Tease Page 2

  “This whole thing is such bullshit,” she says. She doesn’t actually sound worried. Just tired. Or maybe . . . Is she stoned? I actually open my mouth to ask before thinking better of it. “Oh,” she goes on, waving her hand like she’s daintily chasing away a fly, “I guess we’re not supposed to talk.”

  When she says that her voice gets an edge to it, like it was my idea not to talk and she’s mad at me. “I—” I start to say, then stop. Suddenly I miss my best friend so much—so much it feels like a physical pain, like the heat that’s still trapped in my hands after grabbing the sunbaked steering wheel. “How are you?” I finally manage.

  “Well, I’m fat,” she says with a dry laugh. She’s not fat, of course. I’m shaking my head and she adds, “No, I totally am. I can’t, like, go to the gym anymore, my parents are being total Hitlers. God, Emma really jacked everything up, right?”

  She rolls her eyes in that dramatic way she always has and I nod, totally agreeing. God, what a relief, after all this time, to know she’s still there, she still gets how hard this is, she doesn’t hate me—

  I want to walk around the car, to reach out and just hug her—even though we never really do that—but I haven’t moved an inch before her face changes completely, goes back to that casual, not-a-care-in-the-world expression.

  “Blah blah blah,” she says, shaking out her hands at her sides, shaking it all off. She’s definitely stoned. “You look skinny, you whore.”

  I look down, trying not to smile or be too flattered. “Thanks,” I say, but my voice is too quiet. A little louder I add, “You look great, really. It’s nice to see you.”

  “Yeah, right—so nice you almost hit me with your car!” she says with a laugh. The edge is back in her voice, and I don’t know what I said wrong. “Anyway, you’re leaving, I just wanted to say hi. So, you know, hi. And bye! Ha!”

  And just like that, before I can even say “Hi”—or “Bye”—back, Brielle has disappeared into the rows of cars.

  When I get back into my car, I just turn the AC off. It feels better to be too hot. I feel like I’m suffocating, anyway, and what difference does it make if it’s hard to breathe? It’s always hard to breathe now. I haven’t had a good, deep breath in months.

  January

  “I’M TELLING YOU—SHE must’ve gotten his number from someone else’s phone. Like probably Tyler—”

  “Bullshit. Jesus, Sara, you are so naive when you want to be.”

  I pull up my chemistry book protectively, as if covering my boobs will make what Brielle is saying not true. As if I could just curl up and pretend that my boyfriend, Dylan, who is the best thing that’s ever happened to me, isn’t getting texts from another girl. And that I don’t know this because I didn’t find one.

  “You don’t have to whip out the vocab words,” I tell my alleged best friend, but she’s rolling her eyes at me.

  “Okay, fine, you’re a dumb bitch—is that better?” She starts walking toward Chem and I trail after her. She struts past a group of senior guys and they all nod hello, turning to keep watching even after she’s nodded back. “You know they’re in Language Arts together,” she’s saying to me, “and you know she keeps hooking up with Jacob and Tyler, and you know she’s a dirty skank. Don’t assume she’s not creeping up on your man.”

  “But he doesn’t even know her!” I hate the squeak in my voice. I hate the tears that choke up behind my eyes. I already cried about this last night; I don’t need Brielle and the whole world to see me break down now, in the middle of the hallway.

  But suddenly Brielle turns and looks so sorry for me that I really do almost cry again.

  “Oh, honey,” she says kindly. “It’s not Dylan’s fault, I know that! He’s just a stupid boy. Of course he loves you. But boys don’t know how to deal with sluts like Emma Putnam. He’s used to nice girls like you!”

  She gives me a lightning-quick hug, crushing my textbook to my chest, then holds my shoulders for a second before letting go. I give her a little smile, trying to seem like I’m not falling apart over this.

  “It’s Emma,” she goes on, leading the way into Chem lab. “Trash needs to be taken out, for reals. Who knew a sophomore could be such a freaking pain in my ass?”

