Chapter Six #2
“These guys are awesome. I saw them live last year; it was incredible. I’ll burn you the CD. ”
Okay. Apparently not big on irony. Got it.
When we pulled up to one of the well-worn banks of the river, I felt ready to throw up.
You’re fine. Stop being ridiculous.
It wasn’t like I was a prude, but most people assumed I was much more…experienced than I actually was, and that had me gnawing on my bottom lip.
Hastily, I plugged in my phone to his sound system, effectively ending the dying cat sounds that were emanating from the speakers, and turned on my own playlist.
Better.
My heart rate slowed, and I ignored his incredulous glance.
“Do you wanna get out and dance?” I asked when a slower song came on.
“Not particularly,” he answered. I turned quickly to look at him, not loving that he shot down my idea, and was startled at how close he had leaned into me.
“How do you do that?” I asked, willing my voice to sound normal.
“Do what?” he murmured.
“Like, ninja your way closer to me.”
“Practice.”
“You practice being a ninja?”
“No, but I’ve had lots of practice doing this,” he finished before closing the space left between us and pressing his lips to mine.
My initial annoyance at his cocky attitude took a backseat to the sensation of his slight scruff tickling the space above my lip and his fingers brushing my waist. I couldn’t quite settle on where to put my hands.
Everywhere I tried seemed awkward. His biceps seemed as good of a place as any, and I tried to focus after that.
His hands seemed to have a similar issue, though I ventured a guess that it wasn’t for the same reason as he casually familiarized himself with my bare back.
“You know, there seems to be a lot more room in the back… if you’d rather…” he said as he kissed below my ear. I laughed inwardly.
I guess there’s really no suave way to ask a girl to climb into your back seat, I thought, mildly amused.
Nevertheless, I started to extricate myself from his arms to make my way to the other part of the car when I caught the time.
“Shit. I have to be home in like twenty minutes.”
He grabbed my waist and bit my neck lightly.
“We can have a lot of fun in twenty minutes,” he murmured against my skin, his fingers brushing across my chest and sending entirely new shivers up my spine. My eyes widened at the implication, and I smacked him in the shoulder. “What the hell was that for?” he asked, surprised.
“You know exactly what that was for. I’m being serious; I can’t be late. I know it’s completely stupid, but I’m not interested in moving even further up my mom’s shit list at this time.”
“Way to be a tease,” he sighed. But he did start the car and move completely back into his own seat.
“I’m sorry, what did you call me?”
He shot me a sideways glance, assessing my anger.
“You’re a cock tease. Whatever, it’s fine. I’ll take you home; you won’t be late. God forbid.”
“Fuck you, Zack.”
“Yeah, see, that’s sort of what I thought was gonna happen, but apparently not.” He put the car in gear and started back towards the road. Tears pricked at my eyes at his change in attitude. “You’re a dick. Just take me home.”
“As you wish, Princess.”
He turned his awful music back on, but I didn’t even care as long as it drowned out the replay of the last ten minutes that was going on in my head.
He pulled up to my house and turned down the music as my hand reached out for the door handle. I was willing my emotions to stay under wraps until I got inside.
“V, wait,” he let out, his tone apologetic.
“Not a chance.” I grabbed my bag to go, but he locked the door as I grabbed the handle. “Seriously? You’re going to lock me in the car ? In front of my own house? Stellar plan.”
“Damn it, I just…I’m sorry I called you a tease. I was excited to come out with you tonight, and you look like that, and I thought we were having a good time. I shouldn’t have said what I said.” He wasn’t meeting my eyes, and his rapid mood swings were giving me whiplash.
“Um, okay?” I really had no frame of reference for this situation.
“Look. Being with Jenna. It kind of fucked with my head. She would…whatever. It doesn’t matter what she did. But I’m sorry for dragging you into my issues. You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Well…thank you for explaining that much. And, I was having a good time. I don’t know…”
He finally met my gaze, and his blue eyes were pleading. “Can we just try this again? Can I walk you to your door and pretend the last ten minutes never happened? I wasn’t lying when I said I liked you.”
My anger mixed with surprise as he spoke, and I wasn’t entirely sure what to do with that combination. I kind of felt flattered , and I didn’t think that was normal.
“I like you too,” I found myself saying anyway. He gave me a relieved look and got out of the car, coming around to open my door.
