Boyfriend Shopping: Shopping for My BoyfriendMy Only WishAll I Want for Christmas Is You

by Earl Sewell

  “Nuh-uh.”

  The corners of Peyton’s mouth were twitching. “Which part ‘nuh-uh,’ Claudia?”

  “All of it,” I said helplessly, still trying to make sense of what Eddie had just said. “I’m not the kind of girl David Levy likes. Other than, you know, the breathing part.”

  “Don’t forget flexible,” Peyton offered with the most falsely guileless smile ever.

  Eddie cringed. “TMI, Peyton.”

  “Just trying to help.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Well, you can stop now.” To Eddie I said, “English, Eddie, and use small words, because right now that’s all I’m capable of comprehending.”

  “Oh, bull.” A direct brown stare—the twin to mine—skewered me in place. “You understand just fine.”

  “No, I really don’t.” And if he didn’t get on with it, I was liable to go all Kermit-flail, running around like a lunatic, waving my arms around and wailing at the top of my lungs.

  “Okay, short version—David likes you. Really likes you. And forget New Year’s—he’s wanted to ask you out for a long time before that. But he figured you knew his rep and assumed you’d shoot him down before he could get a chance to convince you otherwise.”

  “So he came to you for what?” I crossed my arms and hit him with a stare. “Help? Advice? A ride to the free clinic?”

  Eddie cringed. “Harsh, Claudia.”

  “Am I wrong?”

  “Look, I ain’t gonna lie—he’s no saint, but he’s nowhere near the sinner I think you think he is.” His eyebrows rose. “I’d figured you for smarter than to make assumptions based on a single test. An incomplete one at that.”

  “I know, right?” Peyton threw her hands up in the air. “That’s exactly what I said.”

  I was going to kill both of them.

  “But he still had to convince you, right?”

  He nodded. “Yeah, but it had more to do with the fact that David’s never gone out with a girl more than once.” His expression softened and became that of the boy who used to beat up other kids for picking on me. “You’re a pain in my ass, Claudia, but you’re my cousin and one of my best friends. And you are not a one-date-only sort of girl. And I didn’t want to see you get hurt again. Not after—”

  “Do not say his name,” I broke in.

  Eddie’s expression shifted again, and I could tell he was wishing he’d had his shot at defending my honor. Which left me feeling sort of squishy and generous. But also anxious.

  “So what were the magic words?”

  Caught up in gazing down at Peyton, Eddie mumbled an absent “Hmm?”

  I reached out and smacked him.

  “Ow.” Rubbing the back of his head, he came back to earth with a short “What?”

  “What. Did. He. Say?”

  “Who?” His smirk made Peyton smack him upside the head. “Ow, Peyton.”

  “Don’t be an ass,” she said.

  Despite the impending Kermit-flailing, I couldn’t help but grin. Watching this develop could definitely be fun if it went beyond holiday fling, which it was looking increasingly like it might.

  Eddie kept the scowl planted on his face just long enough so we knew he was annoyed, then relaxed into something more thoughtful.

  “He told me he didn’t consider you a one-date sort of girl, either. He said...you’re a forever sort of girl.” He held up his hands, as if expecting an argument. “And, yeah, I know it sounds like a totally cheesy come-on line, but thing is—” Leaning forward, he took my hand in his—something he hadn’t voluntarily done in years.

  “I’ve known David all my life and I have never heard him use a word like forever. About anything. That’s how he convinced me.”

  Releasing my hand, he sat back. “That and he said if he hurt you in any way, he’d expect me to kick the shit out of him.”

  I sighed and shoved my hands through my hair, wincing as sweat-soaked strands caught on my fingers and tugged at my scalp. It sounded good. Too good. Sounded like everything I’d thought on that starlit terrace and then some.

  But why hadn’t he told me any of this himself?

  “You know, Claudia, it’s really not a surprise David used Eddie as a go-between.”

  I stared at Peyton. “How do you do that?”

  She shrugged and smiled serenely. “It was kind of written all over your face.”

  I resisted the urge to stick my tongue out. “And what do you mean?”

  “I mean whatever his reasons, David’s never considered a steady relationship until you. Taking that step had to be scary enough for him—telling you the reasons why right off the bat?” A single shoulder rose in an expressive shrug. “Come on, he’s a guy. No offense,” she added as an aside to Eddie.

  “None taken.” And could he look any goonier, I swear.

  I sighed again. “I just don’t know.”

  “Peyton’s right.” Once again Eddie leaned forward. Very softly he said, “He was scared. But trust me, he’s ready to tell you now. He’s ready to tell you everything.”

  And just like that, the fairies experienced a full resurrection from their ashy grave, swooping around in military formation, pitchforks primed and ready, leaving stomach-churning jet streams in their wake.

  Still...

  “How can you be so sure?”

  Eddie shrugged. “Because he told me he was.”

  nine

  The doorbell chimes echoed through the house as I shifted from foot to foot, like I had ants crawling around in my flats.

  Was I a chicken?

  Oh, yeah, I was.

  Despite all of Eddie’s reassurances.

