I Kissed The Boy Next Door (8 page)

A coo
kout and a swim in Owen’s pool. Fun! And he was right because everybody was there. Esther. Mel. Sandra. Isabelle. Paulie. Mack. Rick. Even Francisco. It was like old times, except for the few faces we’d lost track of and a couple new ones. Most of them hadn’t seen Jackson in all that time, and so he disappeared on me for a while. Plus, the boys all had to go check out the car.

Us girls all pulled up a poolside chair and started talking. Esther, of course, wanted to talk about Jackson.

“What was up with him on Sunday?” she asked.

Sunday when he’d seen me holding the Perez’s baby and freaked.

“Oh, he wasn’t feeling well,” I said. No way was I going to tell Esther the truth. Esther was a bit of a gossip.

She didn’t believe me. I’d known her long enough to recognize she didn’t.

“But there were all those rumors after church,” she said, “about you and him making out.”

This I was going to shoot down right off because we weren’t doing that.

“Kid stuff,” I said. “We were only talking. He didn’t think he could sit through the service and smile. You know how that is.”

Nothing worse than going to church and you don’t want to be there and you have to fake that you do.

“So you haven’t? Cause I heard …”

“Listen.” I gave her a sharp look. “You hear too much. Don’t believe the half of it. Jackson and I are good friends who happen to be dating. And there’s another thing.” I was warming up
now. “You misunderstood all that I told you. Our bedrooms are across from each other. I can see him, and he can see me. And yeah, a couple times we climbed through the windows, but it was more because it was convenient, not because we were doing anything.”

She leaned back in the chair. She had these freckles that went across the bridge of her nose. I always thought they were nice, but she wasn’t too fond of them. Well, she wrinkled her nose and they stretched all out of shape.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I just assumed, and I probably shouldn’t have. You know I love you.”

“I love you too,” I said.

She got a gleam in her eye. “How about we play dares, but like secret from the boys?”

The other girls
all agreed it’d be fun.

She leaned forward and lowered her voice.
“The person that does the dare will pick someone after and whisper in their ear. Then we can spread it real quiet. Who wants to go first?”

S
andra volunteered, raising her hand. “I’ll take the dare.”

Esther looked around the pool. “I dare you to climb on the top of the diving board and do
Gangnam Style.”

O Lord, this was going to be funny.

CHAPTER 11

Jackson stared unashamedly at Lucy’s rump as she slid her shorts down her frame and then slowly traveled his gaze over her hips, around her waist, and across her chest where he watched her shirt came off as well.

And h
e wasn’t the only one looking. Owen’s gaze was fixed that direction too.

Lucy tossed her head to loosen her hair from the collar of her shirt, the
motion causing his palms to sweat. As usual, she was oblivious to the effect she was having. This became apparent the minute she bent over at the waist the fold her phone into her clothing.

Blessed curves.

She glanced back at him then, one of the other girls, Mel, he thought her name was, whispering in her ear. He winked.

Owen stiffened beside him, and Jackson thought
at last to look away.

“What’s up with the girls?” he asked.

They’d been strange all morning. First, Sandra had done a dance on the end of the diving board. That was followed by Esther shinnying up the lamp post at the corner of the house.

Owen shrugged.
“Beats me. You know girls.”

A warm palm struck Jackson square in the
middle of his back, and he turned.

“We
gonna swim or stand around?” Lucy asked.

“Swim,” he replied. He grasped the ends of his shirt and tugged it over his head, dropping it to the pool deck.

Lucy’s eyes all but crossed. “Wow, I’m hot,” she said.

No kidding.
Though that probably wasn’t what she’d meant.

She took his hand and dragged him down the steps into the water, diving under and emerging on the deep end, her hair plastered to her face.

His heart skipped a beat.

“Can’t you just walk down here?” she said.

He laughed. “I’m not
that
tall.”

The water rippled behind him as others dove in. He made his way from one end to the other, swimming up in front of her and placing a hand on either side of her head.

“Fancy meeting you here,” he said.

She smiled and leaned back on the pool coping.

“Remember Miss Price falling in the lake?”

He gave a grin.
Miss Price couldn’t swim, not well at least. She’d floundered around, spitting fountains of water until someone pulled her out.

“She didn’t fall.”

Lucy’s leg brushed against his in the water, and she didn’t bother to move it.

“No?”

“No. Mack pushed her.”

She giggled.
“Really? She was so … unglued afterward. She came flying into our cabin that night, her hair all sticking up funny, blathering about kids and discipline and never doing it again.”

“She gave us
a speech too. Man, she was mad.”

Lucy looked past him at the others in the pool. “Did Francisco really have a crush on her?”

Jackson made his own search of the immediate area. “Paulie said he did.”

He lowered his hands to her waist, running his fingertips around the arch and settling on her hip. “
I have a crush.”

The screech of someone behind them announced a water fight was on. A spray hit him in the face.
Lucy ducked below the surface, emerging a few feet further away. He followed. There, he leaned on the side of the pool, placing her facing outward against his chest. Her hair fanned out around her neck.

“A crush?” she said.

He wrapped his arms around her waist, securing her there. “Yep. Fabulous girl.”

She revolved in his arms. “Maybe this fabulous girl thinks you’re equally fabulous.”

He gazed in her eyes, his insides floating away. How’d he get so lucky to move next door?

A head popped up to their immediate left. Owen dashed water from his eyes
and shook his head like a dog, showering Lucy in the face.

