"Whatever." Yasmine retrieved the piece of paper from the bathroom drawer, grateful that some nosy girl hadn't rummaged around in there for some hair gel or something and taken the poem with her. She handed it to Mekhi and sat down in front of him. It was such a relief just to be alone together again, even if the walls were crumbling down around them.
Mekhi's heart was still pumping wildly, but the rest of his body had slowed way down. He read the poem carefully, his tongue heavy with liquor and fatigue.
a list of things you love:
black
steel-toed boots
dead pigeons
dirty rain
irony
me
a list of things I love:
cigarettes
coffee
you and your brown cinnamon arms
but the thing about lists is they tend to get lost;
"They are lyrics, aren't they?" Mekhi observed. "I mean, that would be so much better with music." He tried to reread the poem again to himself, but the words began to dance around the page and he couldn't make sense of them anymore. He knew he'd written them for a reason, but he couldn't remember what the reason was.
Yasmine made a funny little gasping sound and he looked up to find her crying the gaspy, chokey sort of crying of someone who doesn't cry very often. Only a moment ago Mekhi had been having a ball, shouting his lungs out into an microphone. How had everything gotten so serious all of a sudden?
Yasmine took his hand. Her face was wet and blotchy, her nose was running, and there was a bloody silver ring in her lower lip. "Look, I know everything is all messed up, but it's still gonna be okay. I mean, it's just like in your poem. I like ugly things. We both like it when things aren't perfect, right?"
Mekhi's hand hung limply in hers. He knew what Yasmine was saying was important, but he couldn't concentrate. What he needed was a cigarette, and as far as he could remember he was all out. Or maybe his cigarettes were with his other shoe. "I need to find my shoe," he told her.
The tears kept falling. Yasmine gripped his hand tightly, desperate to finish what she'd started, to explain what she thought Mekhi's poem meant and how true she thought it was. "We don't have to go to the same school or even live together. We can just be." She wiped her nose on the back of her free hand. There were little spots of blood on her zebra-striped pants from her piercing. She rubbed at them angrily. "No matter what we do, we'll always sort of be together, right?"
Mekhi nodded. "Right," he agreed robotically. It wasn't that he didn't feel her pain, he just couldn't have such an intense conversation right now.
Yasmine's shoulders shook with a silent sob. She wiped her nose again, leaned forward, and kissed him on the lips. Mekhi tried to kiss her back, but he was afraid of hurting her lip.
"All right." She let go of his hand and attempted a smile. "Get out of here. Go be a rock star or whatever."
Mekhi stared at her. She was letting him go?
Duh.
"Would you just leave already?!" Yasmine gave his chest a nudge as she fought back another round of sobs.
Mekhi scrambled to his feet. He could barely see the floor, it was so littered with cigarette butts, empty bottles, left-behind clothes, and destroyed crap. "I can come back tomorrow and help clean up," he offered lamely as he limped away through the mess.
Like tomorrow he was going to be all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and ready to put on rubber gloves and mop up with the Mr. Clean.
45
"You still have this?" Porsha pulled the moss-green sweater she'd given Kaliq over a year ago off the back of his desk chair, where he'd left it the night before. She turned it inside out, checking to see if the tiny gold heart pendant she'd sewn inside one of the sleeves was still there. It was.
Kaliq stood in the middle of the room, watching her. He wanted to whip his clothes off, grab her, and throw her on the bed, but he knew from experience that Porsha liked to do things her way, so he would have to try and wait.
Porsha put the sweater down and ran her hand over the model sailboat on Kaliq's desk. Beside it was a picture of him and his buddies from St. Jude's, holding up the two big fish they'd caught on a fishing trip up in Maine. With his strong, caramel arms, broad white smile, wavy hair, and glittering green eyes, Kaliq was the cutest of them all. Not that she hadn't always known that.
She didn't know what she was waiting for, and she wasn't stalling exactly. She just hadn't been alone with him in this perfect intimate way in so long, she was relishing it. And the funny thing was, all the other times—and there had been many—that she'd thought they were about to have sex, she'd been nervous and fidgety and hadn't been able to stop talking. But not this time.
