"That's not…very honors student of you," I said, but I sounded more hysterical than witty.
"Stop.
What’s going on, Luce?” he asked me. “What can I do?”
I wanted to tell him a hundred things. He gripped my hands with a force that made me feel dizzy.
“Please kiss me,” I said, horrified the instant I said it but unwilling to take it back. “Don’t ask me anything. Just kiss me. Just—”
He did. His lips crushed mine, and the hands holding mine tugged me close to him. I had to crane my neck up to kiss him, and for just a brief second I wondered what an average height girl would have to go through to reach him. I used my toes to push myself into his lips, and I could taste his breath. Like spearmint, maybe Doublemint. I breathed it in. I could see myself, suddenly. I took another deep breath, and saw myself crushed into his arms, kissing him from the other side.
Vertigo
.
Zack’s hands let up, suddenly, their grip on my hands slacking. I opened my eyes, wondering what was wrong. Zack looked paler, and his hands were going limp. He swayed, his eyes still squeezed shut.
“No,” I said, and yanked myself away from him. I slapped a hand over my mouth.
Zack’s eyes shot open, and his skin darkened considerably. He stood up straight, but a look of dazed wonder painted his face red at the cheeks.
“What…are you okay?”
My hand still clamped my mouth shut. I couldn’t let it go, couldn’t let it hurt him. Couldn’t let
me
hurt him. I backed away, my other hand held out to him, pleading.
“Just…I’m sorry,” I said.
“Don’t be,” he whispered. He had the look of someone who had just walked clean and healthy out of a car crash. “That was…awesome.”
I felt the tears coming.
No. Not now
. I shook my head.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I have to go.”
I turned and fled across the grass. This time, he didn’t try to stop me.
Chapter Eleven
Party Hardly
“No Taser, no party.”
I stared at my dad in horror. He sat calmly—his arms folded across each other in a little lazy X on the kitchen table. The dying sunlight streamed in through the window above the sink, back-lighting him, throwing him in sharp silhouette. He didn’t look angry, but he wasn’t joking either. Dad radiated Zen as he pushed the little black plastic box toward me. It slid across the table, two metal fangs bared.
“Technically a stun gun, honey,” Mom said as she floated by, dangling an empty coffee cup from one finger. “The Taser fires the barbs.”
“Thank you, honey,” Dad said. “No
stun gun
, no party.”
“Dad! You’re a freak,” I said, and stood up from the table.
“Sit, young lady.”
I sat, but I wasn’t happy about it. I rattled the table with my knees as I crossed my legs. The little black stun gun jumped on the table as if to say
look at me
.
“You were nearly killed or worse—”
I tried not to smirk at the “or worse.” Typical fatherly priorities.
“—and I’m still letting you go to a party, because I’m a good guy. And this particular good deed is going unpunished, do you hear me, Lucy?”
I sighed.
“You are carrying the stun-gun from now on, everywhere except school.”
“Is this even legal?” I whined. I could hear the teenage-girl-scorned in my voice, but I had no desire to disguise it. “Can a minor even carry one of these?”
Dad shrugged. “I’d rather a cop give you trouble than a thug or a murderer.”
I rolled my eyes.
“This isn’t an argument,” Dad said.
“No stun-gun, no party, right?”
“Right.”
“Then no party. I won’t go.”
Dad laughed.
“All right, I didn’t expect that,” Dad said. “But you still have to carry the thing.”
I groaned. It was actually the answer I expected—I’d much rather go to the party anyway, even if I had to carry it. Mostly I was just calling his bluff.
“Then I’m going,” I said, quickly.
“I figured,” Dad said.
“But I’m not—”
“Take the damn stun gun, baby,” Mom said and sat down next to me. “Keep it in your purse, no one will see it. Just…stop arguing.”
I groaned and scooped up the stun gun. Before I could put it into my purse, Dad stopped me.
“Wait,” he said. “Push the trigger.”
“Dad—”
“I want to make sure you know how to use it,” Dad said. “Push the trigger.”
It wasn’t hard to find. The button nuzzled my index finger when I grabbed the stun gun. I touched it, and a little blue arc zapped between the metal fangs. It made a horrific clacking noise, and I nearly dropped it.
“Upper shoulder, under the ribs, or above the hip. Got it?”
I rolled my eyes again and dropped it into my purse.
