by Jamie Blair
Saturday came with a crack of lightning and roll of thunder that had my heart jumping through my chest at one-thirty in the morning. There was no going back to sleep after my mind woke and began churning through all of the excitement and fear of prom in one week.
I grabbed my phone off my desk and sent Kolton a text.
I know you’re not awake. It’s storming here, and I can’t sleep. I’m so excited and nervous for prom. I love you.
Before I set the phone back down, it rang in my hand. Kolton’s name appeared on the screen. I jabbed the answer button and raised it to my ear. “Hey!”
“Hi, Ladybug.” The voice on the other end of the line was quiet, almost shy.
“Why are you awake?” I got in bed and snuggled down under my blanket.
“I’ve got a lot on my mind. Can’t sleep.”
“Oh.” It didn’t sound like good things on his mind. “Like what?”
“Just how I let my friends push me around all the time. It’s like I’m breaking the rules by going out with you.”
“They don’t like me.” I twisted my sheet in my hand.
“It’s not that they don’t like you, it’s that they don’t like me breaking up the group.”
“They want you with Tabby.” I squeezed my eyes closed. This wasn’t what I needed one week before prom. One week before Monopoly.
“Yeah, but it doesn’t matter. It’s not what I want. This is the first time I’ve refused to do what they expect me to. It feels strange.”
“Do you regret it? I could return my dress if you don’t want to go.” My voice cracked, betraying the confidence I wanted my words to convey.
“No! No, Lauren. That’s what I’m telling you. I want to be with you so much, I don’t care what anyone else thinks. I don’t care if I never talk to any of them again as long as I’m with you.”
“But it shouldn’t have to be that way. I’m taking you from your friends.” I pressed the heel of my hand to my eye.
“You’re not taking me from them, I’m choosing you. Anyway, what kind of friends are they if they don’t want me to be happy?”
We lay in silence for a while, lost in our own thoughts.
“Lauren?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you.”
“I know.”
I rolled over, wrapping up in my quilt. His steady breathing lulled me.
“Don’t hang up,” he said. “Just stay here with me until morning.”
“Okay. Kolton?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you too.”
I woke to his tiny voice coming through a tin can under my pillow. My hand found my phone and pulled it out.
“Morning,” I said.
“Morning, Ladybug. Thanks for sleeping with me.”
“Did you sleep? I think I crashed out on you.”
“You did. You were snoring.”
“I don’t snore!”
“You do.” He laughed. “I slept a little.”
I would’ve done anything to be with him right then, warm and snuggled in his arms. “I don’t want to ever hang up.”
“I have a better idea. What are you doing today?”
“Not much. Kristin’s going to Connor’s aunt’s birthday party. Amy and Oriann might come over.” I scooted up and leaned against my headboard. “Why?”
“If I start driving right now, and you start driving right now, we could be together in ninety minutes.”
He was right. Why hadn’t we thought of this sooner?
I threw my blankets back. “Give me an hour to get ready. I’ll meet you in Williamsburg for lunch in ninety minutes.”
“Seriously? You’ll do it?” He was so excited, I giggled.
“Seriously! Colonial Pancake House. One hour and ninety minutes. Be there.”
“You are the coolest girl I’ve ever known.”
“Yeah, yeah. Stop talking and let me go so I can get there and kiss you.” I was already at my bedroom door.
“Okay, see you soon. Drive carefully. I love you.”
“Love you, too.”
It hadn’t taken me an hour to shower and get ready. I was so excited; I was out the door in forty minutes. Even with a stop to get gas, I was twenty minutes early.
I sat in a booth sipping Diet Coke and looking over the menu for the tenth time, butterflies doing battle in my stomach. I didn’t know why I was so nervous. I couldn’t wait to see Kolton walk through the door.
Looking out the window, I jumped up when I saw his car pull in the parking lot. I speed walked to the door and pushed it open. He saw me and jogged across the lot, grinning. “Am I late?”
“No. I was early.” I let the door go and threw myself at him as soon as his feet hit the sidewalk. We both laughed and hugged each other tight. “I can’t believe we did this,” I said, kissing his cheek then his lips.
“I don’t know why we didn’t think of it sooner.” He kissed me again.
“I know!” We went inside holding hands and sat across from each other in the booth. “It’s not really that far,” I said, thinking back on my drive. “And I listened to an audio book, so it made the time fly.”
“The drive was nothing. We act like we live on opposite side of the world or something.” He squeezed my legs between his under the table.
Neither of us could stop smiling. It was like we both had proof that we could really make this work. It wasn’t going to be as hard as we thought.
