So Close

Courtney squealed when I ripped open the back door of Drew’s Toyota and climbed in. Oops, maybe I should have made my presence known beforehand. Definitely, I thought as she turned to glare at me from the drivers seat, a big black streak of mascara running from the corner of her right eye to her hairline.
“Jesus Christ, Noah. I could have poked my eye out.”
I cracked up laughing. She looked absolutely ridiculous. The morning’s bitter feelings faded to the back of my mind. Courtney’s presence - however hostile she might be at the moment - was always a comfort when I was feeling down. She snapped the mascara wand back into the tube and dropped it into the centre console.
“Relax. That’s why God gave you two eyes,” I said, laying out on the backseat. My back clicked several times as I stretched leisurely, some of the tension leaking out of my body. I sighed, a noise just shy of contentment.
“Yes, well. The eye patch look is so last century,” she grumbled, twisting to face the rear view mirror. I noticed some of the inky black stuff had caught one of her curls, but I wasn’t about to mention it to her lest she turn around and whack me like it was all my fault. Which it was, but that’s not the point. “What took you so long anyway?”
I shrugged, though she couldn’t see it with her entire face taking up the mirror. “Ran into some people on the way out.” One who probably wanted to see me dead, while the other was probably inadvertently going to kill me if my heart didn’t settle down while he was nearby. Note to self: Google likelihood of teenager suffering heart attack from infatuation of the opposite sex.
Her devious smile shone out at me in the reflection of the mirror. “Did one of those people happen to be Tyson?”
My jaw dropped slightly. What, was she psychic now? I decided to play dumb. “What makes you say that?” I asked, working to free one of my hands from the folds of the jacket I was wearing. I pulled my phone out of my pocket. It had vibrated on the way out to the parking lot, alerting me that I had a text message. Flipping it open, I saw it was from Mel, asking whether I wanted roast beef or roast chicken for dinner. I replied with chicken even as my stomach rumbled in anticipation.
Courtney rolled her eyes at me when I glanced back at the mirror, rubbing vigorously at the black streak. “Great. Stupid waterproof mascara,” she muttered when all she succeeded in doing was spreading the mess. “No. Stupid best friend that thinks it’s funny to sneak up on people while they’re doing something that could potentially blind them.”
I laughed some more. “You were only ever in danger of going half blind.”
“Whatever,” she grumbled, licking a finger to try again. I refrained from informing her that a wet finger would no doubt be worse than a dry one, seeing as the mascara was indeed water proof. I’d been in enough confrontations already today.
“I say it because you’re wearing his jacket.”
It took me a few seconds to realise she’d swung back to our original conversation and I glanced down at the thick black hoodie which was at least three sizes too big for me. Oh. Good point.
“Um, yeah,” I hedged, wondering how the hell I was going to explain this without her jumping to wildly inaccurate conclusions. In the end I decided the truth was best, followed by vehement denials concerning any “hidden meanings” she could conjure out of it all. “He let me borrow it last night,” I said, glancing uncertainly at her reflection in the mirror. Courtney’s eyebrows raised, her finger frozen over the black smudge.
“Last night?”
“Well, more like early this morning,” I amended, then realised how that sounded. A girl out with a boy in the early hours of the morning - alone no less, only to show up the next day with an item of his clothing? Yeah, real dodgy. Or at least a big hint that the two had been involved in some kind of hanky panky.
“It’s not what you think,” I blurted, sitting bolt upright when she made a sort of choking noise in the back of her throat, her eyes bugging out of her head.
So I quickly told her how I’d dropped Riley off at the airport and then ended up at Irvine’s, taking a nap, and waking up to Tyson sitting opposite me. I brushed over most of our conversation and made it seem like we’d stayed there for a few minutes as opposed to a couple of hours, only elaborating enough to explain the jacket I was now wearing. Part of me felt slightly guilty at not divulging all of the juicy details. She was my best friend after all. But another part of me knew it was the right thing to do. If Tyson wanted people to know he worked a fifty hour week and lived alone, he’d tell them. It simply wasn’t my story to relay.
