Flirting With Maybe (7 page)

Ryan took her in his arms and kissed her temple. She put her arms around his waist and relaxed into him. During sweet moments like this Ryan felt happy, like maybe they could make it work. He let his fingers slip under her shirt and press against her cool, smooth skin. When his hand rounded her waist, she pulled away.

“Stop, Ryan. You know I hate that.”

Crap. Her “sensitive area.” It was ridiculous.

“What? You hate when I touch you?”

“I don’t like when you touch my stomach and . . . love handles.”

Ryan snorted and rolled his eyes. He couldn’t help it.

“It’s not funny!” she yelled.

So much for their sweet moment.

“Babe.” He reached for her, but she pushed his hand away. “You do
not
have love handles. How many times do I have to tell you that your body is perfect? Do you think I’d try to touch your stomach if it was so repulsive?”

She looked as if she might cry. “You don’t understand.”

No, he didn’t. He sighed and looked down at his letter from the University of Virginia.

“This isn’t gonna last, is it?” Michelle asked. She’d wrapped her hands around her belly and stared at the letters, too.

Ryan didn’t answer, because he didn’t know. And in his silence, she picked up her purse and left.

Ryan and Michelle didn’t break up, but their relationship was teetering at the edge of a cliff. Tension from the anticipated drop surrounded them constantly. After baseball games, Michelle got mad when Ryan was reluctant to kiss her or hold her hand in front of the guys. He eventually gave in to her glares and watery eyes, and dealt with the jibes from his teammates. At moments like that his mind wandered to Brooke; she’d always understood how it was between the guys.

Their season was as great as everyone expected. They took the state title in one of the best moments of Ryan’s life. He and Jake were saying bye to the girls and just about to board the bus for the two-hour trip home when Ryan’s phone dinged. He’d expected to see a message from his mom, who’d just left, but when he saw Brooke’s name his hand shook.

Congrats, Ry!!! Wish I could’ve been there!

“Brooke?” Michelle was leaning over, reading it, and he closed the message box. “Why’s she writing you?”

“’Cause she’s his friend, duh,” Jake answered. He kissed Sarah good-bye and punched Ryan in the arm before climbing on the bus.

Michelle’s face had gone stony. “How often do you talk to her?”

“Never,” Ryan said. “Not since last year. I swear.”

He could feel the eyes of everyone on the bus watching them, and then Coach leaned over and honked the horn.

“Gotta go,” Ryan said. He gave her a quick kiss on the cheek before jumping on the bus with relief. He dropped into the seat next to Jake.

“Dude,” Jake said with a sigh. “Michelle can be a bitch when she wants to, huh?”

Ryan tensed. “Don’t call her that, man. It’s my fault anyway.”

Jake shrugged and didn’t ask what Ryan meant. The whole bus celebrated their win, getting loud and rowdy. For the first time ever their coach didn’t bellow at them to sit down and shut the hell up.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

A
fter graduation, Ryan and Michelle went to a party together at Brian’s house, J.J.’s brother, who thankfully was nothing like his older sibling. Ryan was actually happy to see J.J. and Steve again, along with some of the older guys he used to play ball with.

“Get the hell outta here!” J.J. shouted when Ryan walked in. “The Kid’s all grown up and shit!”

Ryan almost laughed when he saw J.J.’s tight T-shirt that said
I LOVE BOOBIES
, and the gut he’d grown, but he thought better of it. They all drank beer and talked about their stats for the season while a Nats game played on TV. Michelle went outside to smoke cigarettes with her friends, a new habit she’d picked up, which he hated.

Ryan’s neck tightened when J.J. mentioned Jackie might come to the party. Ryan chugged his whole beer and felt a little calmer. He really didn’t want to talk about Brooke to Jackie this time. His head was screwed up enough as it was. Michelle came back into the room and squeezed onto the couch next to him. She leaned forward and tried to kiss him, but he got a big whiff of pungent nastiness and pulled away.

“What’s your problem?” she asked.

“You smell like smoke.”

“I’m chewing gum. God, what do you want me to do? I’m bored to death in here.” She sat back heavily on the couch. Ryan got up to get another beer.

