Unplugged Summer: A special edition of Summer Unplugged

by Amy Sparling

  She doesn’t ask anything about where I’ve been. And although I didn’t want her to get upset with me, it’s kind of weird that she doesn’t care. A shock of jealousy rises up in my chest. Did she spend the time I was gone talking to that other guy?

  I stew over this for a little while. Finally, all I care about is that I’ll get to kiss her again. I need to feel her lips on mine, because that’s when I truly know what she’s thinking. She liked me on the ferris wheel. I hope she still does.

  When we reach a red light, I come to a complete stop as fast as I can. “Finally,” I say urgently.

  “Finally what?” she says.

  I lean over and kiss her. All my fears are taken away the moment her lips meet mine. She grabs my arms and holds onto me and kisses me back with all the same passion she had a few days ago. When we pull back, I make fun of her glittery lip gloss just to tease her.

  “Sorry,” she mumbles.

  She is so sweet it’s insane. I lean over and place a kiss on her neck. She sighs softly, and it only encourages me to kiss her again, and again, trailing my lips down to her collarbone.

  The car behind us honks loudly, startling me and ruining the moment. I look up and the light has turned green.

  “Whoops,” I say as I step on the gas.

  Bayleigh’s grin is lopsided, her gaze woozy as we drive off. And now I finally have my answer.

  She likes me as much as I like her.

  * * *

  The restaurant seems pretty nice, so I’m hoping it’s as good as the online reviews say it is. There’s a basket of freshly baked rolls in the middle of our table and I grab one and cover it in butter. Bayleigh watches me.

  “So how’s your knitting going?” I ask her. I seem to remember her telling me her grandmother was teaching her how to make a blanket.

  “You mean crochet?” she says, watching me.

  I shrug. “Same thing, right?”

  She laughs. “I crocheted a blanket, and it’s pretty awesome. But knitting is so not the same thing. I’ll let you slide this time, but don’t let Grandma hear you talking like that.”

  “Understood,” I say, then I pretend to zip my lips closed. “So where do you normally live? You know, when you aren't banished to your grandparent's house.”

  “I'm from a small town near Dallas,” she says.

  My heart leaps. Mixon is near Dallas. “Does it happen to be Mixon?” I ask, hoping like hell that her answer is yes.

  Her eyebrows pull together. “Huh? No, I’ve never heard of that place.”

  I take another bite of my roll. “Eh, I figured as much. No one lives there.”

  “What's Mixon?” she asks. “You're from LA, right?”

  “Don't worry about it, I'm just…thinking out my options. So,” I say, realizing I need to change the subject before I get all pissed off about motocross. “How was your week?”

  “Well, I learned how to crochet and I made myself a throw blanket. So, obviously, my week was insanely action-packed and you should be sorry you missed it.”

  I smile. “I missed you. I wish I could have called or something but…” I point at her and give her a playful grin. “Someone got themselves grounded.”

  She starts to say something and then she blushes. Luckily for her, our waitress brings our food so the pressure is off her.

  “You never answered my question about Mixon,” she says after a few minutes.

  I gnaw on my bottom lip. “Mixon is a tiny town much like this one, but it's different because Mixon is super famous for its motocross track.”

  “Oh. So are you going to go ride there or something?”

  I shake my head. I can’t think about that right now. I can’t give up on my dream of going pro. But when I look up, Bayleigh is watching me curiously and I realize I care about her too much to just leave her hanging like that. “I spent the last few days in Mixon. They were hosting a nationals race, and my agent met me there. He was already going to be there and it's just easier to see him at the race than to fly back to LA for a weekend, even though he assured me that either way I saw him would be pointless.”

  “Why’s that?” she asks.

  I sigh and run a hand through my hair. As much as I want to run from the truth, I guess it’s time to face it. “I guess my career really is over. He claims he did everything he could to get me back in, but no one will allow it. I've been all but excommunicated from professional motocross.”

  “Excommunicated?” she says, lifting an eyebrow. “That's a thing in motocross?”

