The Secrets of Boys (19 page)

“focus our minds on our personal growth” or something. I thought it was going to suck being out in
the woods all by myself for three days, but right
before I left, one of the counselors slipped me this
book called The Meaning of Mindfulness. It’s by
this Tibetan monk and it’s all about being aware of
everything that’s around you, even the tiny little
things, and learning to enjoy them. I know it
sounds dumb, but reading this book, combined
with being all alone on top of this mountain with
360-degree views of all these beautiful pine
forests–suddenly I was like WHOA, my eyes
opened up, and now I actually SEE all the beauty
around me that I was missing before. It makes
everything easier: dealing with the other kids here,
missing my bed and all my friends and you—it’s
like I can handle it now.

I wish you were here to see how beautiful the
Idaho mountains are and feel what it’s like to swim
in a freezing cold lake at sunrise. I wish I could
send you a little bit of all the nature here to make
you feel better.

Love,

Joe

P.S. Eat some cookie dough for me.

Something’s gotta give,
Cassidy thought as she rounded the corner at the foot of her street, watching the pavement streak by under her sneakers. Beads of sweat began to pop out on her forehead, and she felt one trickle down her back under her sports bra.

It was the first time in over a year that she had gone running for any reason other than to not fail gym. But after several days of nothing but French class and drawing for her art school portfolio, she just had to get out of the house and actually
do
something.

Something’s gotta give,
she thought again as she huffed up a hill lined with McMansions, the sweat beginning to drip down her face. After all, things couldn’t get much worse. She’d dumped her boyfriend, her best friend wasn’t speaking to her, and Zach was acting like he’d forgotten she existed.

She still couldn’t figure out if he’d just used her for sex, and it hurt to even think about it. But as she sank into the rhythm of her sneakers hitting the pavement, she realized she had to find out. Zach would be leaving for New York and college in a couple of weeks, and she refused to let him go forever without knowing why he shared such an intimate moment with her if he was hell-bent on pushing her away. You only lost your virginity once, and she wasn’t going to let the guy she’d done it with just drift off into the netherworld without knowing for sure what had been going on.

Maybe Zach wasn’t exactly ready to drop everything to stay with her forever—she still couldn’t totally believe that he’d just stopped being into her after they had sex.

Something in his eyes on those rare occasions when she managed to catch his gaze in French class made her think that Zach still cared about her. A lot.

So what was she going to do about it? The old Cassidy Jones would have just waited for Zach to say something, but not the new-and-improved, assertive, proactive Cassidy she was starting to become.
That
Cassidy would take initiative. She’d have to make a plan. As she started up the next hill and her lungs opened up to take in the sticky California air, that’s exactly what she did.

*

*

*

“Zach!” Madame Briand had just dismissed the class, and Cassidy literally had to run after him and grab his arm in the hallway to get him to stop walking.

“Oh, hey, Cass,” he said, trying to sound casual, as if he hadn’t slept with her and then ignored her for two weeks. “What’s up?”

“Listen, I desperately need your help with something,” she said.

“Yeah?” Zach looked cagily around the hallway, which was full of students straggling out of class. “Okay, fine. Let’s talk.” He walked so quickly to a discreet nook near the water fountain that Cassidy practically tripped over her feet trying to keep up with him. She had to slow down and remind herself that her plan did
not
involve falling to the floor and breaking her nose.

“So, what’s going on?” Zach leaned against the wall and looked down at her in that special way that still made her heart flutter. “What do you
desperately
need my help with?”

Cassidy twisted her watch nervously around her wrist.

“Zach, I’m really worried I’m going to fail my final presentation. There’s just so much information and all these stupid field trips haven’t exactly been improving my language skills and … I just don’t know what to do.”

“I tried to tell her to cool the experiential crap.” Zach sighed. “So what can I do to help?”

This time she twisted her watch with so much force that the clasp came undone and the silver band went clattering to the floor. “Oh, damn!” She bent quickly to pick it up. Unfortunately, Zach had the same thought at the same time and their heads collided midway down with a loud
thwack
.

