Babydoll

by Nikkole Pruett

  Haley, Lucy, and I all dissolved into giggles, recognizing the quote from Dazed and Confused. My laughter tapered off the quickest when I saw Lane following behind his brother with his pretty princess' hand in his. It was just a lazy Friday night with no party on the horizon and there she was in a prissy floral dress and wedges. She looked impossibly girly and pretty. I felt myself begin to fidget with the knotted tail of my dad's ancient Johnny Cash t-Shirt. My ripped skinnies and Vans that felt so comfy and perfect just moments earlier suddenly felt so raggedy.

  Since the night Lane came to my defense things between us had felt weird. Sometimes I'd catch him looking hard at me like he was trying to figure something out. Those looks always made me feel transparent, like he could see the thoughts in my head. I felt like he could sense how his nearness set the butterflies in my stomach a flutter no matter how hard I smacked them down.

  "What the fuck?" Haley asked, with a wrinkled nose.

  "Haley, you know Allyson," Luke said, gesturing to the two behind him.

  His encouraging tone told us all we needed to know. Be nice, be calm, be friends. Haley schooled her expression into one of sugar sweetness.

  "Sure, from the Girl Scout fundraiser last weekend. We raised so much money for those sweet little orphans," she said, snapping in to a valley girl accent.

  Lucy and I burst into laughter again while Haley stared at Luke with wide-eyed innocence. I could tell it was hard for him not to laugh but he did manage to give her a disapproving headshake. Even Lane had to chuckle. But not Miss Ice Princess. She merely stared at us blankly and cuddled close to Lane's side.

  "Don't mind them," he assured his girl. "They always have something to say."

  "So what's up tonight?" Luke asked, diffusing the situation.

  The three of them piled onto the deck with us and we proceeded to discuss the merits of doing something versus doing nothing. I only half-ass listened. I couldn't keep from staring at the interloper. She sat right next to Lane with her head delicately on his shoulder and her fingers wrapped around his bicep. Her fingernails were perfect pink and manicured. It looked like she was digging them in just a little. As the plan of just staying put on the deck materialized, I watched her tilt her face up to look at him. Her icy blue eyes blinked softly and her full pink bottom lip pouted. Lane nodded without a question.

  "We'll probably cut out if nothing's going on," Lane remarked, causally.

  Clearly, he was wrapped up in a pretty princess. I’d never seen a boy so whipped. I couldn’t help but laugh. Lucy, who had noticed the same thing I did, only made it worse by making a whip snapping noise under her breath.

  "You two have smoked yourself retarded," Haley told us shaking her head. She hadn’t seen what we had seen and her comment only caused us to laugh harder

  Our laugh fest broke up when Mrs. Elton's half-drunk voice called my name out from the living room to let me know my dad was on the phone checking in. After another stellar “I'm not stoned” performance I headed through the kitchen to grab a drink. Much to my surprise, Lane managed to disentangle himself and was in the fridge getting his own drink. My mouth chose to run independently of my brain.

  "Why are you with her?" I asked, looking over the refrigerator door. Clearly, smoking had effected the filter between my brain and my mouth.

  Smooth as ever, he answered immediately without even sparing me a look.

  "Why do you care?" he returned.

  In my head, I told him I cared because she was bitchy and she wasn’t going to make him laugh. I told him she didn’t fit in with us and she’s going to keep him away from us as much as possible. I told him we all missed him when he wasn’t around and we just wanted to hold on to him because he was gone for so long. But that was all in my head and I didn't say any of those things. I wasn’t allowed to say those things because the we was really I and I had promises to keep. I said nothing.

  As I stood there, silent, he finally turned to look at me. As always, his full attention made my world spin and whirl. I shrugged. He smirked.

  "You really wanna know sweet Baby-doll?" he asked. His smile was wickedly delicious. My own smile stretched up to answer it. I shrugged again but he knew I meant yes. He motioned for me to lean in close. His breath on my ear, when he whispered, gave me chills. "She lets me put it anywhere."

  "Oh my God!" I gasped, backing up as if his dirty words burned. But I was giggling again. His impish grin and sparkling eyes were just too much. He was too much.