“I gotta go shower,” I said. “The girls will be over soon.”
Dad nodded and waved me away. I ran up the stairs to get ready.
As I showered, I let my mind wander.
I’d left school early after my disastrous kiss with Zack—I didn’t even want to think what would have happened if I’d let the kiss go on any longer. Would it be possible to hold my breath? Was it even
air
I was breathing?
I wasn’t exactly able to go home without incurring parental wrath. I’d hung around the
Orient Express
take-out, because I was both hoping to run into Puck again and I couldn’t think of anywhere else to go. By the time school ended I trotted back over and intercepted Morgan.
I deflected most of her queries about my truancy, just explaining that Ms. Crane had asked a few questions I wasn’t happy with and I’d bailed. Morgan frowned at that—I had promised to explain to her the reason I’d fled to her house in the middle of the night, something I’d yet to do, and I think the continued secrecy was digging at her. Still, she listened, unhappily, when I told her to keep the information from my mom. As far as she was concerned, I was at school all day.
I’d gotten home and been ambushed by my father. He demanded phone numbers for Benny’s house, his parents, his neighbors, his distant relatives, his ancestors, his pool boy, etc. I’d provided them all, and after a short discussion with Benny’s parents—who were in actuality Benny himself and Daphne on a three-way-call—Dad agreed to let me go.
By the time I left the shower, Daphne, Sara, and Wanda were already lounging around my room. Daphne lay across my bed, her head hanging off of the side facing me, and she was staring at me upside-down with her purple-black hair streaking across it like surreal streamers. She stuck her tongue out when I walked out of the bathroom. Sara sat in the window sill, and Wanda held her cheeks in her hands at my desk, staring at the wall.
“Ladies,” I said, and began collecting garments.
“Hey, Lucy,” Daphne said, and rolled around right-side up. She made a face and clutched her forehead. “Whoa. Brain rush.”
“Don’t you need a brain—” Sara began.
“—for that to work. Ha-effing-ha,” Daphne interrupted. “Your jokes are pedestrian and cheap.”
“So—” Sara began.
“—is my mom,” Daphne laughed. “Try again.”
Sara flashed her teeth at Daphne, threw her arms across her chest, and stared out the window. Daphne flashed me a victorious look, hopped off the bed, and cleaved to my side.
“So…did your dad buy it?”
Daphne grinned and waggled her eyebrows at me and threw her hair up into a quick faux ponytail—I imagine it was her attempt at miming mom-hair.
“How did I do?” she asked, inexplicably, with a British accent.
“You…didn’t use the accent did you?”
Daphne’s sour look answered that question.
“Well, Dad believed you were Benny’s mom,” I said. I couldn’t disguise the lilt of shame in my voice. “So I guess it worked.”
Daphne was, as usual, more perceptive then I gave her credit for. “Unhappy, babe?”
“Just worried.”
Sara, from the windowsill, grunted.
“What?” I asked.
“I think you should be worried,” Sara said. “I think you’re taking advantage of your dad, who’s just scared and wanting to make you happy.”
“What?” I said again, because I agreed with her and wanted to hear her take on it.
“Morgan agrees with me,” Sara said. Both Wanda and Daphne flashed her dirty looks. “But that’s it. I agreed not to say anything else.”
Daphne let out a sigh that sounded like a zeppelin deflating. She hooked her arm in mine and led me over to the closet. Her quick hands swept through my hangers, dresses, and blouses with a keen eye and a familiarity of my wardrobe that I didn’t like. She removed a red pin-striped pencil skirt from the tangle and spun it on its hanger.
“No,” I said. Without comment she raised an eyebrow but slid it back into the closet. She began rummaging again.
“How do I look?” Sara asked, her parental tone either invisible or held well in check. She spun and popped a hand on her hip for good measure.
“Terrible,” Daphne said, with an annoyed tone and without looking. She remained shoulder-deep in my closet.
“You look great,” I said, but I wasn’t paying attention. It looked like a
designer jeans
,
fluffy black top outfit of the style that Sara usually whipped out for special occasions. She pulled the look off well.
Daphne came out with a pink tulip skirt. I made the vomit face, and she tossed it back in.
Wanda slumped even further into whatever misery-induced coma she was gunning for. I wanted to ask her what was wrong, but with the animosity shooting in sparks between Daphne and Sara, it didn’t feel like the right environment. Wanda was fragile as it was—pushing it any further, in semi-public, might make her shatter.
