Going Under (9 page)

She smiled and said, “I completely agree.”

I heard the slam of a textbook onto the floor, causing Gretchen to jump. She turned around, her eyes shooting daggers at Claire and said, “Clumsy much?”

Claire glared at her and said, “Slutty much?” in retaliation.

“News flash, Claire...a chastity belt is not a fashion statement,” she laughed.

Claire narrowed her eyes and said, “At least my right leg doesn’t miss my left leg because they haven’t seen each other in so long.”

Gretchen sneered as she said, “Contrary to what you may believe, Claire, being a prude is not a virtue.”

“Gretchen, the smartest thing to ever come out of your mouth is a guy’s...”

“Whoa, Claire!” Henderson interrupted, causing us all to realize the entire class was being entertained by their exchange of insults.

Mrs. Bishop, oblivious to the free show in her class, began teaching and I tried to concentrate on her lecture, but I couldn’t stop analyzing the motive behind Claire’s verbal attack on Gretchen. Did she dislike her that much or was there more to it? Could she really be jealous?

When class ended, Claire was the first one out the door, with Henderson closely behind her. In her absence, I was left with little reason to talk with Gretchen, except for the fact that I had made a date with her.

“What time do you want to pick me up?” she asked.

I quickly considered how I might get out of this being like a real date and said, “I have somewhere to be early Saturday morning, so I’ll probably have to leave early. Why don’t I meet you there?”

She cozied up to me, rubbing her breasts against my arm as she explained, “I’m more than alright with leaving the party early.”

“I might have to leave really early and I wouldn’t want to ruin your good time, so it’s probably best to meet there.”

She frowned at that idea, obviously disappointed, but said, “Okay, I guess that will work.”

As I walked away, she said, “Do you know how to get to Harrison’s place?”

I pretended the detail slipped my mind as I dumbly said, “Oh, yeah, I guess I need directions,” but it would have been fine with me to skip the whole thing and feign ignorance when we returned to school on Monday.

When she finished giving me directions to the party, she told me to meet her there at eight, and although I agreed, it was still up in the air if I would show or not. We both knew what her intentions were and I wasn’t left with the impression that she planned a reunion between her left and right leg tonight and I wasn’t interested in a girl that had seen more ceilings than Michelangelo.

I walked down the hall considering if the mess I had gotten myself into with Gretchen was worth Claire’s possible jealousy or not when I ran into Dane in the hall. We bumped fists as he said, “Hey, Boone, are you coming to Harrison’s bonfire tonight?”

“I’m supposed to go with Gretchen, but I’m not sure I’m going to make it.”

“You should come. Harrison says that there’s going to be plenty of beer.”

I thought of the repercussions of not showing. “Gretchen would probably be pissed if I don’t show since I kind of asked her to be my date.”

“Dude, I was going to warn you about messing with Claire to make Forbes mad, but if you come with Gretchen, then I know you won’t have time to cause trouble because your hands will be full, literally.”

I was in if Claire was going to be there. “Are you positive Claire will be there?”

“Of course, she’ll be there,” he promised. “We’re using her car for the music because she has a custom sound system.”

Bonfires with beer and bumping sound systems didn’t strike me as things of interest to Claire, so I guess there was a lot I didn’t know about her. “I changed my mind. I’m going.”

“Awesome, but do I have to ask who the persuading factor is?” he laughed.

“I’m fairly certain you can guess who the persuading factor is, but I’ll give you one clue; it’s not the girl with more pricks than a secondhand dartboard.”

“Would it do any good to ask you to not start anything with Forbes?”

“I don’t have the intention of fighting Forbes,” I promised. “But if I want to talk to Claire and she wants to talk to me, no one is going to stop us.”

“Good to hear you are at least considering her feelings these days.”

“I shouldn’t have said what I did about her, but never fear I didn’t get mine because the old saying is true; hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. Frankly, I’m not sure she’s finished with me yet, but I’m ready to find out.”

“Please, be careful. Forbes and his posse still haven’t made good on their plan to take you out and there’s only a week left until the first game. Don’t do anything to push the envelope tonight,” Dane pleaded.

“I’ve told you I’m not afraid of them and I’m repeating myself when I tell you that I’ve lived through more than Forbes Henderson can dish out.”

“And I’ve told you Forbes doesn’t play by the rules, so I guess this point we’ve reached is called an impasse.”

“An impasse it is,” I agreed.

12 All The Right Buttons

Claire

What was wrong with me? I acted like a complete imbecile when Jessie gave the sexual butterfly a little bit of attention and the worst part of it wasn’t that I was afraid Forbes saw right through me-it was that I was afraid Jessie didn’t.

Spending time with him today only confirmed the intense, undeniable attraction I felt toward him. Even if this was a game I was playing, I thought the attraction was mutual, but then he asked another girl out on a date while rubbing it all up in my face.

The boundaries of this game I was playing was becoming increasingly unclear to me. The thought of Gretchen trying to use Jessie as her next screwvenir was making me crazy, but the thought of him saying yes left me with an even worse feeling and then it registered. I didn’t want him to want her because I wanted him to want me.

The whole thing was whacked because I had a boyfriend and not just any boyfriend-a long term boyfriend my parents basically hand picked for me. Forbes Henderson was everything they wanted for me.

What did I really even know about Jessie Boone? He came from Collinsville, which meant he was probably poor. If his prior address didn’t prove it, his junked out truck did. His family was probably uneducated, which meant they most likely didn’t encourage him to succeed. I bet he’d be the first person in his family to graduate from high school.

