Page 4 of 16

Part 31

Posted: Sat Nov 01, 2014 11:22 am
by April
Carolyn:
What a perfect gift for Maria.......a guitar.
Yeah, Michael may be kind of dense sometimes, but he really nailed it with his gift for Maria. He gets her.

Eva:
But just like maria, I'm wondering where she has to sleep. In his bed? With him? I'm not sure that he reaslised that.
Oh, he realizes that. He's just completely okay with it. ;)
It's like he has no clue that his feelings are changing, quickly.
He's been pretty blind to it for a while now, but after that last part, hearing Maria sing . . . that sparked something, some realization.

Sara:
And when are they going to realize they aren't meant for each other? Its painful to watch them go down this road.
I would imagine both Isabel and Michael know they aren't meant to be, but neither one of them has the strength to admit it right now. Because they both know it will hurt her a lot more than it will hurt him.
And FINALLY michael is starting to realize he might just have feelings for this maria girl...about time
Yes, about time!

Michael:
Michael just surprised me during this update... getting Dylan a new room... Maria a guitar and she singed one of my favorite songs of all time. Ahhh!!! I loved it all, especially Michael putting Amy in her place.
This is the Michael that Isabel longs to see, the one who has the potential to be a decent guy. He does exist . . . he just doesn't exist for Isabel.

One of your favorite songs of all time, huh? Cool. I think it's my third or fourth favorite.
Isabel's family dinner just sounded boring and i felt for Michael. I know what it's like for people to think that there better than you...
He just so obviously didn't belong there. :(

Rodney:
Nice gifts from Michael. ....I'll give him that one.
:lol: I know you still hate him, though.
Even Isabel was nice enough to give Maria a gift.
Oh, yeah, that's Isabel. She is a nice girl and was classy enough to rise above whatever jealousy she may have felt over Maria and get her a gift.
But it seems now that Maria is getting all hot and horny :lol: wonder how long she'll keep it pent up?
:lol: Maria is now starting to have a very difficult time controlling her feelings. And after hearing her sing in the last part, Michael might have a similar struggle.


Thank you for the feedback! I really appreciate it!

I'm dropping off more music today. This time it's "Again" by Lenny Kravitz. I'm not his biggest fan, but I've always really liked this song. You can listen to it here or click on :) right at the beginning of this part. Enjoy!









Part 31








( :) )

Sleeping next to Maria was impossible that night. Michael couldn’t shut off . . . the feeling. Whatever it was. It was swirling around in the pit of his stomach, making him feel alert and wide awake. And mostly confused. In his head, he kept hearing her sing that song, and he wondered if she’d chosen it just for him.

He mostly forced himself to just stare at the ceiling, but whenever he looked in her direction, he felt fixated. Fascinated, even, by the way her hair was sprawled across the pillowcase.

What the hell was wrong with him?

It didn’t get any better the next day. They took Dylan outside to play in what little snow had fallen, which normally wouldn’t have been a big deal. But for some reason, instead of playing along with them, Michael decided to just sit out on the porch and watch. He watched intently as they threw snowballs at each other. As Maria laughed. As she smoothed her hair back from her face. As she smiled. When she smiled like that, it lit everything up.

He remembered their first encounters at the Crashdown, back when she’d smiled so rarely, and even if she had, it hadn’t been like this. She was changing.

And so was he.

His thoughts were preoccupied with her. At all times. He found that he was trying to be around her, even when it wasn’t necessary. Like when she was cooking dinner for them the next night. He literally hovered around her, using the excuse that he wanted to get a closer look at the food just so he could stand closer to her. She didn’t seem to mind.

But it was always the most painstaking at night, especially now that Dylan had a room of his own. When it was just the two of them up there, he couldn’t help but let his mind wander, think of the possibilities. But while he was focused on her, she was focused on her new guitar. She played it more and more each night, singing a wide variety of songs, many of which he didn’t recognize and suspected were her own. He usually just listened. Watched, and listened.

As hard as it was to believe, he was actually looking forward to school starting back up, because then maybe things would get back to normal. He’d see Isabel more often, and he’d have . . . classes or something to focus on. Or at least try to focus on for the first time ever.

Kyle called him and invited him to go lift weights a few days after Christmas. He jumped at the chance to get out of the house and be able to do something that would take his mind off . . . everything. Weightlifting was monotonous and routine, the perfect distraction.

“What am I at?” Kyle asked, pausing while holding the bench press bar above himself.

“Ninety-seven,” Michael told him as he stood over him, spotting.

Kyle brought the bar down to chest-level, then lifted it back into the air, repeating it two more times, straining towards the end. Michael took the bar from him and set it back down in the holder.

“Man, I’m outta shape,” his friend groaned, sitting up.

“Yeah, right.”

“No, seriously. My dad’s been chewin’ my ass out lately about hittin’ the gym.”

“Oh, really? I thought he was chewing Amy’s ass out,” Michael joked.

“Funny.” Kyle made a face of disgust. “Gross, but funny.”

Michael slid a ten pound weight off both sides of the bar, discarding them on the floor beside the machine. “Did she spend Christmas with you guys?” he asked.

“Yeah. My dad invited her ‘cause he felt bad for her bein’ all alone.”

“Serves her right,” Michael snarled, feeling absolutely no sympathy for the woman. “You know what I think her ultimate agenda is? I think she wants to raise Dylan herself, but I think she wants Maria outta the picture.”

“Possibly,” Kyle agreed, standing up. “And how is dear, sweet Dylan?”

Michael took his place, straddling the bench press seat. “Good. He loves his new room.”

Kyle stepped up behind the bar, inquiring, “And how is dear, sweet Maria?”

Hot, Michael thought on impulse. But at least he was smart enough not to say it. “She’s good, too.” He lay down, raising his hands to grasp the bar.

“You know, I’m impressed. I never thought I’d see the day,” Kyle remarked, lifting the bar out of the holder for him, “when you could just be friends with a girl and nothing more.”

When Kyle let go, Michael grimaced and strained, struggling to hold the bar up. Not because it was heavy, but because of that word: friends. Forcing himself to focus to the best of his ability, he slowly lowered the bar down to his chest, then pushed it back up again.

He couldn’t wait to get home.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Isabel invited him over. Which was fine, because they got to fool around a little while her mom was out. But once she returned, Michael couldn’t get out of their fast enough. The cousins were gone now; the judgment wasn’t.

It was nightfall by the time he got home, and immediately, he was thinking about being in bed next to Maria again that night. What if she curled up against him this time? Would he move away? Or closer?

He peeked into Dylan’s room, where the little boy was falling asleep while his mom read him a bedtime story. Michael leaned against the doorframe, watching once again, listening.

Maria flipped to the last page of the story, even though Dylan was already out of it, and read it for him. “At long last, Fred the unhappy dinosaur finally knew what it felt like to smile.” She closed the book and set it aside on the bedside table, then carefully untangled herself from Dylan and stood up. “Goodnight, baby,” she whispered, giving him a kiss on the forehead. Then she slipped out of the bedroom and quietly shut the door. “He loves it in there,” she told him quietly.

“I’m glad.” That had been the whole point, to give Dylan a space that was his own, so that he would feel like he had a home there. Because he did. They both did.

“He loves that book, too,” she added. “He’s had me read it to him three nights in a row.”

Who can blame him? Michael thought. At this point, he would have loved to curl up with Maria and have her read him a bedtime story.

What the fuck? A bedtime story? God, he was so messed up.

“Are you okay?” she asked him, narrowing her eyes.

“Yeah.” No. “I, uh . . . I was just thinkin’ about how Teenie used to have me read that same book to her when she was little.”

She smiled adoringly. “You read to your sister?”

“Yeah, when my parents stopped.” He really hadn’t read many books since.

“That’s so cute,” she said.

She thought he was cute? Or she thought the fact that he cared about his sister was cute? Crap, he felt like a chick now, overanalyzing everything. Why was this happening?

“Do you wanna go out with me?” he blurted, not even sure where that had come from.

She gave him a bewildered look.

Shit. He hadn’t meant for it to sound like that. “I mean, do you wanna go out with me tonight?” he clarified. “To a restaurant. To go get food.” He shifted nervously, feeling like a spaz. “To eat.”

She laughed a little, seemingly okay with his sudden awkwardness. “Sure.”

Inwardly, he breathed a sigh of relief. She was acting normal. So all he had to do was act normal, too.

They walked instead of driving. He was fine with it. It took longer that way. They happened onto Main Street, where some familiar greasy food was practically calling Michael’s name.

“So that song you sang for me the other night . . .” he said as they walked together along the sidewalk. “Is that your favorite song?”

“It’s definitely in my top ten,” she acknowledged, “but it’s not my favorite.”

“Damn.” He’d honestly thought he’d have it figured out by now. “I’ll just have to keep on guessing then.”

“You do that.”

As they passed by the Crashdown, he peered inside, noticing it was mostly empty except for a guy and his kid daughter sitting at the counter. “Let’s go in here,” he decided, reaching for the door.

“Wait, are you serious?”

“Yeah.” It was still his favorite restaurant, and it had been too long since he’d indulged.

“I can’t go in there.”

“Why not? Who cares if they fired you? Now they have to wait on you.” He pulled open the door, holding it open for her.

She considered it for a moment, then shrugged. “Well, when you put it like that . . .” She walked on in, and he followed after her.

It was dead in there. Kind of reminded him of those night shifts where she would be the only waitress working. He supposed it was good that it was empty, though. Less of a chance of running into her jackass of an ex-boss.

They automatically went over to his old booth. She sat on the side he usually sat on, and he took the side Kyle had sometimes sat on. He grabbed the menu, opened it once, then tossed it aside, already knowing what he wanted.

“It feels so weird being back here,” she admitted.

“You miss it?”

“Not in the slightest. But it was a steady paycheck for a while. That was nice.”

He let his eyes roam over her, thinking about how he missed seeing her in the uniform.

Get your mind out of the gutter, he told himself, glancing over his shoulder to try to find the waitress. When he located her, though, his stomach churned, because he recognized her immediately.

“Oh, shit, Maria, I’m such an ass,” he swore, trying to hide his face.

“What? No, you’re not,” she said.

“Yeah, I am.” He totally regretted coming in here, because she was going to find out some things that would probably make her think differently about him. “You see that girl back there?”

“The little girl?” she asked.

“No, the waitress. Dark brown hair.”

“Oh. Yeah.”

He sighed, confessing, “I think that’s the girl I slept with when I was dating Isabel last year.”

Oh.” Maria took another look, being a little obvious this time. “Well, get ready. She’s coming this way.”

“Oh, fuck,” he cursed.

The familiar waitress approached the table, giving the same greeting she’d given him last year: “Hi, my name’s Liz and I’ll be your waitress today. Can I--” She cut off abruptly when she saw it was him sitting there. “Michael.” She looked . . . shell-shocked really wasn’t even a strong enough word.

“Hey,” he said, grinning sheepishly. This was worse than running into an ex-girlfriend, because . . . she’d never even been his girlfriend.

“Hey,” she echoed, her face immediately flushing with red. She still had those big doe eyes and that innocent smile. A little less innocent than it had once been, of course.

Finally, she snapped herself back into her spiel, asking, “Can I get you guys something to drink?”

Every alcoholic beverage known to mankind, Michael thought, smiling uncomfortably. “Root beer.”

Liz wrinkled her forehead in confusion, not used to him asking for that. Then she looked expectantly at Maria.

“Oh, I’ll just have the same,” Maria decided.

“Okay. Coming right up.” Liz nervously scampered off behind the counter to fill their glasses.

“So what’s the story there?” Maria asked curiously.

Wasn’t much of a story, really. If it was, he was the villain of the piece. “That’s Liz Parker. Her dad owns this place. She was the hot waitress around here before you were.”

Maria held one hand to her chest and asked, “Wait, I was the hot waitress?”

“Well . . .” Clearly he was feeling flustered, because he hadn’t meant to let that slip. “I got to know her last year, and things . . . happened.”

“She couldn’t resist you, huh?”

“Hey, it wasn’t easy. She’s a lot different than me. She went to a Catholic school, for starters. Very goal-oriented, responsible. Said she was savin’ herself until marriage, until I . . .” He sighed, cringing. “. . . convinced her not to.”

“So she was like a conquest?” Maria surmised.

“Yeah, you could say that.” God, he really sounded like the world’s biggest jerk. “Anyway, Isabel literally walked in on us together. Shit hit the fan. That was about the last time I saw her.”

“Okay, quiet,” Maria cautioned. “She’s coming back.”

Michael tensed again as Liz once again approached the table, setting a glass of root beer down in front of him and one in front of Maria.

“Thanks,” he muttered.

“You’re welcome.” She stood back then, clasping her hands, and, to her credit, was able to start up a polite conversation. “So how have you been?”

“Good.” Awkward. So very, very awkward.

“I heard you guys all had to switch to West this year. How’s that going?”

“It’s alright.” Brief was best. If he didn’t say much, then maybe she’d just go away. “You?

“Oh, yeah, college is pretty good, too,” she went on. “But it’s . . . different than what I thought it would be.”

He wasn’t about to ask if that was a good different or a bad different. Nope. He didn’t even know where she was going to college, and he wasn’t about to ask. The sooner this conversation was over, the better.

“I’m just home with my dad on winter break right now, so I thought I’d work here a little, make some money,” she explained.

Good. So that meant she wasn’t going to be back permanently. He could come in and enjoy a nice, greasy, unhealthy meal a few weeks from now without having to deal with this.

“I worked here awhile back,” Maria told her. “Got fired.”

“Oh, was Derek your manager?” Liz asked.

Maria nodded. “He’s a dick.”

“Yeah, my dad was getting lots of complaints, so he fired him. He’s been managing it by himself for a few weeks now until he can find a replacement.”

“Hmm.” A small smile crept across Maria’s full lips. “Karma.”

Liz exhaled shakily, seemingly still nervous, and returned her attention to Michael. “So I take it you and Isabel didn’t get back together,” she said, sounding as if she felt guilty.

“No, we did,” he assured her.

Looking confused, she glanced back and forth between him and Maria.

She thinks Maria’s my girlfriend, he realized. Not quite. “Oh, sorry, this is Maria,” he introduced. “She lives with me.”

Liz’s perplexed frown intensified.

“Long story,” Maria said. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Liz returned. A few seconds of awkward silence later, she finally just asked, “Do you guys want some food?”

“Yeah. Burger. Fries.” He wasn’t really very hungry anymore, but he’d get hungry once he smelled it.

“Everything on it?” she asked.

“Yep.”

“And you?” She turned to Maria.

“Um . . . I’m not really hungry. Can I just share your fries?” she asked Michael.

“Yeah.”

“Okay, so one burger and fries. I’ll make sure to give you extra,” Liz promised, giving them both a friendly smile as she headed back to the kitchen to place their order.

“You should give her a very good tip,” Maria suggested once she was out of earshot. “She seems nice.”

“Which is exactly why she should’ve never hooked up with me.” As he said the words, it occurred to him that the same could be said about Maria. Maria was a nice girl. A good girl. A good girl with a bad past, sure, but . . . he’d probably be bad for her, too. He was bad for everyone.

“Michael, you’re way too hard on yourself.”

“Maria, she almost got kicked outta school when word got around about what we’d done. And Isabel was . . . she wouldn’t even talk to me. I broke her heart; I took Liz’s virginity. I’m a pretty bad guy.”

“You’re not bad,” she insisted. “You’re . . . misunderstood.”

“Well, as sexy and mysterious as that sounds . . .” It wasn’t true.

“It’s your past, Michael,” she pointed out. “You’ve changed since then.”

Had he? Had he really? He liked to think he had, at least a little. But underneath, wasn’t he still the same guy? Weren’t the fantasies he’d had about lifting up Liz’s Crashdown uniform the same as the ones he was starting to have about Maria now? Sure, this was more intense, but . . .

“I don’t know why you always see the good in me,” he admitted, leaning back in his seat.

She leaned forward, resting her arms on the tabletop. “Because there’s a lot of good to see.”

Was there? Sometimes, if he looked hard enough, he thought he could see it. But other times, it just faded into the background, like it had never even been there to begin with.

But she saw it. And that mattered.

Dammit, Maria. He felt like history was repeating itself, and he wondered if she had any idea.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The next night was couple’s night—oh, goodie—which Michael could have done without, but since Tess and Isabel were best friends and he and Kyle were best friends, it was almost mandatory that they all hang out together at least twice a week. They chose Isabel’s house for it this time, because she had a movie room with a huge screen and massage-recliners. But halfway through the movie, everyone had lost interest, and the girls decided to start practicing a cheerleading routine they were doing at halftime of an upcoming basketball game. As fun as it was to watch them shake and shimmy about, Michael jumped at the chance to get away from it all when Kyle told him to leave the room with him.

They went out to the double staircase at the entrance and took a seat. The girls were still within view, but they were very much in the cheer zone as Tess tried to teach Isabel the moves. The fact that were so absorbed with what they were doing was probably the only reason Kyle said, “Hey, take a look at this,” and subtly pulled a ring out of his pocket. Very shiny. Very . . . long-term.

“Oh my god, Kyle,” Michael gasped dramatically. “I didn’t know you felt that way about me.”

Kyle rolled his eyes, chuckling lightly. “It’s for Tess,” he said, stating the obvious. “I’m gonna give it to her on Valentine’s Day. It’s nice, right? What do you think?”

Michael raised his eyebrows, unable to bite his tongue. “I think you’re fuckin’ crazy,” he admitted.

“It’s not an engagement ring; it’s a promise ring,” Kyle clarified.

“What the hell’s that?”

“It’s like a promise that I will give her an engagement ring someday, maybe even at graduation. And I’ll marry her.”

Well, when he put it like that . . . Michael’s opinion hadn’t changed. “Crazy,” he reiterated.

Kyle put the ring back in his pocket before Tess’s ring-radar alerted her to its presence. “What’s so crazy about knowing who you wanna be with for the rest of your life?” he objected.

“Uh, the fact that you know. You’re eighteen and you know. Or at least you think you do.”

“Oh, I know,” his friend insisted.

Michael turned toward him, lowering his voice, even though the girls were giggling too much to overhear them. “Kyle, you’ve only ever slept with, like, one other girl. You don’t even know what all else is out there.”

“I don’t wanna know,” Kyle protested. “I got everything I want with the girl I’m with.”

“But what if your feelings change?”

“They won’t. She’s the one.”

Oh, there it was. The one. Michael had spent the last decade of his life doubting such a thing existed. As far as he was concerned, practically all the adults in the town were proof that it didn’t. His parents hated each other most of the time, and Kyle’s own dad wasn’t exactly a model of fidelity. Even Isabel’s mom was divorced. Nobody stayed together anymore.

“Okay, but how do you know?” he challenged, hoping to get some real, solid answers out of his friend. “How do you know she’s the one?”

“I just know.”

“That doesn’t help me.”

“Well, what do you want me to say? It’s hard to explain.”

“Try.” He really, really wanted to know.

Kyle hesitated for a moment, and at first, Michael thought it was because maybe he was second-guessing it, changing his mind. But he should have known better. Kyle was always sure. About everything. And when he finally did answer, it became blatantly clear that the only reason why he’d hesitated was because he was feeling something too strong to adequately describe. “She’s the first thing I think about when I wake up and the last thing I think about when I go to sleep,” he confessed. “It’s cheesy, but it’s true. And when I’m not around her, I wanna be. And when I am around her . . . it’s like . . .” He smiled, just a genuinely happy, even awestruck, smile. “It’s like I can’t look away from her. Because I don’t wanna miss any little thing she’ll do or say.”

Michael frowned. Can’t look away from her?

“That’s how I know,” Kyle affirmed. “She’s the one for me.”

Fine, Michael thought. So maybe it did exist for some people. Not for him. He just . . . he wasn’t Kyle. He wasn’t that type of guy. And he didn’t have that kind of life ahead of him.

Glancing back into the theater room, he watched as Isabel extended her arms in the air and twirled around, her beautiful hips making beautiful circles. But when he looked at her, the only thing he knew for certain was that he didn’t know anything at all.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Apparently West Roswell had a basketball rivalry, even though it barely had enough people on both the girls and boys teams. Every December 30th, they hosted the Holiday Tournament, where the rival Springer High Spartans usually beat them down beyond the point of no return. For some reason, a lot of people showed up, though, and even when they were thirty points down near the end of the first half, spirit and enthusiasm was high.

Michael only went because Isabel wanted him to see the finished product of the dance she and Tess had been working on the other night. He convinced Maria to accompany him and was smart enough to let Isabel know in advance that she’d be there.

During a timeout, the cheerleaders did a crowd cheer, dubbed simply, Do It. It was easy enough. Mostly just jumping around and fist-pumping, which even the most uncoordinated person could do. Maria, for some reason, though, was reluctant to participate.

“No, I can’t,” she insisted as the cheerleaders chanted, “Do it, do it, do it! Go, go, go!” in time with the junior class.

“Why not?” Michael pressed.

“Do it, do it, do it! Fight, fight, fight!”

“Uh, because I don’t go to school here,” she answered.

“So?”

“Do it, do it, do it! Win, win, win!”

“Michael . . .”

“Come on.”

“Now stop!” the cheerleaders yelled. “And let the seniors do it!”

All the seniors in the student section stood up, and Michael grabbed Maria’s arm, hauling her up alongside himself and Kyle. “Do it, do it, do it! Go, go, go!” they shouted, making the bleachers thunder with the sound of their jumping. And after just that one round of it, Maria joined in, bouncing around and pumping her fist in the air. “Do it, do it, do it! Fight, fight, fight! Do it, do it, do it! Win, win, win!”

“Now stop!” the cheerleaders said again. “ ‘cause that’s the end.”

“Woo!” Michael yelled, feeling oddly spirited himself. Maybe it was just because Maria was there. He turned to her and gave her a high-five.

A high-five? What the hell was up with that? He hated these rare occasions when he wasn’t smooth.

As they sat back down, he noticed Isabel eyeing them curiously as she and the other cheerleaders lined up along the wall again. He just smiled at her, hoping he looked reassuring. And he must have, because she smiled back.

Once the halftime routine was done, Michael headed up to the concession stand with Maria, inconspicuously squeezing into the front of the line. One of the women working the counter asked, “What can I get for you?”

“Uh . . .” He stared at the list of items someone had hastily scribbled on a poster taped to the back wall and quickly debated his options. “Hot dog and a pizza-stuffed pretzel.”

“Okay. And you?” the woman asked Maria.

“Oh . . . I don’t need anything,” she answered.

Knowing she was probably plenty hungry and just didn’t want him to have to pay for her, Michael took ten dollars out of his wallet and slid it across the counter. “She’ll have super nachos,” he said before she could protest.

“Okay, coming right up.” The woman took his money and called out the order to the other people working in there.

Michael looked down at Maria and smirked, and she just smiled at him. Sort of like Isabel had.

They didn’t go back to the game—what was the point? They were going to lose anyway—so Michael took her around the school, showing her all the uninteresting and relatively pointless things that existed there. The trophy case that was mostly empty. The Student Wall of Honor, which was much the same, except that Kyle and Isabel were both heavily featured there. They slipped past the gates set up to keep people near the gym and headed up to the second level, where no one was around. Eventually, he had no destination in mind for them. They were just walking, surrounded only by darkened hallways, and that was fine.

Maria polished off the rest of the messy chips on the plate in her hand and then licked the remainder of cheese off her finger. The sight of that alone was just about enough to make him go crazy.

“So how did you know I like super nachos?” she asked, dumping the empty plate into a trashcan when they strolled by.

“Well, I know a lot about you,” he bragged.

“You don’t know my favorite song yet,” she pointed out.

“Key word: yet.” He was bound and determined to figure it out.

She shook her head doubtfully, teasingly, even, and grazed her hand along the concrete wall. “This looks like a nice school,” she remarked.

“It’s not bad, I guess,” he admitted, “as far as schools go.” East Roswell had been on its last leg, even before it had been flooded. “I actually kinda like my guidance counselor here.”

“I’m guessing she’s hot, then,” Maria surmised.

“Well . . . yeah.” Definitely MILF-material. “But that’s not why I like her. And when I say like, I just mean that I can tolerate her. You know what I mean?”

“So why can you . . . tolerate her?”

“Because . . .” He sighed, stunned that he was even revealing such an un-macho thing. “She doesn’t seem to think I’m a lost cause. Unlike the principal. And the teachers. And all the other students around here.”

“I’m sure they don’t think you’re a lost cause,” she said.

“Oh, yeah?” He grabbed her hand, not because he needed to, but just because he really, really wanted to. “Come here.” Pulling her into the nearest girl’s bathroom, he enjoyed the confused expression that found its way to her face.

“What’re we doing?” she asked.

He flipped on the light and tipped his head in the direction of the stalls. “Go look at what’s written there.”

She frowned, apparently still perplexed, and slowly did just that. He stayed on the other side of the stall, knowing that, in any girls bathroom in any part of that school, his name was bound to make a few appearances.

“See anything interesting?” he asked after she’d been looking for several seconds.

“Kind of,” she admitted, reading a few scribbled comments aloud. “I hate Michael Guerin. Michael is a loser. Go to hell M.G.”

He rounded the stall, standing in the doorway of it, glancing over all the gossipy little scandals scattered there. Some were in permanent marker, others just darkened with a pen. Clearly the janitors had just given up trying to keep the stalls clean at this point, because it was basically a graffiti mural.

“Most of these were probably written by girls you slept with,” she rationalized. “One night stands. I’m sure you’ve had a few of those.”

“More than a few.” Too many to count.

“Do you regret it?” she asked.

He hadn’t actually thought about it a whole lot before. “I don’t know. Maybe. I don’t . . . I don’t know,” he mumbled unsurely. Did he regret having a lot of sex in his life? No, especially not with girls who were too drunk and/or too slutty to even think twice about it. But as strange as it was to admit, part of him envied Kyle for being so sure about Tess, even though he didn’t have anything else to compare to. It all seemed so simple for them.

She kept browsing through the comments, then pointed to one that had a heart around it. “Oh, here’s a nice one. Michael Guerin has a big dick.”

He grinned, laughing a little. Yeah, leave it to him to get that kind of compliment. Not that he minded. It was true.

“I could write something,” she pondered, holding out her hand. “You got a pen?”

“What’re you gonna write?” he asked.

“Something about you.”

He fumbled around in the front pocket of his jeans, managing to locate a pencil sharpened down to the nubbins. He shrugged and handed it to her. “All I got.”

She took it from him, then placed one hand on his chest and pushed him backward slightly.

“What’re you doin’?” he asked.

Without a word, she closed the bathroom door, and he heard the lock click into place.

“Oh, come on.” If she was going to write something, chances were it’d be something that didn’t paint him in such a horrible light. And he really wanted to see that.

Sighing, he leaned back against the wall, waiting, listening as she pressed down hard on the inside wall of the stall to make the pencil marks as dark as possible. A few seconds later, she emerged, and even though he tried to peek over her shoulder to see what she’d written, she wouldn’t let him.

“Let’s go,” she said, putting her hands on his chest again, urging him backward.

“What’d you write?” he asked, allowing her to maneuver him, mostly just because it felt good to have her hands on him.

“It’s a secret.”

“Maria, it’s a girls bathroom.” Nothing was secret there.

“And you’re not even supposed to be in here,” she said, flipping off the light on their way out. “Come on.”

Oh, well. Once school started up again, the first thing he was going to do was go back to that bathroom and find out what she’d written. First thing.

He took her into one of his classrooms, not because it was particularly interesting or enlightening, but just because the door was left unlocked, and he didn’t want to return to the game yet.

“Whose room is this?” she asked.

“Ms. Alvarez.” His hand hovered on the light switch, and he eventually decided to just leave it off. “English.”

“I used to love English,” she said wistfully.

“I hate it.” Too much reading. Too much writing. Wasting time. He crossed the room and sat down in his seat. Second row, farthest over to the left. Poor Ms. Alvarez. Didn’t she know that an unmotivated, easily-distracted student such as himself needed to be in the front row, and not sitting by a window that could potentially fascinate him?

“That’s where Isabel sits,” he informed her when she started to sit down two seats over.

She stopped, then admitted, “I’m more of a back of the class girl myself,” on her way to the farthest back row.

My kind of girl, he thought, waiting a few seconds before he followed her. She sat down, looking perfectly at place there, and it made him wish that she actually was there, that he could see her in these classrooms and in these hallways during the day. And maybe even in the eraser room.

“I wish you went here,” he admitted, taking a seat at the desk beside her.

“Me, too,” she said quietly, laying both her hands atop the desk. She drummed her fingers for a moment, and he tried to pick out the rhythm of a song. Because it was always possible that it could be her favorite.

“Hey, Michael, can I ask you something?” she questioned suddenly.

“Sure.” He turned his chair slightly sideways, just the way he would have if she actually had sat by him in class.

She waited a moment, then asked, “Isabel still doesn’t know we’re sleeping in the same bed at night, does she?”

He gave her a look. “What do you think?” There would have been a hurricane of girlfriend drama if he’d told her about that.

“I think your mom does,” she informed him. “She asked me about it at work today.”

Honestly, he was surprised it’d taken her thing long to ask anything. She had to have noticed the couch every morning, unslept on, no blankets or extra pillows. “What’d you tell her?” he asked.

“Well, I didn’t wanna lie to her,” she replied, surprising him when she added, “But I told her you sleep on the floor.”

He grinned, pleased with that. Oh, this girl . . . Every single thing made him like her even more.

“Don’t look at me like that,” she said. “This is bad. We’re lying to people.”

“White lies, Maria,” he corrected. “And white lies are okay. They keep people from gettin’ hurt.”

“Or they cause people to get hurt,” she pointed out.

He exhaled shakily, wondering how many white lies he’d told Isabel back when he’d been pursuing Liz. No, don’t worry, Is; I don’t even know the girl. She probably has a crush on me, but I don’t feel anything for her. Liz who? Oh, is that her name?

No. He didn’t want to think about that.








TBC . . .

-April

Part 32

Posted: Sat Nov 08, 2014 1:26 pm
by April
Rod:
Max slept with Maria and is her baby daddy! And now Liz was the one who Michael cheated with on Isabel?! It's like a whole incestuous circle here! :shock: ........with the no one actually being related part I mean.
:lol: You know how I like to do the whole "tangled web" thing in these ensemble fics.
So don't feel bad for Michael on the girls bathroom bit. The one night things with girls who don't care is one thing. But the ones he lied and used.....like Liz.....the ones who hate him....he deserves the guilty feelings.
Yeah, he does. It's good for him to feel guilty. He needs to.

Carolyn:
Michael and Maria are both changing.......
Yes, they most certainly are.

Eva:
The meeting between Michael, Liz and Maria was funny but I feel this was the first step to something more. Maybe a friendship between Maria & Liz? Maybe to a new job for Maria? Or will Maria do something about her education 'return to school) or with her singing.
Maybe, maybe. We shall see. :)
Because in this story, it isn't only Michael who is changing. They all are.
Oh, yes, they're definitely all changing. Some for the better, some for the worse.

Michael: Ooh, I love your new icon!
Wow... I think I might like Liz :shock: ... or at least like her for how she handled the whole Michael situation. I feel like she handled it more maturely than most girls (ex. IASBEL!!!) her age would have.
Everyone knows I have a problem writing a likeable Liz. But I think I might succeed with this one, because she is pretty mature. We'll see. Time will tell.
Michael and Maria... playing a dangerous game, denying each others feelings like they are.
Oh, yes. You just get the sense that it's going to blow up in their faces sooner or later.

Sara:
I really do believe Michael and Maria are meant to be with each other. I think Maria actually makes him want to be a better person without forcing it on him.
Oh, yeah, definitely. All his life, he's had people (his parents, Isabel, teachers, etc.) telling him to be a better person, and Maria doesn't tell him that. She makes him want it all on his own. Which is huge for him, hugely important.


Thank you very much for the feedback!

Once again, I'll drop off some music today. This one is "Mirrors" by Natalia Kills, a song I only stumbled upon when searching for the Justin Timberlake song "Mirror" and accidentally clicking on the wrong video result. I LOOOOVE this song. It's pure and simple dirty pop, catchy as hell, and once in a while, that's just fun. You can listen to it here or click on :wink: when you see it if you'd like to listen. Enjoy!









Part 32








Liz Parker gave Maria hope. Because she looked like a normal girl. Pretty, sure, but not supermodel-esque like Isabel. Smart, possibly, but not Princeton-bound like Isabel. Normal. Average, or maybe slightly above. And if Michael had once had it bad for her, then maybe . . .

Maria literally had to force herself to stop thinking about Michael. It was to the point now where, whenever she started to daydream, her thoughts always found their way to him. She had to remind herself that she was back at the Crashdown with a purpose, and that purpose was one of the few things in her life these days that had nothing to do with Michael Guerin.

It was early, and Liz appeared to be the only waitress on duty. Jose, the cook, was back in the kitchen, but he had the TV on and didn’t appear to be doing any actual cooking yet. When he heard the front door chime, though, it was like a conditioned response for him to reach over to the grill and twist the knob into the on position.

Liz was wiping down the counter, but she literally froze when Maria came in. “Hi,” she said awkwardly.

“Hi, Liz,” Maria returned, looking her up and down quickly. She wasn’t particularly curvy like Isabel, so that meant gigantic breasts weren’t a requirement. Which was a good thing.

Focus, Maria told herself again. God, she was being ridiculous.

“I’m sorry,” Liz apologized. “I don’t remember your name.”

Wasn’t a big deal. Most people didn’t. “Maria.”

“Right.” Liz smiled politely, then asked, “Can I get you something?”

“Oh, I’m not hungry,” Maria informed her, sitting down at the counter. “I just came to ask you something.”

Liz frowned. “About Michael?”

“No.” Apparently her mind wasn’t the only preoccupied one. In fact, there were probably dozens of girls in Roswell who thought about Michael at least half as much as she did; but she was willing to wager that not one of them knew him as well as she did.

“Then what do you need?” Liz asked.

“Actually, I wanted to see if it would be possible for me to work here again.” As much as she hated waitressing, it was one of the few jobs a person like herself could get. “I really need another part-time job, and last time, I kinda felt like I got a raw deal with the old manager. Now that your dad’s kinda running things again, I was wondering if he might be willing to give me a second shot. I mean, I worked here for months, so I wouldn’t even need any training. I could start as soon as you need me.”

Liz nodded her head in consideration and replied, “Well, I could ask him. I know that he’ll need some more help when I go back to college, and if you explain what happened when Derek was in charge . . .” She trailed off, her face wrinkling in confusion. “What exactly did happen when he was in charge?”