Throughout my hasty explanation, Courtney had been working at getting her face clean. So it was currently an even larger mess, but at least the edges were several shades lighter. It kind of gave the illusion of a black eye if you squinted the right way. And it had dried completely. I bit my tongue to stop another wave of the giggles and leaned forward to see if I could help. It was partially my fault. I smoothed my fingers over the patch of marred skin and gently scratched at the darkest part with the tips of my nails. Nope, it was stuck on like glue.
“He likes you,” Courtney said matter of factly, and I narrowly avoided stabbing her in the eye when I jerked in surprise at her statement.
“Oh em gee,” she said incredulously, batting my hand away. “You seem intent on getting rid of this eye. Maybe I should save us both the trouble and poke it out myself.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, my head spinning with what she’d just said. He likes me? I really wanted to believe that, but his actions to date had me more than a little sceptical. People who liked someone didn’t send out mixed messages, with the majority of those messages screaming “You’re a nuisance and you annoy me.”
“You can’t say something like that,” I said, still hovering in the gap between the two front seats. She gave me a droll stare. “Fine. You can say it all you like, but it doesn’t make it true.”
She tsked at me, her little makeup mishap temporarily forgotten. “No, I don’t know what world you live in, but in the real world, when a guy gives you his jacket and then insists that you hold onto it when you try to give it back, it means he likes you.”
I took one look at the determined glint in her eyes and knew I’d already lost the battle of trying to convince her otherwise. Heck, nothing short of Tyson making out with Aidan would make her concede that he wasn’t interested in me. Oh, yuck. I immediately grossed myself out with the image that brought to mind. Ugh!
“Where’s Drew?” I asked in an attempt to both change the subject and stir my twisted thoughts into something less emotionally scarring.
I eyed her face dubiously. Together we’d managed to add a red tinge around the black edges, our harsh rubbing doing more harm than good. “This isn’t coming off by the way.”
Courtney groaned and angled her eye in the rear view mirror so she could get a better look at it. “It’s Cherie’s. One of those top designer brands. She got a whole bunch of them as samplers after her last gig.”
Courtney’s older sister Cherie was a part time eyelash model for Maybelline. She also did some part time clothing modelling. Like Courtney, she was tall and slim, but whereas Courtney had a definite curve to her figure, Cherie had softer, more subtle lines that any professional model would kill for.
I picked up the black tube and read the label. In terms of hand me downs, this was every girls dream come true. Those tiny tubes of mascara were more than fifty bucks a pop.
“At least it works,” I offered helpfully.
She glared at me, but I noticed the edges of her mouth twitching with the effort of holding back a smile.
“Drew is in the chem lab,” she said in answer to my earlier question. “He stuffed up his experiment because he misread the measurements of two chemicals and the beaker exploded the contents all over the floor, the table, and himself.” She giggled as if she found it funny. I myself was surprised high schools let students loose with stuff that went boom. “He was lucky Tyson ducked out of the way. That stuff smells really potent. I imagine our brooding friend would be quite displeased at being doused with some unidentified mix of chemicals. The boy has great reflexes, I’ll give him that.”
The boy has great everything, I thought, conjuring up an image of Tyson at Irvine’s with his hair loose and hanging over his shoulders, his cheeks slightly flushed and eyes sleep heavy.
“Oh em gee!” Courtney squealed, startling me. Oh, crap. Had I just said that out loud? The look of triumph on my best friend’s face said yes. Good God, I was brain damaged. What other explanation was there for my repeated bouts of word vomit?
“You totally like him!” she said grabbing me by the face with both hands.
“I do not,” I sputtered indignantly, though my protest was weak even to my own ears.
“Oh come off it already,” she said, mashing my cheeks together between her hands in her excitement. “Why can’t you just admit that you like him? The world’s not going to end if you do.”
“Ecoz ooh won’t gimme a wake if I do,” I said through my distorted face. She let go and eyed me curiously.
“Say that again?”
I huffed impatiently, embarrassment and self consciousness making me agitated. “I said, because you won’t give me a break if I do.”
“What are you talking about?” She hit me playfully in the arm, but a mischievous smile was blooming on her face.
