by K. D. Kinney
“Yeah, that’s my favorite thing to do since we’ve been here. I don’t always have a great view of the lights in some places we have been, but here, this is the best. Try squinting. It makes the lights look different and even prettier.”
Noah did. He looked as if he was giving me a cheesy smile. I laughed.
“What? You told me to do it.”
“I did. You looked really cute that I couldn’t help but laugh.” I leaned back onto the pillows I pulled through the window and Noah leaned back too.
He turned on his side to look at me.
I tried to ignore that he was staring at me.
He started tickling my arm.
“Isn’t this why Josh is mad at you?”
“He already knows how this is going to turn out.”
“How’s that?”
“That you liked me first. That maybe I’ll get the first kiss.”
I didn’t expect him to say that. A shock-wave washed over me and my cheeks warmed. I clenched my fists, my toes curled, and I made sure I didn’t start breathing too fast when my heart sped up.
He lightly tickled my arm all the way down to my hand. Noah rested his chin on my shoulder as he continued to stare at me.
I focused my attention on the rides. Even though I was pretending he wasn’t there, I could feel his entire presence. His warm breath on my neck, his gaze locked on my face, his hand holding mine, the warmth coming from his chest. He was so close to my arm that I could feel how fast his heart was beating.
“I told you I didn’t want to mess up your friendship,” I whispered.
“He’s upset because he already knows. He told me. He knows we didn’t do anything, at least not yet, and that it was inevitably going to happen.”
I practically trembled with how he was talking. Had he come just so he could kiss me? Was he trying to get back at Josh?
“Did Josh really kick you out?” My voice trembled.
“Yes.” Noah rolled onto his back. “I’m moving too fast. I’m sorry. This just has the perfect set up for the perfect first kiss. You’re right. I don’t need to push this while Josh is all upset.” Noah sat up and hugged his knees. He didn’t say anything for a few minutes. However, it seemed like forever. “I like how the pattern changes on the giant Ferris wheel. We haven’t been on that one yet.”
I squeezed my eyes shut. What had I done? But what did I want? I sat up, crossed my legs, and inhaled deeply to give me courage once I knew. I drew the letter ‘I” on his back with my finger. Then I wrote ‘a m s o r r y” and waited. He shook his head and I wrote it again. He looked at me and smiled, letting his hand fall to my knee.
‘K I S S M E ?’ My heart was pounding in my ears as I wrote each letter and I waited.
When he figured it out, he turned, cupped his hand on my cheek, and pressed his soft lips against mine. The rush consumed me all the way to my toes. The kiss was better than I expected. I opened my eyes when he pulled away and he was looking at me. He pulled my ponytail holder out of my hair and kissed me again, holding my face close to his as he kept kissing me, making me lie back on the pillows. He slid closer beside me, kissing me over and over until he paused.
I let my hands slide into his hair. So soft. The big loose curls tangled around my fingers. He closed his eyes. I stroked his cheek with my thumb. He leaned down to meet my mouth again. He held me close as he turned onto his back and stopped kissing me. I rested my head on his shoulder. He trailed his fingers lightly on my arm.
“Will your mom be home soon?” he whispered.
“Maybe. I don’t know. There’s a bar at the bowling alley that’s open later than here and sometimes she meets friends there.”
I closed my eyes as his heart rapidly drummed against my cheek. I wanted to feel his voice rumble in his chest.
“Can you tell me why you’re so sure Josh will get over this so easily?”
“Are you going to stop wanting to kiss me if I tell you?” Noah held me tighter.
“No. It’s not like we are going to be girlfriend and boyfriend after this week or anything.”
“Are we having a fling?” He lessened his hold on me.
“I guess. That sounds unimportant though.”
“I agree. This is more special than a fling.” Noah sighed. “It’s complicated with me and Josh. We are great friends. I don’t know what I’d do without him. I also don’t know why girls tend to like me first. I do know why you did. We met first.