Maria sighed, figuring it wasn’t necessary to go into great detail. “Jerk customers. Verbal sexual assault. Probably could’ve become something more if Michael hadn’t stepped in, but Derek didn’t like how it made a scene in his restaurant. So he canned me.”

Liz’s expression changed to one of sympathy. “I’m really sorry,” she apologized. “He wasn’t manager material. I bet if I explain that to my dad, he’d be willing to give you a second chance.”

“That’d be great.” More money was . . . well, at this point, it was a way to pay Andy and Krista back. But she really wasn’t looking to leave that house anytime soon, not if they’d still have her.

“Here, just jot down your phone number,” Liz told her, tearing a piece of paper off her order pad, sliding it over the counter with a pen, “and I’ll have him give you a call.”

Maria picked up the pen and scribbled down her name, cell phone, and work phone number. When she slid it back to Liz, she couldn’t help but feel like the girl was looking at her . . . curiously. “What?” she asked.

“Nothing,” Liz said. “It’s just . . .” She clipped the pen back onto her apron, right next to her order pad, and folded the piece of paper, slipping it into her apron pocket. “Was Michael serious when he said he and Isabel are back together again?”

It was such an odd question, mostly because it had nothing to do with what they’d been talking about. “Um . . . yeah,” she answered honestly. Enviously. “They’ve been dating again since . . . about the beginning of the school year.”

“Huh.” Liz sounded . . . surprised? Or was that something else?

“Jealous?” Maria asked, thinking they could probably relate on that level.

“Oh, no, not really,” Liz replied. “I mean . . . I really liked Michael last year. I kinda thought I might be in love with him, but looking back, I realize it was just a massive crush.”

Maria frowned. A massive crush? Could that possibly be all that she was feeling? Was that the reason why she couldn’t get him off her mind? Was that all it was?

“But I guess I never could picture them making it last together,” Liz admitted.

Maria shrugged, feeling slightly weird having this conversation with Michael’s former other woman, especially since so many people—including Liz—probably suspected her to be his current one. “Well, maybe they’re meant to be together,” she pondered, hoping desperately that wasn’t the case. Because she already felt like she stood no chance as it was.

“Maybe,” Liz said, sounding doubtful. “I don’t know.”

God, how was this possible? She’d been so intent on staying focused, on walking in there and discussing nothing other than the potential of waitressing again. And now, like usual, she was discussing Michael.

“Thanks, Liz,” she said, quickly getting to her feet and heading towards the doors.

“Maria,” Liz called after her.

Reluctantly, she stopped and turned back around.

“Be careful,” Liz suggested, sounding completely serious. “I know that, deep down, Michael’s not a bad guy. But he makes lots of mistakes. You know?”

She nodded slowly, wary of agreeing with her. Yeah, she knew. She knew he sometimes did things without thinking. She knew he ran the risk of turning out like his dad. She knew he was completely and utterly confused about who he was and who he wanted to be. But she also knew that she was undeniably, madly in love with him, and if she pretended it was just a massive crush or some feeling that would pass, she was simply deluding herself into ignoring the obvious.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The plug to the sound system sparked as Michael tried to insert it into the socket, and he jerked his hand away when he felt a slight jolt. “Shit,” he swore.

“What happened?” Isabel asked, immediately rushing to his side.

He tried the lower outlet, and the plug slid in with ease. “That was awesome. I think I almost got electrocuted.”

She made a face. “And you think that’s awesome?”

“Yeah.” He stood up, grinning dopily. He wasn’t dead, so . . . yeah. Pretty much awesome.

She shook her head, clearly not understanding.

“Come on, I felt a spark run through my entire body,” he explained, wishing she could just . . . get it.

“Hmm,” Tess murmured, staring suggestively at her boyfriend. “I feel that way all the time.”

Kyle, in the midst of trying to patch up a hole in one of the speakers, was barely listening, but he did hear that, and that elicited a grin.

Michael made a few exaggerated gagging sounds, causing Tess to roll her eyes. “Oh, please,” she scoffed. “There’s nothing wrong with being nauseatingly romantic. You should try it sometime.”

“No, thanks.” Let her and Kyle have their perfect storybook romance. He didn’t want it.

“Can you guys focus?” Isabel snapped. “In less than five hours, there’s gonna be a New Year’s Eve party happening here, and as the host, I’d like very much for it to be a success.”

“Won’t be,” Michael predicted.

She glared at him almost threateningly. “Why not?”

“ ‘cause of your stupid no-alcohol policy. Honest to God, Isabel, it’s New Year’s and your mom’s gonna be gone all night. I can’t believe you’re throwin’ a party with no booze. That’s fucked up.”

“Uh, that’s smart,” she countered. “Everyone knows the cops are out thick on New Year’s. I don’t wanna get busted and get into trouble. I can’t. I’m going to Princeton, you know.”

“Oh, trust me,” he muttered, “I know.”

“Oh, great, this is gonna be a fun New Year’s,” Tess remarked sarcastically. “Can’t you two just get along?”

Good question, Michael thought, deliberately not answering.

“So who’s all comin’ to this thing?” Kyle asked.

Isabel shrugged. “Everyone I invited said they’d at least drop by.”

“It’s gonna be packed,” Tess declared. “Isabel’s very popular, you know. Most cheerleaders are.”

“Is it just gonna be people from school?” Michael asked, fishing for a little info. “Or are other people gonna be here, too?”

“Well, I invited a few others,” she replied. “Some of last year’s seniors. And Alex and all the other Study Buddies tutors.”

“Great.” Just what he wanted, to hang out more with a guy who was the complete opposite of him. “Who else?”

“Just . . . people. I don’t know.” She narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously, asking, “Why do you ask?”

Oh, shit. He was being obvious. Well, apparently there was no point in hiding it. “I was gonna see if Maria wanted to come.”

All it took was the mere mention of her name for Tess to roll her eyes exaggeratedly and groan, “Ugh.”

“Tess . . .” Isabel cautioned.

“What, you don’t like her or somethin’?” Michael challenged.

Tess shrugged unapologetically. “Not really.”

“You don’t even know her.”

“So? I don’t like what she’s doing. I think it’s weird, her living with you like this, just inserting herself and her son into your life. She’s probably hoping you’ll insert a little something into her.”

Kyle forgot about the speaker momentarily, and came over to put an arm around his girlfriend. “Alright, honey, let’s not say words,” he suggested.

Still, she didn’t seem to have any problem continuing on her tirade. “Why not? She’s his friend. She’s not ours.”

Kyle winced and mouthed an apology to Michael. For the most part, though, Michael just stood there, taking it in. So that was what Tess really thought of Maria, which probably meant that was what Isabel thought of Maria. She just wasn’t being so vocal about it.

Clearly trying to play the part of the non-jealous girlfriend, letting Tess carry the hate for the both of them, Isabel forced a smile and offered, “Bring her along if you want.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Household chores had been going smashingly well until Michael got home. Once he was around, it was almost impossible to keep her concentration on doing the dishes. Didn’t really help that there weren’t that many dishes to do. It especially didn’t help when he invited her to Isabel’s New Year’s Eve party that night.

“I don’t know,” she responded, weighing the pros and cons in her mind. On the one hand, Isabel herself hadn’t exactly extended an invitation, so maybe she wasn’t really welcomed there. But on the other hand . . . Michael had invited her. Was it even possible to turn that down?

“Come on. Why not?” he urged.

She lazily ran the scrub brush over the plate in front of her, repeating the same motions she’d been doing since he’d started talking to her. The plate was as clean as could be. “It’s just not really my scene,” she pointed out.

“Wait, didn’t you used to be, like, this crazy party girl?”

“Well, no offense, but it doesn’t exactly sound like it’s gonna be a crazy party.”

“Exactly. That’s why we need you there.”

She shook her head, reluctant to give in so easily. “But I’m not a crazy party girl anymore.”

“Okay, then it’s the perfect place for you. There’s not even any alcohol. I gotta sneak in my own beer.”

“You’re sneaking in drinks to your own girlfriend’s house?” She couldn’t help but laugh. “That’s so messed up.”

He leaned his side against the counter, tilting his head flirtatiously as he kept trying to convince her. “It’s all messed up. That’s why I need you there. I don’t wanna go alone.”

“You won’t be alone. You’ll have friends. And your girlfriend.”

“You know what I mean.”

She was fairly certain she didn’t. But she wished she did.

Moving the plate to the dry side of the sink, she set the scrub brush down on the counter and put one hand on her hip. “Okay, tell me, who’s all gonna be at this so-called party?”

He shrugged. “Football players. Cheerleaders.”

Just as she had expected. “And where do I fit in?”

“You don’t,” he admitted, “but that’s okay, ‘cause neither do I.”

“But you’re a football player,” she pointed out.

“No, I’m just me. And you’re just you. And after everything that’s happened so far this year . . . I just think we should spend the last night of the year together.”

Together. Oh god, she loved the sound of that word. She longed for it. It was startling, in a way, to realize just how much she wanted it.

He had her. He always did.

“Well,” she said, smiling, “when you put it like that . . .” There was no possible way she could resist.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

( :wink: )

Apparently Isabel wasn’t the only one in her neighborhood hosting a New Year’s Eve party that night, because cars were parked along the side of the street for blocks. Saying that you had to park a mile away wasn’t exaggeration. James Winston appeared to be having some stuffy, aristocratic type of party, and Maria even spotted him standing in his doorway, greeting guests as they arrived. Michael must have noticed it, too, because he put his arm around her and walked faster.

When they finally got to Isabel’s, it was more packed than Maria would have imagined for a party with no alcohol allowed. Of course, the people who’d been expecting it were leaving, while those who had decided to stay were dancing to the pop music blaring over the sound system.

When Michael motioned with his head for her to follow him upstairs, she swore she almost had a heart attack.

They slipped into Isabel’s bedroom—quite the glamorous space—and sat down on the floor and started downing the beer they’d smuggled in. Well, Michael had smuggled it; she’d mostly just agreed it wasn’t a bad idea. He drank three cans while she just drank two. After they emptied a can, they tossed it up onto the bed. Michael popped the tab open on the last can and took a drink, then handed it to her. She took just one sip, because she really didn’t need any more, and then sat up on her knees, feeling a little buzzed.

Smiling, she put one hand on his chest, mostly just to have it there, partly to hold onto something while she stood up.

“Are you drunk?” he asked.

“No. Just happy.”

“Tipsy?” he guessed.

“No. Happy.” This wasn’t like it had been with Max. She wasn’t sloppy and disoriented. She felt energetic and a little bit rebellious, but not in an out of control way.

She bent down and grabbed him by the shirt collar, urging him forward.

“No,” he protested, even though he was getting to his feet. “I don’t dance.”

She giggled a little, betting he would if she started dancing first.

“I really don’t,” he insisted, on his feet now. “I just . . . grind and stuff. And I can’t do that with you.”

She pouted, hoping it wasn’t too noticeable, and moved from side to side in time with the music blaring from down below. The bass was so loud, she could feel it shaking the floor.

Taking both his hands in hers, she practically forced him to start moving, even if it was just waving his arms in the air. He tried to look like he was hating it half as much as he probably hated the song, but he couldn’t conceal the gradual smile that worked its way to his lips. And soon enough, he was moving all on his own.

Feeling more playful and younger than she had in years, Maria shook her hips from side to side, flinging her hair back and forth in time with the beat. She twirled, spun around, laughing, not because anything was particularly funny, but because it was just fun. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d just danced like this, and she loved dancing. She loved anything that involved music, no matter how obnoxiously upbeat the music was.

And when music involved Michael like this, that was a bonus. He looked ridiculous as he over-exaggeratedly lip-synched the words, using his own fist as a pretend microphone. Clearly she wasn’t the only one who was a little buzzed. And clearly she wasn’t the only one who was having fun.

People wouldn’t believe it if they saw him like this. They wouldn’t believe that he could have a good time without being . . . destructive. But here they were, and nothing was being destroyed.

Except maybe his relationship with Isabel. But in that moment, she didn’t even care.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

From the onset of the party, Isabel had been determined not to be one of those hosts who was so busy hosting that she didn’t even get to enjoy the festivities. But it was hard to enjoy anything when most of her guests were acting like idiots. Even though she’d specifically informed them that there was no alcohol allowed on the premises, half of them had showed up inebriated to begin with. Every time she turned her back, she heard something crash and break. Usually a vase or a lamp. Usually expensive. She was going to have fun explaining to her mom how her nice, normal party had resulted in broken family heirlooms.

She searched around for Michael, thinking he might help her throw some of these utter losers out if she asked him nicely enough, but he was nowhere in sight. Kyle didn’t even know where he was, which was odd, considering their bromance practically came with an internal tracking device.

At last, after a great deal of searching, she encountered him as he was coming down the stairs. “Hey,” she said, relieved to see the only person she really wanted to spend the new year with. “I was looking for you.”

“I’ve been here,” he said, bending down to give her a quick kiss on the cheek. “Nice party.”

She raised her eyebrows, shocked to hear him say that. “I thought you were all set to hate it.”

He shrugged. “It’s alright.”

At first, she smiled, thinking it was a compliment to her fantastic hosting skills. But when she caught a whiff of beer on his breath, she made a face, disappointed instead. “Have you been drinking?”

“Just a little bit,” he replied. “Before I got here.”

“So you drank and then you drove over here.” He could be so irresponsible sometimes.

“Okay, fine, I drank after I got here,” he admitted.

“So you snuck in alcohol after I specifically told you not to.”

He threw his hands up in the air, clearly exasperated. “Fine, I drank in the car before I came inside. Satisfied?”

She frowned, answering honestly. “No.” How could she possibly be satisfied with any answer he gave when he was so evidently lying to her?

Unapologetic as ever, he looked at her for a moment as if he were annoyed, then mumbled, “I’m gonna go find Kyle,” as he made his way past her, slipping into the crowd.

Isabel watched him go, feeling strangely . . . relieved, actually. Because at least he hadn’t said he was going to find Maria.

“Isabel.”

She spun when she heard her name, and there was Alex, dressed in a Carlsbad university sweatshirt, wearing black glasses she’d never seen him wear before. Sort of . . . geek chic.

“Hey, Alex!” she greeted, happy to see a friendly face. “I’m so glad you could make it.” She gave him a quick hug, noticing that he was holding a present awkwardly behind his back.

“Well, college parties get a little wild on New Year’s,” he said. “I figured this was more my speed.”

“Hmm, I don’t know. Half the parties we have around here end up with my boyfriend being carted off to jail, so . . .” If he was expecting tame, perhaps this wasn’t the place for it.

“Well, let’s hope that doesn’t happen this time,” he said, handing her the box he was holding. “Here, it’s a . . . a belated Christmas present.”

“Oh, thank you, Alex,” she said. “You shouldn’t have.” Just by the feel of it, she could tell exactly what it was. “Chocolates?”

“Yeah.” He smiled. “I figure all girls like chocolate.”

“And I’m not even one of those girls who pretends she doesn’t. Thank you,” she said again.

“Yeah, you’re welcome.”

“I don’t have anything for you,” she admitted sheepishly. Sure, she’d given all the Study Buddies tutors a Christmas card during their last session before the start of winter break, but really, cards were so lame. “I mean, I actually do have something for you, but it’s not a gift.”

“Oh.” He frowned, confused. “What is it?”

“Well . . .” She moved a little closer to him, talking as quietly as she could when the music was so loud. “I wrote a book. A novel, actually.”

“Seriously? That’s amazing.”

“Well, it might be, or it might not be. See, I haven’t shown anyone, and I really need someone to take a look at it. But I can’t show my mom, because it’s a romance novel, and that would just be weird. And I can’t show Tess, because she’ll like anything I write. And I can’t show Michael, because he literally doesn’t read.”

“So you’re gonna show me?” he concluded. “I’d be honored.”

“It might not be any good,” she cautioned. Even though she loved writing, this was the first novel-length story she’d actually managed to finish. “But I’ve been working on it for over a year now, and I really need some fresh eyes to see it.”

“My eyes are fresh,” he proclaimed, removing his glasses. “I’d love to read it.”

She laughed a little, grateful that he didn’t view it as some kind of chore. “If you hate it, just tell me.”

“I won’t hate it,” he promised.

“No, you might. It’s . . .” She trailed off, sighing. “I don’t know.”

“Hey, who doesn’t love a good romance novel?” he joked. “Just get it to me before I leave. I’ll probably have it read by the next Study Buddies session.”

“Thanks.” He had to be the most generous guy she’d ever met. As a college student, he had to be plenty busy, but he always made time to do her a favor. First Study Buddies, and now this.

“So what’s it about?” he asked. “Is it, like, a modern romance, or . . .”

She wanted to listen, but she couldn’t help herself from getting distracted when she noticed who was walking in her front door. She recognized that long dark hair, the deceptively innocent brown eyes. She’d seen them before.

“What the hell is she doing here?” she demanded, knowing right away that that was Liz Parker.

“Who?” Alex asked, looking back over his shoulder. And then he surprised her by approaching her, even putting his arm around her, and saying, “Hey, baby. You got off work, huh?”

“Yeah.” She tilted her head back, signaling for him to bend down and give her a quick kiss.

Isabel narrowed her eyes, walking up to the two of them. And it was almost hilarious how, the second Liz saw her, her mouth dropped open, and a look of panic flooded her face. “Wait,” she said. “Alex.” She glanced back and forth between the two of them, sputtering, “Who—whose party is this?”

“Isabel’s,” he replied before introducing them. “Liz, this is my friend Isabel. Isabel, this is Liz, my girlfriend.”

Isabel just stared at her, faintly recalling that Alex had mentioned a girlfriend before. But she hadn’t counted on this.

“I hope it’s okay I invited her,” he said.

No. It wasn’t okay. It wasn’t okay at all.

She flashed back to the last time she’d seen that face, in Michael’s bed, underneath him, contorted in a mix of pain and pleasure. She remembered walking up the stairs and opening the door to that room, thinking she’d be surprising him when she showed up with her prom dress in hand. Yeah, he’d been surprised.

“Excuse me,” she said to Alex, turning and darting up the stairs. Seeing Liz there, even though what had happened had happened nearly ten months ago . . . it was too much. It was a reminder of how much Michael had hurt her, and it brought all those old wounds to the surface.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

It was hard to believe bedrooms like Isabel’s even existed. It was at least twice the size of any room Maria had ever had, and it was full of so many nice things. Like the sheets Michael verified were made of real silk. And the collection of French perfumes arranged on the vanity, with names so complicated Maria couldn’t even pronounce them. It looked like a space out of an interior designer’s catalogue.

Maria walked around, taking it all in, noticing all the little details Isabel probably took for granted. When she walked over to the nightstand, her original purpose was to look at the lamp, because it was probably an antique worth, like, thousands; but when she looked down, something else caught her eye.

There were a few Christmas cards stacked there, and the top one, partially open, only had one handwritten word on it: Max.

Maria tensed. Just seeing that name . . .

She heard the door open, and she felt relieved that Michael had returned. “Good, you’re back.” When she spun around, though, it wasn’t Michael, but rather Isabel, who was standing there. She looked just as surprised to see Maria there.

“Oh,” Maria whimpered. “Hey, Isabel.” She hoped it wasn’t obvious that she’d been snooping around her room. She could probably just lie and said she’d come up here looking for a bathroom. There was a bathroom attached. Heated floor tiles and everything.

“Hey,” Isabel returned, her voice sounding . . . hoarse. She cleared her throat and blinked back what appeared to be tears in her eyes.

“Are you okay?” Maria asked her.

“Yeah,” she answered quickly. “It’s just . . . hosting a party . . . kinda stressful, you know?”

Maria nodded, even though she didn’t know. She’d been to plenty of parties in her time; never hosted one, though. “I think people are having a good time,” she said, trying to make her feel a little better. “I know I am.”

Isabel nodded silently, her eyes soon fixating on the five empty beer cans on the bedspread. “I see that.”

Oh, shit, Maria thought. Was it totally obvious now that she and Michael had been up here, drinking and dancing and having their own separate party?

Figuring it was best to just change the subject, Maria said, “So, um . . . I couldn’t help but notice . . .” and lifted up the Christmas card from . . . whoever the Max in Isabel’s life was. “Who’s Max?”

“Oh, he’s my brother,” Isabel responded with disinterest, sitting down on the bed.

“You have a brother?” Odd. She’d never seen him around.

“Only in the biological sense,” Isabel explained. “Our parents divorced when we were young. I don’t even really remember him. I could probably see him on the street and not even recognize him.”

“Huh.” Maria looked down at the signature again. Just three simple letters. It was unsettling that three simple letters could still get a reaction out of her. “So does he live around here?”

“No. He lives with our dad, out in Albuquerque, last I heard.”

Maria frowned, slowly setting the card back down. That sounded . . . way too familiar.

Don’t be stupid, she told herself. There were probably dozens of Maxes who lived in Albuquerque.

“Actually, he’s a couple years older than me, though, so he might be in college now,” Isabel added.

Maria felt her stomach tighten. Sounded like the perfect age to be Dylan’s father. Except . . . Dylan’s father never would have gone to college. He was probably sitting in jail by now.

“Lives with your dad,” Maria recapped quietly. “In Albuquerque?”

“Yeah. Hey, Maria, don’t take this the wrong way, but I kinda need to be alone for a minute,” Isabel blurted suddenly.

Maria took one look at the girl, noticing that she looked like she was on the verge of tears again. Clearly something was upsetting her. “Yeah, sure,” she said, quickly gathering up the beer cans. “Sorry.” She wasn’t sure what she was apologizing for as she left the room: for invading her personal space, or for spending so much time with Michael that night. Every night.

She headed downstairs, attracting every drunken or wannabe-drunken idiot’s attention with the empty cans she was carrying. “Where’d you get the booze?” they all asked. She told them she didn’t have any more and managed to weave her way through the crowd to the kitchen. The gigantic, marble countertop kitchen. Once there, she located the trash can and dropped the cans into it, smashing everything down a bit so nothing spilled out.

When she turned around, a guy she didn’t recognize was behind her, way too close. He was wearing a blue and yellow letterman’s jacket that had his name, Ryan, stitched onto the front.

“Hey,” he greeted, grinning lasciviously.

“Uh-huh.” She tried to slip past, but he put one hand on the counter, blocking her.

“I’m Ryan,” he said. “Seen you around.”

She decided to just play along, just to crush his dreams even more in the long run. “Oh, yeah, I remember seeing you. You play basketball, right?”

“I’m a starter.”

“Yeah. You’re the guy who missed all his free-throws the other night.”

He laughed nervously, trying to recover. “Well, football’s more my sport.”

“Didn’t you sit on the bench?”

“I’m Michael’s friend,” he blurted, attempting to change the subject.

She shook her head. “No, you’re not. I’ve heard about you.”

“Oh, yeah? What’d you hear?”

“Not good things.”

He leaned in a little closer, trying to sound seductive when he suggested, “Give me a chance to surprise you.” He even licked his lips.

“Ugh.” Guys like this actually made Maria feel grateful she was no longer in high school.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

It wasn’t very often that Michael felt out of place at a party. But with New Year’s being a somewhat romantic holiday and all, Tess and Kyle had retreated into a world where it was just the two of them, even though they were surrounded by partygoers. And even though there were plenty of other people there who Michael knew, people he saw at school on a daily basis and had no problem talking to, it was becoming glaringly apparent that he just didn’t feel like spending time with them. The actual amount of people he wanted to be around was small.

He walked around the house, looking for Maria, knowing he wanted to be around her most of all. It was hard to explain, but when it was just the two of them, he felt . . . free. Like he wasn’t constantly being judged and criticized. Because she didn’t do that to him.

He found her in the kitchen, but she wasn’t alone. Ryan was finally stepping up to the plate and taking his shot, although judging by the look on Maria’s face, she wasn’t interested.

Michael pushed past others, getting closer to them, and overheard Ryan smugly asking, “You think you can handle me?”

“Oh, you’d be surprised what I can handle,” Maria informed him, sending Michael a reassuring glance. He hung back, figuring she looked like she had things under control.

“So would you rather handle Guerin or handle me?” Ryan asked, wriggling his eyebrows.

“Hmm.” She glanced down at his package—or lack thereof—pretended to think about it, and then replied, “Let me answer that with a brush-off.”

Ryan just stood there, stunned, like a statue, unable to move or even say anything as she pushed past him and scurried towards Michael. Michael smirked at his former friend, deciding he’d wait until school started back up to gloat. Although, what the hell would he gloat about? It wasn’t exactly like Maria was handling him, either, contrary to popular belief.

“Oh, god, you were right; he’s such a tool,” Maria groaned as they made their way back through the kitchen.

He put his arm around her shoulders, knowing that Ryan would see and get jealous, and asked, “How long was he botherin’ you?”

“Oh, just like a minute. I think I put him in his place, though. Multiple times, various ways.”

“Good for you. Still . . .” Reluctantly, he let go of her, because he didn’t want other people to see and get the wrong idea. “You should probably stay away from him.”

“I will,” she promised.

They stopped near the bottom of the stairs, and he wanted more than anything to reach down and hold her hands. His own hands were literally tingling with the desire to do so. But he held back, stuffing his hands in his pockets to help resist the temptation.

What the hell was wrong with him? Since when could he be bothered to hold a girl’s hand? Hold her boobs, sure. Hold her legs up on his shoulders while he was on top of her . . . all the time. But her hand?

“So I ran into Isabel,” she told him suddenly. “She looked kind of upset about something.”

“Oh, great,” he grumbled. “What’d I do this time?”

“I don’t know. Maybe it’s not even about you. She just looked like she was about to cry.”

“Then it’s probably about me,” he reasoned. Usually was. He had a lot of power over Isabel. Power to make her smile. Power to make her laugh. Power to make her feel like her heart was broken.

“Maybe you should go talk to her,” she suggested.

“Nah, I’ll ask her about it later.” He was having a relatively good night—shocking, considering he wasn’t even the slightest bit wasted—and he didn’t intend on ruining it with some serious conversation that all ended with her pointing out yet another one of his deficiencies. It was New Year’s, and he wasn’t going to start off his new year with girlfriend drama.

“You wanna get outta here?” he asked Maria. Even though parties were usually his scene, he would have much rather preferred to be somewhere else. With her.

Just her.

Before she could answer, Bubba’s loud voice rang out as he started to count down from fifty-nine. A few of the other football players joined in, and soon, they were almost louder than the music.

This was it. The final minute of the year. And all he could keep thinking in his mind was, The way you ring in the new year is the way you spend the rest of the year. Last year, he’d been with Liz, charming her, slowly seducing her, and Isabel had had no idea.

“It’s almost midnight,” Maria said.

He wanted to kiss her.

Maria glanced up, remarking, “There she is.”

Managing to tear his eyes away from her, he looked up and saw Isabel slowly making her way downstairs, looking like she’d just gotten done crying about . . . something. He honestly had no idea what. She couldn’t possibly be so mad about him doing a little drinking while he’d been there.

“You should go be with her,” Maria suggested.

He didn’t want to move a muscle, so he asked, “What about you?”

She smiled reassuringly. “I’m fine.”

It was wrong, and he knew it was wrong, to want nothing more than to ring in the new year with a girl who wasn’t even his girlfriend. To put his mouth on hers and see if it felt as amazing as he’d imagined it would. He knew it was wrong to brush the back of his hand against hers, but that was exactly what he did. Because then at least he wasn’t holding it.

“Happy New Year, Maria,” he said, wishing he could give her something more. After everything they’d gone through together, this seemed so . . . anticlimactic.

He met Isabel on one of the middle stairs, when the countdown was down in the twenties. She was flustered, and he could barely understand her when she choked out, “I never thought I’d see her here.”

He made a face and reminded her, “I told you I was bringing her.”

“No, not her. The other her.” As if it pained her to say that, she winced.

“Isabel.” He had no idea what she was talking about, but they were at ten seconds now, so he touched her cheek as tenderly as he could manage to.

She sniffed back tears, tilted her head towards his palm, and murmured, “I love you.”

Normally, he would have told her the same, because it would make her feel better. It would make her forget about anything that was bothering her, and she’d be okay again. But as the countdown hit one, he decided just to kiss her this time instead of saying it back. And hopefully that kiss would be enough to convince her that he loved her, too. Because on some level, he did.

On some level.

She kissed him back almost desperately, as though it would be the last time she ever kissed him, and he felt unbelievably guilty. Because given the choice, he would have rather been kissing someone else.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Maria felt absolutely pathetic as she stood there at the bottom of the stairs, watching as Michael and Isabel kissed while other partygoers moved around them. They looked so good together, the two of them. Both of them tall, gorgeous. They looked like the perfect couple, even though they weren’t.

It would have been easier if they had been perfect, if nothing could have ever come between them. Because then she would have known without a doubt, with complete certainty, that it would never happen for her, that she’d never stand a chance. But as things stood, she kept hoping, kept believing.

She had to look away, and eventually, she had to turn and walk away, figuring she’d just walk back home. Because at this point, watching the two of them together was no longer just discouraging, or even frustrating. It hurt. Sometimes more than she could bear.








TBC . . .

-April

Part 33

Posted: Sat Nov 15, 2014 10:33 am
by April
cjensen2: I always appreciate your feedback. It's very insightful and thought-provoking. :)
I have to admit that I'm having a hard time sympathizing with Maria. She knows fully what Michael is capable of and yet she just acts like he's this perfect guy. I understand in a way because he is basically the only person who has supported and been nice to her, so she seems to be developing an unhealthy dependence on him.
Maria's definitely not all that innocent here. I don't think it's weird to have a tough time sympathizing with her. She's knowingly getting involved in a shady relationship with a shady guy.
After seeing the way he callously manipulated both Liz and Isabel, I would not want to ever be in a real relationship with him. Although her own morals are pretty questionable as she doesn't care that she is trying to get Michael to cheat on his girlfriend.
Oh, yeah, Maria's own morals are definitely pretty questionable. She's made a lot of mistakes in the past, and she could be making some now.
And I'm actually pretty confused about why Michael is even with Isabel. I know he supposedly cares about her to some degree, but his thoughts shows that he basically doesn't ever enjoy talking to her and just hanging out, other than sex. He basically only cares about sex and it seems hard for me to believe he would put in this much effort to have sex with Isabel when there seem to be other girls who are easily available for that.
Michael doesn't always like Isabel--they have next to nothing in common and haven't ever really just been friends. But she loves him, and he does, in his own way, care about her as a person. They are, to me, that couple who should have broken up long ago, but they're just so used to being together that they just keep staying together, even when they shouldn't. I think every high school has that couple.
Although you do like a Liz who helps boys cheat, unless she didn't realize that Isabel and Michael were together? Did he pretend he was single or did she know he was with Isabel, since Isabel went to a different high school?
Liz knew Michael and Isabel were together. Like Maria now, she wasn't all that innocent.

Rod:
Now Liz and Alex together?

Yep this bunch sure is intertwined aren't they :lol: Is Max going to be bringing Serena with him also? :lol:
:lol: Nope, no Serena. I've never written her in any of my fics and don't intend to start now.
PS.....I came back here to post more. I'm very curious on the whole Michael/Liz interactions in the past. Did she know, when they cheated, that he was in a relationship? Knowing past Michael I doubt it.
Oh yeah, she knew. But much like Maria now, she just felt powerless to resist.

Eva:
Alex & Liz? Well, didn't see that one coming! Although in your story I should've know...
Oh, yeah. You know me. I like to make things as twisted up as possible before attempting to un-twist them. :D

Carolyn:
"geek chic".........I love that description!
One of my favorites.

Sara:
HA! This gets more and more convoluted as the story progresses....everyone has been with everyone who has cheated on everyone.....
So maybe the story should be called Everyone, Everyone. :lol:
and I agree about Maria. She is setting herself up for this...she KNOWS Michael is in the relationship but pretty much doesn't seem to care.
I totally agree, too. Maria is definitely not some uber-innocent, squeaky clean girl. She has a definite bad girl side, and that's risky since she's totally and completely let herself fall head over heels for a bad boy.


Thank you for the feedback! I really appreciate it!

Well, I seem to have hit a very musical stretch in this fic lately. I guess lots of songs were inspiring lots of scenes. Today's suggestion is "White Blank Page" by Mumford & Sons. You can listen to it here or click on :? when you see it if you'd like.








Part 33








Even though Michael usually felt calm after he got off, nothing could quiet his thoughts that night. Lying in bed with Isabel, his arm around her, all he could do was picture Maria lying in her bed—his bed, their bed, whatever—by herself, and he wanted to go be next to her.

“Mmm,” Isabel purred contentedly, nuzzling her face against his chest. “What’s your New Year’s resolution?”

Oh, no. “What?” This sounded like the start of a potentially long conversation, one he wasn’t interested in having.

“What are you resolving to do?” she rephrased.

She probably didn’t want to find out. “I don’t know,” he muttered.

She draped her leg over both of his, snuggling closer. “I wanna get something published. Even if it’s just a short story. Do you think that’s a good one?”

Sometimes, he actually forgot that she loved to write. He never asked her about it. He never read anything. “Sure,” he replied.

“I think it’s good,” she agreed. “You have to go after what you want.”

He tensed. What he wanted . . . wasn’t there.

“Hey, I think I’m gonna take off,” he told her suddenly.

She lifted her head a bit, frowning. “Why? My mom’s not gonna be home.”

“Yeah, but . . .” He searched his mind for an excuse. “I wanna make sure Teenie didn’t sneak out tonight.”

“I’m sure she’s fine,” Isabel assured him.

“I’ll feel better when I see it with my own eyes.” He kissed her forehead, then tossed the covers aside and sat up, locating his clothes. He dressed without making eye contact with her, because he was afraid that she’d be able to tell he was lying if he did.

( :? )

It was quiet when he got home. His dad was probably out at the bar, and his mom and sister were probably asleep. First, he checked on Dylan, who was sleeping soundly in his new room. Then he went upstairs and peeked in at Tina, who, against all expectations, was doing the exact same thing. And then he quietly opened the door to his own bedroom, feeling like he couldn’t breathe when he saw Maria lying there. She was curled up on her side, eyes closed, breathing steadily. And like usual, she was wearing one of his old t-shirts, along with a pair of her shortest pink shorts. She’d kicked off some of the blankets, as she had a tendency to do, bringing her thighs into view.

He closed the door, darkening the room, hoping that it would be easier to resist touching her if he couldn’t see her so well. He stripped out of his shirt and took off his jeans, replacing them with sweatpants, and carefully crawled into bed beside her. She’d left plenty of room for him. Being as small as she was, she barely took up any space.

He lay on his back for a few seconds, forcing himself not to look at her, but soon enough, the temptation became too much, and he had to turn over onto his side. He could barely see her small form outlined in the moonlight, but he could see enough to entice him. He could see the dip of her waist, the curve of her hip. The small smile that pulled the corners of her mouth upward and made him wonder what she was dreaming about.

