The Secrets of Attraction (12 page)

He leaned down.

“Let's just dance,” he whispered, lips brushing my ear. My breath stopped. Maybe I was too quick to dismiss the dance, because his mouth on my skin made me forget we were even on planet Earth. I snuggled into him as he caressed my back and we swayed to the music.

For all of ten seconds.

Until the beat got fast, and Pitbull echoed through the gym, sending up some loud whoops as the crowd got crazy again. A few of the teacher chaperones darted onto the dance floor as a precaution. Sacred Heart was a no-grinding zone—but it didn't stop people from trying. Zach lifted his arms up in the air and rocked his hips, with the sort of fearlessness that canceled out the goofy moves. He moved closer to me, so serious I had to laugh. I wondered if he'd practiced in a mirror.

“C'mon,” he said.

He screwed up his face like he was in pain and continued to dance around me. I finally relented until Miss Preston, the driver's-ed teacher, gave us an
I'm watching you
glare and we parted. I took the moment to search the floor for Jazz or Wren but it was impossible to see anyone through the thick mass of bodies.

“I need some air,” I yelled at Zach, and pointed out to the hallway. He led the way toward the door. Once outside the gym I felt cooler. Zach draped his arm over my shoulder as we walked down the hall.

“Have I told you how smokin' you look?”

“Yes, twice, but you can keep telling me.” I snaked my arm around his and leaned into him.

“We should do something after this,” he said.

“Like what?”

“Your couch, maybe?”

“This is not a couch dress.”

“Who said you had to be wearing it?” He nuzzled my hair.

I stopped short. “Zach, really?”

“What?”

His brow bunched up in confusion. I wasn't sure why what he'd said bothered me. Zach's pervy side normally made me swoony, especially the thought of being skin to skin. Somehow, in the hallway of school, it pissed me off. Maybe it was from watching Wren and Gray slow-dance and realizing that it might not be so bad to have a main squeeze I kind of adored. Someone who would seek me out during a slow song instead of grinding against my leg. Not that that wasn't fun. Why wasn't spending time with me
in
the dress enough for him? Couldn't he think of anything else for a moment? He brushed some hair away from my face.

“Madison, what did I do?”

“Nothing.”

“It's not just tonight, you know, you've been . . . weird lately. I feel like I'm always one step away from annoying the hell out of you.”

He frowned, his eyes soft, uncertain, making me feel like such a hard-ass. How he could go from howling on the dance floor to this vulnerable mush in a few short minutes was part of the reason that whenever I thought about untangling myself from him, I couldn't. I couldn't stand this look being directed at me or thinking that I was the cause of it.

“No, you're not,” I said, tugging on his tie.

He leaned down and I brushed my lips across his, getting lost in the heat of the kiss. This was where we were perfect, the lovely liquid place when our eyes were closed and our mouths touched. Was this how Wren felt with Gray on the dance floor? My whole body relaxed as his arms surrounded me. We stepped back until I bumped the wall behind me; the cold tile made me tremble. Or maybe it was Zach and the way his tongue wrapped around mine.

You couldn't build a relationship with someone simply because you got off kissing them, I knew that, but it wasn't exactly a shitty way to start.

The urgent click of heels in the hallway coming in our direction made us part. Miss Preston walked by, smiling as she made her way to the cafeteria. I ran my thumb along the corner of Zach's mouth, to wipe off where my lipstick had smeared. He took my thumb in his mouth and nibbled before I pulled away, laughing.

“Why don't you help me with these pictures I'm supposed to take—it'll go faster, then we can just enjoy this thing. Sound like a plan?”

“Sure,” he said. “What should I do?”

“Let me know if you see anything interesting.”

He lifted the strap over my head, and holding the camera at arm's length, put his cheek to mine and said, “Say whiskey.” He held down the button so the camera clicked multiple times. A group of girls walked by us and giggled.

“Zach! You left without saying good-bye,” a girl with long blond hair and a sparkly purple dress said.

“Hey, smile for the camera,” he said. They pulled together, three of them hiking up their dresses to show some leg, and grinned.

