head around sometimes. Me and Ms. Settles, doing each other every chance we get.
Lori helps me with papers and assignments, but with tests I'm on my own. Dad will put me under house arrest if my grades don't come up. If I tell Lori I need to buckle down, she'll find a way to talk me out of it. She has in the past.
And then there's the problem of my friends. Lori just doesn't get it. I need to hang with them more. First because I want to, and second because I need to. They don't analyze every word I say. Or have a breakdown if I want to do something they don't want to do. Only thing is, when we go out and do stuff together, I feel as if I'm cheating on Lori. Not that I'm doing the horizontal boogie with anyone except her, but she can make me feel pretty guilty when she turns on the tears.
The guys tell me it's great to have me in the mix again. Honey acts as if I'm some long-lost traveler home from a faraway galaxy. One afternoon when I'm at her house, she tells me, “It's like you were lobotomized and now you're back. I've missed you.”
“Sure,” I say. “I was taken over by aliens, grown in a pod and tossed back into McAllister armed with only my wits. Bet you can hardly see the place where I was attached to my pea pod.” I lift my shirt and show my belly button. Her face turns red, and I realize she's not like Lori, always wanting me naked. I pull down my shirt. “Sorry.”
“What? You think I don't know you have a navel? We've been to the pool together, mister.”
“Hey, chill. I was making a joke.”
“I'm not mad. And I'm not a prude.” She's all huffy-sounding.
I laugh. “Could have fooled me.” I duck down, stare up at her face. “Whoa. Is that a flicker of a smile?”
She tries hard to hide it.
“Maybe this will help loosen it up.” I spring on her, toss her onto the rec-room sofa and start tickling her.
In seconds, she's shrieking. “Stop it!” She's laughing and hiccupping, twisting and turning, but I keep up my tickle attack.
I shout, “My pod masters have given me the strength of ten bags of spinach. Resistance is futile!”
When she goes limp, I'm straddling her body and I've pinned her arms above her head. Her hair's a mess and she's breathing hard. Her face is as pink as if she's just played a game on the courts.
“You will pay!” she threatens, catching her breath and still laughing. “I will hurt you.”
Watching her struggle, I feel a surge of power, and something comes over me I can't explain. Without thinking, I dip my head and kiss her on the mouth. I pull back and her eyes are wide and she's staring up at me like a startled bird. I roll off her as fast as I can and stand up. “Sorry.”
“No. No, don't be sorry,” she says.
But I hardly hear her because I'm already halfway up the stairs and heading for her front door.
Honey
Ryan kissed me. Me, Honey Fowler. On my mouth. Without any begging or pleading on my part, Ryan kissed me. I may never come down from the high I'm on. I won't tell anyone, not even Jess, because I want to hold on to the kiss and the feelings in my heart forever. If I share the story, my friends will dissect it, pick it apart and make it into something else.
“He likes you,” Jess will insist.
“Finally he's come around,” Taylor will say. “About time, too. How long have you crushed on him? A hundred years?”
I'll keep the magic to myself. Right here inside my heart, where no one can go except me. The kiss was spontaneous. He might not have planned it, but I have longed for it and now it's mine. He can't take it back.
I wonder if he really meant it. If he did, why did he apologize for doing it? A guy doesn't tell a girl he's sorry for stealing a kiss. Not if he really means it. I don't want him to be sorry. I want him to like me— love me—as much as I love him.
“What are you so happy about?” Jess stops me in the hall. She's tacking up posters for the upcoming freshman-sophomore spring dance.
“Do I look happy?”
“Air-walking happy.”
“I'll try to look more serious.”
She eyes me skeptically. “Something's different.”
“I aced an algebra test.”
“You do that all the time. No, this is something else.”
“You're so nosey. Can't a girl just be happy without the third degree?”
“No.”
I burst out laughing.
“What's so funny?” Joel has come up, slipped his arm around Jess.
“You're way too young to understand,” I tell him, and turn and walk away.
When I see Ryan alone in the library later in the week, I freeze. What should I say? He looks up, beckons me over. I slide into the chair across from him at the table. “Are you a role model for Homeworkers Anonymous? You're always in the library.”
He shrugs. “Got to keep up the grades. Better to do it here. Fewer distractions.”
He's never had trouble before with his grades, but my mind isn't on schoolwork. “I haven't heard much from you lately.” I choose my words. I want to ask, “Why haven't you called, or e-mailed, since you kissed me?”
“Full slate.”
I stare at him, my heart pounding. “Too full to even shoot off an e-mail?”
“I haven't done a lot of things I used to do lately. Nothing personal.”
I feel as if he's blowing me off. “I miss talking to you.”
He lays down his pen, leans back in the chair. “Why are my friends giving me heat? You, Joel— I have a list. You all act like I don't care anymore just because I have to keep on the books. I'm working hard. I don't have time to explain every time I can't get together.”
I feel stung, as if I'm messing where I'm not wanted. The kiss was a fluke. “I'll leave you to your books.” I go to stand, but Ryan takes my wrist.
“Wait.”
I sit.
“I'm not avoiding you. You're my best friend.” His voice is softer.
I want to be more than your friend. “Okay. So now what?”
He tips his head and grins. “So why don't we go to the spring dance together?”
Ryan
What was I thinking? Why did I kiss Honey? Why did I ask her to the dance? To keep from having to talk about the kiss. I answer my own question. The kiss was an impulse. It just happened. I did it just because I could. Because Lori makes me crazy and I wanted to be in contact with my other world again. Stupid! But now I'm committed to going—Joel's already said we'll double—so backing out isn't an option.
I tell my dad, “I need some funds for the school dance at the end of the month.”
“You're going?”
“Thought I would.”
“That's great, son. Who are you taking?”
“Honey. We're doubling with Joel and Jess.”
“Has something changed between you two?”
“Still just friends.”
“And she's all right with that?”
