The Wilson Mooney Box Set

by Gretchen de La O

  “Just getting dressed.” I wanted him to pay attention to what I had to say, and if I talked to him half-naked he wouldn’t be able to focus. I scooped up my panties and pulled them on. My jeans were bunched up on the floor; I shook them to release the legs and wiggled into them.

  “Here, let me help you.” He sauntered toward me. His fingers caught the front of my pants. Pulling at the button, he snapped it tight below my navel. His hair blocked his expression. His fingers still behind my waistband, he slid them around to the small of my back. I shivered.

  “Max,” I whispered slowly through my exhaled breath.

  “Shhh. Don’t say it.” The muscles in his jaw constricted, his brows converged above his narrow, pained eyes as he raised his head. He brought his forehead to rest on mine. “I know how hard it is going to be—being in a room with you, not able to hold you and kiss you, or talk freely with you,” his voice was low; his breath smelled sweet, like Jolly Ranchers swirled in Ghirardelli chocolate. His hands clung to my back, pressing me close to him.

  He got it. The whole picture of us tangled in the vines of the forbidden fruit. We can’t go to dinner together in public. We won’t kiss goodnight at the door. Holding hands was totally out of the question. We will have to maintain the student-teacher facade for another six months. Just until after graduation, then we could be ourselves. I pushed my lips to his. “I’d better text Joanie to come get me.” My butterflies became frantic. “I’ll have her meet us back at Peet’s.” Their wings hit and tore, fighting to break the bubble of regret surging up into my throat.

  I broke away and pulled my phone from my pocket.

  “Wait, Wilson. I need twenty more minutes with you.” He grabbed my phone and closed it. My heart climbed up into the back of my throat. Maybe it was the butterflies succeeding at escaping the churn of emotional turmoil deep in my body.

  Max stared at me, his inviting green eyes filled with the apprehension of actually calling out the amount of time we had left together before my chariot turned into a pumpkin pulled by little white mice. Twenty minutes wasn’t much time. He slid his hand around my waist and pulled me in. His long fingers brushed my hair back as he pressed his palm to the side of my face. My hands clutched at his waist. My eyes watered. He slid his thumbs right under them to catch my tears.

  “You are so beautiful. I’m so lucky,” he whispered.

  I didn’t say anything. I didn’t want to ruin the moment with stupid words that would bumble awkwardly from my mouth. So I breathed deeply and leaned against his chest, tightening my arms around his waist. Tomorrow was going to be okay.

  MONDAY

  Everything was silent when I woke up Monday morning. I half expected Cindy to still be pissed at me. I wouldn’t blame her. Instead, she was already gone. Probably better that way. I don’t think I could handle another fight with her.

  Last night, when Joanie picked me up from Peet’s Coffee, it was excruciating to drive away and leave Max in the parking lot. My heart was torn from my chest and it left a huge gaping hole. My butterflies poured out, desperate to stay with him. It was Max who had tamed them, and they were loyal.

  I had a dream last night—more like a nightmare. The warning bell for fourth period had rung and I was heading into my government class. Max’s class. The door was heavier than usual but I didn’t care. I was going to see him and I could feel my butterflies jump to life. Except when I walked into class, an old, gray-haired woman stood behind his desk. She was frail and little, dressed from head to toe in black. She noticed me right away and shuffled over. She asked me if I was Ms. Wilson Mooney before she handed me a folded note. My knees went weak. I felt the blood drain quickly from my cheeks. My butterflies froze. I recognized the lined paper—it was the same type Max had used to give me his number, the same one I flushed down the toilet.

  The paper was soft and the folds were flat but worn, like he’d opened and closed it too many times. My hands trembled as I walked back to my desk, waiting until I was sitting to open it. The room was filled. There was someone I knew at every desk: Cindy, Joanie, Bonnie, and Jacky. My heart pounded fast and loud when Max’s mom came over and told me to take a deep breath and open the note. Tears were streaming down her face as she reached to touch my cheek. Her hand was so cold it cooled through my skin and muscle, all the way down to my bones.