“Got it! Official yearbook business,” he said, which caused the girl in purple to laugh a little too loud at him. She . . . was flirting? Zach looked back at me, goofy-ass grin on his face.

“What?”

“You left
where
without saying good-bye?”

“Oh, the caf—Kyle and me were talking to them. They're sophomores—come to our indoor matches sometimes. Why? Jealous?”

I shook my head. “Nope.”

Slight disappointment flashed across his face, but then he kissed me.

“Why don't you just pass the camera around to different people, make your job easier,” he said.

“Because it's, like, a three-hundred-dollar camera, and it's my job, come on.” I tried to get it from him but he held it out of my reach.

“You said you wanted me to help you,” he said. “Chill, trust me.”

I swallowed a groan. I didn't want to chill or trust him. I just wanted the freakin' camera. “Zach.”

He wandered farther down the hall, stopping to take a picture of a statue of the Blessed Mother, which, considering he'd just had his tongue down my throat, seemed slightly inappropriate.

“Zach.”

He was a good five feet ahead of me, when he stopped, looking down the annex hallway that led to the two newer classrooms in the building. His mouth opened slightly as he raised the camera to his face. “Cool.”

“Please give it—” I said, then looked at what he'd deemed “cool.”

It
was
pretty cool.

The hallway was decorated with bunches of pink and purple glowing balloons. The ribbons trailed down into the hallway and were gathered with ties made of tulle; each bunch had a large rectangular card attached to them.

“Hey, um, babe,” I cooed. “Could I have the camera, please?”

He handed it off to me and I went to work. When I got closer to the balloons I saw that each card had a different word on it. I stopped at one that read
CHOICE
and snapped a picture—trying to get different angles, looking up at the balloons, focusing on the word and the glow of the hallway. Another bunch had the word
BOUNDLESS
attached to it, another had the word
UNSTOPPABLE
. For dance decorations they were pretty esoteric. Zach followed behind. The last one had the word
INSPIRE
.

“You know how this dark hallway inspires me?” he whispered in my ear.

“Shh.” I crouched down to get a more interesting perspective.

That's when we heard it.

A high-pitched sound . . . not exactly a squeak . . . more like a sigh. Zach's eyes grew wide and he grinned. There was breathing and a soft smacking noise. I froze, the sinking realization in the pit of my stomach that we had happened upon someone doing something in the small alcove of senior lockers that were now about two feet away. Zach shrunk back against the wall, sliding along it, doing his best impression of an undercover agent about to catch the criminal. I motioned for him to stop.

No
, I mouthed.

He shrugged and kept moving. Whoever was in the alcove, ugh, I cringed at the thought of them being discovered. I coughed. Loud. Purposeful. Zach put his hands up, like he was angry but he smiled. Foiled.

I grabbed Zach's hand and we backed down the hallway, the balloon ribbons swaying in our wake. Once we were out in the main hall he spoke.

“Why'd you do that?”

“Would you really have wanted to surprise someone in the middle of something?” In the middle of what I wasn't sure, but I could use my imagination, and it was quite steamy.

“No. I don't know—you told me to look for interesting things,” he said, raising his eyebrows.

“Fine. Let's stand here for a few minutes and see if they come out.”

I might not have wanted to catch someone in the act of whatever, but I was curious to see who was horny enough to hook up in the senior alcove. We waited for a good five minutes. Drums echoed down the hallway—the band was back on. Finally a guy with longish sandy hair emerged. Alone.

His tie was loosened, part of his shirttail hanging out in back. He barely glanced in our direction as he tucked his shirt back in, then walked toward the gym. I looked at Zach and stifled a giggle, then we heard the telltale click of heels strolling down the hallway. I lifted the camera up to our faces, taking selfies like Zach had done, so we'd look inconspicuous, just there goofing off. We mugged a few times as the footsteps came closer. In my peripheral vision I saw a figure, heard the swish of a skirt. I saw the dress first, the A-line shape swaying with her movement.

“Jazz?!”