And how could I be attracted to a smoker? I had always found it to be so nasty and skanky, but something about the way he held a cigarette between his thumb and index finger when he put it to the side of his full lips was so incredibly sexy. What was wrong with me? I wished he smelled like smoke because I could find that unappealing, but he didn’t. His fragrance was clean and masculine, yet woodsy, and it made me want to lean in closer for a deeper smell.

It would be Gretchen enjoying the way he smelled tonight, not me. In fact, I was sure she would be wearing his fragrance all over her entire body before the night was over.

Fourth period zoomed by and when the bell rang, I realized I had spent the entire class thinking about Jessie and how he would spend the evening with his date. I did the same thing in last period and when the bell rang, I practically ran to meet Payton at my locker.

“Payton, are you ready to go?” I pleaded. “I really need to get out of here.”

She stood carelessly at her locker while I was dying. “I’m ready. Do you still need me to drive you by the dealership to pick up your car?”

“Yeah, we’re using it for the music tonight at the bonfire.”

“Love it,” she sang. “That means we get to pick the music.”

I waited forever while Payton grabbed the things she needed from her locker and we walked to her car, meeting up with Jessie on the walk to her car.

“Hey, Claire, will I be seeing you at the bonfire?” Jessie asked, with a smirk on his face, almost like he knew the anxiety he was causing me.

I wanted to give him a simple reply, but just like the day we met, I felt the words forming on my tongue and I was powerless to control what rolled off next. “Well, I guess that all depends.”

“On what?” he laughed.

“If you spend the whole night screwing Gretchen then you won’t see me at all, but if you only spend part of the night screwing her, then you might get to see me the free part of the night.” The minute I started talking, I realized how jealous and rude I sounded, but it was too late because it was out there. Shit. I couldn’t even look at him now.

“Have I done something wrong, Claire?” he asked, all innocent like.

I shook my head and looked away from him as I regretfully answered, “No. You haven’t done anything wrong.” And he hadn’t because we had no relationship and he didn’t have any type of obligation to me. He was free to be with whom ever he wanted and I wasn’t.

“Like you said, I won’t see you if I decide to screw Gretchen all night, so in case I do that, let me tell you now to have a great time,” he antagonized. I wasn’t sure if he realized the effect of his words on me, but I strongly suspected he did and that’s why he was pushing me so hard.

I couldn’t speak for fear I might vomit. He knew all the right buttons to push to make me furious, jealous and nauseated at the same time.

Payton and I got in her car and she said, “Claire, he wants you to ask him to ditch Gretchen. It’s so obvious.”

She was so obsessed with the plan, but she failed to see the effect he had on me. I looked over at him waiting in his truck parked next to us. I wanted to get out and scream at him to not be with Gretchen tonight. When he looked at me, I knew he was waiting on me and all I had to do was say the words for him to dump her.

I put my hand on the door handle nervously, but hesitated as my heart was beating out of my chest. If I walked over to him right now, I was a goner for sure because I was no longer thinking strategy.

I closed my eyes and said, “Just go.”

“You’re blowing the plan, Claire. What is wrong with you?”

I couldn’t open my eyes to look at him. “I just need you to get me out of here. Now.”

Payton couldn’t make heads nor tails of my reaction. I played it off like I got nervous about the plan because I was afraid he would see it on my face. I told her I still wanted to go through with it so I wouldn’t tip her off as to how I was really feeling.

After I spent the afternoon on the edge of hysterics, I picked Payton up and drove toward Harrison’s, listening as she explained the change in our plan. “I’ve thought of a way to salvage the plan. If he’s going to the bonfire with Gretchen then he plans to get laid tonight, but I’ve come up with a plan to keep him from getting any action. I call it The Coitus Hiatus.”

Payton could be on to something. I liked the sound of that plan.

“You get him to think about being with you by telling him that you’re into him but you need some time to think about the situation with Forbes. The Coitus Hiatus maneuver comes into play when you tell him that he can forget about anything between the two of you if he touches Gretchen’s slide to unlock button because you don’t do The Penivore’s leftovers.”

Damn, this girl was good, but there could be one flaw.

“What if I don’t see him before he gets with Gretchen? That slut puppy is fast.”

“We’ll get there first, so you have to make sure you get to him before she has a chance to drop her panties.”

“I don’t mean to insult your skills of deception by asking, but can you keep Forbes occupied while I talk to him?” I asked.

“Not a problem. I can keep Forbes and all of his pals tied up with the funnel for a while. In fact, I could probably get Forbes to funnel a few beers so you can be free the rest of the night if you want me to,” she suggested.

Payton with a funnel and a crowd of guys was dangerous business because she had a way of getting guys to do anything she wanted. “I don’t need you to kill them with alcohol poisoning. Just keep them busy for a little while.”

“You know I can’t stand Forbes, so we’ll see, but it’s a fact that I can’t be charged with anything if he does it himself. Either way, I’ve got you covered,” she promised.

“Thanks, I think.”

We were some of the first ones to arrive because we were in charge of the music and we saw that Harrison’s brother had come through with the kegs as promised and I didn’t know who was more pleased with the presence of alcohol-me or Forbes and Cooper.

I looked around, but didn’t see Gretchen or Jessie and Payton said, “Relax, it’s still early. They won’t get here until a little later, so you’ve got plenty of time.”

“Got time for what?” Forbes asked as he came up from behind to wrap his arms around me. He leaned around and kissed my neck and I felt nothing exciting when he touched me. If I was being honest with myself, I never had. When we were apart, I didn’t long to be with him and that fact told me everything I needed to know about my relationship with him.

I wondered what my parents would think if I broke up with Forbes. I hadn’t really dated other guys, so they had never had the opportunity to dislike anyone I chose for myself.

Forbes handed a red plastic cup filled with beer my way. “Here, let’s get this party started.”