His Kiss (17 page)

This bit.

***

After school, I trudged to the gym to decorate it for a stupid dance I wasn’t even going to. At first we had a lot of people helping us, but after the first hour only Bianca and I were left. And as I said, I kind
of
hated Bianca. She was bossy and snobby, but president of the dance committee. So, yeah, my day was just tops.

Bianca left to go hunt up more streamers, and then it was just
me
—alone in the stupid gym, getting it all pretty for the stupid dance. I was so sad and depressed I wanted to cry. I could feel tears forming as I was up on the ladder trying to get the tape I’d put on the streamer to actually stick to the wall. But it needed to be up higher than I could actually reach.

“
Do you need help?”

I jerked around at the unexpected male voice. Then I almost fell off the ladder, because it was Griffin. He was standing in the gym doorway watching me.

“Um, yeah,” I managed to choke out. “I could really use some help. Definitely.”

With my heart racing I watched Griffin grab the ladder Bianca had been using. He brought it over next to mine and climbed up beside me. Then he put up all the streamers—for me—and for a dance he wouldn’t be caught dead at. I was touched and speechless, just as I always was these days when Griffin was around.

He just kept doing these unexpectedly nice, wonderful, thoughtful things. They wreaked havoc with my heart—and my resolve to stay away from him. Had me ready to jump into his arms and beg him to call me “Heaven” again and to give me three more minutes in it.

Only just then Bianca breezed back into the gym carrying an armload of streamers and a big sign that said, “Rock My World.”

Looking amazed she gazed around the gym, her expression totally pleased. “Wow, you got a lot done while I was gone.”

 
“Griffin helped,” I said, though that was totally an understatement. He basically did everything. I just supervised and told him what to do. It had been … nice.

Bianca
plunked her armload of streamers down on the refreshment table, eyeing Griffin with a new interest.

“It all looks really great,” she purred.
“
Could you put up this sign for me?”

Griffin’s jaw flinched slightly.
“No, sorry. I’ve got to go.”

“
Oh, okay.” She kind of glared at him, then turned to me with a shrug. “So, finish with the streamers and then hang this sign right over that door and I think we’re set.”

Um, ugh.

Bianca immediately left, saying she needed to check on something.

Once she was gone, Griffin turned back to me. “Want me to put up that sign?”

My heart fluttered. Didn’t he just
say …?
“I thought you had to go.”

He smirked. “I just didn’t want to help her. I don’t like her.”

I couldn’t help smiling at that—smiling big.
“But you’ll help me?”

He had his back to me, climbing the ladder with the sign in his hand. “Sure.”

“Because … you like me?”

He turned to me and smirked. “Well, I don’t hate you.” Then he grinned. “Of course I like you, Heaven. That’s why I keep asking you to the river and parties, but you keep shooting me down.”

“You ask me to the river because you like me?” I couldn’t keep the skepticism out of my voice. I mean, the river—where people get drunk and hook up. That’s where he took girls he liked?

Griffin glanced back over at me and then
back
to the sign, centering it. He didn’t answer.

“Ask me somewhere else,” I whispered, only not out loud.

When Griffin was done with the sign he came over towards me and kept coming towards me until he playfully had me backed against the wall.

He played with a tendril of my hair, and his eyes stared into mine. “I have a crush on you, Heaven.”

Oh, my heart couldn’t take it. It couldn’t. Big, strong Griffin being so sweet and gentle and looking at me that way—all warm and tender and
I want you
. It had my body on fire and all tingly and woozy and my heart beating so fast I was sure it was going to explode. “I have one on you too.”

“I know.” He tugged playfully on a lock of my hair. “You told me.”

I gave a soft laugh, my brain gone—totally not in my head—all I could think about was his eyes and his soft, pink lips and how it seemed he was going to kiss me again. “Oh yeah.”

“I’m writing a song about it,” he said, his face drawing near mine. “A song about you.”

I jerked my head up, coming out of my stupor. Wh????

“You write songs?”

Griffin gave me a look, like:
Why do you sound so incredulous … and turned on?

But after a moment all he said was, “Yeah. I write all the songs for our band.
That song that we did at the school talent show?
I wrote that.”

Purrrrr!

Okay, now I wanted to pounce on him.

Gah!

My stomach knotted a little. Actually, it knotted a lot. Life was cruel.
So unfair.
Why oh why did he have to be a bad boy? Mr. Party Animal? Why did such a hot, talented wise-guy have to come around tempting me
so
bad? Now I was going to dream about him
forever
—and want and lust and yearn for him.

Ugh!

It wasn’t fair!