That urge to touch her hadn’t decreased. Not in the slightest. In fact, it was so strong that he lifted one hand, inching it towards her, wondering if it would be okay to just rest it on her side, or brush against the exposed skin of legs. Or maybe he could play with her hair. It was sprawled behind her over the pillowcase.

It was torturous, sharing a bed with her at night but still feeling so far away.

Withdrawing his hand, he turned over onto his back again, trying to get control of himself, breathing rapidly as he looked up at the ceiling. His hands didn’t belong anywhere near her. And if he let them roam over her even once when she was asleep like this, he’d be doing something she hadn’t given him permission to do. Something he couldn’t take back.

He got out of bed and darted across the hallway into the bathroom, grateful that his hands were still good for one thing.

Closing his eyes, he jerked himself off almost violently, frustrated. He’d locked the door, but he couldn’t keep the thoughts of her out. He pictured her in his mind, pretended it was her hand on his flesh instead of his own, and that helped get him closer to the edge. But not close enough.

Halfway through, he stopped, leaning against the sink, just thinking about her, wondering how it would feel if her mouth was taking the place of his hand.

He raised his eyes, glaring at his reflection, feeling twisted and sick for even thinking about it. He was supposed to be the guy who didn’t want that kind of thing from Maria, because someone else already had.

But he couldn’t help it. So he pictured her doing all sorts of little things—singing, smiling, licking that stupid nacho cheese off her finger the other night—and started pumping his own erection again. Faster. Harder. Faster still. But it was never enough.

He imagined what it would be like to walk back into that bedroom and find her wearing nothing, imagined what it would be like to climb on top of her and just . . .

Once he did enough imagining, he found the release he so desperately sought. But all too soon, it was over, and he was plagued with longing again.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Isabel had to wake up early the next day to make sure the house was in perfect condition when her mom got home from . . . wherever she’d been. Out on a date with some rich guy from work, probably. That was one of the conditions of hosting the party: the house was to be spotless when she returned.

She’d just gotten done when the doorbell rang. Wondering who it could be, she walked over to answer it. Wouldn’t be Michael. He would have just let himself in. And Tess had already explained in explicit detail all the things she and Kyle were going to do today.

When she pulled open the door, Alex was standing there. “Hey,” she said, giving him a friendly smile.

“Hey,” he returned. “Can I come in?”

Unable to help it, she quickly glanced around outside for Liz. Seeing no sign of her, she stepped back, holding the door open as he stepped inside.

“Wow, and here I thought this place was nice last night,” he remarked, glancing around the entryway in awe. “It looks even bigger without all those people here.”

“Thanks.” It was a nice house, and within it, she was living a pretty nice life. But it was good to be reminded to be grateful once in a while. “Hey, Alex, speaking of last night . . . I need to apologize for just taking off in the middle of our conversation like that.”

“It’s okay,” he assured her.

“No, it was . . . very rude of me. I just . . .” She sighed, finding it difficult to even mention that other girl’s name. “When I saw Liz, it threw me for a loop. There’s kind of a history there.”

“Yeah, she told me everything,” he mumbled, stuffing his hands in his front pockets and looking down at his feet dejectedly.

Everything?” For some reason, Isabel doubted that. Liz’s version of the whole sordid tale would probably still be a version that painted her out to be all innocent.

“She said she lost her virginity to Michael last year, while he was still dating you. And you had the misfortune of walking in on ‘em together. Sound about right?”

She shuddered, the memory sending a chill up her spine. “Pretty much. She didn’t make herself out to be some unknowing victim, though, did she? Because let me tell you, that girl was a knowing conspirator. She knew he was with me, but that didn’t stop her.”

“I know,” he said. “She told me. She was really honest, said it was one of her biggest regrets.”

Isabel grunted. Yeah, either that or the highlight of an otherwise dull life. Whichever.

“Anyway, we talked for a long time,” he informed her, “and I ended up tellin’ her we gotta put things on hold. I need some space. I feel like she should’ve told me about it sooner, and by holding back . . . I don’t know, I don’t like that. It seems shady. I don’t think I wanna be with someone like that.”

“Oh, you don’t,” Isabel assured him. “Good for you, Alex. I’m glad you broke up with her.”

“Well . . .” He shrugged. “We’d only been dating for a few months. It was nothin’ serious.”

“Still . . . good for you,” she reiterated. “You deserve to be with someone better.”

He laughed a little, looking down at his feet again, and muttered, “Could say the same to you.”

“What?” How had this conversation become about her?

“I mean . . . Isabel, the guy cheated on you. And you’re still with him?”

“We broke up,” she pointed out.

“Yeah, but now you’re back together. And I know he’s probably told you it was a horrible mistake and he’s never gonna let it happen again, but . . . do you honestly believe him?”

She did. Or at least she was trying to. She fidgeted, feeling very unsettled all of a sudden. “Look, Alex . . . Michael and I are something serious. I love him. So if that means I have to forgive what he’s done, then I’ll do it.”

“I just . . .” Alex threw his hands up, taking a few steps back. “Forget I said anything. It’s not my place. It’s just that . . . I think you’re a pretty special girl, and you deserve a really good guy. And I don’t know if that’s what Michael is.”

She knew for a fact that wasn’t what he was. But he wasn’t completely horrible, either. Even though he could be a downright jerk sometimes, if he didn’t have his good moments, she wouldn’t have stayed with him.

“Anyway, I just wanted to come by and . . . kinda clear the air,” Alex concluded. “Oh, and I never did get your book. The one you wrote and wanted me to read.”

“Oh, yeah.” With everything that had happened last night, she’d completely spaced it. Biting her bottom lip nervously, and confessed, “But after everything you just said, I’m not so sure you’re gonna like it.”

“Why?” he asked. “What’s it about?”

She just gave him a look, not saying anything, figuring he’d understand. Sure, her story was a work of fiction, but she’d definitely used her own life as . . . inspiration.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

There was nothing good about school starting up again. Not one thing. School meant less time with Maria and Dylan, less time screwing around with Isabel, and less time being lazy and relaxed. But at least there was only one semester left. One more semester of tally marks to put on the wall by his bed.

On the first day back, he headed straight up to the second floor, to the girls bathroom he and Maria had ventured into at the basketball game during the holiday tournament. He brushed past a few freshman girls who gave him very confused looks and slipped inside the stall where she had written something. He hadn’t forgotten about it, hadn’t forgotten that it was the first thing he intended to do on the first day of that new semester.

He set his backpack down and scanned the mass amount of writing scrawled onto the wall of that stall. Whenever he saw his name, he read it, wondering if it was something she’d written. But nothing sounded like her, and somehow, when he spotted hers, he felt like he would know—just know with absolute certainty—that it was written by her and no one else.

Finally, he did spot it. And he did know. It wasn’t the handwriting that was a giveaway, because he didn’t know much about what her handwriting looked like. She hadn’t signed her name. But he knew it was hers because of what it said.

Michael Guerin saved me.

He stared at it as if he were entranced, wondering if it was true. Had he saved her? From what? From James Winston? No, he’d been too late for that.

From herself? From life in general? Was it something like that?

It was weird, because the longer they shared a bed, the more he felt like she was saving him.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Michael snuck up behind Maria while she was making Dylan’s afternoon snack and tickled her side, eliciting a giggle. “Hey,” she said.

“Hey. You ready? I got three new guesses.”

“Okay.”

He stood behind her, a little closer than he needed to, peering over her shoulder as she smeared a gigantic glob of butter on a slice of bread. Dylan was a butter junkie. “ ‘Don’t Speak’ by No Doubt,” he tried.

“Nope.”

“Okay, then ‘Torn’ by Natalie What’s-Her-Face.”

“Imbruglia,” she filled in. “And no.”

“Dammit.” He’d felt pretty confident about that one. Sighing, he gave it one more shot. “ ‘Breathe Me’ by Sia? Please tell me it’s that one. I had to look up the lyrics and everything.”

“Sorry,” she replied apologetically.

No,” he groaned, stepping up beside her, leaning his back against the counter. “What am I doin’ wrong?”

“I don’t know what to tell you, Michael. Those are all great songs; they’re just not my favorite.”

“What the hell is it? Is it, like, some obscure thing no one’s ever heard of?”

“No.”

“So is it, like, a well-known song then?”

She tossed the butter knife into the sink and began to unwrap a few cheese slices to slap on there. “I’m not giving you any more hints.”

“Any more? You haven’t given me any!”

“You said you’d figure it out. You were all confident.”

“I’m still confident,” he insisted. “I got this in the bag. I’m gonna figure it out.”

“Okay.”

“I will.” It was more a game than anything else at this point. And he wanted to win.

“If you say so.” She placed one slice of bread on top of the other, then reached into the refrigerator to grab the half-empty milk carton. “So how was the first day back at school?”

“It sucked,” he answered bluntly.

“Well, you only have a few months left.”

“Thank God.” By all accounts, West Roswell was a hell of a lot better than East, but still . . . it was school. Once he got out of there, he was never going back. “How was work?”

She stood up on her tiptoes, reaching into the cupboard for a clean glass. Her shirt inched up as she did so, revealing a small expanse of the skin of her stomach, and, as he always seemed to do these days, he took a second to inconspicuously enjoy the sight of it.

“It was good,” she answered, practically having to crawl up on the counter to reach a glass near the back. “I was only there for two hours, though.”

He reached one hand around the cupboard door, securing a glass that would do just fine, and set it down on the counter for her, smirking. Poor Maria. Short people problems. And she wasn’t even the shortest girl he knew.

“I had an interview with the owner of the Crashdown,” she revealed. “Liz’s dad.”

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah. He was really nice. He said he’d hire me part-time again as a way of making up for my old manager’s ‘obvious mistake.’”

“Obvious mistake. I like that.” He watched absentmindedly for a bit as she filled Dylan’s glass up to the rim, and he started to wonder if that meant she would be around less. Probably. Two jobs meant more work. More work meant less time at home. Less time at home meant less time they’d be able to spend together just doing . . . whatever they wanted to do.

“Yeah, now I can save up some money,” she said.

He nodded, almost automatically frowning. “You’re not, like, savin’ up for your own place or anything, are you?”

She put the milk back in the refrigerator, giving him a look. “Well, not yet.”

“Good. ‘cause . . .” He took one step closer, leaning down, well aware that he was a little too close, in her space. “I’d miss you if you weren’t here.”

She just gazed up at him, smiling, and then she started to blush and looked away.

He felt like there were butterflies in his stomach, and he was so unused to the feeling. Feeling nervous around a girl? That never happened. Not to him. But around her, he felt all sorts of things he wasn’t used to. And in that moment, more than anything, he felt like kissing her.

He was actually contemplating it when his cell phone vibrated in his pocket. He swore internally and took a step back, glancing at who was calling. “It’s Kyle,” he said, knowing somewhere in the back of his hormone-clouded mind that it was probably a good thing that the moment hadn’t continued. Because he had very little self-restraint, so he might have really ended up following through on his desire.

“Hey,” he answered.

“Hey, can you come over for a bit?” Kyle asked right away. “I gotta talk to you about somethin’. I’m not interrupting anything, am I?”

Michael glanced again at Maria, who seemed to be doing everything in her power not to look at him. “No,” he said. “You’re not interrupting. I’ll be right over.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

As it turned out, what Kyle needed to discuss was sort of . . . classified information. At least for one more day. He started out by saying, “You can’t tell anyone yet,” and ended up revealing that his college plans were set: Alabama.

“Wow,” Michael uttered, remembering how cool that campus had been, how alive the stadium was. “So it’s set in stone? Roll tide?”

“Set in stone,” Kyle confirmed. “Just got off the phone with the athletic director a little before I called you. I got scholarship offers.”

“That’s awesome, man,” Michael congratulated. “That’s what you wanted.”

“Yeah, I mean, I kinda knew for a while it was headed in this direction. “It was just a matter of talkin’ to everyone. My dad . . . he’s talked to, like, everyone involved. Head coach, assistant coaches, A.D. . . . I mean, that phone’s practically been glued to his ear.”

“I’ll bet.” Michael couldn’t even fathom it, being recruited to the extent that Kyle was. He was probably going to have his entire college experience paid for with football scholarships. Four, five years if he wanted . . . all right there, possible. For him. It wasn’t like he hadn’t earned it, though. Most people probably didn’t realize how hard he’d worked.

“But like I said, you can’t tell anyone,” Kyle reiterated. “My dad said I could tell you and Tess, and that’s it. I’m gonna hold a press conference tomorrow and announce it to the public then.”

“You’re not gonna draw it out and do the whole spectacle on National Signing Day?” Michael asked.

Kyle shrugged. “I don’t think so. I mean, I’ll have to wait to formally sign my letter of intent, you know. All I can do right now is verbally commit. But I don’t think there’s any mystery about where I’m goin’ anyway, so I don’t wanna make some huge event out of it.”

“But you’re having a press conference,” Michael pointed out.

“Well . . .” Kyle shrugged again. “My dad insists. Hopefully he keeps it small.”

Michael nodded, picturing it. His best friend, up at a podium, talking into a microphone. News cameras and reporters milling about. Like a smaller version of the NFL. It would not be small, not in this town. To Michael, it seemed overwhelming, but Kyle sounded at ease about it.

“Congratulations,” he said again. “That’s really cool, man.”

“Thanks. You know, I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“Ah, whatever.” Maybe he could have done more with a different receiver, one who would have caught that pass at the end of the quarterfinals game. Maybe he could have made it to that State Championship with someone else out on the field with him.

Oh, well. Didn’t matter much now. That last game was the best it would get for the rest of them, but Kyle was onto bigger and better things.

“It’s weird, though,” Kyle went on. “I feel like these last few months of high school are just a formality. It’s like . . . now it’s all about the future. You know?”

He nodded, pretending he knew exactly what Kyle was talking about. But he didn’t know. He had no idea. Because that one word, that one word alone . . . future . . . it still filled him with uncertainty and dread.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

When Michael got home, it was nighttime, and the house was relatively quiet. He heard music coming from upstairs—Tina’s, definitely not Maria’s—and the sound of his mom on the phone, gabbing loudly with his Aunt Karen. Downstairs, the kitchen light was on, though, because his dad was sitting at the table, writing out bills.

Kicking off his shoes, he muttered, “Hey, Dad.”

No response. Just a quick glance, if that. And then . . . a jab. As usual. “Party must not have been too good. You’re home early.”

“I wasn’t at a party; I was at Kyle’s,” Michael informed him.

“Sure you were.”

He rolled his eyes. Fuck, even when he told the truth, his dad didn’t believe him. Why bother? “He got his football scholarship.”

“Oh, yeah? Where to?”

“I can’t say yet. He’s gonna announce it at a press conference tomorrow.” Michael pulled out the chair next to his dad and sat down, not sure why. Maybe he just needed to talk to his dad once in a while, no matter how unpleasant it was.

“I remember Jim sayin’ he’s dead-set on Bama. Is he goin’ there?”

Michael shrugged, not willing to break his promise to his friend. “I guess you’ll just have to wait and find out like everyone else.”

“I bet he is.” His dad stuffed a check into an envelope and quickly licked the envelope to seal it shut. “Well, that must be exciting. For him and his dad.”

Michael just nodded, his lips pressed tightly together, knowing that ‘and his dad’ part had been intentional.

“Surely that gets you thinkin’ about your own plans,” his dad went on.

“Plans?” he echoed. “What plans? I don’t have any plans.”

“Exactly. Don’t you think it’s about time you made some?”

He sighed heavily, regretting that he’d even bothered to take a seat. He should have known it would end up being one of these talks, one meant to exemplify just how inadequate of a son he was. It was never anything else. “It’s all up in the air,” he said vaguely.

“Well, you’re not goin’ to college,” his dad stated simply. “I mean . . . let’s just be realistic.”

Michael’s brow furrowed deeply. Realistic? Realistically . . . there was still a chance. “Dad, you don’t know if I’m gonna go to college or not. It could happen.”

“Son, with your grades . . .”

“Hey, my grades aren’t so bad this year,” he pointed out. “And you never know, I could get a football scholarship, too. Maybe not to Bama, but . . .”

“Do you even know how unlikely that is? They don’t just hand out football scholarships to anyone.”

“Yeah, but . . .” He trailed off. What was the use of trying to defend himself, of trying to get his dad to acknowledge the fact that he was a good, that he was a better player than the old man had ever been? It was pointless.

“Have you even applied anywhere?”

“Yeah, actually, I have.” The fact that his own father didn’t even know that spoke for itself.

“And you haven’t been accepted yet.”

He shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “Yeah, but I haven’t been rejected yet, either. I called a few of the places up the other day. They said they’re still processing my application. Which means they’re considering me.”

“Okay, so say they consider you and decide they don’t want you.”

Kinda like you, Michael thought bitterly.

“Then what?” his dad pressed. “If you’re not goin’ to college, what the hell are you gonna do? ‘cause I can tell you one thing, you’re not livin’ here for the rest of your life.”

“Wasn’t plannin’ on it.” First chance he got, he was out of there. It would be so amazing, so freeing, not to have to live under that man’s roof anymore. Eighteen years of it was long enough.

“Once you graduate, you gotta get out there on your own. Get your own place.”

“I will.”

“Yeah, and you can take your little girlfriend and that kid of hers with you.”

“They have names, you know.”

“I’m serious. I’m tired of you people gettin’ a free pass here. These . . . you see these?” He fanned out a small stack of bills. Cable. Utilities. Electric. “This is reality. You gotta find a way to deal with this stuff.”

“So I’ll get a job.”

“Doing what?”

“I don’t know. Just . . .” He shook his head, truly stunned by just how little belief his own father had in him. Sure, he hadn’t done much to earn it over the years, but . . . wasn’t there such a thing as unconditional love? His mother had it. Maria had it for Dylan. What the hell was with fathers these days? “Fuck, Dad, you act like you want my life to be a crapshoot.”

“Michael, I want you to be able to do a lot of things. I wish you could go to college and get a degree and play football. I wish you could do all the things I never got a chance to do.”

Michael laughed angrily. There it was, another subtle jab. The things he never got a chance to do. Because of the fact that he had a kid right out of high school. So really, what he was saying that it was all Michael’s fault his life had turned out so horribly. No one else’s.

“But let’s face it,” his dad kept on. “You’re not gonna go to college. You’re gonna get a job, probably something involving manual labor, like my job.”

“And I’m gonna end up just like you, huh?” he mumbled resentfully. Oh, wouldn’t that be the ultimate punishment for having the audacity to be born in the first place?

Thankfully, before the conversation could continue, Maria came downstairs. Like a breath of fresh air. The moment she stepped in the room, Michael felt like he could breathe again.

“Here, Andy, I wanted to give you this,” she said, passing him a check. “I figure it should cover the cost for what Dylan and I have been eating lately, at least.”

He took one look at the amount and smiled sarcastically. “Pretty sure you’ve been eatin’ more than that. Thanks.”

“You’re . . . welcome,” she said unsurely, looking down at Michael. “Hey.”

He gave her a half-wave, wishing he’d gone straight upstairs. Straight up to the bedroom. Straight to her. Why take this little detour to dad-land? If he’d been looking for encouragement, he should have known he wouldn’t find it there.

Unfortunately, even with Maria standing right there, his father could be counted upon to chew him out. He picked up the conversation right where it had left off. “You know what your problem is, Michael? You don’t even think about things. All you think about is gettin’ drunk and gettin’ laid and havin’ fun. You don’t think about the real world. You don’t think about all the shit you’re gonna have to deal with someday. You just don’t think.”

The only thing that kept him quiet was Maria’s warm hand, coming to rest on his shoulder. Silently, but supportively. He bent his left arm up and rested his hand atop hers, gently caressing her soft skin, and it calmed him down while his dad kept on insulting him. Once it was over, he’d go upstairs with her, lie down in bed, and think. About all the things he could do to not turn out this way.








TBC . . .

-April

Part 34

Posted: Sat Nov 22, 2014 11:46 am
by April
Eva:
Almost every little detail in his life is giving him a pointer about his future. About the decisions he's going to have to make. But he's chewing on them, over and over again. Like a really bad habit. But the habit is familiar territoy and that's where he"s staying: with Isabel, with no direct future ahead of him, with a father who likes to grind him down.
Good way to describe the place Michael's at in life right now.
I'm waiting for a catalyst, something that will set him off, doing something to become the man he wants to be. But who or what will that be?
Oh, there is definitely a catalyst, and I think I know exactly what it is. But to even give any hints at all would reveal way too much about what I have planned for this story. ;)

Carolyn:
The surprises just keep coming with this interesting, mixed up cast of characters.
I need a score card to keep the couples/hook-ups straight.
:lol: Yes, it's a tangled web of hook-ups.
One thing for certain......someone is an Alabama fan!
I am. They're my second-favorite football team.

Rodney:
You know......as much as Michael's dad is a drunk a-hole....what he said at the end with the only thinking about getting drunk and laid is dead on true about Michael.
Fair enough. Michael still needs to pull his head out of his ass. Not an easy thing to do, though, when your own dad basically tells you you're worthless.
Seems Alex has more sense than Isabel does when it comes to Michael.
Oh, yes. Alex is very logical and mature and has his head on straight, which many of these other characters do not!

Sara:
Maybe being around Andy more and more will actually HELP michael not become such a fucking drunk asshole. Right now he is just a drink idiot.....I do hope he ends the charade with Isabel.
Ending things with Isabel would turn over a new leaf for Michael, and he desperately needs that.
Look how quickly Alex ended things with Liz...and I am glad Alex pointed that all out to Isabel.....she needs to take a good hard look at herself and her relationship with Michael.
Alex is a really good guy. He talks the talk and walks the walk of being a good guy. He wasn't going to prolong his relationship with Liz when he found out that she did something that totally goes against his morals/values in a relationship.


Thank you for reading and leaving feedback! I really appreciate it!








Part 34








The first day back on the job at the Crashdown could not have been more different for Maria than her last day had been. Instead of waiting on greasy, grabby truckers, she was lucky enough to wait on a few elderly couples, one of whom, in particular, was completely adorable. The woman was doing all the talking, and the man was just sitting there, pretending not to listen. Or maybe really not listening, because his hearing aid was falling out of his ear. But every once in a while, he would look up at his wife and smile at her. Cutest thing ever.

Maria was all smiles herself as she gave them their coffee. “There you go,” she said, pleased by how easy it was to be a cheerful waitress when you actually had something to be cheerful about. “Your food should be out in a few minutes.”

“Thank you, sweetheart,” the woman said gratefully.

As Maria turned and headed back up to the counter, she heard the woman telling her husband, “You leave her a good tip now, Herb. She’s a good waitress.”

Ka-ching.

Waitressing wasn’t half bad when you had something to look forward to upon arriving home. The time wasn’t ticking by nearly as slowly as it once had. In fact, it was already lunchtime.

She joined Liz back at the counter, noting how sullen and discouraged the girl looked. “Are you sad that your long college winter break is ending?” she guessed.

“A little,” Liz admitted. “It’s nice to get to spend so much time with my dad.”

“I bet it’s exciting to go back, though.” In the back of her mind, she wondered if she would have been doing the same thing if she’d never had Dylan. Maybe she would have been in college. Maybe she would have been getting ready to return.

Or maybe she would have been a junkie in jail. Hard telling.

“It’s gonna be weird being back,” Liz said. “Alex is the T.A. for my Communications class.”

“Alex?” she echoed, trying to remember where she’d heard that name before.

“Ex-boyfriend,” Liz explained. “Actually, you might know him. He tutors Michael once a week.”

“Oh, that’s right.” Michael had mentioned him a few times, said he was really smart and a lot more helpful than most of his teachers were. “Nice guy.”

“Very,” Liz agreed. “Apparently I’m just not a nice enough girl to be with him.”

“Oh?” She didn’t want to pry, but it sounded like an uncomfortable break-up.

“He found out about me and Michael,” Liz explained. “Didn’t sit well with him.”

“But didn’t you and Michael hook up before you were dating him?”

“Yeah, but that doesn’t matter. I still never told him about it, so . . .” She exhaled shakily. “I think it just makes him see me differently now.”

Maria nodded slowly, contemplatively. Even though Michael had been the only one to actually be unfaithful . . . Liz was judged just as harshly. Maybe even more so, because she and Alex weren’t together anymore. Michael still had Isabel.

“God, I don’t know what’s worse,” Liz fretted, “the fact that my boyfriend broke up with me, or the fact that there’s a guy in my dorm I’m already interested in.”

“Oh, um . . .” Maria wasn’t sure how to respond. She didn’t know this girl very well, after all. Maybe a little spiel about how it was good to get back on the horse? Other fish in the sea? Something like that?

“You see, this is what being with Michael does to you. It makes you, like . . . insatiable.”

“Insatiable,” Maria echoed. “Meaning . . .” She trailed off, thinking she understood. “Oh.”

“I slept with Alex on our fourth date. Do you know how long I would’ve waited had I not already done it with Michael? Four months, at least. Four years, probably.”

“Well . . .” Maria shrugged. “That’s not so bad.” Hell, she and Max had done it after four high-as-a-kite days of knowing each other.

“It is, though,” Liz insisted. “And this new guy I’m interested in . . . I’m already imagining what it would be like to be with him.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that.” Half her days were now spent fantasizing about having sex with Michael.

“I was a virgin, and he turned me into this, like, crazed person.”

“That good, huh?” Damn. Now she was getting jealous.

“Uh, yeah. And keep in mind, it was my first time. He made my first time enjoyable. That’s really rare, isn’t it?”

“Oh, yeah.” Her first time hadn’t been Max’s first time, and needless to say, it had been over before it had started.

“If you guys ever hook up, you’ll see what I mean.”

She laughed nervously, convinced that she shouldn’t even entertain the idea. Fantasies were okay. Thinking that they could ever become a reality wasn’t.

“I can’t believe he hasn’t tried to sleep with you yet,” Liz admitted. “That must mean he really likes you.”

Again, Maria chuckled lightly, but when her mind registered what Liz had said . . . “Wait, what?”

Unfortunately, before Liz could answer, the door chime rang, and in walked the man himself: Michael. Liz immediately slinked off towards the kitchen, probably not wanting to deal with the awkwardness of seeing him again. And Maria was left wondering just what Liz had meant by ‘really likes you.’

“Hey,” Michael said, taking a seat on one of the bar stools.

“Hey,” she returned. “Open lunch?”

“Yep. Guess I’m gonna have to frequent this place again now that you’re working here.”

“Well, I can always use more tips,” she hinted.

Grinning, he reached into his pocket, took out a quarter, and slid it across the counter to her. “So what were you and my ex-tumble talkin’ about?”

“You, actually,” she confessed. “She was going on and on about your . . . how should I put it? Special talents?”

“Sex, huh?” he translated. “Oh, yeah. It’s a gift.”

Good lord, she thought, feeling the need to step outside and get some cool air.

“Can you take a break anytime soon?” he asked.

“Yeah, I think so. Just let me get this couple their food, and then maybe we can go out back? I need to ask you about something.”

“About sex?” He wriggled his eyebrows eagerly.

“No.” She wished. But this was actually something serious.

“Alright,” he said, standing up. “I’ll meet you out there.”

Of course, the elderly couple’s food ended up taking longer than Maria had thought it would, and by the time she got out back, Michael’s open lunch break was down to fifteen minutes. She talked fast, telling him all about how, the other night at Isabel’s New Year’s party, she’d discovered that card from her brother Max. And even though she’d been trying to push it out of her mind and not dwell on it, she still couldn’t stop thinking that maybe there was a connection.

“Okay,” Michael said after she’d told him her suspicion. “She does have a brother, yeah. I’ve never met him. I don’t even remember his name.”

“It’s Max. I’m sure of it.”

“Okay, so he’s got the same name.”

“Same age. Same location. Lives with his dad just like my Max did. Do you see what I’m saying? There’s too many similarities.”

“It might just be a coincidence,” he reasoned.

“But what if it’s not?” she pressed. “What if her long-lost brother is Dylan’s father?”

“That’d . . . be pretty weird.”

“Understatement.” She knew it was a small world and all, but . . . seriously? Was it even possible for it to be this small?

“Well, how are you gonna figure it out?” he prompted.

She sighed, feeling like an idiot for the question she was about to ask. “Okay, this might sound really stupid considering I’ve known you guys for almost half a year now, but . . .” Really, she could have asked anyone in town. But he was the only person she trusted enough. “Michael, what’s Isabel’s last name?”

“Evans,” he replied.

And that was when she could have sworn her heart stopped. Evans.

“What?” he asked.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“Go! G-O! Comets, fight—tonight! Say win—again! Go, fight, win!”

In the midst of doing a cheer she’d done a hundred times before, Isabel’s attention diverted as the gym doors opened and Michael poked his head in. Michael, who hadn’t come back to school that afternoon after leaving for lunch. She kept doing the cheer halfheartedly, distracted, until the rest of the squad noticed him, too. Like dogs in heat, they stopped and started grinning at him flirtatiously, hiking their already short practice shorts up a little higher.

“Isabel, can I talk to you?” he asked.

“Uh, Michael?” Tess jumped in before she could respond. “This is cheer practice. Now I know it might not seem like serious business to you . . .”

“Please,” he cut in, looking only at Isabel. “It’s important.”

Immediately, she tensed. Because he sounded so serious. So . . . unlike Michael. He definitely wasn’t just calling her out of practice to drag her into the eraser room. No. This was something else.

She set her pom-poms down and left the gym, following him outside to the parking lot with nervous anticipation. “What’s going on?” she asked.

He didn’t answer, but when she spotted Maria standing next to his car, she started to fear the worst. “What’s wrong?” If he needed to talk to her about something and if it was important and if Maria DeLuca of all people was there . . .

“We need to tell you something,” he said ominously when they got to the car.

She stayed a few steps back from the two of them, filled with panic and worry. It was all happening again, wasn’t it? The heartbreak, the confusion. She wasn’t going to walk in and see it with her own two eyes this time, but she was going to feel the pain even worse. “No, Michael,” she whimpered, “please don’t.”

He just stared at her, looking perplexed. Maria, being a girl, seemed to understand what she was anticipating, though, and quickly assured her, “Oh, no, Isabel, this isn’t . . .” Gesturing between her and Michael, she stammered, “It’s not . . .”

Subtly, she breathed a sigh of relief. But god, how pathetic was it that she’d just assumed he’d cheated on her again? She didn’t like that.

“This is about your brother,” Maria started.

“My brother?” The one she sometimes forgot she even had? The one she knew next to nothing about? Why on earth did they want to talk about him?

“Yeah,” Maria confirmed. “Max Evans?”

Isabel shrugged. “What about him?”

Maria exhaled heavily, taking a step closer. When she moved, Isabel noticed Dylan for the first time, strapped into the backseat of the car. He had a car seat now and everything. With Michael at the wheel and Maria in the passenger’s seat, they probably looked like a perfect little family.

“I don’t even really know how to say this,” Maria started in.

“Just say it.” Whatever it was, Isabel’s patience was growing short.

“Okay, well . . . when I was up in your room the other night and I saw that card . . .” She trailed off, shaking her head and starting over again. “Look, Isabel, before I lived here, I lived up in Albuquerque. That’s where I got pregnant. And the guy I was with when I was there . . . was named Max.”

Isabel crossed her arms over her chest, narrowing her eyes. “Okay . . .”

“Max Evans.”

She tapped her heel against the pavement, a nervous habit, already understanding where this was going. “That’s weird.”

“It’s more than weird,” Maria said. “Because he lived with his dad. No mom. Divorced. He never mentioned anything about having a sister, but . . . we didn’t always talk a lot.”

“Classy.”

“And he’s just a few months older than me, which would mean he’s old enough to be in college, just like you said your brother is.”

“Okay, so they have a lot in common. So what?”

“Isabel . . .” Michael gave her a look. “Come on.”

“What? What do you expect me to say?”

“Isabel.” Maria’s voice remained calm, but shaky, as if this were drudging up a whole bunch of emotions for her. “I think your brother is Dylan’s father. It’s just too much of a coincidence.”

“Well, what’s his dad’s name?” Isabel demanded.

“I . . . I don’t know,” Maria admitted sheepishly. “I never met him.”

Isabel huffed. “So you had a baby with the guy and you never even met his dad?”

“Is, stop it,” Michael cautioned.

“No, it’s fine,” Maria said. “Yes, I . . . had a baby with him and I didn’t know a whole lot about him. At the time, I wasn’t making many smart choices.”

“Okay, well, that’s tragic,” Isabel said, not even trying to sound sympathetic. She didn’t like this, just being put on the spot like this. “What do you expect me to do about it? Call him up? I don’t even know him.”

“No, no, I just . . . I was wondering if there was a way to . . . like, confirm it or something,” Maria said. “I just really wanna know. It’s gonna drive me crazy if I’m always wondering.”

“You got a picture of him?” Michael asked.

She threw her hands up exasperatedly. “Sure, in my back pocket,” she answered sarcastically.

“Do you think your mom has one?” Maria inquired.

“Maybe. I don’t know. In some old photo albums, buried away somewhere, maybe.”

“Could we . . . could we go see?” Maria asked softly. “Please. Isabel . . . I need to know.”

Isabel wrapped her arms tightly around herself, shivering as the wind gusted past. She looked into the backseat of the car again, watching momentarily as Dylan played with an old Etch-a-Sketch toy, completely oblivious to the conversation that they were all having.

As much as she hated to admit it, she needed to know now, too.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The waiting process at Isabel’s house that afternoon was painstaking. It wasn’t like they could help her, though. She said that, if she had a picture of Max, it would be when he was a kid. And she was the only one who would even have an inkling of what he had looked like back then.

While she went downstairs and rifled through all the photo albums in storage, Maria waited with Dylan and Michael in the living room. It had been nearly an hour now, and Dylan was clearly bored, so Michael was trying his best to entertain them. They were wrestling on the living room floor, and he had him in a harmless headlock. He wasn’t gripping him hard or anything, but it was enough that he couldn’t get out. Maria sat on the couch, watching nervously at first, but upon seeing that her son was having a good time, she lightened up.

“So what’re you hoping for when you see this picture?” Michael asked her. “To recognize him or not recognize him?”

She thought about it for a moment, then replied honestly, “I don’t know.” Maybe it didn’t matter as long as she was certain, one way or the other.

“Well, I’ll tell you one thing: If she doesn’t find this picture within the next ten minutes, I’m guessing it doesn’t exist.”

“Micho,” Dylan squeaked out. “I gib up.”

“You what?”

“I gib up.”

“Oh, you give up? I don’t think so. You said you’re gonna be a wrestler, right?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Then you gotta get tough. Come on, pin me.”