“Ouch!” they cried simultaneously, standing up and rubbing their heads. Cassidy wished the polished linoleum tiles would magically part so she could disappear into them and never have to face Zach again. Her plan was simple—why was it turning out to be so hard to follow?

But when she looked up, Zach was holding out her watch and smiling.

“Obviously I need help with more than just my French,” she joked, clasping the watch back onto her wrist. “I guess I could use a little tutoring on my motor skills too.”

Zach laughed, shaking his head. “Tutoring, huh?” he asked. “Is that what you dragged me over here to ask me about?”

“If I recall correctly,
you’re
the one who did the dragging.” Cassidy’s heart resumed its drum-machine beat.

“But seriously, I was looking at the brochure for this program and it
did
say the TA was available for out-of-class consultations. And if I fail, my parents are
not
going to be thrilled.”

“That’s cool—it’s what I’m here for.” Zach’s new Ice Man persona appeared to be melting. “Actually, I’m free right now. That is, if you are.”

“Um …” Cassidy pretended to think. As if! She would have canceled lunch with the entire cast of
Lords
of Dogtown
to study French with Zach. “Sure. Do you want to come to my place?”

“Okay,” Zach said. “Mind if I catch a ride with you?

Madame Briand had to commandeer the Xterra. Don’t ask.”

Cassidy giggled. Asking questions was the last thing on her mind.

* * *

They didn’t talk much on the way over. Cassidy was nervous, intent on driving, and afraid to look at Zach. She zipped through the streets, maneuvering the Volvo like a sleek, zippy sports car instead of the clunky behemoth it was. Green Day blasted on the radio and she turned it up, listening to Zach drum along to the beat on her dashboard.

Wind whipped through the car from the open windows, the motion of the air hardly enough to mask the fact that it was close to a hundred degrees outside. Zach’s hair stuck to his forehead in the humidity, but even with a thin sheen of sweat on his upper lip he still looked gorgeous.

“Oh, well, at least my house will be air-conditioned,”

Cassidy joked as she cut the motor in her driveway, their feet crunching on the gravel.

But when she stepped through the front door, the air was as warm and stale as her grandmother’s breath.
AC on
the blink—repairman not available until tomorrow
was written on the whiteboard in her mother’s anally neat handwriting.

“Damn,” Cassidy said. She was reluctant to suggest they go to Zach’s place—it would seem too obvious, like all she wanted to do was have sex with him again.

Which she kind of did, but that was beside the point.

“It’s like the fifth circle of hell in here,” Zach joked.

“Maybe we could hit a coffee shop or something?”

Cassidy ground her teeth in frustration. How was she supposed to confront Zach in a coffee shop, with all those people sitting around sipping iced lattes and reading the newspaper?

“Well, we have a pool out back,” she suggested. “And I could, like, make us a cool drink or something too.”

Zach bit his lip. Cassidy wondered if he was having some kind of inner battle over whether he should be alone with her again. But all he did was offer to make lemonade while she went upstairs to put on her swimsuit.

Cassidy gulped. She hadn’t thought about the bathing suit factor, but there was no going back now.

She showed Zach to the kitchen and then rushed upstairs to change, struggling through the soupy air and wishing she could just forget her whole silly plan, dive into the pool, and float there until Zach was back in New York and she could finally cool off.

She noticed the skimpy hot-pink bikini she’d bought at the end of the school year—before she realized she’d be stuck in French class all summer. She hadn’t even worn it yet. Skimpy and hot pink were usually not her style, but it had been on sale and she’d been feeling adventurous.

She ripped off the tags and looked at herself in the mirror, noticing that the subtle underwire made her boobs look
huge
.
Well, maybe that isn’t entirely a bad thing,
she thought, throwing a sheer Donna Karan sarong around her waist so it didn’t look like she was trying
too
hard.

“Wow,” Zach said when she returned to the kitchen.

He stared down at her body in the bikini, then quickly glanced up again. She could see his Adam’s apple bobbing nervously in his neck as he squeezed a lemon wedge that missed the pitcher by several inches. Cassidy thought how funny it was that even the smartest guys could be reduced to grunting like primates the moment you showed a little skin.

