Cursed (Book 1, The Watchers; Young Adult Paranormal Romance) (7 page)

 Well, I had
planned to do my best to get Will to see me in a different way that night.  I
had matured quite nicely and ahead of some of the other girls my age.  I
borrowed a dress from my mother’s closet.  It was a dress one of her
boyfriend’s had given her hoping to calm her down and make her look normal.  It
was a slim fitting black cocktail dress with a crisscrossed bodice and v-neck. 
I knew I was tempting fate if I tried to wear high heals so I settled for a
pair of black dress shoes with an open toe and only a one inch heal in the
back.

 I rolled my long
dark brown hair to add in soft curls and put on a little more makeup than I
usually did.  I didn’t want to look like a hoochy mama, just more grown up.

 When I came out
of the bathroom, Will was sitting at the small table they always have in hotel
rooms watching the news, and I saw exactly what I had hoped for: a double take.

 “You look,” he
paused for a long time staring at me, like he wasn’t sure what to say.  “Nice.”

 Now that I had
his full attention, I was at a complete loss as to what to do with it.  I
hadn’t had a boyfriend yet so I was completely clueless what my next move
should be.  I’d seen plenty of romantic movies but was totally incapable of
trying to act smoldering in any way.  And it didn’t help that Will seemed as
lost as me because all he seemed to be capable of was staring wordlessly.

 I did the only
thing I could think of.  I grabbed my coat and hid under it.  We left the room
and went down to meet the others in the hotel’s restaurant.

 All through the
meal and meeting, I could feel Will’s eyes locked on me.  Every time I looked
back at him, I couldn’t tell where his thoughts were taking him because his
facial expression kept changing.  At one time he looked at me like he finally
realized I was a girl who was becoming a woman.  Then the next minute that would
change to a look of total disgust, which was hurtful.  Then the next time I
dared to look at him I saw what I wanted to see: yearning.

 After the
meeting, Will walked beside me as everyone made their way out of the coliseum. 
Without saying a word he took my hand and we made our way down to the beach
across from the hotel.  The moon wasn’t out yet but we could see just fine by
the lights from the city.  I carried my shoes in one hand and let my other hand
remain in Will’s.

 “Why did you wear
that dress tonight?”  Will asked me in a low husky voice.

 I could feel my
cheeks grow hot and was thankful we were in the dark.

 “Why?” I asked as
innocently as I could fake.  “Don’t you like it?”

 Will stopped
walking which made me have to face him.  “I think every boy in that coliseum
liked it, Lilly,” he admonished, knowing I was evading his question as best I
could.  That’s one bad thing about falling in love with your best friend.  They
know all your evasive maneuvers. 

 Well, I decided,
I had come this far, I shouldn’t chicken out.     

 “I wanted to see
what your reaction would be,” I mumbled lowering my head so I wouldn’t have to
look into his eyes.  If I looked I would see one of two things:  pleasure or
pain.  Pleasure if he felt the same way about me. Pain if he didn’t and had to
let me down gently. 

 I heard him let
out a deep sigh before he drew me into his arms.  It wasn’t the first time Will
had held me in his arms.  He held me when we had to put my first dog to sleep
because she got run over by a car; he held me when I had the chicken pox; he
held me when I needed to cry because some of the girls at school picked on me
for not having the newest designer jeans and wearing the cheap Wal-mart ones
because that was what my mother could afford.  He’d held me numerous times in
our lives, but this wasn’t one of those hugs.

 That night, he
held me like a man holds a woman, close to his heart.  I could feel his warm
hands through my coat gently gliding up and down my back.  I hid my face
against his chest still not daring to look up into his eyes.  Before I knew it,
one of his hands was under my chin forcing me to look at his face.  Even in the
dim moonlight, I could make out the look of distress written across Will’s
features.  What was he thinking?  I couldn’t tell.  It was almost like he was
having an internal battle with himself.  Fighting between what he wanted to do
and what he thought he should do. 

 Finally, one side
won and he smiled. 

 “Have I ever told
you how beautiful you are?” he whispered.