  I grunt in agreement as we sit down at our table. Our lab partners, Jeff Marsh and Seamus O’Leary (Brielle calls him Irish O’Irish), are already perched on the stools across from us, and we smirk at them. They aren’t exactly the coolest guys in school, but they usually do most of the work in this class and let us copy their answers. I’m actually better at chemistry than either one of them—or I was at the beginning of the year, anyway. I only have two classes with Brielle this semester, so we need to spend the whole time talking. I don’t think my grades are gonna be so hot in Chem or PE this term, but at least Jeff and Seamus will keep me from failing this class.

  I have two classes with Emma, too—American History and PE—even though she’s a year younger. For some reason the school she transferred from back in October has American History as a sophomore class. So Elmwood decided she should keep taking it, which messed up her schedule for gym, blah blah blah. She’s already dated a bunch of juniors and she’s always trying to suck up to the girls in our class too. Everyone knows she’s a head case, always starting pointless drama. Brielle pretty much hated her at first sight.

  “So. Irish,” Brielle says, pointing a beaker at Seamus. “Is your brother getting us that keg this weekend?”

  This is the first I’ve heard of Seamus having a connection, and I raise my eyebrows at him hopefully. The party is going to be at Brielle’s house while her parents are on a cruise to Bermuda. As far as I knew we were just going to steal what we could from their liquor cabinet, and maybe some beer from Alison Stipe’s dad’s basement fridge. And I didn’t think Seamus or Jeff were even invited.

  “Aye, me lassie,” Seamus says in a thick brogue. He loves that Brielle gave him a nickname and he always plays along. Boys love Brielle in general—she’s got that rich-girl shine, with the super-long hair and the Abercrombie wardrobe, but she’s also so ballsy and bossy that boys never get bored around her. She laughs at their jokes before they even realize they’ve made any. Because she actually makes the jokes for them.

  It’s pretty amazing to watch, but basically impossible to imitate. I’ve tried.

  “Groovy,” she says, flashing him what anyone would think was a genuine smile. Then she swings her hair back around, shutting him out.

  She looks me in the eye and goes, “We need to resume our discussion of the party.”

  Ah, yes. The discussion. The debate, more like, over whether I should lose my virginity to Dylan at the party—or, like, after the party, I guess, possibly in Brielle’s guest room—or not.

  I’ve been kind of leaning toward not, but ever since Brielle lost her V-card last summer with a college guy at her swim camp, she only wants to talk about my sex life. Or lack thereof. I never met the guy she was with, but I saw pictures, and now I totally see why she’s always complaining about how lame high school boys are.

  Still, it’s easy for her to say—she’s the brave one. And the one who’s already had more than one real boyfriend, even if they have been the lame high school variety. Dylan is basically my first, and I kind of feel like I’m still getting the hang of just making out with him. He’s older, he knows what he’s doing. He’ll know that I don’t know what I’m doing. It sounds like a good idea, and I know everyone does it, but when I’m actually with Dylan and everything, I don’t know. It’s freaking scary.

  But like I said, Brielle doesn’t get scared, and even if she did, I wouldn’t know how to explain why I am. And just like in eighth grade, Brielle has a killer argument ready:

  “He obviously won’t be texting Emma Slut-nam if he’s getting the good stuff from you,” she whispers, snorting a little at her new nickname creation.

  I don’t get a chance to come up with a counterpoint for this, because Ms. Enman shows up and we have to preten
d to pay attention for a few minutes.

  As soon as Ms. Enman turns back to the dry-erase board, though, I hear Brielle say in a low, singsong voice, “You know you want to!”

  My mom works at a big insurance company and is never around after school, so I’m in charge of making sure my little brothers, who really aren’t that little anymore, eat something and do at least enough of their homework to not flunk fifth and sixth grades, respectively. I kind of like that there’s a bigger age gap between us—for one thing, I got to enjoy being an only child for a while, and most of that time was before my parents started hating each other. I think they had Tommy (who wants to be called Tom) and Alex (who wants to be called A-Rod) to try to feel like a real family again. But it didn’t work. About five seconds after Alex was born, Dad moved out and I got promoted to full-time babysitter–slash–co-parent.

