ORANGE

            Once I'm on the wooden platform with him, I can hardly breathe. I brush the sole of each foot against the shin of the other to clean them of the forest floor, then edge to my previous spot. Miles stays standing. As do I, occupied instead with thumbing the sugar residue on my palm.

Then he speaks and I'm staring at him. 'You've not got your cell on you, do you?'

'No, it's–'

Miles has pushed me into the lake before I notice him move.

The shock of the impact and drop in temperature activates every cell in my body and for a split second, I think my skeleton might jump out of my skin. But by the time my head breaks the surface, my clothes waving like clusters of seaweed around me, I'm comfortable in the embrace of the water.

I feign a scowl nonetheless. 'Dickhead! What if I didn't know how to swim?'

'I kinda assumed from you proposing the idea that you do.'

'What'd you do that for?'

'Thought it were funny.'

'Oh, bare hilarious.'

I splash water at him. It barely dots his New Balances, which he steps out of. When Miles takes off his shoes, he unties the laces and then eases each off with his hand. Does he care for everything with such patience? Will you be so gentle with my bones if I hand them to you?

He pulls his shirt over his head and I actually forget how to swim. I emerge spluttering from the water just in time to see him dive from the platform. Brilliant. I'm a dying cat and he's Michael Phelps.

I turn around, bobbing on the spot, and peer at the surface for signs of him. The sun has disappeared behind the hill; thankfully, I don't have to squint. Miles resurfaces some five metres from the platform. He wipes a hand down his face, then along his shaved scalp and though it's too picturesque not to be a performance, I feel as though I'm infringing.

'It's colder than I thought.'

'Thought you were northern.'

I wade toward him, weighed down by my clothes so that when two metres remain between us, I'm out of breath. I hold it so he doesn't notice. The strategy turns out counterproductive.

Miles studies the opposite shore as if calculating how tiring it'll be to swim there and back.

His warm sandstone skin radiates the setting sun, the peach fuzz at his jaw bright, steel earring glinting, and at this moment I understand why moles are called beauty marks. Remove the one from the corner of his brow and he'd be incomplete. He's so beautiful, mashallah.

I shove water at him.

His reflexes are slowed and most of it hits its mark. Face screwed up, he waits for it to drip away on its own. Then his eyes open with a glint I don't manage to analyse before he splashes me back and I have to twist away.

I choose flight. I turn around to set off toward the platform and Miles calls me a coward, boisterous laughter ringing across the lake surface. My clothes weigh me down and I'm wheezing for breath a quarter way in.

'Where're you going?' His voice is much closer than I expected and I try to swim faster but Miles appears beside me within seconds. Then he's past me, then in front of me.

I stop but the water makes me drift onward after I've attempted a standstill. Now, Miles is so close that the rivulets of water he creates by swimming tickle me.

My stutters bring a grin to his face — um, I was just, I'm, there. I've never before noticed the creases at the corners of his mouth when he smirks, the way the right side lifts a little higher, or how, even though he's not showing teeth, his lips part naturally at his canines to reveal a millimetre's sliver of white.

A drop of water clings to the point of his nose. His eyelashes too are decorated like dew on spiderwebs, exalting his dark irises into dravite.

'You're so beautiful.'

I grimace the second the words leave me. Because there's nowhere else to hide, I sink, but he only smiles. Until it fades. The skin of his lips is smooth and without a single rough or bleeding patch. He doesn't peel off dead skin when he's anxious. Does Miles get anxious?

There's a glaze in his eyes I can't decipher until he spells it out for me. 'Can I kiss you?'

My brain registers the lake water in my mouth. Why is there lake water in my mouth? I ease it past my lips as subtly as I can before I speak. 'I've never kissed anyone before.'

He nods. Meaning what? It's okay, my expectations aren't high? In that case, nevermind? Or I know, who'd want to kiss you?

What if I'm rubbish at it? I'm probably rubbish at it. Maybe I should say no, run home to google how to kiss well, and come back with a bit more practice. But what if it's too late then and he'll have understood my no as permanent, as I never want to kiss you instead of give me a sec? Why would he ask me first? He's not supposed to ask first. Now I have to answer! Doesn't he know by now that I can't make decisions?