He struggled to get out of Michael’s hold, but once again, he couldn’t.

“Be careful,” Maria said.

“Ah, he’s fine.” Michael loosened his hold on purpose, and Dylan sprang to his feet, pushing back on Michael’s chest. He lay down, making a big spectacle of it, groaning and exclaiming, “You got me!” as Dylan jumped on top of him.

Maria watched in adoration as her little boy giggled excitedly.

“Dude, no fair,” Michael lamented. “You’re so strong.”

“I got you!”

“You got me.” Michael messed up his hair and asked, “Wanna see if I can lift you with one hand now?”

“Yeah!” Dylan exclaimed.

“Yeah? Let’s try it.” Just as they started to get situated there on the floor, the basement door swung open, and Isabel cleared her throat to get their attention.

“Did you find one?” Maria asked.

“I think so.” She motioned her over.

Maria exchanged a quick look with Michael, knowing he understood that his job right now was to keep Dylan distracted. “Okay, never mind, we’re gonna arm wrestle,” he said.

“What’s that?” Dylan asked.

“It’s easy. Come on. I’ll show you how.”

Maria got up and joined Isabel just in the other room, her heart thudding fast with anticipation.

“Okay, keep in mind, this picture’s really old,” Isabel cautioned, holding a photograph torn around the edges to her chest. “But it’s one of the few we still have. He was pretty young.”

“That’s okay.” Somehow, Maria sensed that if she even saw a young picture of him, she would just know. She’d been in love with Max Evans once. It wasn’t like she could just forget his face.

Slowly, Isabel held out the photo. It was of the whole Evans family many Christmases ago, standing in front of their tree. She had been so young that she could only stand by holding onto her mom’s hand, and Max hadn’t been much older. But there he was, standing beside her in a red sweater that said Santa Loves Me. And even though he couldn’t have been more than three years old, Maria recognized him instantly. Those eyes . . . she remembered those eyes. Many things changed about a person over the years, but eyes weren’t one of them. And the ears were kind of a dead giveaway, too. Back then, his hair hadn’t been quite so dark, but it was still a rich shade of brown.

“That’s him,” she confirmed.

“Are you sure?” Isabel asked.

“Positive.” Even though Dylan still had his blonde hair, there were many similarities. Eyes, ears . . . smiles, especially. The grin on the face of the boy in the picture was the same as the one Dylan had in all his pictures. Like father like son.

“Oh my god,” Isabel gasped. “So . . . are you sure sure?”

“Yes.” She couldn’t look at the picture any longer. Even seeing the toddler version of Max brought back painful memories. So she went back into the living room, caught Michael’s attention, and just nodded.

Michael let Dylan win their arm-wrestling match, then said, “Alright, buddy, I think we’re gonna head on home. You ready?”

“Wessel,” Dylan wined.

“We’ll wrestle more when we get home. Let’s go.” He got to his feet, lifting Dylan up to his, and brought him to the door. Maria returned to Isabel, waiting until Michael had gotten Dylan’s coat on and walked him outside before she started talking about it again.

“So . . .” Isabel pointed out the front door in disbelief. “So that’s my nephew out there?”

“Um . . . I guess. Technically.”

Isabel breathed in deeply, still seemingly dumbfounded by this newfound development. “How is this possible?”

“Look, Isabel, I don’t expect you to, like, suddenly think of him as family or anything,” Maria assured her. “I mean, you and your brother aren’t even close, so I don’t expect you to be close to Dylan.”

“No, he seems like a really sweet kid,” Isabel said. “It’s just . . . really weird, is all.”

“I know,” Maria agreed. “But listen, I’m not gonna say anything to him. And Isabel, I’d . . . I’d really appreciate it if you didn’t say anything to anyone.”

“What about my mom? I’m sure she’d just love to know she’s already a grandmother.”

“No, please don’t,” Maria begged. “It’s not that . . . it’s not that I’m trying to prevent her from knowing her grandson; it’s just that . . . I don’t necessarily want Dylan to know this side of his family.” She realized how rude that sounded and felt the need to quickly clarify. “And it has nothing to do with you or your mom. It’s just because of Max. I don’t want him to have any connection to him.”

“Why’s that?” Isabel asked.

Maria sighed. There were things about her brother that Isabel was probably better off not knowing, but at this point, there was no need to sugarcoat it. “Okay, you and your brother are basically nothing alike. I mean, it’s like night and day. You’re destined for success; he’s destined for failure.”

Isabel gave her a skeptical look. “This doesn’t sound like someone who used to love the guy.”

“No, I did,” Maria insisted. “But . . . it’s like I said, I didn’t make the best choices back then. And Max was a really bad choice. He’s a bad guy; he’s involved in some bad stuff.”

“Like what?” Isabel challenged.

“Drugs. Doing and dealing.”

A look of alarm crashed over Isabel’s face.

“And he made it perfectly clear that he wants nothing to do with his son, so if you wouldn’t mind, I’d like to keep it that way. You know, I know, and Michael knows. That’s it.”

Isabel recoiled a bit, nodding understandingly.

“Thank you,” Maria said. “Really, Isabel, thank you for everything. I just had to know.”

“Well, now you do,” Isabel mumbled. “And so do I. And I kinda wish I didn’t. It’s sad that my own brother turned out to be such a douche.”

“Yeah,” Maria agreed. No one had been sadder about it than she’d been. “It’s okay, though. Dylan and I are probably better off without him.”

“Maybe so, but . . .” Isabel stared down at the photo of her family for a moment, then looked back up with tears in her eyes. “I don’t know what it’s like to have a child, but I know what it’s like to have a single mother. And even though she made it look easy, it wasn’t easy. No woman should have to do that alone.”

I’m not alone, Maria thought, peeking once again at the photo of a happy family that had probably been anything but happy. I have Michael.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Kyle’s press conference was a media circus that evening. The last thing Isabel felt like doing was getting dressed up in her cheerleading uniform and clamoring through that mass crowd of people to stand off to the side of the podium while Kyle got up to talk, but since that was what Tess said they would do, that was what she and the other cheerleaders did. There was a lot of mulling about before Kyle actually got up to make his announcement, but the minute he spoke his first word, the rest of the auditorium was silent.

“First off, I’d like to thank everyone for being here tonight,” he began, referring to a notecard for assistance. “This is a momentous occasion for myself and my family, and I’m excited to be able to share it with all of you. For months, there has been speculation about where I will be attending school next fall, and tonight, I’m eager to announce my decision and make a formal verbal commitment on the record.”

“He’s so hot,” Tess marveled quietly.

Isabel laughed lightly.

“This decision was one I undertook with the utmost consideration and contemplation.”

Isabel sighed impatiently. Yeah, she knew it was a speech, but anyone with half a brain knew where Kyle was headed. He was just dragging it out.

“I’m pleased to announce that I plan to attend the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa this fall.”

Everyone clapped, and the flashbulbs of journalists’ cameras all clicked in rapid succession.

“Roll Tide,” Tess quipped, ruffling her pom poms together.

Isabel smiled. Undoubtedly, her friend was going to go out and purchase an entire wardrobe of Crimson Tide gear now. And of course she would just have to get season tickets to all the games.

When the crowd quieted down again, Kyle continued on: “It’s been a dream of mine to play football at Alabama for many years, and a dream to play college football in general for a lot longer than that. I cannot express how thrilled I am to have been blessed with this opportunity to play with the most electric teammates and the most efficient coach in all the land. The next chapter of my life is one that I am approaching with the utmost enthusiasm, as well as with the encouragement of the man who helped get me here, an alumnus of the university himself, my father, Jim Valenti.”

Again, the crowd clapped, and Isabel took the short delay to lean over to her best friend and say, “When this is all over, we need to talk.”

“I can’t,” Tess said. “I’m going over to Kyle’s.”

“It’ll only take a minute,” Isabel assured her, keeping a smile glued to her face, just in case the news cameras happened to pan over to her.

As it turned out, the talking was more like venting. Before the crowd started to clear out, she and Tess slipped outside to the parking lot, and Isabel told her all about the whole Max Evans revelation. Pacing back and forth, she couldn’t contain her anger, nor could she contain her volume.

“God, it’s just so typical!” she ground out. “Lately, everything in my life seems to revolve around that girl! Every time I turn around, she’s there. And now I will always have some connection to her. Even if she leaves this town and I never see her again, I’ll always know that her son is my nephew.”

“This is so crazy,” Tess chimed in. “This whole thing is like a soap opera or something.”

“Not a very good one.” Isabel growled in frustration, clenching her hands into fists, still pacing. “God! What’re the chances? This is like . . . unbelievably unlucky is what it is. Because unlike my boyfriend, I want nothing to do with the girl, and then there’s this. And I can’t even talk to my mom about it, because if I do, then Michael will get mad at me for betraying Maria’s trust. Just how screwed up is that?”

Majorly,” Tess replied emphatically.

“And I think I’ve been pretty understanding about everything so far. And I’ve been pretty calm, and up until now, I was even pretty calm about this. But it’s just . . . so frustrating.” Even though anger was the main fuel for this rant, her voice quivered, and she realized she was on the brink of tears, too. “This girl . . . she’s just the waitress. She’s the freakin’ Crashdown Café waitress. She could’ve just been anyone not all that long ago, and suddenly she’s this huge someone in Michael’s life. And now she has a part in my life, too, that I never wanted her to have, and I don’t get it, and I don’t like it.”

“I don’t blame you,” Tess sympathized. “Isabel, this is a beyond-weird situation.”

“No, Tess, you don’t get it. It’s agonizing,” Isabel corrected. “Not only does she live with my boyfriend, but she screwed my brother and gave birth to my nephew. I literally don’t even care if I sound like the world’s biggest bitch right now, because I’m so fed up with this, and I can’t get rid of her.” A few tears spilled over, surprising Isabel herself. She hadn’t realized how much she’d been holding in until she’d let it all out.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The press conference was a little more than just a press conference; it ended up being a full-blown community event, which lasted a little too long for Michael’s taste. He left early, eager to get home and be with Maria for a while. She said she was tired, though, and was already in pajamas when he got there. One of his long-sleeved t-shirts this time. Sweatpants instead of short shorts, though. Bummer.

He joined her while she was brushing her teeth in the bathroom, noticing that she was being very quiet. Very up in her own head. He wanted to bring her back, wanted her to be right there with him instead of back in Albuquerque with Max.

Spitting into the sink, he rinsed off his toothbrush and took a quick drink of water, glancing at her quickly in the mirror. She was wiping the makeup off her eyes. Either that or she was wiping tears away.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Mmm-hmm.”

Hmm . . . She didn’t sound okay. “Kind of a weird day, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“Probably brings back a lot of memories.”

“Yep.” She bent over the sink, splashing water to her face, then dried off with a towel and quickly tried to scurry out of the bathroom.

“Hey,” he said, grabbing hold of her wrist gently, preventing her from leaving. “Are you ever gonna tell me the full story?”

She wrinkled her forehead, acting confused. “What do you mean?”

“Well, we’ve gotten pretty close, Maria, and still, all I know about Max is that he’s a deadbeat dad.”

She shrugged, trying to seem nonchalant. “I told you, he’s into some bad stuff.”

“Okay, deadbeat in general. What else?” He wasn’t about to let her off the hook here. If she didn’t talk to someone, she’d regret it.

“Michael . . .”

“Come on,” he urged, taking her hand in his, pulling her closer to him once again. “If you can’t tell me, who can you tell?”

She sighed, grazing her fingers over his knuckles for a moment, then slowly removed her hand from his and wrapped her arms around herself nervously. “Michael, I’ve never talked about this with anyone before. Not my mom, not my dad.”

That would resonate with him later, when he was lying next to her, watching her sleep. The fact that she trusted him enough to divulge something . . . that would sink in. For now, he just wanted to know. He wanted to know more about her. So he just stared at her, silently encouraging her to tell him. To tell him things she’d never told anyone before.

Exhaling shakily, she started in. “I don’t even know why I was so head over heels for him,” she confessed. “I just . . . I was young and stupid and . . . he was really cute, and he had that whole bad boy thing going on. Like way more than you do. No offense.”

He cracked a smile. That was fine. Even though he could be pretty low sometimes, he had no desire to be on the same level as Max Evans.

“Looking back, I know he had lots of other girls on the side, but . . . I didn’t realize it at the time, so when I found out I was pregnant, I had all these visions of us, like, raising the baby together and getting our own place and being this perfect, happy family. But obviously . . . that didn’t . . .” She trailed off, sighing again. “When I told him I was pregnant, his first reaction . . . the exact words he said to me . . . ‘Take care of it.’” Tears sprung to her eyes.

“He wanted you to have an abortion,” Michael concluded.

She nodded sadly, her bottom lip quivering. “He gave me the money to have it done and everything. And . . . I thought about it.” She lowered her head, seeming, for a moment, embarrassed to admit that. “I mean, I was fifteen. Of course I thought about it. But then I—I decided I couldn’t do it, and when I told him I wasn’t going to, he said he’d never speak to me again if I didn’t.”

Son of a bitch, Michael thought. Sure, he’d never been in that situation before, but if he was . . . regardless of who the mother was, he liked to think that he wouldn’t be quite such a world-class ass about it.

“So I said that was fine.” She paused for a moment, laughing at herself. “No, actually, I cried and begged and . . . just was pathetic in general. But it didn’t work. So pretty much the whole time I was pregnant, we didn’t speak. We didn’t see each other. He went on with his life, kept doing the whole drug thing, and I got clean, got my head on straight. I mean, I had to, you know? You can’t do that stuff when you’re gonna have a baby.”

He smiled, wishing he could find a way to tell her how much he respected that. As someone who liked to indulge in his fair share of life’s more addictive things, he knew how hard it was to change.

“But I never planned on keeping him,” she divulged. “I was gonna give him up for adoption. I thought that’d be the best thing to do, you know? I couldn’t give him a great life, so I figured I’d give him to someone who could. I’d take care of him while I was hauling him around, and then I’d hand him off to someone else who could take care of him after he was born. Simple.”

“So what changed?” Michael asked. Chances were, she’d seen Dylan and had a change of heart, but . . .

“Max.”

. . . there was always that. He sensed where this was going.

“Max changed,” she revealed. “Or . . . he said he did. He came to me about a month before Dylan was born, and he said he was trying to turn his life around. He said he didn’t want me to give the baby up for adoption, because he wanted to be there for me. For both of us. He wanted to be part of his child’s life. He promised he would be. He said that, if I kept the baby, we’d raise him together, and we’d be a family, and everything would be alright.” She smiled regretfully, sadly. Saddest smile Michael had ever seen. “And I believed him. I still loved him, you know. I wanted to be with him. And I wanted Dylan to have a father. So I called off the adoption, and for a few weeks, things were good. Max was actually really sweet. We had a baby shower and he came. We picked out a crib together. It seemed like it was gonna work.”

“But it didn’t.”

She shook her head. “When I went into labor, I called him, and he said he was out of town, but he’d hurry there. But he never got there. I was in labor for ten hours, and he never got there. And even afterward, he didn’t show up. So I took Dylan home. Alone. And I started taking care of him on my own, and I kept calling Max, but he just got to the point where he didn’t answer. And so I kinda realized he was probably using again. Probably off with some other girl. And eventually, when he finally did show up, Dylan was already two months old. He stayed with him for half an hour and then he left. And he never ever came to see him again.”

Michael stared at her in astonishment. Leaving Maria was one thing, but leaving Maria and Dylan? How was that even possible? The kid was incredible. Adorable, smart, probably destined to do great things in life. How could you just check out on that?

“And that’s fine, because I don’t want Dylan to have any connection to him. That’s why I don’t even care that Max doesn’t pay child support. I don’t want him to feel like he has any say in what goes on in Dylan’s life.”

“So you end up doing it all alone.” God, this girl was tough. Tougher than he’d even realized.

“Yep. So . . . that’s the whole story,” she said with a simple shrug. “I was never supposed to raise Dylan, but that’s how it ended up. Because I believed Max. I believed what he told me. Like an idiot.”

“You’re not an idiot. Hey.” He cupped her cheek, forcing her to look at him. “You’re amazing.”

“I’m a mess.”

“An amazing mess.”

She smiled tearfully.

“I’m serious,” he said, stroking her soft skin with his thumb. “Dylan’s so lucky to have you as a mom.”

She tried to keep smiling, but she started crying when he said that. She tried to hold it in, but she couldn’t. “I’m sorry,” she apologized, dabbing at the corners of her eyes with her shirt sleeves.

“It’s okay.” He encircled his arms around her, pulling her in close, hugging her tightly. She rested the side of her face against his chest and kept crying. Maybe she was sad because she was remembering a difficult time, or maybe she was relieved because she’d finally gotten it off her chest. Either way, she was strong. She was the strongest person he knew; and when he held her like that, he had no idea how Max had ever let her go.








TBC . . .

-April

Part 35

Posted: Sat Nov 29, 2014 11:48 am
by April
Happy belated Thanksgiving to anyone who observes the holiday! This is one of my favorite times of the year, not only because of Thanksgiving, but because it's college football's rivalry weekend! Can't beat it.


Carolyn:
This certainly isn't a very pretty picture of Max Evans.........what a jerk!
No, it's most certainly not. He was young, too, at the time, but it still sucks that he didn't step up and handle the situation differently.

Rod:
Is it wrong that I found it kind a hot when Tess said Roll Tide? !
Nope, not at all. In fact, I actually kind of figured you would. ;)

Iron Bowl today. Let's hope it's not a repeat of last year.

Michael: I like your current icon now, too. :)
Isabel just sounds like a whiny little kid to me. It's all about her and how she feels... she doesn't stop to think about Maria or why she's so scared about Max finding out that she's in Roswell with his son... hell, she doesn't even think about her nephew! It's about her and how effects HER and Michael. God, it just pisses me off!
Isabel has put up with a lot from Michael so far in this story, and everything at this point is just adding to her frustration. So clearly she should just stop putting up with stuff and put an end to it all, but it's just not that easy for her, because she's blinded by her own feelings for Michael.
I'm probably going to be the only one to say this but I'm not quite putting Max on my asshole list just yet. Don't get me wrong he's on a whole lot of other bad lists of mine... but I still wanna give him a chance and get to know him a little more before slamming the door.
Hey, fair enough. So far all we know about Max is Maria's version of him.


Thank you for the feedback! It means a lot.








Part 35








The worst part about Study Buddies was that it was actually helpful. Every time Isabel asked him how it went, Michael had to swallow his pride and tell her it’d gone well, that he’d gotten a lot of work done, because Alex always made sure he did. The guy was going to make a great teacher someday.

“Alright, math’s done,” he proclaimed, closing Michael’s textbook for him. “That’s good. What’s next?”

Slouching back in his chair, Michael let out a huge yawn, trying to remember what other bullshit the teachers had piled on that day. “I got a rough draft of an English essay due tomorrow.”

“Oh, yeah? What kind of essay is it? Expository?”

What the hell was that? “Possibly.”

“Is it persuasive?” Alex clarified.

“Oh. Yeah.” He bent over to the side, reaching down into his backpack to see if he could find what he’d started on during study hall. At the tail end of study hall. After sitting there, wasting time for the first forty-five minutes.

“Let’s see what you’ve got so far,” Alex said.

Locating the crumpled sheet of paper in the bottom of his backpack, he pulled it out, smoothed it open, and set it down in front of his tutor. Wasn’t much. One paragraph. But it was a good, solid introduction as far as he was concerned.

“That’s it?” Alex stared at him incredulously. “The whole rough draft’s due tomorrow and you’ve got one paragraph done?”

He just shrugged. Whatever, it was a start.

“Well, what’s your topic?” Alex asked.

“Abortion.”

“Abortion.” He made a face. “You know, you might wanna choose a different topic. Everyone writes about that. Your teacher’s probably gonna read a dozen different essays that all sound alike.”

“She said to pick something we feel strongly about.”

“And you feel strongly about that?”

“Yeah, strongly against.”

“Really?” Alex sounded surprised.

“Well, I can almost guarantee my dad wanted to abort me, and if he’d gotten his way, I wouldn’t be here. So yeah, I feel strongly.” Not to mention, Dylan had been fresh in his mind when he’d been brainstorming a topic.

“Okay, let me take a look at this,” Alex said, swiftly putting on a pair of reading glasses. He’d barely even started when he slapped his hand down on the table and gave Michael a look. “Your first sentence. Your attention-grabber. Really?”

“What’s wrong with it?”

Alex read it directly from the paper. “Attention: Abortion is wrong.”

“It works.” Hell, what word grabbed people’s attention more than the word attention itself? It was genius.

“Okay, we need to re-work this.”

“No, it’s fine,” Michael whined. “Come on, let’s just leave it. You have no idea how painstaking it was for me to get that paragraph down. I hate writing.”

“You hate writing. You hate reading. What exactly do you like to do?”

Unable to conceal a grin, Michael lifted his eyebrows.

“Besides that.”

“Well . . .” There wasn’t much. “I like to play football. Like to eat. Listen to music. That’s about it, really.”

“Okay, music. Let’s go with that,” Alex suggested. “What if you were using this essay to make an argument about . . . the world’s greatest band or something?”

“Metallica.” No-brainer.

“Or the best ever decade of music.”

“Oh, the 90s.”

“Why’s that?”

“Because of Metallica. And Nirvana. And Radiohead. It was, like, the height of grunge and hard rock. Nowadays everything’s auto-tuned and . . . freakin’ Kesha and Katy Perry everywhere. It makes me wanna puke.”

Alex looked like he was about to jump out of his seat, getting all excited the way teachers did when they saw the light bulb in their students’ brains kick on. “Okay, this is a good topic. I can tell you feel strongly about it. Go for it.”

Sighing, Michael reluctantly picked up his pencil, crossed out the introductory paragraph he already had written, and started writing a new one below it. He knew Alex must have been about ready to flip the table over when he watched him write down his first line: Attention! Music today sucks.

Once it was time to go, Michael had written the majority of his essay; but of course, as they packed up, Alex was making sure to remind him of what he had left. “Just write that conclusion tonight, man. Make sure you do it.”

“I will.” He probably wouldn’t.

“You’re so close. You’re almost done. And the conclusion’s easy. You just restate your intro using different words.”

“So I can’t use attention again?”

Alex chuckled lightly, packing up his own backpack. “No, I wouldn’t.”

“Damn.” Michael swung his bag over his shoulders, realizing that, besides this stupid conclusion, he really didn’t have any homework tonight. It was kind of a nice feeling. “Hey, listen, man,” he said, getting serious for just about the first time ever in Study Buddies. “I know I’m not the easiest student to work with, but you do a good job. So thanks.”

Alex seemed . . . almost flabbergasted. And what teacher wouldn’t be? Teaching was sort of a thankless job most of the time. “Oh, well . . . you’re welcome,” he said.

“And I couldn’t help but hear through the grapevine that I kinda caused your relationship to implode so . . . sorry about that.”

“My . . . what?”

“You were datin’ Liz Parker, right?” He was just going by what Maria had told him. Hopefully she had her info right.

“Uh . . . yeah. I was.”

“Hey, listen, she’s a pretty good girl. She just . . . couldn’t resist me. You know, very few people can.”

Alex managed to laugh a little again. “I’m sure she’s fine. But . . . I don’t know, once that all came to light, I think I just realized it wasn’t meant to be. And that’s okay.”

Michael made a face, teasing, “You really believe in all that soul-mate, meant-to-be crap?”

“Yeah,” Alex replied unabashedly, even going so far as to question, “Don’t you?”

Michael fidgeted with the straps of his backpack, deliberately not answering. Because for as long as he could remember, the answer to that question had been pretty damn clear. But lately, it wasn’t clear at all.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The Guerin kitchen wasn’t exactly the best place for a birthday party, but it’d have to do. Actually, it didn’t look half bad once they put up streamers and balloons. Dylan would think it looked like a palace.

“Do you think he’ll be surprised?” Maria asked as they set the table with all the multi-colored birthday cups, napkins, and plates.

“Oh, yeah. He’ll love it. Has he ever had a birthday party before?”

“Not really.” She beamed, obviously excited for her son. “This is the first year he’ll be able to open his presents himself, and the first year he’ll be able to enjoy his cake without, you know, slamming his entire face in it.”

“I don’t know, he might be tempted. That’s a pretty good-lookin’ cake.” He finished setting a place for his dad, even though he surely wouldn’t be there, and sauntered up to Maria while she stuck three candles into the top of a chocolate-frosted marble cake.

“I got it at the store,” she said. “Pretty cheap, too.”

“Looks good.”

“I hope it tastes good.”

He swiped his index finger along the bottom of the cake, gathering some of the frosting.

“Hey!” she yelped.

Instead of taste-testing it, he smeared it across her left cheek.

“Michael!”

“What?” he asked innocently.

Retaliating, she swiped some of the frosting from the other side of the cake, attempting to do the same to him, but he grabbed her hand and held it a safe distance away from his face. “No fair,” she said, struggling against him.

With his free hand, he dabbed at some more frosting and smeared it across the other side of her face. She looked like a football player wearing eye-black now. A sexy female football player, of course.

“Stop it!” she hissed. “You’re ruining Dylan’s cake.”

“Okay. Sorry.” He took a few steps back, holding both his hands up to signal a surrender.

She shook her head, pretending to be upset with him, and then licked the chocolate frosting off of her own finger. Oh god. He just couldn’t watch her do stuff like that anymore. Damn.

“Is it good?” he asked.

She nodded. “Yeah, it’s really good.” When she made the mistake of turning her back to him, he plucked one of the balloons off of the back of the chair they’d taped it to and smothered it all over her head, making her hair all frizzy with static. “Michael!”

Really, how could he not give her a hard time like this? It was so easy. Not to mention, fun.

They waited until his mom got home from work to actually start the party, so the sun had already set by the time they began. It was worth the wait, though, just to see Dylan’s face light up when he walked out of his room and saw what awaited him in the kitchen. In addition to the decorations and the cake, there was a small stack of presents on the counter. Not much. A few from Maria, and one from everyone else. But it was probably more than he’d ever gotten for a birthday before.

This would probably be the first birthday he would remember, even if the memories were vague. And Michael was genuinely glad that he got to play a small part in making it a happy memory for the little guy.

“Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday, dear Dylan!” they sang in unison. “Happy birthday to you!”

“Yay!” Maria exclaimed, clapping for her son. “Blow out your candles, sweetie.”

He had to sit on a pillow just to be able to see over the table. He hoisted himself up further, balancing on his knees.

“Make a wish,” Tina added.

He stopped just as he was about to blow, looked over at her, then looked up at Michael and smiled. And then, with one giant puff, he got all three of his candles out. They all applauded him, and he beamed proudly.

“Nice job, honey,” Maria said, squeezing his shoulders. “Okay, do you want cake or presents first?”

“Pwesents!” he exclaimed without hesitation.

“Okay, which one do you want first?” she asked.

“Micho’s.”

“Wise choice indeed, my friend.” Michael went over to the counter and found the box he’d attempted to wrap up. He’d had to use Santa Claus paper, because they didn’t have any plain wrapping paper or birthday paper. But Christmas had only been a few weeks ago, so it was okay.

“I’ll cut everyone a slice of cake while he’s unwrapping,” Krista told Maria.

“Okay, thanks.”

Dylan hopped down off the chair and scampered over to the counter, holding his hands up.

“Alright, here you go,” Michael said, handing him the box. “I hope you like it.”

Dylan plopped right down on the floor and started tearing at the wrapping paper. Michael stepped back, rejoining Maria by the table, and watched as Dylan made quick work of his shoddy wrapping job.

“What’d you get him?” she asked quietly.

“You’ll see.” Truth be told, he was a little nervous about it, because it wasn’t a toy. And sometimes when kids were this age, all they were interested in were toys. But he felt like he knew Dylan pretty well at this point, and he had a good idea of what he would like.

“Tina, help him,” he urged his sister when the little boy started to have problems getting the box un-taped.

Tina knelt down beside him and peeled back the tape, taking the lid off the box for him. He then lifted off a thin sheet of tissue paper to reveal the gift underneath. “Whoa!” he gasped. “Cool!”

“What’d you get?” Maria asked.

He held up a dark green jersey with white lettering. The number sixty-nine was on both sides, and the last name Guerin was on the back.

“That’s my football jersey from junior high,” Michael explained to him. “Back when I was, like, twelve years old and went to East Roswell Middle School. We were the Rockets.”

“Cool,” Dylan said again, eyeing the jersey as though it were treasure.

“I want you to have it, ‘cause you’re gonna be a football player someday,” Michael expressed. “Now I know it’s kinda big right now, but you’ll grow into it.”

Dylan set the jersey down and gazed at Michael with wide, elated eyes. “It’s awesome!”

“Good, I’m glad you like it.”

“You were number sixty-nine even back then?” Maria mumbled.

He shrugged in admittance. Hey, junior high kids were the biggest gutter-heads of all, and he’d been no exception.

“Can I wear it?” Dylan asked eagerly.

“Sure,” Maria told him.

“Here, let me help you put it on.” Michael made his way back over to him and took the jersey out of his hands. “Alright, lift your arms up.”

Dylan did as he was instructed, and Michael stood beside him. The jersey was so big that he was pretty much able to just drop it over his head and arms. Yeah, the kid was swimming in it, but he looked adorable.

“Thanks, Micho,” he said.

“You’re welcome. Happy birthday, buddy.” Michael bent down and gave him a quick kiss on the head. There weren’t many people he would give his football jersey to, even a junior high one. But Dylan DeLuca . . . he was special.

“That looks nice Dylan,” Michael’s mom complimented.

“Yeah, you look like Michael now,” Tina added.

That made Dylan smile even more.

“Okay,” Maria said, moving it along, “which one do you want next?”

He glanced back at his presents, mulling it over a minute before deciding, “The big one!”

Michael lifted it off the counter and set it down in front of him just as the doorbell chimed. “I’ll go get it,” he volunteered, figuring it would take Dylan so long to open that humungous present that all he’d miss was a little more unwrapping.

When he opened the door, there was Isabel, a gift of her own in hand. “Hey,” she said, immediately looping her arms around his neck and kissing him.

“Hey,” he mumbled against her lips, pulling back just slightly. “What’re you doin’ here?”

“Sorry I’m late,” she apologized without answering. “I had to finish the rough draft of that essay.” She kicked off her shoes, hung her coat up on the rack, and headed straight into the kitchen. He followed, semi-confused. Had he invited her? She’d asked him during study hall what his plans were for the evening, and he’d mentioned the birthday party, but . . . that wasn’t the same as an invitation. Not that she wasn’t . . . welcome or whatever. It was just . . . well, it was going to be harder to flirt with Maria with her around.

“Hey, guys!” Isabel greeted cheerfully. “Ooh, this looks fun. Happy birthday, Dylan.”

Yeah, I think she kinda invited herself, Michael decided, stepping up in between her and Maria.

“Dylan, you remember Isabel, right?” Maria asked.

He nodded and paused his unwrapping. “Hi.”

“Hi,” Isabel returned with a little wave.

“That’s nice of you to join us,” his mother said, offering her a slice of cake. She politely declined.

When Maria went to help Dylan with the unwrapping, Michael pulled Isabel back a bit and once again asked, “So what’re you doin’ here? I didn’t expect you to come.”

“Well, when you mentioned this little party, I figured I should,” she explained. “I mean, I am technically his aunt, you know.”

“You still haven’t told anyone about that yet, have you?”

“No,” she assured him. “Well . . .”

Oh, great.

“Just Tess.”

“What? Why’d you tell her? She’s gonna tell everyone.”

“No, she’ll just tell Kyle. And he won’t tell anyone.”

Well, at least that much was true. Hopefully Tess didn’t blabber to anyone else, though. Dylan’s lineage was a private matter. Maria wanted it that way, understandably.

“When we get a chance, I was kinda thinking we could slip away for a few minutes,” Isabel whispered, grinning suggestively.

“What?”

She motioned upstairs with her head. Huh. Weird. It wasn’t that often his girlfriend initiated a fast little fuck.

He couldn’t very well turn it down, so they ate their cake fast and headed upstairs. He’d barely opened the door to his bedroom, though, when she was throwing herself all over him. Literally all over him. He couldn’t even keep track of where her hands were, and she was kissing him almost violently.

He shut the door with his foot, taken aback, and they staggered into the middle of the room. “This isn’t like you,” he said.

“I know.” She lifted his shirt up over his head and threw it on the ground.” Do you like it?”

Truthfully . . . he wasn’t sure he did. He had no problem letting a girl dominate once in a while, but this just wasn’t Isabel’s style.

“I just wanna be close to you,” she said, roaming her hands all over his bare chest. For a moment, she seemed like she was going to slow things down, but then the next second, she was kissing him like a crazy woman again, like she couldn’t get enough.

She was trying too hard. It didn’t suit her.

He kissed her back, though, because the last thing he wanted to do was hurt her feelings. But when she tried pulling him back towards the bed, he stopped. No. No way. He couldn’t have sex with her there and then sleep in that same bed later that night with Maria. That would just be too fucked up.

“Let’s do it right here,” he decided, dragging her down onto the floor with him. Yeah. That would work.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Watching Maria work in the Crashdown nowadays was like watching a different girl. She smiled more. She interacted more with the customers. If there was a training video about how to be a good waitress, she’d be the star of it.

Michael stood outside for a good minute or so, just watching her work, and when he started to feel like too much of a creeper, he headed inside. An elderly couple was hobbling out, and the woman was talking to Maria, saying things like, “You do such a good job, honey. You’re our favorite waitress.”

“Oh, thank you,” Maria said, waving goodbye to them. “Take care, you guys.” Once they were gone, she turned to Michael and babbled excitedly, “Did you hear that? I’m their favorite waitress.”

“Mine, too.”

“They come in here every day and order the exact same thing and have the exact same conversation. I swear, they’re the cutest thing ever.”

He looked her up and down, admiring the way her legs looked in that short little skirt. Cutest thing ever? Uh, he had a nomination for that.

“You should tell your boss they said that to you,” he suggested.

“No, I don’t wanna sound like I’m bragging myself up.”

“Well, I got no problem bragging myself up.” He adjusted her alien antennae headband and said, “Guess what I found out today.”

“What?”

“I got nominated for snowball king.”

“Really?” She just smiled and nodded, looking like she could barely keep a straight face.

“Yeah, we have this stupid winter formal comin’ up. Snowball king and queen. And the thing is, I think I’m gonna win.” Bubba was really only nominated because of his personality, and the other two were extreme long-shots.

“Really? You’re gonna beat Kyle?”

“No, they have this rule that you can’t be nominated for every one of the big dances. So Kyle got homecoming king, and he’ll get prom king, too. Isabel’s probably gonna get prom queen. And that leaves me with snowball king.” It was a step up from what he’d gotten last year at East: luau king.

