On these extra-hot days, I make frequent stops by concessions for ice water and take the long way back for a quick spritz by the Squalid Squirters. Kids love to think they’re getting away with something when they spray me, but I’m grateful for the temporarily cool sensation. It takes less than five minutes to dry under these climatic circumstances.
Today as I take my second stroll through the Squirters, I notice Adam walking toward me from the opposite direction. The instance he sees me coming his way, I recognize the painful effort it takes for him to pull his eyes away from my chest. I kind of forgot about the whole wet-t-shirt aspect of my temperature-control system. Thankfully the Haunted Hollow t-shirts are a relatively thick material, and I subtly glance down to make sure it’s opaque, pretending I needed to rub the back of my neck. All clear for sheerness. We might be talking a tiny hint of nipple. Still, I must commend Adam for managing to look away. I’m not in the face-punching mood today anyway.
My ponytail bobs as I sashay past Luke’s ride and offer a friendly wave.
“Get caught in a rainstorm?” he chides.
“Yeah. Didn’t you?” I ask curiously.
“We still hanging out later?” Luke asks with a sly smile, and most of me is really happy I went with the whole wet-t-shirt look. The other piece of me is quivering and trying to remember what it feels like to have actual sex and if I have any idea what I’m doing.
The afternoon sun blazes on, and I take shelter underneath the shade of the tunnel while the boats run. Something about the cold water flowing through the concrete walls makes it at least ten degrees cooler in here. Plus, it’s really fun to scare the shit out of the kids as they round the corner.
The repetitive drone of the Devil’s Dinghies is almost enough to drown out my escalating nervousness about having sex with Luke. While I’m not a virgin, sex with one dude who was also a virgin before we got together doesn’t offer me loads of experience. According to Lish, who now has two more notches on her belt than I, plus a very advice-doling older brother, Archer, it’s pretty hard for a girl to be bad at sex this early in the game. Teenage boys can get an erection if their underwear is bunching up in the wrong way. Archer also expounded upon the joys of oral sex, both giving and receiving, and it was at that point in his sex-ed talk that I locked myself in the bathroom and sat on the toilet for thirty minutes. It was a lot to take in at twelve.
What is it about sex that scares me? I make a mental list (because God help me if I write it down and someone finds it):
1) See the whole “What if I’m doing it wrong?” fear above, even though I attempted to talk myself out of it.
2) What if Luke doesn’t actually want to have sex with me? That’s a possibility, right? Maybe he’s the type of guy who merely enjoys removing clothes from the upper half of the body.
3) What if he’s a dick and doesn’t want to wear a condom? Then he’s a dick, and I move on. I’m not messing with the loss of my future due to baby and/or disease just to out-sex my best friend.
4) What if I don’t have an orgasm? Judy Blume made it seem so easy in Forever, but I’ve never managed one while doing the deed. If I counted correctly, I’ve really only had two orgasms at the hands of someone other than myself. Would it be horrible if I didn’t with Luke? I wouldn’t get the emoji satisfaction with Lish. Or, you know, the actual satisfaction.
5) Are we moving too fast? Is there time to move slower? Do I want to move slower? Plus I need to have sex so I can one-up my best friend on her emojis.
That is a really stupid reason to have sex.
I guess the question is, do I like Luke Jacobs enough to have sex with him?
Is “I think so” a satisfactory answer?
Maybe I’m overthinking this. Luke and I will hang out tonight, get something to eat, and paint. Who knows what that will lead to … but, really, I’m cool with whatever happens.
Cool as a cucumber … that’s been left out in the sun and is now wilting and actually Broasting™ on the sidewalk.
That’s how fucking cool I am.
* * *
The park closes at six, and the obligatory wait for the crowd to leave commences. I head to my locker, change into a black tank top with red stars on it, then do an armpit check.
Could be better.