  I roll my eyes. “Come on, Bayleigh. Your gullible is showing again.”

  * * *

  After dinner, I ask her to come back to my house for a little while. She agrees, and I’m happy to spend the time with her. Every second with Bayleigh is a second I’m not stressing about my career. Even though I’ll be going back to California after this summer, I can’t help but hope that she asks me to stay.

  Would I stay?

  I can’t really answer that question right now. If my career really is as over as my agent says it is, I guess I have no reason to return back home. But every time this thought crosses my mind, my heart rips in half again. This can’t possibly be the end of the line for me. There has to be something else.

  When we get back to my place, we settle into the couch. Bayleigh lays her head against my shoulder and everything feels right, even if only for a little bit. We flip through channels and try to find something to watch, but really I don’t care what’s on. I just like being cuddled up next to her.

  And then my mom calls. Ugh. “It’s my mom,” I say, giving her an apologetic look. “I’ll be back in a second.”

  I duck into the other room to take her call. She just wants to chat, as I suspected, but if I hadn’t answered then she would have called me back again and again, because that’s just how my mom is. I listen to her stories and try to be a good son even though I’m desperately dying to get back to Bayleigh and feel her soft skin in my arms again.

  When Mom finally tells me goodnight, I hang up and walk back into the living room. Bayleigh isn’t there, so I look around and find her in the kitchen. She’s sitting at the table, playing on my iPad. I watch her. She frowns and then types something, waits, and frowns again. Then she replies again. I can tell by the look on her face that she’s talking to that guy.

  My chest aches. I really thought she was into me, but I guess not. I head back into the living room and sink into the couch, feeling defeated. A few minutes later, she puts down the iPad and looks up at me.

  “Why can’t you just forget about him?” I ask.

  “You don't know who I was talking to,” she says defensively. She sits across from me on the loveseat, which totally kills me.

  “Then who were you talking to?” I ask. I’m trying not to sound like some jealous jerk, but I guess I am jealous.

  She looks away.

  “That's what I thought,” I say softly. “You know I was actually dating this girl before I came here, she was my real girlfriend, not a sort of girlfriend. But I know better than to keep toxic people in my life so I haven't spoken to her since that night at the bonfire. I thought you were on the same page as me, but I guess I was wrong. I guess you prefer guys who treat you like shit.”

  She stands up abruptly and grabs her purse off the end table. “Shut up, Jace. You aren't allowed to care what I do. You're leaving. You're going back home, and you're leaving and everything we've done together will mean nothing.”

  She storms to the front door and yanks it open. I follow, but she clearly doesn’t want anything to do with me. She levels a glare at me. “So don't even act like I deserve better than Ian, because better guys don't stay around.”

  Chapter 13

  I can’t stop thinking about what she said. Even now, hours later, when the sun is about to rise on a new day, I’m still pouring over her words in my mind. From the moment I flew here for the summer, I’ve had every intention of going back home to California. It’s where I was bor
n and raised and it’s where I want to be. It’s the best place for professional motocross, and it’s where all my things are.

  Bayleigh knows that. And she called me on it last night. She knows I’m leaving and she knows I’m not staying, not here in this shit hole of a town in this run own old person house. It’s the truth, after all, even though I don’t like admitting it.

  Another truth I’m having trouble admitting: I’m falling for the girl next door.

  I think about her constantly. I’m dying to see her each day and when she leaves, all I want is to see her again. This is the exact opposite of why I came to Salt Gap for the summer. I’m supposed to be here focusing on my career.

  And that’s the other thing that keeps me up late at night. My agent has absolutely refused to give me any hope for my career. He’s all but told me to fuck off. Actually, he said give it a year or two and he’ll try again.

  A year or two?

  I can’t go that long without a job. I can’t sit around like some old has-been hoping to get my career back at some arbitrary point in the future. Before I met Bayleigh, this kind of news would have broken me. I’d probably have fallen off the deep end, dove into alcohol and slutty girls in an attempt to drown my pain. So maybe meeting her was on purpose, some divine part of life’s plan to make sure I’d land on two feet after my racing career spiraled out of control.