“Huh, so if you’re gonna be snowball king, who’s your snowball queen gonna be?”

“Oh, you can be my snowball queen.”

“Ooh, I’m flattered,” she joked, fanning herself.

“Nah, I think it’s gonna be red-headed Roxie. She’s pretty hot, so I’m alright with it.” They’d have to do the mandatory slow-dance together, so at least he’d have a legitimate excuse to have his hands on another woman. Isabel couldn’t chew him out for that.

“Well, congrats,” she said. “What’re you doing here so early, though? It’s not lunch yet.”

“I know. I just felt like gettin’ outta there.” At this point, school was feeling more pointless than ever. “Plus, I—I wanna tell you somethin’.”

She gave him a confused look.

“Besides the snowball thing.” He glanced around, noting that they didn’t look too busy. There was another waitress on duty, and the only customers there were sitting in her section. “Can we slip out back?”

“Yeah,” she said, removing her headband. “Sure.”

When they were out there, all he could think at first was, I gotta take this girl somewhere new. They had started frequenting this back alley a lot lately, especially since the restaurant was sometimes too crowded at lunchtime. But they were back by the dumpster out there. Not exactly . . . romantic. Not that he cared about being romantic. This wasn’t even meant to be a romantic conversation.

“Get a load of this,” he said, taking an envelope out of his pocket. He unfolded it and handed it to her. “It was in the mail yesterday.”

She took it from him, her attention immediately drawn to the address of the sender. University of Alabama, Office of Admissions.

He gestured for her to open it, so she did. “Congratulations,” she read aloud, “on your acceptance into the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa. Oh my god, Michael!”

“Yeah. I was shocked.”

“You got in! This is awesome.”

“I don’t even know why they’d want me. I mean, my grades are fucked up, Maria. They’re okay this year, but every other year . . . I probably don’t even deserve to graduate. And I can’t even remember how many times I’ve been arrested. You would think they’d take one look at my record and say ‘forget it.’”

“Maybe it has to do with the football stuff,” she hypothesized.

“Yeah, but this isn’t like Kyle. I don’t have an athletic scholarship. I’m not being recruited. I’m just accepted. I mean, I could still be on the team. I could be a walk-on. But that’s not why they accepted me.”

“Well, maybe they just--”

“You know what it is?” he cut in. “It’s my fuckin’ ACT score. Isabel made me take it last year, and I actually tried, so I didn’t do half bad. I got a twenty-nine.”

“A—a twenty-nine?” she sputtered. “Holy crap, Michael. Isn’t the highest you can get, like, a thirty-six?”

“Yeah. Isabel got a thirty-two.”

“Wow. So I guess it’s a good thing she made you take it then.”

“Yeah, I guess,” he muttered in agreement, taking the letter back from her. “So what do you think?”

She smiled up at him, looking all proud, and then she hugged him. “Congratulations. I’m so happy for you.”

He closed his eyes, breathing in the scent of her hair, her perfume, all of her. But then she released him all too quickly.

“Who else have you told?” she asked.

“No one. Just you.” He’d meant to tell her last night, but things had been crazy with Dylan’s birthday party and Isabel popping over to . . . well, fuck, basically. Plus, he had to let it sink in himself. In a way, it still didn’t seem real. “Hey, listen, do me a favor and don’t mention it to anyone else yet,” he entreated. “Not my mom, not my dad. Definitely not Isabel. I got a lot of stuff to figure out now, and I don’t want them trying to figure it out for me.”

“Yeah, sure,” she said, nodding in understanding. “I won’t say anything.”

And that right there was one of the reasons why he’d told her, and why she would probably be the only person he would tell besides Kyle. Because she wouldn’t tell anyone else. In a weird way, he liked having all these little secrets with her.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Even though she’d worked for six hours at the Crashdown and four hours at the library and felt plenty tired, Maria could not fall asleep that night. She lay in bed, on her side, trying everything she could—counting sheep, focusing on her breathing, singing songs in her head—but nothing worked. Her mind refused to go blank. And she knew exactly why.

Turning over onto her back, she listened as Michael breathed evenly beside her. He hadn’t moved much since he’d fallen asleep.

Oh, Michael . . .

In some ways, he seemed to have rubbed off on her. His tendency to just live in the moment and not think too far into the future was contagious. She realized that, since she’d been staying there, she hadn’t given much thought to what her life would be like down the road. All she thought about was crawling into bed with him at night.

But now, with that acceptance letter he’d received, she felt like she had no choice but to think about things again. She knew that she would probably be able to stay with the Guerins for a few more months, tops. The family generally seemed to like having her and Dylan around, for the most part. Andy was the only one to indicate any annoyance with the arrangement, and even he managed to tolerate it. But soon, Michael would graduate, and then what? Maybe his parents would let him stay over the summer if he planned on attending college in the fall, but what about after that? When he would leave, she’d have to leave, too. She couldn’t stay there if he wasn’t there.

Money wouldn’t be the issue then. No, now that she was working full-time again, she’d be able to save up. The issue would be . . . being away from him. Being alone. If he went off to Alabama, then . . . what? Her life would just go back to the way it was before?

The longer she thought about it, the more upset she became. Not with him, and not even with the situation. With herself. She felt selfish. Here he was with this great opportunity, one she genuinely wanted him to explore . . . and yet she was worried about herself?

Thinking it through while he was lying right next to her was just too much, so she got up, carefully slipping out of the bed. She had to crawl over his legs to get out, and then she tiptoed out of the room. Quietly, she crept downstairs and went to Dylan’s room, peeking in at him.

Oh, Dylan . . .

It wasn’t just her she had to think about. It was him, too. He had grown so attached to Michael and Tina these past few months. Tina was like a big sister to him. And Michael was like . . .

She smiled sadly. No, he couldn’t be like that.

But Dylan had never really had a male figure in his life before. His own grandfather hadn’t bothered to see him much, even when they’d been living under his roof. And obviously his dad was a permanent no-show. He practically idolized Michael, and honestly, how could he not? What little boy wouldn’t have looked up to the silly, fun-loving football player?

It would be hard on him, too, having to say goodbye. Having to go back to that other kind of life where it was just the two of them. But he’d bounce back. Kids were resilient in a way adults weren’t.

She let out a shuddering breath, knowing that it would all be okay. It would hurt, and it might hurt for a long time. But Michael would live the life he was meant to live, and she and Dylan would still have each other. They would always have each other. For now, this time they had with Michael, this time where everything was starting to feel so good and so right . . . they just had to enjoy it while it lasted.

She closed her son’s bedroom door, leaving it open just a little bit, and headed back upstairs to get into bed again. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to scoot a little closer to Michael tonight. Just tonight. It was cold in the house, after all, and he was very, very warm.








TBC . . .

-April

Part 36

Posted: Sat Dec 06, 2014 12:01 pm
by April
Eva:
And then real life is back again! Maria is right, she can't stay there forever. It was only a solution for now, although they all got more than excited about it.
Maria and Michael have both gotten so caught up in this living situation that neither one of them has really stopped to think about how long it can last. Until now, when Maria feels like she has to start thinking about it.
Even if Michael doesn't go to college, there will be choises to make. He won't stay there for long, and I'm not sure what would happen first: him leaving or him being kicked out by his father.
Hmm, hard telling which one of those things would happen first.

Carolyn:
I have sympathy for Michael.......I hated to write papers in high school and college!
I never minded because I could just bullshit my way through all of them. Throw in a few fancy words here, a few complex sentences there, and after a while, my papers really started to sound like I knew what I was talking about. :lol:

Sara:
Does she have her GED? I can't remember.
No, she does not.
Maybe she needs to start working on herself so she CAN be better for herself and Dylan. She needs to stop relying on Michael ,who ISN"T single, to make her happy.
I agree. But that's a hard thing to do, because of the fact that Michael has made her so happy lately.
And Ihave to say, I was very impressed with Michael at his study session with Alex. I am glad he complimented Alex.
Michael has these little moments once in a while. :)

Rod:
Roll Tide!! 55-44 April will know what this means
;)
Michael got into Bama too? Knowing his school ethic I don't know if that's cool or a slam on my school :P :lol:
:lol: He has good test scores.
Michael is wrong on the music. The 70's was the best decade for rock music.....Led Zeppelin, AC/DC,Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd.
Ooh, yes, the 70s was a good music decade, too.


Thank you for the feedback!








Part 36








Getting a kid into and out of his winter-wear was a painstaking process. Michael was just thankful Dylan didn’t have one of those full-body snowsuits like Randy in A Christmas Story, because that would have been impossible. This puffy winter coat was hard enough.

“Turn around,” he instructed, squatting down in front of the little guy.

Dylan did as he was told, but he stuck his arms out to the sides. “Hey, Micho?”

Michael put his arms down so he could tug his coat off. “Yeah?”

“Where’s Mommy?”

“Uh, your mommy is working the early shift at the Crashdown today. So that’s why I’m droppin’ you off at daycare.” Ugh, daycare. That many kids with so few adults to supervise? It was like its own kind of hell-zone. “You don’t mind, do you?”

“Nope.” Dylan turned back around, smiling at Michael. “Hey, do you—do you think—do you . . .” He frowned in frustration as he tried to come up with the words to say. “Think they like it?”

“Like what?” he asked as he took off his little boots and set them in the midst of all the other kids’ shoes beside the door.

“This.” Dylan tugged at the collar of his football jersey.

“Oh, yeah,” Michael assured him. “You look like a stud.” From what Maria told him, Dylan had a hard time making friends, so he was hoping the jersey would cause some of the other boys to take notice of him, maybe invite him to play with them or something.

“Cool.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty cool, huh? You’ve been wearin’ that thing a lot, though, lately. We might have to give it a wash, or else you’re gonna stink. You don’t wanna stink, do you?”

Dylan shook his head emphatically. “No.”

“No, that’s no good.” His mom would do laundry over the weekend. They’d throw it in then, maybe try to shrink it a bit. For now, it still smelled fine. “Alright, well, you have a good day, buddy.”

“Pway with me,” Dylan pleaded.

“I can’t. I gotta go to school.” Given the choice, he would have gladly stayed and played with Dylan, though. Maybe outside, away from all those other annoying little brats. “I’ll see you later, though, okay?”

“Okay.” Dylan waved, and as he was sprinting into the playroom, he hollered back, “Bye, Daddy!”

What?

Michael just stayed right there, still squatting down, watching him go, a well-meaning little boy who was completely unaware of the significance of what he’d just said. But Michael was aware of it. Daddy. Daddy?

Since when was he Daddy?

Oh, crap.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

By the time Michael got to school, the first bell was already ringing, so he quickly stashed everything in his locker and hurried out to the cafeteria to see if he could catch Kyle. He found his best friend surrounded by dozens of people, almost all of whom appeared to be asking him to sign something. Really? Autographs?

“Alright, guys, I’ll do more at lunch,” Kyle assured them. “Let’s go.”

There were a few groans of disappointment, but gradually, the crowd dissipated, and everyone headed off to class.

Michael approached his friend, joking, “Will you sign my ass?”

Kyle chuckled, shaking his head in astonishment. “Isn’t that crazy?”

“You’re famous.”

“No, not really.”

“Well, you might be someday.” Couldn’t really blame those people. Someday, when Kyle was making millions of dollars in the NFL, they’d have his autograph on their binders and notebooks . . . well, it looked like one girl was having him sign a glue stick.

“It’s still crazy,” Kyle said, sounding like he was determined to remain humble.

“Yeah,” Michael agreed. “Hey, I’m glad I caught you, though. Can I . . . can I talk to you about somethin’?”

“Right now?” Kyle asked. “I gotta get to class.”

“Come on, man.” Class? Who gave a shit about class?

“Ah, fuck it,” Kyle decided, sitting atop one of the tables. “What’s up?”

“Well . . .” Michael sat beside him, wondering if he even needed someone else’s opinion on what had happened that morning. It wasn’t a big deal. Not really. Right?

No, he needed advice on how to handle it, and this was one of the few things he wasn’t sure he could talk to Maria about.

“Alright, so this morning I was droppin’ Dylan off at daycare,” he explained. “No big deal. I’ve done it a couple times before. But as he was headin’ on in there, he said . . .” Trailing off, he laughed nervously. “He said . . . ‘bye, Daddy’.”

Kyle’s entire body stilled, and he just stared at him.

“To me.” Was it a big deal? Wasn’t it? He needed to know if he was just overreacting.

“Hmm.” Kyle folded his arms over his chest, nodding slowly. “Can’t say I didn’t see that comin’.”

“What? What do you mean?” Why wasn’t he surprised, too?

“Well, you spend a lot of time with the kid. You’re about the same age as his mom. He’s just a little guy; it’s natural for him to get confused.”

“Well, yeah. Right.” That was all it was, confusion. “It’s not his fault.”

“No, it’s not,” Kyle agreed. “What’d you say to him?”

“Uh . . .” Was he supposed to have said something? What the fuck? Was there some kind of handbook for this kind of situation? “Well, I couldn’t really say anything. He was walkin’ away.”

Kyle cringed.

“What? Should I have said somethin’?”

“Probably.”

“Well, what should I have said? ‘Hey, Dylan, I’m not your dad. But I sure as hell know a lot more about you than the guy who’s only spent a half hour of his life with you.’”

“You probably should’ve called him back,” Kyle described as the tardy bell for first period rang, “explained it to him in a way he could understand.”

“How am I supposed to do that?”

“I don’t know. Just say, ‘Dylan, you know I care about you a lot, but I’m not your dad, so you better just keep calling me Michael.’”

He took a mental note of that, so if he did have to have a conversation with Dylan, he’d know what to say. “Actually, he calls me Micho. He can’t pronounce my name.”

“See, the thing is, you should’ve done it right then and there, ‘cause he’s not even gonna remember sayin’ it if you bring it up now.”

“Well, I can talk to him about it when we get home.”

“No, I wouldn’t,” Kyle advised. “Just don’t even bring it up again unless he does. It’ll confuse him even more.”

“Alright,” Michael registered. Perfect. He didn’t want to talk to Dylan about it unless he absolutely had to. He wasn’t good with words, and even though he was good with Dylan . . . he’d probably screw it up.

“That’s gotta feel weird, huh?” Kyle asked.

“Uh, well . . . yeah, kind of. I don’t know.” It had caught him off-guard, sure, but . . . it was sort of a compliment, in a way. Dylan liked him. Dylan felt . . . cared for and appreciated enough to bestow that title on him. “I think if . . . you know, I don’t really think it’s a big deal, actually.”

“You don’t? The kid thinks you’re his dad and you don’t think it’s a big deal?”

“Well . . . he doesn’t think I’m his dad; he just called me Dad.” He made a face once he was done saying the words. There wasn’t really that much of a distinction. “Look, it’s . . . it doesn’t really matter to me.”

“What do you mean it doesn’t matter?”

“I mean . . . if he calls me Dad . . .” Oh god, he had no idea what he was trying to say, but he just kept saying stuff anyway. “Like, he can call me that if he wants. It’s okay, I don’t care.”

Kyle’s eyes widened, his expression growing more serious. “Uh, you should.”

“But it’s just . . . just let him.”

“No, you can’t let him do that,” Kyle warned.

“Why not?”

“ ‘cause you’re not his dad.”

“Yeah, so?”

“So . . . that’d be like me calling Amy DeLuca Mom.”

“Oh, come on, that’s different.” Amy DeLuca was a raging bitch, for starters.

“Listen to me, you can’t let him do that,” Kyle cautioned. “I know you care about the kid more than his actual dad does, but . . . you’re on pretty thin ice here. This whole situation with Maria and Dylan and Isabel . . . you gotta have boundaries.”

Boundaries? Those things he didn’t have since he was sharing a bed with Maria and everything? Great.

“And you also gotta respect the fact that, as Dylan’s mother, Maria might not be comfortable with him calling you that,” Kyle pointed out.

“Yeah.” He didn’t intend on mentioning this to her. Didn’t wanna freak her out. “I just . . . I don’t know, it was weird, but it was kinda . . .” He couldn’t help but smile, hearing Dylan say it in his mind over and over again. Bye, Daddy. Bye, Daddy. Daddy.

“I think I get it,” Kyle said. “Your relationship with your own dad isn’t exactly . . . ideal. And now you’ve got this relationship with Dylan, and it’s like you have this chance to give him all the things your dad never gave you. Am I right?”

Michael just stared ahead blankly, considering it. He wasn’t self-reflective enough to have given it a whole lot of thought. But it made sense. In a way, he and Dylan were both missing father figures. But Dylan had . . . other options.

“Listen, you didn’t do anything wrong, either,” Kyle assured him. “You care about the kid and that’s good. He needs that. But you can’t let him keep . . . ‘cause that’s a slippery slope you’re on there, and you could end up seriously confusing him and even hurting his feelings in the long run. So the next time it happens—if it happens again—you gotta nip it in the bud. Alright?”

“Yeah.” It’d be hard. In fact, it would suck beyond the telling of it. But he’d do it if he had to. Because, as usual, Kyle seemed like he had it all figured it out. It was probably best to take his advice, even if it wasn’t what he wanted to do.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

By far, Isabel’s least favorite thing to cheer for was wrestling. Even though the Comets team was pretty good, those wrestlers were so damn ungrateful for the support. All they did was complain that the cheerleaders were “annoying” when they slapped their hands on the mats. Never mind the fact that they sat at those things for hours on end practically every Saturday, cheering them on and never expecting any thanks for it in return. It hadn’t been so bad last year when Michael had wrestled and Isabel had gotten to see him at some of the bigger invites and the annual East vs. West Roswell dual. But this year, without him on the mat, Isabel felt like she had no one to cheer for.

Saturday was their annual Pin Tournament, which was quite the extravaganza in the wrestling world. Only pins counted for team points, and their team usually faired pretty well, due to a few heavyweight wrestlers who almost always won their matches with a pin. Pretty much everyone who was anyone came to watch.

Michael was floating around there somewhere. He’d brought Maria and Dylan with him. Of course.

Isabel sat with the other cheerleaders in between matches, doing her best not to roll her eyes at the stupidity of their vapid conversations. She was the acting captain for the day, because Tess was accompanying Kyle on a campus visit to Alabama. Every hour, though, she was texting, asking if there was any drama going on between the girls.

As she was just about to attempt jumping into a conversation about the merits of body glitter, Isabel thankfully felt a tap on her shoulder. She looked around, and there was Alex, having climbed halfway down the bleachers to get her attention.

“Hey!” she exclaimed. Thank God, a distraction. Something to get her away from her fellow squad members.

“Hey,” he returned. “You look nice.”

She plucked at her cheerleading skirt, not about to launch into how much she’d always hated it and how she wished they’d ordered new ones for her senior year. “I’ll be back, girls,” she excused herself, eagerly getting up to leave. They didn’t even have a wrestler up on deck yet, so she probably had plenty of time.

She and Alex walked out past the concession stand and past the TV that was broadcasting a college basketball game for those fans in attendance who had a little less of an interest in wrestling. It was hard to find a quiet place, one that wasn’t overflowing with people, so eventually they just went outside. He offered her his coat right away, but she declined since it wasn’t super cold out.

“I didn’t expect to see you,” she said. “You know, if you keep showing up around here, people are gonna start to assume you’re a student.”

“Well, I got a cousin who’s a freshman at Mayfield High School, and he’s wrestling varsity for the first time today,” Alex explained. “In the 113 weight class. He’s kinda puny, but he’s quick.”

“And he’s a freshman.”

“Yeah, he’ll fill out. Anyway, I just thought I’d come and cheer him on, you know?”

“That’s nice of you.” Alex was just a nice guy all-around. As a college student, he had to be plenty busy, but it seemed like he never really thought about himself as much as he thought about others.

“And I also wanted to see you,” he made sure to add. “I read your book.”

“Really?” That was a good sign that he’d gotten through it so quickly. Maybe it was a page-turner.

“Yeah. It was good. I typed up some, uh . . . feedback for you.” He reached into his back pocket and took out a folded piece of paper. Several pieces of paper stapled together, actually. “Some of it I just jotted down as I was goin’ along, and then some of it I wrote after I finished the whole thing.”

She scanned over the paper, looking too quickly to read what he’d written. “Wow, thank you, Alex.” She hadn’t been expecting that. But then again, she probably should have from someone who was studying to be a teacher. “That’s really nice of you.” She refolded the paper, figuring it would be better to look at it somewhere quieter, when she could focus and didn’t have to rush through it. “So what’d you think?”

“It was good,” he told her. “It was really good. It kept my interest throughout, and . . . I mean, you write really confidently for such a young person. That’s pretty rare.”

She couldn’t help but blush at the compliment.

“And there were certain parts where I just like . . . wow. I mean, it resonated,” he went on. “And there were a few lines where I was just like—yes, that’s so good. I mean, honestly, Isabel, I’m not just sayin’ this ‘cause you’re my friend; you’ve got talent. You gotta pursue it.”

“I plan to.” As much as she loved hearing all this praise, she knew it wasn’t a perfect novel. No novel ever was. And since this was the only one she’d ever managed to finish, she wanted to know more. “So is there anything you didn’t like?”

“Well . . .” He scratched the back of his neck, stalling for time. “It’s not that I didn’t like it.”

“What?”

“Just . . . the ending.”

She frowned. The ending? She had known how she’d wanted the story to end before knowing how she wanted it to progress or even begin. Out of all the things he could have pointed out as needing improvement, that was the last thing she would have expected. “What’s wrong with it?”

“It just . . . it wasn’t what I was expecting. You know, it was very . . . happily ever after.”

Well, yeah, that had been the idea. But she obviously hadn’t used those exact words.

“And I feel like your writing’s stronger than that.”

“So you think it should be . . . like, what? A cliffhanger or something?”

“No, not even that. Just . . . different.”

She frowned, totally not understanding.

“Don’t get me wrong, I’ve got no problem with a happy ending,” he assured her. “I’m hoping to get one myself in my own life. But . . . it just felt forced to me.”

“Why?”

“Because, throughout the whole story, you’ve got this couple who just can’t get it together. They’re so dysfunctional, and they keep lettin’ all these little things get in the way. And your male lead—who’s a real jerk, by the way—is clearly not as invested in the relationship as his girlfriend is. Yet, by the end of it, we’re supposed to believe that, all of a sudden, he loves her just as much as she loves him? It’s not realistic.”

She felt a lump forming in the back of her throat as she tried to defend her storyline and her characters. “But that’s what the whole story’s about,” she insisted. “He changes.”

“When?”

“Throughout the whole thing.”

Alex shrugged. “Didn’t really seem like it. I mean, in some ways, he was treating her worse by the end of the story than he was at the beginning. Now maybe this is just my point of view—and keep in mind, this is just constructive criticism from someone who’s read way too many novels in his lifetime—but . . . by the end, I was actually rooting against them. Or against him, at least. I thought the girl deserved better.”

She shifted uncomfortably, not because she couldn’t take the critique. It was just that it was making her . . . think. “I get what you’re saying,” she acknowledged, “but if they don’t end up together, then the story’s pointless.”

“I don’t think so.”

“But the whole point is that, despite everything that’s wrong with both of them, and despite all the obstacles they create for themselves, they’re in love at the end. That’s what it’s about, the two of them finding their way back together.”

“I disagree,” he argued gently. “The way I interpreted it, it’s about the two of them finding their way apart.”

She inhaled shakily, trying not to read too much into it. Sure, it was a story she’d written, spent endless hours on, actually, but at the end of the day . . . it was just a story. Nothing more.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

After being at the wrestling meet all day, Dylan fell asleep almost instantly that night. As much as Maria loved spending time with her son, she also relished any and all alone time with Michael. She sort of loved the fact that it was just sort of understood that they would go upstairs, lie down in bed together, and just talk, the way they often did.

“Tell me something I don’t know about you,” he said, probably hoping that she’d slip and reveal her favorite song. Fat chance.

At this point, he knew so much that she just blurted out the first random thing that came to mind. “I can read palms.”

“Really?” He sounded skeptical.

“No, I’m serious. I had a substitute teacher show me how to do it once.” She propped herself up on her forearm and ordered, “Let me see your hand.”

He held out his left hand and said, “Alright, go ahead and bullshit me.”

“It’s not bullshit.” She happened to believe a lot of silly things like this were pretty damn authentic. Palm-reading. Astrology. Not stupid. “Okay,” she said, grazing her middle three fingers across his palm. God, she loved touching him, even just the simple touches like this. Really, all they got to do were the simple touches, the ones that never failed to get her fantasizing about what more involved touching would feel like.

“Wow, this is fascinating,” he mumbled sarcastically.

“Sorry.” She hadn’t meant to space off, so she traced her index finger along the most noticeable line of his palm, the one that cut down vertically just left of the center. “Okay, this is your life line. And it’s pretty long, so that’s good. And then this . . . I don’t remember what this is.”

“You’re really good at this.”

“Shut up. Then there’s . . .” It’d been so long since she’d done this to anyone or looked up anything about it, she could hardly remember. “Your marriage line.”

“I don’t have a marriage line,” he denied immediately.

“Yes, you do. It’s right here.” She pointed out a small horizontal line just below his pinky finger. “And you have a money line, but I hate to break it to you . . . it’s not too noticeable.”

“Dammit.”

“And then this . . .” She traced a vertical line slightly below his middle finger. “This is your sex line.”

“Ooh.” Suddenly, his interest was piqued.

“And it’s kinda jagged, so I guess that signifies you’ve been with lots of women.”

“Huh, maybe you know what you’re doing after all.” He lowered his hand and said, “Your turn.”

“You’re gonna read my palm?”

“Yeah.”

She lay back down again, extending her right hand outward, letting it rest on his chest. He put his hand behind hers for a moment, covering her fingers with his, and then started in. “Okay, life line. Long like mine. Good. And . . .” His fingers roamed over her palm aimlessly, because clearly he had no idea what he was looking for. “Oh, you’ve got a marriage line, too. But see, I think you were wrong about this one. I don’t think it’s a money line. I think it’s a . . . it’s like a family line, and that’s why yours is kinda noticeable. Because of Dylan.”

She smiled. He was a pretty damn good bull-shitter.

“And it means that you’re gonna have more kids, too. And then there’s your sex line. And—yeah, see how they meet up like that? More kids.”

She laughed a little. Hmm. Maybe he was right. Someday way down the road . . . anything was possible.

“And judging by the various . . . grooves and indentations,” he went on, trying to sound all knowledgeable, “you’re gonna have . . . you’re gonna have a great love.”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah.”

“Any idea when this great love’s gonna show up?”

He stared at her, his fingers lazily intertwining with hers. “I don’t know,” he replied, quieter. “Could be any second now.”

She felt her breath catch, and her heart sped up. And she wasn’t even sure why. Maybe it was because of what he’d just said, or maybe it was because he seemed to have no desire to let go of her hand. For a few seconds, she just gazed at him, wondering if it was painfully obvious just how much she wanted him; and then she let her eyes fall closed, thinking that maybe—just maybe—he’d lean a little bit and kiss her. Even though he shouldn’t.

But suddenly, the door opened, and Tina came into the room, ruining the moment. Maria tore her hand away from Michael’s and sat up.

“Sorry,” Tina apologized.

“You’re fine,” Maria assured her. Nothing going on there.

Michael sat up slowly, pointing out, “Teenie, you should really . . . knock.”

“Sorry,” she repeated. “Just wanted to let you know, Dylan woke up and he’s all scared ‘cause he thought he saw a monster.”

“Oh, no,” Maria groaned, running one hand through her hair. He’d gone through the monster phase a few months ago, but mercifully, it’d been pretty short. She was hoping that had been the end of it, but apparently not.

“I got this,” Michael said, swinging his legs over the side of the bed.

“You sure?”

“Yep.” He strode out of the room, slipping past his little sister and messing up her hair on the way out.

When he was gone, Tina hesitantly stepped into the room, asking, “You guys weren’t, like . . . doing stuff, were you?”

No,” Maria told her emphatically. “No, we don’t . . .” Oh god, was that the kind of impression they gave off? That probably wasn’t setting a good example for this little girl.

“But he does that stuff with Isabel, right?”

“Oh, he . . .” Unfortunately. “I don’t know if . . .” She totally didn’t want to have a conversation about sex with a fifth-grader, so she settled for the truth, figuring that if she didn’t lie about it, Tina wouldn’t ask as many questions. “Yeah.”

“I knew it.” Tina skipped forward and hopped up on her brother’s bed, taking his spot. “Isabel’s really cool,” she raved. “And pretty. She’s a cheerleader.”

“Yeah. Lucky her.”

“They’ve been together a really long time.”

Maria nodded silently, resenting that fact.

“My mom and dad hope they’ll get married someday.”

“Hmm.” She tried to smile, but inside her, bitterness was rising. Mixing with envy. “Maybe they will.” After all, he did have a marriage line.

Tina hesitated a moment, then angled her body towards Maria, looking at her with utter questioning. “I don’t get it, though,” she said. “If he’s with Isabel, then why is he always around you?”

Maria clutched the bedspread tightly, feeling like she was being put on the spot here, not sure how to answer. Especially since she didn’t even know what the answer was.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Since the monster had apparently peeked its head out of the small closet in Dylan’s room, Michael made a spectacle out of getting rid of him. Gave him a chance to flex his acting chops, be a little over-dramatic, and most importantly, put the little boy’s mind at ease.

He stood in the closet doorway, pretending he was taunting the monster as it retreated into the darkness. “Yeah, you’d better run!” he warned. “And don’t come back, you hear? If you ever do, I’ll kick your ass.” Oh, crap. Forgot to censor himself. “I mean, butt. I’ll kick your butt, you got that? Dylan’s under my protection, and there’s no monsters allowed here, so stay out!” He shut the door, satisfied that Dylan would be feeling much better now, and walked back over to the bed. “He’s gone,” he announced.

Dylan looked so fretful, holding his blanket up over his mouth.

“Don’t worry, I got rid of him,” Michael assured him.

Slowly, Dylan lowered the blanket, relaxing again. “Tank you,” he squeaked out.

“You’re welcome. And listen, he’s not gonna come back now, ‘cause I think I really scared him. But if any of his monster friends ever make the mistake of showing up, all you gotta say is, ‘Get outta here. Michael’s taking care of me.’ And they’ll know to back off, ‘cause they know not to mess with me. Okay?”

Dylan nodded, smiling contentedly.

“Alright. Get some sleep.” Michael bent down and gave him a quick kiss on the head, then turned to leave.

“ ‘Night, Daddy.”

He stopped dead in his tracks when he heard that word again. Oh, no.

He turned back around, watching as Dylan snuggled back into his covers, hating that he had to do this, that he had to say this. But it had to be done. He couldn’t let the kid just keep calling him that. He had to set him straight.

“Hey, you know, that’s the second time you’ve called me that now,” he pointed out, trying to be gentle.

“I know.”

Oh, so innocent. So unknowing. Michael re-approached the bed he’d helped make, kneeling down next to the side, trying to remember what Kyle had told him to say. Oh god, his mind was blank. This wasn’t going to be easy. “Hey, Dylan, listen, I don’t . . . I don’t know if you should be callin’ me that.”

“Why not?” His eyes were wide with confusion.

“Well . . .” This sucked. This sucked so much. “I’m not your dad. You know?”

“You’re not?”

“No.” It was amazing that this boy even had a mental concept of what a dad was, though, considering he’d never even really met his. “I care about you a lot, and I have a lot of fun with you, but . . . I’m not your dad; I’m your . . . I’m your friend.” He made a face as he said the words. It just didn’t sound right, so it sure as hell didn’t feel right. He wasn’t about to go around admitting it, but he did feel kind of fatherly towards Dylan a lot of the time. And when it came to taking care of him . . . shockingly, he wasn’t half bad at it.

Dylan’s bottom lip quivered, and Michael worried he was getting upset when he whimpered, “I sorry.”

“No, it’s okay,” Michael quickly reassured him. “You’re not in trouble. You didn’t do anything wrong. I just . . . I want you to know that you should keep calling me Michael instead of calling me Daddy, okay?”

Dylan’s sad face intensified into a pout, and then he complained, “But-but they all . . . got one.”

“What?” Time to put that through the toddler-translation filter. “Who?”

“They do.”

“They all . . . have a dad?”

“Yeah.”

Michael nodded, piecing together that Dylan was probably talking about the other kids at daycare, many of whom, unbeknownst to him, probably didn’t have dads, either. But in his mind, he was the only one without one. In his mind, he was different. “Look, I know it may seem that way . . .”

Dylan flipped over onto his other side, growling into his pillow, “I don’t got dad.” And then he started to cry.

“Ah, buddy . . .” Michael reached out to put his hand on his shoulder, feeling awful for upsetting him, and his fingers brushed against the last name on the back of that jersey he was still wearing. Guerin. He was wearing a last name that wasn’t even his.

He needed to remember that just as much as Dylan did.








TBC . . .

-April

Part 37

Posted: Sat Dec 13, 2014 7:26 am
by April
Eva:
Kyle was right. In this stage Michael can't let Dylan call him Dad. It wouldn't be right.
I agree. He should really let Maria know about it, but . . . well, you know Michael. Doesn’t always do what he should.

Rodney:
This is an April story. ..so I'm for very sure numerous things are going to go bad for M/M before it's all said and done!
Well, after the hell I put them through in my last 2 fics, I have to be creative to come up with new types of drama and angst!

Carolyn:
Can't wait to see how this "daddy" comment plays out with Michael and Dylan......and of course Maria too.
It certainly creates a new dynamic, or at least magnifies a dynamic that already existed.

Sara:
I think Alex is going to open her eyes to a whole new level and quality relationship!
Alex is a quality guy. But Isabel is just lost in Michael-land right now.


Thank you for reading and leaving feedback!

I’m actually having to crank this update out really fast today, but I still have time to drop off music: “Roll Over Me” by The Autumn Film, which I loved from the second I first heard it on One Tree Hill. You can listen to it here or click on :? when you see it if you’d like to listen. (Yes, I did shamelessly link to my own video, as I tend to do. Why not, right?)









Part 37








Isabel clutched her cheer pillow to her chest, lumbering in the front door. She was spent. These all-day wrestling meets really took it out of her. She’d felt sluggish ever since talking to Alex, and now, all she wanted to do was re-read the end of her story, to see if she would interpret it the way he had. And then she’d go to bed.

“Mom, I’m home,” she announced weakly, kicking off her shoes. She didn’t get a response, though, so she called, “Mom?” This time, she heard something, not exactly a reply, but . . . laughter. Coming from the theater room. Of which the door was closed. Odd.

Isabel set her pillow down and made her way over to the theater, pushing open the door. She didn’t expect to see her mom sitting in there with Jim Valenti. They were close together on the couch, sharing a bowl of popcorn, watching something from the 80s.

