Chapter 1
I pause in the hallway and hesitate for a second before enlarging the image of the white lace stretching across her breasts.
Whenever Wilma uploads a picture to her Snapchat story, the same thought emerges, awakening the same forbidden feeling within me. A thought I would never voice aloud and a feeling I would never admit to her: She has become so damn beautiful over the past year.
There’s an unspoken rule that I shouldn’t look at my best friend this way, but my fingers are drawn like magnets to the screen. I scroll down to the lace edge where her slim waist transitions to broader hips. My gaze lingers far too long on details where she poses in the sun lounger with sunglasses, pouting with glossy lips toward the camera.
I run my hand through my freshly showered hair, remove three dark strands caught between my fingers, and write a message.
Me: I’m leaving soon. Just got out of the shower.
Wilma responds almost immediately.
Wilma: What?! Haven’t you left yet? I thought you’d be here soon.
Me: No, I overslept. I woke up twenty minutes ago.
Wilma: Seriously? Hurry up then! Even a snail is faster than you.
“Elias... have you seen my phone?”
I lift my gaze from the screen and meet Julia’s naked figure in the bedroom doorway. She raises her dark eyebrows questioningly, but I return to answering Wilma.
Me: Yeah, I’m on my way. Keep enjoying the sun while you can. See you soon.
With a sigh, I then turn to Julia. “Isn’t it on the nightstand?”
“No! Can you help me look?”
She disappears back into the bedroom with quick steps.
I sigh quietly and check the time—almost half past twelve. Damn, I don’t have time for this. I should have left Gävle an hour ago. Wilma is going to kill me when I arrive, if her parents don’t get to me first.
Usually, I follow schedules, but Julia showed up outside my door last night. We didn’t get to bed until the morning. Now, I need her to get dressed and out of the apartment—a challenge that might take longer than I have.
I put my phone on the kitchen table to get dressed. Julia twists and turns pillows and blankets, peeks under the bed, and rummages through clothes on the floor.
“Seriously, Elias. Can you call my phone?” She runs her fingers through her black hair so forcefully that some strands come loose and fall to the floor.
“Yeah. Start getting dressed,” I say, and hasten back to the kitchen.
Julia mumbles something inaudible that I ignore, and instead, I try to listen for her phone when I call.
The vibrations lead me to the living room where the phone lies wedged between the couch cushions. On the screen glows a message and three missed calls. The latest call is from me; the other two are from someone named Martin.
Martin: I tried calling but you didn’t answer. You’ll get the money back tonight if you have time to meet. I’m free after eight o’clock. I’ll call you then.
I raise my eyebrows and clench my jaw in pure irritation. Not only is Julia slow in the morning, she apparently has other things going on, too.
An icy feeling spreads through my body at the thought, even though I shouldn’t care. But who the hell is he? What relationship do they have? And why am I getting so irritated about it?
“Found it!” I go back to the bedroom and hand her the phone. “Sorry, but I have to go. You seem pretty busy yourself.”
“What do you mean by that?”
I gesture toward her phone.
She looks at the screen. “Oh, no. He’s just a friend,” she says and shrugs, but her gaze flickers.
She comes up behind me and presses her naked body against mine. Her nails dig into my skin and leave faint marks.
I pause in my movements, feel her hands work loose the towel around my hips and let it fall to the floor. A shiver runs through my body when her soft lips touch my back and she takes my cock in a firm grip.
“What are you doing?” I ask and glance at my crotch.
“What does it feel like?”
“I don’t have time now. We’ll do this another time. I have to go pick up Wilma.” But my skin heats from her touch.
“She won’t die from waiting a little longer.”
Julia nibbles my ear, her breath warm and moist.
“Or don’t you want to sleep with me anymore? Maybe I’m not as pretty as your Wilma?” she continues.
Her statement makes me roll my eyes.
