First Time (3 page)

I figured for sure she’d come up after Larry left. But she didn’t. Just went into her bathroom, ran the water for a while, brushed her teeth, washed her face. I thought about going in there and telling her to turn off the taps because there is getting to be a real water crisis in the world. But she’d take it wrong. Anyway, it isn’t up to me to make the first move. It was her fault, making that rude comment about my cooking and then letting Larry dis me as well.

I can’t believe she hasn’t come up. She has always had a rule about not going to sleep angry. Sometimes I’ve thought it was a stupid rule, but now I’m used to it.

And while I was sitting in my room, waiting for the sound of her footsteps, I thought over what had happened at dinner. Mom and Larry were rude, but I over- reacted too. I wanted to tell her that. Maybe I’d even tell her about what happened with Lynn and Chad in the parking lot today.
How she drove off without me. Didn’t even call me later to apologize or explain.

I want to tell Mom that I looked this Chad guy up in my old yearbook, and the whole thing doesn’t make sense. He wasn’t just
a
hotshot, he was
the
hotshot. He was Mister Everything. Which is fine on its own, but the thing that has me concerned is that in practically every picture of him, he’s got his arm around a different girl. The guy’s obviously a player. I want Mom’s advice as to what I should do.

Maybe I’d even find a way to mention that Larry flashed me. It was probably an accident. But just in case, shouldn’t she know? I don’t know what to do. She really likes this guy. I don’t want to cause trouble. Maybe I should let it go, put it out of my head, because there is no easy answer, and it hurts my stomach every time I think about it.

I wish it was the old days and I could talk with Mom the way we used to. But I can’t. She was too busy with her sleazy
boyfriend, and then she went to bed. Couldn’t care less that I was upset.

I glance over at the clock. 1:47 the digital red numbers glow back at me. I’m never going to get to sleep. It doesn’t matter how hard I try. My mind’s leaping around like a gymnast on speed. I shake my thoughts away from Lynn, only to have them land on the argument with my mom. Shake them off my mom, and there’s Larry’s stupid face smirking at me. Life sucks. It really does.

Chapter Eight

It’s raining. The cafeteria is jam-packed. Lynn and I are huddled at the end of a table, sharing a seat. The cafeteria generally smells, but on really rainy days, it’s always worse. It’s the combination of old wet sneakers, bo, the crush of bodies, the grease from the fryer, school lunches mixed with people brown-bagging it, pickles and stale peanut butter sandwiches on day-old bread.
There’s such a crush of humanity in here. The windows are fogged up, droplets gather, swell and then burst and morph into tiny rivulets that trickle down.

“Chad is
amazing
! This guy is a god.” Lynn hasn’t stopped talking since we met at her locker. “I can’t believe he was right there in the parking lot. Standing by my car. What are the odds of that?” I open my mouth to answer, but there’s no need.

“About one in a million,” she prattles.

“A billion even. And yet...there he was!”

She hugs herself happily. No “Sorry I ditched you, Haley. Sorry, I didn’t call.” It’s like it didn’t happen.

“And you know what I was thinking?” I don’t even bother to open my mouth this time. “I was thinking that maybe... just maybe...he lost my phone number but remembered me from last year, and so he came by the school and hung around the parking lot in the hopes of maybe running into me.”

She pauses to draw in a breath and I leap into the gap. Thanks to my yearbook
perusal, I’m prepared. I have plenty of ammunition.

“Lynn, he wouldn’t have remembered you from last year. He wouldn’t have even noticed you.”

“He might have,” Lynn says, a trifle defensively.

Now, normally, I might let Lynn spin her fancy fairy tale, but I don’t feel like it. Not after the way she ditched me in the parking lot. Besides, this guy’s a player. So if you look at it that way, I’m actually being noble.

“Nope,” I say cheerfully. “Wouldn’t have given you the Kleenex he blew his nose on. Number one, he was the top scorer on the basketball team. The team that finally pulled itself together and actually made it to the B.C. championships. Number two, I don’t know if you remember correctly, but he was still working his way through the female population of the senior class. Every once in a while he would indulge in an eleventh-grade girl, but he never got around to tenth.”

“How do you know?”

“Come on, Lynn. Look in last year’s yearbook. There’s only a million pictures of him strutting around the school, his arm flung around a multitude of girls. And last but not least, we get to number three. The salient fact that, last year, you were not quite the girl that you are today.”

