“We got home from school that day, and Dad was there waiting. The house was different. Nearly every trace of Mom was gone from the living room. Her favorite blanket, this pillow we bought, some of those figurines of baby angels. It was all empty and it didn’t even look like our house.” I think that’s part of why I hate our house now. It doesn’t have anything. The empty spaces she left are all still there. “Dad sat us down, and I just remember looking for those stupid baby angels. ‘Boys, this is hard to hear, but your mom is gone and she won’t be returning.’”
That’s how he said it, so matter-of-factly like that.
“I didn’t understand. Jamie didn’t, either. He asked if she was dead, because we knew Abby’s dad had died and that was sad for her. Dad said to us, ‘She’s not dead, but she’s moved to a new house in a new place and you will never see her again. So if you want to think she’s dead, if that’s easier, then she can be dead.’”
I laugh when I tell the story, not because it’s funny, but because Dad handled it the way he did. I know he was kind of in denial about it, but the whole thing is weird to me now.
Haley squeezes my hand, so I keep going.
“I asked Dad, ‘Where are the angels? Did Mom take them with her?’ I don’t know why I cared so much about those damn angels. I don’t know why I didn’t let her kiss me goodbye. I wondered if she took my toy with her, too. ‘No,’ Dad said. ‘I got rid of them. She’s never coming back, so we don’t need her and we don’t need her things around here.’ And that was it. That’s my mom. We don’t talk about her, we don’t know where she went, and to my dad, she’s dead.”
I exhale when I finish the story, and Haley rubs my back. “Jake,” she says. “I’m so sorry.”
I look at her but don’t say anything. I’ve never told anyone this shit about my mom. No one. Haley’s eyes are wide and bright, teary almost. “You don’t have to be sorry. It’s been forever.”
“I know I don’t have to be, but I am. She’s still your mom.”
The way she’s looking at me, it’s not pity but understanding, sympathy. It brings me back to reality. We’re sitting on a football field at what’s supposed to be a date. I shake my head.
“Wow, this is some date. I really went from sweet, romantic gestures to depressing stories.”
“It’s been perfect.”
“You’re perfect.” She starts to shake her head, but I stop her by touching her jaw. “I’m serious, Haley.”
I really want to kiss her.
It’s not the way I want our first kiss to go, but she’s so good to me. She’s sweet and kind, and she’s easy to be with. She listens and cares. I’ve wanted to do this a few times now. Haley’s breath hitches like she’s been waiting for this, too. I lean in.
“We shouldn’t…” she starts, but I rest my hand on her cheek.
My heart is racing as I lean in to her, so close my lips are practically already touching hers. I know what she’s saying. I feel it, too. I hear it, too, but I don’t care about the voices in my head or the reasons why.
“I know,” I say.
I can’t think anymore. The reasons I shouldn’t don’t matter anymore. If they do, I don’t care. I close the space between us, and we start out slow. Our lips dancing, barely touching, energy blazing between us and anticipation as our breath mingles. I feel light, as if my whole being is floating. Her body turns into me, and my hands drift down her back, pulling her closer. I press my lips against hers, slow and soft, until we pause for a breath. To make sure we’re both good. She gives me a small smile and kisses me again. All of it is so good it makes me forget everything I’m not. Everything I’m doing wrong right now by even being with her.
A whistle blows through the field. Long, loud, high-pitched. We jump away from each other and look toward the sound, and Coach Tucker is walking toward us. He does not look happy.
“What’s going on here on my field?” he asks.
I scramble to my feet, and Haley does the same. Coach looks between us. “Sorry, Coach,” I say. “We were just having lunch.”
He eyes the boxes. “I’m pretty sure Chang’s has tables for that.”
“Yes, sir,” I say. “Sorry, it was all my idea.”
Coach looks at Haley. “Don’t I know you?”
She clears her throat and seems a little nervous now. “I’m Chris’s sister.”
Coach Tucker nods and raises an eyebrow toward me. “Yes, Haley, right?”
