Her Kiss (Griffin) (13 page)

CHAPTER 36

Mason is smiling when I wonder into
the locker room. I know he must have just recently had a conversation with
Summer
, because that’s about the only time the guy smiles.
(Yeah, I hang out with a really cheerful crowd.) I’m only half-kidding about
the smile-thing, though. He does it sometimes. Occasionally. But after talking
with
Summer
, his smile is different. It’s dopey.
And dreamy.

“Have a nice chat with
Summer
?” I ask, opening my locker.

He jerks his head up and looks at
me stunned. Like how did I know that?

The smile grows back on his face.
“Yeah—I’m going to make her dinner tonight,” he says with an incredulous
laugh.

“Far out,” I murmur, since that’s
about as strange as me going to a school dance. In fact, it’s so much like it
that I mention it.

I grin knowing my strange will beat
out his. “I’m taking Ally Grange to the school dance.”

He coughs with surprise. “What
?!
”

A half-smile forms on one side of
my mouth. Can’t help it. I’m as shocked as him. “It was the only way I’d ever
get her to go out with me.”

It’s the truth. And I know it. The
girl holds her ground. No matter how mind-blowing the kiss or deep the temptation
(which was excruciatingly deep—for both of us) she was never going to
break down and give me a chance. She would have just kept running from me.
Forever. So, though I’ve never gone to a dance before in my life, I said the
words I thought I’d never say to anyone, ever. (Ever. Ever. Ever.) ‘Will you go
to the school dance with me?’

But hey, she finally she said yes
to me. So, score.

My first date, my
first dance, my first crush—all of it rolled into one.
If it
weren’t for the dance part I’d be ecstatic.

Mason shakes his head slightly, a
sardonic smile playing at the corner of his mouth. “I guess a man’s got to do
what a man’s got to do.”

“Right.” I grin, “So I guess you’ll
be putting on an apron.”

He raises his eyebrows. “And you,
my friend, will be putting on a suit.”

I close my eyes.

Right.

He laughs. “But you’re going out
with Ally Grange, man. I know you, weird-o. You want the school
girl—you’ve
always
wanted the school girl.”

Right.

Apparently, I’m pretty transparent,
but that’s okay, I’ve got nothing to hide … well, except the stuff my
counselors tell me to. Oh yeah, and that stuff with Ms. Sharp. I scratch my
chin. Once again, I’m not feeling like a big prize … yet, you have to admit, I
won
a big prize—a date with
Heaven. It doesn’t even matter that now I’m trapped into going to a
school
dance
and
apparently I have to get a suit or something—still, my heart is beating
all wild and hard and happy, ’cause man, she said yes!!

CHAPTER 37

“I can’t believe you’re going to a
school dance,” Hailey grumbles for the hundredth time. “And with
her
. Why
her
, Griffin?” She says it like I’ve betrayed her. Like Ally
is her biggest enemy, and
me
going to a school dance
is going to mark the end of our friendship. Or maybe even the entire world.

I’m at the mall, looking for a suit
for the dance. I brought Hailey along, so I can get her opinion. I also brought
her though so she can feel needed or whatever. She is extremely pissed I’m
going to the dance. She’s not jealous, I don’t think.
Not
exactly, anyway.
She feels threatened by Heaven. I get it.
Sort of.
Hailey’s used to being the only girl in my life.
But like I said before, I don’t really think of her as a girl anyway. I really
don’t. I mean
,
I’d never kiss her.
Never
. Not even if the world was ending.
When she gets drunk she sometimes tries to get me to do it, but no way. Hailey
is my bud, and girls that I kiss usually end up hating me, it seems.
I don’t want Hailey hating me
,
the girl is
scary
. I say that in jest—mostly. (But not completely.)

But I really mean
it,
I don’t want Hailey hating me. And I also mean it that I
don’t want to kiss her. ’Nough said.

As Hailey bitterly trails me from
one store to the next, I keep getting this ache in my stomach. At first I
thought it was because of the suit, ‘cause really, I can’t afford a suit. But
after a while, I have to acknowledge that the jabbing at the side of my gut is
not worries over the suit. It’s a freaking appendicitis. Great.

Hailey’s busy jabbering on her
phone—complaining to the millionth person in her contacts that I’m going
to the
school
dance
with
school
girl
, Ally Grange—that I’ve
lost my mind, and am no longer trustworthy as a loyal friend, blah, blah, blah.
Her complaints are long and bitter—and embarrassingly loud.

I grab her phone from her, and she
gives me a dirty look—until she sees my face. I’m sure I’m pale as a
ghost. I’m in a lot of pain.