“O,” she fussed.

Owen grinned. “Surprised you.”

Jackson surveyed Owen’s face.
Now he makes his move?

“Bet I can beat you to the other end,” Owen said.

“Bet you can’t.”

“
Oooh, a race!” Esther chimed.

And it was hopeless. She was gone.

Lucy centered herself on the deep end of the pool, and Owen set himself at her side. She pushed her heels against the concrete.

“Count of three. There and back,” Esther said.
“One.”

Jackson slid himself to the left. He’d recapture her when she finished.

“Two.”

Lucy stretched
an arm out in front of her.

“Three.”

Various shouts of “Go. Go. Go,” and either, “Lucy,” or “Owen,” echoed across the yard. Jackson made no shout one way or the other, instead taking in Owen’s lagging, his deliberate grazing of his arm against hers, and the turn of his face her direction.

At the shallow end of the pool, they looped over, and the pace resumed.

Race, my eye.

Yet Lucy seemed clueless. She poured herself into it, her face ducked below the water, breathing only every three strokes, her arms arcing steadily over her head. It was when she and Owen came to within four feet of the end, that Owen at last surged ahead and touched the side.

“And he wins,” he said, triumphant.

Lucy clasped her hand onto the side of the pool, gasping. “Darn it.”

Jackson inserted himself between them. Taking hold of her, he swished her to his right, away from Owen, and placed an arm around her waist. She leaned her head on his shoulder to catch her breath .

A tap came to h
is left. He turned his head and for a split second, saw the eyes of his old friend. Then Owen’s face altered.

“It’s my pool,” he said.
“My party. My parents bought the food. And you
were
my friend.” With that, he pulled himself out and stomped away.

Lucy
peeled her cheek from Jackson’s sticky skin. “What wrong with him?”

Jackson gazed down at her and s
moothed a lock of hair from between her eyes. “Same thing that’s wrong with me.”

She wrinkled her brow and pinched the bridge of her nose. “And what is that?”

He sighed. “You.”

CHAPTER 12

“Three years!” Owen yelled. He swung his arms wildly as if that a
ction would somehow eliminate his problem. “Three stinkin’ years ago she kisses you. You. Not me. Then you disappear, fall slap off the face of the earth, only to reappear right next door and she’s all over you again.”

Jackson gazed into the eyes of his friend, his stomach in a knot. Said like that, he was a complete jerk. Yet
that wasn’t the whole truth.

“Yeah, three years,” he returned. “You had three years when I wa
sn’t here, and maybe wasn’t coming back to make your move. Why didn’t you?”

Owen glared at him, his face red and eyes sparking.
“Maybe because I’m not Jackson The-Girls-All-Want-Him Phillips.”

“What are you talking about?” Jackson glanced through the glass doors toward the pool.

“Give me a break! Don’t tell me you didn’t know, Poster Boy.”

But he didn’t know. What was Owen talking about? Jackson shook his head. “You’ve lost me.”

Owen gave a snort and changed his voice to a warbling falsetto. “Jackson has the most amaaazing blue eyes. I think he looked at me. I’ll bet Jackson’s so hot with his shirt off. I only watch basketball because Jackson plays.”

His returned his voice to normal. “That’s what I’m talking about. While you had your head in the clouds, they were asking me about you.
Me, because I’m just nice-guy Owen. Good old O, every girl’s best friend. Well, you know what? I don’t want to be her best friend. I want to be …” His voice died.

“Be what?” Lucy spoke from the doorway.

Jackson spun in place.

She glanced at him, but walked over to Owen. “What do you want to be, O?”

“How … how long have you been standing there?” Owen asked.

She cla
sped her hands behind her back, her hair dripping on the tile floor. “Long enough.”

“I’m sorry, Luce. I didn’t mean …”

She ran a hand down his shoulder. “I know what you meant, and you’re right.” She fixed her gaze on Jackson. “The girls had it for Jackson, myself included. That’s why he was picked for the dare.”

She turned her back on him and faced Owen. “The heart doesn’t control who it falls in love with.
It simply goes with the flow of emotions that steer it, and I’m sorry, O, for not seeing you as the handsome, available guy you are. But I don’t think three years or five years would have made any difference. I look at him, and my heart turns to mush. I dream about him at night, and think about him all day. It’s nothing he did. He hasn’t set out to win me; there wasn’t any competition. He was simply himself, and I can’t go back now. I can’t reverse the last four days and take him out of my life.”

She took hold of Owen’s face. “This is for all the times you’ve wanted to say something and didn’t, and for all the moments I walked past you, not looking your way.” She drew his face downward and kissed him, full on t
he lips, soft and tender. And Owen backpedaled, eventually falling against a couch sitting against the wall.

She pulled away, leaving him standing cockeyed, and walked up to Jackson. S
he tilted her head to the side.

Words clogged in his throat. So many things he wanted to say, needed to say, but her declaration coursed through him, overpowering any ability he had to say them. He coughed and attempted to speak. “Lucy, I …”

She placed a finger on his lips. “What you have to say can be said later. Owen’s your friend. Don’t let me come between you.”

She crossed the room and slid open the door. “Cannonball!”
she shrieked, and she sprinted across the pool deck.

Jackson stared at the place she’d been.

“Gosh she’s great,” Owen said.

Jackson walked over and hung and arm over his friend’s shoulder. “Tell me about it.”

***

“Come out.” Jackson extended his hand and tugged Lucy from the car. The radio played a mellow tune.