Heart's Reflection (11 page)

Blinking, I
glanced down at the purple silk mid-thigh length dress I'd thrown on. "Is
it? I'm not sure. I don't really know designers."

"I don't
either. But my sister has one of his and makes a big deal of it."

His hand went to
my waist, and he led me into the school and to the gym where the dance was
already well under way. The place was packed. Who would have thought there'd be
such a turnout for a science related event?
Any
excuse for a party, I guess
.

Bruno Mars'
It Will Rain
played over the speakers as
couples hung on each other on the dance floor.

We stood in
awkward silence at the entrance until a couple of kids came up behind us. The
guy stepped on my foot and hit my shoulder as he pushed past.

"Excuse
you," the boy said in a nasty tone. He glared at us, before he walked away
pulling his laughing girlfriend behind him.

"We should
get out of the way," I murmured.

Ronny nodded,
staring off across the room. "You wanna..." He cleared his throat
before finishing. "Dance?"

"Sure. I
guess."

He didn't even
wait for my reply and was already heading in the direction of the swaying
couples. I trudged after him.

Worry about Nathan
ruined any enjoyment I might have had in the moment. And Ronny wasn't nearly as
fun to be with as I thought he'd be. He didn't have that acerbic sense of humor
I loved. By this time, Nathan would have made insightfully amusing comments
about half the people in the room.

When we reached
the edge of the dance floor area, Ronny took hold and pulled me to him. His
hands rested at my waist, and mine lay on his shoulders as we moved with a
six-inch gap between us. Our dance steps consisted of shifting the weight from
one foot to the other.

The brownie sure
didn't seem to be working. Not that I wanted it to anymore. I was so over this
whole thing and now bitterly regretted I'd ever started it. However, if the
love potion had worn off Ronny, could it have worn off Nathan too?

I couldn't think
of anything to say, and the silence stretched. Finally, I recalled something
Ronny had said earlier.

"So ummm.
What did you want to talk to me about?" I asked.

"Oh
yeah," Ronny said with a smile. "You're really great at math."

"Thank
you." He'd asked me on a date to say that?

"And I'm
really trying to keep my athletic team eligibility," he continued.

"Okay? But
what—"

"I'm really
bad at math. So I thought you might agree to help me."

"You want a
math tutor?" If he hadn't eaten the brownie, I would have thought he'd
only asked me to the dance to get my help to pass math.

"I'd pay
you," he offered.

"Yeah. I'll
tutor you. I already have a lot of other kids I tutor. What's one more?"

"Really?
Great," he said, a relieved sigh escaping him.

Another slow song
started, and we danced with neither of us seeming to make the conscious
decision to continue. As we moved, the tutoring thing bugged me more and more.

"Is that why
you asked me to the dance?" I asked. "So I'd be your math
tutor?"

"Well..."
Ronny stared at his shoes, his head hanging. "Yeah."

When I didn't respond
he hurried to add, "Don't get me wrong, you're kinda cute. And you're very
sweet agreeing to be my math tutor but I..." His eyes strayed to a guy
standing at the edge of the dance floor. I knew him as one of Ronny's
teammates, but I couldn't remember his name. I didn't know much about the guy
except that I'd seen him with Ronny. A lot. Then, I remembered I'd never seen
Ronny with the same girl more than twice. Like tumblers of a lock falling into
place, the truth occurred to me.

"You're
gay," I said. Obviously, the love potion couldn't trump sexual preference.
No wonder it hadn't really worked on him. "I should have seen it before
when you mentioned the dress."

"What?
No," he protested, fear filling his eyes. "I'm so not gay. You can't
believe I..."

"It's
okay," I reassured him. "I won't say anything. I'm totally not into
outing anyone."

"No one would
believe you anyway," he said almost to himself.

"You're
right. But, you know, there's nothing wrong with being gay."

"Don't say
that." He pushed me away. "I'm not...what you said. Just because I'm
not attracted to you, you get all insulting."

"Okay, okay.
You're not...what I said. Just don't get so upset."

"I'm not
upset!"

Out of the corner
of my eye, I saw a movement as someone approached us: Nathan.

