Know Me (Truthful Lies Trilogy - Book One) (18 page)

“
Whatever. Do what you have to do. Go see
her. Don’t go see her. Just know that I got my scholarship to think
of, homes. I can’t bail you outta this one like last time. If you
find that Big Brother Dino Moretti has suddenly taken a liking to
juice or something, and is now the size of ten Arnold
Schwarzeneggers, well, you’re gonna have to fight your way out of
that one with Skate only.”

“Skate’s a good fighter.”

I see the giveaway smirk on Trev’s face.
Almost at the same time, we both say, “Except against Midwood!”

High School Football. Only, the Midwood
game was no football game, it was a bunch of dudes throwing fists
at each other when they’d realized the actual game had been lost.
“Skate really came out blue and black in that one,” I
say.

Trev starts going into fits of laughter,
demonstrating an upper cut connecting with Skate’s bloody jaw. Even
their Tight End got in on the action! Kicking Skate on the
ground.

I’m in hysterics now. We both start
reliving it. I say, “And then he cries, ‘Hey,
dude—
oompf!
—Declan
started it! Declan started it!! It was his idea—
oompf!
” I demo a kick to the gut.

I’m almost on the floor
with spasmodic laughter when Skate shows
up. “You guys are assholes, you know?
Every
year.
Every
damn year it’s the same shit. Let it go! I was sixteen,
OK?” Trev and I can’t stop the fits. Skate mumbles, “Assholes.” He
fills Blaze in on the details—
just
—and soon she’s giggling as well. The laughter’s so hard
that my stomach hurts.

Blaze looks up at Skate.
“
‘Declan started it’? Is
that really what you said?”

“Oh, Blaze, not you too now!”

She suppresses a laugh. She sits next to
me on the bench, puts her hand on my leg. Skate argues with Trev on
the fine details of what really occurred. He tries to convince Trev
that it really
was
my
fault.

Soon, it’s just the two of them arguing.
My own laughter settles.

I turn and look at Blaze. She looks
otherworldly in her exhaustion, her hair matted and sticking to her
face and shoulders. “I’m wiped.” Her soft voice is
dizzying.

Surrounded by a background of
playful teasing, I move down
and touch my lips to hers. They’re salty, and her skin is wet. She
places a small hand on my cheek. I meet it with my own, feeling my
eyes close.

I’m almost drifting off into another
world
when I hear the
mutual roar of my boys behind me: “OH,
FUHGAWDSAKE
GET A ROOM!”

So we do...

I drop
her off at home. “Did you enjoy it?”

She grabs the car’s door handle. Looks
down, ponders her answer. A gentle smirk hits her face that makes
me grip the steering wheel
tighter.

I want you
, I think.

“
I especially liked the line, ‘Declan
started it!’”

“
Oh, you liked that, did you?”

“
Yeah...” She bites her lip.

“
What?”

“
I...” She exhales. “You know, this
‘spilling my guts out’ to you
might be harder than I thought.”

“
You gotta start somewhere. Now
confess.”

She aims her gaze at me, a rifle to a
buck, and says, “Just like you started
this
?” She gestures between me and her.

I look out the windshield, see someone’s
spray-paint tag on the brick wall. “Blaze, I’m tryin to be a
gentleman about this. I’m trying to...not scare you
off...because...” I turn to her. If I tell her what I’m really
thinking she’ll run. I shake my head of the rest of it. “Never
mind.”

“
Now
you’re
the one hiding your thoughts from me!”

I feel myself blush. I look at the
gearshift, anything to not confront her beauty. “I’m scared that if
I tell you, that I’ll come across as too intense. And it’ll make
you think you need to get a restraining order against me or
something.”

She says nothing. So I look up at her. I
can’t tell if it’s shock in her eyes, or desire. “May—maybe...” She
clears her throat. “Maybe that’s what I...
like
...about you. How intense you are.” When she
says
Like
, her bottom
lip trembles like a flag in a storm.

Our eyes burn into each other. Eons pass.
For the first time in my life, in front of a girl, I’m
speechless—
oh, no, wait, that was on Saturday night, when I first met
her, so this is the
second
time
. But it’s
because none of the bullshit lines I’ve ever fed a girl would fit
in here.
She
ain’t just some girl, Deck.

I’m watching my step, trying not to step
on that thin layer of ice that might send me crashing down
into
the frozen
lake—
the
grand piano falling
.
Because this one—
Blaze
—I don’t
want to throw away.

I reach over to touch her hand, and as I
get there, she
moves
toward me.

Her tongue touches mine
.

It’s slow. Passionate. Deeply
moving.

My body starts trembling, much like
the
tremble she had in
her chin a second ago. My skin breaks out in chills. My
manhood...grows.

I close my eyes, run my hand over the
shaved side of her head. The side I love the most, because it’s
the
bad
side.

Blaze
is far from bad. But she tries to be bad. It’s the look of
someone who’s been kicked so hard,
stomped
on, and yet gets up again, with a look of
defiance.

I imagine her standing in a road with the
bulls in Spain and, tatted up and hair whipping in the wind, giving
them the finger while they charge toward her. That’s the type of
babe Blaze is.

I also imagine her getting trampled.

And
getting up again, and saying,
I’ll do it better next
time.