  But the boys are cool. They love it when I pick them up from their after-school stuff, which is sometimes a sport and sometimes, like today, just an extra study period at the elementary school. Volunteers from the university come over and help with their homework, so half my job is done by the time I pull around the Pleasant Hill Elementary circular drive.

  Tommy, the sixth grader, flops into the backseat after losing a shove-match with fifth-grader Alex, who’s gotten kind of husky in the last couple of months. Maybe I’m not helping. I mean, like today, as soon as they’re in the car I go, “Whoever can find some loose change in here gets to pick between Taco Bell and McDonald’s!” And then I get practically slammed into the steering wheel as Tommy dives onto the back floor and his head shoves into my seat.

  Alex opens the glove compartment and starts tossing out pieces of paper and crap I didn’t know was even in there. “Yeah!” he yells. “A dollar bill!”

  “How the hell, Alex?” I say, but I’m smiling.

  “Ta-co Bell! How the hell! Ta-co Bell!” he chants triumphantly.

  “Dude, language,” I say, but by now we’re both laughing. Even Tommy’s face is just a big grin in my rearview mirror.

  Luckily for the whole childhood-obesity deal, we only end up with enough money for everyone to get one taco each, so it’s not like we’re having an extra dinner. And I make them go into the restaurant, so there’s some exercise involved too. If walking across a parking lot counts.

  We take our tacos to a booth next to the windows, even though the winter sun is almost gone and it’s cold over here. Alex and I put mild sauce on our food, while Tommy opens about nine packets of the hottest kind and then tries to pour some onto Alex’s too.

  “Quit it!” Alex cries, shoving Tommy back to his side of the bench seat.

  “Wuss!” Tommy yells, shoving back.

  “Come on, guys,” I say, licking a stray piece of lettuce off my finger. “Would you just—” I don’t finish because they’re still shoving, so instead of trying to reason with them I just get up, grab Tommy’s arm, and pull him out of his side of the booth. Pushing him around and onto the bench I was just sitting on, I flop myself down next to Alex and slide my taco across the table. “Okay?” I ask, a little out of breath from the whole maneuver. “Can we eat?”

  Alex smirks at Tommy, but luckily, once he’s yanked his food over to his new seat, Tommy just smirks back.

  “How’s Dylan’s fastball?” Alex asks me.

  I smile. Alex is obsessed with my boyfriend. I guess I can relate.

  Dylan’s always been pretty much varsity across the board, but now that he’s a senior he’s super committed to being really, really good so he can secure some college scholarships. These days all he does is practice for baseball tryouts. He really wants to be a starting pitcher this year. Or is it a closing pitcher? I guess I’ve only been half listening—I mean, when we’re alone, we don’t talk that much.

  The day after Christmas Dylan came over, and since it was freakishly warm outside, he took Alex out to the backyard and practiced with him. So now my ten-year-old brother always wants to talk about Dylan’s pitches. Tommy will be twelve in April, and he usually acts like he’s too cool to be impressed by his sister’s boyfriend. But he gets pretty interested too.

  “I think it’s good, bud,” I tell Alex. “The season starts soon, so you can come to a game with me and see for yourself.”

  Alex does a little hop on his seat while Tommy asks, “I can come too, right?”

  “Of course,” I say. I hope Dylan’s ready for a tweenage fan club.

  I’m still not sure why Dylan Howe wanted to go out with me in the first place. We got thrown together a few times last fall because Brielle was dating another guy on the basketball team, Rob. I’d always thought Dylan was gorgeous—it’s more like a fact than an opinion—so at first I had a hard time not acting like a complete idiot around him. If I could talk to boys my own age as easily as I talk to my brothers, things would be so much easier. Well, maybe—Alex and Tommy talk a lot about farting. I’ve hooked up with guys at parties and stuff, but nothing ever seems to happen, nothing official. For most of sophomore year I thought I was in love with Parker Anderson, and we had this whole texting affair. But it was only texts. At school Parker totally ignored me, and finally Brielle convinced me that I had to ignore him back.

  So anyway, if Brielle hadn’t been dating Rob, I wouldn’t have gotten anywhere near Dylan Howe.