“So Zach,” she said, leading the way through the sliding glass doors to the backyard. She sat across from him and swished the tart, sweet lemonade across her tongue.

“I could really use some help with my
French
.”

Zach looked like he had fireworks going off in his head. “Cassidy?” he said uncomfortably. “No offense, but I’m going to have a lot of trouble concentrating on French with you dressed like that.”

“Oh, really?” Cassidy countered. “Because after the way you’ve been treating me, I’m surprised you even noticed I’m here.” She crossed one leg saucily over the other, gazing at him reproachfully down the length of her nose.

“I’m sorry,” Zach said quietly. “I know I’ve been ignoring you. I guess I should explain.”

“Yup,” Cassidy agreed. Even though her voice sounded cool and guarded, her heart was hammering away in her chest. She couldn’t believe she had actually gotten up the guts to confront him. “I guess you should.”

“I think you’re amazing.” Zach leaned forward and looked her in the eye. “You’re beautiful, you’re smart and funny, and you’re great to talk to. I think about you all the time, but I feel like things got out of control that night we … well, you know. I was trying to keep it together and make sure we didn’t do anything we’d regret, but being with you just makes me …” He shrugged helplessly, unable to finish his sentence.

A secret smile spread through her, knowing that she had put a writer at a loss for words. That was part of what was so great about Zach—he made her feel special, as beautiful and unique as a movie star. But that didn’t make up for the fact that he had probably just been using her, she reminded herself sternly. He wasn’t getting off
that
easily.

“Anyway, I feel bad about it,” he continued. “You’re so great and I care about you so much, but I’m leaving for school in a few weeks and I just couldn’t handle a long-distance relationship. It wouldn’t be fair to either one of us.” He sighed. “This feels so right, Cassidy, but the timing is just all wrong.”

She couldn’t quite put her finger on why what he was saying didn’t make sense, but something was missing. “If it feels right, why shouldn’t we just … I don’t know, go with it?”

Zach picked a lemon wedge out of his drink and sucked it contemplatively. “Well, I don’t want you to get hurt, first of all.”

“It’s nice that you care about my feelings,” Cassidy said slowly. “But maybe you could have, like … asked me?”

Zach sighed again. “I guess you’re right. But … I don’t know, I was kind of freaked out by what happened and I figured that maybe if I just ignored it, it would go away. I guess that wasn’t very mature of me, huh?”

“Not really, no,” Cassidy said. For the first time, she was seeing a crack in Zach’s perfectly polished veneer, an imperfection in the guy who had seemed completely perfect. “I was really upset that you weren’t talking to me. It was my first time having sex with someone, and I expected to at least get acknowledged afterward.” She could feel her cheeks burning.

“I’m sorry,” Zach said, his head in his hands. “I’m such a jerk.”

“No, you’re not a jerk,” she said. “But you did a jerky thing. So thanks for apologizing.”

“You’re welcome,” Zach said. “So I guess we should just, like, chill for the rest of the summer, huh?”

“‘Chill’? Why?” Cassidy asked.

“What do you mean, ‘why’?” Zach said. “Because of what I said earlier. I’m going back to New York and you’ll still be here. Even though I think you’re great, I just can’t sustain that kind of relationship.”

“Haven’t you ever heard of a summer romance?”

Cassidy asked. “I mean, I know you’re going away in a few weeks and a long-distance thing probably isn’t right for either one of us, but I don’t see why that means we can’t be together now. I mean, I care about you too. I have fun with you. So why can’t we just enjoy this while it lasts?”

She didn’t have time to think about her words before they flew out of her mouth. All she knew was that she wanted to be with Zach right then—he made her feel too good to care about what would happen a few weeks down the road.

“Are you sure?” Zach said. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.”

“I won’t,” Cassidy assured him. “Or if I do, I don’t know—I guess I can handle that.”

“Positive?” Zach said. “Because you look so good in that bikini, I might have to take advantage of this in about thirty seconds.”