Sara wouldn’t stop looking at me. She looked worried, pissed, and confused. The kind of combo you might imagine on a friend looking out for your safety and also hoping you don’t ruin their good time.
“I don’t think anything is gonna happen,” Daphne said, reading either Sara's thoughts or my own.
Daphne emerged from the closet with a cute black A-line skirt with lace trim and a deep purple scoop-neck blouse hanging from separate hangers. I raised an eyebrow in surprise.
She turned a box over with her foot, and my smoke-gray wedges poured out and tumbled to the carpet. Sara laughed, a single bark that she couldn’t contain despite her tiff with Daphne, and Wanda said, “Wow.” I gave the suggested ensemble a once-over, nodded, and bowed deeply.
“Your ability to zero in on taste is second to none, Daph.”
Daphne grinned. “You’re welcome.”
When we were all dressed, ready, made-up, and sure that the twenty minutes Zack and Benny waited outside was sufficient, we all headed down in a gaggle. I noticed Wanda typing into her phone diligently for the better part of the prep-time, and she tucked it away with a sharp, annoyed gesture when we left my room.
I wasn’t surprised to see my dad waiting at the bottom of the stairs. The look he gave me could only be described as crestfallen. I flashed him a sympathetic smile and touched his arm as I passed. Much to my surprise, he locked his fingers around my wrist and stopped me dead in my tracks. I glanced up at Wanda, Daph, and Sara, and cocked my head toward the door.
“I’ll…be there in a sec,” I said, trying to keep my tone light.
“Okay,” Daphne said, too cheerfully. “We’re gone in five.”
I growled but said nothing.
“Luce?”
I glanced up at Dad.
“I thought it was—”
“It is,” Dad said, and took in a deep breath. “I want to meet Zack.”
Blood…draining from face. Skin pale, breath sharp. Fast. Heart setting off firecrackers in my chest. Taste of batteries. Wet hands.
“Dad—”
“No, Luce,” he said. “This is my thing. Let me have it.”
“No.”
“I’m not asking,” Dad said. “Zack in this living room or your ass upstairs.”
He said it with that same pleasant, let’s-work-together tone. My fingers were sore from curling into fists. It felt like my hands were being stretched from the inside.
“Fine,” I said. “Three minutes, tops.”
He had something up his sleeve, and something I wasn’t going to be happy about. I took a deep breath, left the house, and jogged out to Benny’s minivan.
The girls were already inside, buckled in, and laughing to each other. Zack was in the passenger seat, and I rapped my knuckle on his window. I took three deep breaths, thinking of the parking lot today. Thinking of him kissing me. Then thinking of me running away like a drama-mama freak.
“Yes, Madame?” Zack asked, the top of the window whizzing past his face. He didn’t seem upset. Allow me to fix that.
“You have to come inside.”
I gave him a look. Zack didn’t even try to hide his smirk. He unfolded from the cramped seat, shoved the door open, and hopped down into the damp grass. Zack smoothed his clothes and hair, an unnecessary move—he looked great. White shirt, sleeves rolled up, faded-but-stylish blue jeans, and a pair of brown shoes.
I took a deep breath, desperate to negate a powerful need to up-chuck. Zack laid his hand across my back, his palm hot against the thin cloth of my shirt. I shivered.
He led me to the stoop like I didn’t know the way. I stared at him, but his sideways smirk didn’t shake. The door opened, and I nearly jumped out of my stylish yet comfortable wedges.
Dad leaned against the door frame, bouncing a stare down off of Zack’s implacable features.
Unfazed, Zack stuck his big hand out and flashed a dazzling smile.
“My name is Zack, Mr. Day,” he said. “It’s great to finally meet you.”
“You, too, Zack,” Dad said, and shook his hand. “Happy birthday by the way…”
My dad let the sentence fade and his last breath hang. It was a trick, and I sucked in a little tight breath. I tried to look at Zack without looking at Zack. Not easy, let me tell you.
“Oh no, sir,” Zack said. “It’s not my birthday.”
“Oh, right,” Dad said. “Benny’s?”
“Yup,” Zack said. “My best friend. He’s a good guy, Mr. Day.”
Zack was smoother than a gravy sandwich. The thought made my stomach jolt—just how many girls’ fathers had he schmoozed into complacence?