by Karen Gordon
♥ ♪ ♥ Ben hadn’t intended to get himself in this position again. The first time he blamed it on the beer and vodka, he couldn’t blame this on a coke. He didn’t want to admit to himself how much he was still attracted to Carrie. When he was thirteen, and she kissed him, he dreamed of her, he obsessed about her, he fantasized about her, and he made sure she never knew. She was out of his league then.
But now, things were different. They were still in different worlds, socially, but he didn’t feel like a little geek kid she would never be interested in anymore. He wouldn’t have to stand on a five inch stump to reach her lips. She needed the stump now to reach him. He had always been smart, but now he was strong, and competent, and sure of himself. Yeah, he thought, just like I was so sure of myself when I gave Joelle that ring.
It wasn’t making things any easier that she was pressed up against his side, her hands tucked under his arm to keep warm and to grab on to him when the movie was scary. He hated to compare her to Joelle, but it felt great that she wasn’t constantly guarding against his touch, that when she leaned into him, it was because she wanted to, and not just to make him happy.
He swallowed the rest of the coke from his can, then put it on the floor along with the empty popcorn bag, and used napkins. Carrie handed him her empty can, and in the process, leaned across him. All he would have to do was lay back and momentum would have her laying on him again, just like last Friday. He was so tempted. He compromised and leaned back a little, waiting to see if she would follow him, hoping she would.
She questioned him with her eyes; should she? Was this what he wanted? He put his arm around her and pulled her down onto his chest as his guilty conscious screamed at him to stop. But his heart and his hormones were winning tonight. He had dreamed of this exact scenario too many times. Now, if she would just let him kiss her, and see and feel her naked body … he forced his focus back to the movie and turned his hips slightly forward so she couldn’t feel him getting hard. He was crossing so many lines already, he didn’t need to get his overeager cock involved too.
♥ ♪ ♥ When the movie ended Carrie considered pretending to be asleep. She wanted to lie on Ben’s chest under the heavy quilt for the rest of the night, maybe longer.
Why didn’t she ever feel this way about Chuck? Would she want to lie against Chuck and watch a movie? Not really. First, Chuck always smelled of pot and cigarettes and sometimes BO. Her physical attraction for him died off a long time ago, and she just let momentum carry her after that. And even if they could pick a movie to watch together, it wouldn’t feel the same. If her hands were cold, he wouldn’t warm them for her. He would want her to order a pizza if they were hungry and get them beers from the downstairs fridge. And, he wouldn’t pause the movie if she did go get beer. He wasn’t mean, but he didn’t think about what she might want or need. Her mind traveled to all the nights they had sex in his room. Sometimes it felt like he barely noticed she was there, that she could be anyone as long as he ended up feeling good. Which led her back to exactly where she didn’t want to go. What would it be like to have sex with Ben? She would want to touch his warm, smooth skin and explore all his muscles, and he would care about her, how she was feeling, what she wanted.
Carrie sat up abruptly, letting cold air rush between them, cutting off her wayward thoughts. She couldn’t look at Ben. Both of them skirted around each other; throwing away trash, putting the movie away, folding the blanket.
Carrie finally spoke as she headed for the stairs, “Thanks . . .for the movie.” Well, that was awkward; the first time she had ever thanked him for watching a movie with her.
“Yeah, sure,” he hesitated near the sofa, not moving toward her or the stairs. “Do you need me to walk you home?”
Carrie smiled, always the gentleman, “No, I can make it.” Ben glanced out the window, “I think it finally stopped snowing.” He walked to the window and looked out, “But it’s supposed to start again later.”
“Oh,” Carrie remembered her plans for tomorrow, “I’m going to take Two-fer out in the snow tomorrow, do you want to come with us?”
“Isn’t he Three-fer now?” Ben said, acknowledging Christopher’s last birthday.
Carrie smiled and nodded, “Yeah, I guess so.” “Yeah, sure. I need to get some work done tomorrow, but come by and get me.” The tension between them was easing. Carrie started up the stairs and Ben followed.