“Oh, hi, honey,” her mom yelped, immediately scooting a little farther away from Kyle’s dad. “You’re home early. Is the wrestling meet over already?”

Isabel stared at her in disbelief and informed her, “It’s 9:30. It got over three hours ago, but there was a parking lot party, so I stayed awhile.”

“Oh, goodness.” Her mom laughed sheepishly, sounding like a little schoolgirl. “We must have lost track of time.”

“I should probably be going.” Jim got to his feet, slipped on his shoes, and waved goodbye to both of them on his way out. “Sleep tight, ladies.”

Ugh, Isabel thought. Sleaze-ball. Sleep tight, ladies? How had a stand-up guy like Kyle come from this man’s sperm?

Once he was gone, her mom paused the movie and inquired, “So how did the boys do? Did they win the tournament?”

“Yeah,” she answered dazedly. “N-no. What . . .” She was so disoriented by whatever it was she had just walked in on that she couldn’t even think straight. “What was he doing here?”

“Oh, you know, just . . . hanging out.”

“Uh-huh.” Not likely. Jim Valenti didn’t hang out with women unless he either was sleeping with or had hopes of sleeping with them. “That’s a little weird, don’t you think?”

“Oh, now you know we’ve known each other for years.”

“Yes, but you also dated the guy once.”

“Honey, we ran into each other at the store, started talking about Kyle’s college plans and your college plans. And then we just ended up back here, watching a movie. There’s no harm in that.”

“Mom, it’s . . . it’s shady,” Isabel persisted, trying to get her to understand. “You know he’s seeing someone, right?”

“I know.”

“And last time I checked, he has a history of womanizing. In fact, didn’t he cheat on you once?”

“We decided we’re gonna be friends again. Completely platonic.”

“Looked pretty cozy to me.”

“Oh, Isabel, please.”

Her complete dismissal was aggravating, and Isabel refused to let it go. “It’s not—no, Mom! That’s not . . . you can’t . . .” She held one hand to her forehead, feeling all the tension in her body start to rise to the surface. “You know what he’s like, and you know what he’s gonna do!”

Her mom got to her feet, approaching her cautiously. “Isabel, calm down. Nothing happened.”

“No!” she yelled again, taking a few steps back, throwing her arms down at her sides. “No, it doesn’t matter! It’s gonna happen. Because you probably still feel things for him, and he probably still feels things for you, and that isn’t fair to the person he’s with right now. It’s not fair to her!”

“Oh, baby, what’s this all about?”

“I can’t believe you’d even do this! God, what’s wrong with you?”

“Isabel--”

She turned around and raced off, upstairs to her bedroom, hoping she’d make it in before she started to cry. She just felt like sobbing.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

When Isabel called Michael the next morning, he was expecting that she was going to invite him to church, already working up his fake cough so he could fake an illness to get out of it. But she said she and her mom were arguing and she needed some space from her that day, so she invited him to go shopping instead. Which wasn’t any better.

They went to three different stores before she even found a dress for winter formal she wanted to try on. While she was in the dressing room, he did the traditional thing and just sat outside, waiting, feeling more and more bored by the minute. Beside him, another guy was waiting for his . . . girlfriend? Daughter? It was hard to tell. He was either a really young father or a really old boyfriend. Either way, Michael gave him a head nod, glad to see he wasn’t the only one who had to sit through this torture.

After what seemed like forever, Isabel came out of her dressing room. The gown she’d put on was floor-length, strapless, form-fitting. And white. Very, very white.

“What do you think?” she asked.

He thought it looked like the kind of thing you accessorized with a veil, which kind of freaked him out. “Looks nice,” he commented, shifting around in his seat.

She rolled her eyes at his simple response. “You don’t like it.”

“What? I—I just said it looks nice.”

“You don’t really mean it.”

He sighed, relenting. It did look nice, technically. Isabel was so stunning, she could’ve worn a burlap sack to that dance and still outshone all the other girls. But maybe it would’ve been better in purple or red. Yeah, red. She looked good in red.

“Okay, to be honest . . .” He took a few seconds to think about his words before he actually said them. Didn’t want to make a sticky situation even worse. “It kind of looks like a wedding dress.”

She looked down at herself, furrowing her brows. “It’s not.”

“Yeah, but it kinda . . . looks that way.” He gulped, hoping he hadn’t just said something he’d regret.

“It’s just a regular dress,” she defended. “White. Snowball.”

“Yeah, I get it. But . . .” He just let his sentence fade into oblivion. What the hell? If she wanted that dress, he’d just let her get it. Wasn’t worth the hassle.

“I don’t know what’s worse, the fact that you can barely even compliment how I look right now, or the fact that seeing me in a wedding dress is totally horrifying to you.”

It was. But what did she expect? He was a teenage guy. “I didn’t say that,” he pointed out.

“You didn’t have to.” Narrowing her eyes in anger, she stepped back into the dressing room, shutting the door.

He exhaled heavily, trying to keep his cool. When Isabel got in a mood like this, it was best to just be agreeable and let her have her way. The next dress she tried on, even if it was awful green one she seemed to have her eye on . . . he’d tell her she looked incredible, and then hopefully she’d buy the damn thing and they could be on their way.

A minute later, she peeked out at him again and asked, “Can you come unzip me?”

“Yeah.” He got up and slipped into the room, but before he could even tell her to turn around, she pulled the door shut again, latching the lock into place. “What’re you doin’?” he asked.

She grabbed onto his shoulders and kissed him hard, catching him off guard. “I’m sorry,” she apologized. “I don’t mean to snap at you like that.”

Ah, he was used to it. “It’s okay,” he told her.

“No, it’s not. I’m just so emotional lately.” She kissed him again, trickling her hands down his chest, offering, “Let me make it up to you.”

All of a sudden, he felt her hand on his crotch, sliding the zipper of his jeans down. “Jesus Christ,” he swore. Sex in public? Not like her.

“I’m sorry,” she apologized again, working his cock out of its confines. And then, in a complete role reversal for the two of them, she was moving fast, giving him no time to even process what was happening. She sank down to her knees and engulfed him with her mouth before he was even truly hard.

“Oh . . . okay.” Weird. Usually he had to beg her to do this.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Maria was quickly trying to secure her hair into a ponytail and get out there into the café before anyone noticed she was late when her fellow waitress, Agnes, popped into the back room and revealed, “Maria, there’s a woman sitting in my section who wants you to wait on her.”

“Oh. Okay.” Probably the little old lady and her husband again. Good. In addition to being positively adorable, they actually tipped pretty well.

Once she was ready to go, she scampered out into the café, halting in her tracks, however, when she saw just who that woman was. Not the little old lady. Not an old lady at all.

Her mom.

Oh, great, she thought unhappily. If they had one of their normal conversation-turned-argument talks, she’d probably end up getting fired again.

Hesitantly approaching the table, she noticed that her mom looked completely out of it. She was stacking sugar packets on the table in front of her and didn’t even notice Maria come up.

“How’d you know I was working here again?” Maria asked, startling her.

She slid the sugar packets aside and responded, “I hear things.”

Correction: You gossip, Maria thought, wishing her mom could hear what she was thinking so she’d get the point that she wasn’t wanted there.

“Two jobs now,” her mom said. “That’s good.”

Wow, was that an actual compliment? “Well, part-time jobs.”

“That’s good,” her mom repeated. “How have you been?”

It was hard to put into words just how well she’d been doing lately, so she went with a simplest answer, the first one that came to mind: “Happy.”

“And Dylan? How is he?”

“He’s happy, too. He has his own room now.”

“At Michael’s?”

No, at the Holiday Inn, Maria thought sarcastically, nodding.

“Wow,” her mom whispered in astonishment. “You two have certainly made yourselves at home there.”

Maria pressed her lips together and took a deep breath. Maybe that wasn’t even meant to be an insult, but coming from her mother, it felt like one. “Do you want anything to eat?” she asked, getting back to doing her job.

“No, I’m not hungry.”

She rolled her eyes, wondering, Then why did you come to a restaurant? “I’m gonna go wait on the other customers then.” She glanced around. Oops. There were none.

“Sit down,” her mom said, motioning towards the other side of the booth.

No, no, no. There were a million other things she would have rather done. But she didn’t really have a great excuse, and so far, her mom didn’t seem completely hostile for once. Maybe this would be a chance to have a semi-decent conversation, and then they could go a few months before ever attempting to have one again.

She sat down across from her, waiting for her to say something. When she did, of course she was fishing for info.

“So I heard Michael got into college. Is that true?”

Maria stared at her incredulously. “How on earth do you just hear all these things?”

“Well, I overheard him and Kyle talking about it one night,” she explained. “While I was staying over with Jim.”

Michael’s college plans were something she didn’t intend to discuss with anyone but him, so she quickly segued into a new topic. “And how is dear, sweet Jim Valenti? Are you still holding his interest?”

Her mother looked down at the table, a wave of sadness crossing over her face. “I’m afraid not,” she replied dejectedly. “I think he’s seeing someone else.”

Oh, crap. She hadn’t meant to . . . As much as she didn’t like her mom, she didn’t mean to bring up something that was clearly depressing her. “Oh. Sorry.”

“Everyone warned me.” Her mom’s eyes were still downcast, glistening with tears now. “But it’s a horrible feeling. I love him, but I don’t know if I can keep him.”

Those words hit Maria like a thousand knives. Not because she could relate, but because . . .

. . . she wondered if Isabel could.

Her mom cleared her throat again, quickly switching the subject back. “Well, you should encourage Michael to go to college. If he really is your friend, that’s what you’ll do.”

And just like that, Maria was done feeling sorry for her. Because now she sounded lecture-y again. “I will.”

“Will you?” Her mom narrowed her eyes skeptically. “You seem awfully attached to him. Just how involved are you two now?”

“We’re not involved.”

“Your child has a room at his house. I’d say you are.”

“We’re not,” she insisted, but it was getting harder and harder to even get herself to believe that. “Hopefully he will go to college. That’d be the best thing for him.”

“And you wouldn’t consider going with him, would you?”

No, she thought, trying to be sure. No, I wouldn’t.

Would I?


“Because that wouldn’t be good for Dylan,” Amy added, “to be away from his family.”

Maria swallowed hard, refusing to say anything more about it. Her mom could talk all she wanted to, but she was overlooking the pertinent fact that, these days, Michael was more like family to Dylan than she was.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Maria got two root beers out of the refrigerator, one for her, one for Michael, and brought them into the living room. He was ending a phone call and looked relieved when she entered. “Thanks,” he said when she handed him the bottle.

“Yep.” She sat down beside him, and unscrewed the top of hers, taking a big swig.

“Oh, Maria,” he groaned, rubbing his forehead as if he had a headache.

“What?”

“I just got off the phone with the athletic director from New Mexico State.”

“Shh,” she cautioned as his father came downstairs. If they were going to talk college, it was best that no one else overheard. She smiled politely at Andy, but he just took one look at the two of them and shook his head, then grabbed his coat, stepped into his shoes, and left the house. Probably headed to the bar. Or back to it.

“He said he wants to formally offer me a three-thousand dollar scholarship to go play football there,” Michael revealed once his dad was gone.

“Oh my god, Michael!” she exclaimed. “That’s awesome.”

“It’s crazy. I’m not a scholarship kind of guy.”

“Well, athletically you are.”

“I guess.” He took a drink, then set his bottle down in front of him on the coffee table. “It’s too stressful. I can’t figure this shit out.”

“Well . . .” She set her bottle down next to his and suggested, “Let’s think this through.”

“Let’s.” For no apparent reason, he hooked one hand under her knee, lifting her right leg so that it was resting on his lap. He did the same with her other leg, and she just let him.

“Okay, so out of all your options so far, what’s your ideal scenario?” she inquired.

“I don’t know.”

“Okay, then let’s break it down. First off . . . Isabel’s going to Princeton,” she reminded him, just because . . . sometimes it seemed like he needed reminding. “Does that factor into your decision at all?”

“Not really,” he admitted.

“Okay. And are you willing to go out-of-state?”

“Yeah.”

“So Alabama’s still on the table.” She probably wasn’t the right person to be helping him with this. Getting college advice from someone who hadn’t even graduated high school probably wasn’t so smart. “Okay, well, your first option, I guess, would be to just . . . not go. I mean, you don’t really like school.”

“Hate it.”

“So you could just . . . stay here, I guess?”

“Yeah. I’d probably find an apartment, get a job.”

“Doing what?”

He thought it over for a moment, then mumbled, “Probably somethin’ I hate. End up doin’ construction like my dad.”

“Alright, so that’s one option,” she recapped, even though it definitely wasn’t the one she was going to urge him towards. “Don’t worry, your other options are much better.”

He smirked.

“Option two: New Mexico State University, at . . . where is it at, exactly?”

“Carlsbad.”

“So the pros would be that it’s not too far away, and since it’s in-state, it wouldn’t be as expensive. And you’d have a little scholarship money and get to play football while you’re there.”

“Yeah, but it’s New Mexico State,” he pointed out. “It’s not like it’s gonna amount to anything.”

“So then that’d be one of the cons. It’s not like you’d be playing on the big stage. And you wouldn’t be playing with Kyle anymore, either. Which brings us to . . .”

“Alabama,” he filled in.

“New state, new start. It’s a big school, so even though you don’t like to study, I’m sure you could find something that interests you there. And you could still be on the football team, maybe even get some playing time as a . . . what do they call it? Walk-off?”

“Walk-on,” he corrected.

“Yeah, that.

“Walk-off.” He shook his head, smiling a bit. “That’s cute.”

“But it’ll be expensive. And even though you’d be with Kyle, it’s so far away. You wouldn’t really know anyone else.”

“That’s not necessarily true,” he mumbled.

“What do you mean?” Had he slept with some sorority girls there or something?

He put his hands on her legs and sounded nervous, almost, when he said, “Well, I was kinda thinking you could go with me.”

She could picture her own stunned expression, her body practically paralyzed with shock. Had he really . . . had those words really just left his mouth? “What?”

“If I decide to go . . . you should come,” he said. As if it were that simple. As if it weren’t a big deal to suggest that.

“Are you serious?” He had to be joking, right? He had to just be trying to get a reaction out of her.

“Yeah.” He didn’t start laughing, or even crack a smile. He definitely meant it.

“Michael, I can’t just pack up my whole life and follow you to college.” It sounded ridiculous. Crazy. Completely absurd.

Tempting.

“Why not?” he challenged. “It’d be a fresh start for you, too, and I know you’d love to put a little distance in between you and your mom.”

“Yeah, but . . .” She wanted to come up with something, some legitimate excuse, but she was having a hard time thinking of one. “It’s not just me I have to think about; it’s Dylan, too.”

“Bring him along.”

“Michael . . .”

“Maria.”

Oh, the thought of it . . . the mere thought of getting in the car and driving off with him, going somewhere new, not having to give up the way she felt when she was around him . . . it was a dream. But it couldn’t be a reality. People didn’t do things like this, especially when they weren’t even . . .

“What about Isabel?” she asked.

“What about her? She’s gonna be at Princeton.”

“But you guys will still be together.”

“Maybe.”

She swore her heart skipped a beat at that. Maybe? If he wasn’t with her, then . . .

( :? )

“You asked me what my ideal is,” he reminded her, “and that’s what it is. To go to Alabama . . . with Kyle, and Dylan. And you.”

She stared at him in disbelief, feeling . . . breathless. Her mom would have hated her so much right now for even considering something so crazy, something that was probably even a little selfish. But with a guy like Michael, how could she not?

Oh god, she wanted to be with him.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

It was getting harder and harder all the time. Harder to act normal. Harder not to notice all the little ways he found to touch her. Harder not to read more and more into what he said, wondering if he was flirting. Harder to resist, as cliché as it sounded. But most of all, it was getting harder not to say anything.

Every time she left either the Crashdown or the library for the evening, she had grandiose visions of going home and telling him exactly how she felt. Just laying it all out there and letting him react. Because then at least he would know. Even if it cost her their friendship . . .

But ultimately, that was why she always held back and didn’t say anything. Because she was worried she would lose him. And she couldn’t survive that.

One night, she walked past a little boutique just off of the main drag, one she had never gone in because she couldn’t afford it. And she glimpsed Isabel and Tess in there, trying on dresses with the full attention of the store owner. Probably for their winter formal. Something must have been funny, because they were laughing.

Maria stood on the outside, watching with envy, wishing she didn’t envy their ability to go to some stupid dance. But she did. She would have loved to have worn a dress like the one Isabel was wearing. It was navy blue, strapless, and fit her like a glove. She looked . . . radiant.

Isabel Evans . . . she was one of Michael Guerin’s many opportunities.

Those girls didn’t know how lucky they had it. They probably found dress shopping to be a chore at this point. They probably took it for granted that they would be able to spend an entire night in the arms of the man they loved, dancing, touching.

But then again, Maria knew she was going home to sleep next to Michael that night. So in a way, who was the lucky one?

It had gotten to the point where she couldn’t face him when she slept, because if she moved in too close, she might do something she shouldn’t. He still faced her, though, and that night, he played with her hair, twisting the ends of it around his index finger.

“Your birthday’s comin’ up, right?” he asked.

“Yeah.” She was surprised he’d remembered, because she’d only mentioned it once.

“What kind of gift do you want?”

“You’ve already given me enough,” she told him.

“I gotta get you something,” he insisted, his voice growing fainter as he started to nod off, the twirling of her hair coming to a slow stop. “I wanna get you something good.”

She smiled sadly, and a tear leaked out her eye and rolled down to her pillow. She wanted to tell him, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t tell him what she wanted.









TBC . . .

-April

Part 38

Posted: Sat Dec 20, 2014 9:50 am
by April
Carolyn: Maria and Dylan have definitely made themselves at home there. And Michael and his family (maybe all of them except his dad) all seem to enjoy having them around.

Rodney:
For someone so street wise Michael can be so naive also. Just to expect Maria to up and move with him to Tuscaloosa! Where would they all live? Get her a job?
This is just Michael, though. It's kind of similar to how Canon Michael was. Very impulsive, acts on his feelings, doesn't always think everything through. It's a great way to live life sometimes, and a very risky way to live it at other times.
Right now I can't grasp Amy.....good mom but tough.....just a self centered bitch.....can't tell.
Probably a little bit of both.

Eva:
Michael and Maria had a serious conversation, even without him realising it. Asking her girl to follow him, isn't a light thing to do. Something Maria understands but Michael isn't ready to grasp his own feelings and dreams.
Yeah, that conversation they had, with Michael revealing to Maria that he wanted her and Dylan to come with him . . . that was HUGE. But while Maria understands that it's huge, Michael just doesn't have the emotional maturity yet to really understand the ramifications of what he's proposing they do. It's sort of . . . recklessly romantic. And foolish. And passionate. And all sorts of other things.

Sara:
Deeper and deeper they go. Isabel is using sex to keep Michael. Michael wants to keep Maria and Maria wants to be with Michael....I just shake my head at all of them.
It's like each one of them is desperately trying to hold onto someone else. Head-shaking ensues.
And I do agree with isabel...how did Jim ever produce a kick ass character like Kyle.
:D Who knows? Kyle's a super guy.


Thank you for the feedback! I really appreciate it.

Music suggestion today is a cover of the song "The Scientist" by Johnette Napolitano & Danny Lohner. You can listen to it here or click on :) when you see it. It took me FOREVER to figure out what song I needed to use as inspiration for a certain part of this chapter.

Oh, and at the beginning of this part, a character is quoting lyrics from Notorious B.I.G.'s "Big Poppa." :lol:

Think of this update as an early Christmas present. ;) Happy holidays!









Part 38








All Michael was doing was getting his things out of his locker and heading off to meet up with Isabel when Ryan and a few of his freshman buddies—a.k.a.: the only people who willingly hung out with him anymore—came out of the weight room and started butchering one of the best rap songs of all time.

“I love it when you call me Big Poppa!” Ryan faux-rapped. “Throw your hands in the air if you’s a true player.”

Michael rolled his eyes and continued walking, resisting his natural instinct to deck the guy.

“I love it when you call me Big Poppa! Throw your hands in the air if you’s a true player.”

The idiot freshmen were laughing, but was it even that funny?

Ryan just kept on going, apparently thinking it was. “ ‘cause I see some ladies tonight that should be havin’ my baby. Baby.”

“You’re fuckin’ hilarious, Ry,” Michael called back to him sarcastically. At that exact same moment, Mr. Frost came out of his classroom and scolded, “Guerin, when the hell did it become okay to use profanity in school?”

“What the fuck?” It was an easy thing to do when your teachers did it, too. Jackass.

When he got to the gym, Isabel was waiting outside after cheer practice, texting someone, but she immediately put her phone away when he got there. “Hey,” she said cheerfully. “How was Study Buddies?”

He shrugged. “Got shit done, but . . . Alex seemed like he was in a bad mood.”

“Really? Why?”

“From what I gather, Liz is already datin’ someone else.”

“Oh.” Isabel’s expression morphed into one of contempt, and she ground out, “What a slut.”

Sorry, Michael thought. I think I might have made her into one.

“Not that I’m bitter,” she said, smiling . . . well, bitterly. She set her cheerleading bag down and closed the distance between the two of them, draping her arms over his shoulders. “So are we hanging out tonight?”

“Uh . . .” Maria was working the late shift at the Crashdown a few nights this week, if he recalled correctly, so he wouldn’t be missing out on anything at home. “Sure. Your place or mine?”

“How about mine?” she suggested. “We can make some popcorn, watch a movie.”

“What movie?” He had to know in advance what it was before he agreed to it.

“Maybe something romantic. You know, like The Notebook.

“You’re shittin’ me.” He wasn’t sitting through that dumb thing again.

“No, we’ll watch Die Hard or something.”

“Yeah. Good.” That was some genuine cinema right there. He never got tired of any action movies. Plus, they didn’t make him get teary-eyed . . . like The Notebook had.

“You wanna slip into the eraser room before we go?” she inquired eagerly.

For a second, he thought he hadn’t heard her correctly. Because there was no way . . . “What?”

“Yeah. We can if you want to.”

What the hell was going on? This wasn’t normal. Not for her. “What’s gotten into you?” he couldn’t help but ask.

“What do you mean?”

“First there was the sex during the middle of Dylan’s birthday party, then the blow-job in the dressing room, now this?” No way had she suddenly just decided to be that spontaneous.

“We’ve done it in the eraser room before,” she pointed out.

“Yeah, but I’ve always had to initiate it.”

“I’m just trying to make you happy,” she said, smoothing her hands down over his chest.

To make him happy? By having sex with him even on the rare occasion when he wasn’t actually wanting it? Something about it just didn’t seem right.

When he still failed to give her the reaction she was looking for, she removed her hands from him, mumbling, “Well, if you don’t want to . . .”

No, he wanted to. Just . . . maybe not with her.

Shit.

“Let’s just wait ‘til we get to your house,” he suggested. With any luck, he’d fall asleep during the movie and get out of this situation altogether.

She nodded in agreement, but she wouldn’t look at him. It was like she was embarrassed or something. And he just didn’t know what to say to make her feel better.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Maria was exhausted by the time she got home. As much as she didn’t hate working at the Crashdown anymore, it was still a sucky job. Since she was still getting back into the swing of things there, she was having to get used to being on her feet so much. There had been a time when she’d been so accustomed to it that it hadn’t bothered her, but now, her feet felt like they were on fire, and her back was aching.

Oh, if only there was someone in that house who was willing to give her a massage. And if only it would be okay if he did.

When she walked in the front door, she heard Krista’s voice call her son’s name from the kitchen. “Michael?”

“No, it’s me.”

Krista came scampering out, asking, “Michael’s not with you?”

“No. Is he not home yet?”

“Oh, I’m sure he’s over at Isabel’s.”

“Yeah.” Doing . . . the things a boyfriend and girlfriend were able to do together. “Probably.”

“How was work?”

“It was alright. Got some pretty good tips. Hey, thanks for picking Dylan up at daycare. I really appreciate it.”

“Oh, it was no problem. He and Tina have been playing games since they got home. I think that’s really good for her.”

So if Dylan was occupied—even though he should have been asleep—and Michael was out, that really didn’t leave her with much to do. “I’m gonna go take a shower,” she said, starting up the stairs. What she was going to do in that shower and who she was going to think about . . . well, that was private.

“Maria, wait,” Krista said. “Can you come here for a minute?” She motioned her into the kitchen. “I need to talk to you.”

Maria’s stomach clenched. Oh, no. Was she getting kicked out? Had she done something wrong? Had Dylan done something? She didn’t want to leave. It wasn’t the perfect household by any means, but there was nowhere else she wanted to be.

Worriedly, she followed Krista into the kitchen, taking a seat on one of the stools at the counter. “What’s the matter?” she asked, sensing that Krista was . . . worked up about something. Her body language said it all. The woman was practically shaking.

“I found something in the mail today,” she explained, “addressed to Michael. I shouldn’t have opened it, but I couldn’t resist when I saw who it was from.”

Maria relaxed a bit, relieved that she wasn’t being forced to leave. But then she tensed again, because it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out what Michael’s mom had found.

“Do you know anything about this?” she asked, handing Maria an envelope from the admissions office at Alabama.

“What’s it say?” she asked, not wanting to give away too much information too fast.

“It says they wanted to, uh . . . verify that he received his acceptance letter and they’re looking forward to hearing back from him.”

Maria nodded, wishing Michael was here. It wasn’t her place to have this conversation. But clearly Krista knew he’d been accepted, whether Michael wanted her to know or not.

Even though it was clear, the proud mother held her hand to her chest and practically wept, “He got into college?”

Maria smiled, finding it adorable how surprised and elated Krista was. “Yeah, he did.”

“Oh my goodness! Oh!” Krista held her hands over her mouth, happy tears glistening in her eyes. “To be honest, I didn’t even know he applied.”

“Well, it took some convincing.”

“And he got in. To Alabama. That’s a good school.”

“Yeah, it is.”

“Do they want him to play football?”

Maria shook her head. “No, he just got in.”

“Really?” Krista just kept sounding more and more surprised.

“Yeah, he, um . . . he mentioned something about his ACT score being really good.”

“It was really good. But I didn’t wanna get my hopes up until now.” Krista literally giggled with joy, starting to cry a little. It was about the first time in months of knowing the woman that Maria had heard her sound genuinely happy. “I wish he would’ve told me right when he found out, though. We could’ve celebrated.”

“I think he just . . . wants to make the decision himself,” she said gently.

Krista stopped giggling, her expression changing in an instant to one of concern. “What decision? He’s going, isn’t he?”

Crap. That had definitely been the wrong choice of words. Now she had no choice but to reveal more of what she knew. “Well, there’s a school here in New Mexico that accepted him, too. They want him to play football.”

“They want him to play?” Krista put one hand over her heart, crying gratefully again. “Oh, I never would’ve even dreamed . . .” She sniffed back some of those happy tears, once again, checking to make sure that she could just give in and be happy. “So he’s gonna go then. He’s got two options and he’ll pick one. Right?”

Maria would have loved to reassure her that, yes, her son would most definitely be attending college in the fall. But with Michael, it was so hard to be sure. “I don’t know,” she admitted.

Krista’s entire face just . . . crashed. And the happiness was gone.

“I mean, I think he’s leaning in that direction.”

“Leaning?”

“But you know how he is. You just gotta give him time.”

“I need to talk to him,” Krista decided quickly, then reconsidered just as swiftly. “No. Maria, will you talk to him? Please. He won’t listen to me or his dad or his teachers or anyone, but he’ll listen to you.”

Why me? Maria wondered. Why me?

“You have to convince him to go,” she practically begged. “He has to go. He has to.”

Poor Krista. She didn’t realize what she was asking. She was asking her to convince him to leave. She was asking her to let him go. To let go of the guy she’d come to think of as her very best friend. Because as nice as it was to believe that she and Dylan could just pack up and accompany him to another state . . . that wasn’t realistic. And he’d said it himself: That other state was where he wanted to go.

“He has to go,” Krista whimpered again. “Please, Maria, promise me you’ll talk to him. Please. He needs this. I-I want him to go. I don’t want him to be stuck here; I don’t want him to end up like his dad. I want him to go and . . . live his life.”

“He will,” Maria promised weakly.

Krista’s tears were falling faster now, no longer the happy kind, but the worried kind. What had been such good news to her ears at first was now such uncertainty. “I love my son,” she said. “Truly, I do. But he’s not . . . he’s not driven. He’s not driven to succeed. Something like this . . . it might be his only chance.”

Maria nodded, all of these words hitting her like a gigantic wrecking ball. She’d known this for a long time, but it was different hearing it from someone else.

Krista was right, though. This was Michael’s chance. His chance to have a future where anything was possible. His chance to defy everyone’s expectations of him. His chance to be someone. Anyone he wanted to be.

Nothing could hold him back.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Michael couldn’t sleep. Isabel looked perfectly content as she lay there, eyes closed, breathing steadily as she dreamed. Probably about him. But he couldn’t do the same. And for that reason, he sat on the side of her bed that evening, reflecting on what he’d just done.

He’d used her. He’d just used Isabel Evans, just as he’d been using her for a while now. She was willing to have sex with him, and he’d never been one to turn it down. Hell, he probably didn’t even know how to turn it down. So he’d slept with her, and now, for the first time in his life, he was actually regretting it.

It hadn’t been bad. It never was with them. But about halfway through, when he’d been on top of her, his face buried in the side of her neck, hips plunging forward at an even pace, she’d started to whisper that she loved him. Over and over again, she’d said it, as if she were desperate to make sure he understood it.

“I love you, Michael. I love you.”

For some reason, he’d made the mistake of lifting his head up and looking down at her. And when he’d done that . . . all he’d seen was Maria.

He pictured her, every little detail of her. Her full lips, her bright green eyes. Imagining it was her lying beneath him, his hips had stilled, and he’d just gazed at her. In complete awe. And then he’d said it.

“I love you, too.”

And that was when it had all faded, and he remembered where he was at and who he was with again. Seeing Isabel’s elated smile as she lay beneath him had almost broken his heart—his god-damn heart, which wasn’t even supposed to factor into his life. She was so happy to hear him say that.

All he could think was, I wasn’t talking to you.

The knowledge that he was inside of her, wishing he was inside of someone else, had hit him hard, like an avalanche. Even with Liz, it hadn’t been this way.

But the worst part . . . was that he’d finished. He finished having sex with her and even managed to get her off. But not himself. Not this time.

So he sat there while she slept, feeling guilty. Feeling fucked up. Even though he’d actively pursued Liz Parker for months, it had never felt like this before. Perhaps he’d actually done a little growing up since then. Not to mention, his feelings for Maria were a thousand times stronger than the mere lust he’d felt for Liz. And Isabel’s feelings for him were clearly stronger than ever. All those things were combining to make him feel something he used to never think he’d feel.

The whole situation was a mess, one he felt like he couldn’t get himself out of. Even though he was using her, he did care a great deal for Isabel. He didn’t want to hurt her again.

But what he was feeling for Maria . . . he just couldn’t shut it off.

He decided to leave, partly because he couldn’t bear to be in that room with Isabel any longer. And partly because he couldn’t bear not being in a different room with someone else.

When he got home, he ran into his dad in the upstairs hallway, just as he was about to slip into his bedroom. Great. This would surely make him feel better.

“So I heard you got into college,” his dad grumbled.

Michael made a face. “Who told you that?” Maria wouldn’t have said anything.

“Your mom won’t stop talkin’ about it. Said she found somethin’ in the mail from . . . where the hell is it? Arkansas? Arizona?”

“Alabama.” Well . . . at least he’d remembered it started with an A. For Andy Guerin, that was quite the accomplishment.

“Huh.”

Michael smirked angrily. “That’s it? You’re not even gonna congratulate me?”

“I would,” his dad said, “if I thought for a second you were gonna go.”

Michael shook his head in disbelief, almost unable to fathom how little faith his own father had in him. “You don’t think I’m gonna go?”

“I know you won’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because.” His dad put his hand on the closed bedroom door and said, “You’re so in love with that girl, you can’t even see straight.”

Michael bristled. How did he . . .

“And I’m not talking about Isabel.”

He had no snappy comeback, no clever response. So he just let his dad walk downstairs, and he remained standing there outside his bedroom, letting it sink in that he knew. He knew. How the hell did he know? Was it that obvious? And if his dad, of all people, who was completely oblivious to most things in life and had little regard for anyone but himself . . . if even he had figured it out, how long could he keep it a secret from everyone else?

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The Crashdown was hectic the next night because of the basketball game. Apparently there was some kind of student-led protest going on at the high school against the concession stand food, so a lot of people were going out to eat beforehand. And since greasy, unhealthy food was almost every high school kid’s favorite kind of food, a lot of them went to the Crashdown. There weren’t enough workers on duty, which unfortunately made things stressful, but at least it made the time fly by.

“Maria!” Jose, one of only two cooks on duty, called. “Fajita’s ready.”

“How’s that chili dog coming?” she asked, grabbing the plate from the order window.

“Workin’ on it.”

She brought the fajita over to the pimply guy who’d ordered it. He and his friend were being real jerks all night, and they’d been sitting at the counter for almost an hour now, basking in the glory of their jerkish-ness and eating mountains of food without ever once even thanking her for bringing it to them. “There you go,” she said, sliding the plate in front of both of them, since she didn’t remember which one had ordered it.

“Is it warm this time?”

She pretended not to hear them and instead turned to face the drinking machine, filling up a glass of water for . . . someone. Someone had asked for water, but there were so many people there, she couldn’t remember who it was.

“Is that her?” she overheard one of the jerk guys ask the other. “Is that Guerin’s bitch?”

She nearly dropped the glass in her hand. Really? That was what people knew her as?

“That’s her,” the other guy replied.

“Huh. She’s not bad. I can see why he’s plowin’ her.”

Her mouth dropped open in horror. Plowing her? Like she was a field or something?

“Ahem.” The sound of a familiar person clearing her throat got Maria’s attention, and when she glanced over at the far end of the counter, Isabel and Tess were waiting there, both in their cheerleading uniforms.

“One minute,” she told them, feeling the need to let out a little frustration. She brought the water back over to the jerks, making sure to ‘accidentally’ knock it over as she was setting it down. “Oops, sorry,” she faux-apologized as it spilled into the lap of the one who’d compared her to a damn field.

He stood up and shook himself off, as though getting spilled on were the worst thing in the world. “Stupid bitch,” he muttered, heading into the bathroom. For some reason, his friend followed him. Suspiciously gay much?

After she quickly wiped off the counter, Maria made her way over to Tess and Isabel, feeling more than a little satisfied with herself.

“God, this place is awful. I would hate working here,” Tess hissed.

