Shut Out

by Kody Keplinger

  I buried my face in my hands. “Why do you like torturing me?”

  “Because you are torturing me with this whole no-sex thing.” Chloe sighed. “Lissa, I’m sexually frustrated.”

  “Are you even old enough to know what sexual frustration feels like?”

  “Now I am. And thanks to this strike, I know that when I’m sexually frustrated, I like to punish others. You are the logical target here.”

  “You’re evil.”

  “That’s why you love me.”

  “Sometimes,” I muttered.

  She blew me a kiss across the table and winked. “Seriously, though, it’ll be fine. Throwing the sleepover here, I mean. I’ll come over early on Saturday and help you set up before and clean up afterward, okay?”

  “Really? Thanks.”

  “Whatever. It gives me a good reason to get away from my mother. She’s decided to quit smoking again, so she’s crabby as hell.” Chloe stood up and walked around the table to stand behind me. “Now,” she said, leaning over my shoulder, “let’s figure out what you’re making for dinner. I’m starved, and I’ve decided you’re feeding me, too.”

  chapter fourteen

  On Thursday, I was taking my fifteen-minute break on the sofa in the back room of the library, eating an apple and reading, when Cash walked in. I kept my eyes on the page as heat crept up my neck. I’d been trying to avoid him since our shift started—it was almost impossible to look at him after that dream I’d had a couple nights earlier.

  “Hey, Lissa,” he said, sitting down on the other side of the couch. “What are you reading?”

  I didn’t answer, just lifted my book a few inches so he could see the title.

  “H. P. Lovecraft’s short stories,” he said. “Nice. I didn’t know you were into sci-fi.”

  I nodded. “Sometimes. I try to read every genre.”

  “Cool. Have you gotten around to Lysistrata yet?”

  “No,” I said, flipping the page. “Sorry. I wanted to finish this collection first.”

  “All right,” Cash said, sounding a little disappointed. “I’m just curious to see what you think about it.”

  “I’ll let you know.”

  “Okay.”

  I peeked over the top of my book and watched as Cash unwrapped a Snickers bar. He was just wearing a maroon T-shirt and faded blue jeans, but he still looked amazing. Feeling guilty for ogling him, I hurriedly turned my attention back to the book. Don’t think about him, I told myself, keeping my eyes trained on the page as I picked up my red pen. Don’t think about him…. Just keep reading….

  “Lissa,” Cash said slowly, drawing out the A at the end of my name. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but… Did you just mark a typo in your book?”

  I bit my lip. “No. Of course not. Why would you say that?”

  “Because you just marked something on the page with a red ink pen—like the ones teachers use to check papers.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Lissa.”

  “What?” I asked, ducking my head. “You’re imagining things.”

  “Let me see,” he said, not bothering to hide his laughter. “I don’t believe you.”

  “Cash, stop it!” I cried. He was already leaning over me, pulling the book gently from my hands. I tugged back, and we wrestled over it for a few minutes. Then Cash poked me in the side and I let out a burst of laughter. In my momentary distraction, he swiped the book from me.

  “Cash,” I whined.

  He shook his head, staring at page 124. “I can’t believe it! You circled a misspelling. And you keep a red pen on you whenever you read?”

  I ducked my head again and didn’t answer. Cash was sitting very close to me, his shoulder leaning against mine, our fingers nearly touching where we both held the book. My heart raced—from struggling to get the book back or his proximity, I wasn’t sure which.

  Cash started flipping through the pages. “Damn,” he said. “This thing is covered in red.”

  “It’s a newer edition,” I said, yanking the book back toward me. “It happens sometimes.”

  “You should be a copy editor,” he said, letting go of the book. “I think you’d be good at it.”

  “Maybe,” I muttered. Honestly, correcting spelling and punctuation errors for a living was more than a little appealing to me.

  He leaned away from me and settled into his side of the couch again. “So,” he asked, smirking, “were you born this neurotic, or did it develop over time?”

  “I actually took a class. Anal-Retentive 101.” Cash laughed, and I smiled back, shaking my head. “No. It, um, started after my mother died.”

