How it Ends (10 page)

I liked it a lot.

“Sure,” he said and leaned over and kissed my cheek. “Happy birthday.”

I smiled expectantly, certain that was just the warm-up for the main event, and when nothing further happened, said, “That’s it? That was the whole thing?”

He quirked an eyebrow, amused. “You complaining?”

“Oh, hell
yeah.
I could have gotten
that
from my grandmother.” Scowling, I shook my head and leaned closer. “I want a
real
kiss, a totally hot, wicked, knock-my-socks-off—”

“No can do, darlin’,” he said. “You’re a little too out of it—”

“You’re a stingy kiss miser,” I said.

He grinned. “And still a little too young for me.”

“Oh, crap, that is
so
not true,” I cried. “I’m like the most mature girl in the
whole school.”
My hand was still moving on his hot, damp forearm, feeling him from the crease of his elbow down to his wrist. “I
have
experience, you know.” God, his arm felt good. It was all I could do not to lower my head and bite it. “And I would like to have more.”

“I’ll bet you would,” he said, lips twitching. “But maybe another time, okay?”

“That’s right,” I said, nodding and tilting sideways until my head was resting on his shoulder. I peered up at him, the bridge of my nose grazing his jawline. “You smell good.”

“You smell blitzed,” he said and heaved a sigh. “What’re you doing?”

“Not a lot,” I said, pressing my mouth against his neck. I licked his skin, just a little, just to get the taste of him.

It was good.

“You taste good, too,” I said.

“Come on, you can’t do this,” he said and then in a mutter, “shit,
I
can’t do it.”

“But it’s my birthday, and good things are supposed to happen,” I said, closing my eyes and sinking even further into him. “So far it’s been really sucky, though, and I don’t know why.”

“Hanna, you have to sit up.” He slid his arm around me, but instead of shifting me up, it sort of cradled me closer. “Come on.”

But I didn’t want to move, not at all. His body was so sweet and hard and perfect that moving was unthinkable, unless it was to lay him down and crawl on top of him.

I hadn’t realized I’d said that out loud until he laughed, low and husky, and said, “Jesus, what’re you trying to do, kill me?”

No, I was trying to do a lot of things, but kill him wasn’t one of them.

“You don’t like me,” I said sadly.

“You know I do,” he said, rubbing his forehead.

“No, you don’t,” I said, slumping. “Nobody does. Seth, the guy from the mall…he just plays me—”

“He’s an asshole,” he said.

“I
know,
and then there’s you…” I peeked up and was surprised to see his mouth quivering. “What?”

“God,” he said, laughing. “You are so fucking subtle.”

I frowned, not sure what he meant.

“Relax, it wasn’t an insult,” he said, patting my back. “I would never insult the birthday girl.”

“Yeah, but you won’t kiss her, either,” I said, sulking and writing my name with my finger on his thigh.

“Careful there,” he said, shifting as the second
N
ended very close to the center seam of his jeans. “You’re getting into dangerous territory.”

“I still have an
A
to go,” I said.

“Yeah, well, you’re going to have to write it somewhere else,” he said and moved my hand back into my own lap.

“Why, because you already have a girlfriend and that’s her private property?” I said, tilting my face up again so my nose was against his jaw and my cheek on his shoulder.

“Nope, no girlfriend,” he said.

“Oh.” I thought a minute. “Are you gay?”

He snorted. “Not hardly.”

“Good.” More bright ideas tumbled in. “You know, you should come see me. But if you do—which you should—you have to hide your tattoo, because my parents would have heart failure, so you could just wear a long-sleeve shirt and then it would be fine. Okay?”

“Sure,” he said. “Where the hell is Crystal, anyway?”

I knew where Crystal was. I’d seen her return, catch sight of us, grin, slip across to the other side of the campfire, and disappear into the dark. “Why, do you want to leave? I
knew
it. You don’t want to be with me, either.”

“Want has nothing to do with it,” he said, gazing out toward the fire.

“Then how come you won’t even
look
at me?” I said, tugging on a dread.

He exhaled long and slow. “You’re making this really hard.”

“No, I’m not,” I murmured, my head on his shoulder, my mouth close to his ear where the skin was soft and hot and everything I yearned for here in the dark.
“I’m
making it very, very easy. Just one…” I kissed his neck…“little”.. and again…“kiss.”

“Damn,” he muttered on a husky laugh. “I’m gonna kick myself in the morning but…” And lifting a callused hand to the curve of my cheek, he lowered his mouth to mine, his dreads slipping forward like a slinky black curtain to shield us from view.

