Kissing Jayden: a romantic teen thriller (5 page)

And I was … totally confused.

Chapter 6: Presents from Strangers

On Monday morning, I realized I was super glad that Kelly had been so out of it at the party. Because then there was at least one person Saturday night who didn’t remember the whole weird showdown with Jayden and Mike. But things got even worse when I got to school, because apparently Mike had decided to mess up Tyler — probably because he couldn’t mess with Jayden.

Actually, I was pretty sure Mike had been
looking
for somebody to pound on after Jayden had beaten him at that stupid game. What … a … psycho.

For the rest of the weekend, I had seriously not been able to stop thinking about Jayden. So, of course, with nothing better to do after I finished my homework, I had been incredibly stupid and baked a batch of brownies — with extra chocolate chips — on Sunday night to give to him. On the way to school, though, I had finally realized that everybody was going to know if I left them on his desk in Mr. Franklin’s class. Bad idea!

I brought them to school anyway, and I was
planning
on sharing them with Stace, and even Kelly, who I was still mad at — until I found out about poor Tyler. The principal had pulled him into the office and asked him who pummeled him over the weekend. But Tyler would never tell. Nobody would. Not if they wanted to live to the end of the day. The only person who could stand up to Mike Jensen and
not
get pounded was Jayden. Mike was mean, but I didn’t think he was stupid, either. Jayden could handle himself and wouldn’t put up with Mike pulling some kind of power trip with him.

I went and found Tyler at nutrition. It was awful. His eye was all swollen up, and he had a split lip. It made me so mad. Mike Jensen was
such
a psycho! Why was he always picking on the quiet kids who never gave him any grief whatsoever? I was also wondering why Jayden would let Mike go after poor Tyler — until I remembered that he had followed me when I went to drop off Stace and Kelly.

When he had walked us outside, I’d told him a few times that we’d be fine, but he had insisted on following me all the way back to my house. After dropping off Stace and Kelly and driving to my house, I had practically fainted in relief seeing that the lights were all still out, which meant Mom hadn’t woken up. Then Jayden had pulled up behind me. I had totally thought he was going to take off. Instead, he had turned off the engine and walked me to the door.

Then, I had kind of reached up and wiped some of the lipstick from Jayden’s cheek. For a long time, he had just stared down at me with this serious look, like he was going to say something. I had desperately wanted to ask him why he had kissed me in the first place. Because why go through with that jerky bet, make me look totally stupid, and then save me and kiss me senseless out of my mind every other time he saw me? I knew it wasn’t because he liked me. More like he felt bad. What he didn’t know was that he was making me totally fall for him even more than before. Which sucked!

Because we were too different. He was popular, too popular. And I was just me, quiet little Molly.

*    *    *

I couldn’t explain how it happened, but I kind of started going out with Tyler again. Maybe it was the brownies that did it. Really. Mom’s brownies are
that
good. And Tyler seemed to think it was a bigger gesture than I had intended. So, when he came and started sitting with us on the quad again, I wasn’t about to be all snotty about it. Plus, I still felt bad for him. And he was cute. Not in a Jayden Stone kind of way, but I seriously had to stop comparing every real guy to a fantasy guy! Because that’s what Jayden was. He was a total fantasy. The fact that we had kissed — three freaking times — was nuts.

The weird thing, though, was that it
seemed
like Jayden had liked it when we kissed. Every time, he had made it sound like I was something tempting and tasty. But after the night of the party, he kind of avoided me. Maybe he thought we were even or something. He had made that stupid bet with Mike, then he had saved me — and now maybe he thought we were even.

The problem was that I didn’t want it to be over. I knew we couldn’t date. Because guys on the baseball team didn’t date girls like me. It was in the rulebook or something. Besides, Jayden had a reputation on the team, and the other guys would totally harass him if he went out with someone like me for real.

We just didn’t fit together. Except when we were kissing. Just the thought made me shiver.

My phone buzzed while I was in Trig, and I took it out really carefully and looked down. The text was from Stace … and it was a picture of Jayden on the quad! He was looking off to the side, totally unaware that anybody was taking his picture.

Stacy Conrad
! I yelled in my head.

Was she trying to drive me nuts and make it impossible for me to forget about Jayden Stone? And the note in her text was totally embarrassing.

A present for you! Love, Stace!

I was going to kill her! Or hug her. This was totally awful and wonderful. Because the picture was
so
great. He looked so hot. I tried not to stare at it, but it was really hard. All through class, I told myself that I would delete it. I couldn’t, though.

