The Carson Springs Trilogy: Stranger in Paradise, Taste of Honey, and Wish Come True (58 page)

His kisses deepened, becoming more urgent. She could feel him pressing into her leg, and thought how uncomfortable it must be, all folded over inside his jeans. She unzipped them and pushed her hand inside. She’d touched him once before, but only tentatively and somewhat surreptitiously—as if brushing up against it by accident. Now she boldly explored. It was soft, like rose petals, and marbled with veins that pulsed beneath her fingertips. Simon moaned, placing a hand over hers and moving it up and down until she got the hang of it. After only a few strokes, he abruptly pulled away.

“Stop. I’ll come.” He sounded hoarse and short of breath.

They undressed to Sarah’s sultry crooning. She’d never been fully naked with him before. They’d always stopped short of taking off their underwear. Now she stared at him.

Divested of jeans and jockey shorts, it looked even bigger, rising emphatically from its dark nest of hair. Finch had given her some idea of what to expect, but Andie had never imagined it to be so … well, clearly it meant business. She shuddered, folding her arms over her breasts.

Simon took his time. They kissed some more before he gently inserted a finger between her legs. It felt good, and she closed her eyes, letting the warm sensations wash over her like when she touched herself under the covers at night. After a minute or so, she pushed his hand away, whispering, “I’m ready now.”

But Simon just lay there, breathing heavily. At last, he croaked, “I don’t have a condom.” With his glasses off, his hazel eyes wore an odd, unfocused look.

“Oh.” It had never occurred to her that he wouldn’t be prepared.

“Would … would it be okay if I pulled out in time?”

“We shouldn’t.” She’d heard all the lectures—pulling out in time was no guarantee. On the other hand, there was about as much chance of her getting pregnant this way as of her parents getting back together. “But I guess it’d be okay … just this once.”

Simon looked as if he knew better, too, but for once his brain was overruled. He lowered himself onto her, easing in a little bit at a time. His cheeks were flushed, and his hair stuck to his forehead in damp little whorls. “I’m not hurting you, am I?”

“No.”

“If it hurts, tell me and I’ll stop.”

“Maybe you’re not in far en—”

She gasped, feeling a hot burst of pain. Not as bad as she’d expected. Then he was moving inside her with careful strokes. The bed beneath her grew damp—blood?—but such thoughts were quickly swallowed by the warm waves of pleasure coursing through her. So this was what all the talk was about. Yet no one could have prepared her for how good it felt—all warm and silky and sweet, like chocolate melting, not just in your mouth, but throughout your whole body.

Simon groaned and with a sharp jerk withdrew. She felt something warm spill onto her thigh. After a moment he drew away, muttering, “Sorry. Close call.”

She touched the wetness on her thigh. Its smell was that of an overly chlorinated swimming pool. “Are you sure you pulled out in time?”

He nodded. “Did you—?”

Andie shook her head, smiling to let him know it was okay. “That was your first time, wasn’t it?” He’d been evasive about it in the past, alluding to one or two possible encounters.

Simon’s flush deepened. “Would you think any less of me if I said it was?”

“Why would I?”

“I don’t know. The whole macho thing.”

“Since when do you care about being macho?”

“You’re right. It’s stupid.”

“Was it what you expected?” she asked.

He grinned. “Let’s just say it beats a solo act.”

For a long while they just lay there, gazing up at the ceiling. In the backyard Buster had begun to bark again, and through the open window drifted the faint smell of meat loaf—Mrs. Corliss next door always made meat loaf on Wednesdays. At last Simon got up to use the bathroom. She heard the tap running, and a moment later he returned carrying a damp washcloth, which he used to gently wipe the blood from between her legs. When they were both dressed, he helped her bundle up the stained bedspread. If her mother found it, she’d say it was her period.

Simon put his arms around her. “In movies this is the part where the guy says, ‘I love you.’ “

“You need a soundtrack for that.”

“Like this?” He hummed a few off-key bars of “Memory.”

She smiled. “You better quit while you’re ahead.”

“Okay, but only if you promise you’ll still respect me in the morning.”

“Which reminds me …” She drew away. “If I don’t get started on this paper I’ll be up all night.”

