17 First Kisses Read online

  Megan and I grab a cupcake apiece and gingerly peel back the wrappers. It is important to take the largest bite possible when eating these cupcakes so you can taste all the flavors at once. The vanilla cake with its raspberry center. The European buttercream. The homemade crushed-almond toffee on top. You have to practically unhinge your jaw in order to pull it off, but it’s totally worth it. After we’ve polished off our cupcakes and licked our fingers and, okay, fine, the wrappers too, it’s time for me to lay down the law.

  “C’mon. We’re getting ready for the party. And I’m not letting you wear that.”

  Megan crosses her arms over her chest. “I’m not going. Everyone knows I got dumped.”

  “No one cares. How many boys have called you since you and Chase broke up?”

  She smiles. “Eight.”

  “See?”

  “But it isn’t the boys I’m worried about,” she says, her eyes scared.

  “That’s exactly why you have to go. You have to show them it doesn’t make a damn bit of difference.”

  “I don’t know,” she says, but I can tell she’s caving. I pick out a red dress that screams, Chase who? and Megan reluctantly puts it on.

  Later, Britney and Amberly come over so we can go together. Megan drives us down to the field in Britney’s 4Runner even though she still only has a learner’s permit (being DD guarantees she won’t be sending Chase any drunk texts). The woods are so dark you can barely see the gravel road that winds through Jimmy Marcus’s property. She hunches over the steering wheel, inching the car along until the flickering lights of a bonfire and a clearing lined with cars begin to take shape.

  A ton of people are already clustered around the fire by the time we get there. I look around for Tanner—I can’t wait to see him! We’ve only been dating for five weeks, but it feels like so much longer.

  I find him lounging on an overturned log, a junior girl I don’t know curled up beside him. Her hair is dyed alternating stripes of dark brown and brassy blond. She giggles and touches his arm. For a second I’m jealous, but as soon as he sees me, he jumps up and weaves through the huddles of people holding Solo cups so he can kiss me hello.

  “Hey, cutie, want some apple cider?”

  I take a sip. There is more to this cider than just apples. I drink up. My alcohol intake has definitely increased this year. I’m gearing up for a few hours of making out in the back of Tanner’s Jeep when a tricked-out truck pulls up. A truck I can’t believe I’m seeing. I pull away from Tanner and find Megan—stat. Chase hops out of the cab, and I’m praying Corey isn’t with him. He rushes past the beams from the floodlights mounted on top of the cab to open the passenger door.

  Oh no he didn’t.

  Out of the truck pops a girl who is obviously determined to redefine white trash.

  He did.

  And she is wearing tighter-than-tight cutoff denim shorts, cowboy boots, and a shirt that says, I kid you not, Dixie Pride. In rhinestones.

  Megan has already spotted her. Her eyes flash. “That bastard. I can’t believe he’s here. And with another girl.”

  Her bottom lip quivers, and I cross my fingers that she’ll be able to keep it together. But I’ve just noticed something else. “Hey, Megan—”

  “How could he do this to me?”

  “Megan.”

  “She looks like such a skank. Everyone is talking about it. Who comes to high school parties when they’re in college anyway? He’s doing it just to torture—”

  “Megan!”

  “What?!”

  “He’s scratching.”

  “Seriously?”

  Chase glances first left, then right, then surreptitiously tugs at the crotch area of his faded Wrangler blue jeans with his middle and index fingers. We start giggling and can’t stop. Megan looks like normal again.

  “Let’s be honest,” she says. “Things were never going to work out with Chase. He doesn’t even know what arugula is.”

  “True. Plus, he has crabs.” We burst into giggles again.

  Megan tries to compose herself. “I can’t believe I actually thought about staying in Pine Bluff for him. I could never be happy here.”

  “No. You couldn’t.” And neither could I. I love that about her—that her dreams are as big as mine. She keeps me from feeling like an outcast for wanting something different from everybody else.

  “We’re making a pact, right now. That no matter what happens, we get out of this town.”

  “Done.”

