Sapience (24 page)

I spotted the football on the hood of a car. I was about to grab it when I heard Brianna’s voice.

“Where are you going?”

I turned to face her. She was soaked from head to toe. My heart started to race. Her hair was dark, it curled its way against her cheeks and down over her shoulders. Her clothes clung tightly over her body as if they were a mere extension of her skin.

My body took a step closer without me consciously telling it to. I took another, It was as if I were moving on pure instinct. I tried to think of something to say but no words would come. The way she looked right now, it left my mind completely blank, I took another step. My heart was beating faster and faster as there was less distance between us.

“What are you doing?” She asked when I was closer.

“Something I have wanted to do since the first day I saw you here.”

I placed my hands on her hips and pushed her back against a car. She watched me intently as I pressed up against her.

“Brianna… I wanted…” I said.

Before I could finish she leaned forward, touching her lips against mine. All of the thoughts I previously had melted away. I could feel the heat emanating from her body.

I moved one of my hands so it was holding her neck, my thumb on her cheek. Her lips felt soft as they moved with mine.

She was so strong, so beautiful, so much a million things that I loved. I couldn’t believe that she was mine.

We began to separate but stopped to share two more short and separate little kisses.

When I pulled back I could see she still had her eyes closed and was biting her lower lip.

“Are you ready to go back inside?” I asked.

She opened her eyes and smiled “Nope.”

I meant to ask her why even though I already knew but before I could she pushed away from the car and used the momentum to trip me. A burst of air slipped from my lungs as my back hit the ground.

I started to get up. I had successfully made it onto one elbow when she jumped on top of me and pushed me back down. I began to speak; she stopped me with a kiss. I wrapped my arms around her and rolled over. This made her laugh.

“What’s so funny?” I asked, starting to laugh myself.

“Nothing,” She said, kissing my twice “I’m just happy.”

“Me too.” I said as she shifted us to our side.

As our lips touched I knew I would always want more and yet I didn’t think it was possible that I would ever get enough. I kissed her as if we were never going to kiss again. We were both beginning to breath heavy, I could feel a strong ecstasy emanating into my lips and cascading through my body. Her labored breathing made me think that she must be feeling the same.

There are moments in life that define who we are. Some you wish you could remember others you will never forget. This is the moment that I wish I could spend the rest of my life inside.

Chapter 15

              It seemed like there were people spread out everywhere when we finally made it to the house. Every speaker in the house was blaring to one of the Kingdom's rock songs. The Kingdom had a pattern with their music, almost all the instruments were made on the computer and the singers were always screaming.

We spotted Brianna’s friend that had run off with Neal and Nikki. She was sitting on the arm of the couch flirting with a group of boys.

“Oh my gosh.” She said, rolling her eyes when we walked up. “Nikki is such a slut! We didn’t even make it to the next room when her and that Neal started making out. It was so gross.”

“That a boy Neal.” I said. The girl gave me a disgusted look.

Brianna pinched me “So where are they now?” she asked.

“Like I would know. I left them as soon as I could.”

“Well that doesn’t help.” Brianna said. “I bet they are in the basement, come on.”

I made a mental note not to interrupt Nikki and Neal if they seemed otherwise preoccupied with each other. There was no need to interrupt them too soon.

I let Brianna lead the way through the throng of people into the heart of the party, our game room in the basement.

The entire open end of the room had been turned into a giant dance floor/mosh pit. The lights had changed from their normal color to a darker mix of flashing blues, greens, yellows, and reds. Black lights had been strung up around the border of the entire room, it looked as though everybody standing by the wall had glowing clothing.

I looked over at the hot tub on the far side of the room, away from the dance floor. A group of people had undressed to their underwear and gathered in the hot water. A lot of them seemed to disappear into the steam. Water was splashing down onto the floor, even though it was a huge hot tub, I don’t think it was meant to hold that many people. I made a mental note to drain and refill it in the morning.

Brianna grabbed my hand and yanked me through the lounge chairs over to the dance floor.

I had to shake my head as she started to jump up and down screaming to the music. She stopped when she saw I wasn’t doing it with her.

“Come on” She said “dance.”

“You looked like you were doing enough for the both of us.” I said.

Nikki and Neal came dancing out of the crowd tangled up together.

“Hey guys!” Neal called. He didn’t look very confident, I noticed, but at least he wasn’t nervous anymore.

Brianna jumped to my side to make room for the spontaneous couple. She laced her hand in mine as they walked up.

“When does the football game start?” Nikki asked.

“You missed it.” Brianna said.

“What?!” she said clearly disappointed. “Well who won?”

“We did of course!”

Neal slapped me on the shoulder “So you don’t have to move? Cool.”

I shrugged “I guess not.”

It wasn’t long before the music changed to a slow song. Half the people groaned and scattered. The other half paired up.

“Oh I love this song!” Nikki exclaimed and she and Neal turned back to the dance floor.

I turned to Brianna who was watching me with a smile faintly touching her lips.

“May I have this dance?” I asked, holding out my elbow for her to take.

She blushed and wrapped her arm around mine. “I thought you would never ask.”

I lead her through the throngs of people until we were in the center of the crowd, I placed one hand on her hip and twirled her with the other.

There were very few times in the government buildings when we would be left alone, most of the time was at night. Adrian, Lillie and I liked to use this time to do things we knew the government would not approve of. Lillie had gone through a phase a while back where she became obsessed with becoming a professional dancer. With the help of our advanced minds, within an hour we could have been. That didn’t stop Lillie from making me practice every night. We studied many techniques and developed quite a few routines. I bet we could have put on quite a show in the end. Even after the phase had passed, every once and a while Lillie would insist that we spend some of our free time dancing.

