Because it does matter.
I turn onto my side and breathe through frustration.
Thomas is fifteen years old and his own person, with his own life. How he spends his time, and who he chooses to spend it with, is his business, as mine is my own. It shouldn’t concern me. It shouldn’t matter, because even though Valarie gets parts of him that I don’t, she doesn’t get the best parts.
She doesn’t have his hoodie or his respect. She doesn’t get all-night phone calls, or to fall asleep in his blankets with his arms and his heartbeat, and she doesn’t get to wake up with—
My next thought makes me feel sick. On my back, I go dizzy. My throat and nose burn inside, and my heart kicks my ribcage. I push blankets down and get out of bed as silently as I can, trying hard to shake the thought that hurts more than anything.
I refuse to think it. I can’t.
They haven’t. They couldn’t.
He wouldn’t.
Pulling my hair over my shoulders and taking a deep breath, I reach for my snow boots instead of the gifts we’re supposed to exchange.
I don’t care.
It doesn’t matter, my brain tells me. He doesn’t care about her, not like he cares about you. He thinks you’re prettier. He says so all the time …
But it does matter.
They can’t do this, not here. This matters. This is mine.
When I get to his door, his light is still on.
I hesitate in between it doesn’t matter and it matters so much.
Because this room isn’t just Thomas’ anymore.
It’s where our secret lives.
Breathing in, I wrap my shaky hand around his door handle and turn.
Fully dressed, Thomas is low lidded and bright eyed, smoking a clip at his window. Leaning against its sill, he looks up and his good mood drifts with the freezing breeze coming in. The cold permeates my resolve, and his easy disposition surrounds me where I stand.
Meeting his eyes across the short distance, I close the door and lean against it. With a look that doesn’t last and defines him—reckless, incorrigible, irresistible—he pulls another hit and blows it out into the night. In my peripheral vision, I notice his bed is still made.
The relief is minimal.
Thomas returns his hooded blues to me, and when he laughs, I know it’s at my boots.
“We going somewhere, strawberry blonde?”
I can’t answer. I feel ridiculous. I feel our age difference. I rushed to get here, but I feel like I’m Dusty’s little sister’s idiot friend. I feel out of place.
I move away from his door, toward him. The air is colder with every step closer, but that’s where he is—that’s where I go. I lean against the other side of his open window, facing him. We’re close, but the space between us is made of winter wind, inconsistency, and guesswork.
I hate it.
“How was your night?” I ask, but my empty voice echoes off his walls. It feels dishonest in my throat, and I know instantly and undoubtedly that I can’t fake things with him like I do with everyone else.
“Wait—” Thomas blows another hit and stands up straight. He towers. I make myself look up.
He tosses the roach outside and points at my boots. “Did you put those on because you were coming here? To see me?”
My heart sinks like a frozen stone into my sick stomach. I’m embarrassed, and I want to tell him to stop being a stupid boy so I can stop feeling like a crazy girl.
Thomas cuts a frustrated breath out through his nose and walks to his dresser. He pulls the top drawer open, and with his back to me, he says, “You don’t need your boots in here, Bliss.”
There’s seriousness in the words themselves, but he doesn’t sound mad. His tone matches his carefree mood and lax posture.
I cross my arms against the cold. I want him to be right. I want to feel right, but I don’t. And I don’t say so, because I don’t want to sound like a kid, but I don’t want to take my fucking boots off.
“My feet are cold.” They’re not.
Thomas is still searching through his top drawer with his back to me. “Bullshit.”
When he turns around, he’s holding a red-wrapped gift box. There’s a smile at the corner of his lips.
“Take your boots of and sit down,” he says. “It’s our Christmas night, right?”
He steps toward the foot of his bed, and my nerves gut my stomach with anger the closer he gets. I cross my arms tighter. I look at the carpet, his shoes, everywhere but at his bed or him.
“I don’t want to sit down,” I say truthfully.
Thomas laughs. “What the fuck, baby?”
