Leaving Paradise (15 page)

twenty-nine

Caleb

Icouldn’t sleep last night, which is nothing new because every night is filled with restlessness.

But last night it wasn’t nightmares of jail keeping me awake, or the night of the accident and what I could have done differently. I was reliving what happened a few hours ago. Kissing Maggie was the stupidest thing I’ve ever done. But, looking into her sad eyes and vulnerable face made me want her more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life.

Last night real emotions were flying. Last night honesty was flying. It felt so raw.

As I’m getting ready for school, I think about our conversation after the kiss. She was nervous, I could tell by the shaking of those lips against mine. She’d closed her eyes and clutched at me as our lips met. I swear I’ve never been more turned on. When I leaned back, she had a worried look on her face as if I was going to give her a flunking grade on her kissing skills.

I can’t believe that happened,
she’d said.

I don’t even know how I responded. All I remember is this feeling of stupidity washing over me, and wondering what the hell made me kiss a girl I should avoid getting close to at all costs. But being close to her felt so damn right, I couldn’t resist her. We’ve been through so much, our lives are meshed and we’re stuck in this web together. The sick thing is, I don’t want to get out of it.

Maggie is frustrating, she’s confused, she’s angry . . . and she hums these ridiculous tunes when she’s working at Mrs. Reynolds’ house. You’d think I’d go nuts from it. I can’t help that I like it when she blows her hair off of her face when she’s working, or when she looks at Mrs. Reynolds sideways when she’s insisting Maggie’s planting her stupid bulbs wrong . . . and when she’s not humming, I resist the urge to tell her to continue.

Get a grip, Caleb. After you kissed her she ran home as fast as she could.

Okay, so after I kissed her she left me at the tree wondering how I got myself into this mess. As much as I want Maggie, I can’t have her. Maybe I should write a letter and slip it into her locker, apologizing for last night.

I sit down at my desk and pull out a sheet of paper.

Maggie,

Sorry about last night.

Caleb

I read it back to myself and it sounds idiotic. I crumple it up and start again.

Maggie,

If I scared you last night, I’m sorry. It was a harmless kiss that didn’t mean anything.

Caleb

I crumple it up almost as soon as I sign my name. Because it did mean something. Kendra’s kisses are more hollow to me than a flute. And, dammit, I’m not sorry I slipped up and got close to Maggie. I wanted to kiss her and I still want to kiss her. Okay, so I’d rather have her say something like
Let’s try that again,
but I’d settle for her not running away. Getting a grip, I head to school early and try to forget Maggie and last night.

I trudge through my day until I get to computer class. Maggie is sitting in front, her eyes fixated on the screen in front of her. She doesn’t even notice when I walk in. I expected to get some sign from her that everything is cool between us, but I get zilch.

Oh, yeah. I do get something—Kendra. She’s been giving me her best seduction smiles all day, promising to fulfill all my fantasies. Little does she know my fantasies are consumed with a girl who refuses to look in my direction. Lucky for me I manage to ditch Kendra and her overexposed cleavage all day.

I head to the bus after school, trying without much success not to be surprised if Maggie sits up front instead of next to me. I plunk myself down in back and catch sight of her pink t-shirt and faded jeans coming up the aisle. Her long hair covers the side of her face, as if shielding it from my gaze. She passes the front seats and heads to the rear, never looking up at me.

When she slides in beside me and the bus heads away from the school, I let out a breath. Being at school is stressing me out. The teachers stare, the kids stare . . . everybody stares at me except Maggie these days.

I look down at our knees, slightly touching. Jeans against jeans. Does she notice the heat transferring from her body to mine? Does she even realize what she’s doing to me? I know, I know, I’m not a virgin and the slightest touch of a girl’s knee is driving me insane. I don’t even know what I’m feeling for Maggie, I just know that I’m
feeling
. It’s something I’ve tried to avoid and deny until yesterday, when I held her in my arms while her tears spilled onto my shirt.

God, our knees touching isn’t enough. I need more.