  After hearing that I couldn’t look at Miss Perfect in her ladylike, floppy beach hat without thinking ‘I know what you’re really like. I know why he's with you’. I grinned cheekily.

  "Hi, Allyson," I said.

  Haley looked at me like I had lost my freaking mind.

  "I see we're playing nice," she sighed and rolled over on her stomach. Ignoring someone she didn’t like was Haley's version of playing nice.

  Instead of returning my salutation Allyson just gave me a tight little smile as she settled carefully on her towel. She clearly didn’t want to be there. I wasn’t sure if it was the sandy beach or us she found more distasteful. I knew why Lane was with her but I still didn’t get why she was with him. I was pulled from my thoughts on the whole subject when I felt ice cold water against my sun warmed shoulders. Two grinning, laughing Campbell boys were assaulting us with water guns.

  "Mother fucker!" Haley yelled laughing, stumbling to her feet.

  She rushed Luke, who shot her the whole time. I turned my attention to the younger Campbell boy.

  "Wanna get wet?" he challenged me, with that dirty boy grin.

  Summer sun and sweet Margarita made me fearless and feisty.

  "You can try," I told him, with my very own smirk. I ran at him.

  He didn’t even use the gun. He tossed it to the sand and instead snatched me up and threw me over his shoulder. I squealed and wiggled and tried to get away…but not really.

  Nearby, Luke followed his brother’s lead and hoisted my friend over his shoulder. The stream of profanity that flew out of her mouth could have made soldiers blush. Lucy was laughing behind her clicking camera and Allyson was watching the whole display with the faintest look of disgust on her face. I didn’t have time to puzzle over why I was the one in Lane’s arms instead of her before we were crashing into the salty water.

  * * *

  Chapter 11

  * * *

  I always loved the Fourth of July. It was one of my top three holidays. I loved that it was smack in the middle of summer so it was always the warmest celebration. I loved the bar-be-ques and fire-works. I loved ice cold sodas out of ice chests at the beach, or as I got older, ice cold beers. I just loved it to pieces.

  It was late afternoon and everyone was headed to the beach for the fireworks display that evening. While Haley and I waited for Luke to get back from gassing up the Jeep and filling the cooler, I was sitting with my feet in the pool amusing myself with a pack of sparklers my dad gotten me. Dad was under the impression that Mrs. C would be driving us to the beach and I hadn’t corrected him.

  "Don't get that shit in the water," Haley snapped, from the deck.

  I rolled my eyes. She had been particularly bitchy and jittery all day. I was pretty sure she had taken something that really didn't agree with her but I wasn’t bringing it up. I preferred to not have her chew my ass out. Besides, I was all jazzed, amped, and ready to get my beach party on. I looked down at my new Razr to see if Logan had text me. He was supposed to be there tonight.

  After Haley and I took that flirting quiz, I decided that I was going to turn things around before I ended up seventy years old with a house full of cats. I decided I was going to learn how to flirt and the best way to learn was by doing. But first I wanted more pointers, so for the next couple of days I pestered my friends. Aside from her confidence bit, Haley didn't really have any suggestions to offer me.

  Lucy advised me to not worry about it, things were just supposed to click when they were right. I even a
sked Gavin but he pretty much agreed with Lucy. I was willing to bet neither of them needed to flirt because the thing between them just happened with no effort what so ever. Lucky ducks.

  My next stop in my quest for information was my favorite big brother. As usual, I found Luke in the kitchen. I hopped up on one of the kitchen stools.

  "Luke, how do I flirt with a guy?" I asked.

  With Luke getting right to the point was the best way to do things. He looked up from the protein shake he was mixing with narrowed eyes.

  "That’s easy, Baby-doll, you don't," he replied.

  I rolled my eyes.

  "Come on, Luke, I need a guy's perspective," I whined.

  Eyes back on his drink, I saw him shake his head.

  "Nope, I’m not hearing this shit," he told me. "It's bad enough I've got to deal with Lucy and Gavin. That kid is fucking weirdo. But I deal. I'm not dealing with my little Bailey Baby-doll chasing after some limp dick little pricks. Not doing it. There's only so many asses a guy can beat."