"Hey." Nathan
grabbed Ronny's shoulder and whirled him around. "You better not be
yelling at my girl."

"Your
girl?" Ronny shook his head as if to clear it.

"Yeah she's
mine, and you better keep your jocky hands off her," Nathan shouted.

"Whatever,
man." Ronny held his hands up in surrender and stepped back. "You can
have her."

"Just what do
you mean by that?" Nathan demanded, taking two steps forward, his fists
clenching. "Are you insulting her now?"

"No, dude.
Chill."

"Let it go,
Nathan," I pleaded, putting my hands on his shoulders and holding him
back.

My best friend
twisted around and smiled down at me. "For you, I will."

Taking me by the
waist, he swung me further onto the dance floor. I fell against Nathan's chest,
and my arms went around his neck, clinging. As we moved, I couldn't help
noticing how different dancing with Nathan was. No awkward distance spanned
between us. We were plastered together as we moved in rhythm with my head on
his chest. And I wasn't bored. Even though the dance was slow, my heart pounded
and my breath chugged in and out as if I was doing a tap routine.

Suddenly, I lifted
my head so I could examine Nathan. Something I'd vaguely noticed during the
altercation now became more important. "Hey," I said. "You look
different."

Nathan was dressed
in a blue sport coat over dress shirt paired with khaki pants. His famous mop
of hair had been dyed back to its normal color and styled into a tamer version
of itself. Instead of a nest of tight curls, his inch-long hair was a shiny
mahogany wave decorating his head.

"You cut your
hair," I observed. "And you aren't wearing glasses. Can you see
without those things?"

His lips quirked
into a wry smile. "Contacts. I had 'em at home but never bothered with
them. But I wanted to look good tonight. For you."

He did look good.
He looked great. This hottie version of Nathan overwhelmed me.

Oh Lord.
Why couldn't he want to impress
me because he wanted to and not because of some root doctor spell?

Flinching, I
jerked out of his hold, pivoted and marched toward the exit.

"What's the
matter?" he asked as he followed behind.

"What do you
think? You ate the brownie. This isn't you."

Just outside the
gym, I almost collided with Gracella and her Aunt Vandi.

"Thank
heavens, you're here." I said to the older woman. "You have to do
something about Nathan."

"I don't need
anything done about me," Nathan protested. "Things are just
fine."

"No—"
I began and he interrupted by grasping my arm and pulling me to him for a quick
kiss. I twisted in his grip, turning tear filled eyes to Aunt Vandi. "See
what I mean?"

"Come
on," Nathan said. "You like me. I know you do."

"Of course I
like you," I replied. "You're my best friend."

"It's more
than that." He gave me a little shake before placing a hand against my
cheek.

My eyes rose to his
and our gazes locked.

"You
responded to my kisses," he said. "You enjoyed dancing with me. You
like me
like me. You don't just like
me."

"Yes," I
admitted. Tugging out of his hold, I felt my face twist in misery. "But
you don't
like me
like me. You just like
me. It's the brownie that likes me likes me."

"How can a
brownie
like you
like you?" he
joked. "A brownie is inanimate...except for those singing ones in the TV
commercial."

"You know
what I mean," I screamed in frustration. "The brownie made you like
me like me when you don't really—"

"Before we's
lost in 'like mes'," Aunt Vandi inserted. "I tell you nothin in dat
potion I gave you 'cept cinnamon, mint and a few red pepper flakes."

We all fell silent
at her words. A few shocked seconds passed before I fully realized the
importance of what she'd said.

"Then Nathan
wasn't drugged," I mumbled.

"Yeah,"
he said. "I already told you that eating that brownie only gave me the
excuse I needed to act on feelings I've had since freshman year."

A happy bud of
giddiness took root inside me. "So really, there was no magic at all
involved."

"I won give
powerful magic to the irresponsible hands of chil'en," Aunt Vandi said.

I couldn't really
protest the irresponsible part. We
had
accidentally
poisoned Nathan. Or we would have if the brownie had been truly tainted.

