Perfectly Flawed (26 page)

What is he talking about?

Ugh, boys.

“You can just tell them I’m your friend.” I
shrug, rolling my eyes when he isn’t looking at me. “There isn’t
anything wrong with that, you know?”

“But I feel like we’re more than, you know,
friends.” He looks to me, shooting me that cocky smile I hate. His
blonde curls fall into his eyes.

How can I tell him this using a language that
he’ll understand?
Hmmm…

No, actually, I don’t know. I don’t think
he’d listen anyway. He hasn’t before.

***

The car slows—and given his erratic driving
coupled with his belief that the speed limit isn’t a law but a
guideline, that’s saying something. He turns, pulling into a
familiar driveway, parking behind a familiar car, and it’s déjà vu
all over again as he parks the car, places his hand on my thigh,
and winks at me.

“Here we are.”

I thought the drive over looked too
familiar.

The street around us is packed with cars but
he found a place to park, in the driveway of all places. It’s
obvious they saved the spot special for him. I look forward to the
blue BMW with red-and-black shiny pom poms in the back window. I
let out a giggle as I shuck off my heavy jacket and beanie, leaving
them in the car. If I remember correctly—and I swear I’m part
elephant—this place is going to heat up to excruciating
temperatures within the next hour.

“This place doesn’t change, does it?” I ask
as I stand in front of Jennifer Long’s front door. Ryder’s hand is
on the knob. The scene of the last party—this won’t be fun at all,
I know it.

Let the countdown begin.

“Not if the Long’s can help it.” Ryder pushes
open the front door revealing the crowd, immersing us in a
deafening bass beat. It quickly cuts off. They
have
been
waiting for us—for
him
—to show up. It’s obvious with the way
everyone’s staring. At the sight of Ryder, the entire room erupts
into a roaring cheer. Loud, booming voices start chanting
“Harrison! Harrison!” and pom poms and streamers are thrown into
the air. It’s a real roaring celebration.

I think I’m in over my head here.

“Harrison!” a large—in size not muscle
mass—guy yells as he barrels through the crowd, aiming straight for
us. I remember his name is Brett, the dude from the last party. His
arms thrust in the air in time to the chanting of the quarterback’s
name. “Diego, get this man a beer! Get the man a beer!”

“The man of the hour has arrived,” Diego, I
think, yells as he hands Ryder a beer. He edges close to me, his
lean frame resembling the body of a swimmer, which surprises me.
“The man with the golden arm.”

Yep, I’m definitely in over my head here.

“Hey, man.” Ryder claps Diego on the
back.

“I see you brought the girlfriend.” Brett
looks me over like a starving dog looking at a steak. I swear he’s
salivating. I’m waiting for drool.

“I’m not—”

“She’s just shy.” Ryder wraps his arm around
my shoulders, oblivious to my body stiffening from his grasp, from
his touch. I shoot him a look for not correcting his friend, a look
for not letting
me
correct his friend. “Hates parties,” he
tries to explain, as if it’s so horrible, so against humanity and
the rights of teenagers everywhere, to hate parties.

Kennie runs by. I can see her blonde hair
bounce through the crowd as her figure disappears behind a tall guy
with the beginnings of a beard. Duke must be in town for the dance
tomorrow night.

“Let’s get her a beer,” Diego excitedly
yells, tugging me away from Ryder. “Loosen her up, some.”

Oh, goody.

Let’s get the basket case a beer.

“Hit that yet?” I hear Brett behind me. I
assume, it’s the only thing that really makes much sense, he’s
asking Ryder about me, that’s the only person behind me—as we’re
still a fire hazard near the front door—he could be asking, but
they can’t be talking about
me
. I want to stay to hear the
answer. I stop and tug, waiting for Diego to stop, but he only
pulls my arm harder, pulling me to the other side of the room, into
the white-and-silver, sterile looking kitchen.

Holy balls, it looks like you could perform
surgery in this kitchen.

In the kitchen, after Diego hands me a beer—I
should say
after he forces the can into my
hands and
wraps my fingers around the sweating aluminum
because that’s
the best way to describe it—I turn to leave, trying to put a large
amount of distance between me and this kid, only to run into a
wall. My head bounces off the wall—wait, not a wall, a body. A
familiar body that I haven’t seen in a while.