  “And we do something big with our lives. We, um, we live out our dreams in the wide world beyond.”

  I give her a serious nod. “Pact number three: No matter what happens, we will escape from Pine Bluff and live out our dreams in the wide world beyond.”

  Megan repeats after me and spreads her arms wide as if embracing the forest and the field full of cow pies. Then she frowns.

  “That band chick is hitting on your man again.”

  It’s the same junior. I shrug.

  “He’s with me.”

  “I can’t believe you’re not worried. Don’t you know what they do on those band trips?”

  “Um. Play musical instruments?”

  “No. It’s like a band-nerd make-out fest.”

  I roll my eyes. “Okay, I’ll see you later. I better go keep an eye on ‘my man.’”

  I walk up to Tanner and tug on his belt loop.

  “Hey.” Then I kiss him while Junior Band-Chick Skunk-Hair Skank is midsentence flirting with him. Megan should be happy. I’ve done everything but pee on his leg.

  “Hey,” he says back.

  “I’ve hardly gotten to talk to you all night.” I push out my bottom lip. “Come on.”

  I lead him to a nearby bale of hay.

  “What did you want to talk about?” he asks.

  I smile what I hope is a sexy smile. “Nothing.”

  We stay on our hay bale, not talking, until the bonfire dims a little and Tanner’s cell phone buzzes.

  “I’ll be right back. I have to get this,” he says.

  “Okay.”

  While I wait, I rub my arms to keep warm. Seth Wong plops down in Tanner’s place and keeps me company with jokes and marshmallows. He makes up a song on the spot about how s’mores are awesome, but they’re not as sweet as me. That kid is hilarious.

  “Can I talk to you about something?” he asks.

  “Sure.” I’ve never seen Seth so serious. He plucks stray pieces of straw from the hay bale while I wait for him to talk.

  “Tanner’s my best friend, but, you know, he has trouble staying with just one girl.” He squeezes my shoulder. “I don’t want you to get hurt.”

  “What is it with everyone tonight? This is the second time.” I spear another marshmallow with too much force and shove it into the fire.

  “I know it’s none of my business. Just be careful. You seem really sweet and . . . maybe a little naive.” He practically mumbles that last bit.

  Why doesn’t anyone think I can take care of myself? Taking care of people is all I do these days.

  “I knew Tanner’s rep before we got together,” I say. “He’s changed. I know what he was like with other girls, but he’d never do that to me.”

  “Okay. I’m just saying, you’re an amazing girl. You deserve a guy who sees that and treats you like that.” His gaze is so intense it’s like he’s trying to memorize my every pore.

  “Thanks.”

  I can’t decide whether to feel complimented or annoyed, so I add, “And Tanner is that guy. Oh, crap, my marshmallow’s burning.” I blow it out, but it’s already a charred sticky mess.

  “I’m gonna go get another cider.”

  Even though I blow off Megan and Seth, their words swirl around in my head for the rest of the night, so I can’t concentrate later while Tanner and I make out in his Jeep. The first few times we parked on the dirt road near my house, I was so nervous. Partly because I worried we’d get caught and partly because after what happened with Core
y, the idea of being alone with a guy with no one in shouting distance made my breath catch in my chest. But then I realized Tanner wasn’t Corey and he’d never do anything I didn’t want him to, and now I’m 100 percent comfortable with him. Usually. I’m kissing him and running my hands over his sinewy back muscles, but half of me is somewhere else. He stops fumbling with my bra strap.

  “What’s wrong?”

  I push myself up from the seat and rearrange my shirt.

  “I don’t know. I just. I just wonder sometimes how much I really mean to you.”

  “Baby, how can you say that? You know how much I care about you.”

  “Some people at the party were talking about your reputation, and it freaked me out. Like, maybe I’m stupid for not worrying about it.”

  “Don’t let them mess with your head. I know how I used to be, but it’s so different with you. I don’t even want to be that guy I was before.” He cups my chin in his hand. “I love you.”

  It’s the first time he’s ever said it, so of course my heart practically explodes with happiness.