“What’s worse is most of the time girls don’t even like him second. He tries pretty hard, though. If I’m there, he doesn’t get far. The other problem might be that we go to a small school. Everyone has known us both for a long time. I had girlfriends starting in fifth grade. He wished he did. In sixth grade, he did get his first, but she was just using him to try to get close to me. Then in junior high, I had a few girlfriends. I quickly got tired of it. I found I didn’t really care for most of those girls once I got to know them. The girls kept trying. I figured out that they didn’t necessarily like me because of me. They either wanted to hang on me and show me off or they used me to get close to the horses. Horses typically attract more girls than flies. When I discovered that, I thought it was gold at first. Then the girls were all about the horses all the time. I love my horses, but that wasn’t working for me either. In high school, I’ve avoided the ones we’ve known forever. I got burned by plenty of them.
“Now there is you. You don’t care about the horse thing and you want to be with us because we’re fun, not just something nice to look at.”
I rubbed my cheeks. They started to warm a little. “But one of the reasons I liked you was because you are kind of nice to look at.”
“So are you. There’s nothing wrong with that. Actually, I think it’s your rainbow colored hair I like the most. I don’t remember seeing that the first time I met you. The whole looks thing was just a bigger deal to those other girls, totally superficial like a status thing. You know, like an expensive pair of shoes they wanted to be seen in.”
“I get it.” I rubbed his chest. The T-shirt material was my favorite and so was his chest. I wished he could stay right where he was all night.
Noah held me tight and tilted my chin up. I thought he was going to kiss me again. He gazed at me instead and played with my hair. I rested my chin on my hand against his chest.
He wrapped his other arm around me and pulled me up so my face was close enough to kiss. Noah started with my forehead. Next, he kissed my nose and then my mouth. He lingered there, kissing me slowly several times. “I need to go before your mom comes home.”
I knew he was right as I rolled off him and sat up. He kneeled in front of me and moved my hair out of my eyes. He seemed to like my hair the most.
“I like your whole name by the way. Seraphina, my gypsy girl.” Noah cupped my face in his hands and kissed me. “I have to show Ezra tomorrow. At twelve forty-five and at two. Can you come?”
“I can’t make the first one. I won’t miss the second.” I grabbed his wrists when he held my head in his hands. I didn’t want him to let go of my face. I loved his touch, his kiss, everything. I wanted to hear his voice when I fell asleep.
He was reluctant to go, but he did. Then he was gone.
I fell asleep with only thoughts of Noah and his kisses running through my mind.
10
Monday
I was very effective keeping Josh out of my mind when I fell asleep. When I woke up, he was the first person on my mind. Guilt overwhelmed me and the thought of running into him started to freak me out the same way horses did.
I sat at the temporary table next to the kitchen. I propped my head up with one hand while I picked blueberries out of my muffin, scattering crumbs everywhere.
“Something bothering you?” Mom asked as she walked into the kitchen. Medicine bottles dropped onto the counter as she rummaged through the cupboards. “I need pain meds.”
“Over by the stove top.” I leaned on my arm on the table and blew th
e crumbs over to the edge. I stopped when Mom looked at me again.
“I know what you’re doing. Keep it up and you’ll be mopping all morning.”
I rubbed the crumbs back to the center of the table and sighed.
Mom unfolded a chair to sit opposite me.
“It is days like this I hate myself for forgetting to come home sooner and I wish we had a recliner.” Mom rubbed her temples. “What’s troubling you? Be glad it’s not this headache I have.”
“Well, I made some friends. Some of them turned out to be not very good ones. They’ve created some problems for me. What’s worse is now I might be the source of drama with the two friends I have left. By the time we’re done here, I might not have any.”
“The boys?”
I nodded.
“What happened with the others? Boys or girls?”
“They’re girls. I guess one of them liked Noah and she was jealous from the second I showed up. They posted a video of me falling on Facebook and they also posted another picture that was meant to upset one of the boys so he would hate on the other. It worked.”