He stood in the kitchen and watched Brian and J.J. having a chugging contest. J.J. won, slamming down his can on the table and squeezing out a loud burp.

“I’ll be damned!” J.J. said, looking past Ryan. “Look who’s here!”

Ryan heard the front door squeak open. He didn’t have to turn around to feel her presence. The whole room lit up at the sound of Brooke’s and Jackie’s laughter as they entered. Everyone in the kitchen stood and moved toward the entrance to greet them, but Ryan had gone to stone with shock. His hands and feet tingled. He stared down into the kitchen sink for a moment, then tilted back the rest of his beer.

The kitchen was loud and crowded now. But he could hear her voice. “Steve, oh my God! How are you?” He imagined her passing around those big hugs where she rocked you back and forth before releasing you. Ryan took a deep breath before turning around. Ryan was inches taller than most of the crowd, and eye level with the tallest of the guys there. He could see her across the room. When her eyes met his and widened, he felt split open, exposed to his core. They stared at each other through all the commotion. Her hair was shorter and blonder, lying on her shoulders. She wore makeup on her eyes and dark lipstick. He stood there, dumb, as she pushed through the kitchen, ran up, and threw her arms around his neck, laughing.

“Ry! Oh, my gosh! I’ve missed you! Look at you!” She pulled back and grabbed his biceps. “You’ve gotten some big ole muscles.” Her eyes were shining.

“You look . . . great,” he managed to say. “How long you home for?”

“Just the weekend. My summer class starts on Monday.”

She grinned and hugged him again. Ryan felt a hard tap on his shoulder. He pulled away from Brooke to find Michelle glaring at him. Having both girls this close was like some intergalactic crash of worlds or something. He’d never felt so awkward and uncomfortable in his life.

“Hey, Sarah!” Brooke said.

“I’m Michelle.”

“Oh.” Brooke blanched, stepping farther away from Ryan. “Sorry.”

“Are you ready to go?” Michelle asked Ryan. He wanted to believe he was a good guy. An honorable guy, but at that moment, when it came to Michelle, he knew he’d never done right by her, and this would be yet another of those failures.

“It’s only eleven,” he said, scratching his neck. Michelle turned to Brooke.

“Do you mind if I talk to my boyfriend
alone
?”

Brooke raised her eyebrows at Ryan and said, “Sure,” before turning away from the couple. She stepped over to the table where shots of cheap liquor were being lined up.

“Ryan!” Michelle’s stern voice made him tear his eyes away from Brooke. “Are you leaving with me or not?”

“Michelle, please . . . I haven’t seen these people in a really long time.”

“In two months you won’t be seeing a lot of me either,” she said.

“I know, but . . .” He wondered why Brooke was wearing so much makeup. Michelle began to rub her knee up his leg and then press herself against him.
Whoa.
She never got feisty in public.

“Let’s go upstairs,” she whispered.

The awkwardness and bad timing of everything made him grind out the words, “Not right now.”

Michelle pouted. “Sometimes I really don’t know why we’re together, Ry.”

“Don’t call me Ry.” His tone made her pull away and his mouth popped open to say something apologetic. He’d never spoken so harshly to her before.

“Forget it. I’m leaving.” She stomped away. From the doorway, Michelle jangled her keys and shouted. “Bye, Ryan!”

She slammed the door behind her. He felt everyone’s eyes. His pulse pounded and he shifted his feet.

Shit.

He went after her.

She must have known he would, because she was standing on the porch with her arms crossed when he ran out. He stopped in front of her.

Michelle’s bottom lip quivered. “What’s happening to us, Ryan?”

Ryan knew he needed to finally grow some balls and man up. He couldn’t keep doing this to her. Or himself.

“It’s not working,” he said. The words sounded foreign and lame.

“You’re breaking up with me?” she whispered.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t want to hurt you, Michelle. But I’m not the right guy for you. I don’t think I can change. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to love you the way you deserve and make you happy.”

“What did I do wrong?” she asked.

“Nothing. Absolutely nothing.”

Ryan held his breath as he held her eyes and waited. One tear fell. Then a second. She swiped them away and choked out, “I need Sarah.”

He nodded and went back in the house, pushing his way through until he found Sarah out back with a cigarette. She stomped it out when she saw his face.

