The Art of Falling

by Jenny Kaczorowski

  “Better than the beavers?”

  He chuckled. “A lot better.”

  She pointed at the homecoming crown. “Congrats on that.”

  He pulled it off and shook his head, dropping it on the ground. “Apparently I get to keep it. So I can remember this magical night.”

  “What a treasure.”

  “How are you?”

  She had to avoid his eyes, bending to fidget with her corsage again. “Shouldn’t you be in with Alyson?”

  He lifted a broad shoulder, perfectly clad in a black tux, but kept his hands in his pockets. “She’s homecoming queen, not my date. Is everything okay?”

  “Yeah.” Fake smile. “Fine. Just a little warm in there.”

  “Yeah.” He shrugged off his jacket and dropped it over the bike rack beside the door. “What happened, Bria?”

  She rubbed a rose petal between her fingers. “What to do you mean?”

  “With us. I thought…”

  “Did you?” She laughed, bitterness bubbling out of her. “You want to know what happened? Alyson happened.”

  His brows drew together, and then his eyes went wide. “Oh God.”

  She shook her head, smiling to hold back tears. “Pretty sure that’s what she said.”

  “Bria, that wasn’t – ”

  “It doesn’t matter. It still happened. I still saw it.”

  He ran his fingers through his hair. “I’m sorry, Bri. For everything. I should…I don’t know. I should have done this differently.”

  “I thought things were over with her.”

  “They are. They have been. At least for me.”

  “What does that even mean?”

  “Ben?” Alyson stuck her pretty, tiara-top head out the door. “We’re about to do pictures.”

  Bria turned away from them, digging her fingers into her arm to keep herself from punching the smug smile off of Alyson’s face.

  “You have the worst timing, Aly.” Ben’s voice crackled with frustration.

  “Is this her?” Alyson said.

  Bria whipped around to glare at both of them.

  “This is my friend, Bria,” Ben said, wrapping his arm around her shoulder in a gesture both protective and challenging.

  “I told you I’m sorry,” Alyson said, folding her arms across her slinky dress and shoving her rather ample assets upward. “You don’t have to rub it in my face.”

  “Oh no? Because you haven’t made this hard enough?”

  “Come on! We make sense together. You guys don’t.”

  He let go of Bria to stare Alyson down. “Tell her what happened.”

  “What? That I kissed you? Fine. It’s not like we hadn’t kissed before.”

  “Stop,” Bria said, grabbing his arm. “It doesn’t change anything.”

  “Wait.” Alyson laughed, a strange, halting sound. “She’s mad at you too? You dumped me and she doesn’t even want you?”

  “Just go, Aly. Please.”

  Alyson turned to Bria and something in her face softened. “I don’t know why I care. I’m with a really good guy now. Whatever happened between me and Ben since school started was totally one sided. He’s yours. I think he has been for a while.”

  Bria opened her mouth but found she had nothing to say in return.

  “Anyway.” Alyson picked up Ben’s crown and shoved it against his chest. “We still have to do pictures. We are king and queen tonight and you better not ruin that for me.” And with that, she sauntered back inside.

  The door shut behind her, leaving Bria and Ben painfully alone, emotions palpable on the still night air.

  “I’m sorry.” His fingertips skimmed her arm, raising a trail of goose bumps, and she squeezed her eyes shut. “I’m so, so sorry.”

  “I miss you,” she said before she could stop herself.

  He moved closer. “What about Raf?”

  “I don’t care about him,” she whispered. “I know I’m supposed to like him. But it’s just… I don’t…” She knew just the right amount to tilt her head to find his lips. The kiss felt so right, so complete, like coming home. His arms circled her waist, drawing her into the perfect warmth of his body. She slid her hands up his chest to link them behind his head.

  “This shouldn’t be so easy,” she said with her face tucked into that spot just over his heart.

  “Why not?” His fingers swept across her cheek, tucking a loose tendril of hair back into place.

  “Bria?” Abby said. “Ben?” Her voice screeched higher and they pulled apart.

