NORMAL (26 page)

I'm still surprised that he talked to his sister about this, but his version of things is easier to swallow I guess. And she's right. Robin is my boyfriend of six months, we've exchanged I love you’s, he's clearly committed to me. It's okay that we had sex. No, not just okay, it's right that we did. I just wish I'd felt ready before he'd made the decision for me.

"Come on, Rory, you're still a good girl. Let's go down and eat, everyone's waitin' on us," she urges. She thinks I'm worried about my good girl rep. I never especially cared for that rep in the first place. I never wanted to be seen as a good girl or a bad girl. Hell, before this year I never cared about being a
girl
at all.

"Yeah, okay," I reply as I stand. I follow Lacey down the stairs and through the foyer.

"Robbie was real worried about you, you know. He really loves you," she says before we head through the French doors that lead to the dining room. Her tone is almost disapproving, like she hadn't expected him to fall in love with me - like maybe I don't deserve his affections. And maybe I don't. I sure never thought Robin Forbes would ever want to take me out, let alone love me.

The Forbes all greet me as I enter. Robin walks over to embrace me. He plants a chaste kiss on my lips before pulling out my chair for me like the southern gentleman his parents believe him to be. I dutifully sit and breakfast commences normally just as it has every other time I've spent the weekend here.

Mayor Bobby and Cindy Forbes go on and on about Robin's UFL contract. They couldn't be more proud of their superstar son. Mayor Forbes starts telling a string of stories about him and my dad back when they were undergraduates together. He asks what I want to study in Gainesville, and I tell him pre-law, but that I'd also thought of applying to NYU like my mom, and that draws surprised glares. When Mayor Forbes says that surely my father would rather I go to Gainesville, I ask if he's heard that directly from him, because my dad certainly hasn't given me any input about my college plans. Mayor Forbes shrugs and says "Not lately, I suppose."
Yeah, that sounds about right.

Mayor Forbes brings up the father-daughter dance at the country club which is coming up in a little over a month. He will bring Lacey, of course, but my father hasn't offered to take me since I was eleven. This year, it will fall on one of the weekends when he's out of town anyway, so he doesn't have to make up an excuse why he can't go, and I can pretend that he'd want to take me if he was in town.

I'm stunned when Mayor Forbes glances at his wife, who smiles her reassurance, and he asks me if I'd accompany him and Lacey. He knows my dad will be unavailable and would be honored to stand in, so he says. I peek over at Robin who starts rubbing his hand up and down my back. This was obviously discussed by the whole family, and honestly, I'm touched. But when half the town is at this event, I always go down to the lake with Cam and usually he reads me one of his short stories. It's not a tradition I want to break, not when so much has changed this year, and after last night, I'm still feeling so conflicted about everything. I tell them I'll discuss it with my parents, but I worry that Mayor Forbes will just go to my dad, who will be relieved to have the chance to both avoid me and to please his friend.

Mayor and Cindy Forbes will be taking a trip to New York the first weekend in February, and Robin tells them he's going to have a bunch of friends over to watch the Super bowl. He doesn't ask, he just lets them know he will be throwing a party in their house. His parents lament over what a great idea that is. Then Mayor Forbes launches into the story about how he first fell for Cindy at a Super bowl party.

"She was Cindy Parker back then. I'd known her, of course, it's Linton, everyone knows everyone, but she was just a freshman and I was a junior and, you know, it was high school. I'd had a girlfriend the first two years, nothin' really serious, but it'd ended the summer before. My Cindy was just as beautiful then as she is now. Long blonde hair, bright green eyes... my buddy Teddy - you're dad knew him too, Rory - he moved away years ago, anyway, he'd invited her because he was hopin' to put the moves on her. That's the only reason she was a freshman at a senior's party." Mayor Forbes and his wife laugh and Robin and Lacey groan. I smile. I've never heard them talk about when they were kids.

