He brought the cigarette to his lips; I followed with my eyes, catching on the V of his white T-shirt, where the dark hair curled up toward the knobs of his collarbone. Together with the two points of his knees, they made a flock of birds, V and V and V—I was sure I’d never seen such a beautiful collarbone, yes, like wings. I wanted to fit my lips like a notch to each knob, flick my tongue between them; I wanted to press my tongue flat into that hollow; I wanted to feel him shiver. He’d blown smoke right into his buddy’s face, I saw—the friend was trying not to cough, but his eyes were watering, and finally he coughed into the crook of his arm. The first guy, my guy, took another drag.

Be good, I told myself, stay where you are. But I couldn’t bear to; my chest was so tight I knew if I didn’t move toward him, I would crack into shards. You’re supposed to be grading, I thought, but the prospect of hunching over papers while this man sat smoking only feet away was laughable, if not impossible. I pressed my tongue to my teeth again: no matter what happened, my teeth would be there. I stashed the folder in a corner behind a plant, then went over, my breath shallow and quick, suddenly uncertain how one was supposed to swing one’s arms while one walked.

“Can I bum one?”

‘“Bum one,’” he said. “What are you, from a potboiler detective novel?” But he tapped his pack against his knee—that knee—and slid one out for me, then cupped his hand around my mouth to light it.

I asked stupid questions to fill the silence: where he was from, how many siblings he had, what he did, where he lived. He answered in as few syllables as he could; he asked nothing in return. But his voice was deep and scratchy, like a burnt log. His collarbone, up close, those hairs curling toward it; his rib cage, grazing his T-shirt as he inhaled. Sitting on the table like that, his face was at eye level, his knee right at my hip. I cupped it with my palm.

He took his cigarette out of his mouth, holding it lightly between two long fingers, and looked me over. His eyes caught on my nipples: they were hard, practically poking through the cotton of my shirt. My hand was still on his knee, and I tightened my fingers around it, its contours pressing into my palm. He pressed back. Heat flared between my legs. If I couldn’t crush my body against his, I might die.

He cocked his head toward the storage nook, a question. I nodded, too vigorously; he got up and ground his cigarette into the floor and I did the same. He walked toward the nook, and I followed.

Inside, I reached up to kiss him, but he swung me around to press my back against the fence. He was so tall, blocking out the sun. The wires of the fence pressed into my spine. He tasted like soot. I reached around his neck and wrenched him in, I wanted him so close I could disappear. I was getting wet—Sam, Dominic, Langham—shut up, shut up—I let go of his neck and reached under his arms, around his back, pulled him toward me with my fingernails. He ground his crotch into mine, the button pressing painfully against me. I said nothing, it hurt in a way I deserved and maybe liked, instead I tipped my head back, biting the inside of my cheek, and let him kiss my neck. Oh God! I pressed into the button as long as I could take it, then another second, then another—then finally shifted away, the pain having obliterated whatever else was in my mind, or was it the ecstasy?