  My eyes dropped to the folded paper in my fingers. I fumbled to open it, taking care not to rip the fragile, worn edges. I brought it to my face. Pressing it to my nose, I smelled him. Lavender flooded my senses. As I pulled open the last fold, I saw it was in his handwriting. The words bounced and jumped off the page, breaking apart as the tears landed on his thoughts written on the lined, creased paper. Mistake, age, student, and too young were the words that clawed their way into my head before they poisoned and ripped their way down to my heart. They destroyed every butterfly that struggled to survive. Every last one—dead.

  I looked up to an empty room; I was alone. I stumbled to leave, clutching the handle on the door, when I saw my mother in the doorway. Her arms were outstretched; was it me she wanted? It couldn’t be me. I turned to look behind me and that’s when I saw Cindy. She ran past me into my mother’s arms. They clung to each other, an embrace I had waited my whole life to get from her. It wasn’t for me.

  My eyes sprang open. I was back in my dorm room with Joanie, still asleep. My heart leapt from my chest, clogging my throat, making it hard to take a deep breath. I knew it was a dream; it was just hard to swallow the messages it sent to me. I could justify Cindy in my dream—she and I were on the outs. I could even see the fear of losing Max. What with him being my teacher and me not being eighteen. But my mother…I never saw her coming.

  The only thing that made the first part of the day half bearable was the thought of seeing Max during fourth period and after school. I wondered if my butterflies would be there, waiting to come back. I had to admit, a small part of me wondered if he was going to have a substitute today. And if it was a little gray-haired lady in black, I wasn’t stepping foot in his room.

  Cindy didn’t sit with us at first break. She made it pretty clear she was still mad. I even tried to make eye contact with her during Humanities: nothing. She was good at making me feel terrible and guilty. It was lunchtime when I figured she knew about Max and me and was just waiting for the right moment to destroy us. Joanie and I skipped lunch and went back to our room. I needed to talk to her before I faced Max. She was my rock and I needed to be grounded; it was the only place we could talk in private.

  We sat on my bed and she knew exactly what to say to make me feel okay. I told her about my dream and she reasoned every scary image away with a positive twist. I loved her for that. I called her my best friend but she was more than that. She was my mother, my sister, my best friend, and the only family I truly had. When I get married, she will be the one to give me away and stand next to me as my maid of honor. She was everything to me.

  We were on our way to Max’s class when I shoved my hand into my pocket. My cell phone wasn’t there and I always carry my phone with me. It was like leaving my room without shoes—it just doesn’t happen. I told Joanie that I’d probably left it on the bed where we were talking and that I’d catch up with her. I ran back as fast as I could. I didn’t want to be the last one walking into government after the bell rang. I wanted to mingle with the crowd of girls going into his class, making it easier to get to my desk without anyone noticing me.

  I pushed our dorm room door open as Cindy pulled. We ran into each other. She didn’t say anything, even when I tried to apologize for dropping the “F” bomb. She just stared through me, smirked, and kept walking. I spotted my phone on my bed. It was open. My body flushed a cold sweat from every pore. Why hadn’t I cleared all my messages? I spun around the room looking for evidence of where she’d been. Maybe she hadn’t seen my phone. I snatched it up, scrolling through our texts, seeing if our words were as descriptive as I remembered. I couldn’t believe I had just given her t
he biggest weapon of all; one that could annihilate everything Max and I had.

  As I ran to his class, adrenaline pumped fast throughout my entire body. I struggled to convince my mind that she hadn’t seen it. She had government with me and I wanted to catch her before she went in. When I turned the corner to his classroom, I saw the door slam shut. I cased the room as I peered through the diamond-wired window, looking to see if she was slinking her way to her desk like a shark hunting for kill. She was laughing and talking to Jacky when they both looked across the room. I followed their gestures. There he was. Max. His back was to the class; he was erasing and rewriting something on his whiteboard. My knees went weak and I shuffled away from the window. I had to go in, had to be there to show Cindy that nothing was going on between Max and me. I grabbed the handle as the second bell rang. I was late and everyone was going to see me walk in. I wanted to vomit; get the anxiety to leave my body. I needed to remember what every day before the weekend was like when I came into his room. I took a deep breath, swallowed the last bit of regret, and pulled the door open.

