I would have thought the wait would be as fantastically awkward as the rest of the date had been so far, but she talked easily enough for the both of us and I managed to find something to interject with now and then when she paused long enough and with the intention of waiting for me to answer.
When we got our packet of chips, she carefully carried it back to the beach and found us a spot to sit, finish watching the sunset, and eat. At least there was a small moment of silence in the otherwise incessant noise.
Just as I was beginning to wonder how long I had to sit on a patch of warm but slightly damp sand for it to count as a complete date, she spoke.
“So, Davin. Do you want to be my mistake?”
I had to have heard wrong. “Sorry. Your what, now?”
“My mistake. Everyone has them. And I want you to be mine.”
This night was either going to be the best or the worst of my life. “You’re going to need to explain that to me some more…”
She was still smiling. “You know.” I didn’t. “You’re supposed to go through the ‘bad boy’ phase. I want you to be my bad boy phase. Help me show Miles and everyone else I’m not such a goody-two-shoes.”
Ah, this was making more sense and we were veering into worst night ever territory. “So, you want the muppet back, then?”
She shook her head as she popped one of the last remaining chips into her mouth and looked out over the water. “No.”
Less sense again. “No?”
“No. I just don’t want to be that stupid little girl everyone sees when they look at me. And,” she shrugged, “I figured who better to help me trash my reputation than the Davin Ambrose?”
“You want me to what?”
She nodded, her smile widening. “I want you to be my boyfriend and I want you to teach me how to not be good.”
Well, I was probably capable. But was I willing? “How not good are we talking here?”
“I dunno. Start small, see where it leads us.”
I ask you, “Is that even how this works?”
“What?”
“Nothing.” Cue knowing look. “You know, I do have a life. I’m not just waiting around for some girl to decide she needs a makeover to go like ‘oh. Hey, yeah. I can do that’. I’d have no idea how to…trash your image.”
“Well, what did you do to yours?”
I blinked. “I was born.”
“Funny,” she giggled, turning back to the water.
Oh, cute. She thought I was joking.
Now was supposed to be the time the guy goes all weird over her laugh, isn’t it? Like, it sounded like tinkling rain and made my chest flutter at the same time my cock stood to attention or some shit. Well sorry to disappoint you, but there was none of that. Her laugh may as well have been nails down a chalk board for all the lack of activity in my chest cavity and pants. I had never felt less erect since I’d learnt what an erection was or why I got them.
“I’m not joking. It’s my life. I can’t just up and change who I am because it’s…less than ideal.”
“You’re life’s not ideal?” she asked, turning her whole body to face me with way too much interest.
Nothing about this was going the way I wanted. “No. My life is fine.” Although, define fine. “I was referring to yours. You can’t just change who you are–”
“Why not?”
I breathed, “Why…?” as I raked a hand through my hair. “Jesus. Right. Well, let’s boil this down to a cliché, shall we? You want to not be the good girl? How many guys have you fucked?”
“One.”
Well, at least she didn’t shy away from the question. That actually surprised me. Although, not as much as I wasn’t surprised by the number.
“Okay. Kissed?” I asked.
“Two.”
I sighed. This part was going as well as expected. “Okay. You want to be bad–?”
“Not good.”
There was a difference? “Right. Start with hooking up with some more guys and see where that…leads you.”
“All right.”
She moved towards me and I pulled away with a speed I didn’t know I was capable of. “Whoa! What are you doing?”
“I was going to start with you.”
I seriously couldn’t tell if this was incredible naiveté she was showing, if she was far too serious about this changing business that she was listening to whatever drivel I spouted off the top of my head, or she was just scarily adept at taking the piss out of both of us.
“Me?”
She nodded. “Why? You don’t want to kiss me?”
“Not really.”
“Why not? We don’t know each other well enough?” She was actually teasing me.
I scoffed, not one to be easily teased. “No. If anything, we know each other too well.”
Another frown. “How is that a thing? You don’t want to know the people you kiss?”
“Uh, I’ll kiss anyone–”
“Except me.”
Apparently. “Except you.”
“Because you know my name?”
If that would mean I didn’t have to kiss her, yes. “If I didn’t know your name, might be a different story.”
She paused for a second and I wondered what she was going to say until, “Then pretend you don’t know my name,” came out a little less assertively than I thought was the intention.
“Pretend I don’t… What?” I was not going to fall for this… Was I?
“Go on. Pretend you don’t know me and kiss me,” she said, that confidence returning.
She was serious about this.
Maybe if I kissed her and she realised there was bugger all between us then I could go home. I could be her temporary mistake only and we could put the whole uncomfortable experience behind us.
Right. One kiss.
“Kiss you?”
The tilt to her lips was less unicorn farts and lollipops and more wry and calculating. “I assume you do actually know the concept and all the stories aren’t rubbish?”
I frowned. “Of course I know the concept. There just isn’t usually this much discussion about one kiss.”
