Chapter 21
BEFORE
August, Eleven Years Ago
On Jackson’s eighteenth birthday, Marie and Phil planned to throw him a giant party to celebrate.
Julie and her new girlfriend flew in from California, and most of the people invited were either about to start senior year like us, or had graduated in previous years.
Everyone would be between the ages of seventeen and twenty-one, so there was going to be alcohol.
It would be too hard to keep track of who was actually legally allowed to drink and who wasn’t, so the Delvecchios made a rule that if someone was driving home, they would have to check in with them to prove that they were sober first. Anyone could stay the night, and I already knew I’d be sleeping over since everyone I knew who could drive me home would be drinking.
Before the party, I went with Jackson to a tattoo parlor. I sat on a chair and watched the tattoo artist begin to write the D for Delvecchio on his forearm.
“I could never get a tattoo,” I said over the buzzing of the gun.
Jackson turned his head to face me.
“You don’t think so? Not even on your birthday?” he asked.
I shook my head. “It’s crazy how permanent it is. And your skin is so red—it looks like it hurts,” I added. I watched as the artist rubbed the ink with a paper towel before he continued spelling out Jackson’s last name. His arm looked even redder now.
“It really doesn’t. It’s more annoying than anything,” Jackson said.
The appointment was no more than thirty minutes. The tattoo looked good—he picked a nice cursive font that wasn’t too curly, so it was easy to read.
“Do I look tough?” Jackson asked as he held up his arm and pretended to kiss his bicep.
“You look very Italian,” I said as we got in his truck to drive to the party.
He chuckled. “I’m not supposed to swim with this. Jules is gonna be pissed. She set up a pool this morning.”
I let out a small laugh. “She’s so obsessed with her girlfriend I doubt she’ll care if you don’t swim with her.”
“True. You’ll have to hang around them, get the 411 on this chick. If she’s the reason Jules didn’t come home during Christmas, then it’s game over.”
I gave Jackson a small salute. “I’m on it.”
When we got back to the house, we helped Phil and Marie finish setting everything up for the party. Kids started arriving, and it was a huge mix of different groups. Julie had invited people she graduated with, and the booze was flying.
It was another hot August, and the last thing I wanted was to get sick from drinking, so I took it easy.
Jackson, however, was not taking it easy; the last time I talked to him, he was at a beer pong table inside, completely intoxicated.
He was laughing and goofing around, and I was so happy to see him like that.
The last trimester of junior year had gone worse than the first, and just like Jackson had predicted, he didn’t do well on the ACT.
He had already said he didn’t plan on going to college.
He was in a weird head space right now, but today he was acting like his old self—something I’d barely seen in the past six months.
I hung around with Phil and Marie for a little while, setting out hamburgers and hot dogs as Phil grilled them. Marie had made a cake, and she let me decorate it; I covered it with sprinkles and made a horrible attempt at writing “Happy 18th Birthday Jackson” in scribbled frosting.
Julie and her girlfriend were in the pool, so I changed into a swimsuit before joining them.
One of Julie’s old friends, Jeremy, jumped in and we played a few rounds of chicken.
Julie’s girlfriend, Laney, was tough, and she knocked me off Jeremy’s shoulders every time.
I liked Laney; she was goofy and carefree like Julie was.
They were a good match. I was only a little bitter I didn’t get her all to myself, considering I hadn’t seen her in a year.
But she looked so happy today that I let it go.
Jeremy got out of the pool after a couple rounds, and I swam with Julie and Laney for a long time before I got tired of playing third wheel. We were the only three in the pool now, and I figured I should give them some time to themselves.
I lifted myself out of the pool, squeezing the water out of my hair.
When I turned around, Jackson was leaning against the side of the house, watching me.
He was only wearing a pair of black athletic shorts and a red pair of Vans.
I was wearing one of Julie’s old bikinis, an orange triangle top with matching bottoms. I suddenly felt exposed—the bottoms only covered half my butt.
Jackson had never seen this much of my body before, not even when he walked in on me in Julie’s room, and I felt the need to hide it.
I walked over to the lawn chair I’d left my clothes on, and slipped on my denim shorts without clasping them.
They were warm from the sun, and I already felt like they were drying the soaked bikini.
I grabbed a water bottle from a cooler, walking over to Jackson to give it to him. He had been drinking for over four hours straight; he definitely needed the hydration. “Settle Down” by The 1975 was playing softly from a speaker, and I mouthed along to the words.
As soon as I was directly in front of him, his eyes dragged down to my chest. I was about to call him a perv for staring at my boobs when he reached up to grab the bottom of the orange triangle, his knuckle brushing against the curve of my breast. I gasped at the pinprick sensation under my skin as his warm fingers adjusted the triangle so it was sitting more securely over my chest. He had never touched me like this before.
“Fixed it,” he said in a low voice. My legs were tingling, slithers of need coursing through me. I wanted more, and I bit the inside of my lip to tamp down the desire.
He let his fingers skim down my side until they landed at the waistband of my shorts, then he grabbed my belt loops and tugged me toward him until our hip bones smacked together.
We were outside, and I worried that someone would see us.
Julie was only ten feet away in the pool, and his parents could be anywhere.
He buttoned and zipped up my shorts for me as he leaned forward. My knees locked, and the spot just below my zipper started to pulse. “You’re distracting everyone here, Addison,” he whispered against my ear.