Anyone else would have taken it as their cue to leave, but not Simon. He sat down on the bed, waiting patiently while she dug around in her backpack until she found her battered copy of
Of Human Bondage.
“Okay,” he said, “the thing to remember about Maugham is that he was gay, so a lot of people think that when he wrote about Philip’s obsession with Mildred he was really writing about …”

The following morning Finch caught up with her at her locker. “You hear what happened? That doofus Freischman almost set the chem lab on fire.”

“Really?” Andie twirled her combination lock. She’d been up half the night working on her paper (which she never would have finished on time if it hadn’t been for Simon) and was more than a little out of it.

“You should’ve heard Wonderlich scream at him.”

“Mmm,” Andie murmured.

Out of the corner of her eye she spotted muscleman Russ Benadetto, an arm looped about his girlfriend, blond school spirit commissioner Shannon Harris, coming their way. It was only a little past ten-thirty in the morning and already he was sporting the onset of five o’clock shadow. Shannon, who sat next to Andie in Spanish, swept past them without a glance.

Finch gave Andie The Look—the one that said weren’t they lucky to have their own exclusive club while freaks like Russ and Shannon only
thought
they were one up.

“Hey, what’s with you?” she asked when Andie didn’t react.

“Huh? Uh, nothing.” She barely glanced at Finch before going back to twirling her lock. This was the second time she’d tried it; she must have gotten the numbers mixed up.

“Nothing, my ass. You’ve been acting weird all morning.” Finch leaned close, her hair swinging away from her shoulders in a silky dark curtain. “You still pissed at your mom?”

“I’m not pissed. I was never
pissed.
Anyway, I can’t talk about it right now.” She glanced over her shoulder at Russ’s and Shannon’s retreating backs. Finch was the only one besides Simon who knew about Claire, and she’d just as soon keep it that way. “Damn. This thing must be broken.” She banged on it with the heel of her hand. If she didn’t get it open, she’d be late for Mr. Hillman’s class.

“Okay, we’ll talk about it at lunch.” Finch impatiently brushed her hand aside and gave the lock several expert twists. The door popped open.

“Thanks.” Andie gave her a sheepish look.

Finch waved as she headed off to class, a slender dark-haired girl in jeans and funky red top who bore little resemblance to the girl Andie had met for the first time last summer. She remembered waiting on Finch at Rusk’s, how withdrawn she’d been, in a mysterious sort of way, as uncertain about Andie as she was about the boots she was trying on. It wasn’t until they’d gotten to know each other that she began to open up. Andie was astonished to learn that Finch had spent twelve of her sixteen years being shunted from one foster home to another before running away last year. She was the only one of Andie’s friends, even the ones whose parents were divorced, who’d understood completely about her father. Finch didn’t have to ask why Andie and her brother didn’t spend Sunday afternoons eating Happy Meals at McDonald’s with their dad.

An hour and a half later they were seated on the lawn, which skirted the administration building on one side and math and sciences on the other, rolling in a gentle slope to the parking lot and bus stop below. The flagpole stood dead center, and served as the compass by which various factions were grouped. The freshmen, lowest in the pecking order, sat closest to the parking lot, with the sophomores occupying the meridian just above. The area north of the flagpole was informally reserved for upper-classmen like Andie and Finch, with the more popular kids lining the benches along the quad.

“Have you picked out a dress yet?” Andie asked, biting into her tuna fish sandwich. Laura’s wedding was less than a month away and Finch still had no idea what she was going to wear.

Finch rolled her eyes. “Don’t remind me.”

“At least you don’t have to wear an ugly one that someone else picked out.” Finch was the maid of honor, but since the wedding was so casual she’d been given free rein to choose her own dress.

“That’s one way of looking at it,” she said. “On the other hand, nobody will care what I’m wearing. The only thing people will see”—her expression darkened—“is the loser who crashed Alice’s wedding.”

Andie hadn’t gone to Laura’s sister’s wedding last summer—that was the weekend her dad, in a misguided attempt to get her and Justin to bond with Cindy, had taken them to Tahoe—but she’d heard all about it. Who hadn’t? Finch had shown up halfway through the reception, filthy and starved—she’d been on the road for days with little to eat—and was caught stealing food off the buffet table. Lucky for her Laura had taken pity and brought her back to the ranch. Finch had been there ever since.