“There!” I snapped, my sudden outcry making her jump. “That’s why. See that smile? That’s the ‘I’m going to get up to something I shouldn’t be doing’ smile. Stop it!”
She cracked up laughing. “Why do you always think I’m going to interfere?”
I scrambled over the gap to sit in the passengers seat. We were heading into dangerous territory, so this conversation was best had eye to eye. Preferably not at all, but that option was off the table now. Courtney was too vested in the outcome of my little crush - because that’s what it was, a crush, not proper like - to let this go without hashing it out.
“Oh, gee, I don’t know,” I replied sarcastically, settling into the front. “Maybe because not so long ago I ended up climbing Mt. Freaking Everest with Tyson in one of your misguided attempts to get us together. My calf muscles burned for days afterwards I’ll have you know. And what’s worse, I hadn’t even so much as hinted that I liked the guy.”
“One time,” she complained. “And don’t tell me you didn’t have fun,” she said, having another go at the black streak on her face. If she wasn’t careful she was going to draw blood.
I gaped at her. “What trip were you on? Did you miss the part where I had to be carried - carried! - like a baby off a bridge that was probably only ten feet off the ground?”
“It was a princess lift,” Courtney corrected, trying to turn an embarrassing moment into a romantic one. “And the bridge was at least fifteen feet up.”
“Courts, princesses don’t bawl their eyes out and strangle their saviours. They don’t grip hard enough to leave marks.” Because Tyson definitely ended up with a faint bruise on the left side of his neck afterwards. Drew had told me so later while stifling his laughter at my mortified expression.
“Well you enjoyed breakfast,” she said, clearly hinting at the display of flesh I’d been treated to when Tyson removed his long sleeved shirt.
“I choked,” I pointed out. “Literally.”
I opened the compartment under the dash to search for something we could use to restore Courtney’s face to its usual pretty self. A small pack of travel wipes was nestled into one corner and I snagged it, tossing it her way.
“We’ll work on that,” she said, ripping one free and dabbing at her eye. I was relieved to see that it was working.
“No, we won’t.” I held up a hand where she sought to interrupt me. “I admit it, okay. I like him.” I whipped my head around when I said it, looking outside as if someone might be watching us. Stupid really, given that they’d have to be serious lip readers to understand what we were talking about. But it wasn’t often I opened up about this kind of stuff. Hell, it had taken me weeks to tell Courtney I liked Aidan and look how that turned out. Needless to say I was afraid of jinxing myself. Was it any wonder I didn’t want to risk someone else hearing my confession?
When I was sure the coast was clear, I took a deep breath and faced her head on.
“I like Tyson,” I said on the exhale, the words sounding strange to my own ears.
My cheeks started to burn under her intense gaze, and I felt nervous and giddy at the same time. I’d never dared let my thoughts stray that way before, so saying them out loud was a big deal.
“Feel better now that it’s out there?” Courtney asked, an indulgent smile on her face.
“Not really,” I said honestly, feeling awkward. “And this doesn’t mean anything,” I rushed to add. “I’m not like you.”
She raised an eyebrow in question.
“You decide you like someone and then make a move in the same instant. It’s not a bad thing, but it’s not my thing. You’re bold and fearless. Rejection by one guy means another opportunity where another is concerned. I’m shy and timid when it comes to expressing stuff like this. I’m terrified of rejection, which is why it takes me a long time to get things out in the open.”
She nodded her head in understanding. “Okay. So are you saying you want to take your time, or that you’re content to stop it at liking him? That you’re not going to tell him at all.”
I shrugged. I honestly hadn’t thought that hard about it. And truth be told, I didn’t want to. Let the chips fall where they may and all that.
“Okay. Well, I promise I’ll try not to interfere,” she said solemnly.
I cracked up laughing and shook my head. Then watched as she whooped when her face was free of black mascara. Red and splotchy, but black free.
“So did you ask your mum about the trip?” I asked and glanced at the time on my phone. Lunch would be over soon, and then it would be back to hell - er, school. Not to mention that much closer to detention with Mr. Phelps. I was dreading whatever heinous task he’d stick me with.