But getting run over by bulls leaves you a
little shaken the next time you see one.
Who was the bull that makes you shake
like this when I kiss you?
I think.

I feel her hesitation
now
—physically. And I
also feel her desire to push through it.

Her gentleness on my lips,
the unsteady caress of my hair
(which drives me crazy, I must mention), tells me this about
her:
I’m
afraid. But I won’t let this fear get in the way of
us
.

The
smacks of her lips on mine is the only sound in this car.
That, and the ever-loudening breathing.

A second ago I was
getting cold—forty or so degrees outside,
the car off. But now, I’m sweating. Sweating everywhere.

She pulls away, her hand
behind my neck. Her eyes flying
furiously left and right. She wavers a second before kissing me
again. No need to rush this. And I like the slowness. I’ve never
liked slowness with a girl.

Gina Moretti
is a testament to that.

But hormones will be hormones, and the
more
Blaze’s sounds
change from breathy whispers to moans of
Mmmmmmm
,
Mmmmmm, MMMMMMMMMMM
, the more
my
male hormones take over me.

I hold back. I force myself to.
Ice on a
lake
, I think.
And what a
beautiful lake you are
...

She pulls away again. I expected her to.
Because she has her pace, the pace that she’s comfortable with. The
pace that makes her face that bull successfully.

Her face is red
. She leans back. She laughs at the fogged up car
windows. “I always thought that only happened in movies.” It’s
clear she hasn’t been with a dude in a car before. “Deck...I...”
She puts a hand to her forehead. “Oh, god. Uhm.” Then, steeling
herself: “
Would you like to come upstairs for a bit
?”

I smile.
“Sure. I’d love to.”

I get a closer look at her apartment now.
Especially at the two mixing setups she has
—one in each corner. And, if I’m not
mistaken, one of them is vinyl. The kit sits on a wooden stand that
looks homemade, and I guess the vinyl records are below that, on a
built-in shelf behind it or something.

“
You scratch?” I ask her.

She nods. “I do it all.” She eases over to
the decks, walks behind the wooden stand. Puts on a hip hop LP that
I don’t recognize, only that it’s from back in the day, and starts
grooving some scratches that make me wanna get my groove
on.

“
How much time do you actually spend on
mixing a day? Or...” I gesture to the vinyl decks,
“...scratching.”

“
My life consists of buying groceries,
reading books while listening to music, and mixing. Well, that’s
how it’s been the last year or so...” She turns her back to me, and
I see her hand go up to her face.

I don’t ask about the friend, although
only an idiot wouldn’t figure out that “
Friend of mine ODed
” happened about a year ago.

“
Wanna drink?”

Actually, all I wanna do is put
you against that counter there
. “Sure, something...
cold
.”

“
Alcoholic?”

“
No, uhm, I gotta drive home
still.”

She pauses in her stride to the fridge.
“Uhm, oh, yeah, of course.” When she opens the door, I see the
mountain of
Amp
and
Rockstar
energy drinks, as well as a
few
Dale’s
Pale Ale
cans.
“
Amp
?”

“
You have soda?”

“
Pepsi.”

“
Sure.”

She pulls out a can, pops it open with a
squish, and places it on the scratched and grooved-up counter. Must
be an art thing, because it doesn’t look ugly or cheap. I pull up a
stool, sit. She’s tracing purposeless fingertips over those same
grooves on the countertop.

I sip. Wait.

Her eyes are down, then up, then down
again.
“In the car, I
wanted to say...uhm...that the line ‘Declan started it’ was funny
because”—she bites her lower lip, looks up at the back left
corner—“because I can see that in you, you know. That you start
things. I mean, because you kinda started
this
as well. With me. Like I said in the car.” She
stops.

My drink is paused to my lips. “So did
you.”

“After you checked me out all night.”

“Because you played a crazy hot set.”

“
So you’re denying you actually started
this?”

“Nope, I can live with starting this. But
that fight Trev and Skate told you about, that was all them!”

“
W
ell, you seem like that kind of person, you know? The one
that will go out and get the things he wants. So, well, I just
thought it was funny. You know, ‘Declan started it!’ And, when
Skate was saying it, I couldn’t help thinking,
Yeah, tell me about it!
’Cause he damn-well
started this shit, too!
Anyway, I didn’t wanna say anything because, well, it was
embarrassing. I mean,
this
is
not even necessarily anything, you know.”

“
Hmmm?”

“
Us. I mean, it’s been”—she counts with her
fingers—“not even two days and—”

“
And nothing. Last night, Blaze...it wasn’t
just...
nothing
. You
understand? Look, I’d tell you ‘I’m not that kind of guy’ but,
well, maybe I am. Sort of. But with you it was different. And I
don’t know what it means, I just want you to know that I was
sincere there with you on that bed.”

Thinking of it makes my
bad-boy cringe for some more.

She trails her finger on the wood, looks
down. Always thinking.
About what?

“
Well, I haven’t been with...a lot of guys.
God, I can’t believe I’m telling you this. Anyway, I
haven’t
been with a lot of guys. But
there was a time when, doing what we did yesterday, was just
physical. You know, get high, get it on with someone. Say
sayonara
the next day. That’s not me
anymore. So...yeah, for me too—it was more than just... How do I
put this?
Rubbing
. It was
more than that.”

“
Glad we’re on the same page.”