by JL Paul
Tears trickled from my eyes as I nodded. A tiny bit of disappointment stabbed my heart but I knew he was right—it was too soon for an engagement ring.
“Thank you,” I whispered. “I love it. I love you.”
He pressed his lips to mine and I wrapped my arms around his neck. “And I love you,” he muttered against my mouth.
***
I was surprised as we filed into the gardens to take our seats for the graduation ceremony at the number of people in the stands. I located my parents, grandfather and Seth first. Right behind him sat Jake, his dad, Greta and the guys from the band.
I fiddled nervously with the yellow rose the Dean had presented to all each girl before marching us into the gardens. I was happy to see mine was thorn-free because I didn’t think it would be camera worthy to accept my diploma with blood dripping from my finger. With my luck, I’d probably get blood all over my diploma, drip some on the floor, and slip in it, falling flat on my face.
But luck smiled down on me as my name was called; I managed to make it across the stage without embarrassing myself.
***
After the graduation reception, Jake and the guys, including Seth, loaded all my stuff into the trunks of Jake’s Mustang and my car. I would ride with Jake, Nick and the guys following in my car, to my house. They were going to drop me off at home and come back the next Saturday for the graduation party my parents planned. I would leave Sunday with Jake and spend a week at his house. That would pretty much set a pattern for the rest of the summer.
And it suited me just fine.
“You’ll be a little farther away from me next year, angel,” Jake mused as he navigated through traffic.
I took his hand and squeezed. “I’ll come see you every weekend.”
He brought my hand to his lips and kissed it. “You’d better. But you know, we’ll probably start touring again after this new record is released.”
“I know,” I sighed, leaning back in the seat.
“Hey. We made it this far, we’ll make it all the way.”
I smiled. “It’s not that. I worry about you guys trashing more hotel rooms.”
He threw his head back and laughed. “We never trashed a hotel room, Iz. It was all staged.”
“Huh?” I asked as my brows pulled together.
“We’d been touring for a while and spent an entire week sleeping in the bus. Finally, we had a show at a hotel in Boise and nothing scheduled for the next day so Doc, our manager, booked us rooms. We were all exhausted so once we finished the show, we all went to our rooms and crashed. It was actually the crew on the floor below us who had a little party but they didn’t trash anything either.”
“So how was this staged?” I asked, a little confused. I mean, really, who would want people thinking they destroyed a couple hotel rooms? I wouldn’t.
“Doc found out about the party because I guess the guys were loud and drew some complaints. He had this brilliant idea to leak it to the press that we threw a huge party and trashed the rooms. He talked to the manager and convinced him that the news would attract tons of people to the hotel, wanting to stay in the rooms we’d destroyed. The manager agreed, and it worked.”
He grinned a nostalgic smile. “We were labeled as bad boys and our CD and ticket sales skyrocketed. Doc said the manager called him and told him they had a waiting list of people wanting to stay in our rooms.” He shrugged. “Worked out for everyone I guess.”
I giggled. “Clever.”
“Sure,” he agreed. “But do you know what’s smarter?”
I twisted so I could face him properly. “What’s that?”
He cupped my cheeked and glanced at me briefly before his eyes returned to the road. “Going to Burger Kastle in the middle of the night for something to eat and ending up carjacking the love of your life.”
I could only smile at him because, hey, he was right and who was I to argue?