I sat back with a weary sigh and listened as Courtney moaned about her mother. She’d given Courtney permission to go away for the long weekend, but there had been severe restrictions. The first and most important one was that Courtney was not allowed to leave the country, which meant her dreams of visiting France were out. How she thought we were going to fly there and have enough time to explore before we had to fly back was beyond me. The second restriction was that she was not allowed to travel more than four hours in any direction. Marie wanted Courtney to be within reasonable distance should something go wrong. I’d laughed at that one, but quickly shut my mouth when she informed me that she’d had to work hard to get a four hour long leash. Her mother had first insisted on thirty minutes. The last restriction was probably overkill but still understandable. She wanted the cell phone numbers of everyone going and the address of the place we were staying at.
“So it’s like house arrest away from home,” she grumbled.
I shrugged. I was actually surprised she’d gotten that much leeway. “Could be worse. She could have said no altogether.”
“I suppose.”
She picked up the mascara and yanked the wand out, preparing to finish the job I’d interrupted. In the distance I heard the shrill sound of the school bell. Reality was calling us back.
“Are you sure that’s wise?” I asked when she raised the wand to her eye.
“What? You’re in the car now, so what could possibly go wrong?”
She had to ask.
A moment later the drivers side door was wrenched open without warning and Courtney shrieked in alarm. On a positive note, the wand whipped across her face in the other direction. A black streak ran from the corner of her eye to just across the bridge of her nose.
I laughed so hard I almost wet myself, especially when she became so irate her words ran together to create an incoherent string of nonsense. I don’t think it mattered that we couldn’t understand her though, seeing as I was hunched over and holding my cramped stomach, and Drew was on his knees beside her, both of us cackling hysterically.

Mr. Phelps version of detention turned out to be quite mild. Or maybe it seemed that way after all of the wild scenarios I’d imagined over the course of the afternoon. I’d had visions of me scrubbing away at the toilet floors like a modern day Cinderella. Of painting over the day old graffiti that covered the side of the gymnasium. Even of playing water girl at some sports team’s practice. And those weren’t even the half of it, despite Drew’s insistence at the end of lunch that they reserved such punishments for the really nasty acts of rebellion. Apparently mine was mild in comparison to some of the things people got up to around school.
So I sat in my stifling economics classroom after school and hand wrote over a hundred set of student notes that Mr. Phelps could easily have photocopied. I would have offered to photocopy them for him, but the thought of receiving another detention for being flippant, doing such a tedious task had me biting my tongue and on my best behaviour. I was quite proud of myself for ignoring his consistent jibes at my penmanship, rewriting sections he deemed illegible without so much as a squeak of protest or a retort about him needing to update the prescription of his glasses if he was having so much trouble reading my clear print.
As soon as four thirty rolled around I dumped the unfinished pile of notes onto his desk and left without saying a word.

The next three weeks passed so slowly I thought time would start going backwards. I was dying for a break from school. One that consisted of more than the mandatory two day weekend. But as was normal with these kinds of things, the more you wished time would speed up, the slower it became.
It didn’t help that Serena had stepped up her vindictive bullying, either. My locker had been ransacked again, her friends had started back up with the shoving and the hair pulling, the tripping and name calling. And just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, someone had gone and dumped the contents of at least four school trash cans into the bed of my truck and written S**T in red lipstick over the windscreen and side windows. I tired to see the silver lining in it all. That I was lucky it was lipstick and not something like spray paint. That the trash could be removed easily enough. But it still had me seething that I was the one who got punished because some guy wasn’t returning her feelings of lust. If she had a damn problem, she should have been taking it up with Tyson, not me. Heck, I didn’t see her robbing Penny’s locker when she flirted up a storm with Tyson last week during English class. Yes, I had noticed, but that didn’t mean I was jealous. Not at all. The images of me smacking her stupid as she rubbed herself up against his arm were completely normal. Same with Ella. Nobody pulled her hair when she slipped Tyson her phone number during lunch the other day. And no, the feeling of relief when he threw that number in the bin with the remainder of his lunch wasn’t uncalled for. I was just glad that he wasn’t littering. Filthy habit, really.
