by Ella Fields
Grabbing my chin, he lowered his head. “I know enough to know I’ve been an idiot, and anything else I find out about you is just a bonus.”
My walls shrank even more, then it was my turn to make the first move. I dove on him, wrapping my arms around his neck and crashing my lips into his.
“Mini Mouse.” He chuckled into my mouth, his hand gliding up my back and sinking into my hair.
Hating myself as exhilaration coursed through me, I snapped, “Just kiss me.”
Corridors, closed closet doors, and lowered car seats.
Our mouths were permanently red thanks to desperate lips and greedy tongues. We couldn’t seem to eat our fill. I couldn’t, and I didn’t think I’d ever be able to.
Yet the problematic question arose. What was going on?
“The game’s been postponed,” Mike said on the way to geography the following Friday afternoon. A week. It’d been a full week since my mouth had first tasted hers, and I was struggling to think of anything besides my next fix.
“Okay.”
“Okay?” Mike said, incredulous. “Dude, what is going on with you?”
We took our seats in the back of the classroom, and I lined my pens up absentmindedly on my desk as I said, “Nothing. The weather has been crazy, so I knew we wouldn’t be playing.”
Mike didn’t say anything.
Renee walked in, offering a brief, closed-lipped smile my way before taking a seat next to some blonde in the front row. I frowned at her luscious red hair as Mr. Denson droned on at the whiteboard.
When the lunch bell rang, I cornered her outside, knowing she would be one of the last to leave. Renee didn’t shove and hustle. She waited until the path was clear, then she moved.
“Hi,” she said, tucking her books to her chest.
“Hi.” I matched her slow stride, my eyes flicking to the students around us at their lockers. “Are you going to sit with me today?”
She didn’t answer me as she stopped at her locker, dumping her books inside and then shutting the door. “Renee,” I hissed.
“Callum,” she countered, her lips curling.
Letting out a loud breath, I asked what’d been brewing inside me all week. “Why is it you seem to avoid being with me in public?”
She blinked, long lashes fanning and making the clenching in my chest ease somewhat. “We … I don’t know. I guess I thought it wouldn’t be a good idea to let everyone know what we’ve been doing.”
“Making out,” I said. “Touching. Kissing. Say it.”
She backed up against her locker as I pressed into her. Fuck what she wanted; this wasn’t some dirty secret. “Callum, you can’t expect me to just …” She looked around, swallowed, then stepped around me. “Look, I’ll talk to you after school.”
I watched her walk away, then watched her from where I sat with the guys in the cafeteria, my jaw barely unlocking enough to eat my damn food.
“You look like you’re about to punch someone,” Steve commented, crushing his soda can with a grin.
“He probably just needs to get laid,” Mike said.
Ignoring them, I watched Renee laugh with her friends, my heartrate ticking higher as each minute rolled by.
Shoving my tray away, I took a swig of water and stood. “Later.”
When I stopped at her table, Renee’s friends looked up at me, then at her with mirroring looks of confusion.
“Callum,” Renee said in a low whisper.
“Can I have a word, please?”
With a wary glance at her friends, she nodded and followed me outside.
“Where are you going, Mr. Welsh?” the teacher on duty asked as we approached the doors.
“The nurse’s office,” I said stiffly, shouldering out the doors as the teacher continued to protest behind us.
“Callum,” Renee whispered when I grabbed her hand. “What are you doing?”
I stopped outside an empty classroom, peering into the tiny window on the door before opening it and dragging Renee inside. I closed and locked the door, pushing her up against it.
“This is stupid,” I said, watching as her eyes grew. “What’s your problem?”
Renee let out a short laugh. “My problem? My problem is this.” She gestured between us. “You’re so … so—”
“So what?” I growled.
“Bossy! I won’t be bullied into being your public plaything.”
I stepped back, feeling as though she’d just slapped me. “Plaything?”