Her eyes went from the camera to me, Zach's face, and then she looked down the hallway—her thought process in motion.

“That wasn't Kyle,” Zach said.

The sight of Jazz emerging from a clandestine hookup necessitated an emergency confab in the bathroom. I'd dispatched Zach to find Wren while Jazz and I waited.

“Please tell me you did not get any pictures of that.”

“Nope, no evidence,” I said, crouch-walking along and peering under the bathroom stalls to make sure we were truly alone so we could get the dirt.

Wren arrived, positively glowing. I felt a stab of envy that I wasn't having a better time; that I didn't feel the way about Zach that she did about Grayson. Would I ever feel that way about anyone? Did I even want to? She did a quick mirror check, running her hand through her hair, and came over.

“What happened?” she asked.

“Jazzabelle happened,” I said.

Jazz grinned and chuckled to herself.

“Huh?”

“Jazz hooked up with someone,” I said.

“Not Kyle?”

“No,” Jazz said. “Logan.”

Wren and I squealed and high-fived.

“So wait, what happened with Kyle?” Wren asked.

“And what about Darby?” I asked.

Jazz motioned for us to come closer. “The other day after the mall, I called Kyle to talk. I really felt bad about—you know—using him as a date for the dance.”

I groaned.

“No, no, really, it was cool. Awkward at first, but then we talked and he said he was fine going as friends. Turns out Darby and Logan just came as friends too—they're here with a group of people. We bumped into each other in the cafeteria, and talked and—”

“And you got friendly down the glowing hallway,” I finished.

“Ooh, my glowing hallway? Cool,” Wren said.

“You did that?” I asked.

“Yeah, they were going to spread those out in the gym, and they looked so sad in such a big space so I thought . . . why not . . . people would be passing through the hall all night.”

“Apparently,” I said.

Two of the girls who Zach had taken a picture of earlier walked into the bathroom. One was the girl in purple who flirted with him. She gave me a sharp look before disappearing into the first stall.

“Did you just see that?” I whispered.

Wren nodded. “What's that about?”

“I don't even know who she is,” I said.

“She was one of the girls that Kyle and Zach were talking to in the cafeteria before. She was pretty much hanging on Zach's every word. He wasn't doing anything, though—you know, just talking.”

When he should have been dancing with me.

“He can talk to whoever he wants,” I said, shrugging it off.

“So where did you leave it with Logan?”

“Not really sure. We didn't do much talking.” She smiled, dimples and all. Jazzy was a fade-to-black girl so this was about the only detail we were going to get out of her. The boy must have been good.

“We exchanged numbers—but for now, I'm just enjoying this
experiment
like you told me to. We'll probably run this week too.”

The sophomore in the purple dress came out of the stall to wash her hands.

“C'mon, let's get out of here,” I said, tossing my shoulders back. “We need to get a picture of our gorgeous selves so we can put it in the yearbook spread.”

As the three of us left the bathroom I gave Purple Dress a wave and a smile. No need to be bitchy.

The rest of the night was a blur. I commissioned Grayson to take a picture of me, Jazz, and Wren because I trusted his ability to click and shoot. Logan asked Jazz to dance. I got some more artistic shots for the yearbook and ended the night with three full slow dances with Zach that more than made up for his ditching me earlier. We helped Wren with some of her Spirit Club clean-up duties before heading out. Kyle dropped off Jazz first then swung by my house.

Zach walked me up to the stoop.

“You don't have to wait until I get in,” I said.

“I want to.”

I tugged on his coat to bring his lips to mine. As I was about to pull away, he deepened the kiss, both arms wrapped around me so tightly he lifted me off the ground.

“Whoa,” I said, laughing as we parted.

“Madison, I . . .” he said.

My stomach dropped. He had this earnest look about him, and I suddenly got the feeling that he was about to say something I wasn't prepared to deal with.

I stepped away from him, walking toward my stairs. “I had a great time tonight, Zach. I'm happy we went.”

“Wait,” he said.

“I'm freezing,” I said. “I really have to get in.”

Don't say it. Don't say it.