“Oh, sorry. How does it usually work?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know. We see each other, then we kiss.”
“You truly are the Jane Goodall of humanity, aren’t you?” I knew that was sarcasm for sure. I wasn’t sure if I was more impressed with the obvious intentional use of the sarcasm or that she knew who Jane Goodall was.
So I leant over and kissed her if only to shut her the hell up. Avery St John was not supposed to do sarcasm. She wasn’t supposed to do wry. And she certainly wasn’t supposed to kiss like she knew what she was doing.
But she did.
For a second, I thought she was going to pull away. But after she got over the momentary surprise of me kissing her, she kissed me back like she meant it. She wasn’t shy, she wasn’t hesitant, she certainly wasn’t a goddamned wallflower.
Somehow she ended up straddling my lap and I wasn’t sure how much of that was because I’d dragged her to me or she’d climbed on. I felt like maybe it was half and half, and there was definitely a little more action going on in my chest and my pants than there had been earlier.
I hated everything about Avery – her incessant happiness, her obsession with colour, the way she talked non-stop, the way I felt like I was crashing from a massive sugar high after every encounter. She annoyed me to the point I’d rather be in detention with Mrs Mack than anywhere Avery could find me. But the way she kissed me? Holy Jesus.
She was soft and warm in my hands as her body pressed against mine. She was dominating me more than I was dominating her, and that was a fucking turn on. She kissed me like I wasn’t just that guy, whoever that guy was. God, and when she took that playful bite of my lip? I felt like I’d toppled off the edge of a fucking precipice.
Only after my hand slid up under her skirt did she
pull away. But she didn’t go far, her nose was still close enough to bump mine. And she was smiling as usual, but there was a different look in her eyes. Something I did not associate with Avery St John. Something I didn’t think anyone would associate with Avery St John.
“You kiss all the girls you don’t know like that?” she asked teasingly.
I had no idea. “You kissed Muppet Miles like that and he still broke up with you?”
She shook her head, her curls bouncing. “Maybe he might not have broken up with me if I had?”
“Yeah. I don’t think I’d make that mistake,” I breathed.
“So does that mean you’ll be my mistake?”
God, she just had to wriggle in my lap, didn’t she? I probably had mere seconds to put a stop to this before the smaller head was taking charge.
“You mean like some kind of fake dating bullshit?”
She shook her head again. “No. Proper dating. All the perks of having a girlfriend without any of the hassle.”
“How is hanging out with you not going to be a hassle?”
Her smile didn’t quite hide the apprehension in her eyes. But then I was distracted when she huffed a self-conscious laugh and I blame the way it made her shift slightly for the effect it had in my pants.
“You won’t have to be polite or charming,” she told me. “You can just be your normal grumpy self.”
“So in what way would this be real dating?”
She leant against me and I had to stop myself from letting us fall backwards. What the hell was she doing to me? “We’d be exclusive, we’d go on dates, we’d kiss and…other stuff.”
“Other stuff?” I knew someone who was interested in this other stuff and he was fighting for control.
She nodded and I was finding it hard to reconcile the Avery I knew with the veritable sultry goddess in my hardening lap. “Like I said, all the perks.”
“And I’m supposed to teach you how to…not be good?” Fuck, I was losing higher brain function fast.
“Just treat me like you’d treat those girls you don’t know.”
A strangled attempt at a laugh left me. “I am not treating you like them.”
“Why not?”
“Uh. Firstly, because I wouldn’t date any of them. Secondly, because tonight is not ending with me fucking you anywhere.” God, what was happening to me?
She leant to my ear and whispered, “Are you sure?”
If she kept that up? No. Not for long. Needing some control back, I picked her up and flipped us so I was lying over her. I watched her watching me carefully and wondered why this was so important to her. Currently more important to me though was the effect her under me was having on me.
“And this does nothing for my self-control.”
“What?” she asked, a smile on her lips.
“Nothing,” I muttered as I looked down at her. “You want to date me?”
She nodded.
“Just as I am. I don’t have to do anything but somehow teach you how to not be so good?” Although how I was going to manage that, I had no idea.
But she nodded again. “Just dating you will probably be enough.”
I wasn’t sure if I should take that as a good thing or a bad thing. And I know what I’d said; one date and that was it, one kiss and that was it. But I wasn’t thinking straight and there was something weirdly addictive about her. The fact that I could be my usual arsehole of a self and she still sought me out? It didn’t hurt she kissed the way she did. I was just going to be a mistake, so there was no way this would last.
So whatever the flimsy premise, I was in.
“Okay.” I nodded. “Consider me your boyfriend.”
Her victorious smile finally found its way back into her eyes and I guess I didn’t hate it. “Great.”
“If you talk anymore, I am going to kiss you again, though.”
Her eyes shone brighter in the moonlight. “Really? You’re already bossing me–”
Oh, I’d warned her. And I didn’t bother reminding her. I just kissed her and thought that maybe it wasn’t going to be the worst night of my life after all.