"Do you want to listen to some music or put a movie on or something?" Kaliq asked, wondering if he needed to enhance the mood. If only he had some candles or incense or something.
Massage oil? Handcuffs?
Okay, let's not get carried away.
Porsha walked over to the bookshelf and turned on the ridiculous globe lamp that Kaliq had had since he was five. Then she switched off the overhead light. Light from the globe mingled with the moonlight shining through the skylight overhead, casting the room in a soft blue glow.
"There." She kicked off her black flats. Her toes were painted dark red and looked sexy even to her. She grinned at Kaliq. “Come here.”
He did as he was told, tucking his hands up under her shirt and helping her off with it while she practically tore his head off removing his. Her bra was filmy, white, and wireless, and when she unhooked it, it fell away like tissue paper to the floor.
Kaliq stood his ground. He'd gotten this far so many times before, it wouldn't have surprised him if Porsha's mom knocked on the door and told them that she was actually having triplets and the other two babies were arriving just this minute.
Porsha wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her body into his. All the times she'd imagined doing it, she'd put herself and Kaliq in place of the actors in a love scene in some old movie. But this was so much better, because it was real, and it felt so nice.
He couldn't stop kissing her. She guided his hand down to the waistband of her jeans and then reached for his. Okay, maybe no one was going to knock on the door and the sky wasn't going to fall in. Maybe this time it was really going to happen.
She pulled him backwards onto the bed and they shimmied out of their pants and underwear. Then there was nothing left but them. They kissed again in every kissable spot, until it became obvious that certain measures needed to be taken. Kaliq fumbled in his bedside bureau drawer for a condom.
Now for the awkward part.
Only it wasn't awkward. Without a word, Porsha took the condom, kissed her way down his body, and carefully rolled it on. There. All better.
Kaliq had forgotten what it was like being with Porsha. How touching her wasn't a haunted-house experience, where he blindly had to guess where things were and what they were, and wound up bumping into walls. With Porsha, he just knew. And everything seemed to fit just right.
Porsha didn't even have to tell Kaliq to slow down. They were so in sync, all she had to do was close her eyes and wrap her arms around him, arch her back a little, and feel it happening.
Ta-da!
When it was over, they lay on their backs, holding hands and smiling up at the ceiling, because they knew that in a few minutes they could do it again. They could spend the rest of their lives doing it if they wanted to. Have food sent up to Kaliq's wing of the townhouse. Take their finals online.
"Maybe I won't even go to college," Kaliq mused. Why should he, when there was so much pleasure to be had? He kissed her hand. "We could sail around the world together. Have adventures."
Porsha closed her eyes and tried to imagine sailing around the world with Kaliq on the yacht he'd build especially for them. "I'd wear a different bikini every day," she whispered out loud. In her head the fantasy continued. Their bodies would be all strong and wiry from working on
the yacht and from their diet of raw fish, seaweed, and champagne. At night they'd make love under the stars and in the morning they'd make love to the sound of the seagulls' caws. They'd have beautiful, milky chocolate, green-eyed babies who swam like dolphins and never wore clothes. They'd stop in exotic ports, where the natives would dance for them and give them gifts of rare jewels and furs. Eventually, they'd amass such a collection of treasure, they'd be known around the world as the richest seafarers in the universe, and pirates would come after them to plunder their booty and steal their impossibly beautiful, model-type children. By then, having nothing better to do with all those hours on the boat, she and Kaliq would have their black belts in karate, and they would fight off the pirates, sending them plunging to their deaths in the shark-infested seas. Then they would sail off into the moonlight, unharmed, and more in love than ever.
It could happen.
"Or maybe we'll both go to Yale," she said hopefully. Some doctor at her mom's hospital had left a note with her doorman today saying he wanted to write her a recommendation to Yale's premed program. She'd never considered becoming a doctor, but if it was going to get her into Yale, why not?
"I'll play lacrosse and major in geology," Kaliq murmured into her hair.