My point was, that if she was trying to eliminate all threats and competition, she might want to start with the people throwing themselves at him first. If she started there, she’d no doubt find that I would be the last person on that list. I may have confessed to liking him, but that was as far as my boldness stretched. And I hadn’t even said the words to him, only to Courtney in the privacy of Drew’s car.
I trudged into World History and ignored Aidan, who was as usual shooting me a death glare. If looks could kill, I’d no longer be walking this earth. All of his bruises had long since faded, his nose the teeniest bit crooked from Tyson breaking it a month ago. True to his promise to Tyson, he’d kept his distance from me, and only threw the evil looks my way when he was sure Tyson wasn’t looking. After all, Tyson had been clear about what he’d do to Aidan if he caught him looking at me the wrong way.
Courtney and Drew had been worried about Aidan paying me an unexpected visit to my house in retaliation, but they needn’t have bothered. Simply because Aidan had no idea where I lived. During our brief time together I’d always met him out, refusing to let him pick me up. I was very self conscious of people coming over to my house, my first thought always being that they’d take one look at it and say, “Oh my God, you’re rich!”. It wasn’t a sprawling mansion, but it still had an air of elegance and money about it, something that was bound to prompt a myriad of questions from nosy classmates.
Tyson had seen it, yes, but then again I hadn’t expected him to walk into my homeroom and become a part of my life. I was already starting to freak out about what Ashleigh and Drew would say tomorrow. We’d decided to meet at my place and start our journey from there. Final destination: a beach house that had a huge deck leading right onto the sand. Because if Courtney couldn’t go to France, the next best thing was the beach. Estimated travel time: Four hours and twelve minutes. After much pleading and grovelling Courtney’s mum had allowed her the extra twelve minutes.
World History passed in a blur, and I only really paid any attention when Miss Clarke called me by name, asking to see Tyson and I after class. I sighed wearily, knowing exactly what she wanted.
Despite meeting up every Monday and Wednesday after school to work on our assignment, we’d made no headway. I mean zero progress; zilch - nada. Forget our cosy moment sitting in the school hallway, or his reluctant confession at Irvine’s about living alone. He’d completely reverted back to his normal self: cold, distant, and frustratingly unhelpful. But still good looking, my mind added of its own accord. I decided I needed to fry that part of my brain, because Tyson being good looking didn’t help me in terms of the A I was hoping to get in World History.
I was still finding it hard to believe that in less than twenty four hours I’d be stuck in a rented holiday home with him - along with his best friends, Dark and Moody of course.
We both grabbed our bags and trudged over to her desk as the rest of the class filed out, where Miss Clarke was straightening out a bunch of papers.
“I was hoping it wouldn’t come to this.” She got straight to the point as usual. She tugged on her pantsuit - a burgundy one today, forever trying to straighten out the invisible wrinkles. I was half tempted to reach over and scrunch the material up. At least then she’d really have something to straighten out. It just grated on my nerves the way she tugged at the already smooth fabric. I shoved my hands in my jeans pockets to quell the urge.
“These are your latest submissions for review on your case study.” She pushed two pieces of paper across the desk towards us. Mine had my name as well as Tyson’s written at the top of the page with “Lives alone” printed neatly underneath. The rest of it was blank, aside from the little cartoons I’d doodled in the margin, but I don’t think Miss Clarke was too impressed with those. Tyson’s page had both our names neatly written, and underneath them, the words “Possible neglect”. Then the rest of his page was blank too.
My eyes narrowed and I glared at him. “I never said I was neglected.”
He huffed impatiently, swinging his bag over his shoulder. “You haven’t said anything, really. It was just a guess.”
A guess that was too close to the truth. I wasn’t neglected in the traditional sense of the word, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t a perfect example of some variation of it, what with having no parents and a flaky brother.
“Oh, no,” I said, straightening my back in indignation. “You are so not pinning this on me, Mr. Next-question-or-I’m-leaving. How many times must we go through the list of questions before you answer one?”
“As many times as it takes for you to answer them first,” he snapped back, turning to face me properly. His bright blue eyes flashed in annoyance, his jaw clenching and unclenching. In spite of the obvious argument we were having, my heart rate kicked into high gear, always hyperaware of his close proximity.