“She needs you,” Ryan says.

“You finally broke up?” Sarah asked.

The words jolted him like a punch. Ryan nodded. He followed her back through the house, but when they got to the front door Sarah turned and stopped him with her palm to his sternum.

“You’re done. I got this.” The stern look she gave him showed that she understood, even if she wasn’t happy.

“Are you taking her home?” he asked.

She gave a terse nod and reached for the doorknob.

He stepped back to let the door close. A sour sense of loss and finality settled in his belly, mixing with the guilt and wonder of a sweet presence in the room behind him. Looks of pity flickered over him as he turned, but none more sympathetic than Brooke’s. He swallowed and pulled off his baseball cap, running his hand through his flattened hair before sliding the hat back down on his head and low over his eyes.

“You okay, man?” Steve asked.

Ryan could only shrug and try not to stare at Brooke, who hadn’t looked away from him. He was more aware of her than he’d ever been of anything in his life. He hated himself, because with each second that passed, his sadness over ending his first relationship became less and less of what took up his heart.

J.J. wrapped a long arm around Ryan’s neck and handed him another beer, which he really didn’t need. “It’s all good, Kid. Welcome back to singlehood.” J.J. clinked their bottles together, and people in the room finally began to return to their previous conversations.

Ryan put the bottle to his lips, but didn’t drink. His body felt strange—numb and heavy inside but buzzing on the surface. He sensed Brooke walking around the table and coming to him as J.J. let him go and went to hassle one of the high school girls.

He couldn’t bring himself to look at her.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Yeah.”

“She’s not mad at you for talking to me, is she?”

“Nah. We’ve been having problems. The whole college thing, y’know? It’s not your fault.”

Brooke studied him, taking him in with her eyes.

“Man . . .” She stared up at him. “Even your voice has changed. I have to look up at you now.”

Her attention gave him a rush.

“I was always a little taller than you,” he said.

“Yeah, but now you’re like . . . I don’t know.”

For a second she seemed almost shy, and it filled Ryan with masculine pride.

“Wanna take a shot with me?” she asked.

“Just one. I haven’t decided if I’m staying the night or driving later.”

“You should stay,” she said, pouring the clear liquid into a Dixie cup and handing it to him. “It’s been too long.”

It
had
been too long, Ryan thought, but with the comfortable ease between them, it was as if no time had passed. Their eyes met and locked as they threw back their shots. It burned like liquid fire and Ryan coughed, which made Brooke laugh. He hadn’t had hard liquor since the night of his birthday when he’d gotten drunk and called her. The memory brought heat to his cheeks.

Jackie came over and grabbed Brooke by the arm. “We’re playing cards. I need a partner.”

Brooke looked at Ryan as if asking permission, filling him once again with that masculine pride of ownership, which he had no right to feel.

“Go on,” he told her, nodding toward the table.

“Come with,” she said. Her smile was sweet, and Ryan sensed she didn’t want to be any farther from him than he wanted to be from her. So he was content to sit back and watch.

The party grew as the night went on, and Brooke continued to drink. Ryan had counted eight, which he thought was a lot for a girl, but Brooke stayed upright. She’d gotten louder and was laughing a lot more. Still, she seemed the most sober in the group. Jackie had already slid out of her chair during one laugh attack, and J.J. was a slobbering mess.

At two in the morning people started clearing out.

J.J.’s little brother, Brian, pulled out the couch bed and people piled on. Jackie curled up in a recliner and passed out.

Brooke’s eyes drooped slightly, but were otherwise clear as she smiled up at Ryan.

“I’m not ready to sleep yet,” she told him.

His heart beat a little faster.

Brian must have heard because as he passed them he said, “Y’all can hang in the basement.”

Ryan peered around the room. The last thing he wanted was some rumor to get back to Michelle that he’d gone off with another girl the same night they broke up, but nobody was paying attention.

Brooke followed Ryan down the wooden steps to the unfinished basement. It was mostly used for storage, but one corner had an area rug on the concrete with an old couch and a television for playing video games.

Ryan flopped onto the squeaky couch and was surprised when Brooke leaned heavily against him with her head on his shoulder. The slump of her body showed him she was drunker than she’d let on upstairs.