Shiloh stands there by the door with an expression that shouts, what the hell am I doing here, so someone plugs her in as the next person in the closet and it is Game On. I think it was a dare or something… I don’t care about the why. She’s here and by the gods of the beer bottles I’ll be the chosen one.
I’ve crushed on this girl since I was ten years old and she was thirteen. I even remember the first time I saw her. She pulled up in her mother’s beaten up Subaru wagon, climbing out to stand and stare resentfully at the house. I’d been spending the day with Sammy at their neighbor’s house while Mrs. Brookings went to pick her up from wherever she was, and Sammy and I stood now in the yard, watching as she bent to grab something from the front seat.
“She looks mad,” Sammy whispered.
“Didn’t you say her dad died? She’s probably just upset.”
“He was my dad, too.” Sammy elbowed me.
“Yeah, but you didn’t live with him.” The Brooking parents had some weird arrangement where they split the kids when they divorced, but since they had been on opposite sides of the country, they rarely saw the other child. I didn’t understand it.
The girl was skinny, with dark red hair pulled back in a loose braid. She was just starting to develop, though. I could tell, even though she was presently sitting on the step with her arms crossed over her chest, that she had boobs.
Boobs were almost as interesting as baseball, I had decided recently.
“C’mon,” I said to Sammy. “Let’s go talk to her.”
THE BOTTLE STARTS TO SLOW. One… two… no, not him, please… Yesss! I release the breath I was holding with a low whoop of excitement and bump fists with Miles as I rise to my feet. In the back of my head there’s a low litany of words playing like a scratch on vinyl: don’t fuck this up, don’t fuck this up, DON’T FUCK THIS UP. I pump my fist with each mental word to build myself up.
Shiloh stands beside the designated closet, scrolling her phone and looking faintly bored. She looks up as I approach and tucks her phone in her back pocket. “Ah, Gunner…this is a little awkward. Come on, let’s get in here before Sammy sees and flips his shit.”
For a moment I’m dazed. She knows my name. Then I remember she’s seen me with Sammy. Of course, she knows your name. Dumbass. “Oh, yeah… he took a break this round when he heard you were stepping in. He didn’t want to be accidentally paired with his sister. Or even see you paired with anybody. Said something about ‘my eyes, my eyes, my fucking eyes,’” I tell her. Shiloh laughs. Score.
“Well, that was smart of him.” She takes my hand and leads me into the closet with a little finger wave at the group and I look back and waggle my eyebrows. Even if we do nothing else, my reputation is boosted just by her taking my hand. She’s so awesome. And hot. Did I mention hot?
As the door closes behind us, I start to check her out in earnest, but the lights go out and we are plunged into an inky darkness. I startle and knock into a rack of clothes beside me. “Shit. Shit.”
Shiloh chuckles. “Easy, Tiger. Part of the rules.”
“Oh. I knew that.”
Somehow the darkness heightens my perception of everything. I can smell her scent, something light and citrusy. I’m glad she’s not one of those girls that slathers on the perfume. I like being able to smell her. She smells so freaking good. Edible and sweet. I inhale deeply, remembering one of my science teachers talking about the power of the olfactory sense and how certain smells can linger in a person’s memory years after first smelling them. I know this will be one of those scents my memory holds onto.
In the light from the seams of the door, I can just make out the outline of her body and the gleam of her eyes. I swallow and rub my palms on my jeans.
“Are you nervous?” she asks me.
“Nervous?” I force the laughter through suddenly dry lips. “Shit, no. I’ve done this lots of times.” I see the glint of her teeth and a faint white as she flashes a smile at my bravado.
“Good.”
I feel her hands on my cheeks drawing me closer to her. I’m a little taller than her and dip my head down to meet her lips, but then I realize my hands are just dangling. Where should I put my hands? On her shoulders? Somewhere else? I don’t want to come off as an overeager puppy, groping and slobbery. Don’t fuck this up. I decide on the shoulders and set them there hesitantly. No, that’s weird. I move them to her hips. There, that’s better. That’s not quite as middle school as shoulders, but it’s only semi-sexual. Sexual. Great. Now I have a partial boner. Where do I put that?
I start to edge closer when I feel her tug her head back, as if she’s trying to look at my face. “You know this is just a dare, right, Gunner?”
“Uh, yeah. Of course. I mean, I know you wouldn’t be going after a ninth grader, or any —”
“Ninth grader. Right. Fuck my life.” I feel, rather than hear her sigh, the gentle waft of air on my face and the rise and fall of her chest so close to mine.
“I’m older, though.”
“Yeah? How old are you, big man?”
“I’m fifteen.”
“How are you fifteen? Aren’t most freshmen fourteen? At the most?”
I shift uneasily, wishing I’d never brought it up. “I kind of flunked kindergarten. Or got held back, whatever you want to call it.”
A short laugh escapes before she captures it. “Oh. Well, that’s no big deal, Gunner.”
“Thanks. I’m not dumb or anything.”
“I know.” Her voice is soft. Sympathetic. “So, Gunner.” With the lights out, I can feel her regard. “I don’t want to sound mean, but I just want to make sure we establish a few ground rules. Especially with you and Sammy being friends.”
“Okay.” I would agree to dance naked in front of the varsity team right about now.
“No groping. Your hands stay in one spot and that spot is not my boobs or my butt.”
I nod, then remember she can’t see me. “No problem.”
“And don’t be running around bragging about this. It’s a dare. And what happens in the closet stays in the closet.”
“I don’t kiss and tell,” I tell her, liking the way the words sounded in my head. Rico... Suave, as my dad would say.
I lean into her all the way before I can think of anything else, or worse, open my stupid mouth and start talking again, and I kiss her. It’s great — warm and not too dry and not too wet — except it lands right on her fucking nose. “Fucking light!” I curse and try again, but she’s reared back and is wiping her nose, laughing a little. I love her laugh. It’s low and husky and so sexy.
“Gunner,” she says, and places her hands on my face again. “Let me.” Her skin is so soft against mine, her fingertips cupping the base of my jaw and sliding into the hair curling at my neck. It sends tingles down my spine. And then her lips are on mine, warm and electric and delicious.
I hold my breath, not daring to breathe as she teases my lips expertly with the tip of her tongue. Then, growing bolder, I release my breath with one giant gasp — shit, was that too much? Now I’m sucking air — and tilt my head to the right. Our noses bump, but I feel her lips crinkle in a smile as she maneuvers her own mouth into position so our mouths can meet more firmly. I’m moving my lips happily against hers, exploring but not daring to go too far, when her lips part and I feel her tongue reaching for mine. Our mouths mingle, hers tasting faintly of beer. All right, I think... I think maybe I got this. I move my hands to her waist, and she sighs a little into my mouth. I open a little wider, dare to nibble at her lush bottom lip the way I’ve seen them do in the movies. I’m getting the hang of this now.