If I'm Being Honest(76)
Heat rises in my cheeks. “Oh, shut up. I panicked. I admit it wasn’t my smoothest line.” I speak haltingly, distracted by his touch crossing my waistband.
“No, it definitely wasn’t your—” I cut him off with a kiss, having had enough of this teasing. “Mmm,” he murmurs against my lips. “It’s going to take my brain a while to accept this is really happening.”
“That’s okay.” I climb onto the covers, pulling him with one hand onto me. “I’ve got time.”
He holds himself over me on one elbow, dipping his head to press quick kisses to my lips. Each fires a spark through me. I bend my legs impulsively, instinctively, and he collapses into me, his hand running up my arm, his heartbeat racing to match mine. I can’t catch my breath, but it’s a delicious kind of breathlessness.
I feel a tremble in his touch, an echo of the nervous exhilaration flooding though me. Reaching up, I caress his forearm, and he grins into my lips.
He withdraws a fraction of an inch. “Do you remember,” he asks, his voice a tender whisper, “when I told you there was nothing I could ever want from you?”
I do remember. I couldn’t forget his vehemence during our first conversation, the wounded resentment in his eyes when he ordered me out of his life. I nod.
“Well, I was wrong.”
“Oh yeah?” I run my hands up his chest, raising an eyebrow coyly. “What is it you want from me, Brendan Rosenfeld?”
He leans in, his lips brushing my cheek as he whispers in my ear. “Everything.”
* * *
We wake to the routine sounds of Brendan’s parents in the kitchen, footsteps and closing cabinets outside Brendan’s door. We slept on top of the covers in our clothes, wrapped in each other. I don’t even remember when we nodded off.
He tucks me to his chest, and I don’t want to budge for the rest of the day. Possibly forever.
But instead, I whisper, “I should sneak back to Paige’s room. I don’t exactly think our relationship would go over well if your parents found out by walking in on us.”
“We could risk it,” he mutters, smiling sleepily.
I can’t help a laugh. But reluctantly, I walk to Brendan’s door. I pause with my hand on the knob, a thought leaping into my head, sunlight through an open window. “Brendan,” I say, facing him. “Will you go to winter formal with me?”
Brendan beams. I can’t remember a time he’s looked this openly happy, and it’s unbelievably endearing. It makes me want to ask him again, just to fix that expression on his face.
“Yes,” he says. “Yes, Cameron. I’d love to.”
I open his bedroom door, throwing a final smile over my shoulder.
I walk quickly and quietly down the hall to Paige’s room. Easing the door open gently, I duck into the bedroom, where I’m relieved to find Paige breathing evenly under the covers. I slide gingerly into my sleeping bag.
I’m replaying the night, my chest full with the memory, when Paige speaks, startling me. “I knew it,” she says, her eyes still closed. “I knew you liked him.” She rolls over and fixes me with a triumphant grin.
I reach for a comeback. And for the first time in the history of my friendship with Paige, I come up empty.
“Wow,” she says in undisguised astonishment. “You’ve got it bad.”
I smile and roll onto my back, staring up at the ceiling. Yeah, I do.
Thirty-Six
I CHANGED MY OUTFIT THREE TIMES THIS morning, and I still have no idea if I picked the right one. What do you wear when you’re going public to the Beaumont student body with your relationship with Brendan Rosenfeld while your friends hate you and want every excuse to scoff behind your back?
Not that what I’m wearing will matter to Brendan, of course. It doesn’t even really matter to me.
The outfit’s a distraction from this weekend. From the problems I knew—even while watching TV with Paige and taking refuge in Brendan’s arms—I would come back to when I got home.
I found Mom sleeping on the couch in my Homecoming dress when I got home from Paige’s on Saturday. Even though it was nearly ten, I didn’t bother waking her up, but I had to resist the urge to throw the front door closed behind me. For the next day and a half, I endured her watery eyes and one-word conversations. Whatever happened with my dad, it wasn’t good. She called in sick to work twice, and I know she’s not getting to work on time today. It won’t be long before she gets fired or quits.
I’ve kept out of her way. If I speak to her, I’ll say nothing nice. I have nothing nice to say. I’ll let out years of resentment, the bitterness that boils in me every time I have to watch her fall into familiar patterns with Dad. I know she was disappointed in her plans with him just like I was. But I don’t understand why she can’t or won’t protect us from this person, this human wrecking ball who destroys us both every time we try to rebuild.
I have a full school day before I have to face her again, though—a day including Brendan.
I find him waiting on the front steps—waiting, I realize, for me. I’ve never seen Brendan in the morning. I figure he’s usually in one classroom or another by now, and it fills me with an indefinable gratitude that he’s come out for me. He’s grinning already, and I feel a pang of frustration I can’t put thoughts of my mom from my mind and concentrate entirely on this new thing between him and me.