Maria just smiled politely. Did she not understand how that could be viewed as an insult?

“You would hate working anywhere,” Isabel declared.

“Not true. I would love to work for many years as a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader. Or a cheerleader for whatever team Kyle ends up playing for. Or . . . I could just be a beautiful NFL wife.”

“Well, it’s good that you have such high aspirations,” Maria snickered sarcastically. Hey, if Tess could throw a subtle insult at her, she could throw one right back.

“Speaking of inspirations . . .”

“Aspirations.”

“We have to cheer tonight, so we’re kind of in a hurry,” Tess proclaimed. “Could we get two hot dogs and two medium fries? Like really fast.”

“Like totally,” Maria mimicked, not sure if Tess was smart enough to pick up on the fact that she was making fun of her. Even if she was . . . honestly, she didn’t even care. “Anything else?”

“I think we’re good,” Isabel said. “Thanks, Maria.”

Oh, of course Isabel was being nice. No fair. Maria couldn’t say anything sassy to her, not when she was being friendly. Friendly to her face, at least.

As she headed back to the kitchen window to place their order, she once again overheard people talking about her—seriously, it was loud in there, but did these people not realize she could hear them? It wasn’t the guys this time, though.

“God, Tess, be a little more rude,” Isabel chastised. But she didn’t seem all that upset about it.

“Oh, come on. You know it’s fun to make her wait on us.”

Isabel didn’t say anything, but she didn’t disagree, either.

Maria took a deep breath, forcing herself to stay calm and not get worked up over that. And then she just continued working. It was her job to wait on people, after all. She was a waitress.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Miraculously, even though they were playing a far superior opponent, the game was . . . close. Or at least close-ish. They were only behind by twelve, which was better than being behind by twice that much. Which they usually were.

“Come on, Comets!” Tess yelled, shaking her poms together. “You got this! We’re number one!”

To her left, Roxie laughed like the airhead she was. “No, we’re not.”

Tess rolled her eyes. Stupidity. Pure stupidity. “Idiot,” she mumbled inaudibly. Cheerleaders always thought their team was number one, even if they were losing. It was, like, a cardinal rule of a spirit squad.

Thankfully, Isabel soon came back from the bathroom, slipping back into her spot on the sidelines between her and Roxie. “You okay?” Tess asked her. She’d been in the bathroom for a long time.

“I’m fine,” Isabel assured her. “I got my freakin’ period, though.”

“Oh.” Tess made a sympathetic face. “Do you need supplies?”

“No, I got it covered.”

“Sorry, honey, that sucks. Look at it this way, though: It’s better to get it than to not get it, right?”

“Maybe,” Isabel mumbled in response.

“Exactly.” Tess started to ruffle her poms together again, then stopped abruptly. “Wait, what?”

“Nothing.”

“No, did you just say . . .” What did maybe mean? Maybe it was better than not getting her period? Since when was that not absolutely and obviously better?

“Let’s go, Comets!” Isabel shouted halfheartedly, obviously trying to get Tess’s attention back on the game.

“Isabel.” Tess grabbed her friend’s arm, suddenly gravely concerned. “What did you mean?”

“Nothing,” Isabel said again. “Just let it go.”

“I will not let it go. What’s going on with you?” Before she could get an answer, the buzzer rang out, signaling the end of the first quarter. Time for a crowd cheer. “Go Big Blue,” she instructed the girls, leading the way out towards the student section. “Go Big Blue!” they chanted. “Go Big Blue!” Most of the students stood up and joined in along with the, and a few of the parents did so as well. But Tess’s heart was no longer in it, so she called “Last time!” after only a few rounds of the chant. Instead of going back to the sideline, though, she grabbed Isabel’s hand and said, “Come with me,” practically yanking her up the bleacher steps. On the way, she located Michael sitting next to Kyle in the stands, and she gave him a quick shove, snarling, “Jerk!” just the for the heck of it.

“What the hell?”

She huffed and brought Isabel up to the top of the bleachers and out of the gym. Whatever was going on with her, she suspected Michael played a big part in it.

She found a quiet, emptier hallway and wasted no time getting serious with her best friend. “Okay, what’s going on?”

“Nothing, Tess, I’m just . . . PMS-ing or something.”

“No, you said--”

“I know what I said, but . . . I just said that, Tess. I wasn’t thinking.”

“Why would you not wanna get your period?”

“I’m glad I got it. Really. It’s not like I wanna be . . .” She trailed off, shaking her head. “I mean, that’d just be crazy.”

“Yeah,” Tess agreed, sensing she knew what this was all about. “Okay, Isabel, let’s get real here: You’re freaking out about Michael, aren’t you?”

“No.”

“Yes, you are.” Tess had already been witness to one freak-out, the whole OMG-Dylan’s-my-nephew thing. This one wasn’t much different.

Isabel sighed heavily, finally admitting it. “Okay, fine, I am,” she confided. “It’s just . . . I see him all the time with Maria and Dylan, and it’s like they’re this happy little family. And I don’t have that with him, and I’m jealous.”

“You have so much more with him, though,” Tess reminded her.

“I know, but . . .” Isabel grabbed at her hair, messing up her ponytail. “God, what’s wrong with me? Tess, I—I’m not myself lately. I don’t know what’s going on.”

“Oh, Isabel . . .”

“I’ve been having sex with him constantly because I don’t want him to get bored with me. And I haven’t even been making him wear a condom. And the other night I thought . . .” She closed her eyes for a moment, sounding ashamed when she confessed, “I even thought about skipping out on my birth control, because--”

What?

“Because I-I just was . . . I don’t know, Tess. That’s not like me.”

“You ended up taking it, right?”

“Yeah, but just the fact that the thought even crossed my mind . . .”

“Is not like you,” Tess agreed. “Okay, be logical. Be smart. You’re eighteen. You’re in high school. You’re going to Princeton. You don’t need to be having a baby.”

“I know. And I don’t even want one yet; it’s just . . . I want him, you know. I want all of him. But it’s like they have this part of him that I don’t even get to see. And I’m trying to see it, and I’m trying to be the kind of girlfriend he wants me to be.”

“Yeah, but he doesn’t want you to be pregnant,” Tess pointed out.

“I know. And I know I should just act normal, but . . .” Isabel’s eyes started to brim with tears. Tears that had probably been building up for a long time now. The last freak-out had been an angry one; this was a sad one. “Tess,” she whimpered, “even when we are together . . . I feel like I’m losing him.”

Tess would have loved to assure her friend that that wasn’t true, that she and Michael would be together forever and nothing would ever break them apart. But how could she? She was trying to hope for the best, but . . . betrayal. It had already happened once. What was to stop it from happening again?

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The only thing worse than a mad rush of customers was a complete absence of them. When there was no one to wait on, time seemed to drag by. With each second she sat there alone, Maria wished more and more that she could have been with Michael at the basketball game. Dylan would have loved to have gone along, too.

The game must have been a pretty good one, because when she turned on the radio to the local sports station, she heard that it was going into overtime. Must’ve been exciting. If they won, there would probably be a huge party in the parking lot afterwards, and then Michael wouldn’t be home until late.

She flipped off the radio, because it was almost worse to listen than it was to just not know what was going on at all.

“Hey, Maria,” Jose called from the kitchen, “I’m gonna take off. You okay lockin’ up?”

“Yeah.” If it was just her there, then she could leave a little early, and no one would think anything of it.

“Alright, see ya.”

She waved goodbye to Jose, then leaned against the counter, figuring she’d wait about ten more minutes before she locked the doors and flipped over the open sign. If there were still no customers there at that point, she was going to clean up quickly and leave. Probably still wouldn’t be able to get to the game, though. Oh, well. It wasn’t even her team.

Drumming her fingers against the countertop, she grumpily sang to herself, “Happy birthday to me. Happy birthday to me . . .” Before she could finish the song, though, the door chimed, and the one customer she didn’t mind seeing walked in.

Michael.

“Hey, what’re you doing here? I thought the game was in overtime.”

“It was. I left early.”

“Why?” The radio announcers had made it sound so exciting.

“I had a birthday party to get to.”

“Mmm, well, it isn’t much of a party here.” She hopped up on the counter, feeling bad that he’d given up his time at the game with his friends to come hang out in an empty restaurant with her.

“I can make anything a party,” he vowed, sauntering towards her, reaching into his coat pocket. “I got you a present,” he said. “I didn’t know what you wanted.”

I want you, she thought. Just you.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The gym emptied out quickly once the game was over. No one wanted to stick around after a Comets loss. Kyle stayed to pick up the trash left behind in the student section, though. If they had won, more people might have stuck behind to help him. But as it was, it was just Isabel.

“That was disappointing,” she said.

“Yep.” The game had basically come down to a bad call on the part of the refs. Comets fans were going to be livid about it for a long time. “Oh, well. I gotta get home and do some homework anyway. Where’s Tess?”

“I think she’s chewing out some of our freshmen for not knowing the cheers,” Isabel replied.

“Oh. Are you giving her a ride or am I?”

“I am.” Isabel tried to toss an empty Mountain Dew bottle into a trashcan located on the steps of the bleachers, but she seemed absolutely defeated when she missed. She’d seemed that way all night, just sluggish and distracted and upset.

“You alright?” he asked her.

“Yeah.” She caught the bottle as it started to roll down the steps and walked it over to the trash instead. “So did Michael say why he left early?”

“He just said he was tired.”

“Oh. So he’s not . . . he’s not going home to hang out with Maria or something?”

And there it was, the reason why she’d seemed upset all night. “Not that I know of.”

“Don’t tell him that I asked that. It’s just . . .”

“I know. I get it,” he assured her. But really, how could he get it? How could he understand? Isabel’s relationship with Michael was so vastly different than his relationship with Tess. He never had to worry about Tess hanging out with some other guy, because she always just wanted to hang out with him.

“Do you think I should be worried?” she asked unsurely.

“About Michael?”

“About his relationship with Maria.”

Oh, this definitely wasn’t a conversation he wanted to get into, but Isabel looked like she was hanging on by a thread, desperately seeking reassurance, and he felt like he had to try to put her mind at ease.

“Because I asked Tess, and she said everything’s gonna be fine, but she’s my best friend; it’s, like, her job to say that.”

“Look, it makes sense why you’d worry, given his history,” Kyle acknowledged. “But I can honestly tell you, he’s never once said anything to me about being into her.” Of course, Michael had never said anything to him about being into Liz, either, and look how that had turned out.

“Never?” she echoed.

“Never. And I know they’re pretty close, and he does care about her . . .”

“And Dylan,” she added.

“Yeah, and him. But he’s with you. And he’s been with you for a while now. Now, come on, we both know Michael only does what he wants, so if he’s with you . . . it’s ‘cause he wants to be.”

He saw her smile for the probably the first time that night. It was a shaky smile, but it was there. “So you think I’m being paranoid?”

“You’re being cautious,” he corrected. “And that’s okay. But I think it’s gonna be fine. You’ve got nothin’ to worry about.” He wasn’t sure if he believed everything he was saying, because there were times when Michael would talk about Maria, and his whole face would just light up. But Isabel believed it, so clearly, she felt better.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“Michael, thank you. I love it.”

Michael groaned, unsatisfied with his gift. “It’s a necklace.” And he was giving it to her in the Crashdown of all places.

“Yes, I see that. It’s really pretty.”

“That’s what the gay dude workin’ the counter said, but . . . it’s a necklace, Maria.”

She gave him a confused look, unclasping the thin chain. “Okay . . .” She hooked it around her neck, beaming once she had it on, and asked, “How does it look?”

“Great, but . . .” Then again, anything would look great on her. Or off of her. “It’s a necklace.”

“You keep saying that like I’m supposed to know what it means.”

“It means I should’ve gotten you something more. But I kinda fired off my best present idea with that guitar at Christmas.”

“That was an amazing gift. And so is this.”

“It’s not amazing,” he denied. “It’s simple and cliché. Everyone gets girls jewelry.”

“No, everyone gets girls body spray,” she corrected, “which, if you think about it, is kind of an insult, because it’s like, hey, did I not smell good enough before?”

He laughed a little, glad that she didn’t seem too disappointed. But still . . . he knew a necklace wasn’t enough. Not for this girl. She thought he’d done so much for her, but really, she was the one who’d done so much for him. She was someone who just . . .

She was someone.

“Alright, I got an idea,” he announced, shuffling closer to her, not quite sure what he was doing. “Another present.”

“Michael, I don’t need another present.”

“Close your eyes,” he instructed.

“What?”

“Close your eyes.” Whatever he was doing, he was pretty sure it was best if she didn’t see it coming.

“Michael . . .”

“Just . . . do it.”

She stared at him for a moment, skeptically, playfully, smiling a little. Oh god, she had a great smile. She had great lips. Great personality. Great everything.

At last, she gave in, her eyes falling shut. And she just stood there, waiting.

Waiting for what? He still didn’t know.

But he did know. He’d known for a long time now that he just had to. He just had to.

( :) )

So he cupped her cheek, hesitating only briefly before deciding it was best not to second-guess it. And then he was kissing her, lips pressing gently but insistently against hers, his free-hand dropping down to her waist. And her mouth responded instinctively. Even though she had to be completely surprised, and even though she literally hadn’t seen it coming, it was like it was natural, and she kissed him back.

He couldn’t believe this was happening.

When their lips parted only slightly he heard her take in a shuddering breath, and, worried that she would stop, he quickly kissed her again, not willing to let it end. He was a bit more forceful this time, moving his mouth a little harder against hers, letting himself be greedy, letting himself want more, and more, and more. More of her.

He snaked his arm around her back, pulling her in closer, feeling like there wasn’t such a thing as close enough. She arched up into him, matching his intensity, her hands holding on tightly to his shoulders as she kissed him just as much as he was kissing her. She had wanted this. He knew it now. This was all she’d wanted, and since it was all he’d wanted to give . . . now they had it.

Together.

How long had they been together?

He would have just kept going, because he had no self-control; but she did, so she tore her lips away, gasping in astonishment at what had just happened. At first, she didn’t look at him, and he hoped it wasn’t because she was embarrassed. There was nothing to be embarrassed about. That had been . . .

He couldn’t even put words to what that had been to him. All he knew was that he wanted to do it again.

Rubbing her back, he smiled gently, hoping he’d see a smile from her in return. But when she finally did raise her eyes to look at him, she looked . . . terrified.

“Why did you do that, Michael?” she asked.

There wasn’t a logical reason, nothing that would make sense. “Maria . . .” There was only . . . want. And hunger. Desire.

He had so much fucking desire for her.

“You shouldn’t have done that,” she mumbled halfheartedly.

It was probably true, but still . . . “Why not?” he challenged.

“Because . . .” She didn’t have to explain it to him. He knew why he shouldn’t have done that, why it was wrong. But he just didn’t care, because it felt right.

He leaned in, attempting to kiss her again, but she pressed her fingers to his mouth, pushing him back this time. And then she was slipping out of his embrace, backing up a bit, trembling with . . . what was that? Uncertainty? Doubt? Whatever it was, he didn’t feel it. All he wanted to feel was her.

“I think you should go,” she whispered.

He frowned, stunned. Go? After all that . . . she wanted him to leave?

“Maria--”

“Michael. Just go.”

He couldn’t believe it. That hadn’t been one-sided. He was sure of it. If it had been, she never even would have kissed him back.

Suddenly, he started to feel that same worry she seemed to be feeling. Had he changed things?

What did I just do?

Pulling himself together, he did as she asked and headed for the exit, not trying to make another pass at her, not leaving her with some lame attempt at seduction. No. The reality of the situation was setting in.

He stopped at the door and looked back at her, wishing she’d change her mind and tell him to stay. Because he would. And if he did, he’d give in to all that desire again, and maybe she would, too. And then they could just forget about second-guessing any of it and go with it, because it felt so good.

She gazed at him almost apologetically, but she didn’t change her mind. So he did as she asked, and he walked out. Even though each step was agony. Even though every fiber in his body was screaming to go back. Even though he knew now, with absolute certainty, that he was in love with her.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Oh god.

Maria felt like she could barely breathe. That kiss . . . that had been no ordinary kiss.

Dazed, in disbelief, she sat down in the closest booth, the one he always used to sit in, trying to wrap her mind around . . . everything. Had that really just happened? Had Michael Guerin really just kissed her?

Like a little girl, she brought her hand to her lips, unable to suppress a smile. She’d been dreaming about this moment for so long now, imagining what it would feel like, and this had surpassed all her wildest expectations.

And if he’d kissed her . . . then that meant he felt something. Maybe he felt something like she felt something.

As tempting as it was to get lost in the elation she was feeling, she forced herself to come back down from it. Because now . . . now everything was a mess.

It wasn’t as simple as just falling in love and being with the guy. Her life automatically came with obstacles in place. And so did his. His girlfriend, his future . . . he wasn’t thinking about those things yet, but he would. And when he did, maybe this was something he would regret.

But even so, even knowing that . . . her heart still raced.








TBC . . .

-April

Part 39

Posted: Sat Dec 27, 2014 11:55 am
by April
GOOD NEWS! I actually finished this story 2 days ago. As usual, it ended up being LONG: 1,316 pages. (I really thought I was going to keep this one under the thousand page mark, but it just took on a life of its own while I was writing it!) I'm excited to share the rest of it with you guys as we continue on here.

Eva:
And then he takes that big step!

Whoaw, it was totally unexpected and then again, it wasn't.
Even though this is an AU Michael, I wanted to retain Canon Michael's impulsiveness and tendency to just act on whatever he's feeling in the moment. And Michael certainly did act on his feelings here!

Sara:
I think she needs to take a step back, evaluate what the heck is going on here and get a clue. She is spiraling out of control and its driving me crazy! I just want to smack her.
You and Tess both want to smack her then! Yes, you used the exact right word there: spiraling. That's totally what Isabel is doing right now. It's as sad as it is frustrating, and it's likely to get worse before it gets better.
And Michael....come on buddy...man up. If you REALLY want to make a try with Maria, BREAK UP WITH ISABEL. Stop stringing her along. These characters are driving me insane. Its like they were all born with NO COMMON SENSE. UGH!
They're teenagers. :roll: In my experience working with teenagers, I can assure you, it seems like they have no common sense sometimes.
Common Sense....Someone? Anyone?
Ha! I see what you did there. ;)

Carolyn:
Michael and "The Notebook"........now that's something I'd like to see.
Michael is so . . . guy, you know, that it's funny to picture him watching that movie and tearing up, isn't it?

Rod:
The kiss l know will be celebrated by numerous candy fans on this board. But to me it just proves that Michael is still just the cheating jerk he was. Just instead of cheating on Isabel with Liz it's going to be Maria. If he likes her better than man up and have the guts to break up with Isabel first.
I don't disagree at all. The thing that prevents that first kiss from being truly sweet and romantic is the fact that it shouldn't have happened. No matter how you slice it, Michael was wrong to do that, and Maria was wrong to let him do that, because Isabel's still in the picture. He does need to man up and break up with her, but Michael's still very much a boy who's learning how to be a man, and it's not coming easy to him.


Thank you for the feedback! Hope everyone has a happy new year!








Part 39








The walk home felt endless. Or maybe he was just going in circles. Didn’t matter, really. Once he got home, he wouldn’t feel any better or less confused about what had just occurred.

Everything was different now.

When Michael walked in the house, it was quiet. He almost would have preferred his mom, his sister, or even his dad to be downstairs so he had some kind of distraction. Something to do to keep his mind off of . . . everything. But no such luck. It was late, and everyone was probably asleep.

He leaned back against the door, wondering what he was going to say to Maria when she got home. He’d had the entire walk home to think about it, and he still had no idea. He didn’t want to apologize, because he didn’t feel sorry for doing it. But clearly urging her to do it again wasn’t going to get him anywhere, either. She’d seemed . . . pretty freaked out back at the Crashdown.

Dammit. He rarely ever had good things in his life, but whenever he did, he usually screwed them up.

Lumbering towards Dylan’s room, he thought about peeking in there, but when he stood outside the door, he heard the little boy talking to one of the imaginary monsters that lived in his closet. He sounded all brave and determined, saying things like, “Go away. Micho’s gonna get you.”

Smiling fondly, Michael listened a little bit longer, until Dylan’s talking ceased. Apparently the monster had gone away. Since he didn’t want to disturb the little guy as he was falling asleep, Michael trudged upstairs, stopping in the bathroom first to jump in the shower. Then he headed back downstairs to get something to eat. Then he sat in the living room and watched TV for a while.

He knew exactly what he was doing; there was no fooling himself. He was trying to stay up so he could confront Maria when she got home. Which really should have been any minute now. She was probably stalling, doing something like cleaning the Crashdown way more than was necessary just so she didn’t have to come face to face with him.

When he finally gave in and went upstairs, it was miserable having to lie down in that bed alone. Sleep? Yeah, right. Wasn’t a possibility. He couldn’t shut his mind off. It was consumed with thoughts of her, mostly thoughts that recalled what it felt like to kiss her.

He’d kissed lots of girls in his time. But never like that.

Unable to nod off, he got up and walked around his room. Just paced back and forth. Back and forth. It started raining around 2:00, so he stood by the window and watched it fall. And then he tried texting Maria and calling her, because he didn’t like the thought of her being out in a storm. Although she probably wasn’t. She’d probably resorted to staying at her mom’s for the night, all because he’d gone and changed things between them.

What had he been thinking? Or had he been thinking at all? Maybe if he had, he would have stopped himself . . .

No. No way. He wouldn’t have. The way he was feeling, nothing in the world could have stopped him from taking the chance he had. Now, all he could do was hope that it didn’t backfire in his face. Because if he lost her—truly, completely lost her as a friend—he’d never forgive himself.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

As much as she would have liked to, Maria knew she couldn’t stay away forever. She could draw it out, make her absence last a long time. But in the end, she was living in the guy’s house. Her son was there. She had to face him.

It was hard to even comprehend everything she was feeling when she got home. In a way, she was the happiest she had ever been. But on the other hand, she was completely petrified. Things had changed, and she didn’t know how to handle it, or how she was supposed to handle it . . . versus how she wanted to.

She had barely stepped through the door early that morning when Michael came trundling downstairs to meet her. He looked like he hadn’t slept a wink that night, like he’d been up the whole time waiting for her. Which was sweet. He was so much sweeter than anyone gave him credit for.

That look in his eyes, though . . . it was like he was seeing her for the first time.

“Hey,” he greeted, trying to sound casual.

She made no such attempt. In fact, she didn’t say anything. Her mouth felt dry.

“I was worried about you,” he admitted. “I called, I texted.”

“I know.” She’d ignored. Not because she wanted to; only because . . . it seemed like the smartest thing to do. She was really trying to be smart about this, even though she was a drop-out. That didn’t mean she was an idiot. That didn’t mean she charged into something head first without thinking it through. Those days of her life were gone. Now, all she did was think about the consequences. Actions had consequences, and sometimes those consequences were . . .

Oh god, she thought. I sound like Mom.

“Where’d you go last night?” he asked.

“I stopped in quick to check on Dylan.”

“I didn’t even hear you.”

“I was quiet.” She hadn’t done so much tip-toeing and careful stepping since she’d been sneaking out of the house to go be with Max. “And then I left and spent the night at the library.”

“You slept at the library?” he echoed incredulously.

“It was just like old times.” Maybe it was a little extreme, but it just seemed best to be away from him for a night. If she had come home right after kissing him, she would’ve had such little self-restraint, and who knows where things could have gone from there.

“You could’ve come back here,” he told her.

“Michael . . .” She gave him a look. He was acting like it was no big deal, that everything would have just been fine and dandy, but they both knew better.

“What? Maria, we . . .” He lowered his voice so that no one would overhear. “We kissed. It’s not like we triggered the start of the end of the world.”

Maybe the start of the end of Isabel’s world, she thought remorsefully. It didn’t matter if she liked the girl or not. She didn’t deserve this.

“Sorry it was so horrible,” he grumbled. “I’ll never do it again.”

“No, it wasn’t . . .” Without a doubt, it had been the most electrifying moment of her entire life. “It wasn’t horrible. That’s the problem.”

“Why is that a problem?”

“Because I--”

“You wanna do it again?”

“Yes. No!” She was tired, confused, and totally not in the right frame of mind to be having this conversation. “God, Michael, I don’t know!”

“You kissed me back,” he pointed out.

“I didn’t even know what was happening.”

“You kissed me back.”

She sighed heavily, feeling like they were getting nowhere, and like they were going to continue getting nowhere, because they were both too worked up, their emotions running too high.

“Look, Maria, maybe I shouldn’t have done what I did,” he acknowledged. “Okay? But I just . . . I do that. I do stuff without thinking. That’s just me. And it was your birthday and I just . . . I don’t know, I thought—I-I just . . .” He looked like he wanted to kick himself for stammering so much. “I wanted it to be special.”

It had been so special. But she didn’t know how to tell him that without getting in even deeper, making the situation even more problematic.

“I wanted to kiss you,” he stated simply.

“Why?”

His eyes stared straight into hers, intently, seriously. “Why do you think?”

She thought a lot of things, and most of those thoughts were conflicting with each other in one way or the other. “That really doesn’t answer my question,” she whispered. Had he kissed her just because it was her birthday? Or had he done it just because he was a guy and wanted to make out with someone? Or maybe there were real feelings there.

“What do you want me to say, Maria?”

“I don’t know.”

“You want me to apologize? ‘cause I’m not gonna do that.”

“It was wrong,” she pointed out. “It shouldn’t have happened.”

“Why not?”

“Do I really have to explain why not? You have a girlfriend, Michael.”

“I know, I know,” he groaned.

“And I have a son.”

“Who I adore.”

“So it’s just not that simple.” It would have been so nice if it was all just a fairytale. Boy meets girl. Boy saves girl. Boy and girl fall in love and live happily ever after. But those stories didn’t have a bonus chapter where boy cheats on his girlfriend and girl allows it to happen.

“I don’t know what to do now,” she admitted. “I probably shouldn’t even be staying here.”

“What?” His expression changed to one of alarm, and he quickly switched tactics. “No, Maria . . . I’m sorry, okay? I didn’t mean to . . . I should’ve thought about what I was doing and . . . not done it.”

As much as she hated that that kiss was wreaking havoc on them now . . . the thought of not kissing him was even worse.

“Let’s just forget it ever happened,” he suggested. “Go back to normal.”

She stared at him skeptically. Normal? Could they do that? Was there such a thing anymore?

“It was just a kiss,” he mumbled, looking down at his feet. “It doesn’t have to mean anything.”

She swallowed the lump in her throat, fearing that it meant more to her than it did to him. It wasn’t possible for her to forget about it, but maybe it was something he could do. He had a girlfriend, after all, and plenty of other options. There were lots of girls out there who led less complex lives than she did.

“It doesn’t have to mean anything,” she agreed quietly, well aware how unconvincing she sounded. Because no matter how logical and ethical she tried to be, it still meant everything to her.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Michael knew his plan was flawed from the start. A kiss wasn’t an easy thing to forget, unless there was alcohol involved. And even then, it usually stuck with a person. But this kind of kiss, especially, this world-stopping kind . . . he could never forget it, and he doubted Maria could, either.

It was hard to act like things were normal when they weren’t. Everything was awkward, and Maria was always on edge. When he sat down beside her at the dinner table that night, she scooted her chair away from him a bit. When he slipped into the bathroom to brush his teeth, she finished brushing hers at light speed and practically bolted.

But nothing was worse than the bed situation. Even he was second-guessing it now, but he was determined to act like everything was fine, to act as if things really could be normal again. Because it was normal for him to lie next to her and want her. Nothing unusual about that. But now that she knew he had feelings, and he knew she had feelings, too . . . it was different.

She did get into that bed with him. But she put up a wall of pillows in between them so that they would stay apart. During the night, he pretended to be tossing and turning in his sleep just so that he could kick a few of the pillows aside, but she got up, retrieved them, and put them back in place. Needless to say, for the second night in a row, neither one of them got much sleep.

The next morning wasn’t much better. He was waiting outside the bathroom for her to get done in the shower, and when she came out, she was just wearing a towel tucked underneath her arm. She gasped as she bumped into him, clutching the towel in place. “What’re you doing?”

“Nothing.”

“I was in the shower.”

“I see that.” Oh god, this was too much, knowing that she was naked under that towel. Usually she wore a bathrobe, but a week ago, he’d shrunk it in the laundry. Totally on accident. Not at all on purpose. Not at all in an effort to get her to don this towel ensemble.

“What’re you doing?” she demanded again.

“I was just waitin’ my turn. Don’t worry, I wasn’t waitin’ out here like a creeper just so I could . . .” He trailed off, fixating on the tiny droplets of water clinging to her skin. Skin that was smooth to the touch, not that he’d ever gotten to touch much of it. But it looked that way.

Jerking himself out of his fantasies, he stuttered, “What was I . . . what was I saying?” He honestly couldn’t remember.

“Michael!” She pushed past him and stormed back into the bedroom, leaving wet footprints on the carpet.

“Oh, I remember!” he called out to her even after she’d closed the door. “I wasn’t standin’ out here like a creeper just so I could . . .” He lowered his voice, muttering, “. . . gawk at you.” And of course that was exactly what he’d done. How could he not, though? The girl lived in his house. She slept in his bed and bathed in his shower. Even if he’d had some self-restraint, it would have been hard to resist.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Being back at school was actually a blessing. Or a welcomed distraction, at least. Michael thought it would give him something else to think about, but really, he should have known better. He didn’t think about school, ever, not even when he was in it.

His friends had no idea that anything was going on. They treated it as if it were a normal day. And it was, to them. They sat down at lunch and had their normal conversations, in which Tess always did most of the talking. But Michael just sat there, dazed, lost in his own thoughts, wondering if Maria was at work, thinking about him much in the same way he couldn’t stop thinking about her.

“Wait ‘til you see our dresses for the dance. They’re so cute!” Tess raved.

“Yours was expensive,” Isabel pointed out.

“But so worth it. Hey, you know what I was thinking? Why don’t we just make the winter dance a Valentine’s dance? It’s only a couple weeks away, and it’s, like, the best holiday.”

Kyle made a gagging sound at that, then, upon getting a glare from his girlfriend, put his arm around her shoulders and agreed, “You’re so right.”

“I mean, it’s so romantic,” Tess kept going. And going, and going. “And dances are romantic. It’d be the perfect dance. Actually, I think we should have dances for all the holidays. Like . . . oh my god! We could have an earth day dance!”

Isabel laughed. “What?”

“Yeah, and we could all show up wearing leaves and stuff.”

“Hmm, I’m not sure I could get Principal Forrester to approve that.”

Michael just stared at the sorry excuse for food on his lunch tray. God, he was so bored.

“Okay, then we could just wear green and stuff,” Tess proposed, revising her plan. “Wouldn’t that be fun?”

“Sounds super,” Kyle agreed cheesily, giving her an encouraging thumbs up.

“What do you think, Michael?” Tess asked.

He thought . . . wait, a minute, what were they talking about? “Huh?”

“Earth Day dance,” Isabel said. “Yay or nay?”

Earth Day dance. This was the topic of conversation? “Sure,” he replied. “Why the hell not?”

“See, Michael’s on board. Isabel, make this happen,” Tess urged. “I’m counting on you.”

Isabel laughed. “Okay, Tess.”

“I’m serious.”

“I know you are. That’s why it’s so funny.”

And just like that, Michael was spacing out again, wondering which one of them, if any, would notice. Maybe Kyle. Although, when he was around Tess, he usually didn’t notice much else.

It was weird. They were all there, right there with him. But he was just . . . not there. Not really. His mind was somewhere else.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Michael was more than ready to crash for the night. He needed sleep. He needed rest. He needed relaxation.

He needed Maria not to construct that damn wall of pillows again, which, unfortunately was exactly what he found her doing when he got done brushing his teeth that night. It wasn’t just an annoyance anymore. He’d had three nights of this, and it was to the point where it was legitimately pissing him off. “Are you kidding me?” he barked.

“What?”

“We’re doin’ that again?”

She sighed, fluffing the pillows so they rose up as far as possible. “This is just how it’s gonna be.”

“For how long?”

“I don’t know.”

No. Screw that, he thought, fed up with the awkwardness and all the changes. He wanted things back to the way they were. He marched forward, demolishing her wall, tossing all those extra pillows onto the ground.

“Hey!” she yelped.

“I barely have enough room as it is. I don’t need all these damn pillows gettin’ in the way.” Once they were all on the floor, he got into the bed and lay down, watching her expectantly. Surely she’d give in and just lay there with him. She wasn’t that stubborn. “It’s not like I’m gonna reach over and molest you in the middle of the night,” he pointed out.

She stared down at her side of the bed, shaking her head. “I can’t . . .” She got down on the floor and started arranging pillows down there.

Propping himself up on his forearms, he looked down at her. “What’re you doin’?”

“I’ll just sleep on the floor.”

He shot up into a sitting position, staring at her in disbelief. “Come on, Maria.”

“What? We need to keep our distance from each other.”

“No, we need to get back to normal. Get up here.”

“Michael, I’m fine down here. Really.”

Son of a bitch, he thought frustratedly, growling low in his throat. “This is stupid,” he muttered, sliding off the edge of the bed so he was down on the floor beside her. “I’ll sleep on the floor.”

“No, just sleep on the bed.”

“I’m not gonna sleep on the bed and have you sleep on the floor.” He wasn’t even that much of a gentleman, but even he knew that wasn’t right.

“It’s your bed,” she pointed out.

“It’s yours, too.”

“No, but it’s . . . Michael, it’s your room. It’s your house.”

“So?”

“So just let me sleep on the floor and you sleep on the bed. That’s it. It doesn’t have to be this whole issue. It doesn’t have to be this whole big thing.” She was starting to talk with her hands, which meant she was getting a little worked up.

“It wouldn’t be if you hadn’t built the damn pillow wall in the first place!”

“Michael, we shouldn’t even be sleeping in the same bed!” she argued, throwing a pillow at him. “This is, like, a good wake-up call, you know?”

“No.”

“Yes! It is! God, why don’t you get it? We can’t go back to the way things were!”

That much they agreed on.

Once again without thinking, he grabbed her and kissed her, not bothering with being gentle this time. He needed her to know how much he wanted her, and the best way to do that was to show her.

Her hands were on his chest, scrunching his shirt up as she held tightly to him. She was moaning this time, caught up in it. Did she realize that she was kissing him back with just as much tenacity as he was kissing her? Did she realize that she was breaking her own fucking rules?

Did she care? Because he sure as hell didn’t.

She did, though. She did care; because she broke off the kiss suddenly, holding him back when he once again leaned in for more.

“I’ll sleep on the couch,” she decided, scrambling to her feet and sprinting from the room.

