Dead of Summer

“I hate you,” I manage to wheeze, just loud enough for him to hear. My hands flex against his shirt, where I’ve left them, and for some reason I can’t extract my fingers as my hands tremble from the adrenaline setting in.

“Oh, I’m sure you do,” Kayde assures me, just as softly. “I just saved your life in front of how many people, again?”

“Fuck off.”

“Nah, I’m not done being your hero, sweetheart.” He leans over me, checking my face, and his fingers are gentle along the painful edge of my cheek that still smarts. “Did you hit your head?” he asks, waiting for me to answer silently before moving on in his examination. “Did you inhale a lot of water? Your mouth was open when you went in.”

I open my mouth to tell him no, but instead turn just in time to gag, river water spilling onto the dirt from my throat.

Fuck.

“I will take that as a yes,” Kayde murmurs, clasping my hand that’s still clutching his shirt, though he doesn’t make me let go.

Noise to my other side heralds the arrival of Liza, and she drops to her knees in the dirt, paying no attention to the water sinking into the ground near my face. I cough again, body shuddering, and manage to gag out another mouthful of foul-tasting water.

“Are you okay? Did you hit your head at all?” Her hands replace Kayde’s on my face, and she opens my eyes to check my focus, her brows drawn together. “You swallowed a lot of water, huh?” I can only nod vigorously at that, and nausea roils in my stomach, making me groan. “Can you carry her back to the medical cabin?” she asks, glancing up at Kayde even as I give another argumentative groan.

“I can walk—” I protest, which only makes Kayde snort derisively and causes Liza to give me the Mom look.

“You cannot,” she disagrees, getting to her feet. “Daniel is going to take all the kids to the beach where a couple other cabins are already. He can handle that much.” Though she gives Daniel an unfriendly look over her shoulder, like it’s his fault his campers decided to knock me into the river.

“I really can,” I still argue weakly, trying to sit up at the very least, though I use my grip on Kayde’s shirt to manage any progress I do make.

Which isn’t a lot. And it doesn’t last longer than a few seconds before Kayde gathers me into his arms again, his now-soaked shirt cold against my body. I can’t help the shiver that goes through me, and it brings a concerned look from him and a small quirk of his lips into a frown.

“She’s cold,” he informs Liza, holding me closer. “Really cold.”

“I was in the river,” I point out dryly, rubbing the gooseflesh breaking out along my arms. “Of course I’m fucking cold.”

Kayde doesn’t give me an answer. He sets off after Liza at a fast walk, as if my weight really doesn’t inconvenience him or his ridiculously toned arms. The only saving grace to my day, I realize, is that I’d accidentally left my phone in my cabin when I’d stopped by in my frantic whirlwind. Otherwise I’d be mourning that loss, and I definitely don’t have it in me to buy another new phone this year.

I groan again, tugging on Kayde’s shirt and turning my head away from him as another wave of nausea climbs up my throat. In seconds I’m gagging up more river water, but Kayde doesn’t drop me in disgust or even act like he minds. He just stops and helps me sit a little straighter in his arms, not saying a word about my death grip on his shirt as I wretch, eyes streaming once more.

“You’re okay,” he tells me when I’m done, a low moan leaving me as I try to get myself to stop shivering. I’m not a cute puker, and my body tends to make more of a deal over it than is strictly necessary. By quite a lot, if I’m honest with myself.

“You could let me walk and keep my dignity,” I implore him as we breeze past the volleyball court and the pool. “That would be like, super cool of you.”

“You’d fall over,” comes his too-sweet reply. “Then you’d look even more pathetic crawling to Liza’s cabin and retching every few steps. God, can you imagine? You’d never live that down. At least here you just look desperate and a little in love with me?—”

“I do not.”

“Darcy is certainly going to think so.”

Darcy will most likely murder me the moment she finds out about this, if she hasn’t already seen me in the arms of her dream man.

Liza’s cabin looms in my vision, and the small groan I let free is one of relief that we’re finally done with this whole thing. Kayde, finally, can go the fuck away.

That’s what I want, anyway. But when he sets me down gently on the bed closest to the wall, he thumps down in the seat beside it while I glare at him, willing him to go or spontaneously combust.

Either will do.

“Here you go.” Liza appears with towels, one of which she drops onto me and the other that she hovers with, until Kayde takes it. I don’t realize what he’s doing until the towel finds my hair, and with surprisingly gentle movements, Kayde wrings the worst of the water out of my long, soaked and clumped auburn mane.

Clearly he’s just waiting for his moment so he can suffocate me with the towel.

I take the other one and work on drying off the rest of myself, not bothering for modesty as I shuck off my shirt, leaving me in my camp appropriate, star patterned swim top. My shorts, being water resistant and slick, aren’t nearly as bad, so I don’t bother with them or my flip-flops. I do shudder from the cold again though, hating that my teeth start to chatter.

I shouldn’t be that cold, but something tells me it’s more from shock than the actual water.