What are you even doing?
“I’m sorry tonight ended the way it did. Will you let me make it up to you?” he asked as we made our way up to my front door.
I sighed, not entirely ready to deal with more decisions. “Do you have classes tomorrow?” I asked.
“Yeah, at one.”
“Well, maybe you actually come find me in the commons before. I have practice at three.” That was as close to accepting his apology as I was going to get at the moment.
“Done. I will see you then.” He kissed my cheek and sauntered back to his car.
I attempted to physically shake off the feelings from whatever that was, but the energy was settled around me like a fog.
I couldn’t have said whether I was happy or angry or hungry or tired.
When I tried to replay the whole scene from beginning to end after reaching my bed and falling into it, I found that there was no making sense of the whole ordeal.
His comment about Jenna had piqued my interest, but I hadn’t been capable of pressing him for more information after the dizziness I suffered from his complete 180.
Next time… What could she possibly have done?
It was going to drive me crazy until I knew. When I was almost at the point of giving up on analyzing my own emotional state, my phone dinged.
LIV: Hey, did you do the psych reading? I need help. Or answers. Whichever really :).
V: Ya, I did it. Just call me.
My phone rang moments later.
“Hey girl. What seems to be the problem?”
This question was rhetorical of course. The problem was that I’d never once seen Liv take notes all throughout high school, and we’d had nearly the same schedule senior year.
Nevertheless, she always seemed baffled by her lack of understanding.
I wasn’t a particularly amazing student, but I tried .
She was lucky we ended up with the same psych professor.
“Bleh. I started reading…but it seemed like it was never going to end? How much is there to say about the founding of the field of psychology?”
I bit back a smile, amused, but talked her through the questions. It wasn’t even really homework; more of just discussion prep.
I let my mind wander as we spoke. After the odd ending to that date, I wasn’t sure I wanted to mention it to anyone, but my mouth got the better of me.
“So, I sort of had a date tonight.”
“And what possible reason do you have for talking to me about dead guys for thirty minutes instead of leading with this? With Zack?”
“Yeah. I saw him before practice, and he asked me to dinner. I didn’t want to say anything, because, I don’t know, he doesn’t seem to have the greatest follow-through.”
“I can’t believe you said nothing . My brain would have exploded trying to keep that to myself. Seriously, you’re like a secret agent.”
I just laughed and listened to my friend prattle on about how cute Zack was and tell me in no uncertain terms that we would be going on some epic double dates once she decided which one of his friends to go out with.
I zoned out, still not able to reach a consistent train of thought about when exactly things had turned south.
He seemed to like me. He complimented me and it made me have all the butterflies.
He kissed me, and it made my heart stutter.
Despite that, I couldn’t shake the sense that there was more going on with him.
Or maybe you’re self-sabotaging.
It was so like me to get close to something I wanted and then do something stupid to screw it up.
Like how you ended up living at home when you were almost out .
I still frowned thinking of how I let that blow up in my face.
There was an uncharacteristic silence on the other end of the line.
“Well?” Livy questioned, apparently exasperated.
“Well what? Sorry, I was in my own world there for a minute.” I could practically hear the eye roll through the phone.
“When can we go out ? I want a homecoming date.”
“Oh, um…I don’t know. I’ll ask Zack. He said he’d call later. Yo u do realize, though, that we’ve been on a total of one date. He’s not, like, my boyfriend.”
“Yeah, yeah. Can you just be a little more enthusiastic? I mean, if you’re not into him, I would gladly take him off your hands, just—”
“Keep your French-manicured hands to yourself, Olivia.” I grinned slightly at the jealousy in her voice, no matter how masked it was by humor.
“You know how I feel about the use of my full name.”
“I do,” I replied, my grin getting bigger.
“There are four syllables, Vanessa. Completely ridiculous. Whatever. You’re lucky I love you. I’m going to go and get ready for bed, but I want actual details tomorrow. No more of this ‘we went out, it was fun,’ bullshit. I wanna know what he tastes like.”
“Ew, you are too much.”
“I know. It’s why you keep me around. Talk to you later.”
“See ya.” I had to simply shake my head as I tossed my phone on the bed.
I just needed to make a decision. Over-analyzing was not my thing. I usually just did what I wanted and assumed it would turn out okay. So, I decided to give the boy the benefit of the doubt. For now.