And I do want to. It must be the flaw of sequential time or my appeal to novelty fallacies and travis syndrome, but I wouldn't hesitate in saying I've never wanted anything more than I want to kiss him. I want to kiss him now, not later.

'Yes.'

My heart tries to choke me. It pounds so violently that I feel it in my Adam's apple. I'm not going to be sick, am I?

It's only when the loose fabric of my parachute trousers touches his leg, sending a jolt through me as though they're something like whiskers rather than a piece of clothing, that I realise how close he is.

Forget out of breath, I stop breathing altogether.

What do I do? I don't know how to do this. What kind of kiss does he want? Should I do something with my tongue or not? Maybe I should've drunk alcohol. It would be easier if I was drunk, right? I don't know, I've never drunk anything. He's not drunk, is he? What if he's drunk and that's the only reason he's doing this and tomorrow he won't even remember and it'll be just me who lies in bed retracing the ghost of him on my skin?

The moment Miles kisses me, my mind falls silent. My eyes fall shut. Forget survival kits.

His lips are impossibly soft from the coconut butter he lathers onto them whenever he's bored or tired or when he merely needs something to do with his hands. Slightly parted, they press to mine and stay there, stationary, until the pressure is so natural I can't imagine a life without it. That's when he moves, initiating a lazy flow I mirror instinctively.

The pace doesn't pick up, though just as he withdraws, Miles plants another kiss on my cupid's bow. I quite literally almost drown. I think I actually die for a split second before my body understands that it needs oxygen. The hum of the marsh grass, shimmering leafage, and distant road are mute under the rush of blood in my ears.

Miles is still too close for me to see more than half of his face at once. I settle for staring at his lips. They stretch to a smile. 'Can't believe I finally get to do that.'

My attention flicks to his eyes. 'What?'

'D'you honestly expect me to live next to you and not dream about this every day? Like, literally dream.'

Something slithers in my chest and, before I can capture it with my butterfly net, sneaks to the control panel of my brain where it spits venom. 'Maybe becomin besties with Lysander and Tristan wasn't the best way to get on my good side.'

'You hated me from the second we met. I–' Cutting himself off, Miles sinks in the water. 'I'm so sorry. It were stupid.'

The poison rears its head to me instead. 'I didn't hate you.'

'Totally did.' He discards my regret with cruel nonchalance: I have no use for it, don't give it to me.

I have no choice but to accept defeat and do my best to justify myself. 'I've lived here my whole life. You just show up one day and then you're everywhere.' My voice is quick to twist into anger. One sentence in and I've already failed whatever apology this was intended as but I can't stop once I've started. 'Like the bus stop. Every time I pass it now, I look for you. But it's supposed to be my bus stop. You don't even like it here! You can't just move in and take everything. This is my home.'

Miles stares at me, mouth a little open. I scowl at him.

'You do know other people live in the world, right?'

'It's just you in mine.'

The weight of my words landslides onto me when it's far too late to take them back.

Unable to come up with a cover to deflect his spotlight, I resume my asthmatic swim to the platform. Arms heavy, I clumsily manoeuvre myself onto it to land with a splat of my soaked clothes, somehow managing to tangle myself in my trousers when I climb out of them.

'I'm wearin your shirt.' I ball up my XL Spice Girls t-shirt and throw it at Miles. He's barely on his feet but catches it with ease. 'You can have mine.'

Without a word of complaint, he wrings water out of it and shakes it out.

Has every vein and notch in his arms always been this prominent or is it only the lighting? Tan lines circle his biceps and shoulders from the alteration of t-shirts to sleeveless tees. The palest skin, which is the colour of toast, teases from the edge of his soaked boxers where a sliver is entirely untouched by the sun.

His stomach doesn't cave into his ribs, muscles faint below the fat cushioning his abdomen. I look down at my own. Since the loss of baby fat, I've been "skin and bone" according to Iya, and it certainly hasn't improved since Edenfield. It took me five months to manage solid foods.