  Despite all of Peyton’s reassurances as she’d followed me up the stairs to my room and waited while I showered and changed into something that didn’t make me look homeless and wasn’t black.

  Despite the fact that I could still hear David’s voice, confessing his love of the stars, his desire to be more and his fear his father would never understand. Could see him, profile etched against the night sky, torchlight flickering over the planes of his face and casting it with mysterious shadows that revealed both the little boy I’d once known and hinted at the man he wanted to be.

  Trapped between two worlds in more ways than one.

  Despite all that...

  Cluck. Cluck.

  As the last chime pealed and faded away without signs of life, I took that as A Sign and turned to make a run for it.

  “Claudia.”

  I slowly turned to find David standing in the open doorway, barefoot and in shorts and a T-shirt, hair damp and with an obvious just-showered look about him.

  “Sorry, I was just finishing getting dressed when the doorbell rang.”

  “If I’m interrupting—”

  He reached out as if to hold me back from taking off, though he refrained from actually touching me. “Eddie called,” he said, a faint hint of red streaking across his cheekbones. “Said you might be coming over.”

  Judas, I started to automatically think, before taking in David’s appearance once more.

  “You...showered because you thought I might show up?”

  He shoved his hands in his pockets and lifted one shoulder, the red deepening.

  “I cleaned up, too,” I heard myself saying, feeling heat rising from the scoop neck of my shirt. It wasn’t red, because I couldn’t quite bring myself to wear that color again just yet, but a perfectly respectable sapphire-blue that had met with Peyton’s approval.

  “You look nice.”

  “Thanks.”

  Uncomfortable silence fell then, both of us knowing why I was there, knowing we needed to talk, yet clearly at a loss as to how to get on with it.

  “Do you really use the ‘I want to be
more than a ballplayer’ line on all the girls you hook up with?”

  Well, that was one way to get on with it.

  His mouth opened and closed, and then he sighed and looked so sheepish, I knew there was at least some truth to the bimbos’ gossip. But before I could take off, he reached out again and this time grabbed gently on to my arm. “Claudia, please—I can explain.”

  And it was the expression in his eyes—so much the David I’d once known long ago and the David I’d gotten to know in those magical few hours—that had me slowly nodding and following him into the house. After a pit stop in the kitchen to pick up a couple of sodas, he led me into the sun-washed family room overlooking the backyard.

  After we settled on the sofa, he immediately turned to face me and with a deep breath said, “Yeah, I have used that line on girls before. But only as a line. And an excuse.”

  “What?”

  “I’ve never wanted to see girls more than once.” Looking more than a little embarrassed, he went on. “So I used baseball and studying as reasons I was too busy for more than anything but the most casual hookup.”

  I put my unopened soda on the coffee table and crossed my arms. “So then what was it with me?”

  “The truth.” He set his soda on the table beside mine and held his hands out. I looked from his face, so open and unsure, down to his hands, which were visibly trembling, and back to his face. Slowly, I put mine in his, breathing deeply at his touch, enjoying the distinctive gentle-rough feel of his skin against mine.

  “I like you, Claudia.” His voice was low, but sure.

  I swallowed hard. “So Eddie said.”

  “Did he tell you how long I’ve liked you?”

  I shook my head. “He said you’d wanted to ask me out for a long time before New Year’s, but he didn’t say exactly how long.”

  The muscles along the column of his throat worked as he swallowed. “Guess he figured if a girl’s going to hear a guy’s had a crush on her since they were about ten years old, it’s best coming from the guy in question.”

  Once again I experienced the sensation of hearing the words, identifying them, but not having them make a whole lot of sense.

  “You—” I freed one hand to point at him “—have had a crush on me—” I pointed at myself “—since we were ten?”

  “Honestly?” He cocked his head, considering. “Probably since the day you made me eat sand at the beach.”

  “David—we were five.”

  A crooked half smile lightened his face. “Maybe in a different way, but yeah...even that far back.”

  “But...I made you eat sand.”

  “You provided such sound rationale and made it sound like the smartest thing ever.” His grin blossomed into that full, gorgeous smile. “That’s when I knew.”

  “What?”

  He reached up and took my hand that still hovered between us and folded it back into his. “That you and I, Claudia—we’re alike.” He looked past me for a moment, visibly collecting his thoughts. “You were just so freaking smart and curious about everything. And then the older we got, the more I saw we were alike in other ways.”

  I rubbed my thumbs over the backs of his hands, trying to soothe the trembling that had started again. “Like?”

  “Like bucking the family expectations. The wanting something more. The being unique in a culture that rewards conformity.”

  “But you conformed.” I meant it as observation—not criticism. He obviously understood, considering how he met my gaze steadily and nodded.

  “It was just me and Dad for so long. I thought I had to. Thought I owed it to him.”

  His confession echoed with the unmistakable ring of truth, which in turn, gave me the confidence to ask, “If you’ve liked me for so long, why didn’t you ever ask me out while I was still living in Miami or during other visits home?”

  “Because I was an idiot?” The half smile graced his face again along with the slight blush. “Honestly, I was still trying to figure things out—trying to figure out how to balance baseball and academics, especially—” He paused and hit me with a raised-eyebrow stare. “Since you didn’t seem to think much of the whole baseball thing.”

