Avra's God (26 page)

“I promised Morgan I’d go to the Fall Fling
with him.”

“You
what
?” Cisco popped up like a
piece of toast from the toaster. His eyes pinned her to the ground.
“Are you going to start playing games with me now? Come on, Avra,
you can’t possibly like that dweeb. You’re trying to get back at
me.”

She sat up. “If you would just wait a minute
for me to finish what I was saying—without going zero to red hot in
five seconds flat. Oooh, you make me so mad.”

“Like I don’t have a good reason—the girl I
love just told me she’s going to a dance with a guy who’s been
stuck on her since elementary school.”

He loved her. It was the first time she’d
heard the words in five months. Her cheeks flushed. She opened her
mouth, closed it. “He asked me before classes started.”

“What kind of whack job asks a girl to Fall
Fling before the semester opens?”

“Maybe he was just smart. He knew we broke
up, and he took the opportunity.”

“So what? I have to ask you to the graduation
after-party
n
ow?”

Cisco’s mention of graduation struck her as
funny and she broke out giggling. “You— you—” She quit trying to
tell him what was so funny and gave in to the laughter.

“Uh, Avra.” Concern replaced his anger. “Are
you okay? You’re having a meltdown—laughing in the middle of an
argument.”

This sent her off into another paroxysm of
giggles. She held her stomach and took deep breaths. Finally, she
wiped the tears from her face. “I was just going to say that if you
want to ask me to the graduation after party, you’ll have to do it
more nicely.” Laugher bubbled up again.

Cisco gave her a soft smile and shook his
head. “Come here.” He opened his arms to her. She scooted into
them. “It’s been an emotional roller coaster for the past month
since we started talking.”

She nodded against his chest that smelled
like sweat, deodorant, and dryer sheets. The laughter left her.
Tears welled up in its place. She wanted to stay in Cisco’s arms
forever; she’d missed them so much. Then, gentle sobs rose up from
deep inside her. These tears were different from all the ones she’d
already cried over Cisco—healing.

Cisco stroked her back. At last she calmed
and tried to pull away. He held on to her a moment longer and
kissed her forehead before he released his grip.

She sniffed. “You’re getting my emotions the
first time around instead of after I’ve analyzed them. Are you
disappointed to find out I’m just as emotional as your
sisters?”

He brushed the hair from her face. “I like
seeing who you are inside.” He leaned back on his arms. “So tell me
the rest of the story about Morgan.”

“I told him no at first, that I still didn’t
have romantic feelings toward him, probably never would. But he
said we’d go as friends—that I couldn’t lock myself away for the
rest of my life just because my heart got broken. So, I said yes,
and I’m going.”

“Oh.”

“Just
oh
?”

“Uh, would you go to the graduation after
party with me?”

“Depends.”

“Depends on what?”

“On whether we’re together or not.”

“This conversation is starting to go in
circles. Let’s pray.” He leaned his arms on his bent knees and
stared across the field. “Jesus, you know I love Avra, but I don’t
deserve her. Whatever You want.” He didn’t speak for so long, Avra
thought he’d finished praying. “Maybe Morgan’s the better guy for
her—he’s loved her longer, been into You longer, he’s not a
screw-up. But You’re my Dad, so I’m asking.”

“Show me what You want me to do at the right
time,” Avra prayed.

Cisco gave her a hand up. They rode back to
Avra’s the way they’d come—not speaking or touching—but everything
had changed.

Kallie tapped her foot. “What’s your answer,
Jesse?” She folded her arms tightly across her chest. “You’ve kept
me hanging for a week.”

He dropped his head, sighed, faced her.
“Yeah, I’ll escort you to Fall Fling.”

“Okay.” She pressed her lips together in a
thin line and turned on her heel.

What was Jesse’s problem? If she hadn’t been
so stubborn sticking to her first choice, she could have spared
herself the humiliation. Avra had been right, as always. She was
breaking her own heart.

The yearbook photographer positioned the Fall
Fling candidates and their escorts on Echo Plaza. Kallie saw what
she had to do—place her hand in the crook of Jesse’s arm.
Nervousness shot through her veins like a can of Red Bull. Why did
she
have to touch
him
? He already thought every girl
on the planet had the hots for him.

