"What are we going to do at the lake?" I whined. "It's cold."
"Let's just ride our bikes down there and take a look."
I shrugged my shoulders, which Jess took as consent. He flew to his feet and grabbed my hand in one fell swoop as he headed for my front door.
I blew on my hands as we weaved in and out of the trees that separated the main road from the lake. It had been an uncharacteristically warm day for the middle of March, but it was still too cold to ride a bike without gloves. We had parked our bikes by the edge of the road and were now making our way on foot through the mud and dead leaves that were between us and the lake.
"My dad wants partial custody." He kicked through a pile of moldy wood chunks as he spoke.
His announcement came out of nowhere, and even though I was shocked to hear it, it somehow explained his sudden need to go on a random bike ride to the lake in the middle of March.
I pushed a dead branch out of our path. "That can't happen, can it? Not after what he did?"
Jess shrugged and shook his head. "I'm not sure." As he spoke, we both lifted our heads toward the voices coming from the shoreline just twenty feet ahead of us.
"Oh, no." I was disappointed. "There are other people here."
"Good," Jess replied. "I'm glad other people are enjoying this place."
I looked at him in disgust, and then I looked down at my mud-covered blue jeans. I heard the voices more loudly. I cleared one branch away and then another until I saw four girls sitting on the sand at the edge of the pond. Even though I could only see the back of their heads, I knew immediately who they were; Drew, Carmen, Stella, and Stephanie. I wanted to turn around and bolt before they could see me, but a branch snapped under my sneaker and they instantaneously turned around.
"Gemma?" Drew spoke first. She was obviously surprised, but I thought I sensed some annoyance in her voice. Did she think I followed them? Maybe it was in my head. Before I could respond, Jess stepped out of the trees behind me. All four girls stared at him with shocked expressions. I was positive that they were wondering what a guy like him was doing with a girl like me.
"Who's your friend?" Drew nodded toward Jess. The same protection I had felt over my secret non-friendship with Trace earlier that day took over me again now, only ten times stronger.
"Uh," I stammered. I was tempted to give him a fake name like Bruce or A.J. in order to keep him safe from their future conversations.
"I thought you said you didn't have a boyfriend." Skepticism dripped from Stephanie's words as she spoke.
I ignored her. "This is Jess Tyler."
Drew's eyes widened as she looked straight past me at Jess and lifted one eyebrow. "Hi, Jess Tyler, it's nice to meet you. I've heard a lot about you."
It was absolutely impossible to find anything wrong with her greeting to Jess. Unlike Clarissa's brash form of flirting, Drew was subtle and cool. I hated it. I had to wonder, though, where she had heard about Jess. I had never told her about him.
Jess shifted behind me. "Do you girls go to school with Gem?"
"Gem?" Drew sat up straighter and looked at me with a devious smile. "I like that."
I looked down at the dirt and mumbled, "Don't call me Gem."
Jess patted me on the back. "She thinks it sounds too much like Jim."
Jess loved calling me Gem, despite the fact that I had begged him not to for years. It didn't bother me anymore when he said it, though. It was like a little pet name he had for me. But I still cringed whenever anyone else said it. And for some reason it was driving me twice as crazy to hear it from Drew.
"I think it's cute," Drew said while smiling at Jess.
I turned to Jess and reluctantly told him their names. I spoke in a steady tone, but my eyes pleaded with him not to give away the fact that I had been talking about them all afternoon. Jess read my cue and nonchalantly walked toward the shore line of the pond. "It's nice to meet you all." He picked up a couple pebbles and tossed them into the pond. All four girls had their eyes glued to the back of his head. I could have painted a picture of them in the length of time they spent watching him. I looked at the back of Jess to see what was so incredible that all four of them would be watching him with drool practically dripping down their chins. Okay, I knew Jess was tall and good looking. But there were a lot of good-looking guys in Franklin. Why was Jess getting so much attention from some of the most popular girls in town? He had on a Philly's hat that he wore backward on his head, his brown hair curled softly out the ends and around his ears. He was wearing a midnight blue hooded sweatshirt with the sleeves pushed up around his forearms so that they wouldn't get dirty as he picked up rocks. He wore a pair of old Lucky Brand jeans which, now that I looked at them, fell over his lower half perfectly. And to finish it off he was wearing some old running shoes that were now soaked in mud and dead leaves.