  "So what you’re saying is Lucy can had a boyfriend and Haley can do whatever it is you two hornballs do, but I've got to be all by my lonesome?" I asked, arching my eyebrow at him. While I appreciated his concern, it hardly seemed fair.

  "Exactly," he said, giving me an easy grin.

  "Luuuukkkkeee," I huffed. This wasn't going the way I wanted it to.

  "Nope, we’re not doing this," he said, shaking his head. "You’re little, Bailey. Stay little."

  "I'm barely younger than Haley and I know what you guys did last night," I told him, with a pointed look.

  "Remind me to tell Haley to shut the fuck up," he sighed.

  Near the beginning of the summer the status of Haley's virginity slipped from barely there to non-existent. She had been regaling me with sex tales ever since. Even though I had to make myself not picture the two of them specifically, I ate her stories up. Sex was almost always on my brain. Sex and boys and flirting and kissing and all kinds of stuff that would give my dad a heart-attack.

  "So, about those pointers," I tried to redirect Luke to my inquiry.

  "Pointers on what?" asked a velvet voice, suddenly near my ear.

  Lane was in my personal space, as usual. It occurred to me that clearly I'd gone to the wrong Campbell boy for advice on this particular subject.

  "Flirting," I said, leaning my back to his chest.

  I had grown accustomed to Lane crowding me. It wasn’t that it didn’t affect me anymore. It did. The butterfly wings still flapped and my tummy still flipped and flopped and it made me feel just a little guilty. Particularly when Lucy was around. But if she noticed that Lane touched me just a little more than anyone else she never said anything.

  "I could teach you everything you need to know," he said, innuendo thick and a smile in his voice.

  Luke turned and narrowed his eyes at the two of us.

  "Not no, but hell no," he said. "I'll cut your dick off, little brother. You'll be Ken doll, dickless. Actually, I'll just tell Baby-doll's daddy. He'll jail your ass. Jail your ass and shoot you. Back away from the little girl."

  I rolled my eyes.

  “I’m not a little girl, Luke,” I said. “And I know better than that.”

  I nodded my head toward Lane, indicating I knew better than to get mixed up with the likes of him.

  "Jesus, you guys act like I'm some sort of creeper," Lane said, moving to sit on the stool next to me.

  "You’re a nasty little fucker," Luke said. When Lane gave him a "what the hell" look Luke shrugged. "These walls are thin."

  Lane couldn't do anything but smirk.

  "Anyways," Lane told Lucas, navigating the conversation away from flirting and all things associated. "The game's on."

  His brother nodded.

  "Sweet," Luke said, heading toward the living room. He stopped to kiss me on my forehead on the way out. "No boys, Baby-doll. They're all bad for you."

  When he was sure Luke was out of ear shot Lane bumped his shoulder to mine. I took a moment to check out my favorite forbidden eye-candy. His lip looked like it had been recently busted and there was a bruise on his jaw. Instead of making him look haggard or rough, the imperfections made him look dangerous and tempting.

  "I'm not that bad," he said, with a smile.

  My smile reacted.

  "I know," I said. I reached and touched the purple on his jaw. "How'd you break your face?"

  "Business," he said with a shrug, eyes guarded. So mysterious. So cool.

  Instead of asking what kind of business, I just nodded. I could be cool too.

  "You really want to know how to flirt with a guy?" he asked, eyes lighting up again.

  I nodded.

  "It's in the eyes. Eye contact is everything. If you’re really interested he’ll feel it," he said. His eyes were on mine as he spoke. I could feel those words. It felt like my clothes were catching fire and smoldering right there all because of those gray-blue eyes. “And if you want him to kiss you, you just look at his mouth. He’ll get the point. Unless he’s an idiot.”

  To emphasize his point he let his eyes slide down to my mouth. I felt my breath catch. I swallowed hard.

  "That works?" I asked. My words came out so breathy I could have been auditioning for a porn hotline.

  Lane smirked.

  "Every time," he said, and gave me a sly little wink before he stood up and headed to join his brother.