  “It’s not…” Bria crossed her arms across her stomach, the stricken look on Ben’s face nearly undoing her.

  He shoved his hands into his pockets. “It was just a hug.”

  “Just?” Bria’s stomach dropped.

  “It better be,” Abby said. “Because it kind of looked like a whole lot more and she has a date in there.”

  “She’s congratulating me on the crown.”

  “Right.” Abby looked between them, but when neither moved, she shook her head. “I’m sure that’s all.”

  “I’ll be right behind you,” Bria said.

  Abby rolled her eyes and marched back into the gym.

  Bria turned to Ben. He held his jacket in his hands and had the crown on again.

  “Bria…”

  “Forget it. Good-bye, Ben.” She opened the door behind them, and Jake Moreno stumbled out, nearly slamming into her.

  “See, I told you,” he said, elbowing the guy next to him. “Ben’s screwing that scary chick.”

  “Shut up,” Bria said, shoving past him.

  “She has to be crazy in bed,” the other kid said. “Right, Ben?”

  She turned, needing to see his reaction.

  “Come on,” Jake said. “Spill, Bro. What’s she into?”

  Ben lifted his shoulder. “Not me.”

  Chapter Thirty

  Bria stared at her painting, as she had all weekend. At the rough shape of the shoreline and the empty place where the sky should be. She hadn’t moved in hours. The light inside the garage faded as the day drifted into twilight and the paint on her palette thickened into useless sludge.

  “Bri,” Dolores said, knocking on the side of the garage. “Are you in here?”

  Bria made some kind of noise, but her voice felt too rusty to speak.

  “Oh, sweetie.” Dolores crouched down in front of her and Bria dropped her head on her shoulder.

  “I hate myself so much,” she said.

  “What happened at the dance? You’ve never skipped school in the entire time I’ve known you and last time I checked, you’re on probation.”

  “Consuela called me off. I wouldn’t do that to Ben.”

  “Seriously? That’s what you’re worried about?”

  Bria groaned and covered her face with her hands. “I kissed him. Again. And Raf. I kissed them both on the same night and I swear to God I’m not that kind of girl. I’ve never cheated. Is it still cheating if you’re barely a thing?”

  “I thought you were going to stay away from Ben,” Dolores said.

  “I’m trying. I swear I am.” She scrubbed at her eyes to keep the tears from coming. “But he was there and he’s just so perfect and I don’t even care if it doesn’t make sense.”

  “Then you need to cut Raf free. What if he found out?”

  “I know!” Bria looked up at her. “Why don’t I like him?”

  “Because he’s not right for you?”

  “Why not? He should be right. I’m trying to make it right.”

  “How does making out with Ben figure into that plan?” Dolores stood and put her hands on her hips.

  “I don’t know.” She pointed at her painting. “I thought I could stay home and work on this and clear my head, but I can’t even paint right now.”

  “When was the last time you ate?”

  “Ate?”

  Dolores narrowed her eyes. “Lunch? Breakfast?”

  “Consuela left lunch for us yesterday.”


  “Yesterday?” She held out her hands for Bria. “Put down the brushes. I’m feeding you.”

  “I’m not a child.”

  Dolores glared at her until she nodded and set her brushes beside the canvas. “Much better.”

  Bria led the way inside. “I ate a granola bar sometime today. I think.”

  “Are you sleeping at least?” Dolores rummaged through the pantry.

  “I try.”

  Dolores shook her head and poured various things into a pot on the stove. “Do you even see what he’s doing to you?”

  “But everything makes more sense when I’m with Ben.” Bria crossed her arms on the counter and laid her head against them.

  “That is the most melodramatic, illogical, cliché thing you’ve ever said.”

  “I know! But it’s just so easy when we’re together. We talk and laugh and the kisses. Dolores, the kisses. It’s like, perfect.”

  “Very eloquent.”

  “When we went to the pier, it was like the whole world came together just for us. I don’t even know the last time I had that much fun. We just…click.”