Aunt Vandi gave an
enigmatic arch of her eyebrow and one side of her lips curved up. "But
aint it nice you got zactly what you wished fo?"

I thought about
it, and she was right. She'd said the love potion would get Ronny to take me to
the dance and that I'd get love. Even though she hadn't given me an actual love
potion, I couldn't help thinking the root doctor had done something magical.
But anything she'd done had only nudged Nathan into admitting feelings he
already had and had kind of made me do the same.

"You're
right." I said. "I didn't get what I thought I wanted but I got what
I
really
wanted. Thank you."

Aunt Vandi
inclined her head. "You mose welcome, chile."

Nathan took my
hand and dropped a kiss on my smiling lips.

"Come on,
Istanbul. Let's go back and finish our date. There's a refreshment table to
explore. Maybe they have my new favorite food: brownies."

"I think
they're my new favorite too." Squeezing his hand, I went up on tiptoes and
kissed him back.

#
 
#
 
#

Chapter One

"Let's go
behind the bleachers and do the nasty, Eve." Hot breath tinged with
spittle sprayed against my neck as Quinn shouted in my ear to be heard over the
booming throb of the music.

My date was
ruining the song—one of my favorites by Kanye.

Quinn sidled
closer, pulling at the open collar of his white dress shirt as if to give me a
view of the expanse of his hairy chest. He pressed against my side, making me
cringe. Inching backward, my spine met the cold concrete block of the gym wall.

Almost the entire
high school might be here at the Fall Fling dance, but it wasn't so crowded
that he needed to invade my personal space. Bad enough the perennial dirty-sock
smell of the gym threatened to overcome me, but Quinn and his liberally applied
cologne made me want to gag.

Oh why had I
agreed to go on this date? Just because Lashonda pushed me?

"He's
popular," she'd said. "And your school rep could use a infusion of
popular.
"

A small bit of
help with my social standing at Richard Johnson Academy— known to
students as Double Dick—now didn't seem any kind of inducement. Heck,
being voted home coming queen wouldn't be worth this horrid date.

"Come on,
Eve. I'll play Adam," Quinn said with a chuckle. "Get it? You're Eve
and I'm Adam? Adam and Eve?"

"Yeah,"
I drawled. "Hilarious. I've never heard that one before."

He hooted a laugh,
grabbed my upper arm and tried to pull me into an embrace. In response, I
twisted out of his grasp.

"Back off,
buddy."

"Okay,"
Quinn said. "You don't wanna do the full tilt boogie. We can just go
make-out a little. We gotta capitalize on this sitch, ya know? No one'll notice
if we sneak away." He paused for effect before continuing. "I'll even
let you touch it."

Eww. That was
supposed to be an enticement?

Before I could
even flinch, Quinn's hand shot toward me and he molested my breast.

"Hey, stop
it." I twisted and stepped way from the wall pushing against his chest
with both hands. His big body barely moved. My strength was puny against his
two hundred pounds, but I slapped at him anyway. The impact on his rock hard
bicep had no more effect than would a gnat wing. "Do I have to
scream?"

His eyes widened
and his mouth opened. Of course Quinn had a slack-jawed expression even at the
best of times, but I detected genuine surprise at my rejection. Why did most of
the girls at school think he was so handsome?

"Wha'sup?"
He demanded. "Riding the red dragon?"

"What?"

"Your
period."

"No, you
jerktard," I shouted.

At the moment I
flung the insult, my eyes collided with a gaze from a few feet away. A guy I'd
never seen at school before was staring at me with a scary intensity, but at
the same time I found his gaze exciting. With furrowed brows, the guy turned an
angry glare on Quinn, which gave me a chance to appraise his looks without
being too obvious.

I couldn't find
anything to criticize. His blond hair had a slight wave to it and when combined
with his high cheekbones and full lips, the effect was definitely hot.
Something about the guy was so familiar, but I couldn't place him.

Just then his eyes
returned to me. The word Holden drifted into my head almost as if I knew his
name. We'd never spoken...had we?

I would have
thought I knew the guy from elementary or middle school but my family had only
moved to Savannah, Georgia, in the last year.