Chapter 7: Sauna

The sauna sat at the end of the dock, a tiny cedar box with a stovepipe chimney and steam rolling out under the door.

Henrik shut us in, and the heat hit me like a wall.

There were two wooden benches, a bucket of water, and one dim amber light.

I stood in the middle of the room in my parka and boots, shaking.

"Take that off," he said.

"Why?"

"Because you'll boil."

"That's a terrible line."

"It's not a line. It's thermodynamics."

I peeled off the parka and the sweater, and he unlaced my boots himself, kneeling on the cedar floor.

His hands were slow and rough on my ankles.

He didn't look up.

"Elsa told me," he said.

"I know she did."

"I asked her to keep it quiet for a reason."

"What reason?"

"Kaspar's mother has a bad heart."

"If Calla goes down, she goes down at the wedding, and I'd rather take the hit."

"That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard."

"It's the oldest thing about me," he said, and finally lifted his eyes.

"I take the hit. You know that."

I did.

He had taken hits for me since second grade.

He took a dodgeball, a cafeteria bully, and my father's furious phone call about the cracked Zamboni mirror.

I put my palm against his cheek.

"Stop taking them," I said.

"Not for her."

He turned his face into my hand and kissed the center of my palm.

Something in my chest lurched.

Then he stood, and he was a head taller in the dim light, and he started undoing the buttons of my jeans.

"I thought we were here to talk," I said.

"We can talk after."

"You said we."

"I meant me."

I laughed, and the laugh turned into a moan when he dragged my jeans down my thighs and kissed the soft skin above my knee.

Keep reading free with an account. Start Offside in the Friend Zone from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.