"It was like magic, I swear - I give her one glance and I'm hooked. No way was I gonna let the prettiest girl in town end up with someone else, especially not Teddy Smith. So I just walked over to her and started talkin' and we talked all night - through the whole game. My box won in the pool and I didn't even know until the next day. She was my girl after that, I proposed right after her graduation and we were married before she started at Gainesville."

"How did you know?" I blurt out. "I mean, that she was the one." Mayor Forbes grins widely. Under the table, Robin laces his fingers through mine.

"You know, I just looked at her that night, and I knew I couldn't let Teddy get near her. He was a bit of a dog, that one, and then after spendin' the night talkin' to her... I was already in love. I just knew I'd never want another girl, and I'd never stand it if she dated anyone else. We called it goin' steady back then, and I asked her right that night." They both chuckle. It's a happy memory and sweet story. Robin lifts our linked hands from under the tablecloth and kisses the back of my hand. It doesn't go unnoticed by his family. I think I even hear his mother sigh.

****

Robin and I go for a walk around their property after breakfast. I'm still reeling from the events of the last twenty four hours. I wish I had my jeep with me so I could get away and clear my head. Maybe go home, or to Cam's. But I could never talk about last night with Cam. Not ever. Before Robin, there wasn't a single thing I couldn't talk over with Cam. Now I feel more on my own than ever before. Making love for the first time should have made us more connected than ever, but I couldn't possibly feel more lonely.

I think of all the things I could have done differently. If I hadn't forgotten my shorts, if I'd fought harder, or hadn't fought at all. If I'd been dressing like I used to - in jeans instead of that short sundress that Robin called sexy - that probably didn't help prevent him from getting too worked up. From losing control. That first time he'd touched me in his car, and I smacked him, he told me if I didn't want it then I wouldn't have worn such a short skirt. I've been wearing skirts and dresses all year. From the red dress I wore on our first date to my cheerleading uniform I wore to school every Friday during football season. And will have to wear again on game days once basketball season starts... I wonder if that's what people think now, that I want it.

Sex.

God
, even Chip, my friend since little league, put his hand on my knee and made suggestive comments - something he never would have ever done before - all because of that damned skirt.

"You're awful quiet, sweetheart," Robin murmurs.

"Just thinkin'," I reply.

"What ya thinkin' about?"

I shrug.

"I used to gag when my parents talked like that," he says.

"I think it's sweet," I mutter quietly. Robin stops walking and grabs my hand, he pulls me so that I'm right in front of him, facing him. I feel an involuntary pang of fear, but I know it's irrational and I push it away quickly.

"I used to think they were just a sappy old married couple," he continues, "but I get it now."

"Get it?"

"When I saw you last summer, at the pool, in that sexy little red lifeguard swimsuit- that was somehow hotter than all the slutty bikinis all the other girls were wearin'... it was like I was seein' you for the first time." He stares intently down at me. I had no idea he noticed me at the pool. I had no idea he'd ever noticed me before that day on his parents' front porch when he first asked me out. I'm surprised, and honestly, flattered, even though he's complimented me a hundred times since then.

"I even asked Lace about you, but then when I saw you that night, standin' at my front door in those tiny little shorts, lookin' like you were nervous about somethin'... I don't know, sweetheart, it was like I was struck by lightin' or somethin'.

"I tried to play it all cool, but I couldn't stop thinkin' about those big, brown, angel eyes. About that pretty hair that you hide behind when you're bein' all shy and sweet." He tucks the small curtain of hair that's hanging over my cheek behind my ear. "I ain't been able to stop thinkin' about you since. I ain't ever gonna stop thinkin' about you, darlin'. And I don't wanna."

Robin leans down and in complete contrast to last night, he kisses me slowly and tenderly. He lets the pretty things he's just said linger in the mild winter air. And they touch me. They really do. When he pulls away, his gaze is positively adoring.

"Robin," I breathe.

"Yeah, sweetheart?"

