“What do you mean about what happened at the end?” I asked, trying desperately to hide any excitement in my voice. Not that I was glad if something bad had happened, of course. But finding out any new information about Kieran was bound to help me understand him more.
He grimaced, shaking his head a bit. “I don’t really know if it’s my place to talk about that.”
“But… Something especially bad happened?”
“You could say that. The night that Crystal left her ex-husband, it was…” He hesitated, and I could tell even thinkingabout it was making him uncomfortable. “Well, it was difficult on everyone, I’ll just say that.”
I knew him well enough to know he wasn’t giving me anything else, so I only nodded.
“That sounds tough. I’m glad they ended up okay.”
“Me too.”
Kieran didn’t say much to me when he came through the kitchen on his way out to the truck to leave for work, which was fine. I was pretty sure he was brooding about the whole inviting myself onto his trip and ruining his life goal of avoiding making physical contact or being alone in a room with me. I’d let him sulk, like usual. I could be very patient when it came to his moodiness.
And I had a lot to think about, too. Confronting him about whatever had happened the night my dad had mentioned was definitely not the play. If he hadn’t wanted to talk to counselors about it then, he probably wouldn’t want to talk about it now. Even if the trauma from that night was probably a big part of what was blocking him from being more open with me. It was another thing I was willing to be patient for. I was fairly certain I could work it out of him eventually. Until then, I’d just keep chipping away at his icy wall one little bit at a time.
That night, Kieran stayed out late, probably because he was avoiding me. Part of me worried he’d leave without me in the morning, but then he’d have to explain it to our parents, so I was pretty sure he wouldn’t. Probably. By the time I went to bed, he still wasn’t home. I set my alarm to go off extra early, just in case.
He wasn’t even awake by the time it went off the next morning, but that was exactly what I had wanted.
I stood under the spray of the shower, lathering up and scrubbing down with my various products, and carefully shaving so I was as smooth and slick as a dolphin. I usually did that anyway, but after my enlightening peek at Kieran’s pornpreferences, and the lustful way his eyes had devoured my body, I wasn’t going to try anything different. And truthfully, I kind of needed all the little advantages I could get.
Being smooth and glowy and smelling good could only help my cause, even though I wasn’t completely sure someone like Kieran would even notice how I smelled. Was he the kind of guy to notice stuff like that? Until that moment, rambling in my head over whether he would notice tiny details about my appearance, I hadn’t realized how nervous I was.
I wondered if this was how people felt on prom night. I’d gone to prom, of course. I’d actually been part of the committee, helping with fundraising for the budget and picking out decor and music. But I hadn’t gone with a date. The last thing I wanted was to plant the idea in some poor guy’s head that I’d be willing to get down and dirty with him like apparently everyone else had planned to do that night. It felt a little too cruel.
Not that there was anything wrong with it. But I think some part of me hadn’t been able to let go of the idea that I could have been losing my virginity to Kieran instead. Even if the conscious part of my brain hadn’t exactly believed it could be true, until the night he’d wandered in drunk and felt me up.
I wasn’t used to feeling these nerves and insecurities. For better or worse, he was the only one that could ever make me feel like that. Resisting the urge to scrutinize my naked body in the foggy mirror once I stepped out, I pulled on my everyday attire. Tiny little athletic shorts that Kieran claimed to hate, but probably only because they made my butt look amazing, and a plain t-shirt. I grabbed his hoodie out of my bedroom in case he wanted to blast the air conditioning in the truck on the way over, and slipped it on. The need to look hot overruled the possibility of having cold legs.
It was the weekend, so our parents usually slept in a little. I poured whole-grain granola into the greek yogurt bowl I’dprepped the night before, being as quiet as possible. For some reason I couldn’t exactly articulate in my brain, I didn’t want them to wake up to see us off. It felt like today, and the rest of the weekend, was just meant for Kieran and I.
When he came down the stairs, looking broody and sexy and perfect, his dark hair still damp from his shower, my heart gave one hard thump up into my chest and I had to force myself not to jump up from my seat to be closer, staring up at him. He stared back at me sort of apprehensively.
“You’re all packed up?” He questioned.
“Yeah, I took care of everything last night.”
I’d deliberately waited for him to come down to put my dishes away. As casually as I possibly could, I stood up and brought them over to the sink. I could feel his eyes on my back and legs as I rinsed them out.
“I know what you’re doing,” he stated, his voice drier than any desert on the planet.
Biting down into my lip, I had to compose myself before I turned around to face him. I leaned back a little, propping my butt against the counter and stretching out my legs. “And I know what you’re doing.”
He stared dumbly at my thighs for a few moments before shaking his head, and gently pushing past me to make his food. “I’m not doing anything.”
Part of me, admittedly a huge part, enjoyed arguing with him and getting under his skin. But the fact that he was even letting me come in the first place seemed kind of precarious, and I didn’t want to push it too far.
“I’m really glad you’re letting me come with you.” I figured showing gratitude was probably the safest option. “I won’t bug you or anything.”
He inhaled deeply, glowering down at his cereal. “You never bug me, Jordy. It’s not about that.”
“Well, I’ll… try not to make it a bad trip,” I said, trying again. “Don’t you think we’ll have fun?”
He stared at me again for so long, and so intensely, that my pulse started to speed up again, my blood pounding in my veins while my stomach turned inside me.
“Yeah,” he finally said, but with the resigned determination of a soldier getting ready to march to the front lines of the battleground. “We’ll have fun.”