  “I love you, too.”

  He kisses me, a slow, sweet kiss. Then he unfolds a creased-up sheet of notebook paper from his back pocket.

  “I wrote you a song.”

  “You did?” See what I mean? Tanner is all gooey insides, no hard shell around me. Megan and Seth have no idea what they’re talking about.

  “Yeah. I hope you like it.” He rubs at his nose, a nervous habit that I love because it connects cool, rock-god Tanner to the shy, nerdy Tanner of the past.

  He taps out a drumbeat on the seat, my legs, the Jeep bars overhead, really anything he can find.

  The way I feel when you’re with me,

  My spirit is a bird that you’ve set free.

  With love on its wings,

  It soars through the sky,

  Coming to rest somewhere in the stars.

  Coming to rest inside my heart.

  “That’s as far as I’ve gotten. But I’ll write more.”

  Isn’t he a genius? FYI, if you ever want to make a girl fall for you, write her a song.

  I am light as a feather when he drops me off half an hour later. He always lets me out in the driveway and never walks me to the door because even though Tanner loves me and I love him (officially! OMG!), I’m not ready to explain why my mom never leaves her bedroom and my dad barely speaks.

  I breeze inside, ready to burn off some excess energy dancing around my room and then curl under my covers and dream about Tanner. Until I smell the smoke. I follow it to the living room, where Libby is perched like a gargoyle in front of the fireplace, stabbing with a heavy iron poker at what looks like papers.

  “Libby, what are you doing?”

  When she turns to me, her round cheeks are red and streaked with tears.

  “You were gone, and Mommy’s always in bed, and Daddy wouldn’t play with me because he’s too busy with his stupid work.”

  I rush over and snatch her away from the flames and the poker away from her. There’s barely a fire, just enough to blacken the papers and curl them at the edges. Numbers and sketches and official-looking stuff cover the white patches between the burn marks. My eyes get big.

  “Are those Dad’s?”

  Libby nods and sniffles. “I took them from his briefcase.”

  I take a deep breath and try to figure out what to do next. First, I get a jug of water from the kitchen and dump it over the fire. Then I turn to my sister. Crap. I don’t know how to do parenting on this level.

  “Okay, okay.” I run my fingers through my hair. “Libby, you should never, ever play with fire or the fireplace again. It’s very dangerous. Do you understand?”

  “Yes,” she says in a small, guilty voice.

  “Okay, good. I’m going to go talk to Dad.” Her tears start fresh. “Don’t worry. He’s in more trouble than you right now.”

  I set her up with Beauty and the Beast and a mug of hot chocolate. The fire is gone now. I scoop the charred remains into a dustpan, walk calmly to my dad’s office, and fling them on his desk. Soot and blackened paper fragments and inky drops of water fly everywhere.

  “What the hell, Claire!”

  He kicks away from his desk in his rolling chair. His big hands swipe at the black splotches on his shirt, but he’ll need Spray ’n Wash if he ever wants those marks out. His black eyebrows come together in the middle. He’s mad, but I’m madder.

  “Those are from your briefcase. I found Libby setting them on fire when I got home because you couldn’t be bothered to watch her. Would it kill you to spend time with her? Or act like you’re the least bit interested?” I spit each word at him, not knowing if I’m talking about Libby anymore. What I really want to ask is, If I’m your one, then why do I feel like I’m in this alone?, but that thought cuts too deep.

  He frowns. “You’ve been drinking.”

  Of all the things I expected him to say, that was not one of them.

  “Yeah. I have. I’ve been drinking for a while now. But you and Mom never noticed because you’ve stopped being parents.”

  “I don’t need my intoxicated sixteen-year-old talking to me this way.”

  “Oh, we’re not making this about me.” I swallow the lump in my throat because what I have to say is too important. Someone thinks I’m worth loving, even if it isn’t him, and that thought keeps me strong. “This is about our family. It isn’t right that Mama still stays in bed all day.”

  His eyes widen, but he recovers. “You have to understand. She’s been through so much.”