The waitress took our order. I got a Belgian waffle with strawberries and whipped cream. Kolton got a giant stack of pancakes. When she left our table, Kolton got up and came around to sit beside me.
“I can’t be all the way over there with you sitting right here.” He kissed me and held my hand.
I picked a black hair off of his t-shirt. He took it from me and stuck it to mine. “Tiny wanted you to have that.”
“Tell Tiny thanks for me. Nothing from the lizard?”
Kolton’s eyebrows shrugged up and down and a sly smirk formed on his lips. “Depends on which lizard you’re taking about.”
I didn’t get it at first and narrowed my eyes in confusion.
“Pocket lizard...?” He laughed. “Lame middle school joke. Sorry.”
I glanced down at his lap and cracked up. “That is so middle school.”
“I know. Why else would I want to teach kids that age? Do you know how much material I’ll have to bring home to you? Not only funny names for private parts, but fart jokes, too.”
“You’ll bring them home to me?” It felt like I’d swallowed the sun, bright inside.
He nodded. “Hopefully, someday.. If we went to the same school, in a few years we could live together—rent an apartment or a house just off campus—and I’d pay for it so you wouldn’t have to work and go to school, too. Unless you wanted to, but I don’t know what your parents would think about that. They might want you to only focus on school and--”
I put my finger over his lips. “You want to live together, someday?”
He took my hand and lowered it. “Yes. Not now. I know that would be too soon, right? But maybe next year if that’s what you want, too.”
I couldn’t believe it. We were making plans to be together. It was really happening. I smiled and felt my nose and eyes tingle with the urge to cry happy tears. “Will you bring Tiny?”
“I’ll bring Tiny.”
“And your lizard?” I was smiling so big, it hurt my face.
“Both of them!” Kolton grabbed me and pulled me to him, laughing.
“Then count me in!”
The waitress sat a plate in front of me and Kolton and I broke apart, still laughing. “I’ll go back over to my side and give you some room,” he said.
When the waitress left, he reached across for my hand. “I told you I wouldn’t lose you again. I meant it.”
“I’ll go online as soon as I get home and officially accept to UVA. Unless there’s somewhere closer to home for you that you’d rather go. It’s only an hour and a half away
for me, but three for you.”
His eyes fell shut and he shook his head. “No. I have to get away. I want my own life with just you and me.”
“Me too.”
I loved Kolton. I’d never love anyone else.
KOLTON
My countdown until next Saturday was nothing now compared to the countdown until next fall when Lauren was all mine. When I was out of this town and away from all of the people who wanted my life to be something I didn’t.
No more Tabby.
No more Mom.
No more Kyle.
LAUREN
“Hello! Lauren!” Kristin waved my Shakespeare study guide in front of my eyes. There should never be tests on Shakespeare on Mondays. “What are you daydreaming about?”
I hadn’t told her about going to UVA with Kolton. She still thought I was trying to get into William and Mary to room with her. “Nothing. Prom.” I picked up a carrot stick from my lunch tray and crunched it between my teeth.
“Are you going to see Kolton again before the big day?” She twisted a lock of curly hair around her finger.
“No. I saw him Saturday. We met in Williamsburg for lunch.” I dropped my carrot back on my tray and leaned on my hand.
“So, what’s wrong? You look down.” She tapped my cheek with the eraser end of her pencil right over my birthmark.
“Long distance relationships suck. I miss him like crazy.” I reached up and scratched where she’d tapped. I hadn’t tried to pile concealer on to hide it since spring break.
“Where’s he going to school in the fall?” She gave me a conspiratorial look.
“It’s already in the works, so you can stop giving me that look.” I laughed when she kicked me under the table.
She sat up straight and scooted her chair in. “What about William and Mary? Did you hear back from them?”
No. But, Kristin, you and I both know I have no chance at getting accepted. I’m going to UVA with Kolton.”
“Holy shit, Lauren. You’ve only been together a couple weeks. Now you’re basing where you go to college on your relationship?”
“Can’t you be happy for me? I have a great boyfriend and UVA is a great school.” It felt like the Ides of March was quickly approaching. “After next year we’re going to move in together.”
She grabbed my wrist. “Listen. I’m not against you. I’m your best friend. If I were talking about planning my life around some guy I just met on spring break, you’d tell me I was crazy. You’d probably have your mom call mine and bring the world down on top of me until I saw how nuts it was.”
“It’s not crazy. And we didn’t just meet.” I tossed my bag over my shoulder.
“Knowing someone when they’re eight is a lot different than knowing them when they’re eighteen. You know I’m right.”