“Yes, sir.”
There’s an awkward silence, then Coach shoots me a look. “I reckon y’all have somewhere else you can take this?”
“Yes, sir,” I say.
Haley grabs the food, and I take the rest of the stuff up in my arms. She’s halfway off the field when Coach throws the blanket over my shoulder. “It’s none of my business, son, but I hope you’re making good choices, since that’s your best friend’s sister and all.”
I look him square in the eye. “I am, sir, maybe for the first time in a while.”
Coach nods and pats me on the shoulder. “All right, son. Keep it that way.”
“I plan to,” I say back. It may have been my imagination, but he looks like he wants to smile at me.
I rush after Haley, and she’s laughing out in the parking lot.
“What’s so funny?”
But she can’t catch her breath enough to tell me. What is happening? Somehow, though, it’s contagious. I’m laughing, too. I don’t even know why I’m laughing, which I try to say, but that makes her laugh harder. She puts a hand on my forearm, and the rush it causes throughout my body brings me back to the moment. I lean in, pull her closer to me in a hug, and try to remember the scent and feel of her. I press my lips into the side of her neck, right by her ear.
She sombers, too, wrapping her arms around me. It surprises me, but I try not to let on how much she does to me. Instead, I press a kiss to her cheek again and take her hand. I just want to touch her. “Thank you for coming out on a date with me.”
“It was everything,” she says.
“Maybe I can get another one.”
Haley smiles and separates herself from me. “I would love that.”
I stand there, watching her walk away from me, and I already miss her. I’m way too into this. Into her. And, honestly, I don’t want to be anywhere else.
Chapter Nineteen
Haley
I have Jake Lexington on the brain.
I haven’t spent alone time with him all week, but that kiss on the football field plays on repeat in my head. It’s like a movie I’ve seen a hundred times that never gets old. I spend most of my school day replaying it, and it’s even in my dreams. I’ve imagined it for years, and now that I’ve kissed him, it’s better than any dream I could’ve had.
“Earth to Haley,” Abby says, waving her hand in front of my face.
I jump up in my seat and realize the Belles meeting is over. Oops. Abby is staring at me, eyebrow cocked and a hand on her hip. “Sorry, what?”
She sighs. “I said I’d meet you at the game, then we could go to your house.”
Sleepover night. “Sounds good. I have to stop and get snacks before I go home anyway.”
“I’ve got the Netflix list ready, too,” she says.
“No Starship Elite episodes.”
She waves me off. “I only had one in there and I didn’t think we’d make it. I know you hate it, even though it’s amazing.”
I wrap my scarf around my neck. “Any special requests?”
“Ooh, you know those maple eggs the general store sells?”
“Already on it.”
“That’s why you’re my best friend.”
Georgia Ann comes back to us and starts asking Abby a question. My phone dings, and it’s Jake. Meet me somewhere. I need to see you.
Where are you?
School. You?
Country Club. Belles meeting.
Where you going now?
Store then home then game with Abby. I can swing by.<
br />
Meet me in the parking lot by the ticket booth. Text me when you’re on your way.
Abby is staring at me again, Georgia Ann, too.
“What?” I ask.
“You’re smiling,” Abby says.
“Can’t I smile?” I ask, putting my jacket on.
“You can,” Abby starts, and I can sense more of that sentence coming on but I don’t want to get into it with her. Georgia Ann gives me this look, but I don’t want to read into it. She knows, or thinks she knows, too much already.
I smile even bigger. “Okay, see you at the game! Bye.”
I rush out of there and through the next tasks as quickly as I can so I can get to Jake. I text him when I leave the general store, and it’s only a few more minutes before I’m at the school.
I park my car in the spot at the edge of the parking lot. He texts me. I see you. Come to the booth.
What’s going on? I ask while I walk toward the booth.
When I’m a few steps away, he texts again. Turn left and walk toward the woods. I’m right there under the bleachers.