  So, like a good little geek, I experimented with the data I gathered. I faked confidence and I stared boys right in the eyes. Boys we met at the mall, boys I knew from school, pretty much any boy I ran in to. It didn't matter if I was talking the usual non-sense that came out of my mouth or not. I just focused on working my eye contact. It worked like a charm. By the end of June my phone was constantly blowing up.

  I hadn’t gotten to the mouth trick yet. As many boys as I talked to, I hadn’t met one I really wanted to make out with. That was, until I met Logan. If ever there was a perfect guy for the summer Logan was it. Haley said he was one hundred percent pure beefcake and she wasn’t wrong. He was tall and dark and handsome. We had absolutely nothing at all in common. He liked to hunt and he listened to country music exclusively and I highly doubted he was at the top of his class in school. Regardless, he was super sweet and perfect for just the summer when no one was expecting to meet their soul mate.

  My phone finally beeped, alerting me that Logan sent a text. He asked what time we were going to be there. From the sound of the Jeep pulling up next door and laughter floating over the fence I guessed pretty soon. I texted him back quickly and tucked my phone in the back pocket of my shorts.

  "Sounds like your chariot had arrived, princess," I told my slumped in her chair bestie. I offered my hand to help her up.

  She finally gave me a little smile as she took my hand and it reminded me just how pretty my girl was.

  "Luke better damn well have gotten me some Boones. I need sugar," she said, stretching and smoothing her bright red shorts. She took my hand again, seeming to need a little help steadying herself.

  "Let's go see," I said, and we head over, our clasped hands swinging between us.

  The Campbell's driveway was a flurry of activity and noise. T.I. was bumping out of the speakers in Luke's Jeep. Lucy was perched on the hood snapping pictures as Lucas and Gavin loaded beach chairs and floats in the back. She had a big fat Styrofoam cup between her thighs and judging from her stained lips it was her favorite double cherry slush.

  Surprisingly, the middle Campbell kid was there too, wearing black board shorts and a gray wife beater, leaning against the shiny silver Eclipse he got for his sixteenth. That led me to believe he would be hanging out with us that night. He had been in and out for most of the summer but apparently his girlfriend had left for a couple of weeks to vacation where ever it was that rich people went.

  Lane had more than just the girlfriend thing going on too. He often disappeared only to show back up with scraped up knuckles and busted lips. Bot
h Lucy and I had asked him what he was getting into but he just smirked and told us not to worry our pretty little heads.

  "There's my girls," Luke said, when he spotted us. He walked over and snatched Haley up, spinning her in a circle.

  I smiled, hearing her giggle. Even after those two had done pretty much every nasty under the sun they were still happy to see each other. They still weren’t together. But they were together in all the ways that counted.

  "Did you get me a treat?" she asked, when he set her back on her feet.

  "Of course," he said. "I got you both a little something."

  He reached into the cooler and pulled out wine coolers for Haley. Then he grinned at me.

  "And for you, little girl, summer in a bottle," he said and handed me a bottle of Malibu.

  I grinned. It was perfect. I only had just a little part of a joint left so the booze would be give me lots of courage to maybe kiss the beefcake boy who texted me.

  The guys loaded the massive cooler onto the backseat and it was then we noticed we had a problem. Between all the bodies and the cooler there was no way we’d all fit in the Jeep.

  "I could drive," Lane volunteered. "I wasn't planning on getting fucked up anyway."

  "Ok, I can get Lucy and Gav in the back and Baby-doll can ride with you," Luke said.

  I wasn’t so pleased with that plan.

  "Um, no," I objected. "Lane drives like a maniac."

  Of course that was only part of the issue. Being in close quarters with Lane was just too much. The boy smirked at me let he knew just what was going on in my head.

  "Don't be such a girl," he told me.

  I ignored him.

  "Lucy and Gav could ride with Lane," I suggested.

  "She's not getting in my car with that shit," Lane said, nodding toward Lucy's drink.

  Lucy curled her lip and looked indignant at her brother.

  "I'm not a toddler, dick, I'm not going to spill it," she huffed.

  "Need I remind you of the chocolate milk?" he asked.

  My girl’s sneer turned into a look of sheepishness.