Five: Avery
Miles certainly hadn’t kissed like Davin kissed. Miles had been better than Tom, but Davin put them both to shame and then some.
When Davin kissed me, it felt like he couldn’t get enough of me, like he wanted to kiss me for kissing me and not just because I just happened to be there. He felt like heat and passion and it was sexy. It made me feel sexy and it made me kiss him back the same way.
When Miles had kissed me, it had been nice but the comparison made me realise that Miles had never turned me on just from a kiss – or even just the idea of kissing him. In fact I was starting to wonder if Miles had been what turned me on at all.
But sitting next to Davin on the beach and just thinking about kissing him again turned me on. And I couldn’t help but sneak looks at him while he was staring at the water. It was dark now, with only the moon and distant streetlights to see by, but still early enough in the year that it wasn’t cold.
“What?” he asked, still staring at the water.
“What, what?”
“I know you’re staring at me, what?”
I buried my face in my knees. “Nothing.”
“Really?” he scoffed. “Now you shut up?”
I rolled my head to the side to look at him and smiled. “I’m starting to realise you like the quiet.”
As he looked up, there was that hint of a smile on his face but never the actual thing. “You’re starting to realise? And here I was thinking I’d made it clear on Tuesday?”
I laughed awkwardly. “I’m naturally…sociable.”
“I’d call it annoying. But you’re not wrong.”
We sat in silence for a bit longer.
Even when he said rude things I couldn’t not be amused by him. There was something about the way he said it that made me believe he wasn’t being completely serious. Plus I just really admired the way he felt comfortable saying whatever he was thinking. I couldn’t do that. But I wanted to do that. I needed to do that. Which made Davin the perfect one to help me tank my rep.
And I could understand why a guy who barely talked to another human being would find me annoying. I was just hoping to change his mind. If I didn’t, he might decide not to help me anymore. If I did, it was a pretty sure bet that I wasn’t too good anymore.
“So… This is a date, huh?” he mused after a while.
“What?” I asked.
“This. Is this what the rest of our dates will be like, then?”
“Some of them.”
“And the others?”
I shrugged. “We could stay home and watch movies–”
“How does that help you trash your reputation? Are you planning to become less good by mere osmosis?”
“What’s that?”
“Used colloquially it means that by just being around me you’ll become less good.”
That was exactly the thought I’d had when I came up with this idea. “Well, I am quite confident that that would work.”
“Of course you are.”
I huffed. “Ideally we go out, if there were places you actually enjoyed being. But we date. We just spend time together and see what happens.”
“See what happens? What are you planning? Murder-suicide pacts? Joining a cult? Devil worship?”
“Why is everything doom and gloom with you?”
“Why is everything so nauseatingly bright with you?”
I smiled at him before I looked back to the water. “I was more meaning we could talk, get to know each other…” I petered to a very self-conscious stop.
“That other stuff you mentioned earlier?” he added wryly when it was clear I wasn’t going to continue.
“Yes. That.” I hadn’t been going to mention it because I really wanted to try that now. But I also didn’t want to look like a total ease and I
already had sand all through my hair after he’d seriously kissed me last.
That had never been me before. I’d never been the girl who wanted to do any of that stuff. Not like this. Obviously my plan was working. I’d just kissed Davin and already I felt less sweet and innocent than I’d been before.
No… That was stupid. Wasn’t it?
“How long were you planning on this mistake, then?” he asked.
“Don’t know. Until one of us gets bored?”
“And if I said I was already bored?”
I didn’t like that idea. I didn’t want him to be bored of me. Although I didn’t know why. I just wanted his help. Right?
“Are you?” I asked, aiming for casual and not sure I hit it.
He scoffed. “No. I’m not sure I could be bored with you around. Uncomfortable? Yes. Bored? No.”
“I make you uncomfortable?”
He shifted so his arms were leaning on his knees. “My own company makes me uncomfortable, Avery. Don’t go thinking you’re special or anything.”
I laughed. “Oh, sure.”
We sat in silence for a while longer and I watched him. There was a tenseness to his shoulders as he ran his hand through his hair and looked over the water that made me want to reach out to him. But I wasn’t actually quite so naïve that I thought it would be okay to ask him if he was okay.
“Wow,” he said finally, quickly as though he was really feeling that discomfort. “You actually managed – what? – a whole ten minutes of not talking?”
“I thought I’d give it a go. I like observing people different to me.”
“So I’m some sort of social experiment?”
I looked at him with a frown. “I wouldn’t call it that.”
“No. I’m sure you wouldn’t.” He huffed. “So the guy who hates everything social and experimental has found himself combining the two into one tortuous package.” He turned his head to look at me and I was struck by something in his eyes. Then he shrugged and looked away again. “Gran always said I was a sucker for punishment.”
****
Saturday was Best Friends’ Day! So I was excited about that as well as telling Blair all about my date with Davin.
Being Not Good Page 5