“Yes.” The hard, hissed word fell from such pretty lips. “It’s one thing for you to want to fool around with me, but I’m not about to make it public knowledge. Because we both know that when you’re done with me—”
“Done with you?” I asked a little too loudly, unable to believe what she was saying.
“Yes,” she breathed, her chest heaving, breasts straining against her white blouse. “Everyone knows since you broke up with Tara that you’ve had your fair share of …” She waved a hand. “Whatever, I don’t want to get into it. I just don’t want to be made public entertainment for all the gossip mongers in this school. Which, in case you haven’t noticed, is practically everyone here.”
Stepping away, I scratched at the stubble on my chin, pacing back and forth in front of the teacher’s desk as I tried to figure out what to say to make her understand that her worries were unfounded.
Renee moved away from the door and deeper into the room as someone walked by outside.
After a few beats, I followed her. “I’ve never …”
Renee’s brow arched as she tilted her head. “Never what?”
I shook my head, laughing softly under my breath. “I’ve never even had sex.”
Renee froze, blindly dropping into a chair. “But you’ve … Tara, the girls.”
“Yeah, I’ve done just about everything else,” I said, making her frown. “Just not that.”
“Why?” she asked.
“Why haven’t you?”
She nodded, understanding. “Fair enough.”
The clock ticked behind us, Renee’s hand sliding through her hair as she blew out a breath. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?” I moved over to her.
“For assuming.” A dry laugh left her. “But you have to admit, the evidence was there.”
“I know,” I said. “That’s why I’m not mad. It’s there for a reason.”
I took her hand, her skin soft against my callused palms, then pulled her to stand. “I don’t want to get hurt,” she said, voice so low it was a wonder I heard her at all.
“Me neither,” I admitted, eyes connecting with hers. “But that doesn’t stop me from wanting to be with you every damn second I can.”
Her hand tugged mine, her teeth snapping at my lips playfully as I removed my hand to grab her face. “You can be sweet,” she said. “Sometimes.”
My mouth fused with hers, her scent filling my nose and causing the situation in my pants to become a real problem. Her hand reached down, brushing over me and causing my knees to buckle. “Mouse,” I groaned.
Her lips hovered over mine. “We’ll walk out of here together.”
“Fuck yes,” I said, taking her bottom lip into my mouth and reaching up to palm her tit.
“And we’ll stay that way?”
“Not even a question,” I bit out, moving my mouth to her neck, tilting her head back with a fist in her hair. “If I have anything to say about it, which I most definitely do, we’re going to always stay that way.”
According to most people who’d spoken of it in hushed, excited voices this past week, the midnight carnival was supposed to be creepy. Though hosting anything at midnight was bound to up the spook factor, it was all the same as regular carnivals if you asked me.
They’d set up down by the small lake, gray and black tents lining the long stretch of grass that overlapped the sand, only broken up by the rides and vendors interspersed throughout.
“I’m shaking in my boots,” I whispered in
to Renee’s ear, making her giggle and her arm clench around mine.
“Quit.” Her hand shoved my face away as I tried to nuzzle into her neck. “And I wish you wore boots more.”
“Really?” I snorted. “Why?”
Her silence had me glancing down at her. She stared up at me, a coy smile tilting her peach-glossed lips. “Because seeing those jeans lowered around your ankles, scrunched on top of them, would make for some great me time.”
“Me time?”
Renee looked over at a group of her friends from school and waved. A few waved back, the one with black hair, Hilda, smiling faintly before turning to her friend. My jaw gritted as I watched them whisper among themselves, and I tightened my hold around Renee’s arm.
“Girl time. Often had in private beneath bedsheets.”
Even though my cock was rising, there was no way she would get away with not telling me more about this so-called me time. I cleared my throat. “And is it always me you picture when you’re having this … me time?”
Her laughter was husky, reaching all the right places. “Of course.”
Feeling smug, I grinned. Then I noticed the twinkle in her eye. “Wait a damn minute. You’re lying.”
