Any Red-Blooded Girl (6 page)

“This is it. Home sweet home,” he joked. “You
like it?”

The entire RV was probably smaller than my
bedroom. “Oh…yeah…I like it,” I said tentatively. “It’s…”

Shit. I couldn’t think of one nice thing to
say about the cramped, disheveled space—not that I thought I was
better than Mick or anything. It wasn’t
that
. It was just
that no specific feature of his home was jumping out at me as
something to compliment. And on top of everything else, I was
starting to get a superiority complex (if there even is such a
thing). Because suddenly I felt very privileged and totally guilty
and undeserving.

“I know,” Mick said, saving me further
embarrassment. “It’s not much to talk about, is it?”

I shrugged indecisively.

“Would you like a drink?” he offered, opening
a small built-in refrigerator in the kitchen. “We have iced tea and
water.”

“Yeah, sure. I’ll take some water,
please.”

He handed me a cool plastic bottle. “If you
come over here, I’ll show you my bed,” he said in a teasing,
seductive tone.

“Ooh. Your bed?” I giggled. “I don’t know if
I should. That sounds a little dangerous.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll be a perfect gentleman,”
he promised. “Cross my heart.” He boldly swept his hand across his
chest in a giant
x
pattern.

“Well, if you promise…”

I followed him to a small alcove near the
back of the RV, where he sat down on a couch that was tucked
against the wall and patted the cushion next to him.

“I thought you were showing me your bed,” I
said, still standing in front of him in protest. I mean, he
shouldn’t have offered if he wasn’t really willing to deliver.

“I am. This is it,” he said, grinning
playfully. “This folds flat.” He pointed at the back of the couch.
“I sleep right here. Come on. Sit with me.”

“It’s not really what I expected,” I
admitted, disheartened. “But why not?”

Even though there was plenty of room for me
to sit beside him, I stretched out horizontally and rested my head
in his lap instead. And the cool thing was, he didn’t act
surprised. He just dug right in for a deep, relaxing backrub. I
guess it was another benefit of having a boyfriend with big, strong
hands: He could turn my muscles to Silly Putty.

Now I know this sounds pretty goofy, but the
backrub was so pleasurable I had to just about glue my lips shut to
avoid moaning out loud. After all, I didn’t want Mick thinking I
was some horny tramp getting all revved up over him touching
me.

“So tomorrow’s your birthday?” he asked, as I
started to slip into a sleepy dream.

I sort of half nodded.

“We should do something special,” he
declared. “Something memorable. It
is
your sweet sixteen,
after all.”

I’m not gonna lie. The idea of a sweet
sixteen grossed me out a little. I mean, all I could picture were
phony, overdressed debutantes—dripping with money and
attitude—partying it up at some ritzy, star-studded venue.
Definitely not my thing.

“I don’t know. I hadn’t really thought about
it.”

“Then think about it,” he ordered. “I want
you to remember this birthday for the rest of your life.”

Well,
that
was a tall order. How the
hell was I going to think of something so fantastically original to
do that it would stick in my memory forever, especially here at
good ol’ Wild Acres? And by the way, shouldn’t my awesome new
boyfriend be in charge of the thinking anyway? I mean, I hated to
turn into such a bossy nag so early in our relationship, but…

“Isn’t that your job?” I teased. “Why don’t
you surprise me? I
love
surprises.”

Okay, so I might have misrepresented my
feelings about surprises. But at least maybe I wouldn’t get stuck
doing all the dirty work.

“A surprise it is,” Mick declared.

Out of the blue, the RV’s door jumped open,
causing me to develop an immediate case of rigor mortis.

“Eh, Mick. Cy’s lookin’ for ya,” one of the
card-playing, internet-surfing dudes said, poking just his head
through the doorway.

It was the first time I’d gotten even a
halfway decent look at the guy, since he always seemed to be
staring at the ground. And even though I assumed he was one of
Mick’s relatives, he was absolutely nothing like Mick. He had flat,
greasy hair, a bunch of ready-to-pop zits, and such slouchy posture
he resembled an invertebrate.

“Thanks, Cal. I’ll be there in a few
minutes,” Mick said.

For less than half a second, the mystery guy
made eye contact with me. Then he shut the door and left. “Who’s
that?” I asked.