 I shook my head
because I didn’t think I could speak coherently, and I didn’t want to ruin the
moment.  “I know it’s a cliché to say this but you truly are one of the few
people in this world who’s just as beautiful on the inside as you are on the
outside.”

 He lowered his
head beside mine and whispered in my ear, “Would it be all right if I kissed
you, Lilly Rayne Nightingale?”

 All I could do
was nod my head and hold my breath.  I had always dreamt my first kiss would be
with Will and now it was finally coming true.

 Cupping my face
in his hands, he lowered his heart shaped lips to mine in a gentle caress.  He
was a little hesitant at first but the kiss soon turned more passionate.  After
a few minutes, he finally pulled away almost gasping for air.

 “I think we need
to stop now,” he said in a hoarse voice.

 “Why?”  I didn’t
want the moment to end.  I had waited what felt like a lifetime for this to
happen.  Surely it wouldn’t end so soon.

 “Lilly,” Will
moaned, I could tell he didn’t want it to end either but that he thought it was
what he should do.  “Please, don’t make this any harder on me than it is.  I
need to take you back to your room now. 
Please
.”

 I sighed in
disappointment, “All right.” 

 He took my hand
and walked me back to my room.  After a chaste kiss goodnight on the cheek,
Will left me standing in front of my door only to watch him walk away hoping he
would turn around for one last kiss.

 But, that was the
last time I ever kissed Will.

 The next morning
my world was turned upside down.

 During the night,
a string of tornadoes tore through the county we lived in.  Our high school was
destroyed and several neighborhoods were wiped off the map.  It took forever to
get a call through to my mom.  She was over at Tara’s place when I finally got
in touch with her.

 “Oh, Lilly,” I
could hear the tears in my mom’s voice, something I had never heard before. 
“Everything’s gone.  It’s all gone.”  She wept and wept as she tried to tell me
what happened, but I couldn’t make out anything she was saying.  Finally, Tara came on the line.

 “Lilly, your
Mom’s trailer is gone.”  Tara was never one to mince words.  You could always
count on her to be brutally honest no matter what the situation.  “It was the
weirdest thing I’ve ever seen, girl.  Your trailer was the only one hit in the
whole trailer park.  We went through what was left and found some of your stuff
but you’re basically gonna have to start over.”

 “Was my mom in
the trailer when it hit?”

 “No, she was
stayin’ with a friend over night.”

 I thought it nice
of Tara to call my mom’s latest boyfriend just a friend instead of flat out
saying that my mom had been sleeping at a man’s house.

 I told Tara to look after my mom for me until I got back.  I could still hear Cora weeping in the
background when I got off the phone. 

 Will was there
for me, like always.  He held me while I wept for the few possessions I had
lost, but mostly weeping from relief that my mother was ok.

 We were out of
school for two weeks afterward.  During that time my mom and I were pretty busy
setting up a new trailer and buying new things for the place.  Thankfully, Cora
had kept up the insurance payments on our old trailer.  The insurance paid for
us to get a new trailer and gave us money to help replace a lot our
possessions.

 I only saw Will
once in those two weeks.  He and his parents came by to give us a gift card to
Wal-mart to help out.  I felt funny accepting charity from them, but I would
have felt even worse refusing their thoughtful generosity.

 They set school
back up in a local elementary school’s gym.  It was a mad house.  It became so
hard for the teachers to be heard above the bedlam that some of them just gave
up trying to teach all together.  We ended up having a lot of recess time in
the last few months of that school year.  I wouldn’t have minded that so much
if Will hadn’t changed.

 When we got back
to school I found out through the grapevine that Will had been taking Jessica
McCormick out.  Jessi was the head cheerleader of the football squad.  I was so
hurt and embarrassed I couldn’t even look at him.  Tara knew something was
wrong and finally threatened me with bodily harm if I didn’t tell her what was
going on between Will and me.  I finally told her everything.

 “You mean to tell
me he kissed you and then starts datin’ Jessi?”

 “That’s the way
it looks,” I shrugged, wiping tears away on the sleeve of my shirt.