She’s knotting her fingers together on her lap as if she doesn’t know what to do with them. I want to touch her, but what if she pulls away like before? I’ve never been such a wuss with a girl in my life.

I bite my bottom lip as I slide my hand about a millionth of a millimeter closer to her hand.

She doesn’t seem fazed so I move it closer. And closer.

When the tips of my fingers touch her wrist, she freezes. But she doesn’t jerk her hand away.
God, her skin is so soft,
I think as my fingers trail a path from her wrist to her knuckles to her smooth, manicured nails.

I swear touching her like this is driving me nuts. It’s more erotic, more intense than any other time with Kendra. I feel as awkward and inexperienced as a freshman again. I look up. Everyone else is oblivious to the intensity of emotions running rampant in the back of the public bus.

When I look back down at my hand covering hers, I’m grateful she hasn’t come to her senses and pulled away. As if she knows my thoughts, we both turn our hands at the same time so our hands are palm against palm . . . finger against finger. Her hand is dwarfed against mine. It makes her seem more delicate and petite than I’d realized. I feel a need to protect her and be her champion should she ever need one.

With a slight shift of my hand, I lace my fingers through hers.

I’m holding hands.

With Maggie Armstrong.

I’m not even going to think about how wrong it is because it feels so right. She’s avoided looking right at me, but now she turns her head and our eyes lock. God, how come I never noticed before how long her eyelashes were and how her brown eyes have specks of gold that sparkle when the sun shines on them?

The bus stops suddenly and I look out the window. It’s our stop. She must have realized this because she pulls her hand away from mine and stands. I follow behind her, still reeling.

We get to Mrs. Reynolds’ house. I can smell the scent of cookies invading us as we walk inside.

“Oh, I’m so glad you both are here,” Mrs. Reynolds chants. “Come in the kitchen. I have . . .” The old lady cocks her head to the side, eyeing Maggie and me in her living room. “Is it hot outside?” she asks.

Maggie shakes her head while I say, “Not particularly.”

“Then why are you both so flushed?” she asks, raising her eyebrows.

Oh, crap. While Maggie shrugs and heads to the kitchen, I inform the old lady, “I’m a guy. I don’t flush.”

“Uh huh,” she says.

After eating the cookies, which she insists are her own secret Snickerdoodle recipe, I head outside. As I’m working, I steal glances at Maggie as she kneels on the ground and plants the bulbs with Mrs. Reynolds’ verbal instructions never far behind.

When the old lady takes her nap, I listen to Maggie hum while I work on the gazebo. It’s soothing. Her voice floats through the air as I work. But when the humming stops, I look around and Maggie isn’t here. I head into the house.

I find her taking lemons out of the refrigerator. I watch as she cuts and squeezes them into a pitcher.

“Are you following me?” she asks, but doesn’t meet my gaze.

“Yeah,” I say.

“Why?”

“Honestly?”

She looks at me, her eyebrows raised.

I give her the only honest and true answer I have. “You’re where I want to be.”

thirty

Maggie

“Maggie!” Mrs. Reynolds’ voice bellows through the house.

Caleb pulls back and gives me a helpless look. Then he says, “I guess that’s my cue to get back to work,” and walks out of the kitchen.

I’m standing here, holding a half a lemon in my hand. I’m speechless, I’m excited . . . I’m a wreck.
Caleb wants to be where I am
.

This is not some minor guy. This is CALEB BECKER, the boy who I’d dreamed about for what seems like my entire life. The boy who I used to watch from my window just to tide me over until the next time I’d be in the same room with him.

This is the boy who hit me with his car and left me in the street.

But when I look into his eyes, I can tell he’s not the same Caleb Becker I used to know. The old Caleb only cared about himself. I never thought he observed or cared about the world around him. Has my heart started to forgive him?

I ran away last night because our kiss was perfect. Like I’d always dreamed our first kiss would be. Afraid that he wouldn’t want to ever kiss me again, or laugh, or . . . something would change it from perfect to something less, I left.