  Cash’s face fell. “Oh, shit. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked. You don’t have to talk about it if you—”

  “It’s fine,” I said, realizing as I said it that it was true. “It was a long time ago. But after the accident, I just got so freaked out, so scared of something else bad happening, that I wanted to be in control of everything. That started with me being bossy and then the counting started, and that spawned a whole slew of idiosyncrasies. It’s silly, I know, but—”

  “It’s not silly,” he said. “What’s silly is my deep-seated and unreasonable fear of fish.”

  I frowned. “Fish? Like food?”

  “No, that doesn’t bother me so much. Fish that are alive. I can’t swim in lakes or rivers or anything besides a swimming pool because I’m always convinced the fish are swimming all over me… all slimy and… ugh.”

  I laughed, and Cash smiled.

  “We all have our quirks,” he said. “This is yours. You wouldn’t be you without it.”

  “Thanks,” I said, looking away, feeling embarrassed.

  “All of that said,” he continued, and when I turned back to face him I realized he’d leaned close again. We weren’t touching, but he was definitely crossing the personal-bubble line. “I do think you should loosen up every once in a while. For your own sake.”

  “Easier said than done.”

  “I know.”

  He was so close, and his green eyes were looking right into mine. In that moment, I felt anything but uptight. I was completely relaxed. Completely comfortable.

  Too comfortable, I realized, as the break room door swung open and I jumped away from him.

  “Lissa,” Jenna said from the doorway, “your break ended almost a minute ago. Come on, I can’t have you slacking off when you’re on the clock.”

  “Right,” I said, scrambling to my feet. “Sorry. I’ll get back to work.”

  “Good,” she said. “There are some magazines that need to be reorganized. And when you’re done with that, can you put away the books I just checked back in?”

  I nodded, and Jenna walked away.

  “My guess,” Cash said, smiling up at me, “is that she was just born that way.”

  “Yeah, probably,” I said quickly, grabbing my book and tossing my apple into the trash. “See you, Cash.”

  I forced myself to think of Randy while I worked in the magazine room. Despite our current issues, I had a great boyfriend. One who didn’t deserve a girlfriend with a wandering eye. Or mind.

  But Homecoming was the next night, and I was determined to have a good time with my friends and my boyfriend and no Cash interfering with my thoughts.

  chapter fifteen

  Hamilton High had two Homecomings a year—one for football in September and another for basketball in January. When you’re a freshman it’s exciting because two Homecomings means two opportunities to dance with boys in a dark gymnasium (which, for some reason, seems glamorous when you’re fourteen) and have TV show–like high school experiences—or so you hope.

  By senior year, the whole thing was far less glamorous, but if you had good friends to hang with, it could still be pretty fun.

  I was having a decent time this year, despite my awkward, unromantic dinner with Randy before the dance. I’d picked a Thai restaurant in Oak Hill, the next town over, that I knew served great food and
had a nice, dim, romantic atmosphere. But that atmosphere had been kind of crushed by Randy’s attitude. He’d barely talked to me, shrugged his shoulders in response to almost everything I said, and sent text messages throughout the meal.

  “Who are you texting?” I asked playfully.

  “Shane,” he grunted.

  “Who’s he going to Homecoming with?”

  “No one.”

  “Why not?”

  “You know why not.”

  I frowned and poked my fork at a piece of shrimp on my plate. Yes, I knew why Shane didn’t have a date. It’s because Shane wasn’t really the “dating” type. He was essentially the male version of Chloe. Neither of them would willingly spend an evening attached to a member of the opposite gender unless it ended with sex. Which, tonight, it clearly wouldn’t.

  When the waiter brought the check, Randy paid for both our meals, though he didn’t seem to do it with pleasure.

  Again, I tried to tell myself that this was a good thing. That his annoyance with the sex strike was a positive sign. That the girls would have their victory soon and the rivalry would be over and we’d get along again. I convinced myself that I should be happy he was pissed at me. It still didn’t feel good, though.

