'Nah, but I miss the pretty girls.' It was of course true that the football players did get the prettiest girls. But itwasn't true that just because he no longer played, he didn't get his share.
'Now you have to settle for the ugly ones,' she teased and looked at him out of the corner of her eye.
'Daisy, don't you know there aren't any truly ugly girls in Texas?'
He was so full of it. 'Where'd you hear that?'
He shrugged. 'It's just a fact. Like the Alamo and the Rio Grande, is all.' He took her hand and brushed histhumb over her knuckles as he studied her fingers. 'You'll still be seen with me, though, won't you?'
She turned her head and gazed more fully at him, all prepared with a flip answer, but he glanced up andsomething in his green eyes stopped her. For about half a second, she saw something, something in the way helooked back at her, something that made her think the answer was important to him. As if he wasn't sure. Shegot a surprising glimpse inside of Jack that she'd never seen before. Maybe things didn't bounce off him like hewas superman. Maybe he felt things like everybody else. Maybe more.
Then he flashed her a smile and it was gone.
'Of course, Jack,' she said. 'I'll always be seen with you.'
'I knew I could count on you, buttercup.' For the first time, his voice slid inside her chest and warmed her upwith hot tingles. It was all so incredible and fantastic and left her stunned. And it absolutely could not happen.
She couldn't fall in love with Jack. He was a friend, and she didn't want to lose him. But even if he wasn't herfriend, she'd be an idiot to let it happen.
He squeezed her hand and stood. 'Do you need a ride home?'
She looked up at him, standing in front of her with his hands shoved in the front pockets of his Levi's, andnodded. Jack Parrish had many wonderful qualities. Being faithful to one girl wasn't one of them. He'd shatterher heart like glass. If that happened, they couldn't he friends anymore. And she'd miss him terribly.
By the time Steven walked out of the boy's locker with his wet hair slicked hack, she'd convinced herself thatshe wasn't falling in love with Jack. He'd made her momentarily confused. Like when they'd been kids andwould ride the merry-go-round too long. Jack used to spin it so fast that for a while after she couldn't think orsee straight.
But she was over it now. Thinking straight once again. Thank God. 'Are y'all going somewhere?' she asked.
'We're driving over to Chandler,' Jack answered, referring to a town the size of Lovett and about fifty miles tothe west.
'Why?'
'There's a '69 Camaro Z-28 I want to look at.'
'A '69?' She'd never understood Jack's fascination with old cars. Or as he called them, 'classics.' She preferrednew cars with upholstery that didn't snag her nylons. With Jack, it was more than just a case of not havingmoney for a new car. Although he certainly didn't. In that respect, she and Jack had a lot more in common thaneither did with Steven. Steven's father was a lawyer and his family had money. His biggest responsibility was tomaintain his grades. By contrast, her mother was a waitress who depended on survivor benefits from thegovernment, and Jack's family had a garage that never seemed to bring in a lot of money. She and Lily wereresponsible for keeping the house clean and starting supper, white Jack helped out in the family business. 'Doesthe car run?' she asked.
'Not yet.'
Exactly.
'Hey, Daisy,' Steven said as he approached. 'What are you doing at school so late?'
'Making homecoming posters. Are you going to the homecoming dance.'
'Yeah, I'm thinking about asking Marilee Donahue. Do you think she'll go with me?' Steven smiled and therewasn't a doubt that Marilee would say yes.
She shrugged. 'Are you going, Jack?' she asked, although she was fairly sure she knew the answer.
'Nope. You know I only put on a suit when my mom forces me to for Sunday School and funerals.' He shut thetailgate and walked to the driver's side. 'And I hate to dance.'
Daisy suspected that it wasn't so much that Jack hated to dance as much as he just didn't know how to dance.
And he'd always been the kind of person that if he didn't do something well, he didn't do it at all. 'You couldjust wear a nice shirt and tie,' she told him, but for some reason, the fact that Jack wasn't taking a girl to theschool dance warmed her heart more than it should have, given that she was over her earlier confusion.
'Not a chance.' The three of them got into the old truck and Jack fired it up.
'Have you been asked yet?' Jack asked her as he drove from the parking lot with her sitting between them likealways.
'Yes.' They were so weird about who she dated she didn't want to say.
'Who?' Steven asked.
She looked straight ahead at the dashboard and the mad beyond.
Steven hit her with his elbow. 'Come on, Daisy Lee. Who asked you?'
'Man Flegel.'
'You're going with Bug?'
'He doesn't like to be called that anymore.'
Jack looked at Steven over the top of her head.
'What's wrong with Bug... I mean Mali?' She held up a hand before either could answer. 'Forget I asked. Idon't care what y'all think. I like Man.'
'He gets around a lot.'
'He's the wrong kind of boy for you,' Jack added.
She folded her arms and was silent the rest of the way home. The pair of them were serial daters, and that wasputting it nicely. She wasn't about to listen to their opinion, and if there ever was a 'wrong kind of boy' for heror any girl, it was Jack. Which made her doubly glad she wasn't really falling in love with him.
She spent the rest of her sophomore year dating boys that neither Steven nor Jack approved of, but she didn'tcare. Like most girls her age, she learned how to make out and drive boys crazy. And more important, shelearned where to stop before things went too far. As a result, she developed a reputation for being a tease.
Which she didn't think was fair at all. Boys kissed her. She kissed them back. As far as she could tell, a girl waseither a prude, which meant she didn't kiss at all. A tease, meaning she kissed and perhaps a bit more, or was aslut. And everyone knew what that meant.
That summer, she'd let Erik Marks touch her breast on the outside of her T-shirt. Jack and Steven heard about itand made a special trip over to her house to talk to her. She'd gotten mad and slammed the front door in theftfaces.
The hypocrites.
She made varsity cheerleader her junior year. Her hair had grown out to her shoulders and she got a spiral perm.
Steven was still in football and basketball, and of course, student government. Jack was racing his Camaro onthe flat Texas roads, and she was still telling herself that she wasn't attracted to him. She told herself that sheloved him but she wasn't in love with him, and that her heart didn't pinch when he drove by with his arm aroundsome girl. He was her friend, just as he'd always been. Nothing more. And she wouldn't allow herself to feelanything more either.
All that changed a few weeks before Christmas her senior year when she got asked to the Christmas prom by J.
T. Sanders. J. T. was gorgeous and drove a new Jeep Wrangler. Black. Daisy worked nights at the Wild CoyoteDiner, and she'd managed to save enough money to buy the prefect dress. White satin. Sleeveless with tinyrhinestones on the tight fitting bodice and tulle skirt. It was the most beautiful thing she'd ever owned. The nightbefore the dance, she picked up J.t's boutonniere on her dinner break. When she got home, he called andcanceled. He said his grandmother died and that he had to go to her funeral in Amarillo. Everyone knew thathe'd actually started dating another girl the week before. Daisy had been dumped. Flat.