“Uh-uh.” I crossed my arms firmly over my chest, ignoring it as best I could. “No way, buddy. I told you already, if I give you a little, you won’t give back. You’ll take it and run.”
“You don’t know that. Maybe if you gave me something, I might surprise you and actually answer one of your stupid questions.”
Miss Clarke cleared her throat meaningfully and I looked at her in surprise. I’d forgotten she was sitting there. The uncomfortable look on Tyson’s face said he’d forgotten as well.
“Those are actually my stupid questions,” she said mildly, a hint of a smile playing about her lips. “I’m getting the feeling that you both don’t trust each other.”
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes at her. Gee, whatever gave you that idea? I thought sarcastically. Now I liked Miss Clarke, don’t get me wrong. She was a fair teacher and taught enjoyable lessons. But sometimes I got the feeling she was a little slow on the uptake of anything not related to World History.
“He doesn’t trust me,” I complained, pointing like a five year old trying to shift the blame.
Beside me, Tyson made a sound of incredulity. “Says the girl who only gave me her date of birth and her middle name.”
“Ha! So did you. And believe me, I think I would have had an easier time getting blood from a stone.”
“I told you I lived alone,” he said, a smug look on his face like he’d trumped me.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “That wasn’t during a study session though, was it?”
“Then why did you put it down on the paper?” he shot back.
“When did you decide I was neglected?” I asked, stabbing a finger into his chest. He grabbed my hand before I could pull it back and yanked me closer, so we were toe to toe. Little bolts of electricity shot all the way up my arm at the skin to skin contact, and I squirmed uneasily.
“I said ‘Possible neglect’, not ‘definitely in need of Child Services intervention’. Maybe if you were more forthcoming with information, I wouldn’t have to make assumptions.”
“Alright you two,” Miss Clarke interjected hastily. I think she was afraid we might come to blows.
“I have an older brother,” I blurted suddenly, ignoring our teacher and startling Tyson. I don’t think he was prepared for me to open up about the case study then and there. But what the hell, right? It was a start, and he’d just said himself that if I gave him something, he’d give back. “How many siblings do you have?”
He opened his mouth to answer, and then shut it again, letting go of my hand and taking a step back. I laughed humourlessly at my own stupidity. Guess I was wrong, or he’d lied. Both probably.
“Let me have a stab at answering it for you,” I said scathingly, trying discreetly to flex the lingering tingly sensation from my fingers. I cleared my throat dramatically while he gave me a venomous glare.
“Next question,” I said, trying to get my voice as low as his. It came out warbled, making me cough.
“I wasn’t going to say that,” he ground out through clenched teeth.
“Then what were you going to say?” I asked, hoping he’d give me a real answer for once.
“That this is utterly ridiculous. I don’t have time for this s**t,” he snapped, shoving his hand into the front pocket of his jeans. I knew he was instinctively reaching for his smokes, but wouldn’t dare bring them out in front of a teacher. It was something he did when he was either nervous, or agitated. Three guesses as to which one it was this time.
“Language, Mr. Masters,” Miss Clarke said sternly. “And if you want to pass the class, I’m afraid you’re going to have to make time.” I smirked at him, but then Miss clarke continued. “Both of you.”
“What?” I said indignantly, giving her a wide eyed stare I leaned forward and put both hands on her desk. “How did this become my fault? You just saw it with your own eyes that he’s uncooperative.”
Miss Clarke held up one hand, rubbing her temple with her other as if to stave off a headache. “You’re both as bad as each other. Learn to trust or not, I don’t care. But I want at least half of those questions answered and a start on your essays on my desk by Wednesday afternoon. Understood?”
“That’s five days away,” I protested.
“Exactly. You’ll have the entire long weekend to make progress.”
“And if we don’t?” Tyson asked.
“Then I’ll fail you both on the spot.” She smiled up at us as if she hadn’t just threatened our GPAs. “Enjoy your weekend.”
Tyson stalked from the room without another word, but I wasn’t so quick.
“There’s no chance of me changing partners?” I asked, though as I said it, a part of me screamed in protest. Annoying as he was, I still liked him and looked forward to the time we spent together. That he only showed up because it was a requirement was another story.
