The Wrong Kind of Right

chapter 4

I noticed her hands first — that was the problem.

We were re-caulking the hull of an old Chris-Craft my father had promised some guy in town he'd have ready by August, and Aria had rolled her sleeves up, hair tied back with what looked like a rubber band she'd stolen from the junk drawer, completely focused on getting the bead of sealant even. She was terrible at it. Genuinely bad. And she kept going anyway, tongue between her teeth in concentration, refusing to let me take over even after I offered twice.

"You're going to have to redo that whole section," I said.

"I know."

"You're doing it wrong on purpose?"

"I'm doing it my way, which is apparently synonymous with wrong in your world." She didn't even look up. "Some of us learn by messing it up first."

"Some of us don't have time for that."

"Then teach me instead of narrating my failures."

That stopped me. Not because she was wrong — she wasn't — but because nobody talked to me like that. Not since Claire, and even then it had usually ended in one of us storming off rather than actually fixing anything.

I set my tools down and crouched next to her, closer than strictly necessary for the task. "Hold the gun at more of an angle. Steady pressure, don't stop mid-line or it pools."

She adjusted. It was better. Not perfect, but better.

"See," she said, entirely too pleased with herself, "was that so hard?"

"You're insufferable."

"You keep saying that like it's an insult."

I didn't have a response to that — not one I trusted myself to say out loud, anyway — because standing that close to her, watching her smile at her own stupid joke like she'd won something, I had the distinct, unwelcome realization that I liked her. Not in the roommate-tolerating way I'd been telling myself all week. In the real way. The dangerous way.

The kind of way that had gotten me left at an altar the last time I'd let myself feel it.

I stood up too fast, mumbled something about checking the tide charts, and walked away before she could see whatever expression was on my face.

She didn't call after me. But I felt her watching me go, and for the rest of the afternoon, I couldn't quite get my hands to stop being unsteady.