I'll Be Yours

by Jenny B. Jones

  He stopped. “You’re not breathing.”

  What was with all this talking? “Of course I am.”

  “Do you want me to stop?”

  “No.” The single word came out a little too loud.

  “I don’t want to push this.”

  “But it’s just a tutorial,” I said. The stars flickered overhead, the night breeze sang all around. “It means nothing. Right?”

  A wayward strand of hair escaped, and Ridley reached out and slid it behind my ear. “It’s okay to tell this dude to go slow. It’s okay to say you have . . . boundaries.”

  Ridley was worried about me. Me and my odd assortment of mismatched baggage. “Maybe I’m tired of the boundaries.”

  “Not in this department. Do not make it open season for this guy.”

  I laid my hand on his chest, felt the rapid beat of his heart. “You’re a good guy, Ridley Estes.”

  Then he crushed his smiling lips to mine.

  Good heavens.

  Ridley Estes kissed like a Beethoven symphony. It was power and beauty, a crescendo of fire and grace. His lips on mine, his hands now holding my face, angling it to draw me closer. His tongue traced my bottom lip before capturing it again. “Close your eyes, O’Malley.”

  And I did.

  But not before seeing that hard face soften, his features relax as if completely unguarded.

  Then Ridley seemed to pull back, slow it down. As if he’d decided to savor and take his time. I knew I was awkward. My nose hit his more than once. But he didn’t laugh, didn’t say a word. Just held me tight and kept his mouth fused to mine. My hands slid up his chest and around his neck. I marveled at the heat of his skin. The heat within me.

  He drew his lips away from mine, and I heard him sigh heavily before pressing one final kiss to my forehead. “You think you’ve got it?”

  While I willed my legs to keep me upright, my eyes drifted open to find Ridley watching me, an unreadable expression on his dark face. “Not bad,” I said.

  He grinned at that. “You’ve had better?”

  “Danny Jacobson’s kiss did come with nachos.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  So that’s what I had been missing all this time. I’d never felt that before—as if I would vaporize into a million fragments of dust if Ridley had continued.

  Oh, but he could have. My mouth tingled where his had been. My pulse raced. My skin—

  “O’Malley?”

  “Yes?”

  “You’re gonna have to let me go sometime.”

  The fog made one last swirl through my brain before my thoughts finally cleared.

  I was still holding onto Ridley like he was my anchor in a tropical storm.

  I dropped my hands and took a giant step back, the embarrassment like a blowtorch to my cheeks. “Okay, good lesson. I think we’ve got it. I should be going. Thank you very much. Nice kissing. Good work. See you tomorrow. Tomorrow is personal narrative, paragraph structure, descriptive language. I’ll bring cookies.” Suave as ever, I turned on my heel to go, but he caught me and reeled me back in.

  “Hey,” he said. There was laughter in his voice, and I could not do anything but study the ground. “Harper?”

  “Yes?”

  “Look at me.”

  He gently lifted my chin until we were eye to eye. I wanted a portal to open up in the ground and suck me right in. It had been so awkward, then . . . so nice. And I’d gotten swept away. Like an actress morphing into her character.

  “You did good,” he said. “It takes practice.”

  What did that mean? Were we going to practice more?

  “Thank you.” It was a lame response on my part. Thanks for making out with me? Who said that? “I’m . . . I’m not good at this sort of thing.”

  We still stood a mere breath apart. He was in my bubble, and my tension was returning by the second. I automatically backed up a step. But he only followed. Reached for my hand and followed.

  “You want to tell me what happened?”

  “During the kissing?” Seriously, was he so practiced at it he’d just gone on autopilot and not been aware of his every move?

  His gaze briefly dropped to my wrist. “Before you came to live with the O’Malleys.”

  This boy was worse than any counselor.

  Ridley let the silence linger like an invisible third member of our party before finally speaking. “Come with me.”

  “Where?”

  “To my second-favorite spot.”

  I knew his very favorite was the football field. “I don’t know that this is a good idea.”