“Can you shut up for a second?” I
give her a weak grin, since she looks so shocked—and concerned.
Definitely not a normal look for her.
“I need you to call an
ambulance.”

CHAPTER 38

I wake in the hospital feeling like
crap. Not because of the appendix surgery I just had (since they filled me with
drugs). But I feel bad about the dance.
That I was getting
cut open while I was supposed to be picking up Ally.

I told my mom to call her and
explain—but Mom said Ally wouldn’t answer her phone.

I had nightmares about
it—Ally all dressed up, waiting for me to come to her house … and me not
showing. It killed me to think of her all dressed up, waiting and waiting.
Missing her dance.

The girl didn’t trust me in the
first place—now this. She was going to think I stood her up.

I kept telling my mom, “Call her
one more time.”

Mom swept the hair off my forehead,
her eyes looking strangely lucid, like me being in the hospital flipped on the
mother switch in her haunted brain. Gave her a moment of clarity and protective
purpose. “Griffin, who is this girl?” she asked softly. Then she added with
amazement, “You were planning to go to a school dance?”

She said it like the idea made her
question her sanity.

I think I mentioned to her that
Ally was my werewolf. (Look, I was on drugs.)

CHAPTER 39

One minute my eyes are closed, the
next I open them, and there’s an angel right in the doorway. My eyes stay fixed
on her, drinking her in, while my pulse thumps.

It’s late afternoon now. I was
beginning to think she wouldn’t show. But here she is, Heaven in my hospital
room.

She’s come with a cactus.
It’s
, well—a cactus.

She gently places it on my
windowsill, explaining it’ll bloom a tiny flower in the sunlight. So, now I can
see why she brought it—for that experience. But man, she didn’t have to.
I’m just glad she came.

She also made me soup. That one I
get without her saying a word—but again, like the cactus, she didn’t have
to do it. But then again, if she didn’t do it she wouldn’t be Ally. So I’m glad
she did.

She starts making some excuse about
why she didn’t come sooner.

(I have to tell you, I was worried
she hated me and would never give me another chance with her—so I was
sweating it out when it took her until now to show.)

But I don’t need to hear her
reasons. I’m sure there are plenty—and I’m positive they are all valid.

But what matters to me is: she’s
here, and I’m glad.
I mean, really glad.
I mean, like
my heart may explode out of my chest from seeing her.

Okay, it’s official (to me
anyway)—I’m hers. Her werewolf.

“Just sit with me,” I tell her.

She slips into the chair near my
bed and takes my hand.

I swear, just from that—her
soft hand voluntarily in mine … I’m in heaven.

CHAPTER 40

Heaven stayed visiting with me a
long, heavenly while in the hospital that day. Well, I kind of forced her to,
interlocking my fingers with hers. I wasn’t letting go. Not even when the nurse
came in, needing to check my blood pressure.

“I’m sure it’s high at the moment,”
I told her with a grin.

The nurse smiled, getting it.
“Holding hands with a pretty girl will do that.”

“That’s what I’m saying—and
I’m holding hands with the prettiest.” I lifted my eyebrows a fraction, my lips
quirking up like they do whenever I’m around Ally. “But if I let her hand go,
she’ll probably run away—she does that.”

“I won’t,” Heaven promised shyly,
igniting my insides.

My eyes flickered to hers,
then
stayed. I grinned, “I’m not taking any chances.”

The nurse cleared her throat,
probably because I wasn’t taking my eyes off Ally. Couldn’t. Which might have
let her see I wasn’t kidding about the blood pressure—it wasn’t going to
be normal while Ally was around … and I wasn’t letting her go.

“I’ll come back later,” the lady
murmured,
then
I guess she left the room, though
neither Ally or I noticed. We were in our own little heavenly
trance—well, I was. She seemed like it too. Her eyes were all bright and
drinking me in. Like my eyes were doing to her.

She entertained me with cute
stories about her family and people from her church. She had some pretty funny
stories. I loved the way her eyes twinkled as she told them, and sometimes
she’d crack up laughing out loud in the middle of them. Man, I loved that so
much—her laugh. Okay, to tell you the truth, I loved everything about the
girl. You might have gathered that by now. In any case, I was in an
Ally-induced rainbow-filled world.

Here’s the thing though: she talked
about the people from her church a lot. I mean, a
lot
. So, I knew her church was important to her, part of her life.
And I wanted to be important to her too … and be part of her life. Like, a
major part of it.

The thing was
though,
her life was so different from mine. I was clueless how to even broach easing
myself into it. But man, I was going to try.

I drew in a breath,
then
started spewing my guts. “I like the way you glow,
Heaven. I like it a lot.”