The way he said my full name and the heat I felt from his breath against my ear almost made me lose my mind.
I pushed him back suddenly, slamming him into the wall.
“You’re not supposed to touch me,” I whisper-yelled.
I was off-kilter, my entire equilibrium thrown off by what he was doing.
It had been a long time since Jackson acted like this, but he also had never been this drunk before.
Did he even mean what he was doing? He hadn’t so much as looked at me like he wanted me since my sixteenth birthday.
He wasn’t wearing a shirt, and my hand was still pressed against the hard planes of his chest. I had seen Jackson shirtless before, but never this close, and I had never touched him like this.
That freckle on his collarbone taunted me to move my hand over and touch it.
The feelings for Jackson that I had buried in my chest started to sprint to the surface.
I wanted to touch more of him—but I couldn’t.
“But it’s my birthday,” Jackson said in a flirty tone.
“And I really like your hip bones.” I took a step back from him, bringing my arm with me in the process.
He put his hand back on my waist, and his thumb brushed against the protrusion of my hip.
My swim bottoms were soaked, and not just from the pool.
I wasn’t strong enough to tell him no this time.
His gaze traveled over every inch of my body, like he was deciding which part of me he wanted to start with. His brown eyes finally settled on my mouth, and my lips parted against my will. If he leaned in to kiss me, I wouldn’t stop him—I physically couldn’t.
“Hey!” someone called out to us. I flinched, feeling like I’d been caught doing something I wasn’t supposed to, ready to get reprimanded.
My heart was thumping aggressively in my chest, and I was convinced everyone could see it.
I put a finger to my neck to check my pulse; was I too young to have a heart attack?
“Do you guys want to play badminton?” There was a blonde-haired guy and a redheaded girl holding up rackets in the grass, standing on opposite sides of the net.
“Yeah!” I said quickly. I shoved the water bottle into Jackson’s hands before turning around.
I didn’t look back at Jackson to see if he was following me, but I heard his shoes hitting against the pavement behind me as I wobbled over to the grass on bare feet.
Jackson and the blonde guy, Chris, situated themselves on one side of the net, and I joined the girl, whose name was Sophie, on the other side. I’d had a few classes with her in the past, and we had gone to some of the same parties before.
Sophie and I both sucked at badminton, and we lost the first two games before she suggested one of us switch teams with the boys.
I didn’t want to be close to Jackson again—I was having a hard enough time just playing across from him.
His chest was glistening with sweat, and I was addicted to the way his chest heaved when he lunged for the birdie.
Every time he ran a hand through his dark hair, I almost groaned.
A frickin’ high five from him would be enough to turn me on at this point.
“You go play on Jackson’s team, I’ll take Chris,” I told Sophie. They switched spots and we continued the game.
All of a sudden, Sophie was a pro at badminton, and she and Jackson beat us in the first game.
They were high-fiving, and after every good play, she would find a reason to touch his bicep.
Halfway through the second game they were hugging, and by the third win he was picking her up and spinning her around.
It was hard to watch after his hands had just been on me.
Chris wanted to be done after the fourth game, so I followed him to play cornhole. I stayed there for as long as I could, playing with new sets of people until my arm ached.
By the end of the night I was exhausted, and almost everyone who was staying the night had secured a spot to sleep. All the Delvecchios were in their rooms, and Jackson had said his good-nights to everyone an hour ago with a drunken smile on his face.
I was laying on the couch with Sophie, our heads at opposite sides of the couch. We were both small enough that our legs weren’t touching. Two guys were on the floor, and someone else was in the recliner, lightly snoring.
I was half awake when a light flicked on in the kitchen.
I rolled the other way on the couch, finding that Sophie was gone.
I sat up, rubbing my eyes as I looked to see who was in the kitchen.
Only one small light was on, and I saw Sophie sitting on the counter with her back to me.
Someone was on the other side of her, standing between her legs with their hands on her hips.
I could tell they were kissing, and before I could lay back down on the couch, the person took a step back.
My heart stopped when I saw it was Jackson.
The second our eyes met, his expression changed.
He probably thought I was a freak, watching him make out with someone in his kitchen.
His jaw clenched, and he almost looked apologetic.
I watched as he helped Sophie off the counter, and I slid back down on the couch before I could see what happened next.
The light in the kitchen turned off, and I listened as Sophie and Jackson walked upstairs, their feet padding across the carpet.
I looked up at the balcony as their figures passed in the dark down the hall to his bedroom.
I felt sick. I’d hardly had anything to drink, but I felt like someone had dropped an entire house on my stomach.
I rolled over and saw Julie’s friend Jeremy from the pool, asleep beside the couch. He was lying closest to me on the floor, facing me with his hands tucked under his head. I reached my hand out, rubbing his forearm until he opened his eyes. His eyes roamed my face until they adjusted in the dark.
“Hey,” he whispered softly.
I slid down to the floor and pressed my lips to his.
He kissed me back in a half-sleep daze. All we did was make out slowly, because I didn’t want to do more than kiss.
I didn’t care that his hair was sandy blonde instead of being so dark it looked black, and I didn’t wonder if he had a freckle on his collarbone.
I felt nothing when he placed his hand on my jaw and rubbed it with his thumb.
I didn’t feel the need to press my hips into his.
It wasn’t a bad kiss, but it was nothing like kissing Jackson.