“I’m going to help him build a snowman in the morning, but we’ll need your help to make a fort.” When they reached the back door Carrie realized she had left her socks downstairs. She decided to ignore it. No sense prolonging the awkwardness.
On her way out the door she said, “We’ll probably come by around 10 or 11.” “OK,” he leaned against the door frame, watching her gingerly step into the ankle deep snow with a thick crisp layer of ice on top. “Good sledding snow.”
Carrie turned briefly, “Yeah, let’s do that too. See you tomorrow.” He watched her ‘til she opened the back door to her house and went in. He held the door open a little longer, letting the frigid air clear his head and the residue of the feel and smell of Carrie from his skin.
As he climbed the stairs to his room then looked over at the glowing curtains of her room he reasoned with himself that tomorrow would be safe. Christopher would be there, it would be day. He could do this. Before going to sleep he made a mental note to call Joelle and check on her tomorrow morning. Chapter 15
The end of Christmas break couldn’t come soon enough for Carrie. She couldn’t wait to get back to school, to the routine, to her friends, away from her house. Family time was never a good idea for the Gould’s. Her only break during the break was when Aunt Rose and Uncle Will came for Christmas dinner. Rose was her mother’s youngest sister, and she was the complete opposite of Lana. She was funny and laid-back and full of great stories from traveling all over the world.
They brought Carrie a totally cool jacket they got from a shop in London and some perfume from Paris. Christopher got a handheld computer game that he didn’t put down all Christmas day. Carrie spent hours curled up on the couch with Rose, looking at her pictures from their European trip, discussing the latest fashions and the decorating they had seen on their tour of castles.
Rose and Will left early the day after Christmas. They said they were headed some place warm, but Carrie knew Rose was also getting away from Lana. Her mother was extremely jealous of her younger sister’s exciting life and freedom, and she covered it up with a barrage of underhanded jabs and criticism. She also played the victim with sad stories of how horrible life was for Lana. Carrie knew it was jealousy talking, but that didn’t make it hurt any less when her mom complained to Rose about her being an ungrateful, rude, lazy daughter. Her dad seemed to tune out all the complaints she aired about him, and sweet Christopher was immune. Rose and Will, however, had enough after two days and they were off again.
That left Carrie with the usual tension at home and the new tension between her and Ben. Neither of them wanted to talk about the elephant in the room, but they could both feel it. Winter break was two weeks of spending time together, always with Christopher, feeling the spark between them, then retreating to neutral corners and avoiding each other again. Sometimes she could still see him as Ben, her friend, and other times she wanted to drag him to his basement and under the quilt again. It didn’t help that he kept touching her, warming her hands or sitting behind her on the sled. Even wearing her heavy winter clothes, she was acutely aware of the feeling of him, a solid, warm presence pressed up against her. And she was guilty of finding ways to touch him too. She fell on him during the snow ball fight and shoved her icy hands under his shirt to tickle him. Of course, Carrie reasoned, he was just a physical guy. He would always pick Two-fer up and carry him around. Maybe she was reading too much into it. Maybe him liking her was all in her imagination.
MG wasn’t much help during break either. First she couldn’t come and rescue Carrie because of the snow, then she sort
of disappeared. Every time Carrie called she had to go somewhere, or she would cut the conversation short for another reason. She finally called and said she needed to talk and would pick Carrie up and give her a ride on their first day back to school.
♥ ♪ ♥ They only had a fifteen minute drive from Carrie’s house to the school, so she didn’t waste any time, “OK, what’s up? And why couldn’t you talk to me about it on the phone?”
MG pulled away from the curb, but her attention was not on driving, she was searching for words, “I think … well, Steve … Steve has been living at my house and I couldn’t talk with him there, but I think he thinks we are like dating, or in love, or something”
“You just made zero sense. Start from the beginning.” MG turned left out of Carrie’s neighborhood onto Elm road, school was to the right. That meant they were headed to the park to talk, and probably miss some classes. This must be huge.
