by Kelly Oram
Russ took my hand, and before I had any time to analyze that action, I was overcome with a strange sensation. The hand holding mine was warm, more warm than any hand had a right to be. It felt like it was sending fire through my body.
“Dani?” Russ asked suddenly. “Is everything okay? You look like you’re about to pass out.”
“I’m fine,” I said, though my breath was ragged. Something was definitely off, but I couldn’t tell what exactly was happening to me.
I put my hands to my head so Russ wouldn’t have the chance to be offended that I’d ripped my fingers from his. “It’s just a headache. I haven’t been feeling all that well for the last couple weeks, but I’m okay.”
“A couple weeks? Why didn’t you tell me you were sick?”
“Because it hasn’t been that bad. I’m fine, I promise. I’m already feeling better.” That wasn’t completely true, but I plastered a smile on my face anyway. “Now, what were you saying? You wanted to tell me something?”
Russ seemed to remember himself and took a deep breath. “You’re my best friend,” he said.
It sounded like the beginning of a rehearsed speech. That meant this was serious news.
“Duh….” My voice betrayed how nervous I was.
Russ shifted uneasily next to me and continued. “Because you’re my best friend, there’s something I can’t hide from you anymore. But before I tell you what it is, you have to promise you’re not going to freak out.”
I sucked in a breath. “He is!” my brain screamed at me. “He’s making a move!”
Was I ready for that? If he told me he wanted more than friendship could I give it to him? Could I kiss him and keep a straight face? Could he? Terror seized my chest making me unable to breathe. And yet…maybe it wasn’t fear causing my pulse to race. I couldn’t deny the things I’d been feeling lately. Still. I had no idea how to respond.
“Um....”
Russ took my hand again, and I did my best to ignore the strange connection between us. I wondered if he felt it too.
“Dani, I…”
Love you…
I waited with wide eyes, holding my breath for Russ to spit it out. He looked completely terrified. Which, lets just say, is not a look you often see on Russ Devereaux.
It was surprisingly nice that he was drawing this out because the suspense was making me realize just how much I wanted to hear him say it. Maybe this was a good thing. Maybe it would be perfect. I mean he was my best friend. Who better than him to be my first boyfriend?
“You…?” I prompted.
Russ broke into a sweat. I don’t think it was from the heat of the water. He took a deep breath and blurted, “DaniI’mawarlock.”
“Huh?” I had no idea what he’d just said, but I was pretty sure it wasn’t, “Dani I’m in love with you and want to be more than just your friend from now on.”
“I’m a…w a r l o c k,” he said again—very slowly this time.
Okay, definitely not, Dani, I’m in love with you and want to be more than just your friend from now on.
Was he joking? Or did he just chicken out? Because the panic I saw in his eyes a minute ago was completely real. But, “I’m a warlock?”
Seriously, WTF?
There was literally no way I could respond to such a statement. Like no possible way. I know because I sat there for a really long time trying to come up with a reaction and simply couldn’t. Eventually Russ just had to start talking again.
“Supernatural beings, like the kind you read about in books—witches, vampires, werewolves—they’re real. I’m one of them. I’m a warlock, Dani. I have magic. My dad too.”
Okay, so he was crazy. My best friend had snapped his cap. I remembered the fire I felt when he touched me and immediately plastered my hand to his forehead. Again I was met with an overwhelming sensation. He was definitely radiating something warm and tingly. It didn’t exactly feel like a raging fever, but it was enough explanation for me.
“We need to get you home,” I told him. “You feel way too hot. I think meningitis is supposed to make you delusional and that can kill you.”
“I’m not sick, Dani.”
Russ covered my hand with his and moved it from his forehead to the side of his face. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and shuddered. There was something in the gesture that made goose bumps form all over me—something that leaned me back toward my first theory of Russ wanting to up the stakes in our relationship.
Apparently he was just too big a wuss to say it.
“I know I sound crazy but—”
“Crazy?” I asked with an incredulous laugh. “You don’t sound crazy. You sound like a moron!”
Russ flinched when I yelled. I didn’t mean to lose my temper but I was upset. I could have just called him out and forced him to admit he had feelings for me. Then I could have told him I was interested and ended the most romantic birthday of my life having my first make-out session in a freaking hot tub. But excuse me for having a little dignity and wanting my potential boyfriend to have the guts to make the first move.
“After everything you’ve done tonight to make this the most perfect birthday I’ve ever had, you’re really going to ruin it now?”
“I’m not trying to ruin it!” Russ snapped.
“Then stop being a coward and just say what you really want to say!”
Russ had the strangest look on his face. It was a little bit confusion and a lot frustration, but also, I swear there was disappointment mixed in as well.
We sat there in the most uncomfortable silence as he searched for something to say, and were both extremely startled when the back porch lights of Brad’s house flicked on. “Who’s out there?” Mr. Halloway shouted. “I’m calling the sheriff!”
Russ and I scrambled as silently as we could for our clothes and then bailed before Brad thought to set his dog loose on us. It looked like my birthday celebration was over. Not exactly the way I’d envisioned the night ending, but considering it was us, not that surprising either.