I halted her outside the entrance to the carnival, pulling her to me and grabbing her face. “Unhand me, asshole.”
“Not a chance. Who else do you think about?” Who did I need to make sure disappeared without a trace?
“Channing,” she whispered. “Kit, Jason—”
My hands dropped. “The fuck?”
She laughed again, louder this time, her eyes watering as she stepped away to wipe beneath them. I didn’t know what she thought was so funny. She’d just outright admitted to touching herself over some guys …
“They’re actors. All of them.”
My shoulders loosened. Somewhat. “I’m not exactly feeling relieved right now.”
“Well,” she said, moving close and running a long yellow nail down my cheek. “When we get out of here, I’ll help you with that.”
My nostrils huffed out a petulant breath.
“Callum,” she said.
“Mmm, let’s go.” I turned for the ticket booths, the stars twinkling alongside a weak half-moon.
“I haven’t had to think about them since you first kissed me.”
I stopped. “Really?”
Her arms slithered around my waist from behind. “Really. Now, are you going to win me a unicorn, or are you going to continue sulking?”
“Demanding Mouse.” I turned, tilting her chin up to touch her lips with mine.
“Hey!” Mike’s voice interrupted us, and I stepped back, watching as he walked over with Pat and some of the other guys in tow. “Doesn’t look so scary to me.”
“Right?” Renee said, peering around them to look at the tents.
Steve shook his head. “Nah. When I was a kid, this place was scary as fuck.”
Tickets purchased, we meandered through the crowds. Fog crept over the grass, rolling in smoky tendrils that came from a machine.
Mike ditched us to grab corn dogs with the others, and I felt a tremor in Renee’s hand. “What’s wrong?”
We stopped outside a small black tent, the front opened to the crowd walking by, but the inside dark and lit with only a few glowing candles. “Ten dollars to have your fortune told,” a crone-like voice slithered out.
“No,” Renee said, “thank you.”
I tried to move us on when the lady said, “For you, dear, I’ll give you fifty percent off. You don’t want to miss what the mother has in store for you.”
The mother? I scoffed, then looked at Renee, whose face was drawn. “Ignore her, let’s go.”
Her limbs were stiff as we walked away.
“Do you think I should go back?” Renee asked once we’d reached the magician’s tent.
“Not unless you want to lose ten minutes of your life that’ll only cause you to stew on stuff that isn’t real.”
“You don’t believe there could be any truth to it?”
Laughing, I took her face in my hands. “She’s probably just some old woman who lives in her kid’s garage apartment and plays cards all day while watching Wheel of Fortune.”
“Lovely,” Renee said, quirking her top lip as color returned to her face. “But I don’t know, I got goose bumps.”
“It’s kind of cold.” I eyed her fuzzy knit cardigan. “Maybe we should go.”
“No. Not without the unicorn you promised me.”
The damn unicorn took me fifty dollars and twelve rounds of hammer slamming to obtain. During which Mike and Pat had found us, and Mike had bought Renee some cotton candy.
Asshole.
I watched her smile at him in thanks as the carnie handed me the gigantic rainbow unicorn. His moustache twitched as he watched me eye Mike with what I knew was an unhealthy amount of annoyance. “You know, you coulda just slipped me a fifty, and I’d have given it to ya,” the carnie said.
I raised a brow, taking it from him none too gently before stalking over to Renee. His rough chuckle followed me, making me bristle even more.
“Here,” I said, handing it to her.
She tore her eyes from Mike, her cotton candy dropping to the ground as she gasped and clutched the unicorn to her, which was almost half her size. “I love him. Oh, my God.”
Mike smirked at her, picking up her cotton candy and tossing it in a dumpster nearby.
“Let’s go make out in the car before we go.” My voice traveled as I meant for it to.
Mike’s smile faltered before he nodded at us. “I’ll see you guys on Monday.”