"I... Last night... I don't wanna do that again until I'm ready," I murmur, thanking God that I'm able to say the words out loud.

"I know, sweetheart," he replies, and then slides his arm around my waist and continues our walk.

Present Day

I
don't tell my mom about the fight with Chelsea. I have a feeling she'll find out soon enough one way or another, and she thinks I've been doing so well lately, I don't want to destroy that facade for her any sooner than I have to.

When I wake up the following day, my Jeep is already in my driveway. Sam has been true to his word - not that I ever doubted him. I have no way of knowing if he, and presumably Tuck, dropped it off sometime last night or early this morning, but either way, he didn't ring the doorbell to say hi, didn't call or text. This doesn't surprise me, but it does disappoint me, and I'm once again reminded that my feelings for Sam are out of control.

I take a thirty minute shower and when I realize I'm just procrastinating to avoid school, I decide to give myself a gift.

A day.

Just one day.

Tomorrow I'll go back to school and face the fallout, whatever it might be. The rumors, the consequences, whatever disciplinary action I might face... all of it.

But not today. Today, I will sit around in comfortable clothes, eat comfort food, listen to angry rock music, and reread my favorite novel.

I let my hair air dry and throw it all up on top of my head in a messy bun. I slip on yoga pants, a white lace camisole instead of a bra, and my mom's old, over-washed, navy blue NYU sweatshirt. Sometime in the nineties she cut the neckline off so it hangs loosely over one shoulder. This is my comfort uniform.

I power my cell phone off and decide to bake myself banana muffins. When my mom gets home, I know the muffins will be evidence of my truancy, but by then I know I'll have to tell her what happened anyway, and I hope they will sugar coat things a bit. Literally.

I put my iPod on the dock in the kitchen and start to blast Live's Throwing Copper album. I get out the ingredients and start working.

When the house phone rings I let the answering machine pick up since I'm not even supposed to be here right now. At first I ignore the authoritative female voice that sounds through the speaker, but as soon as I hear "Mrs. Perreira, the dean here at Port Woodmere High," my ears perk up. I pause the music and walk over to the answering machine to hear the dean explain to my mother that Ms. Stanger made her aware that I was out sick today, but that she was made aware of an "incident" that took place yesterday afternoon between me and another student, and she would like the parents to come in to discuss what happened and what kind of repercussions there will be.

My heart sinks. Though I silently thank Carl for having the foresight to make up an excuse when she realized I wasn't in homeroom, I'm reminded that my day of pretending nothing happened, is just that, one day of delusion.

I'm reading Peter Hamill's
Forever
for the third time, once again captivated by the fictional narrative that manages to describe the colorful history of New York City like no other, and trying to figure out where NYU's current campus falls in the city's landscape through the years, when the doorbell rings. I look at the cable box to confirm it's only just after noon, my second batch of muffins aren't even ready.  

Who could that be?
No one knows I'm home,
do they? Did someone notice my Jeep is outside?

My breath comes quickly and, immediately, a fine sheen of cold sweat gathers over my skin.

Don't panic.

It could be a door to door salesperson, it could be a Jehovah's witness trying to convert me, it could be a courier service with some legal documents for my mother...

I remind myself that I'm not in Linton. It can't be
him
.
It also can't be one of his or his father's many minions here to intimidate me out of telling the truth. It can't be Lacey with a group of lackeys here to call me vicious names or sling horrible rumors my way. It can't be my own father here to threaten me or pretend like he's doing me some huge favor by "digging" me out of my "own mess" by helping my attacker cover up what he'd done. Or accusing me of ruining all of our lives.

The bell rings again, this time supplemented by a tentative knock.

No, this isn't the knock of someone here to hurt or frighten me, and as I start to calm, I see Carl's worried face peeking in through my living room window, searching but unseeing. Of course, the thought that it could be an actual friend simply here to check that I'm alright never crossed my mind.