Forever for a Year (25 page)

“You are touching me,” she said.

“I meant touch you there.”

“I know. I was kidding. I'm nervous.”

“Me too,” I said.

“You're not nervous! You're a boy!” She was smiling but also kind of yelling.

“Boys can be nervous too!” So I smiled and kind of yelled too.

“But you don't have to do anything!”

“I have to do it right!”

“You do everything right,” she said, then kissed me so I couldn't say anything. That's when I reached between her legs and pulled away her underwear. I'd read several articles about how to give a girl an orgasm. They said most girls can't come from putting your fingers inside but now that I had my fingers there, I wanted to go inside. So I pushed one finger inside and she clenched.

“Is that okay?”

“Yeah,” she said.

“I can tell you're lying, Carolina.”

“I'm not lying. It feels okay.”

“Don't lie, please,” I said.

“It feels weird.… I don't know.…”

“Okay. I won't do that.” Then I took my finger out and tried to do what I'd read, which was find the clitoris. I had no idea what it would feel like or look like or what it was at all. Not really. So I just moved my fingers around on the outside where it was wet. Carolina seemed to shiver again, which was better than clenching up. “So how's that?” I said.

“That's better,” she said, and she was lying on her back and her whole upper body was stiff, so I don't think she liked it that much. Her hands gripped on to the couch like she was afraid of what might happen next. Her legs kept twitching every time I moved around my fingers. Which maybe was good, but I couldn't really tell.

After five minutes, she said, “Okay, I feel good.”

“Did you orgasm?” I asked.

“I don't know.”

“How would you know?”

“I don't know. I don't think I did.”

“How do you know you didn't?” I asked. I felt like such a failure.

“I don't know, Trevor. Let me touch you now.”

“No, I don't want you to.” Which was a big goddamn lie. She knew it was so she just grabbed me anyway. So I kissed her. She kissed me. And then, you know, she used her hand to make me go.

*   *   *

Afterward, as we were lying there, naked except for our underwear, I said, “I love you so much, Carolina.”

“Even though I couldn't orgasm?”

“It was my fault you couldn't.”

“It wasn't your fault. It was my fault.”

“It was my fault, Carolina. You're perfect. I didn't know what to do.”

“I didn't know what to do either.”

“But you knew what to do to make me finish, so it's my job to know what to do to make you finish.”

She said, “I think boys are easier to finish than girls.”

“Maybe, but it's still my job to know how.”

She said, “How about it's both our jobs to figure it out but neither of us can feel bad if it doesn't happen until we are twenty years old?”

This was smart, but all I could say was, “You really think it could take that long?”

“I don't know!” she yelled, but not smiling this time.

“I'm sorry.”

“It's okay. This was amazing but it was fast and I'm nervous and I feel bad.”

“Don't feel bad.”

“Okay. I love you too, Trevor.”

“I love you so much.”

“I love you sooo much.”

“I love you sooo much more,” I said, but she didn't say it again. She just snuggled her body against mine. Which was nice. I guess.

 

49

Carolina hears from Shannon Shunton

On Sunday night, after I had gotten into bed, I thought about how Trevor and I had gotten almost naked. How he had touched me. How it didn't feel that good. It did, kind of, but more weird than good. Maybe I should do it myself, but then I put my hand down there and it just felt so ridiculous to do it myself that I pulled my hand away. My phone beeped. It had to be Trevor, and I'd rather text with Trevor than, you know, do that.

Except the text was from Shannon Shunton:

SHANNON SHUNTON

How was homecoming?

My brain was racing. So fast. It was weird to be so excited about a text from anyone besides Trevor. I responded:

ME

It was great! Trevor was amazing.

Peggy was weird. But that's okay.

Why didn't you come?

Then I waited. Fifteen minutes. Then almost thirty. I fell asleep. Then the phone beep woke me up in the middle of the night. Like one a.m.

SHANNON SHUNTON

I like how real you are, Carolina. Sorry

I was a bitch in junior high.

Even though my brain was, like, seventy-seven percent asleep, I texted back right away:

ME

It's totally okay. You have been super

nice to me in high school. Nicer than

Peggy. I think you're the most

interesting person in school.

After I pressed send, I wish I hadn't sent it. It was too honest, too kidlike, too complimentary. It was probably better to be more elusive with Shannon Shunton, more artistic. How can you be artistic with texts? Gosh. I don't know. Then she texted again, which made me feel so much better:

SHANNON SHUNTON

You're my rock star.

Her rock star. It was the second time she called me this. I knew she didn't mean it literally. I knew she meant I was amazing, but it was a much cooler way to say I was amazing, which was amazing. It might have been the best compliment a girl had ever given me. Ever. And so I texted back:

ME

I want us to become best friends.

And then she responded:

SHANNON SHUNTON

:)

Which I knew meant she wanted to end the conversation, so I sent my own:

ME

:)

And then I lay awake in bed, thinking about all Shannon Shunton could teach me about boys and sex and, you know, everything. Trevor would love me even more when I knew all the things Shannon knew. I was smart, but more book smart, and Kendra was smart, but more life smart. Shannon was “deep” smart. I don't know what that means. Maybe I mean she just seemed to have seen things no other kids had seen. Maybe Kendra, Shannon, and I would all become best friends. All three of our smarts could be combined and we'd rule the school, but in a nice way. Maybe the three of us would go to homecoming together next year.

*   *   *

But Shannon wasn't at school on Monday. I texted her, but she didn't respond. On Tuesday, her sister wasn't in school either. By Tuesday afternoon, people started whispering that Shannon had run away because no one could find her. And I texted her, like, five hundred times. Not five hundred. I'm not going to exaggerate anymore. I've said this before, I know, but really, life was getting serious and I needed to be more serious. I texted Shannon six times on Tuesday night and Wednesday during school. That's exact. But she didn't respond once. She would respond to me if she could … wouldn't she?