When the bus drops us off on the corner by our houses, I ask Caleb if he wants to come over.

“Is your mom home?” he asks.

“Not for another hour.”

He shrugs and says, “Sure.”

I lead him into my house and up to my room. “My mom would freak if she knew you were here, in my room . . . alone.”

“Yeah, mine too,” he says. “You want me to go?”

I smile. “No.” It’s about making our own choices, not ones our parents have made for us.

He studies the yellow and pink décor of my room, walking around the perimeter. He picks up a pair of red and white boxing gloves I have hanging above my bed. “Yours?”

“I got them when I was in the hospital,” I tell him. “You know, to remind me to keep fighting.”

He smiles wistfully at the boxing gloves. “I’m tired of fighting. I’m tired of reliving the accident.” He says it almost to himself, like it’s a private thought he’s sharing with me.

I take the gloves from his hand. “Me, too.” And for the first time since that fateful night, I mean it. When his eyes bore into mine I ask, “Why are you here? Really.”

He shakes his head. “I don’t know.” He runs his hand over his head, frustrated. “And, God, I know this is crazy and I should stay as far away from you as I can possibly get, but . . . and this part is driving me nuts . . . when I’m close to you I can finally
feel
things again. I laid awake last night thinking about holding you until all the hurt and numbness goes away. Like I need you in order to be sane. I thought it was Kendra, that she’d make me forget. But it’s you.
You
. Isn’t that fucked up, Maggie? Because maybe if you tell me it’s fucked I’ll believe it.”

“It’s not crazy, not by a long shot,” I sputter, then go up to him and hug him as tightly as possible.

He puts his arms around me and holds me just as tight. “Could you ever forgive me?” he asks, his voice shaking.

A single tear runs down my cheek. I feel its hot wetness on my skin. I don’t know the exact moment it happened, but something has changed. I’ve changed. And I think it’s because I’ve finally let go of the past. I’m ready to live my life again. “I already have forgiven you, Caleb.” I tell him.

We stay that way for a long time. I don’t know how much time has passed. It’s as if I’m taking away his pain and he’s taking away mine. Before, I was confused . . . how I feel about him, how I feel about the accident. But when he’s holding me, I let go of the feelings of betrayal I’ve held onto for the past year. When he pulls back, I hear him sniff, and watch as he wipes his eyes with the back of his hand. “I got something in my eye.”

“It’s okay to cry, Caleb. I won’t tell anybody.” I look at my closet, where my racquet is hiding. “I cry a lot.”

“Yeah? Well I’m gonna change that.”

He’s already changed it.

“My mom is going to be home any minute,” I say as I stare into mesmerizing clear blue eyes.

“I better go, then.”

I nod. “Okay.”

He steps closer, so close I can feel his heart beating against mine. I hold my breath when he leans back and puts his palm on my cheek. He lightly brushes my lips with his thumb, tracing my top lip and bottom lip as he moves his thumb across them.

“You have soft lips,” he says.

“You already know I’m, uh, not really experienced with kissing,” I say shyly, then look down and break our contact. I can’t look at him while I say this. “I mean, I’m not really like Kendra in that department. You’re probably used to girls who know what they’re doing, and I’m new at this and
really, really
embarrassed that I’m doing it badly or wrong or . . . oh, I’m really making a fool out of myself right now.”

“I wasn’t going to kiss you.”

“You weren’t?” I look up at him.
Well, of course he wasn’t, stupid. Why would he hook up with me when he can be with someone who actually knew what they were doing,
someone who isn’t responsible for sending him to jail
, my brain tells me.

“Nope. The next time I kiss you I’m gonna take my time, and you said your mom’s coming home any minute.”

I check the clock on my nightstand and nod.

He bites his bottom lip, deep in thought. “No, the next time I kiss you it’ll last a long, long time. And when we’re done you’re gonna realize being turned on is not about experience.”

While I’m still awestruck, Caleb heads out of the house.