“What do you have to with all this?” Mom rubbed her temples.
“At first I was excited since all I wanted out of this week was to make some friends. Then I realized one of the boys likes me more than a friend. I really like him too. But I didn’t know that the other one liked me more. I didn’t find that out until it was too late.” I stuffed the rest of the muffin in my mouth as guilt flooded over me again. I struggled to swallow the pasty mass in my mouth. “In the meantime, the girls have humiliated me more than once. Probably because I’m hanging out with the boys and they aren’t so they keep causing problems.” The lump in my throat wasn’t from the mass of muffin paste coating it. I pressed my fingers against my eyelids before I went on. “It looks like I messed up the friendship of these five people. The boys reassured me it’s not true. But last night was a mess. Now the boys are mad at each other because of me. Well one is mad at the other.”
“What’s the other one doing about it?”
“Liking me.” I hid my head under my arms. “I didn’t stop him to save their friendship. I let him kiss me.” I couldn’t look at Mom.
“Boy, talk about having a high school experience. If you ever wanted to know what it’s like, well here you go. This is what you’re missing.” Mom laughed. “Sorry, kiddo. It’s no fun. High school is full of dumb drama like that. When you are old enough to leave it behind, it’s such a relief. However, not everyone is able to leave high school behind. Those types are stuck in a superficial world. You, my dear, I’ve tried to spare that kind of grief by living an authentic life. It appears that world of grief is inevitable when you haven’t lived at least two decades in your lifetime. I promise you though, you’ll survive.”
“Mom, that doesn’t help.” I rubbed my face. “Now I don’t even want to see the other boy because I don’t want to hurt his feelings.”
“Don’t you think snubbing him would hurt his feelings more?” She tugged on my hair so I’d have to look up.
“I don’t know.” I rested my chin on my arms.
“Yes, it would. Be his friend if he wants to be yours. That is if you want to. Live this week with no regrets. That’s what I mean by authentic. We are just here for the week. It’s not the end of the world for you. These kids won’t be with you after you leave.”
“They’re on Facebook and so am I.”
“You can block the mean ones. Keep the ones you want on there.” She got up to get another cup of water. “When you put that much energy into their nonsense, then they have a lot of power in your life. You need to take it back because they only have as much power as you give them.”
I rolled my eyes. “That’s easy to say. You weren’t there when The Dark One called me and Cessie whores in front of the boys.”
“What did the boys do? Did they believe it?” Mom leaned against the counter unruffled from my hurt from the insults.
“Well, no. They defended me.” I sat up in my chair tracing where Cessie wrote her name in crayon on the table.
“Do you believe it?”
“No.” I finally met her gaze.
She shrugged. “So there’s nothing to worry about. They’re hurtful words but they’re still just words with only the weight we give them.”
“They posted a video to humiliate me.”
“Have you been on the internet? How many thousands of mean videos are there on there? What about all the ones of celebrities when they fall? Jennifer Lawrence comes to mind. She’s done that more than once. Does that stop people from liking her?”
“No.”
“See, there you go. You’re human. You fall. You’ll do dumb things and sometimes people won’t notice. Sometimes they do and let the whole world know. By tomorrow, or at least eventually, it will be forgotten. How many times have I slipped or done something embarrassing during the show? It’s so risky having a macaw and a monkey to depend on for entertainment. When that stuff happens, we shrug it off. We always have so I don’t know why you’re bent out of shape over all this. If it’s over the boys, for heaven’s sake, be yourself and let everything sort itself out. If it doesn’t, we will be gone on Monday and you can forget about all of it. You’ll never see them again.”
I mashed the muffin bits lost in thought.
“If I see a crumb anywhere when you leave the Caravan today, you will clean this place with a toothbrush. By the way, gypsies use to have problems like this, but their problems were much bigger than yours.”