“What I know is that I don’t need this from you.” I spun around and strode out of the lunchroom. I couldn’t believe she was giving me crap about Kolton.
There was so much against us. His mom, his brother, his ex-girlfriend, his friends, and now my best friend. Could we make it work with just the two of us? Would we be able to convince them all that they were wrong?
Were we wrong?
No. Nothing wrong felt so right. I had zero doubt, zero hesitation. I knew being with Kolton was where I was supposed to be.
KOLTON
Rob’s t-shirt read, I know how many licks it takes, and had the Tootsie Pop owl on it licking a red sucker. He blew smoke out the side of his mouth. “Dude, you just met the girl.”
I sat across the picnic table from him drinking a chocolate milkshake while he downed his second cup of black coffee. It wasn’t often that we left school for lunch, but I couldn’t take sitting at our lunch table with Tabby. I needed air. Space. I needed an hour outside the confines of the school walls.
I was sick of defending myself to all of my friends. “We met a long time ago, but it doesn’t matter. She’s it for me. That I know for a fact.”
Rob shook his head, chuckling like an asshole. “You haven’t even slept with her, yet somehow you know she’s the one. Whatever.”
“Don’t be a dick. Matt, Amber, everybody else is bad enough. They have it covered, okay?” I slid my shake to the end of the table, suddenly in no mood to drink it.
“Hey, you know I’ve got your back. I always have your back.” He took a long drag off his smoke. “But you’re talking like some thirty-year-old man. Next thing you know, you and Lauren will be running off to Vegas to get hitched. Slow the fuck down. That’s all I’m saying.”
“Noted.”
Rob stubbed his cigarette out on the bottom of his shoe and tossed a few bucks on the table. I threw down a five for my shake and a tip and followed him to his car.
After school, I paced the pier in my lifeguard shorts. My eyes would not stray from the spot I’d first seen Lauren dangling her legs over the side. The same spot where we sat on her last day of spring break. If there was a way to make her appear out of sheer will power, she’d be popping in any second.
I got off at six today, then I had a few lawns to mow for Mr. Tulane. Then I’d talk to Lauren.
Only three more days until I saw her again.
LAUREN
“Mom put you up to this, didn’t she?” I asked Amy as she held a black shirt up by its hanger and grabbed for the dangling price tag.
“Put me up to what?” Her eyebrows rose at the price, and she hung the shirt back on the rack.
“Shopping with me. She wants info. That’s where you come in.”
She let out a sharp laugh. “It’s a school night. Has mom ever encouraged you to go out on a school night?”
That question took absolutely no thought. “No.”
“Then why would she want me to take you shopping tonight? Especially when she has to watch Oriann the Teething Monster from the Black Lagoon?”
She had a point. Oriann was a screaming ball of slobber lately. “Because prom is in two days.”
“Right. The prom you’re going to with Kolton and then spending the night at Kristin’s while he drives all the way back home.” The smirk on her face made it clear how much she believed that plan. “Mom and Dad aren’t stupid, you know. That’s probably my fault since I pulled every trick there was on them when I was your age.”
“I don’t care if they believe it or not. In a few months I’m moving out and they won’t know who I spend my time with.” I picked up a beaded scarf from a display table and wrapped it around my shoulders. Maybe I’d need it for Saturday night.
Amy slipped the scarf off of me.
“So, which school did you choose? Do Mom and Dad know?”
“UVA, and no. Not yet. But I’m not worried about it.”
“They’re going to freak that you haven’t discussed this with them. You know that, right?” One hand hit her hip. She’d gotten her hair died, her nails done and feisty Amy was back.
“How’s Dave? Are you two still split up?”
“Don’t change the subject. Are you rooming with Kristin?”
I turned to the display table, folded the scarf and put it back. “Kristin’s not going to UVA.”
“Let me guess. Kolton is?” She put a hand on my shoulder, trying to turn me to face her.
I spun around. “Yes.” I walked out into the aisle of the department store. I’d thought maybe Amy would be supportive and understanding, but it wasn’t heading that direction.
She fell into step beside me, waving off a counter girl offering to spritz her with perfume. “I’m not going to give you the You’re Too Young Lecture. You’ve always had your eyes on the future, so I know you’ve thought this through. But, have you thought about what happens if it doesn’t work out?”
“It’ll work out.” I wasn’t having this discussion with one more person. It was enough that Kristin was giving me a hard time about it. Amy couldn’t even keep her own marriage together, so who was she to judge my relationship with Kolton?
My phone buzzed with a tex
t. I dug it out of my bag’s front pocket and read Kolton’s note.
119 days until fall session starts. Love u.
I send him a message back.