The first kiss was brief, his lips light and feather soft, rose petals and sweet plums, ripe and irresistible, tempting me, making me bloom inside, but when he tried to end it and ease back, I followed him, willing him to go on tasting, touching, teasing. He tensed, hesitated, and I sighed low in my throat and his breath swept my cheek, and then his mouth opened and mine opened, too, and his heart was pounding through his T-shirt, and I slid my arm up around his neck because he was so sweet, so hot, and God, I couldn’t get close enough. Each time his breath hitched I molded closer, shifting, and finally sliding my leg over his, crazy to drown in him, to climb on top of him and—

“Whoa,” he said raggedly, gripping my hips and stopping me, holding me almost straddling his thigh and pressed so tight that our breath rose and fell together. “You’ve got to stop. I’m not kidding. I can’t do this.”

“Do what?” I murmured, nuzzling his collarbone. “You’re doing just fine.” I shifted farther onto his thigh, and oh, yes, that felt good.

It must have felt good for him, too, because he groaned and pulled me the rest of the way into him, tucking my thigh tight into his groin and burying his face in the front of my shirt.

I kissed his forehead, his eyes, his mouth, kissed him with no boundaries, no thought, kissed him the way I felt, excited and aching and wanting until I was delirious and his hands were holding my butt tight against him, my thigh tight against him, until I was yearning for him and somewhere in the back of my mind warning signs were flashing, but they were nothing compared to the rush of being on him, with him, against him.

“I’m back, in case anybody’s interested,” I heard Crystal say from far away and would have ignored her had Jesse not started and cursed and pulled away but still held me, with his damp forehead pressed to mine and his breathing heavy.

“I’m going to get a beer, but I shall return,” she said, sounding amused.

“Shit,” he said, pulling back. “This wasn’t supposed to happen.”

“Well, it’s okay, really,” I said, gasping and putting a hand on my thundering heart, still too dazed to think straight. “I mean technically nothing did, right?” And the whole thing hit me, the unsatisfied hunger, the lingering sweetness, the gain and the loss, and I started to laugh and, yeah, to even cry a little, and he slid me off him and waited until the storm passed and I was okay again. “Oh my God,” I said, wiping my eyes and giving him a shaky smile. “Now that was a serious birthday kiss.”

“Yeah.” He ran a hand over his dreads, folded his arms across his knees, and looked out toward the campfire. “It was.”

I bit my lip and waited for him to say more, but he didn’t. “Are you mad at me?”

He laughed without humor and shook his head. “Not hardly.”

“Then what is it?” I said in a small voice, as the beautiful, full blossoming inside of me began to fold in on itself. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No.” He looked at me then, his gaze dark and serious. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Say anything,” I said a little desperately.

He thought a minute, then gave me a crooked smile. “Happy birthday?”

“Thank you,” I said, and maybe it was because I knew he wasn’t going to be my boyfriend or because he seemed so much older but not in a bad way, in a more mature way, like at nineteen and out of school he was so far beyond me that I could just say stuff without having to worry about how he would take it that I added, “You know what? Even though I only got one kiss today, I’m glad it was from you.”

He blinked. “The feeling’s mutual.”

And then his eyes started to twinkle again and my smile returned and there it was, that sizzling bolt of black lightning arcing between us that made me blush and go all soft inside, made Crystal’s return the catalyst he needed to rise, do that jean-tugging guy thing, look down at me, and with a wry smile, say, “Next time I see you, you’d
better
be eighteen,” and I laughed and gave him a wicked look and he left, shaking his head.

“Sorry I had to interrupt, but it was starting to look pretty intense,” Crystal said, plopping down next to me and giving me a knowing shoulder bump.

“Could everyone see us?” I said, only slightly alarmed because there were plenty of other kids making out and half of them were sitting right in front of the campfire where you couldn’t miss them.

“No, it’s pretty dark over here,” she said, and then lips twitching, she added “so, how do you feel? Still buzzed?”

“No, and shut up,” I said, flushing and laughing.

“Don’t like him at all, huh?”

“Shut uuuuup,” I said, laughing harder and burying my face in my arms.

“Don’t look now, but he’s standing by the keg, talking to some guy and pretending not to look over here,” she said in a low, teasing voice.

“How do you know he’s pretending not to look if he isn’t looking?” I said, lifting my head just enough to peek.

“Because you can tell,” she said. “See? He keeps messing with his dreads and watch…see? It’s like he’s trying not to smile. He’s self-conscious.”