My whole body is freezing because I’m in front of the window, but I don’t want to move. I don’t want to be on his bed if she’s been in it. I don’t want to be anywhere near it if they’ve—
I can’t even think the stupid word.
Between that and the cold all over me, I shiver. Thomas is still holding the gift box, and his brows arch together. His light blues aren’t as easygoing anymore. There’s concern and confusion under hooded lids, and he’s looking at me like he cares.
“Why are you with Valarie if you don’t like her?” I ask.
His shoulders fall as he turns his eyes to the ceiling. He takes a breath, and his fingers shift their grip on the gift.
“I’m not with her,” he says calmly, dismissively. “I thought we were doing presents?”
He tosses the box onto his bed and reaches his empty hand out for mine.
“No.” I pull my hand away before he reaches it. “I don’t want to sit there with you.”
Thomas looks at me like I’ve burned him, the way he takes his hand and buries it in his pocket.
“Bliss, what’s the matter? You don’t want to sit where?”
“On your bed.”
The quiet seconds that come after make me think of the ocean—how it can swallow you up, no questions asked.
This boy’s brows dig closer together. He looks over his shoulder at his bed, then back at me, and he opens his mouth to say something, but then I see him understand.
My ice-cold cheeks burn figured-out pink.
“That’s what you’re … You think—” he starts and stops, blinking his eyes like he can’t believe it. He pushes his hands through his hair and drags them down his face, resting his fingertips on his chin as he starts again, carefully composed.
“Not even one time,” he says simply. “Not ever.”
Needy-hearted, I breathe around twisted, knotted nerves that won’t let me go. When I make myself look up again, Thomas’ eyes are waiting.
“Bliss, I don’t …”
I know he’s trying to be patient. He’s all fucks and half phrases, tensed shoulders and clenched jaw, and he doesn’t know what to do with his hands.
“I can’t—I don’t even let her sit on my bed. You’re the only—”
He pauses, and he might never admit to it, but I can hear the hurt in his voice, and it makes my heart and stomach and all of me feel terrible as he looks away. He turns around, emptying his pockets out onto his dresser, and the way he breathes makes him stand straighter as he faces me again.
“I’ve never let anybody else in my bed, okay?”
It’s the truth. I know because my heart beats harder. I shiver between the wind and needing him.
“Will you please give me your hand?” he asks, and I look up. It’s only now that I realize he’s waiting. That he’s been waiting since I said no.
Too frozen to do much else, I nod.
Thomas clears the three steps between us, and I take one away from the window. When he reaches for me this time, I don’t pull away. I meet him halfway.
He touches his warm hand to my ice-cold one and pulls me immediately into his arms and completely to his chest.
“Baby, baby, baby,” he whispers, his voice and strength enfolding me as he picks me up. With one arm around my middle, he closes his window with his free hand. “You’re freezing, girl.�
�� His whisper melts down my neck, and he wraps both arms around me now. He rubs my back, and I breathe out. Shaking and nodding, I hold on.
“Don’t ever pull away from me like that again, L.”
“I won’t,” I promise. “Rule forty-one.”
Setting me on my feet, Thomas takes off his sweater and wraps me in heavily-warm heather gray cotton. He zips it all the way to my chin, pulls the hood up and tugs my red-blonde ends out. His blues are genuinely open and unclouded, and I know that nobody else gets this part of him. Not Rebecka. Not his parents. Definitely not Valarie. Not even his boys.
“This is ours,” he says, kind and clear-eyed in a moment of no nonsense.
It feels immense, whatever this is. Like a cliff, but also like home base—unstable, but essential. Like beginning and like always, and I want to keep it—this—for always.
“Rule forty-two?” I ask.
This boy pulls another one of my curls out and picks me up by my hips so he can set me down on the edge of his bed. “More than that,” he tells me.
I crinkle my brows and watch his eyes as he leans closer, picking up my left leg by my snow boot covered ankle.
“Like a law?” I ask.
Thomas laughs as he pulls my boot off and tosses it to the floor with a thump.