I look up, spotting the bright orange waves
falling into glistening, blue eyes so pale, they’re almost white,
the pale, pink complexion that seems to work on him, and the dozens
upon dozens of freckles covering most of the exposed flesh.

“Hey, Joey,” Avery says, reaching his arms
out to hug me. Not wanting to be rude—I actually like Avery—I reach
my hand out and pat him on the shoulder. He’s wearing his grass
stained jersey, like the other varsity players that got to play
even nanoseconds in the game, happily celebrating their win.

“I haven’t seen you in a while,” I observe,
patting Avery on the arm—on his nice arm; I can feel his muscles
beneath the fabric of his jersey and long sleeved t-shirt. Man, the
boy has been working out since the last time I paid attention. “How
are you?” I ask, honestly interested.

It isn’t every day that I have a conversation
with Avery O’Reilly. I could spend the rest of the night just
talking to him.

“Great,” he starts excitedly; he’s still
floating on Cloud Nine from his win. While everyone was chanting
Ryder’s name when we walked in, they should’ve been chanting
Avery’s, it was he that ran the last touchdown. “Especially after
that win tonight,” he finishes. As I assumed he would be. “I see
that you’re here with Ryder, it true you’re dating” Well, isn’t he
just cutting to the chase?

“No.” I shake my head, emitting a sigh,
tucking my hair behind my ears. “I’m his friend, that’s it. But he
did ask me to the dance and I said yes.” That’s something I’m sure
he heard around school. Everyone new. News about me tends to spread
quickly.

Ryder’s taking the psycho to
Homecoming
, who hadn’t tried to figure that out in the girl’s
bathroom or boy’s locker room when they had the opportunity to
gossip—I mean, discuss.

“I didn’t peg you for a dancer,” Avery
comments, looking me over. Not in one of those pervy, creepy ways
that makes me feel disgusting, just the way he’s done since we were
in the fifth grade and he chose to partner with me in gym because
no one else would—no one had the guts, the bravery, or whatever.
Avery wasn’t like most of the kids in school, he was always scared
of me, but only because I was so small and he was worried something
would happen to me in class. People liked to go after me on the
basketball court or the flag-football field. If it wasn’t Zephyr
protecting me, it was Avery looking out for me.

I’m certain Zephyr had something to do with
that.

“You didn’t know? It’s my secret talent.”
That gets him to laugh. “Really? I’m not,” I reply truthfully. “I
hate it.”

That’s the honest to God truth right
there.

Avery scrunches up his face, his freckled
nose crinkling and wrinkling. “Then why go?” he asks, confused.
Recognition crosses his face, like he’s finally understood
something. “Oh, does this have anything to do with a sulking
Zephyr?” he asks, his finger pointing at me as if he knows.

He doesn’t.

Or does he? I’m not even sure anymore.

But a
sulking
Zephyr? Since when does
Zephyr know enough about emotions to
sulk
? Why haven’t I
seen this?

The idea, the thought of Zephyr sad is too
much for me to picture. “What?” I ask too loudly to be believable
that nothing I do is because of him.
Way to go, Joey, you might
as well tell Avery everything, now
. I see the doubt cross his
face. “No,” I say, while trying to keep my voice under control.

Too late.

“I’ve seen him avoid you for the better part
of three weeks,” Avery continues, taking a pause to drink from the
beer can in his hand. “What’s going on between the two of you?”

Why does everyone keep asking me that?

If I knew, I probably would’ve fixed it
already, people!

“No idea,” I instantly answer, taking a sip
of my disgusting beer, anything to distract myself. “And I don’t
want to talk about it or him,” I add for good measure. “If he had
something useful to say to me, I’d like to think that he’d seek me
out, but like you said earlier, Avery, he’s been avoiding me like
the plague.”

Okay, I’ll admit that was a little harsh to
say to one of Zephyr’s best friends.

But he doesn’t look hurt; he just looks like
he… understands.