"You can skip rocks," Drew spoke lowly and evenly as she boosted herself from the ground and shook off the sand that was stuck to her jeans. She walked toward Jess, who was launching his third stone into the pond. It skipped over the water four times then disappeared beneath the black surface.
Jess squinted into the sun. "Not really. I think that last one was a record for me."
Drew stepped so close to him that they were nearly touching. She looked so tiny next to him. She picked up a semi-flat stone and tossed it effortlessly across the glassy water. It skipped at least six times before it disappeared.
Jess looked sincerely amazed. "Impressive." He nodded as he watched the pond, looking to see if her stone was still skipping. "Where did you learn to do that?"
I felt angry that the other girls and I were all silently watching their interaction. It was like Drew and Jess were the main characters of a movie, and we were all watching and waiting for them to fall in love and live happily ever after.
I quietly walked over to where the other girls were still sitting and plopped myself on the dirt next to Stella. "Do you guys come here a lot?" I was trying as hard as I could to not be bothered by the skipping rock conversation going on ten feet away from me.
Not one of the three girls looked at me. They kept their gaze toward Drew and Jess. Stella finally shrugged her shoulders. "We do lately. There's not much more to do around here."
Stephanie chimed in next, "I can't wait until I graduate so I can get out of this lame town."
I looked out over the lake and down the shore line. Even though the beauty of the lake had been lost in the past five months of snow and ice, it still held a million memories for me of past summers with Jess. Directly across the lake was the dock where Jess taught me how to fish. That summer I caught a fish so big that it took both of us to reel it in. Down the shore a ways from where we were sitting was the old rope swing that we'd hung a few years before. And just beyond the rope swing was the boat dock. One of our favorite things to do was to go down there on summer nights with any other kids we could convince to go with us and play hide-and-go-seek on all the old fishing boats. Nothing got my heart beating faster than hiding all alone in the bow of an old fishing boat at night on the quiet lake, waiting for someone to find me. I loved this lake-even in March-and I loved this town. And unlike Stephanie, I never wanted to leave.
My attention drifted back to Drew and Jess. I couldn't hear what they were saying, but they were both laughing and apparently having a good time together. Drew reached over and touched Jess's elbow. It looked like she was telling him to keep it close to his ribs in order to skip the rocks better. But something nasty, hard, and cold swelled in my stomach as I watched her hold on to his elbow and then his forearm. And then as if it couldn't get any worse, he smiled at her. It wasn't just a smile to be polite. It was the Jess smile. The Jess smile that belonged to me.
Without giving myself time to consider the consequences, I got up from the dirt, removed my Nike tennis shoes, dug my toes into the sand, and then set off running toward the water. I ran as fast as I could and finished with a cannon ball into the ice cold liquid. I was so
shocked with what I had just done that the temperature of the water didn't register to my brain. All I could feel was the slushy mud under my feet as my head sank beneath the water. All at once I felt a million tiny jabs of ice pierce every inch of my body. My head throbbed as the water swirled around it, jabbing at my eyes and inner ears. The pond was quite shallow so my head bobbed back up within a couple seconds, but even though my mouth was well out of the water again, I couldn't catch my breath. I opened my eyes, though I could barely make out the figures standing on the shore in front of me. I blinked the water away from my eyelashes and was finally able to gasp on a breath of air.
I heard Jess's voice. "Gemma! Are you crazy?" His voice was strained as he side-stepped along the water line to get closer to me. All the girls were quiet, though as I continued to blink I could tell that they were watching with wild excitement, especially Drew. Jess looked terrified as he began pushing his way toward me through the knee-deep water. I tried standing up as the water must have only been four feet deep where I was, but the mud underneath me was too loose, and I couldn't get my footing. I tried swimming toward Jess, but my arms and legs were too cold. I could barely feel them attached to my body. They felt more like blocks of ice attached to me with staples rather than arms and legs. The girls on the beach began shrieking with terror as they realized that I was drifting further away. Before I knew what was happening, Jess was at my side, chest-deep in the water.