I snatch up his grey sleeveless tee and pull it on even though my braids are still wet and leave dark splotches at the shoulders where they drip water. Once I've spread out my trousers for drying, I sit on Sonia's previous spot and hug my knees. The plaster has slipped from my thumb, leaving me entirely without armour.

'You're not drunk, are you?' Failing to look at him, I ask this from my feet.

'I had one beer over two hours ago.' A chuckle intermingles with his words and I force one of my own. He expects me to understand.

'Right, calm. Sorry.' Unable to stop myself, I turn to him. 'That means no, right?'

He hums a confirmation.

Miles has sat on the edge of the platform and wades his feet in the lake. Water drips from stalactites of black hair when he hunches over to watch the ripples he generates with the satisfaction of a creator, the god of his own life.

'Is it bad that I didn't stay at the party?' My tone is too honest. I force a joke. 'According to popular opinion, I don't socialise enough.'

He shakes his head, not in response but in amused disbelief. 'I'm gonna tell you summat well important: real life don't have grades. You can't flunk. Do what you like.'

Right.

'And I know I'm a reet hypocrite for saying that. I never do what I like. I don't even know what I like. But you seem like you do so just... do what you like.'

I straighten my legs, my ankles poking over the edge, then cross them again. I can't flunk. I'm supposed to let everything explain itself to me instead of figuring it out. Life's not a maths equation.

Miles is not explaining anything, though. He's just sitting there, watching the water with a smile.

He's not looking at me. Does he regret it?

'Can we do that again?'

He looks up. I nod at the water though have no intention of swimming.

Miles rotates to reach for me before he gets a word out. Fingers already press to the back of my neck when he utters a single one: 'Please.'

Maybe it's the firm ground under us which alleviates the probability of drowning if we get too carried away or the bashfulness of firsts dealt with, but the kiss is hungry from the second it starts. He tastes of coconut lip balm and artificial orange, and from the very back of his mouth, the lingering freshness of Fisherman's Friends coalesces into the saccharose. Though I can't stand liquorice, from his tongue, the flavour is heaven.

I kiss all the sugar from him. I'll prevent cavities for the rest of your life if you let me.

When I stumble on top of him, I accidentally knock my front teeth into his and go to pull back to apologise. But Miles grips my face, grinning into the kiss. My cheeks might be on fire.

My fingers dig into his rounded shoulders. I grip onto them for dear life because everything else is hazy and I've lost all sense of direction. Let go and I'll fall somewhere you don't exist. His hands land on my hips and I might moan, though if it's audible, it's lost into the kiss before it even leaves my throat. They move under my shirt— under his shirt, brush over my protruding hip bones, to my waist where his thumbs are free to press into my flesh. When his fingers tickle my ribs, giggles bubble out of me but neither of us breaks away.

Eventually, the recycled air we sigh into each others' lungs becomes stale and there's no choice but to come up for oxygen. What an unnecessary mechanism breathing is.

His lips are swollen and his gaze unfocused like he's drunk a bit too much sangria on a blearing summer day. You are so beautiful.

With several heaved inhales, the intoxication fades a little. Enough, in any case, to alert me of the tightness of my underwear. I jerk back to stare at my groin. 'I don't want to have sex yet.' Mostly, I'm telling him, but in part, my own body.

'No, I weren't– I mean, we've not... prepared.' His ears turn pink. 'It's a bit fast.'

'We can just keep kissin?'

'If you want.'

I nod. He does too.

Miles slides his hands forward to press his fingertips into the gaps of my spine, unbothered though I feel him hard under me. He leans up again, though rather than returning to my lips, he kisses my throat. The pressure rubs my oesophagus when I swallow and I drop my head back to ease his access. The knowledge that it's an end in itself, not a taster to build up into something but the colossus, effaces the rest of my inhibitions. I make no attempt to suffocate the noises he draws out of me.

Laughter laces them. Oh, to go back and try to convince me from six months ago that any of this is real.