There’s nothing wrong with Julia’s appearance—quite the opposite. She’s one of the few girls I would actually call beautiful. That’s probably why I’ve continued sleeping with her.
“Come on, cut it out. You know it has nothing to do with it.”
Julia stops her movements. “What is it about then? You obviously prioritize her over me.”
I turn my head slightly, my gaze brief and warning before I reach for my underwear. “Wilma is my best friend, not my new fuck buddy.”
“You can sleep with your friends too.”
“Are you speaking from experience?” I ask and try to shake her off.
“Yeah, exactly. I sleep with all my friends. Didn’t you know that? It’s completely normal. Do you want a list of them?”
I snort. “Maybe that’s normal in your world, but not mine.”
“I’m kidding, you get that, right? Stop getting so grumpy every time I say something and kiss me instead, or do I have to beg for it?” Julia says and slips up in front of me.
But instead of seeing Julia’s face in front of me, I see Wilma’s. Not the happy, expectant Wilma from the picture, but the Wilma who can make her eyes turn to icy blue when she’s angry and touch all the sensitive spots to make it really hurt in the chest.
Julia slides down to her knees and takes my cock in her mouth.
Shit, that feels good.
All thoughts of Wilma disappear for a moment.
I lean my head back, close my eyes, and let Julia do whatever she wants with me for the next few minutes before I take command and throw her down on her back on the bed. I lie over her curvy body, kiss her neck that tastes like a mixture of salt and perfume.
Julia pulls me down into the bed and positions herself straddling me. She drags her nails over my chest muscles, down over my abs, and follows the V-shape at my hips to my crotch.
Damn it. Even though I want this, Wilma’s impatience and the car ride gnaw at the back of my mind. Every lingering minute makes my stomach knot at the thought of her reaction when I show up—far too late.
After two hours of highway, sloshing iced coffee, and a growing nervousness, I finally roll into Ljusdal. Everything is the same here in the countryside. A sunny late summer day in August—an elderly couple strolls along the sidewalk in the blazing sun while a family with sticky hands eats soft-serve ice cream on the benches outside the cafe. Everyone seems desperately trying to squeeze the last out of summer before vacation ends and the gray everyday life returns.
I turn onto the familiar road where I grew up, pass three identical houses, and continue past the daycare to turn the car around in the cul-de-sac.
A fleeting image of Wilma and me on the swings appears—a memory from a time when the world felt much bigger and simpler. When we were eight, the biggest problems were who could swing the highest, while our parents’ watchful eyes ensured we never went too far.
Per looks up from the hood when I park along the roadside outside their house. I get out of the car and stretch my legs with a sigh of relief.
Glancing toward Mom’s house, I note that the red Volvo is gone. Too bad. I had hoped to see her today—it doesn’t happen often anymore. She calls a few times a week, always with the same question:
“Are you still alive, Elias?”
Mom has always been overprotective, but it got worse after Dad moved in with his new girlfriend—one who’s barely older than me.
I walk toward the yellow garage, which has faded in the sun over the years. Some fresh paint wouldn’t hurt, but at least it matches the house, which could also use a bucket or two of paint.
“Is she home?” I ask and squint toward Wilma’s window with my hand as sun protection.
“She’s in there.” Per wipes the sweat from his forehead with his palm. “Aren’t you late?” His gruff voice makes me feel like fifteen again.
“Yeah... there was quite a bit of traffic on the way here,” I lie and turn toward the porch.
“Hey, Elias,” he calls, and I stop by the overgrown spruce hedge that should have been trimmed several weeks ago. “I put money in your account. You probably saw that.” It’s not a question, but more of a statement.
“Yeah, I saw it. Thanks,” I mumble.
“Don’t spend all the money at once and make sure to behave yourselves.” He wipes his oily hands on a cloth rag, but the gesture feels more like a marking than a practical action. His brown eyes bore into my blue ones, a silent warning that awakens an old feeling of respect—and a touch of fear—within me.