“It’s too late for that,” Miss Clarke said patiently. “You’d have to switch with someone else in the class, and everyone apart from Miss Holden and Mr. Stone are well under way.”
“Um, no thanks,” I said quickly. I’d rather take the F than pair with one of those two.
She smiled up at me. “I thought so. Whatever the issue is,” she said, gesturing to the open door Tyson had walked out of, “you need to find a way around it, and fast. You’re both bright students, and I’d hate to see you fail because you’re both stubborn to a fault.”
I nodded my head and muttered a goodbye, then left the room.
So I had five days. Five days to break down some of Tyson’s barriers and get some answers. I guess that made our trip the perfect opportunity. Maybe I should just wait until we got out there and then corner him. But if he didn’t open up while we were away, it would be over for sure. No, better to start as soon as possible.
I rushed out into the parking lot and caught sight of him straight away. He was standing beside his car, ripping a smoke free from a pack in his hand and shoving it into his mouth. He’d shucked his bag and jersey, both items thrown haphazardly onto the roof of his Mustang. His plain black short sleeved tee hugged his body nicely, defining well developed biceps and a flat, toned stomach. God, what I wouldn’t give to peel it off and check out what was underneath.
I mentally slapped myself, forcing my thoughts into more neutral territory. I needed to concentrate on the matter at hand, not on what Tyson looked like half naked. Or better yet, fully - concentrate, damn it!
The parking lot was half deserted already, people eager to get their long weekend started. As much as I wanted to join them and haul a*s out of there, I continued in the direction I was headed.
“Hey!” I snapped, jogging over to Tyson.
He whipped his head up at my approach. “What?” he growled giving me a peeved glare, clearly not pleased to see his assignment buddy so soon after being reprimanded about what little progress he’d made.
Using his lighter, he tried to light the end of his smoke, but it wouldn’t catch. I opened my mouth to offer him some advice but he spoke over me.
“You know what? Don’t even try to lecture me and tell me this is all my fault.” He clicked the lighter again with no success. “Just because there’s a teacher there doesn’t mean I’m going to crack and bare my soul to you.” Click, flame, no smoke. “And blurting out that you have a brother like that? What was stopping you from saying that at any number of our study sessions?” Click, flame, no smoke.
“Jesus Christ,” he snapped, looking at his lighter like it was the problem. If I wasn’t so pissed at him, I would have laughed at the hostile expression on his face. As it was, I sighed and stepped closer, yanking the cigarette from his mouth.
“What’re you doing?”
I arched an eyebrow at him and held it up for his inspection. “It helps if you light the right end.”
Tyson’s cheeks flushed a faint red and he muttered a string of curses as he saw what I meant. He’d stuck the damn thing in his mouth the wrong way and had been trying diligently to light the butt. He reached out to take it from me but I pulled it out of his reach, tucking it into my back pocket.
“Give it back,” he said, scowling at me.
“Uh, no. You can have it back when you apologise for being an a*s to me back there and again out here. And when you agree to stop fluffing about and give me my damn answers.”
He raised his eyebrows and scoffed at me. “You want me to apologise?”
When I nodded, he laughed, but unlike last time, this laugh lacked humour. “And if I don’t?”
“Then you’ll have one less cancer stick to suck on, won’t you? Which doesn’t bother me at all, really.”
Amusement replaced annoyance as he folded his arms lightly over his chest.
“Okay.”
I raised my eyebrows in question. “Okay, what?” I said, stepping back slightly. Something in the look in his eyes told me he wasn’t about to oblige, but more likely about to do something I wouldn’t like.
“I‘m sorry.”
“For?” I prodded, a huge smile splitting my face, wanting to drag out the experience. How many times was I going to hear those words come out of his mouth? Probably never again.
“For what I’m about to do next.”
I had a brief moment of confusion before he lunged at me. I screamed in shock and tried to run but he was much faster than me. He grabbed me around the waist before I managed to get three steps from his car and lifted me clear off my feet.
“Wait,” I cried, still trying to get away. “I’m sorry.” Though by now I was laughing. He’d lost his anger completely and when I craned my neck to look back at him I saw he was smiling. A proper, fully fledged smile, dimples and all. My stomach swarmed with butterflies and I forgot to breathe for a second, going light headed.
