For the Best (4 page)

“You really hurt your chances of getting
friendly with anyone decent by lunching with Della.”

I shrugged again. “What’s wrong with
Della?”

She ticked off her reasoning, “She’s fat,
slutty, a total loser.”

“Are these your deductions?”

“If the shoe fits.”

7
^th
Grade 6 years
earlier

I slipped in beside Tanner at the long
cafeteria tables. Now that we were in junior high we only had four
classes together. We’d hung around each other so long our
classmates just accepted that we sat together at lunch, on the bus
ride home, and sometimes got off or on the bus at each other’s
houses.

“Mrs. Ferrell put Benny in my cooking group
in home economics.” My tone conveyed my disgust.

“He likes you,” Tanner replied with a
shrug.

“No, he doesn’t. He likes being mean.” I
ignored Tanner’s comment. He said that about every boy who did
anything mean to a girl. I was just glad I wasn’t one of the girls
who had been pantsed recently. Peyton got her gym shorts pulled
down before PE and she had on Wednesday panties on Friday. She just
laughed it off. I could never do that.

“Yes, he does. He told me in shop class.” He
smiled and slipped me some grapes from his tray.

In the lunch room, Della and I chose a spot
near the window. Peripherally, I saw a table of classmates staring
pointedly at us.

“What do you think that is about?” Della
motioned with her head towards them.

“Does it matter?” Once it had, now all I saw
when I looked their way was teenage gossips.

The cafeteria chair on my left scraped as it
slid back. “You went to Sacred Academy, right?”

Is she asking or confirming?
She was
smug. I ignored her, didn’t answer.

“That yearly ritual thing, you look
familiar.”

I cringed. “There is no ritual thing. It’s
something the football team makes up to look cool.” I imagined the
images, the ones I wished I had never seen.

“Made up, huh? I heard they made the mistake
of posting it and the site was hit so many times it crashed,” I
watched the way her full mouth moved as she spoke. She would have
been a target.

I went back to my food. As if entitled to a
response, she harrumphed and followed with a hair toss on her
return to her gossiping clique.

I was all day dreamy and not in a good way
for the last three classes wanting to text Tanner about what
happened at lunch. We’d been together the last night at his house.
I’d wanted out of hell and would have slept most anywhere else.
When I’d left at 5 a.m. he was still in bed, flat on his back
wearing nothing but a frown.

When I got to my father’s residence, I snuck
back in my room. Gator was sleeping in my bed since I wasn’t. The
boxer pjs and tank top I drove home in seemed a bad choice. My face
was red and swollen from crying.

“What’s wrong?” Lainey asked. I wanted to
believe she cared.

“Nothing.”

I showered and dressed, made myself go to
school only to replay every moment of the time I’d just spent with
Tanner.

We’d gone to bed. In the safety of darkness,
I tried to broach the subject of Tanner’s cheating. “Do I still
turn you on?”

“You turn me inside out you turn me on so
bad,” he whispered and mistook my question as an invitation. He
scooted closer and spooned me up against the wall I was pivoted
toward. He reached across me to pull my hand from my stomach,
unclenched my fist and linked us together, palm against palm.

I began to shudder as I cried. “Sshhh...It’s
going to be okay,” he whispered in the dark.

I flopped over so we were front to front. I
could see my mom, or at least her urn. I’d given it to Tanner for
safe keeping. I didn’t feel comfortable leaving it in the storage
unit and it seemed cruel to take my mom’s remains to the place her
husband and his mistress resided. We’d spread some of her in the
ocean from his surfboard not long after her death. I didn’t
disperse all of her that day.

“I decided where I’m spreading the rest of
her.”

“Where?” he asked softly kissing my
neck.

“Glacier, Montana.”

“Why there?” he mumbled.

“Because we went there on a family trip the
first time she got sick. We stayed at this Swiss looking lodge in
the park. On our last night, Mom got very quiet and reflective as
she looked through the digital images on the camera of our trip.
Then she turned to us and said, ‘Long after everyone is gone, and
life has removed any trace of us from this place it will still be
here. I want to be here too.’”