Are you fuckin’ serious? He wasn’t used to having to work so hard to get with someone. But then again, Maria DeLuca was no ordinary girl, so if he had to work a little harder to be with her, he’d do it. No matter what.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The bar. Andy’s second home. As much as he loved it there . . . he hated it.

“There he is!” his friend Charlie, who was probably already drunk, hollered when he sauntered in. “There’s the man.”

Yeah, I’m the man, Andy thought bitterly. He sat down at the counter next to his friend and got the bartender’s attention. All it took was a flick of his hand for her to know what he wanted, because he came there and ordered the same thing almost night after night.

It never used to be like this.

“Say, I saw somethin’ the other day,” Charlie slurred, pointing his finger at him exaggeratedly, “and I gotta ask you about it.”

“Shoot.”

“Well, I was droppin’ my youngest off at that rat-hole daycare, and I saw your kid droppin’ off a kid of his own. And I says to myself—I says, ‘Well, that ain’t Michael Guerin, is it?’ Turns out, it was.’”

“Yeah, that’s not his kid,” Andy explained. “At least I don’t think it is.” Really, with his son, it was hard to say.

“It ain’t?”

“No. He acts like it, though.” It was a dangerous road his son was on. He was getting in so deep, he might never get back out again.

“That ain’t your kid, right?”

He laughed at the absurdity of that. “No.” That would require his wife to be willing to sleep with him, which she rarely ever did anymore. “It’s, uh . . . it’s his friend’s kid.”

“Oh, alright. I get it now.”

“You do?” He grunted, shaking his head. “I don’t.” He didn’t understand why Michael would go down the same path he once had. If he was so determined not to end up like dear old dad, why was he making the same mistakes? Didn’t he realize he wasn’t tied down yet? He didn’t have to be there for that kid, and there would be other girls who came along who made him forget all about Maria.

Andy grasped the cool bottle tightly when the bartender set it down in front of him, then tilted his head back and took a giant gulp. Good stuff.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

God, this girl . . . she had him following her around like a lost puppy dog.

“Maria. Would you talk to me?” He was starting to grow impatient.

She practically sprinted down the stairs and into the kitchen, but he wouldn’t let her out of his sight. “We’re not having this conversation,” she told him decisively.

“Why not?”

“Because you have to go to the dance.”

“I don’t care about that.” He’d stay home. Fuck the dance. It was a waste of time anyway.

“And your girlfriend’s gonna be here any minute.” She crossed her arms over her chest, leaning back against the counter. “Or do you not care about her, either?”

“No, I do,” he insisted, even though he understood why it might be hard to believe. “I care about her. But not enough, apparently, because I can’t stop thinkin’ about you.”

“You have to,” she whispered sadly.

“No, I don’t.” And he wasn’t going to. He was going to spend every waking second thinking about what it felt like to kiss her, because it felt that good.

“Why are you being like this?” she squeaked out.

“Like what?”

“Stubborn.”

“Oh, and like you’re not,” he teased, getting up in her space, reaching back behind her to brace himself against the counter. “Buildin’ your pillow wall, just puttin’ it together.” As annoying as those damn pillows were, it was kind of adorable how persistent she’d been. “You’re so determined to keep us apart.”

With downcast eyes, she murmured, “Well, one of us has to be.”

He smirked. She had him there. He’d completely given in to it. There was no resistance in him whatsoever. So it was all on her. Because he was all in.

“Maria, it’s not like I just wanna hook up with you,” he pointed out.

She lifted her head, narrowing her eyes as she questioned, “Then what do you want?”

“Probably the same thing you do.”

“Oh, I highly doubt that.”

“Why? What do you want?”

“Michael . . .” she whined.

“Maria . . .” he mimicked.

“You know what? I seem to recall a little déjà vu here. Didn’t you once want something from Liz Parker?”

“That was different. You’re not some conquest, Maria. I’m . . .” He stopped himself before blurting out that he was in love with her. But just the fact that the words were on the tip of his tongue was crazy. If he told her that right now, though, it’d freak her out even more. Or maybe it’d seal the deal. Maybe that was exactly what she needed to hear.

“You know you’d have more opportunities with Isabel,” she declared sadly.

“I don’t care about that.”

“You don’t now. But someday you will.”

What the hell had gotten into this girl? She was selling herself short. Maybe she wasn’t going to Princeton, but he didn’t care. He wasn’t going, either.

“I don’t know what you want from me, Michael. Do you want me to just say that I’m okay with being the girl you cheat on Isabel with?”

“What if I wasn’t cheating?” he proposed, raising his eyebrows. He could break up with her. It wouldn’t be pleasant, but he’d do it.

“Then do you want me to be okay with being the girl who complicates your life?”

“It’s already complicated.”

“No, Michael, it doesn’t have to be. You have so many chances, and I don’t wanna hold you back.”

“Hold me back?” What was she talking about? He really just didn’t understand. It seemed, to him, that she was just searching for excuses. Because she was scared. She was scared to let herself be happy, which was what she was when she was with him. This poor girl had gotten so used to being sad and being stressed that she wasn’t used to the other end of the spectrum.

He heard the neighbor’s dogs barking, which probably meant that Isabel was pulling into the driveway. Great. Perfect timing. Because it wasn’t like he had anything else going on.

He lifted one hand to touch the ends of Maria’s hair, figuring she couldn’t object if all he did was touch that. “Come to the school tonight,” he told her. He couldn’t make it through that stupid dance without her. She had to be there. He had to be with her.

“I can’t.”

“Yes, you can.” She was trying so hard to be good, but a girl like her . . . she was fighting her true nature.

The doorbell rang, and he forced himself away from her to go answer it. There was Isabel, all glammed up and wearing a dress that wasn’t exactly white, but rather . . . sort of white. What the hell was that color called? Beige? Cream? It made her boobs look like mountains, but he barely noticed.

“Hey,” she said, stepping inside. She had to lift up her dress when she walked, because it had a long train. Oh, great, that’d be so dramatic when somebody out on the dance floor stepped on it and ripped it. At least he had that to look forward to tonight.

“You look nice,” he told her, casting a quick glance back in the kitchen at Maria before he kissed her. Nothing too heavy. Just a quick one on the lips that would get her blood boiling a little.

God, I’m such a jerk, he thought.

“Jeans?” she asked, surveying his outfit.

“Nice jeans.” Same ones he’d worn to homecoming, and she hadn’t complained too much then. This was a more small-scale dance, so he figured they’d do. “We’d better go,” he said, motioning towards the door. “I don’t wanna miss my coronation.”

“Yeah, you’re gonna have a big night,” she said, linking her arm with his.

Oh, she had no idea. Once again, he glanced back at Maria, who was still just standing at the counter, trying not to look jealous.

He gave her a pointed look, silently reiterating his request to see her there tonight. And he truly believed he would. Because she was cautious, and she was wary; but she was giving in.








TBC . . .

-April

Part 40

Posted: Sat Jan 03, 2015 12:37 pm
by April
Carolyn:
They want things to just go back to normal.......fat chance that's gonna happen.
Oh yeah, that's impossible. Things can't go back to normal between them now. As much as they say that's what they want, really, they don't, because they want each other so damn much.

Sara:
You're right....sometimes I forget they are just teenagers. Idiot hormonal teenagers.
:lol: Idiocy and raging hormones don't often mix well.
I hope Michael breaks this off but I have a feeling that isn't going to happen tonight.
He knows what he needs to do; he's just been a coward when it comes to actually doing it.

Eva:
I understand Maria's desire to keep him as far as possible. Once she gives in, there will be no road back. And she wants that nice road, the fairy tale one. In which she's the princess in the arms of her prince. The only princess that is.

And on the other hand, she doesn't feel that she's enough for me. That she's worthy to be his princess, any princess for that matter. Michael will have to work on that one.
Exactly. Like almost any girl, Maria would love for Michael to be Prince Charming (but he's obviously not), and she would love for her life to have this simple, happily ever after ending. But she's convinced herself that that just isn't in the cards for her.

Rodney:
If I was Maria there is no way in hell I would even want to date this Michael. Sure he's done tons for her and her son but deep down he can't be trusted. He's still with Isabel, sleeping with her, and toying with her feelings while still chasing after Maria. He's a cheater who I wouldn't trust with anything right now.
Being with Michael is a risk in every sense of the word right now. It's hard to trust that this guy is ready for such a serious relationship when he's being . . . well, not trustworthy.
Maybe when Kyle gets to Alabama they can win a Sugar Bowl again :roll: (inside joke for April) 1-3 as of now in it. :roll:
:lol: That venue is just cursed for Bama!
Tess idea for the earth day dance and the wearing of leaves got me picturing her in one of those Bible Eve in just the leaves scenes..........man cold showers in January are brutal :shock:
HA HA HA!

fadedblue:
April, I was thinking of you while I was watching the Sugar Bowl...as a Michigan fan I had to side with your guys for this one, sorry for that rough loss. Now. Any thoughts about having Kyle jump ship from Bama to Michigan now that Harbaugh is our main man?? You know he'd do good by Kyle
Oh my gosh, I forgot that you're a Michigan fan! I know a couple people who just LOVE the Wolverines, and they really use it to get under my skin, so my feelings towards Michigan are . . . well, not the same as your feelings, let's put it that way. :lol: But Harbaugh does seem like a good hire, so congrats on that. Hopefully it's not too much of a media circus and they let the guy coach and build up the program again. A strong Michigan team would obviously be great for the Big 10. And maybe my Huskers can finally start moving past "good" seasons and have some "great" seasons again. :roll: If we could get Ohio State, Michigan State, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Nebraska all playing great football at the same time, the Big 10 would be back in business.


Thank you very much for the feedback!

I'm bringing by one of my FAVORITE songs today for this part. It's called "Bloodstream" (Vampire Diaries remix) by Stateless. It is SUUUUUUCH a beautiful song and really helped set the tone for a certain scene in this part. You can listen to it here or click on :? when you see it if you would like to listen.

I hope 2015 is off to a great start for everyone! Enjoy!









Part 40








Unsurprisingly, the cafeteria was decked out as a winter wonderland that night. Really, with the dance titled the Snowball Dance, there were only so many options. Michael wasn’t that impressed. It was mostly a whole lot of fake snow, fake glaciers, and nothing else. They’d had the same dance back at East, and at least that had been entertaining because they’d always run the risk of the floor caving in.

The most exciting part so far had been when Roxie showed up wearing a sexy Christmas costume that didn’t hide much. To everyone who was a male, including the male chaperones on duty, it was an awesome sight. But unfortunately, Topolsky was also on chaperone duty, and she took her responsibilities very seriously. So she made her go home and change. Bummer.

Annoying pop music blasted through the speakers. For the most part, no good tunes. Michael requested a few he’d heard Maria singing, but the lame DJ’s response was just, “Sorry, dude. No one’s gonna dance to those.”

That left him with very little to do besides spiking the punch, which he always took it upon himself to do, and then hang back and watch as everyone—freshman and seniors alike—lost their inhibitions and danced below the stage, somehow having a really great time. It was fun to watch the nerds who had no rhythm get out there and get their first boners when they danced with a drunken slut.

Isabel hung back with him by the food table for the most part, people-watching while he ate. She spent a good deal of the time complaining about her dress, saying that she regretted getting it because it was a pain to carry around the heavy train. It was too formal, she declared, and he didn’t disagree.

When a song came on that sounded like it was being sung by a transvestite, she pointedly asked him, “Wanna dance?”

“Not really.” He had to have a little more alcohol in him before he agreed to something like that. Or it had to be Maria asking him. Whichever.

Isabel appeared both bored and frustrated as she looked out on the dance floor again. “Look at them,” she said, motioning to Tess and Kyle. They’d been out there so long that they were probably working up a sweat. Tess was obviously a great dancer, and even though Kyle wasn’t the greatest, he managed to make dorky dance moves look cool. He didn’t seem to care what he looked like, actually. He just cared that his girlfriend was having fun.

“They’re dancing,” Isabel said, pointing out the obvious.

If she was going to start comparing relationship styles, she was in for a world of hurt. “We’re not them,” he grumbled. Hey, the sooner she accepted that this wasn’t going to be a magically romantic night, the better.

When the song ended, Tess dragged Kyle off the dance floor—surprisingly, he looked like he wanted to keep dancing—and they came up to the food table. “Oh my god, this is so fun!” Tess babbled breathlessly. “It’s so much better than the last dance!”

“You think every dance is better than the last dance,” Isabel said.

“Because they always are! This is, like, the best one yet. You two should get out there.”

“I would,” Isabel said, apathetically holding up her train, “but . . .” She shrugged helplessly. “Besides, Michael doesn’t wanna dance.”

“Dude, it’s actually kinda fun,” Kyle chimed in.

“I’ll pass, thanks.” Sometimes he and Kyle differed in their definition for fun. For example, Kyle thought it was fun to talk with Tess on the phone for at least an hour every night. Two minutes of that and Michael would have wanted to pull a Van Gogh and chop his own ear off.

“Well, every party needs a pooper, and I guess that’s you two,” Tess accused, her feet already moving in time with the beat as if she couldn’t wait to get back out there. “But seriously, Michael, you’re about to be crowned king of this dance. Where’s your school spirit?”

“Must’ve left it at home.”

She rolled her eyes just as the music was cut short and Principal Forrester and Topolsky, holding both crowns, stepped up to the microphone. “Testing,” Forrester said, tapping the microphone. “Testing?”

“Okay, Michael, as a member of your social group, I request that you not do or say anything to embarrass your friends while you’re up there,” Tess entreated. “Just smile, stand still, and look pretty while they put the crown on your head.”

“Relax.”

When Tess turned around to face the front, he and Kyle exchanged a look, and Kyle whispered, “Are you gonna do it?”

He nodded confidently. “Hell, yeah.” His luau king speech last year had been legendary. All the people who had gone to East were going to expect an encore.

“The time has come,” Forrester bellowed, “to crown this year’s Snowball king and queen. Ladies and gentlemen, this year’s Snowball king . . .” He pulled out a little envelope like they did on all those award shows, just to make it even more dramatic. Sighing as if he were disappointed by the result, he finished, “. . . is Michael Guerin.”

Michael pumped his fist in the air, not at all surprised by his victory, and shuffled towards the front to a chorus of chants from the guys like, “Yeah, Guerin! Represent, man!”

Represent what? he wondered. The football team? East High? Douchebags everywhere?

When he got up on stage, he had to kneel so Topolsky could put the crown on his head. “Congratulations,” she told him earnestly.

“Yeah, thanks.” It wasn’t some big accomplishment. Popularity contest, nothing more.

“And now,” the principal continued, “the moment you’ve all been waiting for . . .”

“Actually . . .” Michael put his hand over the microphone and urged him aside. “I’d like to say a few things.”

“No!” he heard Tess squeal in protest. Isabel was already covering her face in embarrassment, but Kyle was standing back their giving him a thumb’s up.

“Wow,” he started in, faux-emotional. “I can’t believe this. I mean . . . Snowball king. What an honor. This has been a dream of mine for many, many . . . days now. And because of all of you wonderful people, it came true.”

Light laughter rose up from the crowd, and Principal Forrester tried to take back the microphone, but Michael held his ground.

“First off . . .” He worked up a few fake tears, fanning himself like a girl and whimpering, “I promised myself I wasn’t gonna cry.”

The laughter intensified.

“First off,” he began again, “there are a few people I need to thank. Without them, none of this would be possible.” He took a folded piece of paper out of his pocket and pretended to read off of it, even though there was nothing written there. “First of all, I’d like to thank my personal hero and lord and savior, James Hetfield of Metallica. And I’d also like to thank Santa for creating winter and giving us a reason to have this dance in the first place. And I’d like to thank Nelson Mandela—God rest his soul—because, really . . . how can you not thank Nelson Mandela? That man was a badass.”

“Okay, I think you’re done,” Principal Forrester said, though Michael could barely hear him over howling laughter of his fellow students now.

“And I’d like to thank the baby Jesus, for being born,” he went on.

“That’s it.” Forrester grabbed both his arms and started hauling him off the stage.

“The baby Jesus!” he yelled, struggling against him. “The baby Jesus!”

Everyone started to applaud as though he’d just said something truly remarkable or insightful. Eventually, he gave up struggling and just hopped down off the stage.

His principal shook his head, mumbling, “You’re an interesting guy, Guerin.”

“Thank you.” He took that as a compliment.

Principal Forrester returned to the stage, forgoing the drama this time, as he appeared to just want this coronation over with. “And your new Snowball queen is . . .” He didn’t even look at the envelope this time, as he already knew the results. “Roxie Harson.”

A high-pitched shriek of elation bubbled up from the crowd, and from within the center of a group of grabby guys emerged Roxie, fully-clothed now, in a mermaid-style dress that limited her to waddling instead of walking. She tripped on her way up the steps to the stage, though, and her dress slipped down past her breasts. “Oops, my top!”

“Yeah!” all the guys roared. It was like proof of the reason why they’d voted for her.

Giggling like the beautiful idiot she was, she pulled it back up and climbed onto the stage, receiving her crown. “Okay,” she said, “I really do have something to say.”

Michael tuned her out, because her voice was annoying and she really was one of those girls who would get emotional over something like this. The girl was such an airhead, she could barely string a sentence together.

“Michael!” Tess hissed as she and Kyle and Isabel worked their way through the crowd towards him. “I told you not to do that.”

“Dude, epic,” Kyle congratulated, clasping his hand and doing a shoulder bump.

“Well . . .” Eventually, even Tess managed to smile. “It was kind of funny.”

“See?” He surveyed Isabel, trying to read her body language and see if she was pissed or pleased. He couldn’t tell. “What’d you think?” he asked.

“Oh, I pretty much expected you to do that,” she said, sounding . . . resigned.

“It was funny, right?”

“Hilarious.”

He gave her a look, thinking, Come on, Is. She did have a sense of humor, somewhere in there, but it was buried down deeply beneath layers of sophistication. Maybe the girl just didn’t have it in her to be light-hearted.

When Roxie finally got done with her pointless ramble, it was time for the mandatory king and queen dance, in which everyone formed a circle and they had to dance by themselves in front of all of them. Fantastic. Luckily, having his hands on Roxie’s hot, tight little body made it worth it. Even though Isabel had warned him to be good beforehand. Even though he knew she was staring daggers at them and one wrong slip of the hand would start an argument.

“This is nice,” Roxie commented as they danced.

“Not bad.” It would’ve been better if she was . . . someone else, though.

“You know, I’ve always liked you, Michael.”

“I know. That’s why you hooked up with me.”

“I did?” She laughed, bubbling, “I don’t even remember that.”

“Ouch.”

“Oh, no, I’m sure you were good. I just . . . I don’t really know why I don’t remember.”

“I’m guessing you were drunk.”

“Oh.” She nodded slowly, stupidly. “Probably.”

“Probably.” God, what a simple girl this one was. Easy, in more ways than one.

“You know, after this, we could slip away,” she hinted. “If you want.”

It didn’t take much to understand what she was offering. Herself. Her body. She was probably drunk right now, too, and she wanted to hook up.

Maybe he never should have stopped hooking up with girls like her. Girls like her were a fun time, and they didn’t come with judgment and disappointment attached, like Isabel did. And they didn’t come with all those feelings, like Maria did. Girls like her were the type of girl he could use and not feel bad about it.

Her offer, in a way, was very tempting.

( :? )

About five minutes later, he walked down one of the upstairs hallways after managing to slip away from his friends. He could still hear the music coming from down below. Another slow song. Not a bad one this time.

Perfect.

After chucking his crown into the nearest trashcan, he stopped near one of the restrooms when he felt like he was in a secluded enough spot. It was pretty dark, pretty far down the hallway. No one would find them there.

Taking his phone out of his pocket, he sent a text message that read, by the bathroom…where r u? No need to be more specific than that. She’d know where to find him.

He waited for a few minutes, leaning back against the wall, closing his eyes, fantasizing about what his hands could do to her, and then he sensed that she was coming. He just knew she was there.

When he opened his eyes, there was Maria, slowly striding through the dark hallway, approaching him with just the slightest bit of hesitance in her step. When she got close enough, the moonlight shining in through the window illuminated her face.

“I figured this was a good spot,” he said. They’d hung out around this bathroom before. She’d etched Michael Guerin saved me into one of the stalls. There was a history, brief as it was. It was a good place to make another memory.

“I shouldn’t be here,” she whispered, and he couldn’t tell if she was talking to him or talking to herself.

“I’m glad you are.” He put his hands underneath hers, holding them gently, tickling her palms with the tips of her fingers. She wouldn’t look at him, but when he did that, he saw the faintest smile on her lips. She loved the littlest touches.

“You look pretty,” he told her, even though she hadn’t changed from the last time he saw her.

“I’m sure.”

“You do.” He didn’t care much for the extravagant dresses and the fancy hairstyles all the other girls that night were donning. Her simple white shirt and jeans was just fine. He did eventually find himself reaching up to take the ponytail out of her hair, though. He liked it best when it was down. It gave him something to touch without worrying that he was taking things too fast for her.

It fell in front of her face on one side, so he gently brushed it back over her shoulder, taking the moment to touch her arms and shoulders a little more than was necessary. She shivered, so he moved closer, wanting to warm her up.

“Michael . . .”

“Shh.” He didn’t want to hear any protests. If he wanted to be with her and she wanted to be with him, then wasn’t that all that mattered?

He stroked her cheek adoringly with his thumb a few times, then dropped his hand to rest on the curve of her hip. The other wrapped around to the small of her back, pulling her closer. Her hands reacted automatically, coming to rest on his chest, one of them right over his heart. He wondered if she could feel it thudding, pounding. About to beat right out of his chest.

When she was close enough, he kissed her forehead, not used to being so slow and tender with a girl; but in a way, it felt natural with her. Her hands took that cue to slide up to clasp the back of his neck, her slender fingers working their way up into his hair. He kept his face close to hers, loving the way she’d shut her eyes and was just letting it happen. Whatever it ended up being.

Before he knew it, as he was holding onto her and she was holding onto him, they were dancing, feet moving in time with the music still rising up from the dance. Every time she stepped to the side, he felt her hip move, and it made him want more. It made him want to kiss her, so he brought one hand up under her chin to tilt her head back, and then he pressed his mouth to hers, kissing her deeply. She didn’t object to it. In fact, she was the first one to ever-so-slightly brush her tongue against his bottom lip. He followed her lead and did the same, at the same time, pulling her body even closer. His one hand came to rest naturally on her breast, at first just hovering there, and then squeezing gently.

She moaned into his mouth, and that spurred him on.

He kissed his way down her cheek to the side of her neck, sucking at her pulse point greedily.

“Uh . . .” she managed, craning her neck backward.

He kept trailing kisses all over her, around her throat to the other side of her neck, his tongue darting out to lap at her skin. He could only imagine how the rest of her tasted if this alone tasted so good.

Her hands were digging into his hair now, begging him to keep going. To not stop. To never stop. And he wasn’t going to. Not ever. This was all he wanted.

“Michael,” she gasped. “Michael . . .”

He made the mistake of lifting his head up, and when he did, he caught sight of someone else coming down the hallway. He let go of her, not sure if it was even possible to disguise what they’d been doing. It depended on who that was and how much they’d seen.

Slowly, out the shadows came Topolsky. “Sorry,” she said. “I was just doing a sweep of the halls.”

Maria wrapped her arms around herself, slinking back a bit, looking as if she were trying to make herself as small as possible. Michael just stuffed his hands in his back pockets and waited, not sure what to do or say. This wasn’t the first time he’d been caught in the act by any means, but it was still uncomfortable. At least it had just been his guidance counselor and not his girlfriend catching him this time.

“You should get back down to the dance,” Topolsky advised Michael. “And you . . .” She gave Maria a questioning look. “Do you go to school here?”

“No,” she confessed. “I’ll go.”

“You should.”

Maria nodded hurriedly, giving Michael a quick look before scampering off down the hallway. Topolsky didn’t move, which probably meant she was waiting for him to do so. So he got himself together and followed after Maria, momentarily contemplating just leaving with her, taking off, not bothering to tell anyone that he was going. But when she headed for the exit, he headed back downstairs, just like he’d been instructed to do. The king had to make another cameo at the dance, or people would start to wonder.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

“Isabel . . .”

“Come on,” she coaxed, dragging him up the driveway to the front door. “Just hang out with me for a little while.”

Not good. She was going to want him to spend the night there, and he didn’t feel like it. It was going to be hard to find a way out of it, though, without looking suspicious.

“I’m really tired,” he protested. Lame, but worth a shot.

“You’ve been tired a lot lately,” she noted, still holding up the train of her dress with her free-hand. “Are you sick?”

“No.”

“Stressed?”

“No.” Well . . . kind of.

“What’s the matter then?”

“Nothing.” He rubbed his forehead, relenting himself to hanging out for a while. Why she wanted to spend any time with him, though, was a mystery. He honestly didn’t get it. He’d spent the majority of the night ignoring her—it was this new strategy he had, trying to get her so fed up with being ignored that she would be the one to break up with him—but still, she wanted her Michael-time.

“We’ll have fun,” she promised. “You know I’ll make it worth your while.”

“Hmm.” No way, he thought. No way was he having sex with her tonight. Knowing his luck, he’d blurt out the wrong name when he was cumming.

When she opened the front door, they were both shocked to see what they did, but she gasped, bringing one hand to her chest. “Oh my god!”

There, in nothing but his boxers, stood Jim Valenti, a can of whipped cream in one hand, a jar of peanut butter in the other.

So Jim was fucking Diane Evans? Nice work, man, Michael thought. She was one hot mom.

“Hi,” Jim greeted, managing a smile. He tried unsuccessfully to hide the food items he was holding, then just turned and hurried back down the hall, calling, “Diane!”

Moments later, Isabel’s mom came out of her room, wearing nothing but a silky black bathrobe. “What’s going on?” she asked, and when she saw her daughter standing in the doorway, she immediately hid behind Jim. “Isabel!” she shrieked. “What’re you doing here? Isn’t there some kind of after-party?”

Isabel just stared at her, looking like she was either about to throw up or throw a chair. “Unbelievable!” she howled, grabbing Michael’s hand again and dragging him upstairs. He accidentally stepped on the train of her dress, ripping it on the way.

Once they were in her room, they locked the door, both feeling confident that her mom wouldn’t make a fuss about it tonight. After all, it’d be pretty hypocritical for her to lecture Isabel about having a boy in her room after she’d just had one in her own. Isabel took her dress off, ranting the entire time, and then stood before her mirror in only her bra and panties, still ranting as she took off all her jewelry. “God, that’s just so wrong for any child to have to see. And with him? He’s a scumbag!”

So am I, Michael thought. Had she conveniently forgotten that?

“Isn’t he still dating Amy DeLuca?” she asked.

“As far as I know.” He hadn’t made it a priority to keep up to date on Amy’s love life.

“So he’s cheating on her.”

Michael shifted positions uncomfortably from where he sat on her bed. This was just not the right conversation for them to be having.

“That’s disgusting!” she screeched. “How can he do that to her? And how can she take part in it? Doesn’t she have any self-respect?”

Oh god, oh god, oh god. She had to stop talking, otherwise, she was going to hear some things she didn’t want to.

“She’s just as bad as he is!” Isabel slammed her necklace down on her dresser, huffing and puffing in distress. “I don’t get it. Why do some people think that’s okay?”

Some people, he thought. Like me.

This had gone on too long. Sure, he and Maria had only gotten physical as of late, but the emotional side of it . . . he’d had feelings for her for a long time now, longer than he realized. Maybe it was time to just . . . tell her.

“Isabel, I need to--”

“This is—this is just too much right now,” she fretted, looking as if she were on the verge of tears. When he watched her for a moment, he noticed just how worked up she was. She was literally trembling. “She lied to me. She said nothing was going on. And I believed her.” She threw her hands down at her sides, lamenting, “I’m such an idiot!”

Michael quickly reconsidered his decision to spill the beans about him and Maria. Clearly this just wasn’t the best time. He’d tell her at some point. When it was the right time.

But really, when was the right time to tell somebody you were in love with someone else?

“I’m sorry, Isabel,” he apologized quietly.

“Don’t be,” she mumbled. “It’s not like it’s your fault we walked in on them.”

He’d let her believe what she wanted to believe, because for now, it was best if she didn’t know what he was apologizing for.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Michael took his little sister out for lunch the next day. At the Crashdown, of course. Maria was working, so he figured it’d be a good excuse to be around her. She couldn’t get upset with him if Tina was there. And Tina herself was the perfect distraction from everything else he had going on. She was spunky, and still quirky when she wanted to be. He liked spending time with her.

“Do you think I can have a burger and a hot dog?” she asked as she looked over the menu.

“Have whatever you want.” It was fun to spoil her. Maybe he’d even take her shopping later. Just for a little while, before his brain exploded.

“Hmm, I better not,” she decided, setting the menu aside. “I don’t wanna get fat.”

Oh god, that was such a girl thing to say. He’d sat in that restaurant on multiple occasions, eating burgers and hot dogs and nachos, and he’d never once felt bad about it. “Eat what you want. It’s my treat.” He glanced at Maria, catching sight of her sneaking a peek at him. The more he and Tina ate, the longer they could sit in there.

“I’ll just have a hot dog,” she decided, taking a sip of her soda. It made a gurgling sound as it traveled up her twisty straw. “So why are we hanging out today?” she questioned.

“Well, I figured we haven’t gotten to hang out much since Maria and Dylan started living with us,” he explained. “You were overdue for a bro-date.”

She giggled, echoing, “A bro-date?”

“Yeah.”

“Isn’t that what you have with Kyle?”

“Ooh, good one.” Snappy little comeback she had there. He was impressed. “No, you’re right, that is a bro-date. But that’s more of a bromance date. This is a date with your big bro. I hope you don’t mind.”

“No, I like hanging out with you.”

“Good.” That was well on its way to changing. He could already tell. As soon as she got a boyfriend . . . gone. He’d hardly ever see her.

“I can’t wait ‘til I go out on a real date, though,” she mused.

“It’s overrated.”

“Nuh-uh. My friend Hannah—well, she’s not really my friend, but I wish she was my friend—she has a boyfriend, and they go out on dates all the time.”

“She’s your age?”

“Yep.”

“Then you know who else goes out on these dates with them? Mom and Dad.”

“No, they let her go alone,” Tina insisted.

“Or so she says.” He glanced over at Maria again. She was standing at the order window, talking to the cook, handing back a plate of food that apparently wasn’t done correctly. She looked so cute with those antennae on her head.

He must have been staring, because Tina looked back over her shoulder, then asked, “Are you and Maria fighting or something?”

“What?” What had she picked up on? “Why would you say that?”

“Well, you guys have been acting weird lately.” She took another gurgling drink. “And when I got up this morning, she was sleepin’ downstairs on the couch.”

“So?”

“So doesn’t she sleep with you?”

He chuckled at the way that sounded, stirring his lemonade with his straw. “No. No, she doesn’t sleep with me.”

“Not like that,” she clarified. “I mean in your room.”

He saw a chance to steer the conversation back from him to her, so he seized it. “You know what that kind of sleeping together is, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah? What else do you know?”

“About sex?”

He made a face. Just hearing his little sister say that word creeped him out. And it freaked him out knowing that he’d slept with someone for the first time when he’d just been three years older than her.

“Lots,” she proclaimed. “Hannah told me a bunch of stuff.”

“This Hannah sounds very reliable,” he muttered sarcastically. Leaning forward, he rested his arms on the table. “Alright, tell me everything you know. I’ll set you straight.”

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Maria had a beautiful voice. Michael wasn’t an avid listener of female singers in the soft rock genre by any means, but with her . . . he could listen all night.

He missed being able to just sit in his room and listen to her, though. She didn’t seem to want to do that anymore, now that things had changed. She sat out on the porch that evening since it was warm enough out, strumming her guitar, singing lyrics that he didn’t quite recognize, but that still sounded familiar somehow.

“I think I might have inhaled you. I can feel your behind my eyes.”

He stood beside her, over her, watching as she sang with her eyes closed.

“You’ve gotten into my bloodstream . . .” She must have sensed him standing there, though, because she opened her eyes and stopped singing when she saw him. He wished she would have kept going. Even though it was just her and a guitar, it had sounded really good.

“Was that the song we danced to?” he asked, sitting down.

“I don’t know if you can classify what we did as dancing.” She strummed the guitar once more, then set it aside.

As much as he wanted to scoot closer to her, or reach out and touch her in some little way—even if it was just putting his hand on her leg—he kept a little space between them and kept his hands to himself as he announced, “I’m gonna break up with Isabel.”

He had been hoping she would look . . . perhaps not happy, but maybe relieved. But instead, she just shook her head. “That’s probably a mistake.”

“What? Why—how . . .” he sputtered. “How can you say that? Clearly I wanna be with you.”

“So you’re gonna end a long-term relationship with Isabel, the beautiful cheerleader who’s going to Princeton, and start one up with me? Me, Michael? The high school dropout teen mom?”

He hated it when she put herself down like that. “You don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.”

“I do know what I’m talking about, because I am the high school dropout teen mom. I know how hard it gets, how stressful. And I know you think you’re ready for it, but--”

“I am ready,” he interrupted insistently. “We’ve been livin’ together for three months now. I know what it’s like.”

“Michael . . .” She always said his name like that these days, like it made her sad to talk to him.

“You don’t think I can handle it, do you?” he concluded, the thought of it making him slightly angry. “You don’t think I can handle the responsibility of being with you.”

She looked at him with tears in her eyes. “I don’t think you should have to. You’re eighteen; you got accepted into college. You have your whole life ahead of you, and you should be able to live it. You shouldn’t have me and Dylan holding you back.” When the tears started to build up too much, she looked down at her feet. Everything about her seemed sad. Defeated. Like she didn’t think she deserved something good to happen to her.

I would never make you feel that way, Maria, he thought, wracking his brain for something to say. Something that would change her mind, or at least make her feel better. Something, for sure, that would make it clear that he wasn’t backing down, that he wasn’t going to buy into what she was saying, because he knew it wasn’t true.

His mouth felt dry, but the words were still right there on the tip of his tongue. So he said them.

“I love you.”

She snapped her head to the side, her eyes wide with astonishment, mouth open in disbelief.

Knowing nothing else he said would be able to top that, he got to his feet and headed back inside, leaving her out there to think about that, to think about what it meant, because those weren’t just words he tossed around. He’d said that to two girls in his entire life, and he’d said it and meant it to only her.

“Holy shit,” he swore as he hurried upstairs. He’d shocked even himself by uttering those words. “Shit, shit, shit.” This whole thing with Maria was either going to end up being the best thing that had ever happened to him, or it was going to blow up in his face.








TBC . . .

-April