I rinse my armpits with wet paper towels then reapply deodorant with my secret locker stash, readjust my ponytail, and apply lip balm with a tinge of color (so I don’t seem like I’m trying too hard). I look at myself in the mirror and realize I haven’t worn this tank top since I turned eighteen. The top of my Empty peeks over the edge of my shirt. I consider changing, but all I have with me are extra Haunted Hollow shirts and Luke has seen me in enough orange. “Screw you,” I say to Hendrix Cutter in the mirror. “You can watch.”
It feels brazen to go on a date with my MTB showing. Who cares if the world thinks this is who I’m supposed to be with? I make my own choices, and tonight I choose Luke Jacobs. I’m fueled by this rebellion, enough to stride right up to Luke, who’s chatting with Adam outside the staff locker room, and pull him in for a kiss. He “mmmms” into my mouth. “Hey there.” Luke loops a finger into the top of my shorts, not in a manner where he’s touching anything dirty but definitely in a way that implies these things are coming off at some point.
My breath catches. Coolness plummeting quickly.
“I’ll just be going now.” Adam waves good-bye with two fingers. “Luke, Agatha,” and he’s gone.
“Wow.” I watch him leave. “He won’t even talk to me now.”
“He’ll get over it. He’s probably going to the bathroom to relieve himself.” I smack Luke on the shoulder. “I’m kidding! Or not? It is Adam we’re talking about.”
“Yuck. So let’s stop talking about him, please.”
“Fine by me. You hungry?” Luke asks. We discuss dinner options. I veto Mexican (no need to be gassy), Italian (garlic breath), and sushi (not a fan). We settle on an Indian restaurant Luke and his family frequent.
As Luke drives, I tell him, “After my dad left, my mom started taking us to a lot of restaurants that we were never able to try when he was around. The man wasn’t very adventurous.”
“Where’d he go?”
“Atlanta. He left my mom to be with his MTB.” I futz with the edge of my shorts. This shouldn’t bother me. I tolerate the man at this point, and my mom’s better off with her independence. There’s still something a little painful, a little embarrassing, when I say it aloud. “What about your parents?”
“They were divorced before the Naming. My mom met her MTB, Rick, on the Internet a few years ago. They took it really slowly, since they both already went through failed marriages. But he’s living with us now. Seems okay.”
Luke’s indifference about his mom and MTBs surprises me. I presumed his situation was similar to mine, or maybe I merely wished it were. “What about your dad?” I ask, hoping to remedy the discrepancy through a loathing-of-dads commiseration.
“He found his MTB right away. I have three half-brothers already.” He looks over at me and smiles as though this is cute news. It is not.
We arrive at the restaurant, Indian Garden, and the decision to order Palaak Paneer and Aloo Gobhi takes enough concentration that we are able to move along from the previously disappointing parental MTB conversation.
Luke sits across from me and periodically holds one of my hands to play with my fingers while we talk about movies and games. The difference in our hand sizes is mesmerizing.
After some time, the waiter rolls a small metal cart up to our table and produces several ceramic troughs of curries and plates of rice and naan. We pass our dishes to each other and sample different chutneys. I try not to eat too much, not wanting to have to poo at any point during the date. Fortunately for me, I’m a quick number two-er, so I could probably pass it off as a number one if necessary.
I wish bodily functions weren’t such a source of strife for me.
As we leave the restaurant
(Luke pays, even though I offer. I compromise with a promise of dessert later), he wraps his arm around me and pulls me close to his side. We walk to the car as one, a three-legged race we have no intention of winning. At the passenger door, Luke cups my chin and kisses me adoringly while I smile into the kisses. He opens the door for me and closes it once I’m comfortably inside. Throwing himself into the car, I jerk at the weight shift. After he starts the car and moves onto the road, Luke reaches over to hold my hand. I’m pretty blissed out.
The Haunted Hallow employee lot is virtually empty, save for a few vehicles including Sam Hain’s black minivan with the license plate HH 666. Speak of the devil, we run into Sam Hain near the gate. I feel mildly conspicuous, as though Mr. Hain can see the condoms in my backpack with his carny vision.
“You guys are a little early for work,” he jests.
“We thought we could work on the mural,” I offer.
