Just You (9 page)

“What is he then?” Ashley asked.

“Just a guy,” I said, emphasizing each word.
Just a
hot
guy, I thought to myself, a guy I liked to kiss,
a lot. And talk to. And be with. And think about. “Nothing
serious.”

“Defensive much?” Erin said as our friend
Brooke Smithson sat down at our table across from Ashley.

“Who’s defensive?” Brooke asked, opening up
a small container of blueberry yogurt. We’d known Brooke since
seventh grade but she only hung out with us occasionally, like when
she wasn’t busy with drama class or a play. Which was rare.

“Taylor,” Erin said through a mouthful of
potato chips.

I sighed. This was going to be a long
lunch.

“What’s wrong?” Brooke turned to me with her
big blue eyes already full of sympathy. In addition to being a
tall, graceful, wildly popular Gwyneth Paltrow look-alike and one
of the most talented actresses in school, Brooke was also
exceptionally nice.

“Nothing,” I said, smiling at her.

“She says she doesn’t have a new boyfriend
but we don’t believe her,” Ashley said.

“Oh?” She turned back to me, intrigued now.
“Who is he?”

“Just a guy,” Erin said in that same deep
baritone.

“His name’s Michael,” I told Brooke.

She tossed her white-blond hair off her face
and scooped up a spoonful of yogurt. “And?”

“And he’s nice. He lives in Redwood
Hills.”

“Cute?”

“When I asked her that earlier, she
practically slobbered all over the table,” Ashley said with a
smirk. “So I’m guessing yes.”

Brooke flashed me her toothpaste-commercial
smile. “He sounds perfect.”

“Yeah,” I said, pushing my tray away. “He
kind of is.”

Out of habit, my gaze zeroed in on Brian and
Kara, seated at their customary table over by the windows. As usual
they were draped all over each other, nuzzling and cooing over
their orange plastic trays and making everyone around them lose
their appetites. As I watched the easy affection between them, I
waited for the familiar taste of bitterness in my mouth. But for
some reason, this time it never came.

****

Since Halloween night, Michael and I had
been talking on the phone almost every day. We were getting to know
each other, something Brian and I never had to do because we
already knew each other so well when we started dating. But
everything about Michael was different from what I knew. Or thought
I knew. It was exciting, I discovered, getting to know someone this
way. Learning about them and their lives.

And that first week, I learned a lot about
Michael. Little things, like that he loved medieval history, James
Bond movies, and baseball. That he’d worked at the golf course near
his house every summer since he was thirteen. That his father was a
workaholic, and his mother was a nurse, like Lynn, only at a
different hospital. That his sisters annoyed him a lot, but he’d
gladly pound any boy who ever tried to mess with them. That he’d
never tried drugs, smoked, or gotten falling-down drunk, even
though most of his friends made a regular habit out of each. He
also revealed the cinnamon mystery for me—he was hopelessly
addicted to cinnamon-flavored mints, sometimes going through five
or more packs a week.

I learned some big things about him too,
like how his father expected a lot out of him, wanted him to be a
lawyer too someday but dismissed the fact that Michael didn’t want
that. His father wasn’t the demonstrative type, Michael told me,
but his mother’s warmth and support made up for his dad’s
aloofness. And, in spite of being polar opposites, his parents had
been married for twenty-two years (though they barely spent any
time together).

The most intriguing thing he told me,
however, was that he had an older brother who had been “away” for a
while but would be “back soon.” He didn’t elaborate and I wasn’t
about to pry, but naturally I was curious. I assumed he’d tell me
about his brother when we knew each other a little better.

I talked about myself too, sticking to
innocent little tidbits of info at first. I confessed my love for
sugary snacks, eighties movies, and swans. I told him about how I
sucked at math but excelled in languages. I said that Emma drove me
crazy but had her moments of greatness now and then. I bragged
about her incredible art work. I spoke about my father’s job at the
university, and how my English teachers always expected me to be
the star student when they found out my father taught literature
for a living.

Michael knew my parents were divorced, but I
didn’t say why and he never asked. That information, along his
older brother’s whereabouts, would best be saved until after we
knew each other better.

