Melody's Crush: (Book One) (2 page)

“Ouch. Damn that hurt!” he said, scrunching his face in make believe pain. “You hit like a guy.”

“Keep teasing me and you will see just how hard this ‘guy’ can throw a punch.”

He palmed the side of my face, pushing me just enough so that my body rocked to the other side of the car. Moving farther away from me, he lifted his arm in defense waiting for my punch that never came. I flinched as if I was about to, causing him to flinch as well. I fell into a bought of giggles.

Yep, he was way too much like a brother.

School was all abuzz with bodies moving to and fro making their way through the rhythm of the classrooms. Because I was in all college preparatory classes, Jake and I didn’t have any classes together except for Health which meant we had lunch together too, even though he did not spend it with me.

However, I always looked forward to Health as he always sat next to me in class. I was a front row sitter and he was a back row kind of guy. But, it didn’t seem to bother him to sit next to me one class out of the day smack dab in front of the white board. I always hoped that he was doing it because he secretly had a crush on me. But, based on the way he was eyeing Tricia Scott, I was pretty sure this was not the case.

Mr. Lloyd told us all to settle down in our seats as the bell rang. He ruffled through a stack of papers on his desk and then handed the beginning of each row the right amount of papers after counting the heads of students.

“Take one and pass it back,” he said robotically.

I grabbed the stack, took one and passed it backward as instructed. The title of the paper was “Parenting Project.” It was a permission slip for our parents to sign allowing us to take part in a parenting class where a life like baby would be used to determine our parenting skills. We would have to sign for a key that contained a chip documenting our performance.

But that wasn’t the kicker.

What shocked everyone in the class was that for the one week we would be doing the project, we had to “live” with the other student. This is where the parents had to agree to allow the students to be housed together.

Each living with the other for half a week!

There was no way, with my mother being a single mother she would allow a strange guy to stay at our house for a day let alone four. And she definitely would not allow me to stay with him at his house for three.

However, I was sure that if I got paired with Jake, then it would be no problem.

I looked around the room at all the possibilities of guys I might be paired with. Every one of them made me cringe and I could not see any of them being my “baby daddy.”

The hum of whispers and giggles caused Mr. Lloyd to raise his voice. “Alright, alright, alright. Settle down.” He pulled out the permission slip and raised it above his head. “Each of you has until Friday to get this permission slip signed by your parents. This grade counts as thirty percent of this quarter’s grade. It lasts one week. Friday to Friday. Of course, Friday being the Friday before homecoming. You must equally share in the responsibility of the child that is given to you. You will each be given a key that has your unique identifier chip that documents every time you respond to the baby’s needs. Whether it be burping, feeding, changing the diaper, bathing,” he ticked off with his fingers. “Etcetera, etcetera. We will go over the details this Friday when you get paired up and delivered your child.”

The class erupted in laughter. He skimmed over us all with the evil eye and continued, “Boys will be drawing a name from a… eh hem.” He waited for the class to settle down to a hush. “As I said, boys will be drawing a name from a hat from a pool of the girls.” Snickering came from the back and everyone smiled. “We have an even amount of boys and girls in the class so there should not be anyone left out.”

“This sucks,” someone said from the back of the room.

“That’s enough, Kyle,” Mr. Lloyd reprimanded and then continued. “All your parents have been informed of this project since the beginning of school during parent teacher conference so they will not be surprised when they get this permission slip.”

Well that didn’t make me feel any better.

Mr. Lloyd finished. “This will be the first year that we will be using RealCare Baby technology and based on the results, this will determine if the school will fund for it next year. So, I expect everyone to be on their best behavior and do your best! Alright, enough said. Pull out your books and turn to page one ninety eight.”

Forty-five hellacious minutes later, the bell rang and I headed toward my locker. I could hear the jocks laughing as they poured their way into the hallway. One of them said they did not mind being Tricia Scott’s baby daddy anytime and another said they pitied the person paired with Melody Jenkins.