I doubted Brianna had ever had the chance to learn how to dance, that’s probably why she looked so surprised when I spun and dipped her. Even so, she did a good job following my lead.

I threw myself into the music. Every trick, every move, I was doing my best to incorporate all I had learned of the slow dance. The music moved us, we were two parts of one greater, living piece.  Shadows swept across her face as the lights continued to flash, the rest of the world was just a blur.

As the song started to fade I leaned in for a kiss. When our lips met I felt a burst of frigid air flow into my mouth. It sent a tingle coursing through my body.

“Wow…” I said, you could see my breath. It practically spelled the word out in the air.

It was dark enough that everyone else was no more than swaying shadows cascading all around us. Even surrounded by so many people, in the dark it felt almost as if we were the only two there.

Brianna clung to me tight. She pulled back and gave me a questioning gaze. We were still holding each other like we had been when we were dancing. My hand on her hip, hers on my shoulder, our free hands slipped into one another.

“Ok, where the heck did you learn to do that?” She asked, it was close enough to a whisper so that only I would hear.

“It’s kind of a mental user thing.” I said.

Suddenly Neal and Nikki were there, morphing out of the crowd. I hadn’t even known they were near.

“Where did you guys learn to dance like that?” Nikki asked.

“Yea it was like nothing I have ever seen before.” Neal added.

If that was what they thought of a slow dance, I wonder what they would have said had the song been faster. “It was nothing.”

“No for real dude, you guys made it look like a movie or something. All everybody else did was sway back and forth. How long did it take to learn that?”

“Can you two teach us?” Nikki asked.

“A long time and no.” I wasn’t so sure I could teach it, I was lucky to still be able to do it in the first place.

She crossed her arms “Well I don’t see why not.”

“Yea dude, it could be like a double date thing.” Neal said.

“Ok we will try.” Brianna said “But William is the one who knows how, not me.”

The music abruptly changed to the Kingdom's screamo rock, mid song. Everybody parted as Spencer and Josh took off running through the crowed. We backed away from the dance floor, watching to see what their kamikaze move was going to turn into.

Spencer ran up to Josh and with a little boost launched into a back flip. He landed on his feet and threw his hands into the air, screaming the words to the song. Moments later the circle around the dance floor collapsed inward and the party was back on. Brianna and I were happy to watch from the lounge area.

“What’s the first thing you plan on doing Monday?” She asked me.

“What do you mean?”

“Now that Blake is going to be gone.”

“I think you should take his spot on the football team.” Nikki said.

“No.” I said. “I don’t think the football players will want me on their team after tonight. Besides, do you really think Blake is going to leave town?”

“I have been thinking about that.” Neal said. “What’s he going to do, tell his dad that he lost a bet so now they have to move away?”

“He shouldn’t be making bets if he can’t hold his end of the bargain. People have been killed over this kind of stuff.” Brianna said.

Nikki looked at her wide eyed. “Whoa, don’t you think that is a little dark Brianna?”

“I’m just saying, if this was a professional bet like the ones made in the city, Blake’s options would be pay up or else.”

She had a point. The whole school knew about the bet and he probably wasn’t going to live it down. Hypothetically speaking, he would be like a cornered animal. If there was one thing I was taught about the wild it was that even the nicest animals can turn vicious when cornered, Blake wasn’t really all that nice to begin with.

“What if we let him off the hook?” I asked, thinking about the cornered animal. If you backed off enough, in theory the animal would flee.

Brianna looked astonished. “What?”

“Think about it.” I said. “We have something over him now, maybe we can use it to draw a truce. All we really wanted in the first place was just to get him off of our back. This could still work to our advantage.”

“How do you know that he won’t go back to the way he was?” Neal asked.

“I don’t.”

“Hey!” I heard Rachel yell from somewhere towards the stairs. I turned in time to see her spiky blond hair bouncing through the crowd. “This is my first real party.” She said, sitting against the back side of the couch. She was crystal clean and smelled like coconut. She must have taken a shower after the game.

“I think this is the first real party for all of us.” I said.

“What are you talking about?” Nikki asked.

I hadn’t been thinking about her, she probably went to party’s all the time. In fact I bet Brianna went to her fair share of parties, Neal has probably even been to a few. Rachel wouldn’t have had the chance to go to any, she was older and would have stayed on the lookout with Josh in the trailer park.

“The first time for us too,” I corrected. “We don’t get out much.”

“Have you seen Adrian and Lillie?” Rachel asked. “I swear they are trying to interview every single person here. Some one needs to tell them to lighten up and have a good time.”

“I doubt they will listen.” Brianna said.

“You’re probably right.” Rachel said, shaking her head and standing up. “Well I’m off, I just filled up a bunch of water balloons. Spencer, Josh and I are going to throw them at the people on the dance floor.” She smiled thoughtfully before leaving us to head back up the stairs.

We hung out on the couch for another hour or so before Brianna and I got up to challenge Neal and Nikki to a game of pool. Sometime around my second shot, one of Rachel’s water balloons came cascading into the side of my head. The water submerged my face, washing off more of the leftover mud from the football game. When I looked over to see who had thrown it, Rachel, Josh, and Spencer were making exaggerated whistling faces and pretending to innocently look around the room. I just laughed it off and went back to playing pool.