  Maybe Bayleigh is my future.

  And she’s pissed at me right now, so great job Jace.

  I spend all day cleaning up the house and organizing my late grandparent’s stuff into piles to donate to the Goodwill. I’ll ask Bayleigh’s grandfather to take one last look through everything before I donate it, and then I can start moving my own stuff in. I don’t know how long I’d stay here, because there’s not much to do in Salt Gap, but the house is still mine, after all, so I should make it mine.

  I set my GPS to the local Home Depot and it’s over an hour away, which shouldn’t surprise me as much as it does. I go through the aisles with my shopping cart, getting items I desperately need for the house. Cleaning products, new weather-stripping for the back door, a new ceiling fan for my bedroom. I get a few cans of paint to make the inside look nicer and then I talk to a guy in the bathroom department about maybe updating the bathrooms. If I’m going to stay here longer than the summer, I should fix up the house and make it easier to live in.

  I can’t believe I’m even thinking this. Of staying here in Texas… but it’s the only thing I’m thinking right now.

  The nearest Home Depot was an hour away from my house, so on the drive home, I decide to take a huge leap into the great unknown. It might not work out, and even if it does, Bayleigh might still hate me. But I have to try.

  Jim Fisher picks up on the second ring. “Hello?”

  With one hand on the wheel, I grip the phone to my ear. “Hi, Mr. Fisher. This is Jace Adams.”

  “Wow, Jace? How are you?” Even on the phone, he seems just as star struck as he was when I met him at his motocross track last weekend.

  “I’m doing okay.” I take a deep breath and tell myself I’m doing this for her. If I find a way to stay in Texas, then, maybe she’ll want to be with me. “I’ve been thinking a lot about what we talked about the other day.”

  “Which part?” he asks. My heart races. Was he only joking about offering me a job?

  “Well, you mentioned maybe hiring me to work with you,” I say, suddenly losing all my confidence.

  “That would be amazing,” Mr. Fisher says excitedly. “Are you seriously considering it?”

  Boom, just like that, my confidence is back. “Yes, sir. My agent doesn’t think I’ll be racing any time soon and I’d like to stay in the motocross world if I need to get a real job.”

  He laughs. “Son, I’d love to have you aboard. I know I’d have clients lined up down the block to get a lesson with you.”

  “Even with my criminal record?” I ask.

  He chuckles. “No one cares about that, Jace. I promise you. If you’d like the job, come on down and we’ll figure it out.”

  I’m smiling so big it makes my cheeks hurt. “Thank you, sir. I’ll be seeing you soon.”

  I tap my fingers on the steering wheel while I drive. I have a job. I have a job! I’m going to stay in Texas! Holy shit, this is happening. Now all I have to do is win over the girl of my dreams. Judging by the way she looked at me last night, that might be harder than trying to get back into professional motocross.

  The sun has just set by the time I make it back to Salt Gap. My car’s trunk and backseat are filled with home improvement stuff and I’m wearing old jeans and an older T-shirt. This isn’t really the best time for a grand romantic gesture.

  Which is what makes it a great time. I pull over at the gas station closest to my house and go inside. There was something I saw here last time, and I’m glad I remembered it. In the back, near the cases of beer and cell phone chargers, is a little basket of fresh roses.

  To my annoyance, there’s only one left in the basket, but it’s a beautiful long stem pink rose and it’ll have to do. The nearest florist is probably two hours away and it’d be closed by now. I buy the rose and the cashier winks at me as if we’re sharing some kind of secret.

  “Thanks, man,” I say as I take the rose and head back to my car. The only secret here is that I’m in love with Bayleigh and I need to make her mine.

  Chapter 14

  I’m thinking of exactly what I’ll say to Bayleigh’s grandparents when they open the door. If it’s her grandmother, she’ll probably be lenient and let me see Bayleigh for a little while. If it’s Ed, I might be screwed, but I’ll ask to talk to her on the porch.