“Hmm,” I said, resting my chin on my hand. “Think he can see us?”

“Nope,” she said. “Why, are you gonna flash him or something?”

“Hell no,” I said. “If I ever lift my shirt up, it’s not going to be when he’s too far away to do anything about it.”

So we wandered back into the party in time for Jesse to smile at me before he left, and then me and Crystal cruised past Sammi, who was making out with do-rag guy, took the path down to 7-Eleven so I could buy a soda and use their bathroom, and then it was my turn to find something to do, because the guy Crystal had been crushing on for like a month finally showed up and came right over to her.

I didn’t feel like drinking anymore, and I didn’t want to sit on a log in the dark because those were occupied by couples, so I drifted, talking to Crystal’s brother and other people, just hanging out and enjoying the glow.

It must have been around two when Sammi came back into the fire-light and maybe three when Crystal did. I was tired by then and the crowd had thinned and everyone left was lounged out on the ground, so we decided not to stay all night, which, I found out, Crystal’s mother hadn’t said we could do anyway, so we left and snuck
into her house, and her parents were sleeping, so our getting home so late wasn’t a problem. Sammi took the sleeping bag on the floor while me and Crystal took the bed. I found out that Sammi and do-rag guy were going out, and, she said, if her mother ever saw him, she’d probably ground her for life, but she didn’t care because she really liked him and what was so wrong with a gold tooth, anyway.

Crystal said her crush had asked her out and so she was a girlfriend now, too, and that was cool.

And I said Jesse gave me my birthday kiss, and Sammi was like,
OMG, really?
And Crystal was like,
Oh, yeah,
did
he,
but I got shy and didn’t want to share all the details, so I only said,
No, we’re not going out,
and,
Yeah, I’m okay with that.

I thought about that last part long after they fell asleep and tried to decide if it was true. It was, so I fell asleep, too.

And that was the keg party.

On Sunday the Schoenmakers came over and we had a little party. Gran made my favorite carrot cake in the world and I made a wish—
Please let sixteen be my dream-come-true year
—and blew out all the candles.

I got some good presents. Gran gave me a really pretty pearl pendant and I think it was something she was passing on to me because there was no way they could have afforded to buy it new, and my parents gave me gift certificates to book and clothes stores, seeing as how my mother knows she can’t pick my clothes for me anymore.

The only sad parts were that Grandpa had to have his cake without the cream cheese icing because of his new heart diet and that Gran was so shaky she actually spilled coffee on my pile of birthday cards and got all stricken about it, even though my mother mopped it up so it didn’t even matter.

For a minute I actually thought she was going to cry, and I looked at my parents like,
Do something,
and my mother gave me this look like,
What?
and I didn’t know, so all I could think to do was ask how many new baby fawns she’d seen so far this year, but for some reason that seemed to make it worse, and then I really didn’t know what to do except offer up my biggest humiliation to distract her from hers, so I said,
Hey, remember those new boots I got last Christmas? Well, did I ever tell you that the first time I wore them I fell down the stairs in front of everyone?

And that turned the tide because I told it in a way that made everyone laugh, and then my father started telling one of his funny trip-and-fall stories, and my mother smiled at me across the table like she was saying,
Thank you, Hanna,
and yes, all in all it was a very good birthday.

Memorial Day weekend

There was a parade in town and we went with Gran and Grandpa.

We brought lawn chairs and sat on the curb, watching the scouts, fire engines, and politicians, and the Lions, Moose, and Elks clubs go by.

When the old VFW soldiers marched into sight, Grandpa pulled out a hanky and mopped his eyes, and when the band went by and played the “Star Spangled Banner,” he actually took off his cap and put his hand over his heart.

At first I was embarrassed because
nobody
does that, but then my mother looked like she was feeling it and Gran had taken Grandpa’s arm and my father looked really solemn. I was like,
Oh my God, they’re killing me,
so I gritted my teeth and finally the band moved past.

The town always gives out free hot dogs in the park afterward, but Gran’s knees were too bad to walk that far and my parents wanted to go home and get our own picnic going, so I said I’d just walk through real fast—and it would
definitely
be fast because I was alone, and hanging out alone is no fun—and I’d meet them back home.

So they left and I walked down to the park, where the cliques
were in full swing, which made it kind of boring except that Crystal’s brother told me they were having another party in the woods Monday afternoon if I wanted to come.

“Sounds good,” I said and decided to leave because there was really no one there I wanted to see, so I cut across the park and was heading up the sidewalk when a Harley appeared over the hill, and yes, it was Jesse.