“What do you mean?” Lynn asks angrily.

I know I’m being smug, but I can’t help it. I figured this whole thing out last night. Funny the things that fall into place when you can’t sleep. “Let’s just say you’ve gone up a few bra sizes and you’ve lost the braces, not to mention you are the brand- new owner of a pretty nice car.”

“Chad’s not like that! He doesn’t like me because of that. You’re just jealous because he likes me better than you.”

“I don’t care whether Chad likes me or not. It’s you that I’m worried about.” But even as I say these words, I wonder if they’re true. Why am I pissing on her parade?

Chapter Nine

I call Lynn as soon as I get home. “I’m sorry,” I say. “I don’t know what got into me. I know how much you wanted to see him again.”

“It’s okay,” Lynn says.

“Oh good.”

“But he does like me for me you know.” Her words are sure, but I can hear the doubt in her voice, and I feel bad because I was the one who put it there.

“I’m sure he does,” I say. “I was just mad because you ditched me after school.”

“But it was Chad!”

“I know it was Chad. I understand. It felt a little funny is all, watching you drive off with him when we were planning to do something.”

“But we were planning to try and find Chad. What would be the point of trying to track him down when...”

I finish the sentence for her. “He was standing right beside your car. I understand. It’s just I felt like I suddenly became invisible or something. Like I didn’t matter.”

“You matter,” Lynn says. “You’re my best friend.”

“Okay,” I say, smiling into the phone. I’m relieved that we’re having this conversation and sorting things out. “You want to do something?”

“Of course,” Lynn says. “It’s Friday night, isn’t it? Shall we go to the rink?”

“Sounds good. I’ll meet you out front, six forty-five.”

“No, I’ll pick you up.” Lynn’s laughing.

I start laughing too. “Oh yeah, I forgot, you’ve got a car! That’s so cool.”

We get off the phone and I go upstairs to figure out what to wear. My outfit comes together pretty easily, quicker than I’d thought. Which is kind of nice for a change. I’ve got music playing, good and loud, plenty of time for my makeup.

On my way to the bathroom, my foot bangs into my old Christmas stocking, which is still half-stuffed with things I haven’t gotten around to using yet. But instead of a bar of lavender soap or a still-wrapped toothbrush, a tube of glittery body lotion shoots out.

I’m kind of surprised. I don’t remember seeing that when I opened my stocking. It seems like a sign or something, so I open it up and rub a little bit on my arms and on the exposed part of my chest. It smells pretty. Looks nice too. Gives me a little bit of shimmer and shine. It’ll look good at the rink under those fancy lights they
have going for Teen Skate. I especially like how the Couples Only skate portion looks. Not only do they have the special lights on, but they dim all the lights as well. It’s really romantic.

Just thinking about it makes my belly race slightly. Maybe a cute guy will ask me to skate. “You never know,” I say to the mirror.

I try to smile that mysterious, come-hither sexy smile the models in the hair and makeup commercials do. You know, that sort of half smile they have. I think it looks a little better than the one I do when I’m not thinking about it. My natural one is all teeth. There’s nothing about my regular smile that would make anyone say, “Who is that girl?” I’ve been practicing a little bit. Not sure if I have it down right, though.

I apply a little blush, a brush of eye shadow, a dab of mascara, some lip-gloss. I brush my hair until it’s gleaming. Then I practice my smile one last time and give my hair a Charlie’s Angels toss.

That’s when my cell phone rings. It startles me. I almost don’t answer it for a second. I don’t know why. I just stare at it ringing on my counter. It’s got to be Lynn. She’s probably calling because she got here early and is out in front of my house. My phone rings again. I grab it quick before it diverts her to my message box.

“Hello?” I say, slightly breathless.

“Hey, Haley,” Lynn says, super cheerfully, which immediately makes me suspicious. “What are you doing?” she chirps.

“What do you think I’m doing? I’m getting ready. Actually, I’m pretty much ready right now. Where are you? Are you here already?” I ask even though I’m pretty sure she’s not. I can feel it in my gut.

There’s a pause on the other end of the line.

“Um...” Lynn says. “Haley?” She’s using that hesitant little-girl voice that might work on mothers and boys, but it definitely doesn’t work on me.

“Please don’t tell me you’re flaking out on me,” I say.

“It’s just...” She’s talking over me now, her words rushing out. “Chad called, and he wants me to go to a party with him. I mean, this is the first time he’s asked me out. Like to go somewhere...”