“There you are,” Ryder catches my attention,
walking into the kitchen and slinging an arm sloppily around my
shoulders. I cringe, noticing Avery notice
that
. He doesn’t
do anything. He just stands back and watches Ryder tug me against
his side. With the sight of Avery—because Ryder only had his eyes
on me when he walked into the kitchen—he stands taller and, I kid
you not, puffs out his chest. Understandable, Avery is built like
an ox. “Hey.”

“Hey.” It’s obvious Avery means no harm.
“Good game tonight, man,” Avery compliments, giving him the typical
clap on the back that signals
friends
among his species.

Ryder beams, deflating when he realizes that
Avery isn’t a threat. He, like any cocky, bumptious athlete, loves
compliments.

“Come on, babe,” Ryder says to me—again with
the damned
babe
. He ignores Avery completely. “Let’s party.”
He grabs my hand and tugs me into the crowded living room, onto the
makeshift dance floor, trying to dance with me. At some point I’m
not aware of, music started blaring through the Bose speakers
flanking the large fireplace in the living room. The song is a
familiar pop beat that I’ve heard a few times when I dared
listening to the radio in the car.

Let me stop here before I continue with the
rest of the party because I feel this is the perfect moment for
commentary. If I would have listened to Ryder, back when Diego was
taking me to the kitchen with more force than necessary, if I would
have listened to Dumb’s conversation with Dumber, when he asked
have you hit that yet?
I would’ve heard Ryder’s lovely
response of
not yet, but I’m working on it.

I’m not sure if those were the
exact
words, but I’m guessing here.

I even bet that I would have seen him
wink.

He actually
winks
!

Pervy
.

Back to the dancing, which, did I mention, I
can’t do. I can’t dance. At all. Ryder can’t either, but I’m worse,
believe it or not.

The party wasn’t that great. No high school
party ever is to the sober observer, like I was. However, I was
determined not to get drunk, I was not above the thought of a
little buzz. Just a little haze to push me through the evening
because it seemed so important to Ryder that I enjoy myself, that I
enjoy his company and the company of his friends, people like
him.

I’m not sure when I really started caring
about what Ryder Harrison thought. I’m not sure when I started to
care if I was fun enough to be around him and his friend. I’m not
sure when he really crossed my mind, infiltrating my thoughts, to
begin with. Maybe it was when Zephyr said all those awful things to
me, breaking my heart, maybe when I said yes to Ryder’s Homecoming
invitation because I knew it would piss Zephyr off. Maybe it was
when I learned that anything I did with Ryder Harrison would anger
Zephyr Kalivas.

The bigger question: When did I start caring
so much about what Zephyr thought of me?

Ryder continued to drink. Definitely more
than I was. I stopped counting his beers after five. No, six. The
drunker he got—is that even a word?—the more hands-on he got. I
tried to keep his hands in G-Rated areas, but he wasn’t a rule
follower and didn’t believe in respectable boundaries.

“We should get out of here,” he tells me
while he attempts to dance, leaning closer to my ear to be heard
over the pop song I didn’t know. His hand reaches up and strokes
the side of my face, my cheek, as he thinks he whispers to me when,
in reality, he’s straight up yelling directly into my ear.

Ouch.

“I don’t think you’re okay to drive, Ryder,”
I reply, feeling his hot, sticky breath against my ear and neck. No
one can understand how much I want to take a shower right now. I
need to wash him off of me, I need to wash this night off me.

As predicted, the temperature is so high in
this room that I’m strongly debating the t-shirt I wore. I ditched
the light jacket I wore and tied it securely around my waist like I
used to do as a kid. My hair is tied in a messy bun on the top of
my head but the back of my neck is still boiling. Every time I move
my legs, my jeans stick to me and every move is uncomfortable.

As much as I want to leave and head home—dear
God, let it be soon—I paid attention during freshmen health class
when we had to suffer through that British video about driving
under the influence. Actually, I had to be carried to the nurse’s
office, by Avery of all people. I passed out nine minutes into the
film, smacking my head on the side of the table resulting in a
permanent scar on the side of my face where my ear meets my cheek,
from the sight of all the blood.

It was real footage.

Harley, like the best friend that she is,
filled me in on all the gory details; the death toll, the number of
limbs lost among the victims.

I still shudder when I think about it.