  But Ridley wasn’t hearing the rest of my protest as he laced his fingers with mine and tugged me to the edge of the terrace and down two flights of stairs. Small garden lights illuminated the path he took as he guided me through a winding trail that finally ended at the lake’s edge.

  His hand let go of mine, and I was immediately colder. And more confused. Our intertwined hands meant something, didn’t it? Probably not.

  Definitely not.

  “The pier’s right over here.”

  Clutching his coat tighter and trying not to audibly inhale the delicious scent of it, I walked behind him to a wooden pier that jutted into the lake. The wind seemed to still for us, as if it knew I needed a reprieve. Our shoes thudded on the boards as we stepped onto the pier, the water lapping at the underside, and the moon peeking out from a nest of clouds. It was beautiful out here.

  “Front row seats.” Ridley sat down next to the edge and held out his hand for me to join him.

  “Do you come here often?” I settled in beside him, staring out at the dark expanse of the lake. The waves ebbed and flowed in a dance that soothed and calmed.

  “I take my breaks out here. Even in the winter.” He angled his head, an eyebrow lifted. “You were telling me about your life before the O’Malleys.”

  “I already answered that. I said there wasn’t much to tell.”

  “You know I don’t believe that, right?”

  The clouds clustered to cover the full moon above us, and I thought of all those nights I would sit in my room in the dark, staring out my window at the night sky, wondering where my mother was and who she’d be when she came home.

  “Things before the O’Malleys were bad,” I finally sad. “My mom didn’t want me around, but wasn’t smart enough to give me up. She didn’t like me very much.” The words, the very thought was still a wound. No longer a gaping hole, but more like a paper cut that never goes away. A thin razor slice that irritates, even stings. One you forget about until something occasionally snags it.

  “And she hit you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And your dad?”

  “Not a nice man. She eventually kicked him out when I was four. But other guys would move in. They weren’t much better.”

  “I’ve never met my dad. I just got stuck with his last name.” He said it with the confidence of knowing he was talking to a kindred soul. “So . . . did anyone ever . . . I mean, did those guys try to—”

  “Mostly I was just a punching bag.”

  “Mostly?”

  “Things could’ve been much worse.” He frowned, and I didn’t like the sympathy that was starting to come over his expression.

  “I think it must’ve been plenty bad. You wear those long sleeves like a shield. You jump when someone you don’t know lays a hand on you.”

  “Some men were meaner than others.” I absently rubbed my forearm. “It was a toxic house. I was alone a lot. My mom would leave for work or for some date, and she’d lock me in my room.” I could feel invisible walls closing in. My lungs worked to drag in air. “Tell me to be quiet or . . . I’d be in trouble. The week I first got put in foster care, my mom had been gone for almost twenty-four hours. The neighbor had heard me screaming for help.” But that hadn’t been the worst of it. The worst came six months later when the state returned me to her. If I closed my eyes I could smell the smoke, hear my own screams.


  The O’Malleys had immediately gotten me therapy. And it had helped. But the real bandage on the wound had been their love. They’d held me when I’d cried for no reason. Hadn’t suggested it odd that I’d slept with a night-light ’til just last year. Hadn’t given up on me even though it had taken me two solid years before I’d let any of the O’Malleys near me with a kiss or a hug.

  “But you survived it,” Ridley said. “And you’re stronger now because of it.”

  Was I? Stronger than I’d been at age five or six, yes. But if that had never happened, I’d be normal. I probably wouldn’t have hired a high school senior to teach me how to be a girl a boy would notice, would want to date. Would kiss.

  “I’d be nothing without the O’Malleys,” I said. “I probably wouldn’t be alive.” The courts had tried to return me to Becky Dallas. But Cristy and John had moved mountains to make sure that hadn’t happened. “We lived for six months not knowing if I would have to go back to my bio-mom. I wouldn’t let John touch me, but he loved me like his own anyway.” I swiped away a stupid tear. “He taught me how to throw a punch. How to defend myself. At the time he’d made it a game, but I knew. Even at that age, I knew he was just protecting me in case the worse happened.”