My heart gave this weird leap, and at first I thought he wasn’t going to stop at all, then I thought,
Okay, maybe he’s just going to wave and keep going,
so I tried not to take it personally, but then at the last minute he pulled the bike to the curb and shut it off.

“Hi,” I said, unable to stop smiling.

“Hey, Hanna,” he said and gave me this quirky smile, like he was kind of bemused at seeing me in the daylight. “What’s up?” He took off his shades, hesitated, and then pulled off his helmet. He had on a red bandanna underneath it.

“Nothing much,” I said, beaming.

He shook his head and gave this laugh, a good laugh, and just looked at me. “You always this happy?”

“No,” I said, laughing. “It’s you. Every time I see you, I just…I don’t know. You make me smile.”

“Well, that’s good,” he said, grinning.

“Yeah, it is,” I said because, oh my God, it was the
best
feeling. “So, you going to the park?”

“When I get there,” he said, putting down the kickstand and relaxing. “You leaving?”

“I was,” I said with a shrug. “Nobody’s really there but Crystal’s brother. He said there’s another party in the woods on Monday afternoon.” I smiled again; I couldn’t help it.

“Oh, yeah?” he said, looking away and smiling. “Too bad I’m working.”

“On a holiday?”

“Double time plus,” he said, nodding. “So where you headed?”

“Home,” I said. “We’re having a picnic with the neighbors. I’ll be the only one there under forty.” The minute I said it, I wanted to take it back, because there was no way he could bring that tattoo to a family picnic. “I mean, I don’t really care…”

He let it go. “No Crystal or your other friend?”

“No, they’ve got boyfriends, so I hardly see them at all,” I said, wedging my hands in my back pockets and cocking my head. “I’m kind of on my own now.”

He nodded. “Staying out of trouble?”

My smile widened. “Not of my own free will.”

He laughed and we kind of hit a stalemate.

“Well…” I said after a minute.

“I didn’t bring an extra helmet, or I’d give you a ride home,” he said.

“Oh, that sucks,” I said, making a face. “Riding’s fun.”

He gazed at me as if deliberating, then looked down at the row of bikes lined up at the edge of the park and the guys gathered around them. “Well, Granger’s down there and so is Big Steve. You want me to see if I can borrow you one?”

“Okay,” I said happily.

“Jesus, Hanna,” he said, laughing again. “Sit tight and I’ll be back.”

I watched him rumble off, and he was back in a minute with a candy apple red helmet tucked under his arm.

“You can thank Steve’s girlfriend for this,” he said, handing it over and glancing back down the hill toward the cluster of bikes.

I followed his gaze and, on impulse, stood on tiptoe and waved even though I had no idea who I was waving to.

From the center of the crowd, an arm rose and waved back.

“Cool,” I said and pulled on the helmet. It fit snug and smelled
like flowery shampoo, and I climbed onto the back of the bike like I was born to be there, which made him smile again, and slid my arms around his waist. “Ready.”

“Then let’s roll,” he said, and we rumbled away from the curb. “You in a hurry?”

“Not really, but I can’t be too late,” I said. “Why?”

“I figured we’d take the scenic route down along the canal,” he said. “It’s maybe an extra ten minutes.”

“Perfect,” I said.

It was beautiful meandering through the cool woods and along the sparkling water, just riding without even talking, with my hands settled on his sides at his belt, and every so often him resting a hand on my knee.

“You okay?” he said, following the curve in the road and steering wide of bicyclists.

“I could do this all day,” I said. “You’re a good driver.”

“Thanks,” he said.

But the canal road finally ended and we had to turn onto the road to my house.

“You don’t have to pull all the way in,” I said, getting nervous. “You could just stop at the end of the driveway and I’ll jump off.”

“Your parents don’t like bikes?” he said.

“I don’t know,” I said, praying no one was out on the front porch. “The last time you brought me home, no one was here, so they never knew.”

“Okay,” he said, flicking on his signal light to make the turn into my driveway.

I didn’t see anyone on the porch, so they were probably all out back, but this area was so quiet except for the birds that they probably heard us coming a mile away. The key was to get him out of here before anyone came around and waved us toward the house. The key
was to keep that tattoo, and all they would interpret it as, out of sight.

He pulled in and did a half-moon at the edge of the driveway.

I fumbled with the helmet, yanked it off, and handed it to him. “That was fun. Thanks for the ride home.” I glanced at the house and saw my mother standing in the front door, watching. Still, the combination of the motorcycle engine plus the acre between her and me would let me pretend that, even if she called, I wouldn’t hear her.

