Chapter Twenty-Nine

Saturday, February 12th

Valentine’s Day dance

“You’ll call if you need us, right?” Mom says, clipping on earrings. “I left the number.”

“Mom, stop worrying. I can handle being in the house alone.” Mom doesn’t fully trust me, probably because Caitlin threw a party whenever my parents went anywhere overnight. Dad’s lost faith in me as well, thanks to my accident. He’s taken away my car keys for longer than Gabby took herself away.

They’re headed to a party at a union hall in Flint, then spending the night at a motel. It’s both Valentine’s Day and their anniversary, which proves either great timing or greater frugalness. I’m at home because my sex suspension isn’t over for a few more days. Gabby’s acting distant, while I’m growing desperate.

For me, this night proves that the greatest writer—other than Fitzgerald—was wrong. Screw you, Shakespeare, it is not better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. The three previous Valentine’s Day dances, I didn’t have anyone to go with, and it was sad, but not painful. It would be much worse to go blind than to be born without sight. You know what you’re missing. I have to be with Gabby tonight. I call from the kitchen, home of serious talks.

“Hello,” she answers. My heart almost blocks my throat from responding.

“Gabby, it’s Carson. Please listen.” I wait to hear the click. It doesn’t come. “I know I’m still benched, but I want to see you tonight so bad.”

“How can I trust you Carson?”

“Other than Tim, I’ve not told a soul. And I know you told Charlotte, so we’re even,” I remind her. “Besides, this isn’t working out too well for you, is it? I watch the games.”

Purity is screwing my life, which is bad, but it’s messing with her game, which is worse. Are her dreams going to crash and burn like mine? Like Caitlin’s?

“Why can’t we go to the dance? Why can’t people know about us?”

“You know why,” she says.

“I know what you tell me,” I say, then shoot the three. “This has nothing to do with black and white. I think you’re lying to me. What’s really going on?”

There’s the clicking sound, followed by the dial tone. I don’t even bother to call her back. I grab the spare set of car keys Mom hides in the kitchen, violate Dad’s no driving rule and decide that I’ll break my heart or Gabby’s secrets tonight.

* * * *

Her dad’s truck isn’t in the driveway, but the lights are on in his room. I risk it all.

I pound on the door for ten minutes before she answers with just an angry stare.

“I see the lights on in your dad’s room. Is he home?” I ask. Her non-answer tells me. “If you don’t come out and see me right now, I’m coming in. And I’m telling him everything.”

“That would be a mistake,” she says.

“I’ve made a lot of those. I’m good at it,” I snap. “Don’t I deserve a second chance?”

“I knew you’d play that card.” She makes a sound, something between a laugh and a cry. “I don’t like going back on my word. I said four weeks, and—”

“I’m sorry, Gabby. I don’t know what else to say to you other than I love you.”

Her brown eyes narrow as she stares me down. “You say that but—”

“I don’t want to just say it,” I whisper. “I want to show you. Let me show you.”

Gabby says nothing, but it’s almost as if I can see the wheels turning in her head as she’s trying to decide what to do. I offer my hands to her, but she doesn’t take the bait. “Please, Gabby, let me show you.”

She turns away, so I step across the threshold and gently place my hands on those strong shoulders that carry her team. I move closer, my mouth next to her right ear. “Give me a second chance.”

I back away, put my right hand on her chin. A smile finally emerges, followed by the click of her locking the door. She follows me toward the car and there’s another click, that of the Malibu’s door opening. Then the clicking of my heart against my chest when she climbs in.

“Does a second chance mean a happy ending?” Gabby asks as she clicks the seatbelt. The clicking stops when our lips fit together perfectly once more.

I put the car in Drive and speed away. “Where are we going?” she asks.

“We’re not going to the school dance. Don’t worry.”

“Good, I’m not dressed for it.” She’s wearing her usual hoodie, T-shirt and jeans.

“That’s okay. Where we’re going, you don’t need to be dressed,” I whisper.

“What do you mean?”

“I can’t stop thinking about being with you.” My heart and head accept the limitations on our love, but the monster wants what it wants. “Don’t tell me you don’t feel the same.”

She doesn’t say anything, which says everything.

“I want you as bad as I’ve wanted anything in my life.”

She leans against me, kisses my cheek, then latches onto my arms like a drowning person clutching a rope. She’s not drowning, but I sense she’s holding back tears. I’m not sure if they’re tears of anger, fear or happiness. Like all of our emotions, I suspect it’s a mix tape.

The rest of the drive, there’s little conversation. She calls her dad and lies to him about being with friends. Unlike me, it seems to pain her to lie. “I need to be home by midnight.”

“I just need you,” I whisper back. She leans against me all the way to my house.

“Where’s the bathroom?” she asks as I lead her in the house, toward my bedroom. I point and she disappears inside. While my parents are not supposed to be home until the morning, I play it safe and unlock the window in case we need to abort. I turn off the lights.

“Carson, I’m not sure,” Gabby says as she comes into the room. She’s still dressed.

“Lock the door,” I say, and she complies. I take off my shirt. I’m always a role model.