  “But it didn’t. You’re an O’Malley.”

  Was I? Would I always be? I wasn’t sure what that meant these days. “Ridley, what you do for your siblings, it’s everything. I didn’t have someone to take up for me. To make sure I’d eaten or gotten on the bus for school. But you can’t keep it up. You have a life to lead. You can’t work, go to college, play football and be a parent.”

  “I guess football isn’t an option right now,” he said. “And neither is giving up my family.”

  “There are foster parents out there who could—”

  “Split them up? Parcel them out? Can you promise me they’d be together? Can you promise me they’d both go to a home as good as yours? No, you can’t. No matter what it takes, my family stays together.”

  “My mom, those men—they left bruises. Your mother might not be hitting you and your sisters, but it’s abuse just the same.”

  “It’s not the same. Their lives are completely different.”

  “And how do you figure that?”

  “They’ve got me.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  I had kissed Ridley Estes.

  That was the single thought in my head as I tried to march backward on the football field at Wednesday morning band practice. I relived those dreamlike moments over and over, stumbling three times, playing five wrong notes, and earning a blast from Mr. Sanchez’s bullhorn before he finally let us go.

  “Hey, everything okay?” Andrew walked beside me as our group migrated back to the high school.

  “Yes! Just fine!” Too much? My forced pep would rival a cheerleader’s.

  “You seemed distracted back there. You never mess up.”

  “I’m full of mistakes.” Kissing Ridley last night—had that been one of them? Had I unleashed a Pandora’s box of lust and depravity whose only antidote was a football player I could never have, should never want?

  No, this was ridiculous. It had merely been two mouths smashed together. Meaningless, merely a tutorial in the art of romance. When someone kissed that good, I’d have felt electric jolts no matter who he was. If Andrew kissed me right now, I’m sure it would be just as all-consuming, just as toe-curling, just as—

  Stop thinking about it!

  “Harper, I was wondering about yesterday.” Andrew’s words all but shoved me back to the present. “Maybe we could talk about—”

  “Levin!” Mr. Sanchez yelled. “I need to see you now!”

  Andrew opened his mouth, his eyes serious on mine. “Never mind.” He gave my free hand a squeeze. “I guess I’ll talk to you later.”

  I floated from the field to inside the school, somehow ending up standing before my open locker. My fingers traced the spines of my books as I tried to figure out what I was supposed to be grabbing. First hour . . . Wednesday . . .

  “The big blue one that says Econ.” Molly appeared next to me, her neon pink mouth curved in a mischievous smile.

  I pulled the text and slid it into my backpack. “I knew that. I was just—”

  “Thinking of a certain boy?”

  “It’s not like that at all. He and I—”

  “Are a completely adorable couple. I gotta give you credit, Harper.” Molly bit into an apple she pulled from her purse. “That Andrew’s quite the romantic.”

  Andrew. Right. The boy who had captivated my heart, made me a swoon-worthy picnic, and sweetly kissed me on the cheek.

  Not Ridley. The one who had made me laugh as he showed me how to dance—and forget my own name as he’d kissed me senseless. How was it I could still smell his cologne, feel his skin beneath my fingertips, taste his lips?

  “Hello?” Molly waved her gloved hand in front of my face. “Are you listening to a word I’m saying?”

  Today Molly wore black-and-white striped leggings, gold glittery flats, a pink miniskirt, and ruffled white blouse, topped off by an acid-washed denim jacket.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “What’s up with you? It was like an alien invaded your body at practice out there.”

  “I just got distracted by your outfit.”

  “You like?”

  “Very early Madonna.”

  “I wanted to wear my black hat, but Principal Sparacino just took it away.”

  “He has no clue who he’s dealing with.”

  “And no appreciation for artistic expression.”

  Molly and I joined the masses in the hall, moving in wads like schools of fish. You just had to find a gap in the lines and jump in, swimming with the flow.