"Here, take my hand." He reached for me, and I tried to reach back, but my arm felt like it weighed a hundred pounds.
"I don't think I can," I spoke quickly. I was starting to panic. My body had never felt immovable like this. All I could do was cock my head back to keep my face out of the water, but my feet were sinking into the mud, and it was getting harder and harder to stay above the waves.
Jess moved quickly toward me until the water was up to his chin. "Grab my hand, Gemma." He reached out as far as he could, but the water was lapping me away from shore, and his fingertips were still six inches away from my bobbing body.
"I'm freezing Jess. I can't move my-" I couldn't even finish my sentence. A piece of my hair fell against my cheek. It felt stiff and cold like an ice cycle.
"Gemma!" Panic screamed from Jess's eyes as he dove toward me. He was completely buried in the icy-cold liquid. And within seconds I felt him wrap both of his arms firmly around my waist. His grip felt like thorns against my body as he dragged me to the shore that was a mere ten feet in front of us. I felt so helpless. I couldn't move any part of my body, and yet somehow every part of me was shaking uncontrollably. Jess dragged me to the dry sand, and Drew handed him his sweatshirt, which he had quickly discarded before jumping in the water. He wrapped it around my shoulders, but it only pressed my icy clothes closer to my skin. Drew handed her jacket to Jess next.
"Will this help?" Her expression was eager and sincere.
Jess was breathing hard. He must have been freezing himself. "Yes, but not with all these wet clothes on her. I'm going to go to the road and flag someone down to help us. You need to take off her wet clothes and cover her up with the dry jackets."
The next thing I knew Jess was gone and the four girls were hovering over me, carefully taking off my soaking sweatshirt and jeans. I was embarrassed but relieved to have the heavy clothes that might as well have been sheets of ice removed from my body. One of the girls draped Jess's jacket over my shoulders and zipped it up, while another girl fashioned a sort of skirt for me with Drew's jacket. I felt another dry jacket wrapped around my head and two others swaddling my feet and lower legs. I felt like a mummy, but it was a hundred times better. I heard Jess's voice before I had realized he had returned.
"Good job. She's already looking better." I felt tired, and though not quite so icy, I still felt cold. I dreamed of being home in front of the fireplace drinking hot chocolate. Again I felt Jess's grip-this time under my shoulder blades and my knees as he carried me away from the lake and through the trees. Jess loaded me into the backseat of a car. I recognized the man and woman in the front seat as the Bartons, an older couple that lived on our street. I heard Jess and the four girls saying something outside, and then Jess slipped onto the backseat next to me and held me close to him as the car made its way down the road. He rubbed my arm with his hand so vigorously I thought the jacket might start on fire. Shame overwhelmed me as I thought about myself jumping into the freezing cold lake at free will. This whole catastrophe would have been a completely different situation, almost romantic, had I been thrust into the pond by an unexpected gust of wind. But the fact that I jumped in made me feel like an idiot. Maybe I was remembering it wrong. I was probably in shock and thinking incorrectly. Maybe I hadn't jumped in after all! When my lips felt thawed enough to move, I said in a frail whisper, "What happened?"
Jess looked down at the top of my head that was nuzzled into his chest. "You jumped into the water," he replied callously.
I had jumped into the water, and Jess was upset about it, as he rightfully should be. "Why?" I felt so tired and weak. I meant for the question to be rhetorical. I didn't expect Jess to know the answer, but he sighed and said, "I could make a guess."
I found the strength to sit up and look at him for his guess.
But his head was turned away from me as he stared out the window.
"Can I ask you another question?" I was beginning to feel warm again, but I stayed close to Jess partly to offer him my heat, and mostly because I loved being near him.
