The sound of the phone wakes me up. “Hello.” I say, after getting it too my ear.
I sound like an old blues singer first thing in the morning. I know what you’re thinking...two packs of cigarettes will do that to a voice. But my voice was deep and raspy already—I swear.
“No school today. Can I come over?”
I am suddenly very much awake. I look at the clock next to my bed and sit up. “It’s seven in the morning.” My voice is an octave higher than usual from the shock of the time.
“Yeah,” Max said, it sounded like, and...
“I’m still in bed.”
I hold the phone with one hand and stretch. I don’t hear the television on in the front so my mom has left for the day.
“Well get up,” he says. I can hear laughter in his voice.
“Why are you up?” What self respecting teenager gets up before noon on a non-school day?
“Because I couldn’t wait to see you.”
I let the words sink in. He doesn’t say anything else. I think he’s waiting on my response. But I’m dumbfounded and don’t know what to say, so I say, “Um...okay. See you in a minute.”
“Great, see you in a second,” he says and hangs up the phone.
I jump out of bed knowing he means he’s coming right now. Thank heavens I left my braids in so my hairs not sticking up all over my head. I pull on the cut off jean shorts that are my uniform when I’m not at school and smell under each of my arms. I’m straight, but I spray some extra deodorant on anyway. I’m headed to the bathroom to brush my teeth when I hear Max at the door.
It’s not raining, it’s pouring. The sky is so dark it could have still been night. Max hasn’t bothered with an umbrella and he’s wet but not soaked. We have that awkward moment of standing there looking at each other until I finally take a step back.
“That was quick. Let me brush my teeth.”
“Sure.”
And to my dismay he follows me down the short hall to the bathroom and stands in the door.
“You always get up so early?” I ask putting toothpaste on the brush.
“I don’t like sleeping in on off days. I feel like I’m wasting the day.”
I look at him through the mirror as I brush my teeth and he’s looking at me. All day alone with him. The thought heats my skin. I look away, embarrassed by the blush I know he must see.
“I like your hair down, why do you wear it braided all the time?”
I spit and rinse before answering, “I’m lazy.”
Max comes over and unbraids my hair. The heat of his skin warms mine. His presence is like a physical thing pressing against the back of my body. He takes his time removing the rubber bands off each braid. He looks at me in the mirror never taking his eyes from mine.
Max is dangerous. And I don’t mean he’s a threat to my virtue, although that’s also true. I mean dangerous as in; likely to cause harm and injury, maybe even deadly harm and injury. But he’s also safe. A thought just as weird, but just as true. He’s no longer smiling. The smile has been replaced with something nefarious. Butterflies are in full flight in my stomach. He lets his hands fall to his side and we stare at each other in the mirror for a moment before he takes my hand and we walk back to the front room. I struggle to find air to breath and will my heart to slow down.
“Do you need to call your mom?”
What... wait... where’d that come from?
“Why,” I ask.
“You know, to tell her there’s no school.”
“Oh, yeah right,” I babble. I pick up the phone and Max stands behind me rubbing my arms.
It’s too much. Too intimate, for him to touch me this way, like I belong to him.
“Good morning, thank you for calling Quickie-Mart,” my mom answers.
“No school today,” I say in the phone trying to keep my voice as normal as possible. Max is very distracting.
“I heard. There’s food in the fridge and I left you an extra pack of smokes on the table so you wouldn’t have to leave to get any.”
Have I mentioned how cool my mom is? “Thanks, I’ll see you after work.”
“I’m going over Tracy’s after work, I’ll be home later this evening.”
“Okay, well, see you when you get home.”
I swallow.
Not eight hours, but endless hours alone...with Max...alone. The reason for my anxiety is standing so close behind me I can feel the heat of his breath warming the top of my head. How strange is it that it gives me chills?
“Bye Josette and remember what I said last night.”
“I will,” I say before my mom hangs up.
Finished with the conversation, I turn. Good gravy what have I gotten myself into. I lick my lips because they were dry. Honest. I wasn’t trying to be sexy or anything, and instantly regret it because I didn’t want Max to think I am trying to be sexy or anything. I want him to take a step back. I’d do it, but I’m almost pressed against the wall. As if reading my thoughts, a smile breaks on his face and he does step back but not before grabbing my hand.
“So, what’s on the agenda for today?” He asks as he pulls me into the front room and both of us onto the couch. He throws his arm around me like we’ve been a couple for the last couple of years instead of two people that just met three days ago.
