by Lily Foster
My ears perk up when Cora starts in on the prom again. I told her after school today that I had no plans on going but obviously I didn’t express myself clearly.
“So the prom, Simon. I know you don’t have a date yet.” Crap. Cora looks nervous and hopeful. “I already bought two tickets, so if that’s the issue, then—”
“Let me stop you right there.” Fuck if any girl is paying for my prom ticket. “I’m not going. It has nothing to do with that.” I know I’m poor, don’t need anyone reminding me of the fact. And while I know that wasn’t Cora’s intention, it’s hard to quell the shame and anger rising up in me. “I appreciate the offer, but…” I’m about to make up an excuse, say that I won’t be around that weekend, but it’s a blatant lie and I won’t do it. “I’m not going, Cora.” Her hurt look makes me feel guilty, but I don’t owe this girl my life story. “I know Dave needs a date. I’m sure he’d love to go with you.”
She nods and cracks a forced smile. “Yeah, maybe I’ll ask him.” The ensuing silence is torture, and I breathe a sigh of relief when she finally says, “See you later,” and walks away.
Garth hands me a beer, my first of the night. “Another broken heart left in the wake of the legendary Simon Wade.”
“I can’t wait until the damn prom is over.”
“Four weeks.” He claps me on the back. “And don’t ruin it for me…I cannot wait until that very special night.”
“People make too much of it.”
“Jeez…You’re like Scrooge, man. That night’s going to be the highlight of senior year. I still think you should go.” When I fix him with a look, Garth raises his palms. “I know, I know…I’ll keep my mouth shut.”
“Gracias.”
“It’s different for me, Simon. You’re itching to leave, to get out of here.” He lifts both arms out to his sides and looks around him, surveying the scene. “I just don’t see why people feel that way about this place. It’s like you can only see gray skies but I see the sun shining. I see everyone at Jacob’s Creek in the summertime, whooping it up. I see us all camping, fishing, kicking back with the girls. I love it here, I always have.”
“Nothing wrong with that. I just feel, I don’t know, like I’m suffocating here, like I’ve got to get away. This place doesn’t exactly hold great childhood memories for me.” That’s probably more than I’ve ever said to Garth about my life and I don’t like the feeling that follows. I feel exposed.
I’m grateful when Sienna and some other girls make their way over. Gives me a chance to excuse myself. I dump the contents of my cup onto the ground when I see her standing a few feet from the keg. Some kid is talking to her, same kid who helped with her locker that day. I recognize him. He’s a junior, plays baseball. He’s clearly making a play for Charlotte but she’s giving him that same distant smile she did last time. I listen in, taking my time as I pump the keg and fill up a few other kids’ cups before my own. He’s telling her about his stable and horses, asking if she knows how to ride.
“A few times when I was younger, but I wouldn’t say I know how to ride.”
“It’ll come right back to you.”
“You think?” she asks absently. I’m looking at her now and she’s looking right back at me.
“Definitely.” He’s nodding his head like an eager beaver. “I’ll teach you.”
She turns to look at him. “Um, maybe?”
“How about tomorrow?”
“Charlotte, you got a minute?” I’m speaking to her, but my eyes are now trained on this boy. He instinctively takes a step back.
I watch her throat move as she swallows. I want to put her at ease, assure her that I’m just as nervous as she is. She looks to the boy and smiles before looking back to me. “Um, sure.”
I gesture with my head for us to walk. I want to be away from everyone’s eyes, from their judgement, away from the people who know about the ties that bind the Masons to the Wades.
“Do you need a drink?” I ask as an afterthought, looking back towards the keg.
She looks into her full cup. “No.” Dumping the beer onto the ground, she says, “It’s warm.”
“You’ve been holding that same cup for nearly an hour…Bound to happen.”
I see the hint of a smile. “You’ve been watching me drink, or not drink?”
“Yeah,” I say, because the gig is up. “I’ve been watching you.”