He looked down at me again and nodded his head.
"You don't really think you're dad will be able to get partial custody, do you?"
Jess looked out the window, and I felt him breathe heavier underneath me. "I don't know." And then he said the last thing I ever thought I'd hear him say. "I feel sorry for him."
I was so surprised with his answer that I didn't have a response. All I could do was lean against his chest and hold him. And hope that I never had to let go.
We didn't speak another word before the Bartons pulled into my driveway. I mumbled a thank you and a good-bye as Jess gently dragged me off their backseat, but the good-bye was unnecessary because they anxiously followed us up my front walk and even through my front door. Mr. Barton had called my parents from his cell phone, so they were expecting us with the fire lit and an electric blanket draped over the couch. Jess explained my clothing situation to my mom, who led me up the stairs to the bathroom to take off the rest of my wet underclothes.
"Where's Jess?" My skin had thawed out considerably and talking came much easier as Mom led me back down the stairs twenty minutes later in a dry set of pajamas. Dad was sitting on the couch opposite of the one set up for me, reading the newspaper. As soon as he heard my voice, he jumped to his feet and led me from the staircase to the couch, where he helped me lie down. Physically, I probably didn't need all this help, but emotionally I was drained, so I accepted it easily. Once I was lying on the couch, Dad draped the electric blanket over me while Mom laid a bag of warm rice on my head. The warmth of the blanket, the fire, and the rice bag enveloped me. This was exactly what I had been dreaming about when I was drenched in ice. The smell of the rice filled my nostrils, and I closed my eyes and listened to the popping of the fire.
"Where did Jess go?" I repeated. No one had answered my question.
"He went home," Dad said.
That made sense. I didn't know why he would have stayed.
"Is it true that you did a cannonball into Lake Emery?" Dad asked. He watched me with narrowed eyes, hoping that he had heard wrong, that there was actually a much better explanation.
I folded my arms over my face, which Dad would know was an indicator that-yes, it was true, and yes, I did feel really dumb for doing it.
"What in the world, Gemma?" Mom said as she sat down by my feet and rubbed my legs. "You could have been seriously hurt. Jess could have been seriously hurt. You are lucky things turned out as well as they did."
I opened my eyes slightly and made the most
pained expression I could muster. "I have no idea what I was thinking. It just happened!"
"What were you doing at the lake this time of year anyway?" Dad asked.
I told them the whole story from Jess's love for Niagara Falls to Drew touching Jess's elbow. "Drew was throwing herself all over him. It was disgusting!"
Dad looked unconvinced. "So you jumped into a freezing lake?"
"No, it wasn't because of that."
Mom chuckled under her breath.
I looked at her quizzically. "You think I jumped because she was flirting with Jess?"
"I think you were upset because Jess wasn't giving you his one hundred percent attention. And I think you thought he would start paying attention to you again if you did something a bit outlandish."
I pulled the blanket up over my chin and sank behind it. The last thing I wanted to be was one of those girls that did lame things for attention. But that's exactly what I had done.
"The ironic thing about it," Dad added without looking up from his newspaper, "is that you're the last girl on earth that would need to go the extra mile to get the attention of Jess Tyler."
"I can't believe you never told me you were friends with Jess Tyler." Drew and I had decided to be partners on an assignment in German class the next day, much to the chagrin of the three other girls, who didn't even try to hide their distaste for my presence in their group. Unfortunately, my episode at the lake hadn't so much as given me the sniffles, so I had no excuse to stay home from school. Unlike Jess, who could barely get out of bed that morning. I wasn't too upset about going to school, though. Now that I actually had locker partners and someone to walk down the halls with, school wasn't all that bad.
I pulled a red-colored pencil out of the color box as I replied, "I didn't know you knew who he was. I didn't think it would matter."
"Of course I know who he is." Drew bit her lip as she scribbled on the paper in front of us. "Everyone knows who Jess Tyler is. I had just never met him before."
"How do you know who he is?" I was waiting for her to further prove my point that Jess was indeed popular.
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