  As I drive past her house, I notice that Ed’s Ford truck isn’t in the driveway, but another car I’ve never seen is there. That’s odd. Hopefully she’s still home. I pull into my driveway and cut the engine. That’s when I see it.

  Her porch light is on, and Bayleigh’s standing there on the porch, facing someone who sits on the porch swing. Her arms are on her hips and she’s standing like she’s kind of hostile. I get out of my car and walk over to the passenger seat where I’ve set the rose to make sure it didn’t get messed up. I close the door and look over at her house, wondering if I should wait until her visitor is gone before I go over there. Then whoever is on the porch stands up and he’s shouting something.

  He steps into the porch light and throws a punch at a wooden post. “You need to learn to let shit go,” he says.

  Oh hell no.

  I walk straight over there, rose in one hand and my car keys in the other. I shove the keys in my pocket and some tall skinny douchebag says, “Who the fuck is that?”

  Bayleigh turns around, her eyes wide.

  The guy, who I’m guessing is the idiot who got her grounded, walks to the end of the porch and glares daggers at me. Too bad he’s not the least bit intimidating. “Bro, this has nothing to do with you,” he says, holding out a hand as if his scrawny hand will actually stop me.

  I step up on the porch, putting myself between her and this idiot. “It is my business if you're yelling at Bayleigh.”

  “Like hell it is,” he says in this way that’s trying to be all badass.

  I ignore him and turn to Bayleigh. “For you,” I say, handing her the rose. Even in the dim lighting I can see she’s both terrified and blushing at the same time. I wink at her.

  The douchebag shifts on his feet. “What the fuck is this? You’re gone two weeks and you replace me with this dipshit?”

  “I'm guessing you're Ian,” I say.

  He glares at Bayleigh and then looks at me. “If you know who I am then you know you need to leave now.”

  I shove my hands in my pockets and lean against the wall. “If you'd like directions back to the interstate, I'd be happy to help you out.”

  “I'm not going anywhere.”

  I lift an eyebrow. “I'm afraid you are.”

  Ian scowls then grabs Bayleigh’s arm and tries pulling her
to the other side of the porch. “Tell him I'm not going anywhere.”

  I let him do it, because it only fuels my anger right now. Bayleigh pulls out of his grip, her gaze going to the flower in her hand. “I’m sorry,” she tells him, but she doesn’t sound very sorry. “I think you need to go.”

  Ian is now so pissed he looks like he’s going to burst into flames. I can’t help the grin that spreads across my lips. There’s no better way to win over a girl than by having her choose you. I’m not going to fight this idiot. I’m just going to stand here, leaning against the house, and wait for him to realize I’m the better man.

  “Fuck both of you,” Ian says as he steps off the porch and heads toward his car. “Don't bother calling me when you get home, Bayleigh.” She doesn’t say anything. He spits on the ground. “It's my fault for dealing with some whore still in high school.”

  Yeah, okay. That’s where I draw the line.

  I jump off the porch and grab his shoulder, turning him around so he can see what’s coming to him. His eyes widen in horror. I’m just about to knock his fucking lights out when Bayleigh yells my name and grabs my arm.

  I look at her and she’s panting, her eyes wide, her hand holding my arm back. “Please don’t,” she whispers. Her eyes plead with me, and at first I think she’s trying to save this bastard. But then I realize she’s trying to save me. I don’t need another assault charge and this guy looks like the kind of scum who would call the cops on me.

  “Come on, Bayleigh,” I say, linking my fingers into hers. “He isn’t worth it.”

  While Ian curses and gets into his car, I take her inside. I walk her up the stairs and into her room, where she collapses on her bed, burying her head in her pillow. I sit next to her.

  “I had no idea he was going to show up like that,” she says after her tears have stopped.

  I run a hand over her hair. “I figured as much when I heard him yelling at you.”