“Oh, that’s my cousin. My Aunt Billie’s
kid.”

“Kid? How old is he?” I said, sort of
confused. Honestly, the guy looked about thirty.

“Cal? Hmm… I think he’s about four years
older than me. So about twenty. It’s hard to keep track, since we
don’t go to school. We don’t really measure time the same way you
do.”

“Huh?”

“We gauge time mostly by the seasons,” he
explained. “By the rhythm of nature. Every few months, things
shift. And then there are events too. Special experiences that mark
new chapters, like meeting you.”

It could not possibly be true that meeting
me
was a serious turning point in this sweet, gorgeous boy’s
life. “Really? I’m a new chapter?”

Mick leaned in and delivered a French kiss
that literally curled my toes. “Best one yet,” he whispered. “But
let’s keep writing.” And on that sappy note, a rap on the door
interrupted us again. “Oops, I forgot. My dad’s looking for me. You
are
very distracting, Miss Fontain,” he scolded. “I’ll
probably be busy for a while. Can I walk you home?”

Tupelo-9? Home? I’d almost forgotten that,
technically, Mick
was
at home here in Wild Acres.

“That’s okay. Thanks for the offer and
everything, but I’ll be fine on my own,” I said. After all, if I’d
shown back up at Tupelo-9 with Mick in tow, I would’ve been
inviting an even bigger argument than I’d already signed up
for.

Seven

LIKE a freshly launched cannonball, I flew
back to Tupelo-9. But as I approached the shabby pee shack, I
realized I’d made a rookie mistake. I was preparing to tell a
series of lies that involved me spending a ton of time in the
shower and the bathroom, but it was obvious I hadn’t even changed
my outfit, let alone actually cleaned myself up.

Please, God, let my stuff be here,
I
begged, as I rifled through the bushes in search of my clothes,
which luckily were still where I’d tossed them earlier.

Only…

I couldn’t afford to waste any more time. So
instead of showering, I ducked into a bathroom stall and did a
quick change. Then, in about three seconds, I threw my hair back in
a rough ponytail. Good enough.

And when I got back to camp, I carefully
unzipped my sleep pod and slipped my belongings inside under the
radar.

“Can I play?” I asked nobody in particular,
as I snuck up to the horseshoe pit sideways. I could only hope my
parents would figure I’d been hovering in the wings for a while,
and they just hadn’t noticed. I mean, I
definitely
hadn’t
been missing for hours with my sexy new boyfriend.

“After this game,” my mother said, with a
distinct I-smell-a-rat tone in her voice. “Your Pepto is in the
cooler, by the way—if you’re looking for it.”

“Thanks. I think I’ll get some right
now.”

I strutted over to the cooler, flipped the
lid, and retrieved the bottle of pink goop. And at first I thought
about faking it, pretending to drink the stuff but really pouring
it out somewhere instead. But the Pepto seemed pretty harmless, so
once I got the childproof packaging off, I went in for the
kill.

“Thanks again, Mom,” I said, thrusting the
bottle out in front of me like some kind of trophy. Gulp… Gulp…
Gulp. “I think this is really gonna help.” With a dramatic sweep of
my hand, I cleared the excess pink spew off my face. “I can feel it
working already.”

I guess my last comment must have been a
little over the top, because Will shot me a
who-do-you-think-you’re-fooling
glance, which convinced me
to tone down the suck-up
ishness.

Then, to my great surprise, my family and I
played two relatively pleasant games of horseshoes, for which I
turned in an intentionally dismal performance.

And at the end of game two, my father got the
dinner ball rolling. “Okay peepsles, who’s hungry?” he asked, all
chipper and eager-beaver like.

“I’d love something, Dad,” I said, trying to
reel him in with my innocent puppy-dog eyes.

“All right, Flowbee. You can help your dear
ol’ daddy-o cook then.”

So while my mom and Will put the horseshoes
away, my dad stoked the grill, and I rooted through the cooler in
search of dinner ingredients. Hamburgers? No. Hot dogs? No. Steak?
No. Pork chops? No. Holy cow, I’m as carnivorous as the next
person, but just looking at all that meat was starting to give me a
legit stomachache. But hey, at least I already had the Pepto in my
system.

