Chaste (21 page)

“Any hot chicks in your life these days?”I ask, changing the subject.

He shrugs.

“There’s Tasha.”

“I’d rather have a girl who can think for herself,” he says. “Mike treats Tasha like a windup doll. Worse.” He frowns. “She lets him.”

I put my hands on my hips. “So spill. What do you want in this girl?”

“She has to be soft and strong at the same time.”

“Your dream girl is a roll of toilet paper?”

He laughs and hits me with a pillow. “Someone smart who knows what she wants, but isn’t too into herself.”

I sigh. “And of course, she’ll have to be pretty.”

“That goes without saying. I don’t date ugly.”

“Guys are so shallow.”

“You’re one to talk. Mike Duvall was your first. Don’t tell me you were attracted by his warm and caring personality.”

I think back to the first time I really noticed my ex.

My brother and I had gone to a party at one of his friend’s houses. When the two of us arrived, my brother found his girlfriend and left me standing against a wall, sandwiched between a bowl of Doritos and the blaring base of a loud speaker.

Hours passed while I stood there eating chip after chip, watching as his basketball friends talked over and around me. They laughed at inside jokes, talked about Roland’s tag-along sister right where I could hear them and treated me like the invisible girl until I had to look at my orange hands for proof of my existence.

Then it happened. One moment I was licking yellow cheese powder from my fingers and the next my handsome neighbor was standing in front of me.

“You look really pretty tonight, Kat,” he said. “Would you like to dance?”

“Sure,” I said, wiping my hands on a napkin. The thought of him noticing my sticky fingers was mortifying. Thankfully he didn’t point them out. Instead he took me to the center of the room where I went from invisible to the focal point of the gathering and was showered with compliments for the way I moved.

Mike saved me. He was there when I needed him. Was it so unbelievable that I liked him for more than his looks?

The sound of John tapping his shoe on the floor startles me out of my thoughts.

“Mike can be sweet,” I say.

He snorts. “Yeah, when he wants something.”

Even though John is probably right, I don’t want to admit it yet. Not when admitting it means Mike was only nice to get into my pants. Groaning, I put the bracelet back in the box and snap it shut.

“I should probably go.”

On the way home I drive by Quinn’s house. It may be stalkerish, but I can’t resist. His car is in the driveway and the blinds are open. I know better than to stop and knock.

When I get home, I find a dozen red roses and six white lilies in a vase on the kitchen table. Guilt flowers.
I grab them by the stems and throw them in the trash. The note in the roses falls to the floor.

For my Alley Kat
. Good lord, I’m going to be sick.

It’s quiet when I climb the stairs to my bedroom. My father has left another book on my bed.
The God Makers
has a picture of a Mormon temple on the front. Whatever. I put it on my nightstand with five other books my father has left me in the past week. I started reading one of them last night, a novel in verse about a girl who escapes her oppressive Mormon upbringing—where the characters are all non-thinking sheep who act nothing like Molly or Preston or Quinn. Where the seminary teacher won’t answer hard questions and would probably die of shock if he were ever forced to sit in Brother Parker’s class. And where the abuse of the protagonist’s father is condoned by the Mormon community. When I get to that part, I think of Quinn and how he risked expulsion to keep me safe.

My hand goes to the telephone on my nightstand. Would Quinn blow me off if I told him about Mike’s flowers and gifts, the constant phone calls, the visit from Tasha and my inability to handle my ex? Or would he listen and help me come up with a plan? I’m about to call him when I remember how he put his arm around Molly after school. Jealousy twists my stomach.

I put the receiver down.

The girl’s boarding school my dad threatened me with would keep Mike at a distance. It might even be tempting if it didn’t mean leaving behind my family and friends. Never mind that I’m not the problem here. Why is it when the boy misbehaves, the girl gets sent away? Nope, not gonna happen.

As I burrow under my covers and pull a sheet over my head, I try to forget about this horrid mess.

The memory of last Monday floods into my brain. The feel of Quinn’s lips on mine, the stubble of his cheek against the skin of my palm, his hand pressed into my back until my knees turn to putty. His warm touch, his innocent eyes, his unassuming smile fill me with longing. When I’m with him, I forget about Mike and my still-grieving parents. When I’m with him even the counselor’s psychobabble is bearable.

