Chapter 33
AN HOUR LATER I LIE at the foot of Nora’s bed, watching her eat out of the Styrofoam container as she leans up against her headboard. A sly little grin spreads across her lips as she looks me up and down.
“What?” I ask, glancing down at my white button-down and black dress pants.
“I’m not going to lie. That look is kinda doing it for me.”
“Shut up.” I laugh, shaking my head.
“No, I’m serious. And it’s even hotter when you’re bringing me a plate of food like this.”
“Isn’t that a little sexist?” I ask.
“I don’t think so, because I’m a girl too. So I think I’m in the clear?” She shrugs, straightening her leg to slide her foot under my knee. “This is so bomb,” she says before slurping down another forkful of spaghetti. “I never get to eat home-cooked meals like this.”
“Your mom never cooked for you growing up?” I ask as a big bolt of lightning strikes outside the window behind her.
“If she did, it was mostly cheeseburgers and… more cheeseburgers. There was one dish she’d make for us on special occasions, though.
Stuffed peppers in this sweet tomato sauce with mashed potatoes.
Man… It was so freaking good.” She rolls a meatball off to the side of the container.
“But it’s been years since she’s made it.
Hell, it’s been years since we’ve sat down to a meal together at all. ”
I reach out to rub my hand up and down her shin, a few stubby leg hairs that she missed shaving poking at my palm. It breaks my heart when she talks about her mom, but it also makes me feel so thankful for the mom that I have. And even more confused why I was willing to throw her away.
“How long after we started dating did we hatch up the California plan?” I ask.
“We started dreaming about it right from the start, but we didn’t get serious until maybe five, six months later. Why?”
“I guess I just wondered what prompted us to actually do it?”
“Do you want any of this?” Nora asks as she holds the container out to me.
I shake my head. I think I’m off spaghetti and meatballs for good now.
She sets it on her side table and then crawls down to lie sideways across her bed next to me.
“We figured out pretty quickly that we couldn’t sustain a long-term relationship here, in secret.
” She shrugs, struggling for the right words.
“I mean, at a certain point, this thing between us… It was just getting too big to hide.”
Somehow, after only dating her for a couple of weeks, I can already understand that feeling.
She brings her hand up and a soft smile spreads across my lips at the feeling of her fingers combing through my hair.
I close my eyes and imagine that we’re somewhere else.
Holding hands as we walk through the grassy park near Wyatt High.
Kissing at the top of the Ferris wheel at the county fair.
Or even just being seen together in public without constantly worrying about how people are reading us.
All things that could quite literally never happen.
All things I would give anything to be able to do.
I open my eyes just enough to see her staring back at me, her hand still brushing through my hair, sending a tingle down my body that doesn’t seem to fade. Reaching up, I take her hand and kiss each of her knuckles before holding it close to my heart.
“I think I’m falling in love with you,” I whisper so quiet that I don’t even know if she can hear. I wasn’t sure at first, but I know as soon as the words leave my lips how true they are.
Maybe I already am in love with her.
Maybe I always have been, even when I didn’t remember it.
I peek up to find her pupils engulfing most of the hazel in her eyes.
“Did you hear me?” I ask, a nervous pulse thumping in my throat.
“I heard you,” she replies, her eyes shining.
Heavy raindrops pelt loudly against the roof over us.
I’m not sure which of us is leaning in, but I can feel her breath on my face and then I can feel my bottom lip grazing hers.
She lets her mouth fall open a little and I press my lips into her.
My body ignites, everything burning hotter than I’ve ever felt before.
I kiss her harder each time we readjust. I kiss her so deep that our teeth hit, but still, it’s not enough.
I throw my leg over her, and she grabs me around the waist, pulls me on top of her. My attention catches on her biceps, the shadows created by the warm light of the bedside lamp.
I press my hands against the mattress on either side of her head, push myself back an inch, and smirk down at her. “I like your arms.”
“You like my arms? Really?” she asks, sounding shy for the first time maybe ever.
“Nicest arms east of the Mississippi.” I give them a squeeze and she turns her face into the pillow to stifle a giggle.