Now the smile is bigger, but she looks away, cheeks flushed, uncertain. Charlotte is beautiful. She’s got gloss on her lips and her hair is falling down and across her back. In just jeans and a light sweater, she outshines all the other girls here tonight. We stop just about fifty feet away from the pack, but it’s quieter out here and darker. She sits down on a large rock and I take a seat next to her.
“It’s kind of messed up that you’ve got full access to my sappy innermost thoughts,” I say, nudging her foot with mine. “That you have everything in writing…In your possession.”
“It’s not sappy to me.” After a pause, she asks, “Did you mean it?”
I look right at her, but she only gives me her profile. “I don’t know,” I confess, and she lowers her head in response. “I mean, it’s how I feel but it doesn’t make sense. I don’t know you all that well. We’ve barely spoken to one another, we’ve never hung out, never been in the same classes. But…” I trail off, fixing my gaze on a rusted can that rests by my feet.
“But?” she presses.
“I can’t stop thinking about you. I actually try to put you out of my mind, force myself to look away. I’ve even done things to push you away, to make you to believe that I hate you.”
Charlotte lets out a cheerless laugh. “You did a good job on that last one. You’re very convincing.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not proud of it.”
She gets up slowly and kicks at the twigs and pebbles in her way as she attempts to put a bit of distance between us, but I follow. She leans back against a tree, studying me for a moment. “If this is just some kind of guilt or misplaced sense of, I don’t know, you feeling like you have to go on protecting me because of what happened last weekend—”
“You know I wrote the letter before any of that.”
“But you—”
“I want to kiss you, Charlotte. Can I?”
There’s a charged energy source flowing through my system. I’m literally buzzing as I close the foot that separates us. “Tell me no, I’ll understand.” She says nothing, doesn’t turn away. “Can I?” I ask again as I lean my head in close to hers. I can feel her breath on my cheek and I can feel my own heart thumping. She nods, and for that I’m grateful. I lick the seam of her lips, tasting the cherry flavored gloss as I open her mouth with mine.
I’ve kissed before. I’ve traded innocent pecks with my hands at my sides, twisted my tongue around another’s as hands explored, and I’ve mashed lips in a frenzy as clothes came off.
This is different.
This, just being close to her and kissing her gently as my hands rest on her hips, is possibly the greatest high I’ve ever known. Her head is tipped back, eyes closed and expression soft as she returns the kiss. I feel alive, every nerve ending stirring when she snakes her arms around my neck and begins to twist her fingers through my hair. I hear myself moan when her chest presses into mine, but I’m too lost in it to care or feel embarrassed. And she’s up on her toes now, the motion pulling me closer still. As much as I want to drag her in and fit every groove of us together, I know it isn’t right. I sense Charlotte will freely give what I want to take, and I won’t let that happen. Pulling back just a fraction, I rest my forehead against hers.
“I’m sorry.”
Her brows knit in confusion. “You didn’t hurt me.”
“But I will.”
“You’re everything I want but cannot have.” My heart aches as she whispers those words, my words. “Why can’t you have me? Why are you so set on pushing me away?” When I don’t answer, she asks, “What do you want, Simo
n?”
“I want to be with you.”
She lets out a contented sigh, tilting her head again, inviting me back to her, inviting me in. This kiss is slow and deep and careful. I’m making a decision. Granting myself permission to enjoy this moment, to accept the goodness that’s flowing out of her and seeping into me.
Part of what I said is true: I don’t know Charlotte. Don’t know her favorite food or color. Don’t know what makes her laugh. Don’t know where she sees herself in five years, ten years. And for the first time in as long as I can remember, having everything in my life nailed down, mapped out, every action correlating to the timeline I’ve set for achieving my goals—it doesn’t seem all that important.
I want this, her, now.
She shifts when she hears a voice getting closer, calling my name. “It’s just Garth,” I whisper. “Ignore him.”