MG didn’t talk again till they were in a parking space near the ball diamonds. “OK, so the night of the big snow storm, Steve called me at like 11:30 and asked me to come pick him up.” She stopped for a breath and to think about the order of events, “Well, first he was at home and Stony showed up. He had been missing for a few weeks, not that Steve missed him. So, he showed up like totally wasted, not drunk or stoned wasted, but like freaked out on some hard drugs and pissed off.” She checked to make sure Carrie understood how out of control Stony was. Carrie nodded, “So Stony starts yelling about Steve stealing his drugs and some money from him.”
“Oh, shit,” The picture Carrie had in her head of a drugged-up, pissed off Stony was terrifying. “Right, so he starts beating the shit out of Steve and somehow Steve gets away and out of the house. He walks all the way to the pay phone at the gas station in the snow, with no coat. And he’s like bleeding from his lip and all bruised up.”
Carrie kept nodding that she understood, not wanting to interrupt.
“So he calls me to come get him.”
“Your mom let you?” “Not exactly, she fell asleep watching TV in her room, so I just left to go get him. And it took me like an hour to get there. I got stuck twice, first some people came out of their house and gave me a push, then some tow-truck guy pushed me out of a snow bank on Appleton Rd.”
Carrie’s look told her to get back to the meat of the story.
“So when I get there he is like frozen and all beat up, and I didn’t know what else to do, so I took him to my house.”
“So how did you explain this to your mom?” “Yeah, well, she gets up the next morning and sees this bruised-up guy crashed on our couch, but she was amazingly cool. I told her what happened. She was pissed I drove in the storm, but she seemed to understand why.”
“So he stayed there all break?” “ Yes!” This was clearly the bigger problem. “I mean he couldn’t go home because of Stony. My mom was like taking care of him and it was cool at first, but … ” She stopped to bite the cuticle on her thumb, which she only did when she was really freaking out.
Carrie waited patiently. “We couldn’t fool around with my mom hovering, so we watched a lot of TV and talked, a lot.” MG let out an exasperated sigh and looked up, “He is totally my friend. I would drive through the snow to get him again, but … the more we talked,” she stopped to look at Carrie, “and the longer he wouldn’t leave … ”
Carrie was getting the idea, but there were details MG was leaving out, “What happened?” “Nothing! Everything!” She was really worked up now, “It was like he was so grateful, then he starts talking about how much he cares about me, then. . .” she let her head fall onto the steering wheel, “He told me he loves me.”
“Oh, crap.” Carrie got the whole picture now. “What did you say to him?”
“Nothing. I was a totally fucking coward. I kissed him so he would stop talking.”
Her heart went out to MG. “Now you have to see him at school.” She shook her head, still leaning against the steering wheel, “Oh, no, he decided that he is dropping out to get a job and his own place.”
“Oh, god.” “And, I think he plans to stay at my place ‘til then.” She beat her head against the wheel, “Next thing he’ll want me to move in with him and have babies and, hey, we can start a rockin’ life together in government housing.” She looked up at Carrie with pleading eyes. “I can’t do this! I can’t hurt him, and he can’t stay. I do love him, as a friend. See what happens when you are nice to someone? Learn a lesson from me.”
Carrie gave her a small smile. If MG was still joking, she was OK. “You could come stay with me, but, I don’t know, sleeping in the snow might be better.”
Now it was MG’s turn to laugh a little. She looked at the clock on her car radio, “We’d better get to school, we already missed first period.” She touched Carrie’s arm, “Thank you for letting me vent. You are the only person I know I can trust not to tell anyone else.”
Carrie nodded.
MG backed out of the parking space, “So what was up with you during break? Parents just driving you nuts?” Carrie knew MG would listen to whatever she had to say about Ben, but it suddenly seemed so trivial and juvenile compared to MG’s problem. “Yeah. Same shit.”
