I catch a tennis ball in my hand when a knock sounds from my bedroom window. I’ve been bouncing it off the closet wall in my room for the past three hours. I’m bored out of my mind and should’ve filled the time studying, but the shouting that bellowed up the stairwell for the past two and a half hours had my mind on other things.
Since the floorboards in my house are better filled than Melody’s were when she moved in twelve years ago, I couldn’t hear much of the argument my parents had after Madden’s lecture, but I’m confident in saying it wasn’t the standard one they’ve had once a week for the past year.
This one had nothing to do with my dad’s wish for us to move into the city, and everything to do with Madden’s claims he didn’t sexually assault Annie.
Fable agreed with Madden’s recollection of events, but Annie’s father wasn’t buying it. Just like Mr. Gregg, he’d do anything to protect his daughter—even going against the man helming his campaign to be re-elected to his position.
I don’t know what my father gave Mr. Langfield to weaken the severity of Madden’s fuck-up, but it must have been substantial because not only was Madden lectured for almost two hours, he was forced to hand over the keys to his pride and joy.
This frustrates me to admit, but with nothing but silence to occupy myself the past three hours, I looked a little deeper into what Madden said before our father ended our conversation. Not the gleam his eyes got when he underhandedly hinted he could give Melody want she wants if I wasn’t up to the task, but his comment about girls squeezing your hand when they want you to squeeze their ass.
Whether under the blanket while we’re watching a movie, when we were hiding out during one of her dad's many drills, and multiple times during our trips to school, Melody forever squeezes my hand. It’s one of the touches we do even when we’re in public, and it has me hopeful our slide from friends to lovers will be easier than predicated.
Even now, after crawling through the window I’ve just cranked open for her, Melody’s hand shoots out to squeeze mine before she thrusts a grease-sodden bag into my chest. “Sorry your burger and fries have gone cold. I ordered your stuff when I ordered mine, then we stayed longer than planned.” When guilt darts through her brown eyes, she shifts them to my empty desk. Her brows furrow in confusion before she signs, “I thought you were going to get a head start on our studies while I was gone?”
I love the disappointment on her face, but I’m also uneased. She’s been gone for hours. “And I thought you were only going for a milkshake?” I jingle the bag in my hand. “Late lunch or early dinner?”
“Ah…”
She drops her hands to the fringed hem of her denim shorts. She placed a shirt over her bikini top, so she isn’t feeling modest. She just doesn’t want me to see her truth-bearing eyes, much less tell me what she’s been up to.
Hiding her eyes from me is pointless. I don’t need to see them to know she’s keeping something from me. I can feel it in my bones. Furthermore, physical training isn’t the only training Mr. Gregg and I do. Psychology plays a major factor as well.
When the heat of my stare becomes too much for Melody to bear, she relents on her silent stance. “We ran into some old school friends. They invited us to have an afternoon snack with them.”
Her eyes fall to my lips when I ask, “You ran into some guys who used to go to our school?” I purposely say ‘guys,’ hoping it will narrow down my list of suspects. When her chin dips, I ask, “Did your mother know them?”
“She wasn’t there.” She swivels on the spot like she always does when she’s nervous. “She had to run some errands, so she dropped us off at Mary’s.”
“She left you alone?” My voice would have you convinced I didn’t go through puberty years ago. That isn’t the case. Even with having what Melody likes to call a babyface, I’ve been shaving since I was fourteen.
Melody peers at me as if she heard how ridiculously loud I shouted. “She dropped me off with three friends at an overflowing café in the middle of the day.”
“That had men you didn’t know inside. You know the rules, Melody. Your father has to screen anyone you come in contact with. Did you ask them for identification?”
“Jesus, BJ.” She runs a hand down her face before taking a step back, hoping a little distance will hide her exaggerated eye-roll. “They were seniors last year, which means they wouldn’t have been much older than a toddler during the home invasion. So no, Captain Paranoid, I didn’t request to view their photo ID before accepting their invitation to share their booth.”
Her reply reveals more than she intended. She disclosed her afternoon guests are older than us, and she was invited to eat with them, which means they are either unaware of Mr. Gregg’s wish to keep his daughter away from strangers or they don’t care about his rules.
“You should tell your dad. Give him a heads-up that strangers approached you—”
I choke on my words when Melody shakes her head. “I am not doing that until you stop pretending this is about my safety.”
“This is about your safety,” I both sign and shout.
As she splays her hands across her cocked hip, her face reddens with anger. It makes her appear years younger than her almost eighteen years, but it also makes her as cute as a button. She can’t pull off an angry face any better than me. “This has nothing to do with my safety, and you know it.” She steps closer to me, her nostrils broadening as she endeavors to cool the heat burning her cheeks. “This is about you being jealous about something you have no right to be jealous over.”
I immaturely roll my eyes, pretending she didn’t hit the nail on the head. I’m jealous, I can feel it clawing at my chest, but since Mr. Gregg swears jealousy is a sign of weakness, I’ll never let her know that.
“You really should stop hanging out with Carmen. You sound more and more like her every day.”
When I attempt to remove my bio-chem book out of my backpack, Melody snatches it out of my hand and tosses it onto my bed. “I asked you to come with us, BJ. I invited you. You didn’t want to come.”
Like all teenage boys backed into a corner, I come out swinging. “Because I didn’t want to hang out with your friends. They treat me like a lecher.”
Melody’s angry growl enhances the frantic thrust of her chest. It’s rising and falling as rapidly as mine and has me entranced in under a second, which almost has me missing her signing. “That is funny, you didn’t seem to mind their leering when you were prancing around the boxing ring like a ballerina.”
I swear steam nearly billows out of her ears when I mumble under my breath, “Who’s jealous?” Even mumbling my reply doesn’t stop her from lip-reading what I said.