My eyes search the space ahead of me, and sure enough, there he is, tucked under the stadium bleachers. “What’s with all the cloak and dagger?”
He takes my hand, and instead of answering, he pulls me into him and presses his lips against mine. Questions are lost as I meld into him. One of his hands is resting on my hips and the other on my neck, pulling me closer to his mouth. This kiss isn’t like the one in the field. This one has more urgency, more passion, and god, it’s good. His teeth drag across my lip, and I let out a sound that makes him kiss me harder. I feel like I’m nothing but air, kisses, mouths. I’m moments and heat and passion, and my physical being is gone. I am this kiss, and I never want it to end.
But it does. And when he pulls away, he rests his head on my forehead.
“Sorry. I wanted to do that since the last time.”
I bite my lip. “I’m not complaining.”
“That’s good,” he says. “Do you know how hard it is to sit next to you in class and pay any attention at all?”
I chuckle. “A little bit, yeah.”
“Good. That’s good. Torture should run both ways.”
I laugh, and he leans in again to kiss me. This time, it’s softer, slower, sweeter. Long but too short all at once. He makes every nerve in my body sing.
“Will I see you tonight?”
After every home game, he comes over with Jamie for dinner with my parents and Chris. It’s funny how all these things we’ve always done, and still do, have changed a little. They feel bigger.
“Yes, but Abby is staying over so she will be there.” I’m going to tell Abby tonight that I like Jake.
He tenses up when I say her name. “Great. She’s not very happy with me.”
“Why?”
“She didn’t tell you about our date?”
This little pang of jealousy creeps up into me. Yes, I know about the date. The one that they had to go on because of the silent auction, but I hadn’t realized he’d done it. She didn’t tell me yet.
“We haven’t really spent a lot of alone time this week, either.”
“It was last night,” he says, squeezing my hand. “I’d rather it have been you. You know I had to go out with her, right? She literally paid for a date with me.”
I nod. “I know how it works.”
“I’m sure she’ll tell you all about it. It was a disaster. I think she may be officially over me.”
I don’t want to think about that too long. I’m planning to tell her tonight. I really want to. She’s my best friend. “You’re still going to come over, right? For dinner?”
“It’s tradition.” Jakes smiles and kisses my cheek. “I gotta get to the locker room. Game is in an hour. I wanted to see you and kiss you.”
“You’ve got time for one more,” I say. He smiles a little as he closes the gap between us, and I know I’m making the right move. Taking some action. Leading the charge. He likes when I do that, and I like it, too. Jake makes me feel like I can do anything. And there’s no more evidence of that than me standing under the bleachers kissing him.
When we’re done, which feels like hours even though it isn’t, he smiles at me. “This game’s for you, Hals.”
“That means you’re going to win?”
He laughs. “Oh yeah. More than I already am, if that’s even possible.”
There are two minutes left in the last quarter, and we’re down by one score. They haven’t done the Wicked Wambo yet, which I know because I’ve seen and heard about the play for the whole summer when the boys were perfecting it. There’s a turnover, and it’s our ball again.
I’m in the stands next to my dad, and the crowd is going wild. The cheerleaders start up a Culler chant, and the whole crowd yells the word back. Abby is on fire down there tonight, almost as much as the team is. The whole crowd is, really. It actually does feel like what Jake described. This moment, right now, we’re all connected in one goal: a win. I try to imagine how he feels tonight, and it’s not hard to do with the energy in the air.
Our team passes the ball back. Chris has it in hand. One. Two. He tosses to Spencer, which no one on the other team expected. You can tell because they’re all scrambling to the other side of the field, and about halfway through, he throws it to Shane, who passes to someone else, who passes back to Spencer. They’re not even sure what way to go, and the whole of Culler is in the stands, yelling, GO GO GO.
Then in a flash, the ball is in the air again—soaring right to Jake’s waiting arms. He’s near the end zone. He’s running, running, running.
Touchdown Culler!
This game is ours. Even if they had time to run another play, the other team would never finish it. Plus, we still have a chance to kick, and Will is a pretty flawless kicker.