  I dropped my gaze down to our hands. “I hated it,” I confessed slowly, “but only because it took you and Eddie away.”

  After a long pregnant pause, he uttered a quiet “Oh.” As I glanced up, he said, “I never realized...”

  “Yeah.” And a breath later I found myself confessing one of my deepest darkest secrets that I’d barely even admitted to myself. “Mostly you.”

  “Oh.” His eyes widened, the sun flooding the room turning them a brilliant translucent blue. Like throwing open the windows to everything he was.

  “Yeah.” Fresh heat flooded my face as I added, “Which made all the rumors of your dating exploits that much harder to deal with.”

  He fidgeted, visibly embarrassed. “Yeah, I’ve dated a lot. I’ve...been with a lot of girls, although I swear, nowhere near as many as you might have heard.” He met my gaze steadily. “Look, initially, they asked me out and I can’t deny—I liked the attention, especially since it seemed the girl I liked best wasn’t ever going to pay attention to me until I proved to her I was worthy of it.”

  Me, I realized he meant, still more than a little stunned.

  “Thing was, Claudia, it got old.” He took a deep breath as if bracing himself. “Truth is, I haven’t slept with anyone in close to a year.”

  As his words once again resonated with unmistakable truth, I flashed back to the ladies’-lounge bimbos. The lying hussies.

  And I was an idiot.

  “Maybe this makes me sound like the lamest guy and if you ever tell Eddie I said this, I’ll deny it to the grave, but...” He paused. “Sex without really liking the girl you’re with is honestly kind of...boring.”

  Ditto, as I’d learned in the few short-lived relationships I’d had since He Who Should Not Be Named. But all I said was “Trust me, I do not discuss sex with Eddie. I don’t think his delicate constitution could take it.”

  We laughed together for a few moments before I yanked my hands free and dropped my head into my palms. “God, our timing has sucked.”

  “Maybe.”

  He grabbed my wrists and pulled my hands away from my face. His hands slid up my arms as he moved closer. His palms cupped my cheeks and the tip of his nose brushed mine as he whispered, “Or maybe it’s just the way it’s supposed to be.”

  He waited, his breath warm and faintly minty, his hands ever so slightly trembling again where they rested on my face. Matching the tremors I felt in my stomach.

  “Hey, David?” I whispered.

  “Yeah?”

  “Wanna eat sand?”

  I felt his smile as he leaned a fraction of an inch closer, his mouth resting over mine with the lightness of a butterfly.

  “Oh, yeah,” he said, just before his mouth closed over mine.

  epilogue

  March

  “Did you hear from Stanford today?” David asked.

  “Yep.” I grinned. “Got in, full scholarship. And I take it from the sound of your voice you did, too?”

  “Full ride for baseball.”

  “Excellent.”

  Silence descended over the other end of the line—weighted and more than a little odd.

  “David?”

  “I got a full academic scholarship, too.”

  The phone slipped from my suddenly nerveless fingers, falling to the mattress. “Oh, my God.”

  Peyton glanced up from her bed, where she was supposedly studying, but in actuality, texting with Eddie. And perusing more of the cookbooks she’d ordered. There were so many now, they took up a full two shelves of our large bookcase.

  Sta
nford, I mouthed as I snatched the phone up. The details would have to wait.

  “Oh, my God,” I repeated, feeling tears burning hot at the backs of my eyes. He’d been so worried. Despite his grades and his test scores and, my God, that brilliant brain of his, the silly boy had worried he’d be receiving only baseball scholarships. They’d get him through school, sure, but it would bring with it more battles since high-level athletics often didn’t leave a whole lot of room for academics. At least, not the kind of academics in which David was interested.

  More important, though, it came back to wanting more. Wanting some sort of tangible proof he was worth more than just the sum of, in his words, “my body parts and ability to make constant contact with a ball.” Some sort of validation that his academic aspirations were worth something.

  I could tell him his worth until the cows came home, but I knew, too, it was something he needed for himself.

  “There’s more,” he said.

  “What?”

  “I talked to my mom. She said she’ll help out with school. Anything scholarships don’t cover. I think she’s pleased I asked her.”

  “I think,” I said slowly, “maybe she understands better than anyone the choice you’re making. How difficult it is.”

  “I get that now.” He sounded thoughtful.

  “So does that mean your dad—”

  “Yeah. He’s pretty over it all. Says if I want to throw away my future, that’s my prerogative.”

  I winced. “Papi thinks he’ll come around...eventually.”

  That my father was pleased David and I were dating was a given. That he’d turned out to be such a staunch advocate for David when it came to what he wanted to do with his life? A little more unexpected. But as Mami had admitted during one of our recent conversations, Papi was more impressed with David’s determination in following his dreams than he was by his baseball stats. And that’s considering he was pretty damned impressed with David’s baseball stats.

  She agreed, too, that the Irony Train had once again missed Papi’s station, given he was still mystified by my aspirations, especially once I’d fessed up to my desire to become a forensic scientist. But she was working on him, and eventually, he’d figure it out. Or she’d beat it into him with a two-by-four.