“So, this is it?” I asked, painfully.

He let go of me and the removal of his touch was like a painful withdrawal. “This is it. Friends from this point on.”

I looked around at the parking lot, then at my watch. I saw we were late for homeroom because we had talked much longer than I intended. “We’re late.”

He smiled and said, “Yeah, I know, but I don’t care.”

I took another look around. The parking lot was full of cars, but their occupants were long gone. “If we’re going to be late, we shouldn’t be just a little late. If we have to take a tardy, one minute is no different from ten minutes.”

He smiled and narrowed his eyes at me. “What are you getting at, Princess, because I know there’s a hidden meaning there that I’m not seeing?”

My heart rejoiced when he called me Princess because I loved it so. I scooted so closely to him air could barely separate us. “I need a moment to say goodbye if we’re only friends from this point on.”

He pulled back slightly and said, “I don’t think that’s a very good idea. You know it’s going to start something that we’ve clearly decided should end.”

“You decided it should end,” I reminded him. “And I’m not letting you go until I get a proper goodbye.”

I leaned around and tilted my face toward his to take the kiss I deserved. I teased him at first by placing a light kiss on his mouth, then sucked his bottom lip into my mouth and tugged on it lightly. I prolonged the playfulness of our kiss another minute, then heard him moan lightly and it sent me into orbit. I simultaneously knew I loved him with all my heart, but was never going to be like this with again and I felt an intense desire to make the most of it.

I raised onto my knees and climbed across him with a knee on each side of his leg and he didn’t stop me like I thought he would. Instead, he reached under my skirt and pulled my hips hard against him as he pressed himself against me firmly. I reached down for the button on his jeans and said, “I want you to do it. Right now. I don’t want to wait any longer.”

He reached down to help me with his jeans, then I realized I was wrong. He grabbed my hand instead and stopped me from going further, but I continued kissing him down his neck even as he told me, “This isn’t what you want.”

Between kisses, I muttered, “The hell it’s not. I’ve never wanted anything more than you right now.”

He grabbed my shoulders and gently pushed me away. “We are not doing this in the school parking lot in a parked vehicle for anyone to walk by and see.”

I was desperate to not lose this moment. I licked my lips while I looked at his mouth and said, “Take me to your house, then. Take me to get a room. Drive away from here and park where no one can see us. I don’t care.”

I felt the tears building and I covered my face when I couldn’t stop myself from crying. I heaved from the sudden uncontrollable sobbing and said, “I just want to be with you. I don’t care where.”

When I opened my eyes, Jessie was crying with me and he pulled me closer so that my forehead rested against his. “I know. I know.”

I sat straddled on top of him and we held on for dear life while we both cried about our imminent goodbye. When it felt like I didn’t have anymore tears to cry, Jessie whispered, “We have to go in.”

I knew he was right. He was always the voice of reason, but I squeezed a little tighter and hoarsely said, “Give me one more minute, just one more, then we will.”

He gave me five more and I cherished each one like it was the last I’d ever have with him because for all I knew, it was.

32 Accidental Grazes

Jessie

It was a silly notion to think Claire and I could have a goodbye kiss that didn’t turn into…that. The physical attraction we shared was crazy and I agreed to her proposed goodbye knowing it would be intense, but never dreamed we would end up crying in each another’s arms like we would never meet again.

We stood side by side at the office window waiting for our tardy slips and she allowed her fingers to graze mine, sending a tingling sensation all over my body. I thought it was an accident, but when she did it a second time, I looked at her and silently mouthed the word, “Stop.”

Although she smiled devilishly, she looked like she might begin to cry again. Her eyes were swollen and bloodshot, making them look even greener, and I thought she never looked more beautiful because I knew the tears she shed were for me and the loss of her hope for us being together.

She slowly grazed my hand with hers a third time. I looked around for prying eyes, then reached for her hand and brought to my lips for a quick kiss. This brought a true smile to her face and I promised myself we would do better tomorrow because I just wanted to make her happy today.

After we received our tardy slips, we walked toward our first period classes. We came upon my classroom first and she said, “I’ll see you in Humanities.”