He pulled me closer. There were no gaps
between our bodies. We made love. Once again I betrayed myself.

Hanna

Another morning in hell, I readied for
school. From the kitchen, I heard the shower come on upstairs and
five minutes later Lainey joined me helping herself to a bowl of
Fruit Loops.

“Where are the rents?” she asked.

“Still in bed.”

“You look much better than yesterday,” she
said as she studied me.

“It’s the booze and pills.”

“You would know.” She dug at my vulnerable
spot.

“Thanks.”

The smell of fruity vitamins wafted off the
multi-colored circles in my bowl. I looked up and held her
gaze.

My dad came in, smiled and kissed my cheek.
An involuntary sob welled up in my throat and water pooled in my
eyes. He backed away, rubbing a hand over his mess of dark
hair.

The ice queen he married shortly followed
lighting up his blue eyes in her wake. Through my tears, I studied
her closely. My mom’s brown hair had glints of gold, her hazel eyes
were warm and inviting, her skin - when she hadn’t been ill - was
the color of a golden tan that she maintained without the sun. She
was a vision. His new wife did not compare.

Dad attempted to fuse us together. “How
about dinner and a movie tonight?”

Plans were made, as if I could overcome what
had happened between us and become a part of his newly blended
family.

When I came out of the bathroom at Del Taco,
I saw the back of someone’s dark head talking to my dad. I froze as
I met Tanner’s eyes.

He rose. “Hi Hanna,” Tanner greeted me.

I hesitated then managed to reply, “Hi.”

The booth was a half moon. I slid into the
spot next to Lainey. Tanner followed on the outside.

“What dorm did you sign up for?” I realized
Lainey was talking to Tanner, amiably.

“I haven’t yet.” She was smiling the look of
an interested girl as he answered. Tanner seemed to magnetize my
enemies. “We put in for the same co-ed one. Different floors of
course.” He squeezed my shoulder.

I watched Tanner look across the room. My
stomach churned in a horrible way not due to bad Mexican food. Two
lecherous smiles were aimed in my direction, without batting an eye
I pushed Tanner towards them. “I think your friends are trying to
get your attention.”

Tanner

Hanna…something was off with her. Something
besides her catching me having dinner with two guys she hated,
Didge and Benny.

“Who was that with Hanna?” Didge asked.

“Her stepsister.”

“Hot.”

“Not even close to as smokin’ as Hanna,
though,” Benny spoke the words I should have.

“Yep, I bet there are guys lined up at her
new school waiting to get with your girlfriend,” Didge joked.

I clammed up on that one. Blind, I was not.
I saw the same girl they did, but I was the only one with
privileges. I knew damn well I was the only one.

Like so many times before I’d climbed up the
trellis on her house to talk. That particular night Hanna had snuck
some bottled booze from her parent’s stash. She had two, I guzzled
three. We had been talking – about school, Trevor, my parents -
when we grew silent listening to an argument between her own.

“Why don’t you want me?”

“I do. It’s just I’m tired.” Her dad’s voice
deepened.

“You’ve been tired for two months.”

“Well, nagging me about sex doesn’t exactly
turn me on.”

“I’m in remission. I finally feel good about
myself. I just think it’s odd that you don’t want what most other
men want.”

We could hear him sigh.

When her mom spoke again, it sounded
strangled, definitely like she was crying, “It seems to happen
every five years. The first time it was that incident when I found
that secret credit card you were using to dial 900 numbers for sex
talk. The second time you hooked up with that woman you worked
with.”

“I did not.” His tone of offense sounded
false.

“The counselor even said that men do not
whisper and laugh late into the night on phone conversations that
are innocent.”

“I develop a platonic relationship with a
female work buddy and you get all insecure.”

“She fucking told me you were like her work
husband. Women don’t say shit like that to the wife of a guy she
secretly calls in the dark.”

Hanna’s mom rarely swore, at least not
around us. I felt Hanna stiffen in bed beside me. I wanted to crawl
away, take her with me and not let her dysfunctional parents ruin
our innocence. Trapped in bed with the girl I wanted to be my
girlfriend. I stayed put.