  Dolores banged around the cupboards before finding a bowl. “There’s still the part where he cheated on you with Alyson Kane.”

  “It wasn’t like that.”

  “Oh no?” Dolores slammed the wooden spoon in her hand against the counter. “You and I both saw it!”

  “She admitted that she kissed him first.”

  Dolores slid a bowl of soup across the counter. “Vegan tortilla soup.”

  The smell wafting from the bowl brought up a rumble from her stomach. “Oh God. This looks amazing.”

  “Secret family recipe.” Dolores sat down across from her. “Now. What happened with Alyson?”

  “Umm,” Bria said between mouthfuls of soup. “We talked at the dance. Kind of. Mostly she yelled at Ben. But she kissed him first.”

  “And you believe her?”

  “Ben told me the same thing.” Bria pushed around some bits of corn in the soup. “Besides, why would Alyson lie?”

  “Because she’s a – ” Dolores stopped short of swearing. “She’s a terrible human being and she’s probably trying to humiliate you.”

  “She did that already.”

  “What if she is telling the truth?”

  “I don’t know.” Bria set down her spoon. “Pretty sure I’ve ruined anything left between us. I should have talked to him.”

  “Not eating and skipping school aren’t going to fix that.”

  Bria pushed the leftover soup toward Dolores. “Next time you should put chicken in it.”

  Her eyes widened. “Chicken?”

  “I started, occasionally, eating meat again last spring. But I have this reputation and all these principles, and how do you just stop being vegan?”

  “Oh, honey. You are a mess, aren’t you?”

  “It’s not Ben. Not really. If anything, it was New York. Being away from everyone who knew me. I could just be me and no one could hate me for failing to live up to my own name.”

  “No one is going to hate you for changing. No one who matters any way.”

  “You won’t. Abby will get over it. But I’m pretty sure Raf only likes me because of who he thinks I am.” She jumped up from the counter and grabbed a soda from the fridge. “If he knew me, me? Who I am when I’m alone and cramming bacon down my throat?”

  “Bacon is so good.”

  “I know! So, so good.” She sighed. “I don’t know. Do you ever get feelings about people? Like I knew we’d be friends the first time we met.”

  “Even in my turtleneck and ankle length skirt?”

  “You totally looked like a nun,” Bria said.

  “I had those bad bangs too!”

  “There was just a connection we’ve always had. Me and Abby too. But with Raf, I felt weird and uneasy the first time I met him. I don’t know.”

  Dolores picked up the empty bowl and carted it to the sink. “I do.”

  “You do?”

  She carefully rinsed the bowl and slid it into the dishwasher. “Ty. When we met. When we shook hands. There was this thing, this spark. It’s like this part of me lit up.”

  “Like finding something you didn’t know you were missing.”

  Dolores grinned. “Yeah.”

  Bria swirled the soda can on the counter. “You listened to that tug. Now look at you.”

  Dolores bounced on the balls of her feet, holding back a smile that was getting the better of her. “He wants to take me on tour with them this summer, before I start college. It’s the European leg.”

  “Lor! That’s crazy!”

  “I know, right?”

  “Your mom is going to flip!”

  “Actually.” She traced the toe of her shoe around the edge of a floor tile. “She really likes him too. He brings her flowers when he comes to visit.”

  “I want that. I so want that.”

  “Flowers?”

  “No. That thing that makes you light up. That makes you more you.”

  Dolores sat down again. “Raf doesn’t do that, does he?”

  Bria shook her head. “But Ben does.”

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Pulling up the hood of her sweatshirt, Bria darted across the rain-soaked parking lot to reach the high school. Inside the door she stomped the water off her boots.

  “There you are.” Rafael pulled Bria close and gave her cheek a hard kiss. “I missed you yesterday.”

  “Mental health day,” she said, trying to relax against his side and failing.

  “Give me a heads up next time. I’ll skip with you.”

  “Sure.” She pulled away from him to open her locker.

  “Come over tonight. We can make up for yesterday.”

  She drew her brows together. “What does that mean?”