Griffin had no idea what was going through my head—that I was contemplating making a run for the exit before I did something stupid, like give up my resolve. Give into his … hotness. I mean,
he wrote songs!
And he said he liked me. Well, he
said
he did. But okay, that’s what
players
do, right? They mess with girls’ hearts—tease them and tempt them and get them all panting just for fun.

Geez, I hated players.

I tried reminding myself of that.
Griffin’s a player
,
Griffin’s a player
.
I chanted it over and over again in my head, trying to be strong and keep my resolve—I couldn’t date a bad boy. I couldn’t, I couldn’t,
I
couldn’t.

Griffin’s gaze flicked to the streamers above us. “So, this decorating we did.” His eyes were back on mine. “It’s for a dance, right?”

I grimaced,
then
nodded, wondering if he knew Aiden and I didn’t get back together though I told him we were. I wondered if he knew Aiden was going to the dance with Fiona. Then it struck me—he probably knew. After all, he and Aiden were on the same hockey team, and Fiona was a hockey cheerleader—word gets around in those kinds of circles.
Maybe that’s why he was being so nice—helping me decorate and everything.
He felt sorry for me. The thought was both touching and humiliating at the same time. It filled me with
a strange
warmth, but had my ears burning and made me want to run away and hide and just
think
about all this stuff—Griffin being so nice. That’s all I wanted to do now—fantasize about it. I didn’t want to have to face the actual meaning behind his kind, sweet gesture—the crushing facts of why. It was too … pathetic.

Even rough, tough The Griff felt sorry for me—decorating for a dance I wasn’t going to. That’s probably why he had been all mushy, telling me he had a crush on me. He just felt sorry for me.

Suddenly, I wanted to crawl under a rock. But Griffin tilted his
head,
looking so deep into my eyes he practically had to hold me up to keep me from swooning. “Okay, Heaven,” he said, “you won’t go with me to a party. Will you go with me to the dance?”

My heart stopped and heat rushed in.

I blinked. I was going to fall for real. “You’ll … come to the dance?”

He raised his eyebrows. “If you’ll come with me.”

My heart was pounding so hard I was sure he could hear it. This moment didn’t seem real—couldn’t be real. Griffin was offering to take me to the dance? The Griff?

The thought had me giddy and this awe-inspiring, mind-blowing realization washed through me—no, I couldn’t date a bad-boy, but … Griffin wasn’t really a “bad” boy. I mean, he didn’t pound Aiden’s face in that day after school—the day we kissed— and he didn’t post my journal entries all over the internet—he’d sent them back to me. And since I wouldn’t go to a party with him, he was willing to go to a dance with me—a
school
dance. That was so
not
a bad-boy thing.

I was ready to melt into a puddle.

Griffin grinned at my huge, dorky smile. “So will you go with me
?—
To the dance?”

I nodded, too amazed to speak.

***

I would love to tell you that The Griff and I went to the dance and it was wonderful and all my dreams came true. But I can’t.
Because that didn’t happen.
We didn’t end up even going to the dance. I got all dressed up and waited for him. And waited for him, and waited for him. But he never showed.

Two hours after he was supposed to come to my house and sweep me off my feet, the phone started ringing. It kept ringing and ringing, but I didn’t answer it. I was curled up in a ball on my bedroom floor, still in my beautiful dress that I had bought especially for the dance.

I didn’t answer the phone because I was bawling and I didn’t want whoever was on the line to hear my sobbing. I knew it was either Jazz or Destiny calling to see where I was—or it was Griffin calling with a lame excuse why he decided not to show. Or maybe it would be him laughing, saying: “You really fell for that? You thought I’d go to a school dance?”

He was mean. Evil! I hated him.

Three hours later, I finally dragged myself off the floor to check all the phone messages. I read through the list of numbers, seeing a lot of the calls were from Jazz and Destiny. But there was another number that kept calling too. Finally, I took a deep breath and listened to the messages.

The unfamiliar number wasn’t from Griffin. It was from his Mom. She called to say Griffin was in the hospital, that he had been rushed there and that he’d had emergency surgery.

“It was his appendix,” she said with a quiver in her voice.

I let out my breath as she went on. “Griffin kept insisting I call you.” She gave a meaningful pause. “He wanted me to tell you he’s sorry.”

She had called a few times after that, but didn’t leave a message; however, on her last call she did. She said Griffin was in room 203 at the hospital.

Then she added candidly, “My son wants to see you, Ally. I don’t know who you are, but you seem important to him. He was going to a
school dance
with you?” She said it like she could hardly believe it. “Visiting hours are over for the night, but please come see him first thing in the morning.”

***

Griffin didn’t stand me up! I went to bed on a cloud of happiness.

He didn’t stand me up! He didn’t stand me up!
Earlier I had done a little dance around my room about it, chanting the mantra out loud. “He didn’t stand me up!”