“I thought I was apologising,” he said, repositioning his arms when I almost managed to wriggle my way free. My heart was beating so fast and loud it was almost one continuous sound, and heat bloomed over my back where his chest was pressed firmly against me.
“Fine. Then tell me you’re sorry,” I said, horrified that my voice came out breathlessly.
“Oh, I will. When you tell me exactly what I’m supposed to be sorry for.”
He spun me about so I was facing him and my feet hit the ground, but suddenly making an escape was the last thing on my mind. I let him back me up into the side of his car and came this close to squealing in delight as he pushed himself up against me.
He arched an eyebrow at me. “So?”
Huh? Oh, apologies. I was supposed to be telling him what he was sorry for. I cleared my throat. “Um, yeah. Right. Um, sorry. You. Um. And” Oh, my God. Shoot me now, before I embarrass myself further.
Tyson reached an arm around behind me in search of his lost smoke. He dug his hand into my left back pocket, but the smoke was in the right, and the coherent part of my brain - which was about ninety five percent of it really, went blank. All I could focus on was Tyson, who was pressed so tantalisingly against me.
“Really?” he murmured, pulling his hand out and reaching the other one behind me so I was encircled in his arms. “I’m supposed to be sorry for all of that?”
I felt his other hand dig into my right pocket and sucked in a sharp breath, my legs basically going to putty. I fisted a hand in the material of his t-shirt over his chest and grabbed at his side with my other hand to stabilize myself. The last thing I needed was to fall in a heap at his feet. That would be real classy.
“Yea-huh,” I managed to get out. “All that. Lots more. But, um, I forget what else.”
His fingers closed around his smoke. “Got it,” he said, but didn’t pull it out.
We stared at each other for a long moment, his arms wrapped loosely around me with one resting in my back pocket, while my hands were grabbing at him, both fisted in his t-shirt. We were pressed so tightly together I wouldn’t be surprised if he could feel the erratic beat of my heart. That it was still beating at all given the excitement it was going through was nothing short of a miracle.
Without breaking eye contact, Tyson brought the hand that wasn’t buried in my back pocket up to my face, gently pushing a piece of stray hair back behind my ear. I sucked in another sharp breath at the intimate touch, not sure what the hell he thought he was doing, or what the hell I thought I was doing, but willing to let whatever was happening between us take full reign.
His fingertips lingered on the side of my face, his thumb brushing a lazy circle on my cheek. I gripped his shirt tighter in my hands and unconsciously leaned forward. Our lips were a mere inch apart, our gazes still locked together. His bright blue eyes were questing. Seeking something. My permission? Heck if that’s what he was after he had it alright. He began to dip his head, closing the distance between us slowly but surely, and then -
And then a car horn honked so loud we both leapt out of our skins, Tyson springing backwards and away from me like he’d been zapped, me yelping and half sure my heart really had just died in my chest from the fright I’d just gotten.
He blew out an unsteady breath and ran both of his hands through his hair, glaring at the car that drove by. The guy behind the wheel hadn’t been honking at us, but a friend in another car.
I stumbled a bit, hand to chest, trying to regain some sort of composure, as well as a natural heartbeat, but all that was going through my head was, oh, my God oh, my God oh, my God, over and over again. Intelligent thinking was beyond me. I almost just kissed this guy.
Tyson glanced over at me, his eyes guarded, his posture stiff. Whatever had just happened, or almost happened, it was over. Mistake was written all over his face.
As for me, I didn’t know what to make of it. I needed to get out of here, to find somewhere and clear my jumbled thoughts.
I let out a shaky breath and took a step backwards, away from him.
“Um, s**t,” I said, shock clear in my voice. I kept moving backwards, avoiding looking directly at him. “I, uh, I really gotta go. And you’ve got work and I have... stuff. I have important, um, stuff to - yeah. I’ll see you tomorrow. Morning. For the - oh, you know. Okay. Bye.”
Before he could respond in any way I dashed across the lot to my truck and didn’t even bother putting my seatbelt on in my haste to get the hell out of there.