  And then one night over Thanksgiving break, a bunch of us snuck over to the Pleasant Hill playground. Brielle and Alison were drinking peach schnapps and acting all crazy, jumping off the slide and stuff. I was on the swings, which had always been my favorite. Suddenly, Dylan sat down on the swing next to mine. He’d had a couple of the beers the guys brought, and I could smell the hops and sweat and just general boy-scent on him, all mixed in with the cold air and that dead-leaf-autumn smell. Somehow I actually started talking to him, like a seminormal person. And then out of nowhere he just pulled the chains of my swing over toward his and started kissing me.

  It was the most exciting thing that’s ever happened to me in my entire life.

  Dylan has these really strong hands, like man hands, and with one holding my swing and the other wrapped around my waist . . . I can’t even think about it now without feeling my heart speed up, my blood pulsing in my ears. That night I even reached up and put one hand on the side of his face. Like we were kissing in a movie or something. I was just so stunned, and I was thinking, This might be the only time I have a chance to do this, and suddenly I felt so daring and confident and—God, I don’t know, maybe kind of sexy? His face was really soft, with just a little bit of stubble along his jaw. The tips of my fingers brushed against the line of his hair, under his ear.

  I wanted it to go on forever. But after a few minutes Rob yelled to him from across the playground and Dylan let go of me. “See you later,” he said, and left. Just walked away, with me dizzy and swinging sideways, the chains squealing in protest as I tried not to pass out.

  Who knows what would have happened after that if Brielle hadn’t intervened. She told Rob to tell Dylan to text me, and he did. I started sitting right behind the team with Brielle at every basketball game. And I started making out with him a lot more, mostly in his SUV after those games, his hair still wet from the locker room showers.

  Around Christmas, Dylan started pulling at my pants while we kissed. Sometimes he’ll bring my hands to his belt, too, but any confidence I might have in kissing him just disappears when he does that. Usually I just kind of kiss him harder and at the same time my hands sort of go limp, like they don’t work anymore. He’s a gentleman, he’s never pushed me. But it’s gotten pretty clear what he thinks is going to happen next.

  Brielle broke up with Rob right after she caught him flirting with Emma Putnam at the holiday dance. Emma went to the dance without a date and wore this crazy low-cut red dress, so half the room was staring at her already. I mean, everyone knows the holiday dance isn’t that formal. It was kind of sad to see her show up like it was the Oscars or something.

  Honestly I don’t think Br
ielle minded it that much when Rob spent too long at the soda table with overdressed Emma. It gave her an excuse to dump a cup of Coke on Rob and call Emma a whore, loudly, and that’s the kind of scene Brielle lives for.

  “Can we get another taco?” Alex whines. I realize I’ve been staring out the window, watching the sky get dark and completely ignoring my brothers.

  “Sorry, little dude,” I say, standing up and grabbing my coat. “All out of cash. But it’s cream-of-mushroom chicken night at home!” I say this part as enthusiastically as possible, but both boys are groaning as they put their coats back on.

  It’s fully dark outside and the wind is brutal. For a second I’m too cold to remember what I was worrying about, and then, two cars over, I see a flash of red. Emma Putnam is getting out of the passenger side of a dark SUV. I can’t see who the driver is, but I see Emma’s hair right away, lit up like a fire under the streetlight.

  Suddenly Emma turns and looks over at me. At first I think she’s going to wave, but that would be weird, since she knows I’m Brielle’s best friend. And, um, Dylan’s girlfriend. She doesn’t wave, though. She looks confused for a second.

  And for no reason I could ever explain in a million years, I flip up my middle finger at her. I’ve never done that before—not for real, not in a non-joking way—and it feels really strange. And kind of cheesy. But at the same time it feels really, like, powerful.

  I hold it up so I’m sure she sees, and watch as her mouth drops open in surprise.

  Then I duck into my car and drive my brothers home.

  And I can’t stop smiling.

  “So what was that text about?”

  “Mmmph.”

  “I just”—pant—“It’s not that”—oof—“I mean, I totally trust you—”

  “Wait, what? What’s going on?”