Instantly I recognize Sam Hain’s chest puff with pride. Anything to improve his beloved park. “Well then, here,” he says, slipping a key off a large ring attached to his belt. “Lock up when you’re done.”
“You won’t need this to get in tomorrow?” Luke asks.
“It’s a spare. Keep it until the end of the summer. Good night, you two. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t do,” he advises, arching a wicked eyebrow.
As we walk away from him, Luke whispers, “So that probably means we could sacrifice a goat if we wanted to.”
“Or pray to a dark lord for better sales figures,” I add.
“Or eat sixty hot dogs in one sitting. Adam swears he saw Sam do it once.”
Hand in hand, we walk through the park. With the many thousand carnival bulbs shut off, the setting sun provides a blush-hued glow before the impending flood of security lights.
The evening is clear, and the temperature hovers above eighty degrees. Nary a breeze passes through Haunted Hollow, and the adorable wisps of hair once cascading from my ponytail are now clinging to my moist neck. Luke sports visible sweat rings on his gray t-shirt. Our walk through the park becomes a stroll, then a trudge, and by the time we reach the Devil’s Dinghies we’re both dripping with sweat.
“Damn, it’s hot,” Luke states the obvious.
“Uh-huh,” is all I can muster.
We stumble across the plank onto the grass, where we collapse next to each other. Luke feels around for a second until he finds my hand, then he links pinkies. “It’s too hot to hold hands.”
“Too hot to paint,” I add unmoving. We enjoy the coolness the grass provides. A breeze picks up, and the hair sticking to my face and neck chills. Goose bumps spring up on my arms.
Senses reawakened, Luke asks, “Is it too hot for this?” His fore- and middle fingers act as legs, sneaking across my belly.
“Depends,” I answer lazily. “Do I have to move?”
“Well,”—he props himself up onto his elbow—“you don’t have to. But usually it helps.” His walking fingers find the hem of my tank top and gingerly lift it to the base of my bra. The barely-there pressure of his touch causes me to shiver, as does the wind.
“Mmmm,” I hum unconsciously. The total relaxation of not having somewhere to be on a summer night, lying in a blanket of grass, and being caressed by a beautiful boy is a moment I want to pack away in my long-term memory. For a second I think, This would be enough for the night. This would satisfy me. But Luke is ready for more, as is evident by the languid circles his once-walking fingers are now swirling over my nipple. There is no denying the pleasure it gives me. Luke’s fingers read me like Braille, and he takes his cue to remove my shirt. The air over my skin feels extra cool now against the quickly drying sweat. I need more, so instead of waiting for Luke to pick the lock of my bra hooks, I save him from the puzzle and remove it myself. I sit up for a moment to toss the bra to the side, then lie back down in the soft grass. How does Sam Hain get the grass to stay so soft? Our lawn at home is so crunchy, even when healthy and green. I would never lie on my back completely topless in it. Here at Haunted Hollow, the wind whipping at my nakedness, I think about how I should do this more often.
Luke is quick to recover his contact on my breasts. My back arches into the touch, my legs clench around Luke’s strong body, and my hands grasp at anything to hold on. In one way, it’s disconcerting to lose control of myself like this, to not know what my body will do but merely react. But in another way it is liberating to not have to make a choice, to think through every expression or sound I’m making and wonder am I doing it right? Because when it feels this good, how could I possibly be doing it wrong?
Luke’s kisses are grand and luscious and intoxicating. He kisses down my cheek, my neck, and then his mouth is upon my chest. For the briefest second, I envision him licking Hendrix Cutter’s Name, but as he devours me I lose all thought of Empties. Luke feels so good I manage to close my eyes to Scarlett Dresden’s Name.
I think maybe this is going to be it, naked chests and mouths rubbing against each other but nothing below the belt. With the friction from our clothes and deliciously wet contact with Luke’s mouth, I am feeling the familiar building in my gut and below. I rut against Luke as he smothers me with his lips, his tongue, and anticipate the climax.
Too soon Luke backs off, and I sigh at the loss of contact. He kneels to unbutton my shorts, and in one yank pulls off both my shorts and undies. I am completely naked outside the Devil’s Dinghies.