Jake celebrates with the guys in the end zone. His eyes find me, somehow, in the crowd, and he points. Not to me, not specifically, but in my direction. Even though I can’t tell for sure under the helmet, I know he’s smiling.
Mom made enough food to feed an army, which she usually doesn’t do, but she had the day off today. A mental health day. Mom is an awesome cook, and I love when she does this. She made some fried chicken, mac and cheese, baked apples, mashed potatoes, and biscuits. Jake sits across from me, Chris on one side of me, and Abby on the other. Mom and Dad are at the ends, and Jamie is across from Jake, beside Chris. It’s like an early Thanksgiving dinner at 10 p.m. on a random Friday. The house is full of people and Mom’s food, the way I know she likes it best.
Dad starts talking through the game with the guys, everyone taking turns reliving the moment. Jake’s foot touches mine under the table. At first, I think I imagined it, but when I look up again, he winks at me. With one hand, he reaches under the table and touches my arm. He wants to hold my hand. I don’t know how I know this, but I do, like breathing. I wait a few minutes before moving mine under the table to meet his. I don’t think anyone else notices in the chatter and laughter and food.
We sit that way, dangerously close to something and far from anything, through all of dinner.
After the guys are gone, Abby and I sit together in my bed, watching an old romantic comedy about a girl who wishes to be older. We’ve seen it before, so it’s really background noise. My mind is on Jake, anyway, and on the best way to tell Abby about it. Last time I really tried, she dismissed all of it. It’s what I’ve been thinking about all night, but I couldn’t do it with everyone around. I need to rip off the Band-Aid and tell her and hope she will forgive me.
“What am I going to do tomorrow while you’re at your volunteer thing?”
I shrug. “I don’t know. Sleep?”
“Probably,” she says. “But after, we’re going to do something, right?”
“Yeah,” I say. Tell her. “I need to tell you something. It’s about Jake.”
Abby’s face widens to shock. “Oh my God, you already know.”
“Know
what?”
“About my date with Jake.”
I nod, even though I wasn’t really going there, but she brought it up. If it’s as bad as Jake said, maybe I can use that to transition us. “I mean, I heard a little, and that’s not—”
“I like him more now.”
Wait. Jake said it was a disaster. Did I hear this right? I sit up in the bed and cross my legs, trying not to let on about my real feelings. “What?”
Abby flattens the top of her ponytail down with her hands. “So, he took me to the arcade. Which I hate. But, since it was Jake, I acted like I didn’t. We had, like, nothing to talk about, so we really played games. He was a sore loser, to be honest.”
Her face is glowing when she talks about him, and my brain is battling between being a supportive friend and begging her to stop talking about it. I did this the entire summer, back when all they did was hold hands for a week, and now it’s even worse because I’m kissing him.
“We had dinner after, some pizza in town square over in Haymont, which you know I rarely eat because of all that grease, and we talked.”
“Nothing bad happened?”
She purses her lips. “Well, he wasn’t as talkative as I was, but he’s such a good listener. You know how he gets in those moods? He was grouchy and gloomy. I think he was nervous. Around me! I make Jake Lexington nervous,” she says with a squeal. “It was so cute.”
“That’s all that happened?”
“Of course! He’s a gentleman, and I’m not desperate. Besides, he’ll take me on a real date, not one I bought, for any kissing action to happen,” she says, and I raise my eyebrow. She waves me off. “It was only our first date. It’s better to wait. It’s only a matter of time now.”
“Until what?”
“Until he totally pulls a Captain Reiner and falls for me!”
“Are you sure, Abs? I mean, I heard there was someone Jake was into.”
“I heard that, too,” she says, and my jaw drops. I was totally making that up. “But I’ve brainstormed, and who would it be? We know everyone in Culler, and if he was interested in someone then why would we have had such an amazing date? Come on, Hals. You can’t listen to all the rumors. You’re a Belle. We’re above that.”
The Crush Collision Page 13