I just hoped that by the time I saw Russ at school in a few hours he’d have realized what a tool he was and manned up, because the minute we went our separate ways I got this really strange ache inside me. I missed him the second he was gone and knew that I didn’t just maybe want him. I really wanted him.
For the second time that night I was awakened before my alarm went off. I had a hunch I knew who it would be pounding on my front door at the break of dawn, and smiled to myself when I saw the red and blue lights flashing through the living room curtains. Deputy McHale is just too predictable.
I was glad I took the time to shower away all evidence of the Jell-O escapade and even blow my hair dry and mess it up again to make it look like I’d been sleeping all night because, sure enough, when my dazed and confused parents answered the door our poor excuse for law enforcement stormed in demanding to smell me.
No, I’m not kidding. He asked to smell my arms and hair.
He then proceeded to explain to my parents that someone had filled the Halloway’s pool with Jell-o during the night. When I of course claimed innocence he got all red in the face. “Look, I know it was you!” he yelled at me. “You and Russ are up to your usual no good pranks. Well this time I’ve got you. You see this?”
He held out an evidence bag containing the soggy piece of wrapping paper I’d torn off my necklace, and waved it in my face like it was a smoking gun.
I tried not to laugh as I asked, “What’s that?”
“You know what it is!”
I did know what it was, but my parents looked confused enough that our dutiful deputy explained himself. “This was left on the ground next to the hot tub at the Halloway residence. It’s wrapping paper from a birthday present.”
Bless my parents. They looked at deputy McHale like he was crazy.
“You gonna tell me it’s just coincidence that today is D-day?” deputy McHale asked me.
Ah, of course. D-day is short for Dani Day. On m
y thirteenth birthday Russ said that my officially becoming a teenager was worthy of annual recognition and got the mayor to declare the day a town holiday. Unfortunately the mayor stopped at giving us the school day off.
“Aw, you remembered,” I said. “That’s so sweet.”
“A midnight swim in a pool full of Jell-O sounds right up Russ’s alley for a D-day stunt if you ask me,” deputy McHale continued to rant.
“You can hardly throw me in jail over a piece of wrapping paper.”
“Oh, we’re sending this bad boy to the lab,” he warned me. “And believe me, when I find your fingerprints on it you and that punk boyfriend of yours are going down.”
I eyed the paper in the bag. It was so wet it was practically dissolving. He’d never find a print and he knew it. That’s why he was here. Trying to scare me into a confession. It made this moment so much sweeter.
I yawned really big. “Sounds exciting. Can I go back to bed now? I’m sick, and if I get worse because you deprived me of sleep just to throw crazy accusations at me I believe it would be within my right to sue.”
The deputy’s hands balled into fists and he stalked off muttering to himself.
My mom waved a friendly goodbye to him as he drove away and then turned around to face me with the most bewildered look. “Why on Earth would the deputy think you had anything to do with a prank like that?”
“I know, weird, right? I mean Brad’s having this big pool party in a few days. Should be a lot of fun. Why would I want to ruin that?”
“I’ll have to talk to the sheriff,” my dad said. “It’s not very professional of deputy McHale to go around accusing innocent children of crimes just because it’s their birthday.”
And that folks, is how you do it. My parents are so easy to snow it’s almost embarrassing. It’s not that they’re stupid. They’re actually both really smart—they run the Carmine Historical Society together—but they’re both Carmine, Pennsylvania born and raised.
Russ’s dad, Alex, says that growing up in such a small town your entire life just makes you simple minded is all. That’s the best way to describe my parents really. They’re very intelligent but completely content in their tiny little world and they don’t ever bother to think much beyond it.
Alex is from New York City and went to college at Princeton University. He says the reason Russ and I always seem to cause so much trouble is because he’s had too much influence on us. He says he’s made us both too big for such a small town, but I don’t know about that. I love Carmine, and as long as I always have Russ here to help me drive deputy McHale insane, I can’t picture ever leaving it.
“Imagine,” my mom said—breaking me from my thoughts. “An entire pool filled with Jell-O. I wonder if the Halloways will let me get a photo of it. That is an event worthy of being entered in the record books.”
It was definitely going to go down in my journal, that’s for sure.
My dad sighed as he looked at the daylight starting to seep through the curtains. “Well there’s no use going back to bed now.”
My mom agreed and dragged herself toward the kitchen. “True, but we may as well not waste the time. Special day today.” She smiled at me. “Why don’t you go make yourself beautiful and I’ll cook you a birthday breakfast. Banana pancakes?”
Banana pancakes are my favorite food in the world, but for some reason just the thought of them made my stomach churn. “Thanks Mom, but I think I’d better pass on breakfast this morning. I’m not really feeling that well.”
“Again?”
“Still.”
My mom knitted her brow in concern, and plastered the back of her hand against my forehead the same way I’d done to Russ earlier. “You are a little warm. Do you think it’s the flu?”
“No nothing that serious. I don’t feel sick, just…off.”
“Okay.” My mom still looked unhappy but I knew that she trusted me. “If you’re sure. But you can skip school if you need to.”
“It’s not that bad. Russ would kill me for missing school on D-day anyway. I’ll just use the extra time to straighten my hair for once.”