I was just super relieved that Tyler didn’t sit next to me in Trig. If he saw some totally hot photo of Jayden on my phone, it would just be totally awkward. He would probably think that Jayden had sent it to me or something. Well, that wouldn’t make sense since Jayden didn’t even look like he knew anyone was taking his picture. But, still. It wouldn’t be good if anyone saw the picture.

Besides, even if I wasn’t the most exciting girl in school, I was good for Tyler right now. His ego — and his face — had taken a serious beating. Kind of like my ego had taken a beating after the dance … something else that also happened to be totally Mike Jensen’s fault.

Someone needed to put that guy in his place. But it wasn’t going to be me. Or Tyler. It was best if people like us just stayed off his radar from now on. Which meant I had to stay away from Jayden, because Mike and Jayden were friends. I totally would’ve been better off thinking Jayden was a jerk like Mike, but I knew he wasn’t.

First off, every time he kissed me, it felt like I was floating. And second, he had totally saved me from Mike. So, I couldn’t really blame him for the dance thing, because he did
seem
sorry about it.

When I got another text before Trig ended, I thought it was just Stace messing with me again. But it was Mom. The note said that Grams had tripped over Daisy, that yappy little Chihuahua she loved so much. She had a broken her hip and was in the hospital. I started getting all teary-eyed until I read that Grams was okay. She just needed help once she got back home. So Mom, Aunt Jenny, and Aunt Carol were going to take turns staying with her.

Mom’s note said she was leaving the car with me, and she had already called Stace’s mom and asked if I could stay over there while she was gone. At lunch, when we all met up on the quad, Stace and Kelly gave me big hugs since Stace’s mom had already texted her. Stace totally knew what I was going through. Her grandma had suffered a stroke last year, and Stace had cried for days.

Even if they had almost gotten me into serious trouble with Mike Jensen … and Mom, I was still lucky to have Stace and Kelly. They were good friends. I knew they’d be there when I needed them, so I was glad I’d stuck my neck out for them. Thinking about the party, I glanced over to where Jayden’s group hung out. He had his guitar and Vicki Westfield was staring at him like she wanted to eat him. Then again, probably half the girls in school were, too.

Turning, I caught Mike Jensen looking at me with his cold, creepy stare. What was
his
deal? Emma Simmons was hanging all over him and he was giving me creepy looks? What a freaking jerk! Hadn’t he intimidated me and messed up my life enough already?

After lunch, I walked over to my locker. As soon as I pulled open the door, my heart totally jumped out of my chest. The little black box I had found in my locker, which I had brought to the lost and found, was sitting on top of my books. I picked it up and grabbed the note underneath it.

Think you’re too good for everyone?

I couldn’t help it. I clapped my hand over my mouth and totally started bawling. I didn’t even care that people were passing by and staring at my meltdown. I was scared out of my mind, and my thoughts were just going a mile-a-minute. Then I turned and saw Jayden at the other end of the hall. I looked away fast, trying to pretend everything was normal and fine when it totally wasn’t. The bell was going to ring at any second, but I knew if I tried to go to class I was going to throw up or freak out in front of everyone.

This wasn’t supposed to happen to me! I was shy, quiet — I never did anything to anybody! And now somebody was leaving scary, weird letters in my locker.

“Molly?”

I reached up and swiped at my eyes before I turned around to face Jayden. His crystal clear blue eyes were serious when he saw how bad I’d been crying, which just made me start to cry even harder.

“Molly, what happened?”

I hiccupped and tried to say something, but I just ended up sobbing. Before I knew it, Jayden was wrapping me in his arms, and I was crying all over his soft T-shirt. When Mrs. Gillman, who I’d had for geometry freshman year, stuck her head out her door looking annoyed, I heard Jayden say something about taking me to the nurse’s office.

He put his arm around my shoulders and started leading me away from the classrooms until we got to the quad. Then, instead of continuing to the offices, he stopped on the steps to the amphitheater. This was where he usually hung out during lunch, and I never came over here, even when his band had played a few times. The music was good, but Jayden playing guitar — not to mention the sight of his biceps when he played — was the main reason girls screamed.

I totally knew I wasn’t supposed to be here. This wasn’t my world. I didn’t fit the image of a baseball player’s girlfriend. At all. I couldn’t be loud and outrageous even if I tried. It would be more like try-hard in my case. And I was happy enough with my life. I really was. Mom was always saying stuff like, “Molly, honey, you’re just a late bloomer. Boys will want to date you like crazy when you get to college.”