 “I didn’t even
think he talked to Jessi more than a couple of time in his whole entire life!” 
I could tell Tara was getting madder by the minute.  And to be honest, it made
me feel good to have her on my side.  “I’m gonna go have a talk with Mister
high and mighty Will Allen Kilpatrick right now!”

 I restrained Tara from leaving by physically blocking the front doorway to Utha Mae’s trailer.  She was
about to crawl out a window before I finally convinced her not to embarrass me
any more than I already was.  How much more could I take?

 Will kept his
distance from us the rest of the school year.  Utha Mae kept asking where he
was and why he didn’t come around anymore.  We just told her he had found a
girl he liked.  I can still remember how Utha Mae looked at me when she thought
I couldn’t see her, like I’d lost a part of me I would probably never get
back.  She must have known how I felt about Will but never said anything about
it.

 That summer I got
a job at a small convenience store one of my mother’s friends owned.  It wasn’t
the most exciting job in the world but it gave me a lot of time to catch up on
my reading between customers.  One day a cute boy came in the store to buy a
Coke and some chips.  I didn’t recognize him at all.  He was about eighteen
with jet black hair, tanned skin and the most gorgeous green eyes I had ever
seen.

 “Hi, I’m Nick,”
he held out his hand to me across the counter.

 I shook his hand. 
“Lilly.”

 I noticed him
looking me up and down as I rang up his items.

 “So what school
do you go to?” he asked.

 “South Clarks.  You?”

 “I go to St.
Benedicts in town.”

 “Do you like it?”

 “I’d like it
better if we had pretty girls like you there.”

 Ok, in my defense
I was only sixteen and to have a cute boy like Nick waltz into my life at the
exact moment I needed someone to flatter me was, to say the least, perfect
timing.

 He asked me to go
to the county fair with him that Friday night.  I said yes and quietly hoped
Will would be there with Jessi.  Friday night was the most popular night to go
to the fair.  You could ride all the rides you wanted for ten bucks. 

 Nick picked me up
in a restored dark blue 1966 Pontiac GTO with white racing stripes.  He told me
almost every detail of the restoration on the way to the fair.  I tried to find
it as interesting as possible or at least pretend convincingly that I found it
interesting by asking follow up questions.

 The fair was
crowded that night, as I had already assumed it would be.  I think we must have
ridden every ride there at least twice.  I ended up having so much fun I
completely forgot to look for Will in the crowds.  Late in the evening, we ran
into a couple of Nick’s friends from his school.  They handed Nick a jumbo size
plastic cup and told him to enjoy.

 “What is that?” I
asked him.

 “It’s crown and
coke.  Want some?”

 “No,” I told him,
watching in amazement as he sucked half of it through the straw in just a few
minutes.  I didn’t like him drinking, but I didn’t know him well enough to
chastise him for it.

 The rest of the
night went downhill from there.  Nick and his friends were pretty hammered an
hour later.  Why do people get so stupid when they drink?  It’s almost like
they devolve into Neanderthals or something.  Case in point:  I was standing by
the rail of the next ride we were going on when I felt a slight draft up my
shirt.  I whipped around to see what was going on and found three giggling
juveniles behind me.  Apparently, Nick had told his good old buddies that I had
a cute behind.  They told him to prove it and so he lifted the back of my
babydoll shirt so they could see for themselves.

 It was then I
asked Nick to take me home. 

 “I don’t know
what you’re so upset about,” he slurred, stumbling to his car.  “You have a
cute ass, what’s wrong with showing it off?”

 I wanted to slap
him dizzy but since he could barely stand on his own two feet as it was, I
figured it probably wouldn’t be the nicest thing to do.

 “Give me your
keys,” I told him holding my hand out.

 “No way!  Nobody
drives my baby but me.”

 “I am not letting
you drive me or yourself home.  I’ll drive you home and call my mom to pick me
up from your house.  Now hand me the keys!”

 “Are you having a
problem here, Lilly?”

 I swirled around
and saw Will standing right behind me.  My heart felt like it was lodged in my
throat being so close to him again. 

 “He won’t let me
drive him home,” I said lamely.

 “Why don’t you
let me drive you both home?” Will said more to Nick than to me.  “You’re not in
any shape to drive, friend.”