"We're being way too serious."

She's right. My neck muscles are on the verge of cramping. I take a slow breath and roll my shoulders. "It's my fault. I'll try to lighten up."

Rebecca peeks at her watch and pats my leg. "It's late. I should go.

Big day tomorrow."

Fighting the urge to ask her to stay and talk a while longer, I stand up and walk her to the door. As we reach the foyer, Rebecca turns and takes a coy step in my direction. She takes another, more determined step, her eyes fixed on me.

A second later, as if driven by an uncontrollable force, her body is pressed against me, her lips on mine. Her hands are on my face, easing toward the back of my neck. I accept her kiss, and a shiver pours down my back. The shiver transforms into heart-pounding heat, and I grab her waist and pull her closer. I slide my thigh between her legs and feel the gentle pivot of her hips.

As quickly as she lunged at me, she pulls away. We stare at one another, unblinking, eye to eye. I've got to get this on level ground, but I'm not going to do that with Rebecca straddling my thigh and breathing down my neck.

She leans in and touches her lips to my ear. "I don't usually attack someone on the first date." She relaxes and rests her forehead on my shoulder. "But you don't know how long I've wanted kiss you."

"I think I have an idea." I stroke her back with both hands. Her body is lean but soft, a wonderful mixture of athleticism and feminine contours.

I kiss her lips again, this time softer, sweeter. Rebecca traces her fingertips along my cheek, lingering a moment on my neck before continuing down my chest toward the top b.u.t.ton of my blouse. I'm on fire, almost wishing she'd open the b.u.t.ton.

She kisses my throat and whispers, "You make it hard for me to be a good girl."

"I don't want to be good. But I need to be good for a little while."

I'm forcing my hands to stay on her arms.

She moves her lips back toward mine. "If you do everything the way you kiss..."

"You're crazy." I rub my cheek against hers, wallowing in her gentleness and wishing she were someone else.

Rebecca brushes her hands down my arms and steps back, avoiding my eyes. "I'm sorry."

96.

"Don't be."

She looks up, a weak smile tickling her lips. "You must think I'm a real s.l.u.t."

I wrap my arms around her shoulders and hug her tight as our bodies sway to the music in my head. "Just surprised. Pleasantly surprised."

My antiperspirant gave out the second she touched me, and my stomach is fluttering around somewhere between my knees and my ankles. But I'm not complaining. I'm just not accustomed to such gleeful confusion swishing through me, making clear thoughts as elusive as desert rain.

Rebecca touches my cheek again before she leaves.

I like that.

CHAPTER 19.

Fifteen minutes. I had fifteen minutes to meet Lora at the tennis courts, and my parents were lingering in the kitchen like they had nowhere to go. As seconds ticked away, another of my already frayed nerves unraveled a little more and sent my senses into overdrive. Every noise was unbearably loud. The sound of Mom's shoes clopping on the linoleum reverberated down the hall and into my head like a gong. Dad opened the refrigerator door, then closed it, sending another thunderous boom into my ears.

I wanted to shout down the hall, "Bet the Osbornes are getting hungry!" But I bit my tongue. I jumped up and paced across the room.

I'd been pacing a lot over the past week, so much that I noticed a slight rut in the carpet along the foot of my bed. Finally the back door closed, the Impala's engine sputtered, and the sound of crunching gravel gave way to silence.

I paused in front of the dresser, just to give Mom and Dad a good head start. Glancing in the mirror, I groaned. Gross. I was red-eyed, pale, and wrinkled. What a mess. Lora couldn't see me like this. I stripped off my clothes and tossed everything but the borrowed panties into the laundry hamper. I folded Lora's underwear and tucked it in the back corner of my sock drawer, then dashed toward the bathroom. I grabbed a washcloth from under the sink, sponged off as best I could, and rolled fresh deodorant under my arms. My greasy hair was hopeless, and I brushed it out with a sigh. It would have to do. After throwing on a pair of sneakers, jeans from the clean laundry bin, and a Lady Warriors T-shirt, I bounded out the back door.

Within five minutes, I had steered into the parking lot behind the high school. It was a secluded place, surrounded on two sides by the school and on the third by the football field house. Only the narrow road leading to the parking lot was open. A knee-high pile of brown leaves had blown against the field house wall. An intermittent breeze swept the ground, making the pile swell, collapse, and swell again like the frazzled breathing of a sleeping monster.

97.

98.

When I saw Lora's Pinto parked in front of the field house, my mouth got dry and my hands got wet. I swallowed hard and rubbed my palms across my jeans.

Her windows were rolled down, and Blondie's The Tide is High blared on the car radio. She didn't look at me as I parked. I dried my hands again, braced myself for the worst, and got out. Despite the cool wind tousling my hair, a fine sweat broke out on my forehead. I threw open the Pinto's pa.s.senger door and toppled into the seat.

Still not looking at me, Lora turned down the radio and dropped a wrinkled brown paper bag into my lap. I unrolled the top and peered inmy lost panties, folded into a perfect white square and Matthew's cla.s.s ring perched on top like a blue and gold cherry on a virgin ice cream sundae.

"s.h.i.t," I muttered.

"I don't think Mom knew you were there. If she did, she didn't say anything." Lora glared at the brick wall in front of the parking s.p.a.ce.

"Lora, I think" I started to talk, not sure where I was going.

She cut me off. "I'm not a queer." She turned and looked at me with desperate eyes. "Are you okay?"

"Fine." I snuffled back the fullness swelling behind my eyes.

"Are you sure? I mean... I don't know what I mean." When she shook her head, all sad and confused, Lora Tyler had never been more beautiful.