. . . . .
Whatever was bothering me, it got worse as the morning progressed, but it wasn’t the flu. It was just this really strange feeling inside me. A fluttering feeling that made my body ache. It was almost like a severe restlessness.
I opted not to wait for Russ to pick me up and walked the mile and a half to school hoping the exercise would make me feel better. I took the shortcut through the woods along the creek and let the fresh air clear my mind.
It was cool, but not uncomfortably so, and the air had a crisp quality to it that woke me up. Unfortunately, the more I woke up and got my blood pumping, the weirder I felt. My body was physically pulling me in a million directions at once. It was yearning for something. I felt empty. I felt the need to search for something that was missing, but I had no idea what that something could be.
I found out what my body was craving when I got close to school and Russ came jogging up the path to meet me. Then I kicked myself internally for being so pathetic.
The minute Russ joined me this euphoric calm washed over me. I went all tingly and the restless energy melted away. The strangest part of it was that I got the sudden urge to throw myself into his arms. Just so you know, that was definitely not normal.
“Good morning, birthday girl!”
Russ put a party hat on my head. He let the elastic string snap sharply into place under my chin. He said something else to me then but I didn’t hear what it was because I was too busy shoving my hands in my jacket pockets. I didn’t trust myself not to touch him. The compulsion was so strong I got light headed.
Russ noticed me sway and reached out to steady me. The energy I felt when he touched me made me gasp, and before I knew it he was sitting me on the ground.
“Huh?” I asked when I realized he was talking to me. I sounded like I’d just run a marathon.
“What’s the matter with you?” he asked, full of concern. He sounded angry too. “Why are you walking to school by yourself when you’re this close to passing out? Why are you even going to school? We should be taking you to the doctor.”
“I’m fine!” I snapped.
I didn’t mean to be so cranky but I didn’t understand what was happening to me. My physical reaction to him couldn’t be normal.
I got to my feet and started walking again just to prove how fine I was.
Russ tried to put his arm around me, still not convinced that I wasn’t going to fall over, and I yanked myself away from him so violently it startled him. I didn’t mean to hurt his feelings, but the things I felt when we touched were really freaking me out.
It’s like the minute I realized I liked him last night I became physically drawn to him. I’d felt his absence when I went home, and now that he was next to me I felt him near. I think it was my desire for him that was making me not feel well. But that’s crazy, right?
“So…?” Russ said, looking for a change in subject. He’d shoved his hands in his pockets as well. “Why the walk to school today?”
I looked at all the trees around us that were in full autumn bloom. Normally Pennsylvania could be so green it was overwhelming but right now it was full of bright oranges, reds and yellows. “I don’t know,” I said. “In a few weeks everything will be so dreary and depressing looking for the entire winter.”
Russ looked up at the trees like he’d never noticed they had color. “Is that the only reason?”
I glanced at him and he couldn’t meet my eyes. It was almost enough to make me die of shock. Russ Devereaux nervous?
I shrugged my shoulders even though he couldn’t see the gesture. “I needed the air,” I admitted.
We walked in silence until we got to school and then Russ suddenly blurted, “I’m sorry about last night. I don’t know what I was thinking. It was late and I hadn’t slept at all because I was planning your surprise. Plus if you’re sick, maybe I have whatever you ha
ve.”
Ha! I nearly snorted out loud. The same thing I had? Yeah right. I mean I know he’s a little vain but I seriously doubted he was suffering from a severe addiction to himself.
“Can we just chalk it up to some kind of sleep deprivation induced delusions?” he asked me. “I don’t want you to be mad at me on your birthday.”
“Sleep deprivation induced delusions?”
Russ shrugged. “I can’t think of any other explanation for saying what I said. Can you?”
My insides deflated. Russ clearly thought last night was some big mistake and was going to go with the pretend-it-didn’t-happen tactic. But if it really was just some kind of sleep deprivation insanity that meant I’d imagined everything else.
“Sure Russ. Whatever. If that’s really what you want, we’ll just agree that you’re a psycho. But just so you know I fully intend to make fun of you for the rest of your life.”
When Russ looked relieved I got so mad at myself. Somehow overnight I had actually become one of those stupid girls that pined after their best friend with unrequited feelings.
Well that’s just great. Happy freaking birthday to me.
. . . . .
When we reached my locker I sighed. “I’ll see you in class,” I hinted after Russ stopped to wait for me.
Our town is so small that our school goes all the way from kindergarten to twelfth grade. There’s a whopping twenty-three kids in my graduating class, which means we all have every class together. That means that Russ and I have had every class together since kindergarten. Normally I think this is the coolest thing ever, but suddenly it felt more like torture.
Russ gave me a questioning look, but I didn’t explain myself and he walked away without asking. Immediately I could feel a pull in his direction. It was like my body yearned to follow him and just be wherever he was at all times. It was ridiculous.
When I got to class Russ was already in his seat on the opposite side of the room from mine. No one in class has assigned seats except for Russ and me because we can’t seem to behave or pay attention when we sit next to each other. We’ve learned to deal with it, but today my body was all too aware of the distance between us.