  Wilson’s Beta Readers: Becky, Debbie, Karley, Suzanne: Thank you for your time and input. It means the world to me that you care about the characters within these pages as much as I do. I am humbled by your support and grateful for your time.

  Tiffany: Thank you for having my back! Your expertise and handle on the English language is amazing. Thank you for bringing coherence to my story and humorously reminding me that when it was really good, I lost my handle on the use of grammar. You are such a generous person and I hope you’ll have me for all the novels waiting to come alive.

  Toski & Sommer: You both have such love and passion for what you do. Thank you for sharing your talent and time with me. I truly feel blessed to have worked with you and I look forward to working with both of you in the future. Both of you are angels sent to rock my world!

  Liza: I love your talent. Thank you so much for sharing it with me. I appreciate your honesty , loyalty and authenticity.

  Becky: Well, Sis, we made it through another book. I don’t know what I could say here that you don’t already know. Through thick and thin, through frustration and fun, Wilson and Max live on—not only in my head, but they skip around in yours too. Without you, I truly don’t know if this book would exist. Thank you for everything you give, everything you do, and everything you are. You are my rock, my memory keeper, and my soul sister!

  My Family: Ed, Jared, Kyle, Nate, and my Mom (Grandma K): Thank you for being a supportive husband, loving children, and a caring mom/grandma. Thank you for the times you had to forgive my lack of being the domestic goddess when I should have been, and the preoccupied mother I shouldn’t have been. Thanks for telling me when you needed to be with me and for the times you let me be. Beyond it all—Jared, Kyle, and Nate—I hope, if nothing else, that I taught you nothing is ever beyond your reach when you let your heart follow its calling. I love you all so very much and am so blessed to have each and every one of you in my family.

  MONDAY MORNING

  I grabbed a green Expo marker from my desk and decided to stop worrying about Wilson walking through my door. I hated having to wait to see her. I kept visualizing the way her body moved through my room—the curve of her hips swaying against the open space, her glowing blue eyes speaking secrets, and her loose blonde curls bouncing against her shoulders as her aroma clawed seductively through my body. I felt the need to touch her warm skin swell below my belt. Shit, not good—Queen of England… dead puppies… Margaret Thatcher… Margaret Thatcher… Margaret Thatcher… Margaret Thatcher. Fuuuck, come on—not now. Please, not now.

  I spun around to the whiteboard, making sure to keep the tent in my Levi’s out of sight. The last thing I needed was for any of my students to come in and notice it. Pressing the marker to the whiteboard, I scribbled out that night’s assignments. I made sure it was just enough reading to cover the required sixty minutes of homework, and that the questions were challenging enough for Wilson to play devil’s advocate with me later.

  That’s what turned me on about her: no matter what the subject, she always found a way to make me see her side of it. It was refreshing, to say the least; finally, someone so beautiful yet still able to debate even the most obviously lopsided of subjects. Don’t get me wrong, she was wickedly sexy too, and I could never wait for the part where we challenged each other because, whether I won or lost, we would always end up making out. She knew what turned me on, and I knew what made her go crazy. I loved watching her body react to what I did. How her hips would roll and thrust, speeding steadily against my fingers; how irresistible she was when her breath would ripple across my skin; and how she’d moan and bite her bottom lip before she’d explode. I liked how uninhibited we were with each other. She discovered how to rock my world, and quickly became really good at it.

  The smell was pungent and the ink wet as the lines of my letters dried. Damn it, I picked the wrong pen. The odorless ones worked best. I looked down at the end of the tray and noticed the good markers were stacked there in a line. Wilson must have put them that way before she’d left for Aspen. I’m so fucking torn. How can I battle or change everyone’s expectations? Legally, I know I shouldn’t go out with her—she’s one of my students. God knows I’ve tried to avoid it. Hell, I’ve fought these feelings every day I’ve seen her. But when everything in my gut is telling me it’s right, how can it be wrong?

  When I left early on Friday I was dreading letting yet another weekend go by where I didn’t have the balls to make a move on Wilson, stressing about the fact that I wanted to be with her and knowing that I couldn’t have her. I’d hoped that going to Aspen would help me keep my mind off the whole situation.