On the hunt for something lighter, I dug all
the way to the bottom of the cooler. But the only thing left was
chicken. “Chicken it is,” I announced, passing the sticky, wet
package to my dad, who immediately started whipping out utensils
and spices and other culinary junk like he was a contender in the
Iron Chef competition.

And even though I’d agreed to help him cook,
once my dad got going, I just got out of his way. With yet another
plate of macaroni salad and an icy bottle of Coke, I flopped into a
lawn chair and awaited the rest of my dinner. And that’s when, out
of the corner of my eye, I spotted Mick striding toward me with a
dazzling, clueless smile.

Shit. I should have warned him about my
parents. I should have told him that they’re
way
overprotective. That they don’t think anybody’s good enough for me.
That they think I’m too impressionable. All at once, a million
things I should have said raced through my mind, causing a thought
meltdown of epic proportions.

The second Mick stepped off the dirt road
onto Tupelo-9, everything around me went fuzzy. It was sort of like
a car accident we were in when I was eleven. My mother was driving
me and Jessie home from the fifth grade ice cream social, when the
pavement got really slick. And as the road curved in front of us,
the cars up ahead slid into the ditch. But for some strange reason,
I thought
we
would avoid the growing heap of metal on the
side of the road. When we hit the turn, though, I felt our tires
lose contact with the ground. Then everything spun out of control,
and all I could do was stare in frozen horror. That’s how I felt
watching Mick strut toward me: utterly helpless. It was too late
for all the things I should have said.

But at the very last moment, a shred of an
idea occurred to me. If only I could get to Mick before my parents
did, maybe I could whisper a quick warning in his ear. On a
kamikaze mission, I tossed my half-eaten plate of pasta into the
trash and bolted toward the road.

And maybe if I hadn’t been in such a
god-awful hurry, I might have actually noticed the stupid air pump
my father had left on the ground in front of the Maroon
Monstrosity. But unfortunately I
didn’t
notice it until its
hard, fat cord caught between my toes and hurled me to the ground.
Of course, before anyone else could respond, my sweet, sweet Mick
dashed to my rescue.

I had a limited window to act. “I don’t like
you,” I blurted over his shoulder, as he hoisted me to my feet.

Shit. That hadn’t come out exactly right.
What I’d meant to say was that I was
pretending
not to like
him. But with my mother advancing on us at breakneck speed, there
was no time to explain.
Play along,
I tried to mouth. But I
could tell by the hurt look in Mick’s eyes that he hadn’t
understood.

“Are you all right?!” my mother shrieked,
rocketing to my side. She tugged me by the arm to the picnic table.
“Sit down, so I can get a good look at you.”

Here we go again. Just because my mother
works in a dental office, she’s under the delusion she’s also
qualified to be a nurse. Honest to God, whenever anyone gets hurt,
she springs into action like she just can’t wait to try out her
hidden talents on the poor sucker.

“I’m fine, Mom. Really,” I assured her.
“There’s nothing wrong with me.”

“I’ll be the judge of that.”

The Mental Hygienist had fixated on a sizable
scrape on my left calf, which she was running her fingers over in
some sort of voodoo maneuver.

And, of course, that’s when my father decided
to butt into the middle of a situation that already had one parent
too many. “Ooh, Flowbee. That looks painful,” he said with a wince.
“Better let Moo-Ma clean that up for you.”

Mr. Tightwad winked at the Mental Hygienist,
which made me wonder if they were conspiring against me. But, more
importantly, had Mick just heard my father refer to me by that
ridiculous nickname? I cranked my head around to check his
reaction, only to discover—to my absolute anguish—that he was
gone.

Now, I swear, I’m not usually the crybaby
type, but seeing that wounded look in Mick’s eyes—and knowing he’d
been upset enough to disappear—got the best of me. Luckily, though,
the waterworks kicked in just as my mother sloshed an alcohol pad
over my scraped leg, so at least the blubbering made sense
anyway.

“It’ll be okay,” my mother said, briefly
patting me on the head before she reached back into her handy-dandy
medical kit for some Neosporin. “It’s not as bad as it looks,
sweetheart. I promise.” She slathered a huge gob of the gooey
ointment over my injury, then stuck a gauze pad on top of the whole
mess with some medical tape. “There we go. All better,” she
declared.