  It struck me then that Randy and I were sort of playing the same game. I was withholding sexual activities and he was withholding… well, everything else. By avoiding conversation and being so distant, he was leaving me feeling frustrated and unfulfilled, too.

  Whether I liked it or not, I didn’t complain about the way our paths separated once we got to the gymnasium. We needed a break from each other, so he went off to talk to his teammates—none of whom seemed to understand that dances were meant for dancing—and I found Chloe at our usual place by the refreshment table.

  “I still cannot believe Kelsey is wearing that,” she said after we’d been hanging out and eating pretzels for about an hour. “Someone should tell her that yellow isn’t her color. Oh, and I think that someone should be me. Be right back—”

  I grabbed her elbow and held her in place. “Leave her alone.”

  “Party pooper.” Chloe took a sip of her Diet Coke and scanned the dance floor again. “At least Susan had the sense to wear something cute. Oh, and Mary’s dress is so pretty. I wonder where she got that? It’s probably expensive, though. Damn it. And—hey, looky there.”

  “What?” I looked up from the pan of cupcakes I had been examining on the table, trying to decide between chocolate-on-chocolate or chocolate-on-vanilla. “Look at what, Chloe?”

  “Your lover boy is standing over there,” she said, gesturing across the dark gymnasium.

  I squinted, thinking I’d see Randy standing there. Thinking he’d be looking at me. Thinking he’d walk over, take me in his arms, and tell me he was sorry for not taking me seriously and that he wanted the feud to end, too. Thinking we’d dance until midnight when they finally kicked us out and for once I wouldn’t care who was watching and—

  No.

  No, it wasn’t Randy at all. It was Cash. Cash was the one standing across the dance floor, and he wasn’t looking at me. He was leaning against the wall, arms folded loosely over his chest as he talked animatedly to a pretty sophomore in a dress so short I wondered if it was meant to be a shirt instead. He was flirting with her, and the girl was inching closer and closer, touching his arm when she laughed.

  “That’s not funny,” I told Chloe, forcing my eyes off Cash and continuing my mental cupcake debate. I reminded myself that I had no reason to be upset. I was with Randy. I shouldn’t care about Cash at all.

  Still, I couldn’t fight that nagging feeling in my stomach. That irrational possessiveness over Cash. I just wanted to march over there and pull him away, keep him to myself and hide him from all the other girls.

  Crap. Cash wasn’t supposed to be on my mind tonight. I’d promised myself.

  “I think it’s funny,” she teased. “Randy might not, though.”

  I groaned. If only she knew.

  “Speaking of Randy,” Chloe continued, “you should probably go find him. It’s almost time for the Homecoming Court announcements.”

  “Yeah.” I sighed. “All right. I’ll be back.”

  I grabbed a chocolate-on-chocolate cupcake and headed off in search of Randy. Really, there was no important reason for me to find him, but I did want to be next to him when they announced that he’d won. It was just good girlfriend behavior. I should be there to smile and cheer and hug him when the “unexpected” announcement came—whether he liked it or not.

  When I finally reached the other side of the gym, I found Shane leaning against the wall, sipping a Coke that was probably spiked with something. Knowing Shane, something strong.

  “Hi,” I said.

  “Hey there, Lissa Daniels,” he said. He raised his Coke. “Would you like to say hello to your distant cousin, Jack?”

  “No, thank you.”

  Shane shrugged and took a swig of his Jack and Coke. “So what’s up?”

  “Not much,” I said. “Where’s Randy?”

  And right then—when Shane’s big blue eyes darted toward me and away so fast I barely noticed, and his free hand shoved forcefully into his jeans pocket—right then I knew something was wrong.

  “Shane?” I asked slowly.

  “He’s, uh, in the bathroom. He’ll be out in a minute.”

  I thought back to when I had been standing with Chloe next to the refreshments table. It had been a good ten minutes since I’d noticed Randy over here with Shane—way, way more time than he needed in the bathroom.

  “Thanks,” I said, moving around Shane and heading toward the boys’ bathroom.