I looked down to see how late we were. Yikes, we were really late for class. “Yeah, pretty soon judging by the time on my watch.”

She walked away backwards and said, “Good,” before she turned around to go to class. I stood next to my classroom door watching her make her way down the hall. She turned around to see if I was still there watching her and smiled when she saw that I was.

We were being ridiculous like two teenagers in love-because that’s exactly what we were. The ridiculous part wasn’t how we stood around grazing hands when no one was looking or how we watched one another hoping no one would take notice. Because we couldn’t be two carefree teenagers in love was the senseless part of it all.

I wasn’t in Calculus long before it was time for second period with Claire. I was strangely neurotic about being in class with her today. Things felt so different and strangely unsettled although we both agreed we were saying goodbye to anything between us other than friends.

For the first time, we met one another on the way to class. Claire instinctively reached to loop her arm through mine and sent my heart to galloping. A second later, she remembered why she shouldn’t and pulled it away, causing me to be saddened. It was awkward to have been so intimately close in my truck only a half hour ago and now unable to touch physically.

We were only in Humanities a couple of minutes when Mrs. Tanner announced we would be spending our class time in the library today. We walked silently to the library, both of us wondering what the other thought about going to our private table toward the back of the library. We stopped to look at one another as our classmates dispersed without the least little thought about their choice of table.

Claire became quite aware I wasn’t going to make a move and said, “Do we go with tradition or is today the day we choose a new table?

The safer thing to do was choose a table in the middle of all the other students, but I wasn’t feeling like I wanted to share Claire today. I wanted her at the back of the library where it was just the two of us. “I think today has already been filled with enough surprises, so why don’t we stick to what we’re used to? I think we do great work without all the distractions.”

She smiled because she liked the sound of that and said, “I couldn’t agree more.”

We sat at the table and she leaned forward to get something out of her backpack. I watched the way her hair fell forward slowly, forming a curtain that hid her face. It reminded of when I laid under her on my bed and it fell forward, brushing my face and bare chest.

She raised up and saw me watching her. She smiled and asked, “What are you thinking about?”

I knew I shouldn’t because it would only stir trouble, but I was powerless to stop myself from telling her. “I was watching the way your hair fell as you leaned over your backpack and it reminded me of the way it looked when you were on top on me-how it all came rushing toward me and fell against my face and chest. I was remembering the way it tickled and sent fiery tingles all over my body.”

“Just hearing you say that sends tingles all over my body right now,” she confessed, then looked at me so sadly.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have thought it and I shouldn’t have said it. We can’t say things like that anymore if we’re only friends,”I apologized. Who were we kidding? This wasn’t as easy as we might have thought.

“We might be able to control saying it, but I don’t think we can control thinking it. At least, I know I can’t,” she said as she thumbed through the binder she had pulled from her backpack.

“So, we’re keeping our thoughts to ourselves?” I asked.

“I guess that’s our only option if this friend thing is going to work.”

We did a fair job of finishing Mrs. Tanner’s assignment after our agreement if you didn’t consider the endless thoughts of Claire running through my mind or the numerous accidental grazes of our hands.

Third period was a little more friend friendly since we didn’t sit together and Claire had Payton to occupy her. I tried to force myself to not look her way, but I gave in a few times. Each time I did, she was looking straight ahead listening to Mr. Buckley and I wondered if she was finding this easier than me. The fourth time I stole a glance at her, she turned to look at me and I felt satisfaction in discovering her desire to look at me as well.

The rest of the day seemed to go a little smoother as we felt our way through just being friends. It was strange really. We didn’t get to experiment with being friends before we jumped head first into a romantic relationship because we were too busy arguing and blowing off the steam from our intense sexual attraction for each other, so it was nice to see Claire on an entirely different level.

As I walked to the field house to change out for practice, Coach called out for me from his office. He never did that, so it caught me a little off guard and had me wondering what was up.

I walked to the doorway of his office and stood, waiting for an invitation inside. “Come in, Jessie. Shut the door behind you and have a seat.”

After shutting the door, I walked over to the chair and sat after putting my backpack on the floor. This type of interaction always made me nervous because it usually meant something was wrong or I was in trouble.