Besides, I hadn’t been looking for a boyfriend. I hadn’t even been looking for a guy to kiss. Then this whole thing with Jayden had happened, and my life just kept getting more and more out of control. Jayden held my shoulders and kind of lowered me onto the steps. When I shivered, he wrapped his jacket around my shoulders, and I hiccupped again.

“Come on, Molly. You’ve gotta tell me what happened.”

I swallowed and looked into his insanely blue eyes. Then I started talking really fast and out of control, telling him about Grams. After that, I just kind of thrust the black box and the note into his hands. He looked down at them with this confused look. Then he opened the note and frowned.

“Who gave you the box, Molly?” he asked, his voice suddenly sharp.

I shrugged and wrapped my arms around my knees.

“I-I don’t know. I found it in my locker a while back, and then it just sort of showed up again.”

His eyebrow went up.

“And you never opened it?”

I shook my head and shivered, trying not to start bawling like a baby again.

“No. I was too freaked out.”

He flicked open the box, but I couldn’t see past the lid. He closed the box and frowned, studying the note again.

“Can I keep these?” he asked.

I was confused, but I nodded anyway and then looked down.

“I’m really sorry about your shirt,” I mumbled, stifling a hiccup.

“Molly, look at me.” I looked up at him and sniffled. “I don’t want you to worry.”

I hiccupped again. The guy I was totally crushing on was telling me not to worry about my stalker.

Right!

Chapter 7: Chocolate Solves Everything — Not!

When I got home from school, I packed up my stuff and drove over to Stace’s house. While we were working on homework, I eventually caved and told her all about the notes and the weird jewelry box — and Jayden. She was totally mad that I hadn’t told her in the first place, but part of me was still thinking that she and Kelly had just brushed it off when I found the first note. Plus, I didn’t want to look all crazy paranoid.

“So, who do you think it is?” Stace asked. “I mean, gah! You’ve got your own stalker! That’s kind of awesome, don’t you think?

I gave her a look.

“Stace, you are the only person on the planet who would think that having a stalker is in any way a good thing!”

“Come on, Molly! Someone’s got some deep, dark secret crush on you, and you’re not the least bit curious?”

“The notes were crazy creepy, Stace.” I shivered. “They totally weren’t love letters. Whoever wrote them is nuts.”

Later on, after we finished our homework, it was like middle school. We sneaked into the kitchen and finished all the ice cream while Stace talked about getting back together with Kyle. When she asked me how things were going with Tyler, I kind of shrugged. I hadn’t really meant to get back together with him. I had just felt so bad — like Mike Jensen’s rampage had been my fault since Tyler had gotten smashed up right after I had left the party with my friends and Jayden.

When it was time to go to sleep, Stace’s mom set me up in the rec room, which had a foldout couch. It was across the house from the upstairs bedrooms, but at least the room had its own bathroom. I sent a quick text to Tyler since he had texted earlier. The bad part was that I wasn’t even thinking about Tyler when I typed it out, because to get to his number, I had to scroll past Jayden’s. Thinking about the night of the party, when Jayden had given me his number — and kissed me again — I felt my heartbeat speed up.

Suddenly I wanted to see him — Jayden not Tyler. My chest just ached. The way he had wrapped his arms around me earlier and held me while I cried. I had been totally wrong about him. He wasn’t a jerk like Mike. He was strong … and sweet. And I still couldn’t figure out why he was helping me.

Sitting on the foldout bed, I took out my notebook and tried writing another poem. Yuck! This was why I hated writing poetry. I really sucked at it. The poem I had written about Jayden in Mrs. Sharp’s class had just kind of flowed since I hadn’t been thinking about it so much. Mrs. Sharp had called it raw and emotional, which had been monumentally embarrassing since it had been about someone who hadn’t even known I existed at the time.

Giving up, I threw my notebook back in my bag and turned out the lamp. I was nearly asleep when my phone buzzed. I had already gotten a text from Mom earlier saying Grams was doing really well, so I couldn’t think of who would be texting me this late. I grabbed my phone and looked down. I dropped the phone when I saw the text.

Why’d you tell him?

I started shaking and curled up on my side. I was nauseous and terrified, because all of a sudden I had a pretty good feeling who my stalker was. But
Mike Jensen
stalking me made even less sense than Jayden helping me. Or maybe it made too much sense. Because … maybe Jayden was only helping me because he
knew
his buddy had decided to torture me.