At the last moment she slipped her hand into
Jesse’s barely offered arm. She placed her fingers on the folds of
his sleeve. As soon as the camera clicked, she dropped her hand and
stepped away from him. While Jesse made a big show of getting out
of his suit coat, she slipped into the bookstore.

If she didn’t need a guy to parade around the
gym with, she’d tell Jesse to forget it. And she did want to stick
it to God’s-gift-to-music Olivia Marsden. She was so stuck. In more
ways than she cared to admit.

Cisco came around the corner of the Lemerand
Center and stopped in front of Jesse. Why had he bothered to put on
his black jeans and the only dress shirt he owned to spy on Avra
and Morgan at Fall Fling?
It feels like a bad idea
already
.

Jesse sat on the edge of a metal picnic
table. His jacket and the top buttons of his shirt were unbuttoned.
His tie hung loose around his neck.

“Seen Avra?” Cisco said.

“No. Why don’t you go in and see for
yourself?”

He glanced at the door as some students
pushed out into the artificial lamp light. “Can’t. Avra would be
ticked. Sitting home imagining Avra with Morgan was driving me
loco
. Better to see the worst and deal with it.”

“Is she trying to make you jealous?”

“Avra doesn’t play games. She promised Morgan
she’d go after we split. The timing sucks. Just when we were
putting the thing
b
ack together—” He paced
back and forth in front of Jesse. “I had this coming, but I don’t
like it.” He dropped his chin on his chest. “Jesus, I know I don’t
deserve any favors, but if You could just keep Avra from falling
for Mr. Clean-living, I’ll owe You. But even if Avra ditches me,
I’m not checking out. You’re the Man.”

Jesse stared at him. “What’s with you? I
thought you were going to swear, not pray.”

“I got God. I didn’t show up at your church
for half the summer just to get my cheeks pinched by old
ladies.”

“I don’t want anybody telling me what to do,
especially God.” Jesse clamped his mouth shut as though he’d said
too much.

“I had nobody telling me what to do for too
long, and I was set on self-destruct. You’re running from God?”

“Can’t run far when your old man’s a
preacher.”

“I hear ya. Spending all that time with God
people—He’s catching up, huh?”

“Yeah, like right now. I’d have to be blind
and stupid not to see the change in you.”

“Don’t run forever, bud.” Cisco knocked
knuckles with him. “I’m going down by the cemetery to
w
alk and pray this night into the ground.”

The Lemerand doors opened, spilling music and
a stream of students, Kallie at the rear. Jesse focused on the
palms silhouetted by the moon behind her, bracing himself. Beside
him, the teen refreshment booth attendant
s
hot paper wads into a trash can.

The heels of her shoes clicked on the
concrete as she drew near. “Come on, Jesse, come inside.” The
breeze, smelling faintly of fish and salt, lifted the soft neon
green folds of her dress.

Did she wear that color because of the
song?

“Dance with me.”

Jesse spread his arms in a helpless gesture.
“I can’t dance.”

“What’s so hard about it?”

The refreshment booth attendant chimed in,
“Yeah, all you do is drape your arms around the girl’s neck and
lean to the right and left till the song is over.”

Kallie glanced at the kid, glared at him, and
spun back toward the dance. Her dress flared around her and swished
at her ankles as she sped away, her back rigid. Jesse’s eyes
followed her across the porch. A hand slipped up and she wiped
something from her face before she opened the door and disappeared
into the dimness and noise.

He grabbed the back of his neck as the
attendant prattled about the high school football game against
Seabreeze. Every few minutes the doors belched a new group of
students in search of liquid and cooler air. Twice he walked to the
door without going in.

Much later, he looked up from the pool table
in the Student Center to see Kallie standing in the doorway.

Her hair mussed, and skin shiny with sweat,
she motioned him toward her. “Thanks for being my escort, for
picking me up and stuff.” She had wiped expression from her face
and voice. “I’ve got a ride home.”

“Don’t you want to ride home in the Lexus?”
With me?

“You’ve done enough. I’ll be fine.” She
slipped out the door.