By the end of the week, everyone was saying that Shannon had been killed. Murdered. But the police couldn't find her body, either alive or dead, and there wasn't any real proof. Every teenager had seen police shows on TV, so we knew there needed to be proof or a confession, but the one kid that knew anything, this junior named Dan Gassman, who was the son of a Riverbend police officer, said there was nothing, no proof at all, nothing. Then Shannon's mom and sister moved to Florida to live with Shannon's grandmother. They left the dad behind, which made it look like he was the one that murdered Shannon, but still there was no evidence and no one in the family would say anything to anyone.

When I first heard the rumors that Shannon Shunton might be dead, it was at lunch and I started crying. I tried really hard not to, but I couldn't stop and Trevor hugged me. He didn't say anything. Just hugged me. Then Peggy found me and hugged me. She was crying so loudly it almost felt fake, and she talked the whole time we hugged about how sad it was, except I didn't think Peggy knew the real Shannon like I did. I didn't think Peggy thought it was that sad, she just wanted everyone to think she was sad. When Peggy and I stopped hugging, it felt like we were bigger strangers than ever. Shannon Shunton had been better to me than her, and she was gone and Peggy was still here. I wished Peggy was dead and Shannon was alive. I felt like a horrible person for thinking that. I did. I should be arrested for thinking some of the things I think. I wondered if other people had evil thoughts like I did. Probably not. I was probably the only evil thinker in the whole school. I couldn't find out if I was the only one, obviously, because I couldn't tell people what my thoughts were in order to find out if they had bad ones too.

But two weeks after Shannon disappeared, I started thinking she wasn't dead. Those texts we shared in the middle of the night on Sunday, weren't they the texts of someone knowing they would run away? Weren't they? I didn't tell anyone about them. Maybe I should have told the police, but I didn't want to ruin her plan if she had run away. See, Shannon was too smart, deep smart, to have been murdered.

So yeah, Shannon Shunton was alive. Had to be. Somewhere. She had probably found a cool older boy to take her to California and she changed her name, and she would become a singer or an actress and someday I'd see her on television and only I would recognize her. I wouldn't say anything to anyone. But I would tweet her, because famous people use Twitter more than Facebook, and I'd tweet, “You're a rock star,” and she would know I knew but she would also know I could be trusted and she would text me, because I'd have the same number, and we'd become secret best friends. I really hoped that would happen. I really,
really
just hoped she wasn't dead. Because if Shannon Shunton could be gone forever, anyone and anything could be gone forever soon too.

 

50

Trevor loses his juice

Coach Pasquini asked me to run varsity cross-country for the conference championships. After winning several junior varsity races, my times were better than anyone's except for the star, Todd Kishkin, and the captains, Randy Chung and Craig Billings. I had done a good job of not seeing Carolina the night before meets, or at least not kissing her much if I did. But the Friday night before the conference meet, Carolina came over and we went into my basement. Shannon Shunton had only been missing a few days. Carolina was upset, and I could tell her thoughts were only half about me. She kept saying she wanted to be closer to me than ever. So we got naked super fast. I promised Aaron I would never hook up on nights before races, but Carolina was kissing me with too much energy. It made me lose my mind. I couldn't stop her. Then, after she started touching me, she kissed my neck. Then she kissed my chest. Then my stomach. Then … it.

Holy …

It was the greatest feeling in my life. It hurt a bit because of her teeth, but I didn't care. I can't even think straight now remembering it, let alone when it was happening. Afterward, I asked Carolina why she did it.

“Did you like it?” she asked.

“It was so good I can't describe how good it was.”

“Good. I'm glad. I watched videos and tried to do what they did,” Carolina said. Then with a different tone in her voice, like she was possessed by a ghost, “I don't want to wait forever anymore. I don't want to wait to experience things with you because I'm afraid something bad might happen. Bad things might happen no matter what.”

“I love you, Carolina.”

“I know, Trevor.”

*   *   *

The next day, at the conference championship meet, I ran my worst race of the year. Well, the worst since the first one. I finished last on our team and with a worse time than three of the junior varsity guys. By a lot. Coach Pasquini asked if I was sick. So I said yes. He could tell I was lying. But I couldn't tell him I had gotten my first blow job last night and my brain and body both felt like they weighed five times as much as usual.

The next week was sectionals. But I knew he'd run someone else. My cross-country season was over.

*   *   *

Shannon Shunton disappearing changed Carolina. It changed everyone at school, at least a little, but Carolina … She suddenly seemed much older. I felt too immature for her. I was still this freshman, but now she had the air of a senior. A senior too old for high school anymore. I'd want to talk about video games or school, but Carolina would only want to talk about life. And family. And being a kid. And growing up. And not growing up. Before I met Carolina, before we fell in love, that was me … I was the one who could only think about the dark, depressing crap. But since Carolina, I've tried to be positive. To think about good things. But Carolina couldn't. She couldn't think about anything fun or easy. Only about Shannon Shunton. “Because if Shannon Shunton was dead, she would never grow up.” Carolina said this over and over.

“We'll never see her be a sophomore,” Carolina said. “And we'll never know if she would have graduated. Maybe she would have become my best friend and she would have taught me about all the horrible things in the world and I would have taught her how to be a better student. Maybe she would have gone on to a great college and she would have written books or songs or saved the environment. Maybe…”

“Maybe,” I said.

“It's not fair, Trevor. It's not fair.”

“I thought you thought she was still alive. That she ran away.”

“You're right,” Carolina said, “you're right. That's what I really think. But why wouldn't she text me to tell me she was okay? I wouldn't tell anyone.”