♥ ♪ ♥ School was a calm refuge for both girls. Steve didn’t show up and Carrie only saw Ben once, between Lit and Comp classes. They passed in the hall, and he bumped into her on purpose. He smiled at her and said, “Oh, sorry.” She rolled her eyes and smiled at him, trying to think of him as only a friend, hoping the jolt of excitement and wave of happy she felt inside wouldn’t show. But it was hard to keep that much bliss under wraps. One touch, one stupid little nudge, and she was riding on a high for the next hour. And she probably would have stayed there, if she hadn’t seen Joelle at lunch. Then guilt washed over her and landed in the pit of her stomach.
She didn’t tell any of her friends about Ben. It was too complicated, and personal, and she wasn’t sure what there was to tell anyway. He bumped me in the hallway. MG was also not sharing her drama about Steve. Telling Carrie was one thing, but telling the others would seem like a betrayal. She may not be in love with him, but she still cared about him, a lot.
MG drove slowly to Carrie’s house that afternoon. She was dreading going home, a feeling Carrie could definitely relate to. “Call me later?”
“I will.” MG stared straight ahead out the window
“Maybe if you tell him your mom wants him to go.”
“Yeah, I’ve thought about that. But where would he go? Back to his dad’s apartment, with Stony?”
“Stony might be gone by now. You said he had been missing for weeks before this.” MG perked up a little. She was starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel. “Maybe I’ll offer to take him by his apartment to get some stuff. We could see if Stony’s still there, and he could talk to his dad.”
Speaking of Steve’s dad, “What about his dad? Doesn’t he want him to come home?” MG shook her head, “Probably not. Steve said he gets along OK with him, but really, they hardly ever see each other. He works second shift at Tricon and sleeps and drinks, and that’s about it. I guess he noticed Steve was missing.” She shrugged.
“He didn’t try to call his dad the entire break?”
“Nope. He always tells Steve to stay away from Stony, so maybe he was glad Steve was gone if Stony was there.”
“What a mess!” Carrie realized how unhelpful that statement was after she said it, “Sorry.”
“No, you’re right.”
“Will you call me after you take him to his apartment? Let me know what happens.”
“Sure.” It didn’t feel good letting MG go home to that mess alone, but least her mom was there, and she was being helpful. Carrie tried to push it away quickly, but she felt a flash of jealousy toward MG. Sure she was in a big mess, but she wasn’t in it alone. Her mom could be a little flakey sometimes, but she was there for MG and for Steve.
She was completely exhausted by the emotional roller coaster of her day and nee
ded a nap. Before she lay down on her bed, she kicked a few of the romance novels on the floor under it. They seemed like such bullshit right now. They were full of too-beautiful people who were destined to meet their one true love, know it immediately, then ride off into the sunset. Where was the one about falling in love with the wrong person, the person who didn’t love you back? Or what if the only love that finds you is a waste-case loser who cheats on you? Carrie reached up and got her blue bunny from the shelf above her desk. Her grandma had given it to her when she was born, and it had been worn thin from comforting her through the years. With blue bunny squished against her chest she curled into a ball and stared out at Ben’s window. Where was the book with ideas on how not to fall in love with a guy whose girlfriend wears a promise ring … and calls you a whore? Carrie let a few silent tears fall.
Chapter 16
Steve did go home that afternoon. Stony had disappeared again. His dad seemed glad to see him but not really worried about where he had been for the past two weeks. MG guessed Christmas wasn’t much of a big deal if your kid doesn’t show up, and you aren’t really concerned.
Guilt crushed her as she drove home after leaving Steve at his apartment. She had just left one of the coolest guys she had ever known in a place where his freaky, drug-addict brother might come home and beat or kill him. She wasn’t in love with him, but she didn’t have the heart or the guts to tell him. And now she was sure he had just spent the best Christmas he had in years hanging out with her, her mom, and an odd group of semi-related people.
She had pretty much told her mom the whole story, except for the love part. For that she could only talk to Carrie, so she called her as soon as she got home.