We were silent for a moment, but a question gurgled in my throat. I tried swallowing it, but it wouldn't stay down. I considered a dozen ways to ask, but couldn't find one that sounded right. "Do you wish...

are you sorry about what we..." The words got lost somewhere in my chest, and I dropped my head. I blinked hard and waited for her to strike my deathblow, but she didn't speak right away. She brushed her hand through her hair, sucked in a deep breath, and held it.

When you're waiting to be disemboweled, a few seconds can feel like forever. I fully expected Lora to turn blue and pa.s.s out before she breathed again, but she exhaled slowly and propped her elbows on the steering wheel. She buried her face in her hands. "Why won't it go away?"

She looked so scared, so vulnerable that I wanted to reach for her, comfort her, and say something understanding, but all I did was grunt, "Huh?"

Head still bowed, she looked at me. Her eyes glistened. "This has bothered me for so long, since grade school. h.e.l.l, since forever. I've begged G.o.d to make it stop, prayed till my knees are blue, but He isn't 99 listening. It goes against everything I've ever been taught, everything I believe in, but I just can't get it out of my mind. I can't stop thinking about you. I can't stop thinking that I might really be... Jesus, I can't even say it out loud."

Lora's pained expression cut deep. I dropped my head again and gazed at the floorboard. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry. It's my fault. I started it, and now I have to finish it. I'm just sorry I dragged you into it."

I looked away and stared at the pile of leaves. The monster was still breathing. In and out. In and out.

Lora sat up and wiped her eyes. "Have you ever... been with a girl before?"

"No."

"But you've thought about it?"

"Not really. Not before now." I faced her. "Have you done it before?"

"No. Never."

"Why me?"

"I don't know." She paused. "I feel like I can be myself with you.

That Sunday in my bedroom, anyone else would've told the whole school, but I knew you wouldn't. I knew you'd keep my secret." She stopped, and her voice went hard. "Claire, no one can ever know what we did."

"I won't tell. Besides, if I rat on you, I rat on myself." My shoulders slumped as my last shred of hope began to fade away. Lora's desires were in a fight with her principles, and it looked like the principles would win out. I just had a ringside seatmy urges didn't count. I dried my hands on my jeans again.

Lora propped her hand on the gearshift and squeezed the worn k.n.o.b till her knuckles turned white. "I have to go. I'm meeting Jock before work."

"Lora, wait... I... I don't know what to say." Bulls.h.i.t! But she didn't want to hear what I had to say. My confession would turn her against me, and I wouldn't even have her as a friend. But could I be just a friend to Lora Tyler? Could I see her and not want her? Would I ever forget our night together? Could I bear watching her stroll down the halls of Franklin High, hand-in-hand with Jock Richardson? I didn't think so.

A vision of Lora with Jock formed in my head. When she'd first told me about her s.e.xual escapades with her boyfriend, it had turned me on. Now the thought of him kissing her made me sick. I gulped down the acid rising in my throat and blinked hard. Who was I trying to kid? Jock 100 was her boyfriend and I was nothing. He would be the one holding her hand during lunch break. He would dance with her at the prom and stand with her before the minister. It wouldn't be me. It couldn't be me.

But I was young and brash. And worst of all, I was in love.

Something rose inside my chest. My hands began to tremble, and the skin on my arms broke out in gooseflesh. Then it hit me. I had to go for it. What did I have to lose? Like a tsunami crashing over me, the realization sent my thoughts tumbling and thrashing till they smacked together and melded into a single question. Why not me?

A geyser-like pressure forced my words out. "Break up with Jock.

Be with me." Stunned by my own statement, I stared at Lora.

Her eyes went wild, her face suddenly pale. "What?"

My heart was on cruise control, ignoring my brain's protests to exercise caution. I sped on. "He's full of s.h.i.t, you said so yourself. I won't treat you like he does. I'll treat you like a queen. I'll give you anything you want, anything. Lora, I've never felt the way I feel with you. I don't want to forget this ever happened."

The muscle in her jaw twitched. "You're serious, aren't you?"

"I am."

She looked away. She looked at me. She looked away. "I want to be normal. I don't want to be a freak, to have everyone pointing at me and laughing behind my back."

"They'll never know."

"People will find out."

"No. I promise, it'll be our secret."

One corner of her mouth turned up. "Our secret?"

"Besides, wouldn't you rather be a freak and be happy than be normal and unhappy?"

Lora sat quiet for a moment. A rumble from the nearby highway drifted over us, and the Pinto trembled. She timidly reached for my hand. She didn't have to say another word. Lora wanted me. We could deny it, ignore it, try to forget it, or even fight it, but it wasn't going away. It couldn't. We were bound together by a rudimentary need that seventeen years of programming couldn't erase. It was at the core of our being, and without it, we couldn't live. But with it, what did our future hold?

Lora's hand was damp and clammy, but her touch sent a surge of blood to my groin. My heart beat faster. My head swam. "What now?"

"I don't know." She looked toward the empty street, then leaned across the console and kissed me.

101.

I met her lips and tasted her sweet breath. I was starving for more, but we were in the open and exposed. We pulled apart as quickly as we'd joined.

Lora's face was flushed with the same excitement that raged through me. "This is crazy. We're asking for a world of trouble, Claire.

If anyone even suspects what's going on, we're toast."

"I've never felt right with anyone but you, not even with Matthew.

I don't care what people say, this is what I want."

She brushed my cheek with delicate fingertips. "If you can handle it, then so can I."

With that, Lora and I started our journey. For the first time in his life, Jock Richardson had been benched, but I was a rookie and didn't understand the game. Only time would tell if I had what it took to keep Lora Tyler on my team.

CHAPTER 20.