those nights show me something else entirely.

We inevitably end up in her bed, curled around one another and playing with each other’s fingers or giving each other chills until one of us finds an excuse to place a kiss on the other. It’s agony, waiting until I can figure out how to get away with it, or waiting for her to, waiting, waiting, waiting until we can explain it away with sleepiness or drunkenness or just wanting the other one to feel and taste how amazing this new lip gloss is.

I’ve started to think about them in advance, how I might excuse dropping a kiss on this one spot on her neck that always elicits this tiny noise that makes my toes curl. It isn’t quite a moan and it isn’t quite a growl and as soon as I hear it, I’m out of my mind for the rest of the night.

Maybe tonight we can pick up where we left off. If I can get a dab of guac on her throat, I can watch her close her eyes as I lick it off. Hear that sound she makes as I lick again for good measure. And again. Maybe I gently suck at her throat, the way I did the other night. Judging by the way she pressed against me, by the way I can still feel the pressure of her fingertips below my waist, the way I could just barely hear her begging me to do it again …

Images come to mind of sliding off her shirt—for easier access to that spot, of course. Of taking mine off, which only makes sense. Who wants a rough cotton shirt against your skin when someone else’s skin feels so much better? And her skin is so soft, scented with that peach lotion, and—

I don’t even realize what I’ve been doing until my nails scrape the tile of the shower, trying to find something to hold onto while my body shudders around my fingers. I grasp the indentation in the wall meant to hold soap and promise myself that I’ll think about how messed-up this is later, after I’m done feeling so, so good.

True to my word, I feel like a mess when I dry myself off after the shower. I don’t know how else to describe it because I don’t feel gross, exactly—it’s not like I think there’s anything wrong with masturbating (or, let’s be real, like it’s my first time), or with finding a girl attractive. I just feel confused. And guilty. This is how I think about Chase; it isn’t how I’m supposed to be thinking about Jasmine. It isn’t how she’d want me to think about her. God, if she knew what’d happened, she’d probably never touch me again.

I wish I was okay with that.

I’m supposed to be okay with that.

It’s something we do for fun, not something I think about in the shower or feel down to my bones. It’s not something we do with intention.

But isn’t that what you were just doing, by thinking about how to make it happen? my brain nags. You were trying to plan it, and the whole point is that this is a thing that only occasionally happens between you two.

Except it’s not occasional.

When did it stop being occasional?

It’s too much. It’s messing with my brain. I already have my shower rotation all worked out, and it fully involves a certain number fourteen football player. There isn’t any more space for those kinds of thoughts. Chase has been serving me just fine for years now.

Anyway, nothing’s going to happen tonight. All our friends are coming to the boil, as are Declan’s, and knowing my mom, she invited some of her new Russian friends. The house and beach will be packed, and maybe somewhere in there will be a new guy to entertain myself with—someone who makes sense, who’ll be a perfect