Ten minutes later, tingly and pleasantly tired, I linger by the sanctum’s edge and watch Marcos clean himself in the waterfall below. He’s even more nude without his glasses, which lay folded on the cavern ledge. The falls cascade down his face like oversized tears…but he’s smiling. In a rainy corner of my mind, I’ve been worrying what would happen if we hooked up. Would he beat himself up? Pretend it never happened? Get angry and attack me? Beg the Reverend for forgiveness? So far, he’s done none of that. He’s remained fully present, validating everything we did together—and everything it meant—by simply staying and smiling.

Revolutionary.

“Come here,” he says, reaching with a flapping, summoning hand. I’m similarly bare to the elements (except for Ario’s pendant), but I approach Marcos as un-self-conscious about my body as I’ve ever been. My bare feet, agonizingly knotted from jungle running, slap across the cavern’s shallow puddles until I close my hand inside his.

After we shake ourselves dry, we dress in our shorts but nothing else; neither of us are eager to jump back into the sweat-drenched Nightlight shirts we discarded hastily around the cavern. Curled beside the torchlight, Marcos rests my feet in his lap and grinds into them with his thumb, firing shock-combos of pain and relief up my legs. A strip of wilting black hair drips handsomely down his glasses as he concentrates. His wood-beaded bracelet with the small, embedded crucifix brushes my ankle, summoning a devilish smirk in me over how thoroughly we’ve corrupted each other.

He plunges his knuckle into my arch, and my leg responds by dancing into the air. “There’s your trouble. I’ve got a trick my abuela would do.”

Marcos closes his fist, his bicep expanding as it recoils to strike. “Wait—what are you doing?” I ask, wincing prematurely.

“Relax. You’ll feel amazing after.” BOOM. His knuckles collide with my tender, pulsating arch, instantly rupturing the knot the way dynamite levels a dam. “How’s that feel?”

“Holy shit,” I moan. “That worked.”

“My abuela used to—uh, y’know, my grandma—”

“I know what abuela means,” I say, winking. “I’ve seen the cocoa packets.”

“My dad’s always on me about talking English every single syllable all the time. My abuela would tell him to…well, it basically means shut up and mind your business.” He chuckles before walloping my other arch with another grand slam. The relief is night-and-day.

“What does she think of you being here?”

“She’s not…super all there anymore. Few years ago, Dad built a guest house for her, and, y’know, it keeps her out of a nursing home.” A draft blows through the sanctum as a shadow passes over Marcos’s blissful expression. “My dad lies. He lies all the time, so he’s probably got her thinking I’m at boarding school or something…”