She shakes her head and lets out a frustrated breath as she checks her phone. “It’s past eleven. I’m driving and my friend Daisy’s parents are beyond overprotective. I have to get her back home.”
“Is Daisy the puker?” She nods and smiles. “You’re a good friend to her.”
“I don’t think I’d even get a B-minus in the friend department, but I’m making an effort to be better at it.” She shakes her head. “That sounded stupid.”
“It doesn’t.” I plant a kiss on her forehead when I say it. Fact is that I do know Charlotte. I know what it’s like to come from circumstances that are different from all the wide-eyed innocent people around you. It makes you feel alien, makes you feel like a fraud when you do your best to try and fit in. People like Garth and Daisy—people who’ve never experienced the dark—they mean well but they just don’t get it.
I take a step back when I hear Garth’s voice again. I want to strangle that moron. She smiles and starts to walk ahead of me back the party. But I don’t want her to go, so I take her wrist and turn her back to me. “Let me take you somewhere after work tomorrow?” She doesn’t answer right away. “Unless, that is, you’re going horseback riding or something.”
That earns me a full-bellied laugh and a push. “No, I’m not going horseback riding.” She studies me for a moment before nodding. “I’ll go out with you tomorrow.”
Chapter Ten
Charlotte
He’s sitting in his car when I show up for my shift at the diner. He’s half an hour early for work, parked there, keeping watch to make sure I’m safe.
Oh my Lord.
That phrase played on repeat in my mind as I drove Sarah and Daisy home last night. I didn’t hear one thing they said, just their tipsy giggles. I was lost in my own blissed out fog.
I can’t stop thinking about you.
I want to kiss you.
I want to be with you.
I’ve never had someone look at me that way before. It was desperate, the way Simon looked at me. And the way he looked after we kissed, it was as if I’d helped to settle something turbulent inside of him. As if my kiss had granted him some measure of peace.
“Good morning.”
“You want to get in?” he asks, looking uncertain as he finishes rolling down the window.
“Can’t.” I shake my head, unable to contain the smile that spreads across my face. “Here,” I say, passing him a paper cup and a muffin. “You don’t have to come here early, you know…Marley opens with me now and Denny’s here.”
“I want to.” He takes a bite of the muffin and grins as he leans his head back, talking around the mouthful. “Mmm, it’s still warm.”
I’d gladly trade places with that muffin. When he takes a sip of his coffee, I ask if I got it right: milk light, no sugar. He nods and asks, “You remembered? I think I ordered from you once and that was a long time ago.” I try to shrug it off like it’s nothing, like I remember everyone’s order, even though I don’t.
“Can you wait a few minutes for me today, or do you want me to pick you up at your house after I’m done?”
His question comes out sounding casual, but I read the uncertainty in his expression. We both know option number two, well, it just isn’t an option.
“I’ll wait.” Absently, I add, “Good…I didn’t know if we—”
“I didn’t change my mind.”
“No.” I swallow. “Me neither. I brought clothes with me, to you know, to change into.”
He smiles at me with tenderness. He knows I’m nervous and doesn’t want me to be. “I’ll see you later, Charlotte. Don’t work too hard today.”
I don’t know how I keep myself from cartwheeling my way back across the street.
Not only did I bring a change of clothes, but I brought a toothbrush, a washcloth, make-up and hair products to transform myself after my shift. I’m aware that I often leave this place smelling like french fries, and today I want to look good without looking like I put in too much effort. I think this to myself as I rub the washcloth over my arms and neck and face, practically bathing myself in the sink.
Denny whistles when I come back out by the register, tossing my duffle on a counter stool. I still have about ten minutes to kill before Simon will be ready to go. “Hot date, Charlotte?”
I feel my cheeks redden. “If your idea of a hot date involves cramming for a Global History test at the library, then yeah…I have a hot date with Joseph Stalin.”