Throughout all this conversation, I found
myself liking him more and more, despite my determination to not
get too involved. But I couldn’t control the euphoria that burst
through me whenever I picked up the phone and heard his voice on
the other end, or when I thought about how his lips felt on mine.
We had a connection and it didn’t matter if I chose to accept it or
not. It was just
there
.

My second official date with Michael took
place exactly a week after Halloween. This time we went to his
friend R.J.’s house, the same place we’d met for the first time
over a month ago. Actually, we went separately. Dad was okay with
the idea of me dating and I knew he would have liked Michael, but I
couldn’t take a chance on him letting something slip to Mom. She
definitely wouldn’t approve of me seeing a good-looking,
upper-class, seventeen-year-old who had his own car. She’d barely
approved of me dating Brian, and she’d known him
and
his
parents for years. I knew if she caught wind of this, she’d ground
me for months and probably try to outfit me with a beeper. And a
chastity belt.

So of course I didn’t tell her.

Michael and I spent most of the night in
R.J.’s laundry room, pressed up against the huge front-loader
washer and kissing. I left the laundry room that night knowing I’d
never smell fabric softener again without blushing.

Still, despite the nightly phone calls and
fooling around, I remained insistent that Michael was not my
boyfriend. Because he wasn’t. We’d never touched on the issue of
commitment. For all I knew he could be making out with twenty other
girls during the week, though I realized by now he wasn’t the
player type. Besides, for whatever reason, he liked me
.

Robin was ecstatic that we’d hit it off. It
irked me that she turned out to be right, but not enough to bother
pretending otherwise. By now I had myself convinced I could be like
her: cool and carefree, open to all possibilities. Michael wasn’t
Brian. He was different, and when I was with him I was different
too, more confident, like I had taken charge of myself and what I
wanted. Kissing him that first night had empowered me that way.
With Brian I’d always felt so much pressure to be the kind of
girlfriend he wanted, to feel things for him I didn’t feel. But
with Michael I didn’t even have to try. Like our connection, the
feelings were
there
whether I welcomed them or not. This
reassured me that I wasn’t some cold, heartless freak, but at the
same time it also scared the hell out of me. Did I even want this,
or were my hormones clouding any rational thought?

“You’re over-thinking again,” Robin said one
rainy Saturday in mid-November as we loafed around my room. “God,
I’ve never seen someone so scared of boys in my entire life. Chill
the fuck out, okay? Here, have an almond.”

She tossed me a salted almond—one of several
handfuls we’d swiped from Dad’s supply—and I popped it into my
mouth. “I’m not scared of boys,” I said, chewing. “Not trusting
them and being scared of them are two very different things.”

“You’re scared to trust them, then.” She
gave a dismissive hand flip. “Same difference.”

“You’ve been cheated on before, right?”

She licked salt off her fingers. “Danny
Caldwell cheated on me with that slut who works at the McDonald’s
on Centennial Drive…Callie Norton. Douchebag. They deserved each
other.”

“Ever hear the saying ‘Once bitten, twice
shy.’?”

“Ever hear the saying ‘Get over it or else
Robin will kick your ass.’?”

“I am over it.”

“And I’m a D-cup.” She got up to sift
through my magazine collection, which I kept in a messy heap on the
dresser. “You know,” she said, digging out the latest copy of
People
, “if you give out nothing but negative vibes, then
negative things are going to happen to you. And if you spend your
life just waiting for people to let you down, then they probably
will.”

“Thanks, Dr. Phil.”

“No, really.” She flopped back down on the
bed with the magazine. “The way I see it, life is what you make of
it. If you don’t take it too seriously, it can’t really beat you
down.”

I thought about this as I polished off the
rest of the almonds. Maybe I did take life too seriously, focused
too much on the negative. Maybe I was more like my mother than I
cared to admit.

“Robin,” I said, stretching out beside her
on the bed.

“Mmm?” She was engrossed in an article about
some singer’s latest antics.

“Do you know anything about Michael’s
brother?”

She looked up at me. “I didn’t even know he
had a brother.”