“More than that,” he says again, reaching for my right boot and removing it, too.
Butterflies that have replaced the knots in my stomach flutter all the way up behind my smile when he tucks my bare feet under his leg for warmth. “Just the truth.”
I MAYBE live for Fridays.
For a few years now, they’ve been my favorite day of the week. I’m sleepy-happy quiet in the mornings, but Fridays I’m bouncing-ecstatic inside.
Today is no different.
It’s Friday morning, which means I get to see Becka. And the thought that comes with it as natural and eager: I get to see Thomas.
The smile I woke with curls a little higher.
Freshly showered and wrapped snug in a towel, I work another one through my hair and breathe in sweet cinnamon pancakes and fresh coffee on my way back to my room.
I’m a firm believer that the right music is essential to any morning being a good one, especially an earlier than normal one. Door closed, I turn the Beatss with two s’s mix that Rebecka made specifically for the New Year on and up. Not too loud, just enough to feel the drums and beats and bells as I move to them.
I pull light pink unders up my legs and clasp-strap the matching bra, glancing over at my boots.
Wintertime has snow-slicked the whole world for miles in every direction, and my boots are my grace-givers. They do for my sense of balance what delicate lace does for my confidence. Secure in one and secretly sexy in the other, I feel less like an awkward kid and more like a teenage darling every day.
Tight, dark denim tugged up over pale pink courage, I slip into a cami and a cardigan, wooly socks, and super boots. I shuffle-shuffle drumbeat-step to my dressing table where I curl my hair and shimmer my eyelids. By the time I’m finished and grabbing my packed-last-night bag, I all but skip downstairs still moving to the beat.
Mom drops me off at school and reminds me to call if I need anything, and she emphasizes anytime.
While I’m at my locker, Becka runs and skids down the eighth-grade hall as the bell rings. She trades me a handful of Lemonheads for two of my Pixy Stix.
“Where was it this time?” I ask, each of us walking backwards in opposite directions.
“In the fucking refrigerator. In the vegetable crisper!” She laughs, attempting to pour the stick out onto her tongue, but blue sugar dust flies everywhere.
“You need to start keeping your shoes under lock and key.” I have to turn to go up the stairs.
“I know! Such a fucker.” My girl flashes an easy-bright grin. She’s every bit as in love with Friday mornings as I am.
A few minutes into algebra, I crunch Lemonheads between texts from her brother.
Morning, sunny-side girl.
Morning, trouble-maker boy.
I slip my phone back onto my lap. I know I’m not supposed to have it out during class, but this is when Thomas almost always texts me.
You coming over tonight?
No, I thought I’d stay home and work on some extra credit reading.
I watch the PowerPoint presentation going on in the front of the room, but I’m picturing Thomas sitting in the back of one of his classes. Or leaning in the hallway. Or hanging out in the parking lot, pausing whatever he’s doing anywhere to text me.
As all good kids should on Friday nights, his text says.
I tart-smile around a fresh Lemonhead.
Like I’d be anywhere else on a Friday night, I reply.
I consider putting my phone away, but decide to change the subject.
Is my hoodie ready yet?
Later Christmas night, after I was barefoot and warmed up, I snuck back down to Rebecka’s room. I returned with his gifts … and his baseball sweater.
“Isn’t it kind of rude to return a gift to its giver?” Thomas asked, brown eyebrow lifted over curious blue.
“It is,” I said. “Obviously, that’s not what’s happening.” I handed over the hoodie that smelled more like me than him and brushed loose strands of strawberry blonde out of my face. “Make it smell good again.”
The left corner of his mouth curved up. He checked his smile like he was way too cool for it. “What?”
“You know…” I shrugged “…like a dusty delinquent.”
Untying the ribbons on the gift I’d handed him without looking away from me, he asked, “You think I smell good, Bliss?”
My very own pair of Ray-Bans were in the gift box he’d given me, and I put them on in response. I couldn’t hide my smile, so I leaned back in his bed and showed him my middle finger. “Shut up, Thomas.”