  “I do understand. I’ve been through it with you guys. But it’s been seven months. You get to a point where you have to start trying to heal. And we hit that point a long time ago.”

  My dad takes what I’m saying as a personal attack. And I guess maybe it is. “You can’t expect everyone to grieve on your timeline. What are we supposed to do? This isn’t something you can snap out of. Your mother isn’t going to forget he existed just because you’re ready for her to move on.”

  “I’m not asking her to forget. Hell, I’m not even asking for her to be happy. But she has to get out of bed.”

  I don’t know how to fix my mother. But I do know that lying in bed and crying all day won’t fix anything. Because I’ve tried that.

  “Your mom just needs time.”

  I am done with giving things time and waiting to see if they get better.

  “No. Mom needs a therapist. And not just someone at church—a real therapist. She needs someone who can make her want to try. And Libby needs her parents. And I need . . . I need some help around here. I’m not a grown-up.”

  “Claire—” He reaches out to me, but I jerk away.

  “No. If you want to hug someone, Libby’s downstairs watching a movie.”

  I turn and slam the door on my way out, and then go to my room and slam that door too. I flop on my bed and look around. I better get comfortable, because between the drinking and the way I just talked to my dad, I’ll probably be in here for the rest of high school. I replay everything I said to him and wince. At least I’ll have thoughts of Tanner to keep me company.

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  Chapter

  11

  Megan must have gotten the report about me maybe being ready to make up, because she comes over to my house after school that same day. She shuffles into my room with her shoulders drooping and her head hanging low—very un-Megan-like posture.

  “Can I talk to you?”

  I turn my desk chair to face her.

  “I guess,” I say, even though nothing she says will be good enough. I forgave her before, but you can only give someone so many chances.

  She sits on the absolute edge of my bed, like she’s poised to spring up and run at any moment. I wait and wait, but she just stays there, silent, biting her lip, looking more and
more like she’s about to unravel. I’m determined not to cave, though. My brain goes over the likely excuses, but there is not one, not a single reason, why it was okay for her to—

  “Chase is engaged,” Megan blurts out. Then she bursts into tears.

  There were a lot of things I thought she might say. That was not one of them. She usually treats Chase like something mildly unpleasant she’d like to wish out of existence. Like store-bought pie crusts.

  But by the way she’s sobbing into my bedspread, it’s obvious she feels much more strongly about him than she does about ready-made baked goods. And even though I should be really pissed at her, and am still a little pissed at her, I can’t help but sit beside her on the bed and put my arm around her while she cries.

  “Chase is an idiot. We hate Chase.”

  “I know.”

  “Would you really want to be engaged to him?”

  “N-no. I mean, I know it’s a good thing we broke up, because we want different things out of life, and I’m embarrassed that it hurts this much, but it does.” The words come out all garbled by her tears. “Amanda texted me a link to his fiancée’s blog while we were at the party, and I was looking at pictures of them, and they looked so happy. Like, really, truly happy. That was so close to being me. And I started freaking out, wondering if I’ll ever be able to make someone else that happy.”

  “Hey.” I pull her back into a sitting position because I need her to hear me say this. “Hey, of course you will. Someday. Just not stupid Chase Collins. He’s twenty and getting married. You don’t want that. You want out of here, remember?”

  She nods like she’s thinking about believing me. “After that, I drank too many mai tais. And then I found you guys on the swing.” She hesitates. “Luke was such a good listener. I was crying, and he put his arm around me and started running his hand up and down my shoulder, and then he looked deep into my eyes, and I swear he was wanting to kiss me. I did try to kiss him first, but I wasn’t imagining the connection. I mean, he wouldn’t have done those things if he wasn’t interested.”

  I don’t say anything back. Her story sounds similar to when Luke was comforting me. But . . . she must have misinterpreted what he did. I know what it was like with Luke on that porch. I’m positive he wanted me. I don’t tell Megan this, though. Because he ended up with her. He chose her. So maybe I was the one who misinterpreted things.