"Yes," Porsha agreed dreamily. Kaliq would excavate the Connecticut woods looking for rocks and wearing the beautiful sweaters she'd knit for him during her lengthy premed lectures. All the female premed students would be in love with a brilliant young biologist who also happened to be Porsha's advisor, but she would pay him no mind—she'd only have eyes for Kaliq.
"And we'll live together," she added aloud, in a ram-shackle old Victorian house right near campus. They'd make hot cider on the wood stove and cook s'mores in the fireplace.
Kaliq grinned happily. "We'll get a Great Dane."
"No, two Great Danes and two cats," Porsha corrected. And they'd be so involved in their studies and making love on their antique bed in their creaky Victorian bedroom that they'd forget to cut their hair or buy new clothes and they'd look like hippies, but they'd still graduate magna cum laude.
"And we'll get married," he whispered.
"Yes." Porsha squeezed his hand beneath the sheets. They'd have a gigantic wedding, and when they returned from their yearlong honeymoon in the south of France, they'd live in a Fifth Avenue penthouse overlooking the park. She'd be the surgeon general of New York, and he'd stay home with their four, thick-haired, green-eyed children, building sailboats in the living room. And he'd always pack a Hershey's Kiss in her lunch to show that he loved her.
Porsha turned over and rested her head on Kaliq's chest. The possibilities were endless, but they didn't have to decide now. The only decision they had to make right now was whether to do it again, or wait a few minutes and then do it.
His heartbeat rang in her ears, an urgent, vibrate sound. She lifted her head and kissed him.
Why wait?
Author's Note
Are Mekhi and Yasmine still together, or is it a just-friends thing now? What kind of "roommate" is she looking for exactly?
Will Mekhi become an internationally famous rock god?
Will Porsha finally get into Yale? Will she have to join the army or become a doctor to do it?
Will Chanel and Kaliq and Porsha all go to Yale together? Is that really a good idea?
Will Bree become a famous and untouchable supermodel or will she mess up again and have to go to boarding school to escape the burning stares of passersby?
Will Kaliq ever be unfaithful to Porsha again?
Find out in the 7th book of the Upper East Side series, which is out now! Also, if you'd like more updates and interaction with me you can contact me at the following:
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: AshValentine__
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I'd really appreciate your feedback so please leave reviews and tell me what you think!
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Did you love Upper East Side 6? Then you should read Upper East Side 7 by Ashley Valentine!
In case you've been hiding under a rock somewhere and don't yet know us—doesn't everyone?—we are the belles of the ball, the princesses and princes of New York's Upper East Side. Most of the time we live in penthouse apartments in those stately doorman buildings on Park or Fifth Avenues or in town houses that take up half a city block. The rest of the time we're at one of our “country” houses, which vary in size and location from compounds in Connecticut or the Hamptons to medieval castles in Ireland to beachfront villas in St. Barts. Weekdays there is school—yawn—at one of Manhattan's small, single-sex, uniform-required private schools. Weekends we play hard, especially now that the weather is fine and our parents are off in their yachts or private jets or driver-operated town cars, leaving us crazy kids to do as we please.
The uptown girls are headed downtown as Chanel and Bree take on their new fabulous roles as rock-star model girlfriends of New York's hottest band, The Raves. Meanwhile, Mekhi is too busy drowning his sorrows in empty bottles to notice a mysterious French beauty who has a penchant for dirty, Lenny Kravitz-wannabe lead singers. Porsha takes residence at the Plaza to think about her future. Will she become a gun-toting international spy or Manhattan's snobbiest society hostess? Decisions are so difficult! Sounds like everyone needs a day off at the spa. And Senior Spa Day promises to serve up further doses of scandal for New York's busiest private school vixens.
Also by Ashley Valentine
Bridgeport Academy
Bridgeport Academy #1
Upper East Side
Upper East Side 1
Upper East Side 2
Upper East Side 3
Upper East Side 4
Upper East Side 5
Upper East Side 6
Upper East Side 7
Upper East Side 8
Upper East Side 9
Upper East Side 10
Upper East Side 11
Upper East Side #6 Page 15