I related word for word what Michael had
told me about this mysterious older brother of his. “I wonder what
the story is there.”

“Maybe he’s away at college.”

“Why wouldn’t he say that then? Why be so
vague?”

She turned a page in the magazine. “Want me
to ask Devon or R.J.?”

“No,” I said. “I’ll wait until he tells me
himself.”

Her shoulder bumped against mine. “You
haven’t had any revealing, tell-all conversations yet? What, are
you too busy sucking face to talk?”

I bumped her back a little too roughly,
causing
People
to slide to the floor. “We talk,” I said, and
then added in a softer voice, “On the phone.”

“Really.” She leaned over the edge of the
bed to rescue the magazine, and then flipped back to the page she’d
been reading. “But you can’t control yourself in person, is that
it?”

I felt my face redden. “Whatever.”

“He must like you,” she said, still wearing
a teasing smile. “I haven’t seen him so much as talk to another
girl since he met you. At Jenna’s party last Friday? Elena Brewster
kept trying to get her hooks into him and he wouldn’t even give her
the time of day. She’s this gorgeous junior who’s liked him
forever.”

I wasn’t sure how to react to this
information. Myriad emotions bubbled up in me—elation, dread,
worry, fear, elation, elation.

“The boy has good taste.” She gave me an
affectionate look. “And I can’t say I blame him for being sick of
the girls who hang around those parties. They’re barracudas, those
chicks.”

I nodded. “I feel so dorky and immature
around those girls. They barely even acknowledged my existence
until they realized Michael and I were together. Then they got all
phony, acting like we were all best friends or something. But I
could tell they were all wondering what the hell I’m doing with
him. They probably think he’s lost his mind.”

Robin made a face. “Screw ‘em. They’re just
jealous.”

“I guess,” I said, even though I knew that
wasn’t it.

At seven-thirty we headed over to Robin’s
house. As usual, it was empty. And because empty houses demand to
be taken advantage of, Robin came up the bright idea of inviting
the guys over. She claimed she was getting sick of crowded, noisy
parties, but I didn’t buy it. Robin lived for crowds and noise.
Coincidentally, she had dreamed up this plan right after our
conversation about the “barracudas” and how uneasy they made me
feel. I knew she was trying to be thoughtful; she had no idea the
thought of being semi-alone with Michael scared me more than any
barracuda girl ever could. Sure, we’d already made out in R.J.’s
laundry room (and in Michael’s car, several times), but Robin’s
house was different. For one, it had a couch. Second, my father
happened to be four houses away. Not that he knew anything about
this. I’d told him we’d be hanging out at Robin’s for the evening,
watching movies. He assumed her mother would be home, which she
hadn’t been since last night, and wouldn’t be until tomorrow
afternoon sometime.

“What’s your mom’s boyfriend like?” I asked
Robin as we searched though the kitchen cupboards for snacks. They
were pretty bare. It seemed like they subsisted on diet Coke and
Triscuits.

“Some rich dude.” She stood on tiptoe to
check the cupboard over the fridge. “I only met him once. My mother
is a trophy for him, basically. All she has to do is look pretty on
his arm and service him regularly and he lets her use his credit
card.”

“Gross.” I opened the fridge and surveyed
the contents: a jug of water, several cans of pop, a half-gone
bottle of wine, mustard, cream cheese, and a six-pack of
yogurt.

“I know. He’s short and fat and I’m pretty
sure he has hair plugs. Disgusting.”

We gave up on finding any form of snack food
and retreated to the living room, where Robin put on some music.
The guys arrived a few minutes later, their jackets wet from the
rain that had been falling all day. Their collective height and
presence seemed to shrink the entire house. Devon headed directly
for the kitchen, and I could tell by the way he navigated the rooms
that he had been here before, more than once. Robin followed him
while Michael and I stood there near the door, smiling at each
other. I wondered if he was inwardly comparing Robin’s ancient,
rundown little bungalow, with its outdated fixtures and faded
floors, to the mini-mansions in his own neighborhood. But after a
minute I realized he wasn’t the least bit interested in his
surroundings. His blue-gray eyes stayed locked on me.