With Quinn I feel safe.

31

Quinn

There’s a rumor going around at lunch that Mike and Kat have gotten back together. When I hear it, I almost choke on my cheeseburger. After I swallow and wash it down with a carton of milk, I decide to find out the truth.

But when I look around the cafeteria, my partner is nowhere in sight.

Same with physics, John and Tasha are here, but no Kat. And it’s lonely sitting by myself. I miss joking about Mrs. Williams’ craziness to someone who gets it.

By the time I show up to my afterschool chamber music rehearsal, I’m dying to talk to a person who knows something. So I pull John aside. “Is Kat back together with Mike?”

He shrugs. “That’s what Mike says, but I think she’s avoiding him.”

“She’s not home sick?”

“No, Kat’s tough. She almost never gets sick. Also, she called me this morning and asked me to pick up her homework, something about needing a day off.”

“But Kat—”

“Believe me, I know. It doesn’t sound anything like Kat. She seemed shaken up on the phone, but for whatever reason, she won’t tell me why.”

“Maybe I can help.”

He laughs. “Good luck, man. That girl is closed off.”

Despite his doubts, he pulls a binder from his bag, rips out a sheet of paper labeled “Kat’s homework,” and hands it to me. As he walks out the door, I fold it and stuff it in my pocket.

I always go straight home after my Tuesday rehearsals because it’s my night to cook, but this is about me letting go and trusting my gut. I need to go with my instincts right now, trust them so Kat can trust me. I can’t help her otherwise. It’s frightening, and I worry she’ll slam the door in my face. But humiliation is worth it if I can be with Kat.

On my way to her house, I stop by a flower shop where I pick up white daisies and some yellow mums. When I knock on Kat’s door, her mother answers it. From the hard line of her mouth, I know she’s not happy to see me.

“Is Kat home?” I ask.

She starts to shut the door.

“No wait,” I blurt, sticking my foot in the door jamb.

“She’s busy.”

I hold the flowers closer to my chest to hide my pounding heart. “I need to see her.”

“You need to stay out of her life.”

“Lay off him, Mom,” says the voice of an angel.

I look over the shoulder of the middle-aged woman blocking my path and see Kat walking toward us from the stairs with a book in her hand, her usually straight hair is now corkscrew-curly in the most feminine style I’ve ever seen.

I want to protect her. I need to know she’s not with Mike, the jerk who calls her nasty names and treats her like slime on the bottom of his shoe.

When Kat looks directly into my eyes, my heart stutters.

“Fine, but don’t tell your father,” I hear her mother say before leaving us alone.

My legs won’t move as Kat comes closer, and for a second I forget about the flowers in my hand.

“Uh,” my mouth goes dry.
Say something, idiot!
“I, um, brought your homework.”

“Why didn’t you let John do it?”

My thoughts stall, but I manage to fumble around in my pocket and pull out the paper with her assignments on it, pushing it into her hand.

Kat stuffs it into her book.

“Okay, then. You’ve run the errand. So you can go. I’m sort of, you know, busy trying to grasp this bizarre-o religion of yours.”

“Hold up,” I say, trying not to hyperventilate. This is my chance, so I’d better not blow it. “Please don’t go back to Mike. He’s a jerk, and you deserve better. You need someone good—no, great—who sees you as the amazing woman you are. Who doesn’t take you for granted. And it doesn’t have to be me, either, even if I would give my right arm for a chance with you. Breaking Molly’s heart was the hardest thing I ever did, not that I need to tell you that. But ever since you and I kissed, I can’t get you out of my head. So here.” I thrust the flowers forward. “Break my hea—”

Her lips on mine cut off my words. The flowers drop to the floor along with her book as I move forward into the house and shut the door with my foot. This is madness, but I’m lost in the feel of her body, unable to resist her perfect girl-smell, the sound she makes in the back of her throat, the fullness of her mouth.

My hands move up and down her spine while hers slide along the back of my neck. She’s so warm and sexy and gorgeous that I don’t ever want to stop. And for a moment I understand why my sister let things go too far with Ray. If kissing Kat always feels this good, I am totally screwed.

The sound of the doorbell makes me pull back.

“Kat, we need rules,” I whisper.

She pulls on my arm, guiding me to her mother’s office and puts a finger to her mouth as a signal to be quiet.