“No, of course not,” I answer quickly, almost too quickly. “I’ll go see if Wilma is ready to leave.” I don’t want to linger under his scrutinizing gaze a second longer than necessary.
I step out of my sneakers on the hallway mat and go up the creaky stairs two steps at a time to the upper floor where Wilma has her room. A heavy, perfumed heat hits me in the hallway. The scent of Wilma’s allergy-inducing shower soap hangs thick in the air, almost like invisible steam after a finished bath.
I stop in front of her door and knock three times so she can hear me over the bass pumping through the wall. Twenty seconds. Forty seconds. One minute.
No one opens.
I knock again, a little harder this time, and look around while I wait. The hallway feels different—more spacious. The white dresser that used to be squeezed between the bathroom and her parents’ room is gone. In its place now stands a large green potted plant that’s probably dying from lack of water. Above hangs a school photo of Wilma in seventh grade, with a stiff smile that reveals metal-gleaming braces.
Wilma could argue anyone under the table back then. The same intensity remains in her, which is why I rarely argue back since I’ll probably lose.
I knock one more time, but this time I open the door and step in.
The music pulses through the room, and her body in the white underwear follows the rhythm. Wilma is unaware of my presence, and I observe her, from the damp, ash-blonde hair that sticks to her sun-tanned back, to how the thong marks the line between her buttcheeks.
My gaze gets caught for a brief second before I look away toward the bed. Her suitcase lies on the white bedspread, and a moving box and two plastic bags with shoes stand on the floor.
I expected her to bring her book collection and all the posters of scantily clad guys hanging on her walls, but it looks like she only packed the essentials.
“Shit, you scared me!” she says and jerks me back to the present. She goes to the white vanity table where the phone lies and lowers the volume.
“I actually knocked. Several times, too.”
Wilma crosses her arms and gives me an icy look. “Four hours, Elias? Four hours! I’ve been sitting here on pins and needles. I missed half the day! I called you like three hours ago, and then it didn’t even sound like you had left Gävle.”
Sweat breaks out in my palms where I stand with my hands deep in my jeans pockets, and shift weight from one leg to the other. She’s angry, but not as angry as I imagined she would be.
“Something came up.”
She raises her eyebrows. “Oh? What kind of thing?”
“Does it matter? I’m here now, aren’t I? I thought you’d be happy to see me, not start by scolding me.”
“Since when do we have secrets from each other?”
“Come on, cut it out. Is all this coming with us or what?” I point toward the bed.
She comes toward me with quick steps and wraps her arms around my waist. I hesitate for a second, but then put my arms around her. My pulse rises when she presses her body against mine.
“You—you should probably get dressed.”
“As if you’ve never seen me in underwear,” she says, looking up at me with blue eyes. She has a small brown birthmark under her left eye that I can’t remember seeing before. Or is it that I haven’t noticed it until now?
“You’re not eleven anymore and running around in my shirts. You’re—like—you know.”
She raises her eyebrows and blinks with her long eyelashes.
“Well, a girl.”
“I’ve always been a girl,” she smiles and rolls her eyes. She goes to the closet and pulls out a white short dress.
The scent of her melon perfume and freshly washed hair has stuck to my white T-shirt with damp traces.
Damn, mom would have been so enthusiastic about this Wilma-moving-in project. At that moment, I had nodded like a bobblehead, mostly to avoid her nagging. But now? Now it feels like I’ve invited a potential disaster into my two-bedroom apartment. A beautiful disaster, admittedly.
“Elias, can you help me pull up the zipper?” Her neck is exposed when she pulls her hair aside.
I move toward her, run my palms over my thighs and reach for the barely visible zipper.
Damn. It looks so inviting that I can almost taste her skin just by looking. Can’t help but fantasize about...
“There,” I say when I’ve pulled up the zipper and back away from her. “I’ll carry your things to the car while you get ready.”