My heart squeezed a little at the insult.

I get it. I am not the popular girl in school and I definitely didn’t try hard enough to make my appearance at all attractive. I got to my locker and quickly opened it to retrieve my lunch.

Hell, I even still brought my own lunch. Disgusted with myself, I shoved my lunch back into my locker, slammed the door and headed to the girl’s bathroom. It normally was empty at the beginning of lunch when everyone was fending for their feast. Removing my glasses, I turned on the faucet and let cool water pool into my hands. I splashed my face a few times and then really looked hard at my features. I was pretty enough. I had striking eyes, long lashes, flawless skin, perfectly straight teeth due to four years of dental torture and my hair was the perfect color of wheat.

So why did guys not find me attractive?

Okay, so my eyebrows needed a little waxing and pulling my hair back into a braid every day was a bit boring, but on a scale from one to ten, I would easily give my features a solid seven. Hell, even an eight on a good day.

I heard the bathroom door open and I quickly grabbed my glasses and then reached for a paper towel to dry my hands and face. It was Tricia Scott and her two cronies that seemed to follow her around everywhere she went. She eyed me up and down once and then let out a snort of disapproval. I rolled my eyes at her and pushed by. Like I needed an additional insult added to the previous injury.

After reaching the crammed lunch room, I scanned the sea of hormone crazed students for Jake but he was nowhere to be seen. I noticed through the lunch window in the courtyard, there were some guys playing hacky sack. Most likely, he would be there.

I pushed my way through the crowd and out into the courtyard. Sure enough, there he was.

A small beaned bag came hurling toward me. Instinctively, I popped my chest out stopping the assault letting the ball drop and then kicked the ball back into play. The circle of guys just stared at me with their mouths wide open as the hacky sack dropped to the ground with a resounding thud. Even Jake looked surprised.

“What?” I asked. “Like a girl can’t play hacky?”

Walking through the circle, I headed toward the closest vacant bench as I muttered
imbeciles
and then plopped down, crossing my arms. Looking up, surprised eyes were still staring as if I had grown two heads.

Seriously, this couldn’t be that much of an anomaly could it?

I shrugged my shoulders and lifted my hands with a jerk. “What?”

They all turned back to each other and started hackying again without giving me another glance.

Why was it so hard to believe a girl could hacky? Argh! Guys were so sexist.

If they only knew the moves I could do when I was by myself kicking the bag out of frustration, then they would have the right to stare. It started the night after Jake left the hacky sack at my house after breaking up with girlfriend number eight, or maybe it was number nine. He kicked and popped it while talking about his frustrations of yet another failed relationship.

Seemed to work for him, so I started playing around with it and then understood why he did it. It was a great stress reliever.

Funny how I never shared that little secret with him.

It gave me little butterflies in recalling his dropped jaw. Covering a grin with the back of my hand, I giggled to myself.

“What are you giggling about?” His voice had me dropping my hand to my lap as I looked up to stare into those emerald pools. “Scooch over,” he commanded as he popped the side of my thigh. I obliged and he sat down.

Looking around the courtyard, I noticed harsh stares coming from the girls around us. He didn’t seem to notice or care.

My skin felt like crawling as I could hear the whispering. They were probably wondering why someone like Jake would be sitting with someone like me.

Eh, who cared?

But even as I tried to blow it off, it still stung at my pride.

“I’m hanging out with the guys after school today so you don’t have to wait for me,” he said, ruffling my already unmanageable mane.

I was a little disappointed. “I’m not your babysitter,” I said a bit too harshly.

Second time today I caused him to look at me that way. Smiling a little bit too forcibly, I punched him in the arm at which point he shoved my head slightly to the side. He smiled again and I felt better.

Somewhat
.

He got back up and joined the hacky circle and all I could do was just watch in awe at his amazing athletic ability. It did not hurt that his jeans hugged his thighs just right as he kicked and popped the bag. Quickly, I averted my eyes but not before the heat had already stung my cheeks.