Mrs. Jackson brushes past us to answer the ring.

“Didn’t I already tell you that Kat has the flu?” I hear her say to the guest at the door.

“Yes,” says a familiar voice. Mike’s voice. Kat’s eyes go wide as saucers. “That’s why I brought a can of Campbell’s chicken noodle soup. I know it’s her favorite. If you let me use the kitchen, I’ll heat it up and take it to her.”

“She’s resting.”

“Come on Mrs. J, you know I’m only trying to be nice.”

Kat snorts before putting a hand to her mouth. I rub her shoulder, put an arm around her back and hold her against the front of my shirt.

Her mother speaks, “Thanks for the soup. When Kat wakes up, I’ll tell her you stopped by.”

I hear the door shut. Mrs. Jackson marches into the office holding a can of soup and an envelope. “He sure is persistent,” she says to Kat. “Maybe you should be honest. Tell him you’re not interested, that it’s over. I don’t like lying for you.”

Kat shuts her eyes so tight it looks painful. “I’ve already told him a million times.”

The envelope passes from Mrs. Jackson’s hand to Kat’s. For a moment I think she’s going to open it. Instead she walks from her mother’s office and starts picking the daisies and mums off the floor.

“You aren’t going to read it?” I ask.

“Not in front of my mom.”

I squat down, pick up her fallen book and suppress a shudder when I see it’s one of the most inflammatory anti-Mormon titles ever written.

Kat looks at me for a few seconds too long, almost as if she knows what I’m thinking.

“My father gave it to me,” she says in an apologetic whisper. “I think maybe I was too hard on him. This is his way of protecting me.”

“Because I’m so dangerous,” I say, my voice shaking with hurt.

The very thought that she’d rather read half-truths and hateful propaganda than risk asking me a few questions burns like betrayal up my esophagus.

“I don’t believe everything I read, Quinn,” she says as she takes the daisies and mums to the kitchen to put them in a vase.

Though I hear the creaking of the faucet and the water flowing, I keep my eyes on the book in my hand. “Just promise you won’t read anymore,” I say.

She shakes her head no.

My shoulders tense and I feel myself getting agitated. I think she senses it too because she loops an arm around my waist. I look into her eyes and see softness there, like she actually cares.

“Don’t let this come between us,” she says.

Glass slides against granite as she puts the flowers in the middle of the kitchen island. Before I know it, I’m staring at her lips, touching her hair as I go in for a kiss.

Our mouths move in a rhythm that makes my bones and muscles buzz with heat—not unlike when I play the cello and feel the vibrations spread through my rib cage—except with Kat the feelings start from the inside and work their way out.

She pulls back and smiles at me before ripping open the envelope from Mike. She reads his note out loud.

“Alley Kat.” She clears her throat. “Did you get the bracelet, the flowers, the apology? I know I made a mistake last week, but I was only trying to protect you from the damage of your careless behavior. If you hadn’t run away, I wouldn’t have accidentally hurt you. You can forgive me, can’t you? I know Walker is in the house with you, and that you’re not really sick. I’m not stupid. So what if I cheated on you? Now that you’ve cheated on me, you can say we’re even. I need you. I’ll do anything to make this work. Just tell me what you want. Mike.”

“He’s blaming you for his actions,” I say, my instinct to protect Kat stronger than ever. “Maybe it’s bad, but I’m glad I hit him. No one deserved it more.”

She freezes.

Did I say the wrong thing?

“No one can know about the note,” she says. “Telling you was hard enough.”

I nod, but only because that’s what she wants. Why she’s embarrassed is beyond me. Whether or not Mike chooses to rein in his anger has nothing to do with anything Kat says or does. He should be ashamed, and she should be angry. Not the other way around.

“Come to my place for dinner,” I say, wanting nothing more than to take her from this prison of a home. “Mike already knows we’re together. Maybe it’ll send him a message that you’re living life on your terms.”

Her smile is so pretty. “I’d love to, Quinn.”

“This time I’ll drive.”

32

Katarina

I toss back my hair and square my shoulders on my way to Quinn’s car, which has a dent in one side and needs a fresh coat of paint. Although I know it’s nice of him to open my door, a part of me hates giving up control. Maybe we’re not so different.