  “What?” Shane sounded terrified as he reached for my arm with one hand while struggling to hold on to his bottle of Coke with the other. “Lissa, wait a sec. You can’t go into the boys’ bathroom.”

  I sidestepped his attempts to reach me. I wasn’t just going to wait around to find out what was going on.

  “Lissa, wait. You really don’t want to do that—”

  And I knew he was hiding something from me.

  As fast as my heels allowed me to move, I shoved through the freshmen, toward the bathrooms. I pushed against the heavy wooden door of the boys’ room—a door that was supposed to be propped open by a doorstop at all times. As soon as I stepped into the tiny hallway, separated from the rest of the large bathroom by a tiled wall, I heard the noises.

  A suction-y noise mixed with heavy breathing and one very female giggle.

  I skirted around the wall as fast as I could, daring myself to see who was on the other side. Even though, really, I already knew.

  Sure enough, there was Randy. He was with some leggy blond girl (or maybe she only looked leggy because of the way Randy had her skirt hiked up to her hips, exposing a string of her thong). They were leaning against the wall opposite the urinals—classy—with her back pressed against the tiles and his front pressing into her. They were making out in the most vulgar way possible, and by the way her fingers were scurrying across the zipper of his pants, it appeared as though the scene was about to turn into a lot more than just making out.

  “Oh my fucking God.”

  “Lissa,” Randy gasped, his mouth still only inches from The Blonde’s. I hated that he said my name so close to her lips. Hated that he said my name at all. It wasn’t his to say. Not anymore.

  I turned and hurried out of the bathroom, back into the gymnasium.

  “Lissa, hold up!”

  I don’t know how Randy managed to disentangle himself from The Blonde so quickly, but suddenly he was there behind me, grabbing my arm and turning me to face him.

  “Don’t touch me,” I said, jerking out of his grip. “Just leave me alone, Randy.”

  “Lissa, don’t be mad.”

  “I don’t want to talk about this here,” I hissed, knowing we’d already attracted the attention of a few bystanders. Deep down, I wanted to scream, How could you? What the fuck is w
rong with you? But my instincts kicked in before I could do anything so dramatic. Instead, I was stiff, cut off. Chloe called me Little Miss Ice Queen, and that’s how I felt. Emotionless. I was safer that way.

  “You brought this on yourself, you know. I didn’t have a choice,” Randy snapped, not letting me go. “What was I supposed to do? Keep waiting for you? Been there, done that.”

  “Randy, stop.”

  But he didn’t. He was in a rage now. Whether at me for catching him or at himself for getting caught, I don’t know, but while I closed myself off, he exploded.

  “You promised,” Randy reminded me. I was painfully aware of how loudly he was speaking. “When we got back together at the end of the summer, you promised you’d stop being such a prude. That we’d do it. And then you went and started this stupid-ass sex strike, and what am I supposed to do? Keep waiting?”

  I felt my cheeks burning, but my tongue was stuck to the roof of my mouth. I couldn’t believe he was saying this. Saying it in front of everyone.

  “Hey,” Randy called, looking away from me, his eyes searching the group around us, “just so all you girls know”—his eyes focused on me again, steely and meaner than I’d ever seen them—“your ringleader here is a hypocrite. She’s making all of you give up sex, but really, she’s not giving up anything. Lissa is a virgin.” It was the most spiteful look he had ever given me.

  I expected there to be an audible gasp—like in movies—but there wasn’t. The only sounds were the fading pulse of a techno song and a screech of feedback as the Spanish teacher, Mrs. Romali, took the stage. “Time to announce the winners of this year’s Homecoming Court!” she yelled cheerfully, unaware of the humiliation I was facing.

  I turned slowly away from Randy, hoping only freshmen and sophomores had gathered to witness my embarrassment. Not my friends. Not the girls. Not people I knew.

  But of course I’d never get that lucky.

  Among the faces staring back at me were Ellen, Kelsey, Susan, Mary, Chloe… and Cash. They’d all heard. They all knew that I was a liar.

  Like I was playing Red Rover on the playground, I hurtled through the wall of people in front of me.