Just For You (18 page)

"Cameron? Where's Cameron in the house tonight?"

The crowd began to look around, trying to find him. They would know him by the obvious deer-in-headlights look they all knew he would be wearing.

"He's a little shy," Imogen spoke into her microphone. "Allow me."

He watched, rooted in place, as she came down the few stairs and made her way to him in a straight line. He wanted to run. His mind was screaming at him to run, but his legs were heavy and his feet felt as if they were anchored to the floor, or as if they grew up from the floor and there was no way for him to pull them up.

If she thought she was going to get him up there she was sadly and sorely mistaken.

The smile she wore made him irate.

"No. No, no, no, no. Before you come any further, no." Cameron held both of his palms up toward her. Finally he was able to move, and he did so, spinning around so that his back was facing her and he rested his weight on his elbows against the bar.

"Don't be such a wet blanket, Cameron. It's fun!"

"My idea of fun does not involve me getting up in front of a bunch of drunk strangers and screeching out some song that no one really gives a shit about in the first place."

Imogen laughed and put her hand on the back of his arm. "You're being overly melodramatic right now. Is it literally going to kill you to do this?"

"Yes," he turned to her. "Yes, it is. It will kill me. I will step foot up there and drop dead right in front of all your eyes. Do you really want to have that on your conscious? Knowing you killed a man?"

She laughed harder this time, throwing her head back.

"Is he coming?" The DJ asked. For the first time, Cameron noticed that the attention of every single person in that bar was on him. He felt his knees go weak and quiver underneath him.

Soon his name was being chanted. Softly and quietly at first, the word evolved to something larger and much more intimidating with every syllable, until it became a drumming
thump thump thump
which imitated the rhythm of Cameron's own heart. His throat was dry and constricted, his palms damp, his head hot.

Her hand was around his wrist and she was pulling him from the barstool. He went easily, without a fight. His only defense was that he was stunned; if he had been in his right, sober state of mind he would have fought back much harder, he told himself.

"You can do it." Cameron felt Imogen's arm snake up his back, coming to rest on the top of his shoulder, close to his neck. She squeezed him there, for reassurance, as she spoke in his ear. "Just picture everyone in their underwear. We're all here to have a good time, and as long as you have fun, they'll have fun."

The lights were in his eyes. Though conversation buzzed all around him, Cameron was deaf to it. The silence he heard in its place was deafening. The few faces he could see, at his feet, were dark in contrast to the blinding light shining on him from above. There was a murmur in his ears; they felt as if they were attempting to adjust to a pressure change, needing a pop for relief. He looked over at Imogen, not daring now to take his eyes from her. Smiling, she handed him a microphone, and without even knowing he was doing it, Cameron took it in his hands.

I hate you,
he mouthed to her. She only laughed in response.

The music started up and Cameron missed his queue. Imogen sang her part, catching his eyes with her own. She motioned for him to sing, but all he could do was swallow in an attempt to rid himself of the grating, dry cotton feeling in his mouth.

Fearing the crowd would turn on them, Imogen laughed and told the crowd to encourage him. They clapped along to the rhythm and he could hear shouts from people he didn't know. His mother's voice was suddenly near, at his feet. He looked down and she was smiling up at him, with her hand on the tip of his shoe.

"Sing, Cameron! Sing!"

He knew he had two choices. One, he could refuse to play along, and walk off the stage right then and there. He could run out the door and make an ass of himself. Or two, he could stay there, sing along, and attempt to have a good time. He knew Imogen was counting on him to do the former, proving to herself and Cameron that he was as uptight as he seemed. Well, she wasn't going to win. He would have to embarrass himself completely, but then again, he thought, no pain, no gain.

Wide-eyed, he looked at Imogen again. Lifting the microphone to his lips took colossal effort, but somehow he managed.

"S-s-she swam by me…"

At his lull in the words, Imogen's eyes lit up and her mouth visibly dropped. Breath rushed out audibly from Cameron's mouth into the microphone and she nodded her head at him, telling him to go on.

"She…ha- she had a cramp." The words were spoken, not sung, but Imogen lifted her arms in the air anyway and laughed with triumph. The crowd followed.

"He swam by me," she sang, making her way over to Cameron and placing her arm across his shoulders. "Got my suit da-amp."

Cameron stumbled to the left when Imogen bumped him with her hips.

"I saved her life, she nearly drowned."

"He showed off, splashin' around!"

Everything blended together in front of Cameron. Soon he could no longer make out individual objects, or people. Words and phrases had no meaning- sound fell together in a mixing bowl and created something indiscernible and new. The only thing he concentrated on were the lyrics he was expected to sing next and the weight of Imogen's arm around him.

She was with him, right beside him, helping him along.

To his surprise, he actually had fun, and to her surprise, she was finally able to coax Cameron out of his shell.