I felt tears leaking from the corners of my eyes. I didn’t know which was worse. Getting stalked by Mike “The Jerk” Jensen or Jayden only watching out for me because he felt guilty that his friend was such a psycho. I buried my face in the pillow and just cried, wishing I had never gone to that stupid Valentine’s Day dance.

The next day when we got to school, I knew I looked awful and sleep-deprived, mainly because I hadn’t slept at all after the creepy text. I watched for any sign of Mike Jensen and begged Stace to let me put my books in her locker. The thought of going back to mine had me almost in tears again. The one thing I was beyond thankful for was that I didn’t have any classes with Mike Jensen. Well, I would have been thankful for that on a normal day, but now I was extra relieved.

I still didn’t get it, though. Why would Mike have any interest in
me
? It was more confusing than Jayden noticing me. Mike was big, loud, raging, loved to party, went through girls like tissue paper. There was nothing about me that was remotely like that.

Girls who liked living dangerously were into Mike Jensen. And that was fine with me if they were into that; I just didn’t see the attraction. Jayden was another story. Yeah, I had heard about him doing some wild stuff, and he went out with a ton of girls who were nothing like me. But Mike was a cretin. Jayden wasn’t. At least that’s how I justified still having a major crush on Jayden.

I managed to get through the day without any additional creepy stalker notes, but it might have been because I was dumping my stuff at Stace’s locker and avoiding mine. At lunch, when Tyler asked about why I wasn’t going to my locker, I just shrugged. Seeing as Tyler had gotten his face pounded by Mike, I wasn’t going to drag him into this. If anything, I wanted Tyler as far away from this as possible, which was hard because he was still hanging out with us on the quad at lunch.

What was I supposed to say, though? That hanging out with me put a big target on Tyler’s back because Mike Jensen was nuts? Nobody would even believe me anyway. Mike Jensen leaving weird stuff in
my
locker? It didn’t even sound real to me.

I looked over to where Jayden’s group was hanging out. Mike and Jayden were sitting as far as possible from each other while still occupying the same general space. Jayden looked like he was waiting for Mike to do something crazy. And Mike was playing it all cool, making out with Emma Simmons, who couldn’t seem to get enough. Girls like Emma probably thought girls like me didn’t know what we were missing. Yeah, right! I knew enough to avoid a psycho.

Usually I wouldn’t spend so much time analyzing what the baseball guys and their groupies were doing, but I kind of felt like my life depended on it right now. Back in freshman year, I had thought the whole poem thing in Mrs. Sharp’s class was harmless, because it wasn’t like I had put Jayden’s name on it. And that had been freshman year!

Now I was afraid that everyone had known this whole time about me having this huge crush on Jayden.

When I got out to the parking lot at the end of the day, I got into Mom’s car and turned on the radio, stoked to have transportation, even if it was only temporary. Turning on the radio, I started doing my homework. Then I started getting kind of annoyed at Stace for being late. Finally I had a total “D’oh!” moment when I remembered her text about her dentist appointment that her mom had picked her up early for.

Turning on the car, I figured I’d go back to my house for a bit, get some new clothes, maybe do some laundry — and then go back to Stace’s house. Or maybe I’d just bake some brownies and take them over there to thank her parents for letting me stay over on such late notice.

Hearing a rumbling noise behind me, I looked in the rearview mirror and jumped. There was an enormous pickup truck right behind Mom’s car. Of course, I knew whose it was immediately. It was impossible not to recognize it with
Monster Mike
painted across the side in big, red letters that looked like they were dripping blood. All of a sudden my hands were slick with sweat, and I had to wipe them on my jeans so they wouldn’t slide off the wheel.

I looked around. The parking lot was totally deserted, and when I checked the rearview again, the truck was still rumbling behind me. I swallowed hard and shifted into reverse. The windows on the pickup were super dark, so I couldn’t see Mike Jensen, but I knew it was him. He wouldn’t let anybody else touch his truck. If someone did, he’d break that person into little pieces.

I waited for several seconds, sweating and itching to grab my phone and call Jayden. Then the truck just tore off, leaving exhaust and skid marks behind. Exhaling nervously, I backed out and turned out of the parking lot, my pulse hammering in my ears.

That was
so
bad.