“What’s going on here, Max?”
I’ve always been the type of person that needed clarification and butterflies, shortness of breath and accelerated heartbeat aside, I can’t move past the last few minutes without getting the air clear. I pull myself from Max’s side and sit on the edge of the couch looking at him.
“I like you.”
He says these three words as if it’s enough. I wait on him to elaborate and when I continue to look at him he continues.
“I want to be with you.” The sly grin on his face has my mind in the gutter.
“What do you mean be with me?” I ask, a lot more breathless.
“I mean be with you.”
He’s teasing me. Letting me read between the lines. Leaving all doors open.
“You want me to be your girlfriend?” I ask, because while sex is not completely out of the realm of possibilities, I’m not going to be the one who brings it up in conversation.
“Yes.”
“But you don’t know me.” I know I should shut up. I’ve gotten the answer I want. I’m filled with nervous excitement about having my first boyfriend. A hot first boyfriend.
“I know enough.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
“Yeah, okay.”
“Good,” he says, and kisses me.
My first kiss since kindergarten when Roy Jones kissed me in the hallway during a tornado drill. I thought it would be just as awkward but it isn’t. Nothing touches except for our lips. But it’s slow and sweet and everything I think a first kiss should be. I’m glad I waited for it. I can’t imagine a more perfect one.
“Want some breakfast?” I ask, my lips still tingling from the kiss. I’m soooo excited, but I have to play it cool.
I’m getting up when the lights go out. The dark outside makes it almost pitch black and I stop in my tracks trying to remember where a candle is. Living in a state that has constant storms you’d think we would have the correct supplies: candles, flashlight, maybe a battery operated radio. You thought wrong. The best I can come up with was a couple of scented candles that are in my mom’s room on her chest of drawers. Fearing that would be too romantic, I lie.
“Hey, we don’t have any candles. Let’s go to your house.”
Max stands in front of me rubbing my arms again. I didn’t need light to know that he had that look in his eyes again.
“Okay,” he breathes into my ear. My heart stops and I’ve halfway change my mind when he takes my hand and head towards the door.
“Wait, I’m still in my pajamas. I need to put on some clothes.”
Well, I can’t go to Mrs. Anderson house in a t-shirt w
ith no bra.
“No problem, I’ll wait here.”
I find a bra hanging on the closet door knob and quickly raise my shirt and snapped it on then I twist it around. I take my arms out of the armholes in my shirt and quickly shimmied into the bra before righting the t-shirt. Done. I slipped my feet into a pair of flip flops and open the door. Max’s standing right on the other side. I don’t know if he was just standing there, or if he was about to open the door, but I’m glad I made my wardrobe change with no interruptions. I think.
“Ready?” Is all he says.
I lock up the house and we walk huddled together under my umbrella. Mrs. Anderson has better than candles; she has small electric lanterns already set up in crucial spots when we arrive. The old lady smell is in full force.
“Good morning, Mrs. Anderson,” I say.
She’s sitting at her kitchen table with a cup of coffee and enough costume jewelry and makeup that I wonder if she sleeps in it.
“The lights went out and Josette didn’t have any candles. We didn’t want to sit over there in the dark. Besides all the board games are here. You want to play one with us?’
“No I think I might go lay back down,” Mrs. Anderson says and my heart skips a beat.
“Well, I’m going to show Josette my room.” Max grabs my hand and we walk down the hall, pass the bathroom, and turn a corner.
It’s the same set up as my house. I guess there was only one floor plan to pick from when they built this neighborhood. Max’s room is the same as the one I have in my house. Ms. Anderson house shares the same cramped decorum as mine. The furniture is too big and there’s too much of it. I’m beginning to think the originals old houses were bigger than the one’s they moved into. Or maybe all old people are hoarders. Who knows?
“I usually have the window open to air out the room,” he whispers.
I know it’s so his grandmother won’t hear him, but the few low words have my heart racing. His hand is on my shoulder and he’s leaning down, his lips are almost on my ear. I can feel his breath like a summer’s breeze on my skin. He could have just said, “Take off all you clothes,” the way my body is reacting...the way I’m reacting.
Max doesn’t have a chair in his room so I sit on the bed so close to the edge that I’m not sure if my butt is even really on it. Max plops down at the other side just as pleased as Punch and leans back on his elbows. His secret smile isn’t so secret. I think he’s trying not to laugh at me. At my discomfort. I stand and start to walk around the tiny room. Pretending that being here was not making me nervous, by inventorying the cologne on the chest of drawers, picking up each bottle and inspecting them way too long. I can feel Max eyes on back.