“Sure, no problem,” he said, glancing at me, then past to my mother, then back at me. His smile deepened. “Have a good one.”

“You, too, and you know, I’m probably not even gonna go to that party on Monday now,” I said in a rush, flushing as his smile grew quizzical. “I mean…I don’t know. I might have something else to do. Stop it,” I said, laughing and giving his arm a playful whack. “Go already or who knows what’ll come out of my mouth.”

He laughed. “That could be interesting.”

“Go,” I said and waved as he pulled out.

My cell phone rang.

I pulled it from my pocket. “Hi, Mom.”

“Since when do you know boys with motorcycles?” she said.

“Oh my God, I only know one,” I said, waving to her.

“Who is he?” she said, coming out onto the porch.

“Jesse Yennet,” I said matter-of-factly, walking up the driveway toward home. “His mom used to be my fifth-grade art teacher, remember?”

“Yennet,” my mother said musingly. “Ohhh…she got sick, didn’t she? Uterine cancer?”

“Ovarian,” I said.

“Terrible,” my mother said, sinking onto the porch swing. “Yes, I remember now. My God, her husband was a basket case and—”

“Did you guys eat yet?” I interrupted because if I didn’t, she’d go on forever.

“No, we were waiting for you,” she said, rising and giving me a look. “We’ll talk about this when you get here.”

“Okay,” I said and stuck the phone back in my pocket. Waited until she went back inside, then did a wacky little happy dance right out there for the world to see.

I never went to the party on Memorial Day. Crystal wasn’t going to be there and the only other reason would’ve been to dig myself up a boyfriend and I just wasn’t into it.

Weird, I know.

But get this: on Tuesday, Seth showed up on one of my new hall routes, not his usual path at all, and said, “Hey, stranger, where you been?”

So I was nice back, not crazy in love like before, where everything he said was funny and every move he made adorable, but friendly, and I could tell he didn’t know what to make of it because he said, “So who’re you going out with now? Do I know him?”

And I laughed and said, “Nobody. I’m free as a bird.” And gave a very strange but totally spontaneous little skip, caught his surprise, and said, “What?”

“You tell me,” he said. “Why so happy?”

“Why not?” I said with a shrug. “We’ve only got like four days of school left—”

“Yeah, that reminds me,” he said. “You doing anything this summer?”

“What, like a vacation? No, I’ll probably just be hanging out,” I said. “Why?”

“Well, if I hear about any good parties, you want me to give you a call?” he said, stopping and leaning against the lockers.

“Sure, that’d be cool,” I said, and my voice didn’t even waver.

“Okay,” he said and ambled a few steps backward. “Well, I have to give Bailey a buzz now, so I guess I’ll see you…”

“See you,” I said and headed off in the opposite direction, only then realizing that he’d done it again.

School is out. I made it with one A, two Bs, a couple of Cs, and two Ds, and no one caught the mandatory community service thing, either.

The funny part is that I don’t see anything so much more superior, character-trait-wise, between the kids who did the service and me. I mean, I serve who I want to serve without being graded on it; I plant Grandpa’s tomatoes and feed the cats and in the fall and winter walk the back acre route with Gran, pulling the little cart filled with food for the deer, and I do it to help them, not because I need a good grade on it to pass school.

So what good is it if they
make
you do it? Isn’t the whole idea to want to help on your own, and if you don’t, you just don’t?

I don’t know. Maybe it’s me, but I’ll tell you this: if you’re only doing it because other people are watching, then what is it really worth?

Well.

Crystal called and told me Jesse left on a monthlong cross-country motorcycle trip with a couple of friends.

“Oh,” I said. “Wow. That’s half the summer. When did he leave?”

“Yesterday,” she said. “You didn’t know?”

“Why would I know?” I said, but yeah, he could have mentioned it on Memorial Day weekend or something. “We’re not going out or anything.”

“Well,” she said. “He called, and before he talked to my brother, he spent all this time telling me about the website he set up where they’d
be posting pictures from the trip, and I was thinking, yeah so, who cares, but now I wonder if he was telling me so I would tell
you.”

“What’s the url?” I said.

So she told me and I went there and it was a black screen with a few biker graphics and a couple of shots of him and two other guys packing gear and then riding out of town. There was one picture of him, though, where he was next to his bike and looking straight into the camera with this gorgeous smile that I swear made me feel like he’d meant it for me, so I copied it off his site, printed it, and stuck it in my wallet.

It never hurt to have a cute guy around for company.