  Who would have known I’d be coming back Sunday night with a whole new story—one with Wilson wanting me too? I was a changed man. I still didn’t know how the whole thing happened. Everything seemed so fast, so perfect. One minute I was hanging out with my family, the next I was at Cindy Browler’s cabin with Wilson.

  When I found her in that bathroom and saw how I’d broken her heart, something took over my reasoning. All I wanted to do was heal her, hold her, make her see how much I wanted her. My heart was pounding so hard, I could feel it in my ears. It was strange—I was scared and calm all at the same time. I didn’t want to fuck anything up, and the thought of her crying because I was too scared to act on my feelings tore me up. I couldn’t help it—when she pushed me away, something clicked and I couldn’t breathe. I didn’t want to lose her. I had to fight for something I didn’t even know I could attain. Damn, she was irresistible; and, man, she tasted so good. It took everything I had to hold back with her.

  She’s so perfect. I still can’t believe she’s my girlfriend. If I die tomorrow, I have to admit, I’ll die happy.

  But what if it’s too perfect? Quit doubting fate. For fuck’s sake, I took her home and my mom loves her; my whole family is crazy about her. Wilson likes me, that’s all that matters. She wants me as much as I want her, that’s gotta mean something. She wants to be with me and it’s so hard to wait.

  Sometimes I can’t believe Wilson’s only seventeen. She seems so much older. She lives beyond all the bullshit other girls her age seem to be caught up in. She’ll be eighteen in less than a month. What the hell’s a month?

  Okay, just power through today without making eye contact, it’ll be fine. Take one step at a time. Make it through this class and then the rest of the day will be cake.

  The door swung open and high-pitched voices entered the room. Shit, there’s Cindy—don’t look at her. I snatched the eraser and started to rub the whiteboard Wilson had cleared on Friday. What in the hell am I doing? Don’t look stupid erasing nothing.

  I noticed Wilson still hadn’t walked through the door. Maybe coming to class today was just too much for her. Yeah, she needs time. I can’t expect her to walk in here and keep it together—hell, I can’t. I dropped the dry eraser into the tray. What would make this go fast enou
gh to make it worth me being here? Well, if she decides to show up today—that would make the whole day totally worth it.

  Shit, there’s the bell, I thought as I turned around and saw all the girls chatting with each other. I pushed my fingers up through my hair, brushing it off my forehead. I didn’t want it in my eyes. At least I wasn’t sporting a tent in my Levi’s anymore.

  Where is she?

  I cleared my throat and completely avoided making eye contact with Cindy or Joanie.

  “Okay, okay. Time to take your seats—that was the bell, people,” I attempted in a relaxed tone.

  “How was your weekend, Mr. Goldstein?” a voice sang from the back of the room.

  Shit, what am I going to say? Keep it short and to the point.

  “I had a nice weekend.” Perfect—a simple enough answer to keep it vague; gotta avoid saying too much.

  I glanced at Cindy. She was leaning into Jacky, whispering something into her ear. My throat felt like a desert. Suddenly I couldn’t swallow enough to dampen the cactus stuck below my larynx.

  “What was so nice about it?” Victoria Morgan shouted from the back row.

  As I looked over the room I could feel my face heat up and my heart pound. I looked down at my desk, dragging the tips of my fingers across the grooved, aged surface before I walked around the corner of it and propped myself squarely in the middle, facing the front of the classroom.

  “Well, before I tell you about my weekend, how about you tell me about yours, Miss Morgan? Hmm?” I changed the focus.

  “Well, mine was boring; I went with my boyfriend to see Angels and Devils, the stupidest movie ever,” Victoria spat. Several students agreed in rhythmic whoops and hollers.

  “Alright, ladies,” I was working to settle the room when I heard the door scrape across the worn tile floor. I looked up and caught my breath—she’s the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen. My heart hammered in my chest. The blood in my scalp rushed through my ears and down the back of my neck. I felt my mouth water with the memory of tasting her. My hands perspired and every last drop of blood in my body instantly collected between my legs.