“So, what games are we going to play?” I ask.
“Why are you so nervous?” Max doesn’t move from his place on the bed.
“Why are we in your bedroom?” I ask.
“Because this is where I hang out when I’m at home.” He actually scoots back on the bed and lays his back against the headboard. Like he’s settling in for the day. “Nothing is going to happen that you don’t want to.”
What?
“I’m not some sex crazed lunatic.”
“I thought all teenage boys were sex crazed lunatics,” I say.
“Why don’t you have any friends?”
What the...
The change of topic makes my head spin. Off the subject that includes the word sex in it I relax...a little, and kick off my flip flops and sit on the bed. Hover may be a better word.
“Because I don’t generally like people,” I answer.
“You never see your dad?”
Max lay across his bed with his chin in his palm. I finally scoot back and even put one leg on the bed. My body is turned so we can see each other. His face is close to my bent knee. His lips mere inches from it. Max is looking at my face but all I can think about is him moving his head a fraction and kissing my knee. The slow smile that spreads across his face makes me wonder if he knows what I’m thinking. I turn away from it. It’s too much for a girl.
“No, I’ve never met my dad? What about you, where are your parents?” I look at him from the corner of my eye.
“My dad’s in jail and my mom died.” There is no sadness, no emotion that I could see.
“You’ve never lived with either,” I push on.
“Well, I lived with both of them for a while. My mom was already pregnant with me when they got married. My dad wanted to live up to his dad standards but wasn’t able to find a job to provide the type of life he had been brought up in. You know, the wife at home barefoot and pregnant, cooking and taking care of the house and kids. So he supplemented his income by doing some less than legal stuff. He got busted. My mom did the best she could but then she got sick and we moved in with her sister. She had cancer and died when I was seven.”
“Your dad’s been in jail all this time?”
“No, he’d get out and go back. The last time he was sentenced to twenty years.”
“Whose mother is Mrs. Anderson,” I ask, ready to be done with this conversation and to move on to something a little happier.
“My dad’s.”
I thought I remembered something about the Anderson’s having a son. It’s not really information a kid would find interesting, so I don’t worry too much that I don’t know the specifics. The lights come on and the rain has lightened to a drizzle. Max reaches over and turns off the lantern that’s on the night stand next to his head. Shifting his body to reach and his shoulder touches my knee and I almost gasp. He’s so warm. Like a human furnace. But his heat doesn’t make me hot. At least not in that way. He sits up and holds his hand out to me. “Come here.”
I sit for moment, my breath caught in my throat, my stomach in nervous knots. Ever since Max has come into my life, short time that it’s been, I’ve not been myself. He makes me feel...different, less sure of myself, confused. It’s like he short circuited my brain and everything got jumbled in the reboot. I crawl towards him and he pulls me into his arms. When we’ve settled in, his back against his headboard and my head on his shoulder, everything feels right.
“Let’s talk about something else,” he says in a low voice not quite a whisper.
“Do you miss your friends from your old school?” I ask hoping that it was enough of a subject change.
“Not really.” Max is rubbing my arm and I can feel his breath on my neck, telling me he’s looking down at me, or at least the top of my head. The rest of the tension that’s been riding me since he showed up on my doorstep this morning leaves my body. I even take a deep breath. I’ve been holding it since seven this morning.
Max smells like rich black earth with a hint of sawdust and a touch of sandalwood. No shit. The smell is beneath the smell of soap and laundry detergent. I want to move my head so I can but my nose in his neck. I know that he’d let me. I feel like he wants me to and he’d even be a perfect gentleman about it by not getting all touchy-feely. My honor is safe with him. The thought makes me want to laugh.
“What’s funny,” Max asks in spite of me not laughing.
“How’d you know I was thinking something funny,” I ask and I can feel him shrug his shoulders.
“I was thinking how safe I feel with you.”
“And that’s funny?” He asks moving so we faced each other. His face inches from mine. So close that I can see that Max doesn’t grow facial hair. So close that I can see every crease and line in his lips and can count his eyelashes if I want.
“I was thinking that my honor was safe with you,” I whisper. I want to lick my lips, but my tongue may touch his lips. That’s how freakin’ close we are.