Luke doesn’t wait for me to help with his pants, and without a fumble he is completely naked, too.
The sky has darkened significantly since our grassy tryst began, but the lights have yet to kick on. I’d rather not be exposed having sex on the lawn of a ride, and it feels sexier to see each other by the glow of the setting sun, colors reflecting in the sweat on Luke’s chest, his hazel eyes settling on a golden hue.
Luke kneels closer to me, and he whispers, “Is this okay?” I ask myself, too: Am I ready for this? Is this really going to happen? The answer is that if I’m going to see how great sex can be with a non-MTB, then I have to have sex. It’s as (nerve-rackingly, not even remotely) simple as that. “I have condoms in my backpack,” I say, wondering if he recognized the nerves in my voice that I heard. Together we crawl, naked asses in the air, bare knees pressing circles into the grass, until I find my backpack in the shadows. The crinkle of the condom packet reverberates comically off the wall of demons. I turn away so it doesn’t feel quite as much like they’re watching. At least now we are less out in the open than a second ago. I pray Sam Hain doesn’t have security cameras hiding behind the devils’ eyes.
The moment of condom application is a strange one. Am I supposed to do it? Is Luke? Does he want me to? Were we supposed to discuss this beforehand? Are we supposed to stop and discuss this now?
Something tells me that Luke is not in the mood for discussion. And that something is the way he grabs the condom from my hand and rips the wrapper open with his teeth. I watch him roll it on, pinching the tip like they taught us in health class (would I have been comfortable enough to remind him to do so if he didn’t?). Is everyone’s head a cacophony of questions before sex? Luke leans over me, and I lie back into the welcoming cushion of grass.
Sex with Luke happens.
One minute his penis is outside me, and the next it’s inside me, and instead of being the hot, orgasmic experience pontificated about in my junior-year diary, it’s faster and clumsier than required to be pleasurable, like when a crowd of people starts clapping along to a musical performance and the clapping speeds up but isn’t in sync with the music and it’s really disconcerting. Sex with Luke is also disconcerting while at the same time not all that gratifying. At least for me. Luke comes in a flash. I’m left with grass-stained butt cheeks.
As Luke and his ginormous body lie panting on top of me, the security lights find the least opportune time to blink on and blind us. Luke, in his state of release, doesn’t notice, so I not-so-delicately hoist him off me (using strength reserved for lift
ing a car off a crash victim) and scramble around for my clothes. I’m fully dressed before Luke has one leg through his boxer briefs. I watch him curiously. He really is beautiful to look at, and it wasn’t that what he did wasn’t enjoyable. But it wasn’t that enjoyable.
Luke lethargically stretches his shirt over his head. His shaggy hair, previously wet from heat, blows dry in the wind. He looks like a Roman warrior posing for a marble statue.
So why the hell wasn’t he mere chivalrous?
Luke’s satisfied expression tells me he has no idea he left something extra special to be desired.
What do I do? How awkward would it be to say to him, “Luke, I love what you did early on in our groping session. You may have even noticed I was thisclose to letting go, if you catch my drift. But once you hit this zone”—I gesture to my groin with a circular motion—“what happened, buddy?”
You can’t say that shit to someone you just had sex with. What’s he going to do, rewind? If I tell Luke that I didn’t come (although how could he not have noticed?), will he feel embarrassed? Offended? Confused? Maybe he doesn’t know what a female orgasm looks like. Maybe his ex-girlfriend faked it for the last three years. Maybe it’s up to me to help him help me.
I try to think of a subtle yet clever way to imply that, yes, we will do this again, but with some adjustments, when the windy, dark sky opens up and torrential rains burst down. We bolt to the parking lot, my short legs keeping pace. Before we part Luke attempts to pull me in for a passionate, rainy kiss, but I’m over it and appease him with a rushed peck before I dive into my car, soaked.
I drive home, confused, half-satisfied, and frankly disappointed. I want to call Lish to sort it all out, but she’s probably having ridiculous sex with the love of her life.
Meant to Be Page 13