* * * *

Imogen sat at the vanity dresser in her guest bedroom, brushing her hair. She was smiling to herself, going over every single moment from that night. It was currently one am, but she wasn't aware of the time. She wasn't aware that she and Cameron were leaving his parents' house that afternoon, or that she wasn't packed at all. She couldn't have told you the date, or the day, or possibly even her name. Before her eyes, she didn't see her reflection. She barely noticed that she was even in the act of brushing her hair. Her mind was filled with moments from earlier: the moment Cameron started to dance while up on the stage, of his own accord, no less; the moment that glorious, blinding smile made its way to his face when the song ended. Imogen could say with all honesty that she had never before seen a smile more beautiful than the one with which he awarded her after it was all over. The fact that she was the one who put it there made her beam from the inside out.

He even took her hand, helping her down the steps from the stage to the dance floor.

Her insides felt all light and jumbled.

Imogen jumped a little, coming back to reality, as it were, when she heard a knock on her door. Imogen opened it, to reveal Cameron on the other side. He was leaning all of his weight on his right forearm, placed against the doorframe, with his opposite hand in the pockets of his jeans.

He reminded her just then of an undeniably cool Greaser-type.

As for Cameron?

He could never describe the feeling that came over him just then. It was overwhelming and all consuming and it crashed over him like a heavy wave. It wasn't new to him but it had been a while since it came around. He clenched his jaw and let the fingers of his right hand curl into his palm, where he squeezed.

All he wanted to do when he came here was to thank her. The same moments Imogen was busy picturing with the help of her memory were all the things Cameron remembered, with a new sort of fondness, during every step of his trek down the great hall from his room to her room, just a stop on his journey to Alex's bedroom, two doors down.

He let the beauty of the moment- the sweet, tangible, fragile, all consuming-beauty of the moment a boy looks into a girl's eyes and just
knows
- absorb him and he wondered at why he allowed himself to go so long without experiencing more moments like it. He hated Imogen and loved her at the same time for showing him, without even knowing it (or perhaps she
did
know it?) that it felt good. It felt good to care for someone, to know someone, to have someone to talk to, to be himself in front of Imogen and to not be judged.

She looked quite pretty, standing in the doorway with her back against the frame, half of her face hidden by the dark shadows in the hallway and the other half illuminated by the soft light from her bedroom. The thick curtain of her hair draped loosely over her shoulders and his fingers itched to engulf themselves within it. She was giving him a curious expression, her eyes glittering and her full mouth pursed; no doubt an unspoken question hung on them.

Cameron cleared his throat and took a hesitant step toward her, raising one of his arms. His movement brought them dangerously close together. She didn't move an inch, but Cameron lost his courage and so took two steps back. Not knowing what else to do, he shoved his hands in his pockets.

That was the way he did everything in life: one step forward and two steps back.

What was he going to say? No. He knew what he wanted to say, had a general idea of what he wanted to tell her, but he didn't have the words. And words are everything when you want to speak to someone.

"What is it, Cameron?" she asked. Her voice was quiet and soft and patient and it wrapped around him comfortably. It took the tenseness Cameron didn't even know he was feeling out of his shoulders and back. He felt an ease infiltrate his body and the tight knot in the pit of his stomach loosened just the tiniest bit.

He shook his head, something he did when he was trying to gather nerve. Cameron ran a hand over his face and laughed a little bit at the ridiculousness of the situation. He couldn't believe that, of all people, Imogen was the one to make him tongue-tied. Hadn't he always had some response to her, even if most of them were just plain rude? And how had she paid him back for the way he treated her, but by being a friend to him, genuinely concerned and ready to listen to anything he might want to tell her.

His cheeks flamed hot red with shame. Whatever he was about to say or do, or whatever he was thinking about saying or doing, would fall almost wildly short of what Imogen had given to him in their short friendship.

Then he saw the smile on her face, crooked and sweet and innocent. The skin around her eyes crinkled and she seemed to emit a glow from the inside out.

He felt comfortable again. He felt resolve.

"I---"

Don't falter. Don't falter, just get the words out. Speak slowly and audibly. She's still the same person, Cameron. She hasn't changed.

"I just---"

He sighed. Words weren't going to cut it. He would have to show her.

Cameron stepped forward again and Imogen raised her head to get a better look at him. He towered above her, his shadow falling upon her face, covering the dim half-light so that her entire face was now engulfed in darkness. He was amazed when his hand slid easily over her jaw, as if it belonged there, gripping her behind the ear. His lips descended until they touched the pillowy-soft skin of her cheek.

He closed his eyes and felt a burning sensation in the places where their bodies met. It was hard to let go. Cameron's lips lingered on her skin just a split second too long, unwilling to leave now that they collided with her.

"
You don't understand, Imogen. The two of us--- it'd be like putting potassium and water together. Don't you know what happens when potassium and water mix? They explode, Imogen. It's bad. Bad all around."

She tilted her head to the side, long hair grazing the side of her arm. "Didn't you ever stop to think that maybe they explode together in a good way?"

Cameron moved back to gauge her reaction. It wasn't exactly what he'd imagined in his head. She wasn't horrified, or disgusted, or even terribly confused. She looked pleased, if a little stunned.