“So who is she?”

“Who?”

“The woman this time.”

“I think your meds are making you
paranoid.”

“I’m not paranoid. Ask any man or woman out
there. A husband who won’t sleep with his wife more than four times
a year is getting it on the side.”

“I just have a low sex drive.”

At fifteen, I had an erection several times
a day. I wondered if this low sex drive thing was something that
hit all men his age.

“You’re really hurting me.” Those were the
last words her mom said.

Hanna got up and raised her window
disappearing over the ledge. We snuck off to the beach.

“Are you scared about going to high school?”
I whispered just to say something. We were going from junior high
seventh through ninth to the big leagues. My parents chose a
private school for tenth through twelfth grades. Lucky for me Hanna
and a lot of our other friends were following.

“A little,” she answered. “How about
you?”

“Terrified. Sophomores are like the bottom
of the barrel. I’m afraid of getting picked on, I’m afraid of hard
classes, I’m afraid to grow up.”

“You’ve got a 4.0. Hard classes are not
difficult for you.” She smiled over at me.

“Keep smiling. You’re all grown up, Hanna.
At least the guys think you are. What if you were me? It’s like I
still look thirteen.”

“Please, like that matters. You can date
younger girls. I’ll date older boys. We’ll make fun of them all on
our weekly movie night.” Hanna and I only had a study hall and
lunch together. This was a big departure from having a bunch of
classes together since 7
^th
grade, and all day together
before.

“Are you going to ditch me in high school
Hanna?” I asked.

The boardwalk creaked as we walked on the
aging wood. When we hit the sand, we headed south where the homes
were sparse and people were few.

There was a bonfire on the beach in the
distance. Noise and smoke filled the air. We were at a stretch
along the shore where there were houses being built, perched up in
the sand dunes, at a height the owners considered safe from tidal
surges. I started to slow down.

“Do you want to rest?” Hanna asked and the
lights around me were just orbs in her hazel eyes. The moon was
full, and glowed across the ocean before it broke light on cresting
waves.

“Yeah, maybe a minute.” I took off my shirt
and laid it on the sand. We plopped down missing grace replaced by
alcohol. “So you didn’t answer me. Are you going to ditch me in
high school Hanna?” I asked again.

“How can you ask me that? What if you find
some cool guys to hang out with, are you going to ditch your best
friend because I’m a girl?” she slurred.

“If you weren’t a girl this would be
easier,” I mumbled.

“Why?” she asked seeming not to
understand.

“It just would,” I muttered.

We both sighed. I mustered all my courage,
leaned in slowly and let her lips meet mine. As our tongues danced
together, a heady rush began to flow between our bodies. The
pressure of the kiss changed. Sounds of the night grew louder -
waves crashing on the beach, a dog barking in a distant
neighborhood, echoing voices of a party long forgotten. We rolled
around on the sand drunken with new sexual courage.

She let my hands explore her, under her
shirt, beneath her waistband. Her fingers tightly circled my wrist
as I maneuvered my fingers within her, her shorts sliding from her
bottoms in the process. I moved over her, aching to be between her
legs.

She struggled, the friction only adding to
my desire. My board shorts were untied - lowered. Gripping her hips
in my hands, I ground and pushed. On a strangled gasp, I let my
pelvis thrust her into the giving sand. Quick spasms rocked my
body.

I rolled off her. Me – embarrassed, her –
unreadable, we didn’t meet the other’s eyes as we yanked and clawed
to right our clothes as if that action could rewind what had just
occurred.

She rose. Her breath rasped as she began to
walk, as if tears were blocking her airway. Stumbling after her, I
followed close behind.

The dark, sandy access path back threatened
me. As the prickly sensation of fronds of palmettos brushed my
legs, and animals scurried in the brush the realization of what I’d
done registered.

We emerged on the sidewalk that led us away
from the sound of the waves, across the six lanes of A1A. I walked
her home, never touching or talking. In her yard, she climbed up
her trellis to the still open window and disappeared without a
word.