That was almost three weeks ago. I’m ready to have my hoodie back now.
Did you get knee pads yet?
I hide my blush behind my left hand and go back to taking PowerPoint notes.
Friday hours take longer than any other day of the week, but eventually I’m in the backseat of Tommy’s Mercedes with freedom and elation coursing through me. We’re on our way to the mall in Toledo, but my best friend has other ideas.
“You know…” she nudges her mom’s elbow and looks at her with sneaky-glinting highly hopeful blues “…there is a tattoo shop right down the street. They’ll pierce my lip for free if we buy the jewelry …”
“Sure.” Tommy nods. She flashes her daughter a yeah right smile, and even her sarcasm is pretty. Her eyes glint and her smirk reminds me of her son. “And maybe your father won’t snatch it right out of your gorgeous face.”
Rebecka settles with a pout and another two holes in her left ear. There’s still only one in her right, and I love that the only standards of beauty she wants to live up to are her own.
While her ear’s in the piercing gun, I secretly sort of wish my mom was here. I could maybe get a second hole in each ear, too.
Mom hasn’t been too keen on spending time with Tommy recently. They’re not unfriendly, but things haven’t been the same since my birthday.
The wish passes as we head to the movie theater. Smitty and Oliver are there, and I’m okay with not having new holes punched through my ear lobes, and with Mom and Tommy not being the best of friends. I’m an entire city away from home, getting and doing things that Mom and Dad have no idea about. I’m carefree and happy, and more grateful than anything.
We get back to Becka’s house a little after eleven. Thomas is out with his friends. Luke’s in Portland for the weekend, and Tommy heads to their bedroom for the night. Rebecka and I basically have the place to ourselves.
After an hour on the couch, Thomas still isn’t home, and we’re tired. I want to be awake when he gets back, but I’m worn out.
I tuck my phone under my pillow in Becka’s room and try to stay awake through my yawns, but my eyes refuse to see
things my way.
My screen glows 2:13 a.m. when the buzzing under my cheek pulls me from sleep.
Wake up, girl.
My smile stretches awake seconds before every other part of myself and my heart flutters for the part of Friday I’ve looked forward to maybe the very most.
Blinking dreamy sleep from my eyes, I text back, I’m on my way.
THOMAS MEETS me in the hallway with his hood still up.
His grin is crooked and the confident way he usually moves is sort of uncoordinated. With barely open eyes and the most deviously high smile I’ve ever seen, he takes my hand.
“Hey, drunkface,” I whisper, loving how warm his fingers are between mine.
“What?” He fills his tone with innocence as we enter his room and he closes the door. “I’m totally straight.”
“Drunk, drunk, drunk,” I tease, watching him push his hood back and fumble a little. His blonde hair’s a mess, and his cheeks look warm with overindulgence. His tipsy blues wander, unable to focus, and he laughs, patting his pockets.
“I’m not drunk,” he lightheartedly misleads. “Just a little faded, baby.”
We talk about our days and nights while he breaks pot up on his geometry textbook. I’m relaxed, but far from sleepy, and I’m fascinated by things I know I’m supposed to stay away from. I watch closely as he sprinkles green grass into the open fold of thin white paper and then touches the tip of his tongue to the corner. He lightly licks from one end of the joint to the other, and I watch the paper turn translucent. I watch his eyes and his fingertips and his lips …
Dusty may be my best friend’s brother.
He may be two years ahead of me at all times.
He might even be a drunkface hoodlum right now, but the sight of him sealing a joint with little licks and careful fingers does unspeakable things to my butterflies.
My heart pulses a Thomas-inspired beat, and I feel a tickle-tingle all over. If I had his hoodie on, I’d snuggle deeper into it, but I don’t. This troublemaker has it on, and there are no words for how good it’s going to smell when I get it back.
I tuck the thought away and rest my hands on my stomach, fidgeting with my pajama top’s bottom button. While Thomas doctors the end of the joint, I fingertip a circle around my belly button through sleep cotton.
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