“Who cares what anyone thinks?” Andie said. “You’ve got me—and Laura and Hector and Maude. What else matters?”

Finch shrugged. “Yeah, I know, it’s just that I worry sometimes. About not fitting in.”

Andie felt privileged that Finch would confide such a thing to her, knowing her friend would sooner cut off her big toe than admit that to anyone else. “You’re a million times better than those bozos.” She gestured toward Russ and Shannon, seated on one of the benches surrounded by their equally snobby friends, all of them laughing uproariously at some joke—probably one that was at someone else’s expense.

“I just hope I don’t trip coming down the aisle,” Finch said darkly. The permanent crease between her heavy dark brows, which grew more marked when she was worried or upset, was deeply indented and her olive-skinned cheeks stamped with color.

“Lucky for you there isn’t going to be one.” The ceremony was taking place on a hilltop.

“You know what I mean. The only one looking forward to this wedding less than me is Hector.” A corner of her mouth hooked up. “I think he’d just as soon get married with just the four of us and a justice of the peace.”

“Well, it’ll be over soon. Then everything will be back to normal.” She thought about Claire, and her stomach did a little flip-flop. Life in her house would never again be normal.

Finch’s brow smoothed, and she leaned back with her elbows planted in the grass. “Yeah, well, what’s normal? I’d have to look it up in the dictionary. My definition was being at the same address for more than a few months.”

“I know what you mean. Nothing’s been the same since my parents got divorced,” Andie said, careful to add, “Not that I ever had it as bad as you.”

Finch turned to her, squinting against the sunlight. “Does your dad know about your sister?”

Andie felt a familiar hollow open up in the pit of her stomach. “He was in the middle of something when I called so we didn’t get much of a chance to talk.” The truth was he hadn’t seemed to think it was such a big deal, only commenting mildly that it might be nice for her to have a big sister. “Anyway, it’s not like he can
do
anything. I mean, I’m sort of stuck with her, aren’t I?”

Finch tossed a crust from her sandwich to a sparrow pecking in the grass at their feet. “It might not be as bad as you think. She might be okay.”

“On the other hand, she might not.”

“Either way, it’s only one person.” Finch sat up and tucked the rest of her sandwich into her bag. Andie had noticed that she seldom finished a meal, as if to remind herself that she always knew where her next one was coming from. “Me? Every time I’d go to a new family I’d have a whole boatload of relatives to get to know.”

“It must’ve been rough.”

A cloud seemed to pass over Finch’s face, with its high Indian cheekbones and dusky skin that made Andie think of the fabled Princess Matilija, buried on Mount Matilija beside her lover. She looked at Andie with her dark eyes that had seen so much and revealed so little. “You get used to it.”

Andie felt small and selfish all of a sudden. Was she making too big a deal of this?

She glanced over at the flagpole, where one of the sophomore girls was giggling with her friends, all of them looking straight at Mr. Hillman, scurrying past with his head tucked low. Earlier in the day she’d heard that some anonymous joker had scrawled “X + Y = QUEER” on his blackboard. She wondered if it was what Russ and his friends had thought so hilarious.

“I suppose she couldn’t be as bad as Monica,” she conceded.

Finch’s eyes widened with interest. Andie had only given her the highlights, and she was eager to know more. “I still can’t believe you actually
went
to her house.”

“We were there almost an hour. She was pretty drunk by the time we left.”

“Other than that, what was she like?”

Andie thought for a moment. What was the one thing that summed up Monica? “She seemed sad.”

Finch snorted. “Yeah, right. With all her money?”

“I think she’d trade it all for someone who truly loved her.”

“She’s been married a few times, hasn’t she? Never mind, I take it back.” They exchanged a look. They both knew that love and marriage didn’t always go hand in hand. “I’ve heard she’s slept with half the men in town. Do you think it’s true?”

Andie remembered the way Monica had batted her eyelashes at Simon. “I think she likes the attention. Aside from that, don’t believe everything you hear.” She thought about what had happened afterward, at the house, and the sun beating down overhead grew that much warmer all of a sudden.

Andie looked up to find Finch’s dark gaze fixed on her. “Yeah, even if she was sleeping around, what’s the big deal? I mean, it’s not like she’s hurting anyone, right?”