“Bye, Mike,” Renee said absently, patting the unicorn’s fuzzy mane.
Joining our friends, I watched him walk off into the thinning crowd with them, then I took Renee around the shoulders and led her back through the aisle of tents and various vendors.
Just as we were about to reach the parking lot, every single light over the area blinked out, leaving everyone in pitch black.
A few people screamed while others gasped and laughed nervously. I fished my phone from my pocket, turning the flashlight on as a group of clowns started making their way down the aisle.
Renee clutched at my shirt, leaning into me heavily. “What the fuck?”
What the fuck was right. I barely blinked, my eyes wide on the misshapen, zombielike masks the clowns were wearing. They carried weapons, the steel of the maces and daggers glinting in the moonlight. Some stood on stilts, others without weapons juggling what looked like balls of fire.
“Are those real weapons?” Renee whispered.
“I doubt it.” The clowns silently stalked through the throng of people who’d started to run or stood, much the same as us, off to the side with their jaws hanging open.
They seemed to float by us, eerily, little more than an apparition in their long black cloaks and tattered capes. I exhaled a long breath as they passed.
One turned back, and when he winked through his mask at us, Renee inhaled sharply. “Can we please go.”
Not a question, but I wasn’t about to argue.
She clung to my arm until we reached the car, where I helped her inside before rounding it. Once in the seat with the ignition on, I glanced over at the tents just as the lights flickered back on.
No sign of the clowns.
The clock on the dash told us it was almost two in the morning, but I wasn’t tired at all. “That was a nice party trick.”
“Uh-huh.” Renee clipped her seat belt on, the unicorn on her lap. “They were freaky as hell.”
I snorted, backing out of the lot and waiting behind another car before turning out onto the street.
“Just a bunch of dudes with nothing better to do than fool around in costumes and indulge their inner loser with scare tactics.”
“So scornful.” She tsked. “Where do your parents think you are?”
“At the carnival, then staying out. Wanna sneak me into your place?”
; “Sure,” she said without pause, looking out the window at the blurring trees and houses we passed.
I parked her Rover in front of the three-door garage, opting not to open it in fear of waking someone. Upstairs, Renee giggled as I carefully closed her bedroom door. “Chill. They’re not going to hear you.”
“We need to stop this sneaking around crap,” I muttered, kicking off my shoes and flicking the lock on her door. “It’s getting old.”
Switching on her lamp, she hummed in agreement, setting the unicorn on her bed and heading into her bathroom. I undid my jeans, shoving them to the floor as I surveyed her bookshelf.
“I still can’t get over the love you harbor for Sailor Moon,” I told her once she’d returned, her face freshly washed and pulling her dress off over her head.
She stood before me in her candy pink bra and panties, and I shrugged off my shirt, stalking over to her to drown myself in the minty taste that lingered on her lips.
Pushing me back, she moved over to the bed. “Keep your briefs on, just in case.” I did as I was told, climbing beneath the mountain of frilly blankets and pillows on her bed, then pulled her to my chest. “And Sailor Moon is amazing so get over it already.”
“It’s a dreadful show about a whiny schoolgirl.”
Her fingers drummed gently over my chest. “Ah, see, the fact you’ve gone out of your way to watch that much of it proves that you enjoyed something about it.”
“I did not.” I scowled up at the waves of material hanging from her bed.
“It aired in the 90s, you know.” Her sigh warmed my chest, and I felt my muscles loosen one by one. “We were born a decade too late.”
“I’m fine with that. Now we can watch stuff on demand.”
A quiet laugh. “True. But come on, a magical brooch? I want one so bad.”
The moonlight cascaded across the floor to the bed, highlighting the way her lashes rested over her high cheekbones. I moved a piece of hair off her face. “You have about twenty brooches that would be considered magical to many people.”
“Shush. Don’t bring reality raining down on my dreamy parade.”
“You live such a tough life, princess.”
With her eyes still closed, she smiled. “Admit it.”