Jake was a different kind of jock. He wasn’t the arrogant football quarterback type jock like Kyle Warner. Instead, he was the soccer type and was the school’s most beloved medaled swimmer on the swim team. Several times I had thought about joining the swim team just so I could be closer to him. But there was no way I would ever get through a practice with him in the same pool. So, I elected to join the debate team instead.

And of course to make my image that much brighter, I volunteered once a week after school at the Griffith Observatory giving tours to small groups. It was part of my community service toward graduation. Even though I had already completed all the required hours my freshman year, I couldn’t seem to give up my Thursday afternoons at the Observatory as it was the place Jake and I would spend countless hours at when we were in junior high.

Finally, the bell rang interrupting my trip down memory lane and the students poured from the courtyard back into the halls and into the classrooms.

Three more periods passed before once again, we all emptied into the parking lot. I reached my mustang and fired her up. There were many admirable onlookers as I pulled out into the line of exiters.

Even my car had more popularity than I
.

As I pulled into the driveway at home, I noticed Mrs. Kensington, Jake’s mother, getting into the back of a luxury car. The chauffeur closed the door, got into the driver’s seat and then drove off.

It seemed that my mother and Jake’s father were best friends in college which is why we were allowed to stay in the guest apartment when my mom left dad. It was only supposed to be temporary until my mother finished up her nursing degree working in anesthesiology, but we just kind of got used to being there and the thought of buying a house never came up. To be honest, I was thankful she never made the decision to move.

I rested my head on the steering wheel for a few minutes before mechanically opening the car door like I had done a thousand times already, grabbed my books and then headed toward the guest house at the back of the property.

After entering my room, I threw my book bag on the floor and just fell across my bed. Visions of Jake’s slackened jaw and widened eyes today made me chuckle. It was a great feeling to surprise him like that. I wondered what else I could do that would make his jaw drop again.

After finishing my homework, I headed for the kitchen. I placed the permission slip under a magnet on the refrigerator so I wouldn’t forget to tell my mother to sign it in the morning. Hugging my arms and crossing my fingers, I prayed that it would be me Jake picked from the hat on Friday.

After cleaning up my dinner dishes, I headed back to my room, took a shower and changed into my pajamas. Looking in the full length mirror, even my pj’s looked dull and boring. I flung the towel from my head at the mirror and plopped down on the bed. Hugging my pillow, I curled up into a ball, closed my eyes and for the first time in years, I fell asleep before nine.

The hinges on my window screeched causing me to sit upright like a jack rabbit. Jake was standing above me looking down his perfectly shaped nose with concern.

“Hey sleepyhead!” he yelled a bit too loudly.

I looked up, cupping my hands from the offensive sunlight pouring through the window and gave him my best ‘kiss my ass’ look. But he only pushed my forehead causing me to fall back onto the bed.

“Guess I will be driving my beamer today?”

I sat up and pushed him out of the way, headed to my closet, stripped off my pajama bottoms, pulled on a pair of jeans, left my tank top on and just slipped into a button down shirt. I moved over to my vanity and pulled my hair back into a ponytail not bothering brushing it out or braiding it. I slipped into sandals and then grabbed my book bag and glasses, then headed out the bedroom door. It wasn’t until I was halfway down the hall that I noticed Jake had not followed me.

“Jake?” I called out.

I walked back to my bedroom and he just stood there staring at my closet door. His jaw was once again slackened.

“Hey… you coming or not?” I asked, my eyes furrowing at what possibly could have caused him to go slacked jawed again.

He shook his head and I noticed he swallowed a bit too loudly.

“What’s gotten into you?” I insisted. But he just pushed by me and headed toward the kitchen.

Mom was already getting her second cup of cream laden coffee before she started in on the sleeping arrangements for my ‘husband.’

“Mom, really?” I asked, my voice a bit strained. “I’m already stressed enough about it. Can we not go there right now?”