They both knew her house was on his way home.
He tossed his pool cue on the table, startling his opponent, and
stalked out the door.

He crawled past Kallie’s house in the Lexus
he’d borrowed from Marty Simon. Funny how Kallie’s ditching had
sapped the enjoyment out of driving the car. How had things gotten
so twisted between them? Maybe they were a train wreck.

Her bedroom light at the back of the house
bathed the croton bushes white. Whichever guy gave her a ride home
hadn’t lingered. He pulled up to the curb and hit her seldom-used
speed dial number on his phone. Talking couldn’t make things worse.
“Hi.”

“Jesse.”

“Did you wear neon green to make a
point?”

“Yeah.”

“The point was—?”

“That I understand you’re not into me. I just
needed an escort.”

“Come out and talk. I’m at the curb.”

Silence. Sigh. “Okay.” Click.

Kallie walked down the front steps and let
herself into the car.

His gaze ran over the faded T-shirt that
filled in the V of her pale yellow terrycloth robe, the yellow
flip-flops, and stopped at her eyes. Everything warmed and ran
together inside him. “You were right. I took so long to give you an
answer about Fall Fling because I wasn’t sure what you were
asking.” He looked away. “I’m not ready to sign my life away.”

Kallie sucked in a breath. Her eyes
flashed.

“But I would have been ticked if you asked
some other guy.”

The anger in her eyes melted into hurt.
“Would it have killed you to dance with me once?”

“I’ve never danced before.”

Her eyes widened in surprise. “Did you think
I’d laugh at you? What?”

She would never understand. “My pa’s preached
all my life that dancing is evil—all dancing but Mom’s ballet, that
is. The tapes keep playing in my head.”

“Oh, please.” Kallie raked her hair back.
“What do you call what you do on stage when you’re performing a
song?”

Jesse opened his mouth and closed it without
saying anything. He held his hands out helplessly. “I didn’t want
to make an idiot of myself.”

“At last, the truth.”

His jaw clenched. How did Kallie bulls-eye
the guy inside, the one he hid at all costs? “I’m sorry I was such
an—” He cut himself off. “It was my fault it didn’t go well
tonight.”

Kallie sighed. “At least you talked it out
with me.” She fingered the stretched-out neck of her T-shirt.

He tried to read her eyes in the shadow from
the street light. “I don’t want to be responsible for another train
wreck.”

She smiled. “No more train wrecks for
us.”

The guy inside smiled back. “So, get out of
here, already. I can’t look at you much longer in your pj’s without
kissing you.” He ran a hand over her hair, resting his palm at the
back of her neck.

Kallie glanced down at herself. “I’m
decent.”

His lips softened, melted as he stared into
her eyes. “It’s just the thought.”

Kallie searched his eyes for another second.
“I’m gone.” She shut the door on his chuckle.

Cisco stood on the walkway below the porch as
Avra pushed through her front door. “You’re up.” He was too wound
to be relieved.

Avra dropped the blankets in her arms on the
floor. “Yeah.”

He dug his hands into his jeans pockets and
paced the walk. “How was Fall Fling?”

“You were there.”

“For a while. This thing with you and
Morgan—are you going out again? Are you choosing him? What?”

“How does it feel?”

“Don’t play me, Avra.”

“I’m not
playing
you. I want you to
understand a little bit of how I felt when you were with
Isabel.”

“This is whacked. I’m outta here.”

She planted her feet and glared at him.
“Fine. Leave. Don’t get your answer. Let it eat your gut for a
couple of months. Maybe you’ll find out what I went through.”

He lowered his voice. “What’s up with you and
Morgan?”

“I’m not going out with him again.”

He stood at the bottom of the steps looking
up at her. “You got your pound of flesh.” Jealousy and relief
warred inside him. “I watched him touch your back, hold your hand,
lead you into the Lemerand Center. You looked so pretty all dressed
up, like a stranger—not like the soccer jock I fell for. I tortured
myself imagining you slow dancing. I couldn’t sleep last night
thinking about him kissing you good night.”

Avra sat on the top step. The pull between
them crackled in the morning air. He could see her breath as she
spoke.