Lust

wanted to be like Harper. Of course not. She didn’t even like Harper. But all the more reason not to want the other girl to laugh at her, hold it over her for the rest of the year, spread it around the school that Beth was… well, Beth was sure Harper would find an appropriately cutting description.

Maybe this had all been a big mistake.

“I swear, I won’t laugh,” Harper promised.

“You will,” Beth countered.

“Beth, I promise you,” Harper said seriously, “you can tell me anything. If you have a problem, I really want to help.”

On the other hand, she sounded so sincere-and Beth was so desperate.

“It’s sex,” Beth said finally. “I’ve never-well, it would be my first time, and I’m not sure I-”

“You haven’t slept together yet?” Harper asked incredulously.

“You probably think that’s pathetic, don’t you?” Beth held her breath and waited for the inevitable.

“No, no, of course not,” Harper said hastily. “You just caught me off guard, that’s all. I always assumed… but there’s nothing wrong with it.”

Beth sighed in relief. Maybe she could confide in Harper after all. This thing had been eating away at her for too long, and it would be so good to actually talk to someone about it. Even Harper…

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” Beth explained. “It’s not that I don’t want to. I do. Or at least, I think I do. But every time we get close, I just freeze up. And he thinks it’s because I don’t trust him, but it’s not that-it’s just that…”

“You’re not ready,” Harper prompted.

Beth sighed again.

“I guess so. I mean, I guess I’m not.” Why was it so easy for Harper to grasp, but still so hard to make Adam understand? It’s not like she’d made some hard-and-fast rule for herself, no sex until college or something. And it’s not like she thought there was something wrong with the girls in her class who were doing it-even the ones who were doing it a lot. She had just always thought of herself as someone who would wait. Until she was really in love, until she was old enough-it had all seemed pretty simple and straightforward in the abstract. But now? With Adam? Now she wasn’t so sure-what did it mean to be “really” in love? When would she be “old enough?” What did it mean to be “ready”-and would she even know when she was? Would it be when she wasn’t scared anymore? When sex didn’t seem like such a big deal that might change everything, ruin everything? What if that time never came, and this was what it felt like to be ready? After all, when she was with him, part of her always felt ready, more than ready-eager. Hungry for more. It was just that the other part of her, the part that said no, wait, not now, not yet-that part was stronger. And that was the part that stayed with her when she got out of bed. That was the part she had to trust-right?

“So, have you two talked about this?” Harper asked.

“It seems like it’s all we ever talk about anymore,” Beth admitted. “And he says he understands, but it’s like there’s always all this tension between us. We’re always fighting about something-but it seems like, somehow, it’s always about this. I’m just afraid…”

“What?”

Beth had never put the fear into words before, although it was always with her, simmering just beneath the surface. Somehow saying it out loud made it just a bit more real, a bit more dangerous. But it had to be said.

“Sometimes I’m afraid that he’s going to break up with me,” she said quietly. “Find someone else who’s not so-someone who is ready.”

“Beth,” Harper said in a grave voice. “Like you said, I know Adam. He would never do that. He loves you.”

“You don’t understand, Harper,” Beth said plaintively, and suddenly all of the concerns she’d bottled up over the last few weeks came spilling out. “There’s something off, and lately it’s like, everywhere I turn, he’s with Kaia. What if she-and he-I don’t know. Maybe I should just-do it, you know? What am I waiting for?”

“You’re waiting until you’re ready,” Harper reminded her.

“But how will I even know when I am?”

“Trust me, when it’s time, you’ll know,” Harper promised.

“And in the meantime?” Beth asked, already knowing the answer.

“In the meantime, you wait,” Harper explained. “And if he loves you, he’ll wait too. I promise.”

“Thanks, Harper.” Beth was grateful, but unconvinced. “Listen, don’t tell anyone about this, okay? Especially Adam. I’d be so embarrassed and-”

“You don’t even have to say it,” Harper assured her. “My lips are sealed.”

“Miranda, you’ll never believe what I just found out!” Harper squealed into the phone.

Talk about the light at the end of the tunnel. So the perfect little relationship was missing one thing? Meaning- unless something had happened last year that she didn’t know about (unlikely)-Adam, too, was still a virgin. Unbelievable.

She laughed and laughed.

If he loves you, he’ll wait, she mused. Yeah, right.

Miranda hung up the phone feeling strangely optimistic. Harper seemed convinced that Beth’s impenetrable virginity was a sign that the relationship could never last. Miranda wasn’t so sure-and as Harper was tossing out the insults, Miranda silently wished that she wouldn’t be so quick to forget Miranda’s own virginity. But Harpers buoyant tone had swept her beyond all doubt or annoyance. And the feeling of hope was contagious. So contagious, in fact, that when Harper suggested that Miranda call Kane and ask him to the upcoming formal, it actually hadn’t sounded like an insane idea.

That was then, this was now. And now her phone was staring her down like a cellular firing squad.

Miranda took a deep breath, gulped down an Altoid (though the minty fresh breath did little for her confidence level), and brought up his number on the phone. She couldn’t overthink this, Harper had pointed out. She just needed to suck it up and do it. Whatever happened, at least she would know she tried. Right? At least she’d know she had some balls.

Miranda hit talk and waited, with mounting panic, as the phone rang and rang.

“Hey, Kane, it’s Miranda,” she said when he finally picked up. She tried to make her voice slightly low and husky, aiming for perky but not too perky, casual but intense, sexy but not sex starved-but most likely, it just came across as lame.

“Oh, hey, what’s up?” He sounded vaguely surprised to hear from her-small wonder, since in all their years of semifriendship she’d never called him (the number was in the phone only as a concrete manifestation of her pathetic wishful thinking).

“So how’s your weekend going?” she asked, trying her best to sound nonchalant even as her stomach clenched and her heart thudded rapidly in her ears. She’d always prided herself on her clever banter, but all remnants of wit flew out of her mind now that his voice was on the other end of the line, and the moment of truth-or, potentially, of abject humiliation-crept inescapably closer with every passing second of small talk.

“Better now.” She could almost hear the smirk in his voice, and she knew that his deep brown eyes were twinkling beneath an ironically raised eyebrow. She’d memorized his face, and the minute movements it made, well enough that she could close her eyes and see him peering back at her. Which, on a ten-point scale, upped her nervousness level to about a thousand.

Is he flirting with me? she wondered as always-or was this just the only way Kane knew how to talk to people? After all, he also “flirted” with the old woman who ran the cash register in the cafeteria, and occasionally the bald guy with the unnecessary hairnet who ladled out the food from behind the counter. Maybe he just couldn’t help himself.

“I’m glad I could bring a little ray of light into your dark and lonely life,” she told him, an electric thrill running through her when she scored a laugh.

“So what’s up?” he asked, chuckling. “Or did you just miss the sound of my voice?”

“You wish. No, I’m calling because-” Miranda stopped, the words choking in her throat.

Because I want to ask you to the dance.

Because I want to know whether you had a date yet for the dance.

Because I want to come over there and rip off all of your clothes.

“Because, uh, I was wondering if, I mean, do you have-”