  “Bow-chicka-bow-wow,” Abby said, elbowing her.

  “Shut up.”

  “I missed you too.” Abby grinned at her.

  “I have to stop by my locker,” Rafael said, backing down the hall. “But we’ll hang tonight, right?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  “Ooooooh,” Abby said, waggling her eyebrows. “So how serious are things with Raf?”

  “Not really serious. At all.”

  Abby shook her head. “I heard him talking with some of the guys about you. About leveling up.”

  “What does that even mean?”

  “You know.”

  “Oh, God, no.” Bria rolled her eyes. “No. I mean, we have fun and all, but I am not sleeping with him.”

  “You better tell him that,” Abby said. “’Cause I’m pretty sure that’s what his big plans for the night are. I mean, you’ve been a thing for basically the whole year. That’s like forever.”

  “It’s just band practice tonight.” Bria shut her locker. “Abs, how do you always stay friends your exes?”

  Abby lost her teasing tone. “Seriously?”

  “Seriously.”

  Abby blew out a breath. “I’m honest with them from day one.”

  “I already effed that up.”

  “If it’s not right, it’s not right.”

  Bria dropped her head back against her locker and stared at the ceiling. “I thought I could make it right.”

  ~

  Bria parked in front of Rafael’s house and cut the engine. Rain continued to pummel Oceanside, despite weather reports claiming it would pass soon. She zipped up Rafael’s jacket, calculating the distance between her car and the open garage door.

  She should have taken the umbrella Aunt Becky wanted to buy.

  The feeling of dread in the pit of her stomach weighed heavier with each step. Break ups were never fun, but if the rest of their relationship was any kind of portent, this would be a doozy.

  “Raf?” She stuck her head around a stack of boxes at the front of the garage.

  “Hey, Babe.” He pulled her against his hip and smacked a kiss on her lips.

  “Don
’t call me that,” she said, pushing him away. “I’ve told you I hate it.”

  “Sorry. Just excited.” He pointed at the pile of boxes. “We got the demo back.” He reached into the top box and help up the CD. Her drawing of the Viking goat graced the cover.

  She took it from his hand. “Okay. I admit that’s kind of awesome.”

  “Take a couple. Maybe pass one on to your dad.”

  The CD suddenly felt a lot heavier in her hands. “Yeah. Sure.”

  “So Matt booked a gig on Friday.” He began moving around the garage, picking up gear and wrapping cables. “We’re playing The Whiskey.”

  “That’s Abby’s opening night.”

  “We’ll go see the musical on Sunday or something.”

  “Raf.” Memories clicked inside her head. “How did you already know who I was when we met?”

  “What do you mean?” He looked up from his bass but his eyes didn’t focus on her, like he was looking past her. Like he’d never really looked at her at all.

  “You knew my name. You knew I was freakishly tall. On the very first day of school. How? Why?”

  “Come on, you’re cool and you’re cute. I asked about you. I mean, what do you want me to say?”

  “Did you ask me out because of my dad?”

  The pause said enough. “I don’t – ”

  “Shut up. You know exactly what I mean.”

  “Your dad being Archie Hale is just a perk.”

  “A perk?” She crossed her arms. “Did you really think you could start hanging out with me and I’d get my dad to rep you? It doesn’t work like that.”

  “Come on, Babe. Chill out.”

  “I am not your babe and I’m not letting this go.” She shrugged off his jacket and shoved it against his chest. “Do you even like me?”

  “Of course I do. Sit down. We’ll talk.”

  “Are the other guys in on this? Jackie and Matt? Do they know you’re a bastard?”

  “Let me explain.”

  He touched her arm, but she pushed him away. “No. No way. We have nothing to say to each other.”

  “Maybe I started hanging out with you because of all that, but it’s different now.”

  She backed out of the garage into the rain. “Stay away from me, you asshole.”

  “Bria!”

  She threw the CD across the slick driveway and yanked open the door to her car, pleading with the Corvair to start on the first try. The engine roared to life and she gunned it away from Rafael’s house.