I lean right back down to her again and tilt her chin back to me until her mouth reconnects with mine. She unbuttons my pants and runs her hands over the bare skin of my thighs and back up toward my underwear.
A sound escapes my throat that surprises me, makes me pull away an inch, but Nora stretches her neck up to kiss me again.
She slips her thumbs through my side belt loops and tugs me closer, her hips bucking up under me with the same force.
I push myself back, sitting up straight, my chest heaving as I slide my hands under her tank top and over the warm skin of her abdomen.
I need to be closer.
“Nora?” I say, stopping at the bottom of her sports bra.
“Yeah?” she asks, her stomach expanding and contracting under my palms with each heavy breath.
“I, uh…” I slide my hands back down and slip my fingertips into the waistband of her shorts. “I don’t know how to do this.” I laugh, embarrassed and nervous and excited.
“Are you sure you want to?” she asks.
I laugh differently this time. “Yes,” I reply. I’m absolutely positive.
“Just do whatever feels right,” she tells me, sitting up underneath me and unbuttoning my shirt before slipping it off. She drops it onto the bed and then slides her hands up my back, holding me there up against her.
I don’t know much about sex, but I would know what to expect if I was with a guy right now. I mean… I wouldn’t know what to expect, but I would at least know what goes where. Pretty straightforward. But this is different.
“Do whatever you want, Stevie,” she adds, maybe sensing the panic on my face.
“I want to kiss you again,” I reply, wrapping my hands around her head as she looks down at my bra, making me wish I had worn a nicer one. But then she kisses the bare skin of my chest and I see that she wasn’t really looking at it anyway.
She pulls my face down to hers again while we both shuffle under the covers. I motion that I want her to take her bra off, so she does, and she takes mine off too. And the feeling of settling back on top of her is completely dizzying.
She slips her leg in between mine and I press all my weight against her. A loud breath escapes her lips, which only makes me want to do it again.
Layer by layer, we take off the rest of each other’s clothes, and she rolls us over so she’s on top of me now.
I’m glad for it too, because unlike me, she knows what she’s doing.
Her lips begin moving across my jaw, down my neck, and over my collarbone.
Each kiss starts another little fire on my skin as her hand trails down each rib, across my stomach, and then down farther.
And oh my God.
A crack of thunder roars all around us.
She leans into the crook of my neck. I can feel her smile against my jaw as every muscle in my body tenses and I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to make this moment last forev—
“What the fuck is going on in here?”
My heart feels like it both stops and beats through my skin all at once as I register the sound of someone else’s voice in the room. I pick my head up to see Mrs. Martin standing frozen in the doorway.
Shit. Fuck. FUCK.
Nora’s hand clamps down on my forearm in a vise grip under the comforter, her fingernails digging into my skin. But I can’t bring myself to look at her.
“Put. Your. Clothes. On,” Mrs. Martin hisses through her teeth as she looks toward the side wall and then doesn’t move a muscle.
“Nora?” I whisper, my eyes coated with tears.
“Stevie, get out of here. Now,” Nora says under her breath, but she’s still sitting frozen, squeezing my arm.
I wriggle out from her grasp, swallowing the vomit sitting at the top of my throat, then somehow manage to pull my underwear back on and button up my shirt enough to cover myself.
Finally Nora snaps back to reality, pulling her sports bra on and her shorts, keeping her eyes locked on her mom the entire time. Maybe I should say something.
“Mrs. Martin, this is all my fault. I—”
Suddenly Mrs. Martin unfreezes and lunges forward. She clamps her hand around Nora’s jaw, forcing a high-pitched cry out of her throat.
“I always knew there was something wrong with you.” She squeezes even harder.
“Mom…,” Nora squeaks out. “Please. I’m sorry.” Her face turns beet red as tears roll down her cheeks and over her mom’s hand.
Mrs. Martin jerks Nora forward until their noses are practically touching.
“You’re dead to me. Do you hear me? You are dead to me.” She spits into Nora’s face and then all at once throws her sideways. Her head crashes into the heavy wooden dresser.