I was shivering and shaking, and I nearly ran the stop sign as I pulled out of the parking lot. When I got to our house, I bolted out of the car like somebody was going to grab me. Inside, I sort of sank down on the floor and had a full-on cry fest for a few minutes. I felt sick to my stomach, like I was going to throw up.

I just wanted to stay on the floor, but then Stace texted me to say they were on their way home. I was just glad she hadn’t called me, because I was a huge mess. Finally I picked myself up off the floor and went upstairs to shower and change before grabbing a bunch of stuff from my room.

By the time Mom called on my cell to give me an update on Grams, I had it mostly together, so she didn’t get suspicious. After we hung up, I went and got the poem I had written about Jayden out of my dresser drawer. I wasn’t even sure why I wanted to see it now. It was kind of stupid, but reading about his blue eyes and half-smile made me feel better. Sitting down on the couch in the living room, I took out my phone and brought up the text with the photo of Jayden.

Yeah, I could totally see girls stalking him, but I still didn’t get Mike Jensen stalking
m
e, though. … Unless it was just another thrill for him — scaring some inexperienced little bookworm. He
was
psycho, and he did seem to like watching me squirm.

I texted Stace that I was running a little late before turning on the oven and collecting the ingredients for brownies. It was kind of soothing just standing there and cracking eggs and sifting flour. When I started melting the butter and the baking chocolate together, I was really tempted to make an extra batch for Jayden. I just couldn’t think of a way to do it where it wouldn’t cause trouble. Besides, we weren’t going out or anything. Taking a deep breath, I reminded myself that he was just helping me because Mike was a scary jerk.

End of story.

It made me ache, though, just thinking about how Jayden never would’ve asked me to the dance — or even noticed me at all — if Mike hadn’t made the stupid bet with him. Because which was worse? Never getting kissed by Jayden in the first place — or getting to kiss him only because of Mike Jensen?

After stirring in the sugar, I added the eggs from the bowl. When I finished mixing everything, I poured the batter into the baking dish and licked the spoon, even though my mom was always warning me about salmonella. Then I sprinkled chocolate chips over the top of the batter.

I put the brownies in the oven and set the timer. While I waited, Stace texted me — two more times — seriously impatient until I wrote back that I was bringing over a batch of Mom’s brownies.

I smiled when she texted back “Can’t wait!!” Stace was pretty easy to please. Poor Kelly, on the other hand, was always worried about her figure since her step-mom kept telling her she was getting chubby, which was so not true! And her step-mom being so mean made me feel a little better about Kelly swiping the realtor keys from her.

Right now, I was just looking forward to hanging out with Stace, eating brownies, and trying not to think about guys in general. Before the stupid Valentine’s Day dance I hadn’t had any reason to even worry about guys!

Yeah, I sometimes secretly thought about Jayden Stone — but that was totally different than actually kissing him. Besides, we had nothing in common. I was quiet, shy, always reading a book. Jayden was center of attention and star of the baseball team. Plus, girls screamed like psychos if he even laid a hand on his guitar.

The timer for the brownies went off, and I waited for them to cool a little bit before wrapping the dish in foil, packing some stuff for lunch the next day, and grabbing my overnight bag. When I got to Stace’s house, her mom beamed at the sight of the brownies. They’re actually more like fudge than brownies — thick and gooey, so chocolaty.

By the end of the night, I finally told Stace everything, including about Mike Jensen being a crazy stalker. I made sure to swear her to secrecy, and I could tell that she was in major disbelief.

“Why would he stalk
you
?” she demanded.

I shrugged. The problem was that I didn’t know, either. I felt better telling Stace, but by the time she went back to her room to go to sleep, my stomach was in a million knots. Why couldn’t things just go back to being simple?

When I woke up the next morning on the foldout bed, I just wished Mom would get back from staying with Grams. I was craving something kind of normal, since nothing really was lately. Stace insisted we leave early for school because she wanted to get a super-sized frozen coffee drink with a ton of whipped cream. When we got to the coffee place, though, the line was huge, so I dashed over to the drugstore to buy a granola bar to add to my lunch.

Really, though, I just wanted to print out the picture that Stace had taken of Jayden. I couldn’t help myself. It wasn’t like I was going to put it up in my locker and pretend like he was my boyfriend or anything. But I wanted the picture anyway.

Maybe I’d keep it in the drawer with the poem. Or I could use it as a bookmark in my history book. Then I froze. What if I left my book somewhere by accident and someone found it with Jayden’s picture in it? That would be awful! I’d probably die of embarrassment.