“It is,” he says and kisses me lightly. It’s almost not a kiss at all. More like a promise of a kiss. “Come on, let’s go for a walk.” He gets up and grabs my hand. I don’t bother putting on my flip flops, I love walking after a good rain with no shoes on. It’s the country girl in me.
The door to Max’s bedroom has been open the whole time. Mrs. Anderson made good on lying back down. I can hear the sounds of soft snoring coming from her room. Her bedroom is diagonal from Max’s. She hadn’t checked on us and I hadn’t heard her go to her room.
Outside the sun is making its first appearance although it’s still raining. Max holds my hand as we make our way to the street. I walk closest to the curb in ankle deep water that’s racing towards the drain at the end of our street. The cool water feels good on my feet. Instead of walking towards the main road we turn right and head deeper into our small neighborhood. Our little world is not very big. I consider everything outside our cul-de-sac as the outside world. We have nowhere to go, the day is ours and so our pace is slow. Eventually Max puts his arm around my shoulder and I put my arm around his waist. We don’t talk, we walk in comfortable silence.
“You ready to go back,” Max asks about thirty minutes later.
“Yeah, I guess I need to check in with my mom,” I answer. We take the same route back to my house.
Why is it that when electricity goes out people walk around flipping light switches? I go through the house turning everything off before calling to check in.
“Thank you for calling Quickie Mart,” my mom answers again.
“Hey just checking in,” I say and it’s like déjà vu. Max standing close and me distracted. He’s rubbing my neck and I catch myself breathing in deeply. The feeling of his skin on mine is doing crazy things to me. Is this normal?
“I’m going to have to work another shift. We had two people call in. They’re milking this storm thing.” I can hear a lot of people in the store, people out buying supplies in case the storm comes back.
“Okay, see you when you get home then.”
“Bye hon. Gotta go.”
“Mom’s working late?” Max breathes into my ear, raising every hair on my body. He puts his arms around me and I want to kiss him. I turn so that we face each other and I stand on my toes so my lips can reach his. His eyes are open and there’s a smile on his closed lips. He pecks me on my lips and then pulls me into a hug.
“We need to go back to my house,” he says, letting me go.
T is outside. “Hey Josette, hey Max,” she calls out from her front yard. She’s making mud pies.
“Hey T,” we call out together heading her way.
“Mud pies huh.” Max says and to my surprise sits down next to the little girl. T looks like Max just walked on water and the smile on her face is priceless. I sit down next to Max. The ground is saturated and there’s standing water in some places. The exposed earth in T’s yard is dark and smells wonderful. It smells like Max, or he smells like it.
“Where’s Rolanda?” I ask working on the second layer of my mud wedding cake.
“She’s with Pops. They went to the store to get some bread.”
Pops is what T called her dad. His name is Reginald and he’s Mrs. Denton’s oldest son. He and his kids were the first to move back in with Mrs. Denton. They had lived in New York or maybe California before returning to our small town.
“My mom’s coming to visit next week,” T announces. She’s excited. I never asked why Pop’s had come back with his children but with no woman. To be honest he’s a little spooky to me. I’d spoken to him a dozen or so times. He’s quiet and didn’t have much to say, which is fine by me since I’m the same way. Still, there’s something there that I can’t put my finger on it.
“Oh yeah, you must be very excited,” Max says. He’s finished with his mud pie and is now decorating it with some leaves and twigs. It looks pretty good for something a boy made.
“Yeah, we haven’t seen her since we came back. She’s staying for a whole week.” T stops working on her mud pie. “Hey Pops,” she yells when she spots her dad and sister coming down the street.
Max and I finish up with our mud pies before getting to our feet. Not to be out done by a boy I’ve put some small rocks around mine. It looks pretty good, but not as good as Max’s.
“Hello Mr. Denton,” Max says as Pops, Rolanda and T approach.
“Hello Max, enjoying your free day,”
He’s what my grandmother called stick thin. His clothes are a little too big for him like he’s lost weight. He has a bald head and his goatee is salt and peppered with grey.
“Josette how are you.”
“Good Pops and you,” I rub down my legs getting the leaves and grass off as best I can. I swipe at the seat of my pants too.
“Hanging in there,” Pops answers. He’d stopped in the driveway and now looks like he is trying to figure out a tactful way to get out of having to talk to us. I hate when that happens.
“Well good seeing you Mr. Denton, Josette and I better head out, be seeing you around T.” Max says right on cue.
Lupa (Second Edition) Page 6