  “You look tired.”

  She had no idea. “The university let my dad go. Press conference this afternoon, I guess.”

  “Oh, Harper. I’m sorry. Do you need a hug?”

  That pulled a laugh out of me. Molly knew those things were usually about as comforting to me as sticking my hand in a blender.

  “Seriously, what can I do?”

  I dodged a senior who had no respect for the implied rules of the hall. “There’s nothing you can do.”

  “I can’t believe it’s come to this.”

  Neither could I.

  “Oh my gosh. There he is.” Molly gave a little squeal beside me, and I fought not to hightail it the other direction as I saw the source of her girly fit. Coming toward us was Ridley. My heart lurched at the sight of him. He’d yet to see us, and I made a quick study of every inch of him. He had his arm around some cute brunette from the dance team, and as he said something to her, she tossed her glossy hair and laughed. The tiny darts of jealousy came swiftly and unexpectedly. I didn’t care if he flirted with that girl! Heck, he could have a girlfriend for all I knew. Five of them.

  Yet he had kissed me last night.

  Kissed me like he’d meant it.

  Except that moment had meant nothing to him.

  And nothing to me.

  “Hey, girls.” Ridley smiled as he approached. His bemused gaze dared me to look away.

  Did the nameless brunette see the shadows beneath his eyes? Did she notice how his posture bent the slightest bit, as if he carried the weight of the world on those shoulders?

  “Hello!” Molly chirped. “I want you to know I think it’s an outrage you’re not playing right now.”

  Ridley smiled, then kept moving with the flow of traffic, his attention pulled back to his skinny dancer.

  “You don’t even know who we play,” I said to Molly.

  She sighed. “Who cares? All I know is I’ll be at that game, and Ridley could be as well. The band geek and the football god. It would make a great romance novel.”

  “Or fantasy.”

  “Talk to him for me. You see him all the time. Do you have any idea what kind of gift that is? It’s like being handed a key to Macy’s. A check with lots of zeroes
. A chocolate fountain that never runs dry.”

  It was right there on the tip of my tongue to tell her about yesterday. Ridley’s ridiculous farce that we were engaged, my going to his work, his kissing me senseless. But instead I kept walking, keeping my secrets to myself.

  “Talk to him, Harper. That girl doesn’t love him like I do.”

  “You don’t love him.”

  “I know. It’s much too soon,” she said. “But after our first date, he would realize I was all he’d been looking for and be blinded to all those other girls.”

  “And by your outfit.”

  “Can you even imagine what it would be like to kiss that boy?”

  “Yeah.” I looked back, but Ridley had disappeared in the crowd. “I think I can.”

  Econ class flew by in a blur. Unfortunately, a blur that included a quiz and some group work that had me thinking villainous thoughts about my teacher.

  When the third-hour bell rang, I went to the band room’s instrument closet and once again retrieved my beloved trumpet. Finding my seat, I ran a cloth over the silver metal, polishing it until it shined like the day I’d first got it. My trumpet had been one of the first things the O’Malleys had given me when I’d come to them as a foster kid. My bio-mom hadn’t been able to afford an instrument, so I hadn’t gotten to sign up for elementary school band. My dad had found out on a Monday, and by Tuesday, I’d come home from school to my very own trumpet. All mine. In the world of scraps and secondhand, so very little had been completely mine.

  “Hey, Harper.” Andrew sat down in his number two seat, a hint of caution on his face. That didn’t bode well. “So . . . you took off pretty quickly yesterday.”

  “I’m sorry. Something came up.” Andrew was such a stark contrast to Ridley. Andrew was slender to the point of needing a cheeseburger, while Ridley could probably deadlift a refrigerator. Andrew had longer hair, where Ridley’s was short. Andrew was vintage T-shirts, while Ridley dressed like a Latin Abercrombie model. Andrew told me he thought he might be allergic to dogs, and Ridley braved bullets and fake engagements to help me save them.