“How did I used to get you to stop?” Gavin asked, although he was on the cusp of cracking up himself.

I shook my head. “I…don’t…remember…” I gasped for air. My stomach was aching. I tried to think of serious things like librarians and their stern expressions. The astronomy professor, leaning on his podium — no, that was even funnier. I burst into a fresh batch of giggles.

“Is somebody in there?” A voice outside the ring of crates made me clap my hand over my mouth.

“Now we’ve done it,” Gavin whispered, but he was already laughing.

The plastic began rustling. “You should come out now.”

Gavin put his finger over his lips.

I was heaving with effort and trying to stop, sucking air in. I should have been appalled, worried, but no, I couldn’t bring it down.

A head peeked through the gap, a guy not much older than us with square black glasses. “I knew it!”

Gavin held up his hands. “We’re busted.”

The face disappeared and resumed as just a voice. “I’m the TA in charge of the graduate study area up here. This is a silent study floor.”

“We’re coming,” Gavin said. He turned back to me and handed me my backpack. “You ready for the great escape?” he whispered. “I’ll go left, you go right, and we’ll meet in the stairwell.”

I nodded, only just now able to get my giggles under control.

“I’ll go first, distract him, then you bolt.”

“Got it.”

Gavin pushed through the plastic. “Hey there. I don’t think we were making any noise.”

“You’re not supposed to be in there.”

I waited a second, not sure when to leave.

“What’s in these crates anyway?” Gavin asked, and I could tell he’d moved away from the opening.

I took a deep breath, then pushed on the plastic and wormed my way out. As soon as I was free of the crates, I took off to the right, barreling along the interior wall that held the elevator shaft and stairwell. I didn’t look back, not even when the TA said, “Hey!”

I saw the exit sign and snatched at the door. I went down one flight, then looked up, waiting.

Gavin burst through it and said, “Go!”

I began running down the stairs, holding on to the rail. Gavin caught up. “Let’s not go to the bottom, in case he’s waiting there for us. We’ll kill time on one of the middle floors.”

We leaped out at the fourth floor, a busy area with full stacks and tons of students. Once we were safely away from the elevator and stairwell, we collapsed at a study desk.

“That was nuts,” I said.

“That was awesome!” Gavin’s smile was as wide as his face. “We never were troublemakers in high school. We have to make up for our well-spent youth.”

I swallowed, trying not to wreck the moment. I’d done enough bad stuff for both of us. All three of us, I amended.

“Hey.” Gavin reached over and squeezed my arm. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think about how worried you’d be about getting in trouble.”

“No, no, it’s fine. It was fun.” I faked a smile. “I just had forgotten about the giggle spells. It’s been too long.”

“I’ll say.”

“How long do you think we should wait?”

Gavin checked his phone. “It’s 10:30. I’m guessing he’ll go to the ground floor, wait a couple minutes, then he’ll have to get back to his duties.”

“When do you have to be at work?”

“11, but it’s not a big deal. I’ll call Bud if we get stuck. Meanwhile,” he reached for my hand, “I’ll just sit here and gaze at you lecherously.”

I felt a trickle in my jeans and realized that once again we’d gone without a condom. Might as well bring it up now. “So. I was thinking.”

“About doing me again in the elevator?”

I smiled. “Maybe. But also about how the shot failed us before.”

His expression sobered.

“So maybe we should do something extra?” My fingers gripped his. “Like condoms?”

He let go and sat back. “You think it will happen again?”

“Statistics seem to indicate that if you have a hormone birth control failure, you have a higher incidence of another. I might not be a good fit for it.”

His face was looking angrier as I talked, and I couldn’t understand it.

“You want to keep me at risk? You want it to happen again?” I stood up, ready to walk away.

Gavin jumped from his chair. “No! No. Of course not. I just don’t think it will happen again.”

“But it might. Are condoms that big of a deal?” A couple of students were looking at us, so I sat back down.

I could see him relent. “No, no they aren’t. I’ll buy some.” He walked around the desk and bent down to wrap his arms around me. “I’ll do whatever you ask on this.”

My shoulders relaxed. We would be all right. Surely lightning wouldn’t strike twice. 

The Harley’s engine was so loud I could barely hear myself think as Gavin handed me an extra helmet. “I’m not so sure about this!” I yelled.

“You’ll love it!” he shouted.

“It looks like a red bowling ball!”

Gavin laughed. “You’ll rock the look.”

I stuck the helmet on my head. “Now what?”

“Get on behind me.” He pointed to a footrest. “Your feet go here.”

I held on to his shoulders as I threw a leg over the seat. He revved the motor and I could feel the vibrations in my girl parts. “Hey, this is like a sex toy!” I said in his ear.

“Now you’re getting it.”

I found the footrests and clasped my arms around his waist. “Aren’t there any seat belts on this thing?’

“I’m all you’ve got,” he said, and he backed us away from the curb in front of my apartment.

The butterflies still twinkled in the trees. I got a notice from the management yesterday that they had to come down, but I’d ignored it. I kept Finn’s blue butterfly inside the house for safekeeping, but the others would stay. The apartments were cheap. The overworked maintenance guy would probably be too busy to take them down. I couldn’t imagine Lorna, the stuffy and perpetually stiletto-heeled office manager, sinking into the damp ground to yank them out of the trees herself.

We lurched forward, and I screamed in Gavin’s ear. I could feel his laughter in his ribs, even though the motor drowned out the sound. When we paused at the exit to the complex, he turned his head. “You’ll be fine.”

Maybe. So far we’d only been going five miles per hour. I wasn’t sure I could hang on at sixty.

We jetted onto the street, and I screamed again. I felt like I might rocket off the bike at any moment.

Thankfully, we hit a red light almost immediately. “I don’t think I can do this,” I said.

“Sure you can. Just relax into it. Sink into me a little rather than being so stiff.”

He took off more carefully this time. I tried to be like Jell-O, and fitting loosely against Gavin seemed to help. I could sense when he was about to lean one direction or the other and could move with him. The ride became less bumpy.

We swung onto the highway, and I tried to stay relaxed as we merged into traffic and really got going fast. I could see so much, every direction, unlike the fragmented view through windowpanes in a car. I could smell the ocean as we rode along the harbor. The air was exhilarating, flowing around my neck and tossing my ponytail. Okay, I was getting it. I could see the appeal.

We exited to go east on I-8 toward the mountains. The drive would take a half-hour just to clear civilization. Gavin had packed some sandwiches. It would be a good evening, even if we never got around to the assignment.

As the minutes passed, random body parts began to get tired of their position, and I would adjust. First my neck, then my foot, vibrating on the rest. Eventually I found the right place to fit, and I could just hang on, my head against Gavin’s back, and watch the landscape change from city to suburbs to open road.

We slowed down past Alpine, and he turned off the freeway onto a dirt trail.