She tilted her head like she had no
idea what I was talking about. So I grinned and happily enlightened her. “You
glow, Heaven. You do. The rest of my life is dark sometimes—but you glow.
I think it has to do with the way you live your life. The choices you make. You
won’t go to places that are going to dim your light—like the parties I go
to. I get it—you won’t change your life for me.” My eyes clung to hers.
“But, Heaven, I wouldn’t mind changing my life for you.”

Her pretty lips parted with
astonishment. She swallowed hard and her eyes got glittery. “I wouldn’t ask you
to do that.”

“I know, but your life seems grand.
It’s full of nice things—mine not so much. I mean, my life is pretty
messed up.” I grinned, since that was an understatement. I gently squeezed her
hand. “So, I wouldn’t mind changing it up a bit.”

“Griffin,” she breathed out softly,
like she might cry or something.

I squeezed her hand gently again,
not wanting to blow her mind, but … “You know, I could go to your church with
you sometime—if you want. I mean
,
I’m
pretty
sure the building won’t
actually burn up if I went inside. I mean, I’ve been told I’m the
devil—and that was by a friend. But I know I’m not, ‘cause I got to go to
heaven with you that night at that party.” I grinned, my voice going low and
husky, “And I’m in heaven right now.”

Ally’s wide eyes went all sparkly
and starry-
eyed,
like they did that day I carried her
books for her. So of course my heart was exploding.

Her voice was full of wonder.
“You’d go to
church
with me?”

“I’d do anything for you.”

I leaned in towards her, my lips
softly brushing against hers. My palms finally let her hands go, so they could
tangle in her soft hair, and our happy mouths got reacquainted.

Unfortunately, right as my eager
tongue slid into her warm, moist, bring-me-to-my-knees mouth, a bunch of my
friends from the hockey team came bursting through the door. When they saw us
mackin’, they started cheering—because that’s my friends, they’re like,
ten.

Startled, Ally jumped, but I
laughed softly against her delicious mouth, holding her head as I deepened the
kiss, ignoring my friends—because man, I was in heaven.

I kissed her deeper and deeper
until Ally moaned softly in my mouth. More heaven!! But
also,
unfortunately, more cheering from my friends—because like I said, they’re
ten
.

I pulled away with a sigh, already
missing Ally’s glorious mouth. “Nice timing guys,” I muttered, but it was only
mock annoyance. I was in a good mood, my eyes staying on Ally, watching her
catch her breath, and enjoying her glow. Man, I was hanging on the moon.

My friends bore gifts of fast food,
which was awesome. But they made Ally jumpy as they crowded around us, being
their loud, boisterous selves. (AKA: foul-mouthed, unruly, obnoxious, gigantic
ten-year-olds.)

She was small and they were huge
and obviously scary to her. Like she was afraid she was going to get trampled,
like we do to people out on the ice. (Or like she saw happen to Poser that day
at school.)

I held her hand tighter as she
quickly got up. “You’re not going, are you?” I protested.

“Yeah, I should take off,” she
whispered, totally lying. Her eyes kept darting sideways looks at Jake
Edwards—the loud guy that had beat up Poser that day in the school
hallway. The guy visibly gave her the shudders.

“You’re not leaving because of us
are you?” Mason asked, sounding ready and willing to pull out all the guys from
the room (which I wanted him to do). His questioning eyes washed over Ally. “We
can come back later if you want.”

“No, I really need to go,” Ally
lied again softly, scurrying quickly for the door.

“She’s shy,” I explained with a
hint of laughter in my voice as my friends watched her scramble away from them
as though they were a pack of wild rabid dogs—which they kind of were,
especially in small confinements … like a hospital room.

“Who is she?” Jake asked as she
opened the door.

Ally froze at my answer. “She’s my
girlfriend.”

Like lightening, she turned back to
me with wide eyes and flushed, glowing cheeks, and a big questioning smile
spreading across her face.

“Right?” I said to her.

She nodded.

Right.
On
.

My heart rejoiced at the tiny
gesture. I mean it, I practically heard angels singing.

Hailey had said I wouldn’t change
for a girl … but she was dead wrong. I’d change for one (and
only
one)—Ally, my Cookie Girl. I
was going to let her lead me around, anywhere she wanted. Anywhere. ‘Cause I knew
the places she’d take me were the kind that make you glow—and I needed a
little light in my life.
A little Heaven.

With Ally-made rainbows in my
vision, I watched her skip happily out of the
room,
thrilled she wasn’t going to run away from me anymore.

Then I closed my eyes and smiled.
Huge. I,
Griff The Grief Master
, had
a girlfriend—Ally Grange.
The sweetest girl in the whole
school.

Wild.