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Beautiful.
Another time I see him from the classroom window during math. He’s smoking again, slouched against the water fountain, the smoke curling up in the air in fantastical shapes. He seems to be in deep thought, his brows drawn together, his gaze distant.
I really shouldn’t stare, but I can’t help it. Boy’s gorgeous.
He should be in class, like me, but he’s obviously cutting school. His dark hair looks wet, as if he’s just stepped out of the shower, or as if he’s been running. The thought of him all sweaty makes my little heart go pitty-pat.
God. What’s happening to me? I never got this hung up on a boy before.
I glance at him again out of the corner of my eye, while pretending to be checking something out in my math book. He’s still there. He has shoved a hand through his hair, and has closed his eyes. The bulge of his thick biceps mesmerizes me. He’s so strong, his shoulders so wide, he’s just...
Sexy.
Dangerous.
Unlike any other boy I’ve ever known.
In fact, he’s exactly the kind of boy Mom has always warned me about. A slacker. A flake. A punk. A delinquent. A troublemaker. And I have no business wondering what it would feel like, being held in his arms.
“Miss Watson!” the teacher snaps, and I jerk my gaze back to the whiteboard, heart pounding. “Pay attention. We have a test coming up.”
I nod, and try to regulate my breathing into the semblance of something normal. I force my mind back to the calculus written on the board and the problems to be solved.
When I look outside once more sometime later, he’s gone.
***
“You say he lives here?” Merc asks, glancing sideways at the Lowes’ house. “This Jarett guy?”
“Yeah. Stop looking! What if he sees you?”
“Nah. I’m stealthy like a ninja.”
“Shut up.” I snicker and elbow my brother. “He usually sits at the attic window, looking at the street. I think that’s his bedroom. Just don’t look that way.”
“Gotcha.” Merc shoves his hands into his pockets, kicks at a pebble on the street. The golden afternoon light catches on his hair, turning it bright like flaming crown. “You’re in love with him?”
“What?” My heart starts its pounding again. “Of course not. Who said that?”
“No one. You just can’t stop talking about him.”
I lift my chin. “Whatever. I only said he’s at our school, and our neighbor, and Mom says he was adopted—”
“—and he’s awesome, and he wears Metallica T-shirts, and has some tattoos that are so cool, and generally you can’t shut up about him.”
I fall silent, stung, and kick at a plastic wrapper.
“Hey.” Merc nudg
es me with his elbow and stops walking, his back to the house of the Lowes. “I’ve just never heard you talking so much about someone, that’s all.”
“Yeah?” I steal a glance at Jarett’s window and I think I see his silhouette behind the glass. I look away quickly. “I’m sure I have. Your memory is clearly going together with your looks.”
He snickers.
I just walk down the street every afternoon in the hope of catching a glimpse of Jarett. Is that normal?
Or pathetic?