“Nora!” I cry, taking a step back. But as Mrs. Martin moves toward her again, I throw myself forward until I’m right in between them. The edges of my vision turn black as Mrs. Martin catches me by the arm. She drags me up onto my feet and pushes me so that I stumble backward into the bed.
She points her finger at Nora, curled up in a ball, covering herself protectively. “You get your shit and you get the fuck out of my house,” she says, then storms out of the room.
I hurry over to Nora, but her eyes are looking past me somewhere. I grab her face in my hands. “We have to go,” I tell her.
She doesn’t say anything, but she gets up onto her feet, her whole body shaking against me.
I pull a duffel bag from the top shelf of her closet and set it on the bed in front of her.
She stands there, staring at it for a few seconds, before she finally starts darting around her room, grabbing handfuls of clothes and stuffing them inside.
The last thing she grabs is a small box from under her bed that she tucks into the bag before zipping it up.
With the rest of my clothes back on, we both head downstairs toward the front door, but Nora stops short.
“Mom?” she says, looking into the living room, but her mom has her back turned to us and she doesn’t move a muscle, doesn’t say a single word.
“Come on.” I take Nora’s hand and tug her toward the door.
We step outside into the pouring rain, and both of us are instantly drenched from head to toe. Nora pulls her hand out of mine and I turn around to find her stopped dead on the front walk.
“What am I going to do? What was she even doing home?” she asks over the rain falling around us. “Oh my God. What the fuck just happened?” She crouches down, dropping her head into her hands.
I lean over her, my head still reeling from what I just saw, from seeing the girl I love thrown into a dresser by her own mom.
“Nora, you can stay with me,” I tell her.
“And tell your parents what?” she asks, turning to look at me.
The second she turns and her eyes meet mine, I know exactly what I want to do. I know what I have to do. I have to protect her. I have to be with her. And I’ll do anything to make that happen.
“Listen to me. I’ve been thinking about it a lot and… I’ll tell my mom the truth. Okay? She loves me. She’ll be okay with it. And my dad is barely around anyway. We’ll figure it out.”
“Stevie…” Nora shakes her head.
“Come on.” I pull her up onto her feet and toward my car as a heavier wave of rain comes down on us. “I’ll tell her right now. I’ll tell her I’m gay. I’ll tell her I’m in love with you and that you need our help.”
“Stevie, just stop!” She rips her hand out of mine.
Why is she being like this?
“It’ll be fine. She…”
“You already told her!” she yells, then looks down at my feet.
“What?” I ask, confused. “I don’t understand. What do you mean?”
“Stevie…” She meets my eyes again. “You already came out to her.” Her voice is softer now, barely audible over the rain. I shake my head.
I… what?
She takes a few steps closer and wraps her arms around my elbows, the rain running down her face.
“I’m sorry it’s another thing I didn’t tell you. It’s just… things were so good between you guys and you were so set on keeping it that way. When you told me not to make you choose, it didn’t feel fair to tell you. I didn’t want to ruin that for you.”
I shake my head at her. “No. No, if she knew she would’ve told me. She would have.” Unless…
“It didn’t go well. It was a few months after we started dating and you tried to come out to her, but she basically denied it.
Said there’s no way you could know that at your age.
She thought you just hadn’t met the right boy yet, and something about how labeling yourself like that could ruin your life before it even got started.
But you always thought with the Church and everything, she was worried about how it would make you look, how it would make your family look.
So you never told her about me. That’s why your relationship fell apart.
You didn’t just drift apart, Stevie. She couldn’t accept you. ”
Tears roll down my cheeks, mixing with the rain as I think about every time I’ve felt guilty the past two months about how things went down between me and my mom.
Every time I thought it was all my fault…
because she let me think that. How could she let me think that?
It’s like Savannah and Rory all over again but a million times worse.
I can feel the pieces of me that want to fall apart, but I take a deep breath. As pissed as I am at my mom right now… I need to focus on Nora. Nora, who no longer has a mom at all. She needs somewhere to stay tonight. She needs me to hold it together.
I reach out and hold her head in my hands and she presses her forehead into mine.
“I know where you can go.”