She falls in beside me. My arm is around the back of the chair, and she’s pressed up against me but still sort of stiff. It’s crazy how she can just go for things sometimes but is nervous others.

“I can’t believe you burned the popcorn.” Hopefully my teasing will loosen her up.

“I told you I can’t cook.”

“That’s not cooking.”

She just shrugs and laughs a little, and I love that I can be close to her like this and still tease her.

The movie starts, so I pull her close and finally, finally she loosens and molds herself against me.

We’re about through the movie, and I can’t stop thinking about the fact that I’m sitting here watching a movie with her. That I’m okay just chillin’ with her instead of pulling her to my lap and kissing her. I mean, I definitely want to do that, but this is okay, too.

Suddenly, I need to tell her, want to make sure she knows I’m not playing games with her. “There’s no one I could watch old movies with like this. No one even knows I watch them. Just you…”

“I like being with you, too.” She somehow gets what I tried to say.

And then I’m looking down at her, and she’s looking up at me. “We’re close.” I say, which is ridiculous. Of course we’re close.

My hand moves to her cheek and then my lips press against hers. I kiss her gently, as though she’s breakable, when she’s anything but.

Then I grab her waist and pull us even closer than we were before. This kiss feels different than our others. She’s definitely a voodoo girl. Maybe not angry, but she’s cast a spell on me that makes me crazy and makes me want her more and more.

Our legs tangle together on the ottoman. She goes to my head, making me foggy and in need of something I never knew I missed. Something I can’t even define. I can’t get enough of her.

I deepen our kiss. My body is pulled toward hers like a magnet. I can’t deny the tugging I feel inside me. Sliding my hand behind her neck, I touch her hair, let the strands wrap around my fingers as we kiss.

God, I want her. But I like her, too. That sort of clears my head because part of me is begging for more, but I know she was with James for almost a year. I don’t think she went very far with him, and here I am grinding against her on her mom’s floral chair.

As much as it physically feels like my body will explode, I make myself pull away.

“This is a good part.”

And so she knows I’m not pulling away, I really do pull her onto my lap and hold her. When we’re sitting like this, it makes me realize being with someone isn’t hard when you’re with the right girl. Maybe this is what moving forward feels like.

***

I’m sitting in class all antsy. I totally don’t feel like being here. The sun is out and calling my name. I know I’m supposed to see Ziah a ton this week because of the wedding, but all of a sudden, that’s not soon enough. I know better than to ask her to skip, so the best I can think of is getting out of this place myself before I go crazy. Yeah, I like her, but this whole jonesing for a girl thing is weird. I feel like Derrick.

As soon as the bell rings, I know the rest of the school day is going to have to find a way to get along without me. Instead of hitting my locker, I go straight for the Hummer. A few minutes later, I’m towering over all the other cars on the road and then turning down my street.

I pull up next to a strange car in the driveway, and wonder who the hell’s at our house in the middle of the day.

My first thought is Dad decided to buy something new, but a BMW really isn’t Dad’s thing. Plus, it wouldn’t be a reason for him to be home when he should be at work.

Then it hits me. Holy crap! Did Dad bring a woman home? I mean, we talked about it and I want him to go for it, but the thought is a little freaky. Still, there’s a part of me that’s thinking, “Go, Dad,” too. He works fast.

Figuring it won’t be too hard to sneak in and make it to the game room without being noticed, I slip into the house. Voices float out of the kitchen: Dad’s and a woman’s. I don’t know what it is, but something about the voice makes my chest pinch. It’s a little nagging feeling that slowly, with each step I take toward the kitchen, multiplies, spreading further and further out from the epicenter.

My feet feel like weights. My heart is pounding. What’s wrong with me?

I stand planted on the kitchen floor and everything, every fucking thing in my life shifts. I’m cracking like a windshield hit with a rock. I hate myself for being so weak, gasping for breath like I did when Derrick locked himself in the room and Dad wouldn’t stop crying. Rage jolts through me, battling for dominance over the pain.

“Dylan…” Dad’s eyes catch mine, and I can see. He knows he screwed up. That I’m going to explode at any second. “Son…”

And then she turns. The person who made Paul, Derrick, and me cookies. The one who made me feel like the luckiest kid in the world, who brought me to the park for hours and held me when I was scared.  The stuff I tried to forget, too.

The person who cried a lot, who fell asleep watching old movies in the living room rather than upstairs with Dad. Who had hushed phone calls and fights with strange guys in the park. All of the things I’m only remembering now hit me.

The person who broke Dad. Who made Derrick grow up too fast. Who left me. Who I loved. How did I block those things out?

Her hand covers her mouth, and it’s shaking. What the fuck does she have to be nervous about? Scared about? I actually see tears fall from her eyes. What gives her the right to stand here and cry in our kitchen?

My mouth is glued shut. All these thoughts are scratching and clawing to be free, but I can’t let them. I can’t get them out. My mother is standing in front of me, and I’m fucking breaking into pieces.

Dad steps toward me, and somehow I find a way to pull my eyes away from her. How could he do this to me? How could he betray me like this?

“Dylan, we were going to tell you. Then…it wasn’t even a guarantee she would be found. Why upset you for no reason?”

Ding. Ding. Ding. We have a winner. Rage manages to briefly knock out the pain, and I find my voice. “You should have fucking told me! What is she doing here?”

It’s the first time in my life I’ve yelled at my dad. That’s just not how things work with us. My throat already hurts. I’m not sure if it’s from the yelling or the knot that’s clogged there.

Dad shakes his head. Briefly, I let my eyes scan her again. The eyelashes. I got my eyelashes from her. Suddenly I hate the blue eyes girls have gone on about for years because seeing hers is like looking in a mirror. It’s not as if I haven’t seen pictures, like I don’t remember her, but seeing her again makes it more real.

“I know. I was—I put it off. Let me explain. I didn’t know she was coming—”

I hold up my hand. “You know what? I changed my mind. I don’t give a shit what this is. I don’t want to know about it. You guys keep playing house or whatever it is you’re doing without me.”

I turn, somehow prying my feet off the floor. She’s here… she’s back. How is she going to break the Gibson Boys this time?

“Dylan, wait.” Dad is coming after me when I hear it. Hear her.

“Please, just wait. I don’t deserve it, but let me talk to you, Dylan.”

I freeze at her voice. It feels like pinpricks all over my body. It hurts, but there’s a part of me that wants to hear her say my name again. To taste her chocolate chip cookies. And that makes me even madder at her and myself.

Turning, I say, “No. No, you don’t deserve it, and I don’t want to hear anything you have to say.” Dad touches my shoulder, and I shake his hand off. “Fuck this. I’m out of here.”

They don’t come after me as I tear through the house and jump in the Hummer. It takes everything in me not to take out her stupid BMW. To drive over the car the way she drove over us. Instead I peel out of the driveway, and I’m gone.