Thumping his dirty apron with a spatula, he says, “You tell him if he gets out of line, Denny here will trample his ass.” Marley doubles over laughing as Denny, truly bewildered, asks, “What did I say?”
When the bell rings to signal a customer walking through the door, the butterflies in my stomach kick it into high gear. I’m hoping that it’s Simon, but at the same time, I feel fiercely protective of this new and fragile thing between us. This is mine and I’m not entirely sure I want Denny, Marley, Daisy—or anyone for that matter—in on it.
“Good afternoon, officer,” Marley greets Wes. “Table or the counter?”
“Just here on business,” he says without taking his eyes off me. “Wanted to check and make sure you haven’t had any more trouble.”
Denny answers, “No trouble. And I don’t imagine we’ll be seeing that piece of trash walking the streets again, will we?”
“No, pretty sure he’ll never get out. He’s facing manslaughter charges now, in addition to four different assault indictments.”
I get up to leave. He can stay here and make small talk if he wants, but I’m out. I don’t appreciate the intrusion, don’t want him coming to my workplace.
“In a rush, Charlotte?”
“My shift’s over.”
He takes my elbow. “So, everything is ok?”
“Fine.”
He lets go but follows me out, and the timing couldn’t be worse. I pray that Simon understands the very slight shake of my head and my wide eyes as he exits the hardware store. Stay put I’m trying to tell him, but he either doesn’t understand or won’t comply.
Wes places a hand on my shoulder. I cringe, fighting the urge to physically shake him off. “I’m fine, Wes. Everything is good.”
“You’re not acting like everything’s good.”
“You don’t need to come around checking in on me. Don’t do it again.”
Wes starts to say something but Simon interrupts, “Hey, Charlotte, what’s up?”
“Nothing,” I say, going for light and casual. “Done for the day, heading to the library.”
He nods, looking to Wes. It’s a standoff, and for some reason Wes, with gun in holster and badge, caves first. Walking back to his police cruiser, he says, “You call whenever you need me, Charlotte, understand?”
Simon waits in front of the diner as I walk to the parking lot and throw my bag in the trunk. I stall, making sure Wes is gone and out of sight before I make my way back over to him.
“Will you follow me to the library? I’ll leave my car there.”
He nods his head in the direction Wes drove. “He’ll check on you?”
“I do
n’t think so, but I can’t be sure. He’s my brother’s friend—”
“I know who he is.”
I hang my head. “I’ve been looking forward to this all morning.”
“And he’s not going to ruin it,” he says, taking my hand and leading me back towards my car. “I’ll meet you outside the library.”
Simon
He’s my brother’s friend.
There’s more to it than that. The way Wes Keller looks at her isn’t innocent, and that wasn’t some conscientious cop or concerned family friend routine I just witnessed. He looked pained when he placed his hand on Charlotte’s shoulder, like he was struggling to regain some measure of control.
He’s affected by her, same as me.
Christian’s pack of wolves. Not one of those boys set foot near the courthouse during his trial. They were all in on it, and I still to this day don’t know how they can live with what they did. I try to imagine it, to put myself in their shoes. But I can’t picture anyone persuading me to turn on a friend like Garth, or getting me to turn on the worst, least likable guy in my school for that matter. So I see people like Wes Keller as weak, easily manipulated—as less than a man.
He’s a piece of shit. He doesn’t get to touch her.
She looks left and right as she makes her way to my car. “Hey,” she whispers, avoiding my eyes when she clicks her seat belt into place.
I wait her out, and it’s nearly a full minute before she looks my way. “Hey,” I say back, smiling.
She lets out the breath she’s been holding. “I’m sorry, he just showed up out of the blue. He’s angry with me.”
“For what?”
“I know what happened to your brother. And I can’t pretend. I can’t just go on acting like Wes is the person I thought he was.” Shaking her head, she says, “I wanted to take up where we left off last night. I didn’t want all this between us again.”