“I didn’t plan on this,” she says, then slips off her hoodie, then her white T-shirt.

“We’ll just let it happen.” I guide her into the bed. The room’s dark with just a ray of white light from the moon illuminating our way. “We’ll take it slow, like you want.”

Just like times before, we kiss for a long time. Her tongue tickles the rough of my mouth. I still fumble with her bra, which always makes her laugh. That’s not the sound I want tonight.

She rolls on top of me and starts kissing my chest, lowering herself. She starts to unsnap my jeans, but I reach down and stop her. “Carson, what’s wrong?” She moves up the bed.

I respond with a flurry of soft kisses and gentle licks. I flip positions, and now I’m on top and moving down her body inch by inch. I undo her belt, but she resists. “Gabby, just relax.”

“Carson, no,” she whispers as my tongue traces small circles down her body.

“This might take a while at this pace,” I whisper. “You know, because—”

“I’m tall for a girl,” she whispers back.

“And I’m enjoying every inch.” I unhook her belt, unsnap her jeans, and slide them down. She lets me pull her panties down, my fingers brushing against her curly pubic hair.

“Carson, wait—” she starts, but stops when I put my mouth on her. She moves her hips and my crappy old bed creaks, but that’s the only sound for a long time until finally she moans.

“Let me make you happy once. Trust me.” All my words are whispers now.

“Go slow,” she says, so softly I can barely hear her, which is amazing given that all five of my senses are working overtime with taste and smell racing in front.

“That’s nice,” she whispers. Minutes later, a moan says, ‘more’. Then the moaning stops.

“I’m sorry,” I say, looking up toward her, “I don’t really know what I’m doing.”

“It doesn’t seem like it. It feels nice.”

“I’ve never done this before,” I confess.

She breathes in deeply, then says, “Contrary to popular opinion at school, neither have I.” I have to stop because I’m too busy laughing. It takes me a second to compose myself before I can start again. Instead, she pulls me up toward her. “That’s enough, Carson.”

“So, you’re ready,” I say as I open the drawer next to the bed where the condom is stashed.

“Carson, don’t be angry,” she says, her voice muffled.

“Did I say something? Do something? I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

“No, this is perfect,” she says as I nuzzle against her. “I just can’t.”

“What’s wrong, Gabby?” I snap. For once, I’m doing things right, and she’s still upset.

“Maybe I was wrong to even do this. When I first met you, I thought you were so gentle,” she starts. We’re eye to eye, but hers are watering. “I didn’t think you’d act like this.”

“Act like what?”

“Another one of those guys who get all angry at their girlfriends because they won’t—”

“I’m not angry at you because you don’t want to have sex,” I say and sigh. “I’m angry because you won’t tell me why. I’m angry because you won’t let me into your life. Let me in.”

She doesn’t answer, so I let the darkness and silence and beating hearts fill the void.

“You always say that you want to trust me, and I’ve done my best.” I flick my fingers gently over her exposed stomach. “But you need to do the same for me. You need to trust me. You need to tell me. You need—”

“The reason I got so mad at you about my dad and the reason I won’t have sex with you, it’s all related. It’s all a bunch of lies. I’m sorry, I should have told you this, but—”

“But what?” I sit up, but she pulls me back down next to her. Skin to skin for a long overdue heart to heart.

“I didn’t want you to think badly of me because of my past,” she says, starting to cry.

“Your past?”

“When I lived in the north end of Flint, before we moved out here… I got pregnant. I was fourteen.”

I can’t decide what to ask first—why? Or who?—so I shut up.

“He was older, a friend of my cousin’s,” she says. “He made me feel special, but he was a player. When I told him I’d missed two periods, it was the last I heard from him or my cousin.”

“So, you have—”

“No,” she says, then goes silent.

“I couldn’t tell my mom,” Gabby says. “She would have called me a slut. I knew it.”

“So you told your dad?” I ask.

“It was the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”

“What did he say?”

“Nothing,” she answers. “He just stared at me. He could’ve punched me in the face and it wouldn’t have hurt—or left a mark as deep—as that look. I never want to see that look on his face again. His eyes were so hard, so angry, so filled with rage, betrayal, disappointment.”

While my arms never leave Gabby, my brain races to images of the looks on my parents’ faces if I told them that Caitlin Banks is now Callie Bangs. Lies hurt—truth destroys.

“We went out of town, like he was ashamed, but I wasn’t ashamed. I was just afraid,” she continues. “Afraid of going to the clinic, afraid of making the only choice I could and yet just as scared of what my life would be like if I didn’t.”

I’d have pulled her closer if the laws of physics would have allowed it.

“All my dreams, all his dreams, all of it, I knew, would be gone if…” she says. The word ‘if’ acts like lightning and knocks out the power to the conversation and all that is left is the beating of our hearts. Nothing is like I imagined it, but the distance between the dream and daily life doesn’t devour me, it brings me comfort. I start to speak, but she silences me.

She’s right, again. There are no words too hard or too soft. Everything is just right. I can’t do anything about Gabby’s sad past, so I know I need to give her—and Autumn—a happy ending.