Forever for a Year(31)

“I knew your mom,” he said. Yeah, Scott, I knew that already. “She was so beautiful—”

“She still is,” I said. Why did I say that? Who cares? I wanted out of this car. Not away from Carolina. No. We should run away together, forever.

“I bet she is. Tell her Scott Fisher from Midnight Dogs says hello. She’ll know what that means.” No way was I telling my mom hello for him. But I would. I’d have to. Carolina and I were going to be … Yep. I’d have to.

Carolina, always knowing the right thing to say, said, “Trevor and I have three classes together.”

“Well, Trevor,” he said, “I hope you can help Carolina take school a little less seriously.”

“I like how Carolina does everything,” I said, which I didn’t mean. Maybe I meant it. But I didn’t know for sure. My brain wasn’t focused. It was tied up about Scott and my mom. And I don’t know. I couldn’t really … I don’t know. Carolina liked what I said, though. She smiled at me from the front seat. This glow surrounded her. Like she was an angel. That’s lame. Like she was a ghost. A ghost angel. I don’t know. It all sounds lame. But she and her glow were the opposite of lame.

“I stand corrected,” her dad said. “I respect that. Okay, then.” We had turned into the Covered Bridges development. I told him what turns to make to my house. You know how many covered bridges are in Covered Bridges? Zero. Yep. Zero. That is why this world sucks!

Never mind. It’s boring to be so negative. I don’t want Carolina to see that. I’m going to be more positive. For her.

*

After Scott stopped in front of my house, I thanked him and said to Carolina, “Thanks, Carolina,” even though I don’t know what I was thanking her for. Not literally. I got out of the car, started moving toward the front door, and it felt wrong not to hug her good-bye. Damn. My body just wanted to hug her. But I couldn’t hug her in front of her dad. Not after our first date. This wasn’t even a real date! Trev, you probably are imagining that any of this will mean anything. By Monday, everything will probably go back to what it was. Strangers. Or worse.

But then I heard a door open and turned. Carolina ran toward me. Not fast. But faster than walking. And she was embarrassed, and could barely look me in the eyes. She opened her arms and wrapped me in them. And I hugged her back. Tight but not so tight. Then she pulled back a little, and we were staring at each other. So close. Her face was so close. Her lips were so close.

She wanted me to kiss her.

Crap.

Did she?

What if I was wrong? I couldn’t be wrong about this!

Help!

Kiss her!

No.

Don’t. So dumb, Trevor. She smiled, said, “Thank you,” and turned before I could kiss her, or before I could not kiss her longer, and got back into her dad’s car.

*

After I got into bed, I lay there, staring at the ceiling, thinking about Carolina. About kissing her. About holding her hand. About her being my girlfriend. After thinking about this, obsessing about it actually, I realized my mouth had been stuck in this dorky frozen smile. Man, I’m such a loser. But I still went back to thinking about her. I sure as hell wasn’t going to sleep.





25

Carolina gets a text

“He wants to kiss you, Carolina,” my dad said as I watched Trevor walk toward his front door.

“No, he doesn’t. Shut up,” I said. Trevor had such a nice house. It was fifty times bigger than ours. Gosh. He wouldn’t like me anymore once he saw how we weren’t as rich as he was.

“Look how slow he’s walking.”

“Shut up, Dad!” But I liked that he said it. My dad always treated me like I was his friend, not like a little girl. Which was amazing. Sometimes.

“Just go hug him good-bye, you’ll see.”

“No, he’ll think—” But then I stopped talking, opened the car door, and ran after him. But I didn’t want to look too nervous, so I think I slowed down, but I was too nervous so I’m not sure what really happened. I hugged him because—wait, gosh, what was I doing? This was so weird. I’m so weird! I don’t know how this works! He’s going to be able to tell and then my life will be over. STOP BEING SO DRAMATIC, CAROLINA. I just hugged him for two more seconds, and then I pulled back a tiny, tiny, tiny bit. Because if we were hugging we wouldn’t be able to kiss. Wait.

Wait.

Wait a minute. He was going to kiss me. Our faces were, like, an inch apart, we were the only people in the universe, except I couldn’t stop thinking about how my dad was watching, and maybe his parents, and how I would tell Peggy then Kendra, or maybe Kendra then Peggy, and then, wait …

Wait a minute.

He wasn’t kissing me! He didn’t like me! He didn’t like me at all!

Wait a minute.

He was nervous. Oh. Gosh. He was as nervous as I was! Which was amazing. That meant he really liked me, didn’t it? But I couldn’t say anything. I couldn’t kiss him first. So I said, “Thank you,” and then turned before I died from love or something.

*

“I guess I was wrong,” my dad said when I got back in the car.

“No, you were right. He was just nervous.”

“How could you tell?”

“Because…” And I was going to say, we’re in love, but that would sound crazy, even to my crazy dad, and then I was going to say, because I know him, but that felt like I wouldn’t know what I was talking about even though I did, and so I said, “I just can.”