“You and Chad drove all over town yesterday after school.”

“But that doesn’t count!” Lynn interrupts. “Not really. That wasn’t like a date or anything. It just happened.”

“Well, what did you tell him?” Lynn doesn’t answer. “Did you tell him we already have plans?”

I hear Lynn clear her throat. “Not... exactly.”

“What did you say?” I already know. I want Lynn to have to say it out loud. Be truthful about the fact that this is the second day in a row that she’s blown me off for Chad.

“I said that I’d go to the party with him.” There is a silence now. Because really,
there’s not much else to say. I wait for a second or two more, in case Lynn decides that it would probably be nice if she invited me to go to the party with them. Since it is a party and not a date-date, like dinner for two. But she doesn’t. She just says, in an I’m-so-miserable-this-is-such-a-hard-choice voice, “I’m so sorry, Haley. I really like this guy, and it might be the only time he asks me out.”

“Whatever,” I say and hang up the phone. I catch my reflection in the mirror, all dressed up and nowhere to go. “Great. This is just great.”

I stomp out of the bathroom, flop on my bed. I wish I was a little kid again so I could bang my heels on the wall, over and over, wail my head off, until my mom came upstairs to see what was the matter. And then, after she’d comforted me, we’d go downstairs and make a big batch of sugar cookies. We’d use the heart-shaped cookie cutter, and she’d let me be in charge of sprinkling the red sugar crystals
on the top. I miss those days. When everything was simple. Thinking about it fills me with this odd sort of longing.

There’s a knock at my bedroom door. “Come in,” I say, half sitting up. Maybe Mom and I can go to the movies or something.

The door swings open, but it’s not Mom who steps inside. It’s Larry. He shuts the door behind him. My stomach drops.

“Haley...Haley...Haley,” he says.

I feel scared. Don’t know why. “What are you doing in my room?”

He doesn’t answer.

“Could you please get out of my room,” I say. I’m trying to sound polite, like this isn’t sort of freaking me out. “I’d like some privacy, please.”

He doesn’t leave.

“Where’s Mom? Mom!” I call. No answer.

He laughs, soft under his breath. “She can’t hear you. She went to the liquor store to pick up some Limoncella. I’m going to treat her to my famous lemon
drop martini. Maybe we’ll even let you have one.” He smiles. “If you behave.” He pushes away from the doorframe. “Nope, it’s just you and me, babe,” he says, sauntering toward me on the bed. “And you are looking real good.”

I get up off the bed two times in my head before my legs actually move me. I try to make it around him, but my feet slip, get tangled up in all the crap on my floor. It’s not enough to make me fall, but it’s that skid, that extra second of hesitation, that is my undoing. Suddenly, I’m falling to the floor. Falling, or was I pushed? I hit the ground hard. His body lands on mine. I try to get up, but I can’t get him off me. His body’s too heavy. Squashing me down. Can’t breathe.

“Get off!” I push at him hard, with both hands. The next thing I know, he’s pinned my hands over my head. I’m stunned how fast this guy can move.

“It seems that we’ve fallen,” he says, like he’s talking about the color of his necktie.

“Get
off
.” I can’t get free, no matter how hard I twist and turn.

“Hold still. Let me help you. You’re all tangled up in this stuff on the floor.” That’s what he says, but his hand is sliding under my top, pushing it up. I squeeze my eyes shut, trying not to cry. But I know what he’s doing. I can feel the cold air on my stomach first and then my breasts.

“Stop...
please
don’t!” But he’s touching them now, and I can’t get away.

“Oh yeah...You like that, don’t you.”

“No, I
don’t
.”

“Yes, you do. I hate to correct you, my dear, but you’re really quite wrong about that. I’ve never seen somebody so hot for me. But that’s okay. I’m a great believer in education.”

I try to twist my body out from under him, get away.

“Hold still, you bitch,” he says, his voice suddenly harsh. And it’s almost like I hear it before I feel it, his hand making contact with my face. My eyes fly open from the force of the impact.
But I don’t look at him. Anywhere but at him. I will not cry. I won’t give him the satisfaction. “You’re hot for me. You want me. It’s really quite disgusting, you coveting your mother’s boyfriend. But the truth is there.” His voice switches again, soft and reasonable. “I’m always one to support the truth.” He kisses me on the forehead. I feel his hand start to slide down.