At some point, he moved us from the edge of the platform so that when he gently turns us over, one hand under my head, the other at the small of my back to soften the landing, my heels press firmly to the wood. Until I drape one leg around his hips instead.

His hands find mine and press them to either side of my head. 'Fuck.' He whispers it like a prayer, a plea this isn't a lucid dream his mind has managed to concoct.

There's another beauty mark on the inner corner of his jaw. Two drops of water roll from his hair onto my cheeks and his gaze follows them until it fixates on something else.

He blinks awake. Drowsiness is replaced with panic. Then dulled to misery.

To locate his distraction, I turn my head left. The bite mark, though healed, is prominent on my wrist from this angle and the understanding of what the gauze hid a month ago doesn't take long to dawn on him. Once he's noticed the first, the rest emerge from my skin in some perversion of watching the night sky and finding new stars with each second.

My heart shrivels like a flower blossomed prematurely only to be smothered by the next night of wintry temperatures. 'It's nothin.'

Miles nods as though he's read the translation of please don't ask me about it right now from my mind. And by some miracle, when his eyes find mine, he smiles without forcing it.

Or is he forcing it and either he's too good at it or I'm too gullible? He must be. Disgusted is no doubt what he is, and the only reason he's still here is that he's too polite to run for it. But he will. He'll escape at the soonest opportunity and never speak to me again. He didn't sign up for more paranoia. He never intended anything but sex, did he?

Maybe he does this often. He certainly gives off the impression of experience, of hours of practice to hone his craft to know exactly where to kiss and how and at what speed. Maybe this is the bet.

Sitting back on his heels with me still under him, Miles caresses the base of my thumb. 'What's wrong?'

'How many people have you had sex with?' I ask only for my cheeks combust. 'You don't have to answer that! I can't believe I said that out loud. Astaghfirullah. I'm so sorry.'

Miles laughs as I cover my face. 'It's fine.' There's a long enough pause for me to think he won't answer and to start racking my brain for something else to talk about, but then he does. 'Just two.'

I shift my hands from over my eyes to peer at him.

'My ex and this bloke from football back home. It were only a few times and it didn't mean nowt... to him anyway.' His thumb sweeps to the heel of my palm to massage it. 'Don't worry about it. Honest, I don't wanna rush this time. I don't think I wanted... I went along with it.'

'Do you want to talk about it?'

He shakes his head. 'I don't wanna think about it yet. I can't think about it yet.'

I squeeze his hand.

'You smell nice.' My skin might actually melt off my face. Why would I say that? Is this the time to say that? Miles looks puzzled, so I repeat meekly, 'Like, your cologne, it's nice.'

'Oh... Ta.' It's hesitant but a smile soon blooms. 'I weren't sure if you'd like it.'  He shakes his head at himself. 'It were dead expensive but it's a Vietnamese brand so I justified it like that, like, it's Vietnamese. But I've owned it for two years and used it maybe three times so it really were a stupid use of money.'

'I think it's nice.' Nice? How many times am I going to use nice in a row? Do I not know other adjectives?

The sunset halos behind him. Miles watches me, pouring the same honey onto me through his eyes. 'You're dead close to giving me a fucking heart attack, love. You know that?'

The boyish stupor rejuvenates from its hiatus. I ask him to kiss me again.

This one is languid and open-mouthed. The kind of kiss that's unafraid of time, that belongs to people who don't even believe in its passage or at least don't have to worry about it. The moments we drift apart to breathe, check in, or simply stare at each other are no less arrogant or devoted.

I can never escape intimacy in Summer even if I wanted to. Tied into every marsh grass and water strider, is Miles. He has stolen it from me by his mere existence and I've never been happier to lose something so personal. Take the rest too. Take all of it. It's already yours.

Forget attachments, I want to melt our skeletons together. I want to tear out every other disk from my spine and exchange them with his so that I'll never be able to do as much as stand without his presence, without his aid. He'll be necessary in everything I do. Ana walo bla bik — I am nothing without you.