“We’re pretend gypsies. We shouldn’t have real gypsy problems.”
“We aren’t as different from past gypsies as you’d like to think we are.” Mom disappeared into her room.
I watched the time as we prepped for the show. One o’clock took forever to arrive and that show was the slowest one ever. Once it was over, Mom let me go watch Noah.
I was still in my gypsy clothes. At least I didn’t have to wear the jingly belt. When I got to the bleachers, I found a spot right in the middle where no horses could sneak up and scare me. I played with the colored strands of my hair to preoccupy myself when I spotted Bree and Rachel coming to sit on the bleachers. I was so busy watching them that when someone slid into my side, I jumped and nearly launched off the bleachers. Josh held onto me when my foot almost slipped through the bottom step.
I punched his arm.
He held his finger to his mouth to silence me before rubbing his arm. He winced dramatically.
I whispered, “I know to be quiet. You should know better than to do that.”
“I do. I’m sorry.” He rubbed my back. “I’ve never been this close to you when you’re all gypsy. I kinda like it.”
I didn’t move away. However, I hoped he would stop touching me before Noah’s turn. I leaned back and whispered in Josh’s ear, “So what does he have to do?”
“Ride the horse in circles in all gears.” He smirked.
“Seriously.”
“I don’t know everything he has to do. This is his first time in the advanced competitions and Kelly’s too. She’s had private lessons. She probably should be competing in something even more advanced than this. I’m not sure if her plan in coming here was to hook up with Noah or beat him. I’m sure at this point it’s beat him.” His hand touched the inside of my arm lightly and he slowly worked his way to my hand.
I moved it so it was harder for him to reach. He rested his head on my shoulder. I couldn’t concentrate on anything that was going on in the arena. I slid down the bench to the end and jumped off.
Josh followed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you were completely off me now.” He rubbed my arm.
I brushed his hand away. “I’m not off you because there wasn’t that sort of thing going on between you and me. I don’t want you intentionally trying to upset Noah when he’s trying to do well out there. ” I spotted Bree at the top of the bleachers with her phone camera pointed at us. “Hey, reach up with your left hand an
d grab Bree’s phone.”
Josh was far faster than I thought he would be. He had Bree’s phone before she could take more pictures or video and he handed it to me.
I pointed to the arena when she protested. It was Kelly’s turn.
Josh shushed Bree.
I stuck the phone in my bra.
She started to jump off the bleachers when I climbed back onto the bench to return to the spot I left. Josh was right beside me. More people filled the stands so fortunately Bree couldn’t get to us without making a scene.
“That was awesome.” Josh covered his mouth when he couldn’t stop laughing.
Bree said our names in a loud whisper. We turned and shushed her and so did everyone around us.
“Can I see it?” Josh asked.
I discreetly pulled it out of my shirt, setting it on Josh’s palm and stared straight ahead. I wasn’t sure how well Kelly was doing. I didn’t see anything that looked like a mistake.
“Kelly has another unfair advantage. Her horse is professionally trained too. Noah has taught himself and his horse everything they know.” Josh pushed my hair over my shoulder so I could see what he was doing on Bree’s phone.
I kept glancing at the phone while he worked quickly, deleting a bunch of pictures she had taken of me. It looked as if Bree had been stalking me even when I wasn’t with the boys. He found the videos she had taken and deleted those. He got onto her Facebook and posted a hacked status about how much she liked stalking people especially gypsies because she wanted to be taken away by one. Then he went through her texts and found out what boy she liked. Josh went back to Facebook to post on the boy’s Timeline a “tbh” saying how much she loved him and thought about him constantly.
“Thank goodness she doesn’t have an iPhone.” He took the battery out of her phone and stuck it in his pocket.
Josh slid off the bench away from Bree and walked away.
I couldn’t see where he went. Bree slipped off the bleachers after Kelly finished. Another rider and horse entered the arena. They weren’t as good as Kelly. Once they finished, Josh was back.
