My Life Next Door(44)
The door opens and in comes George. “Mommy said to bring these.”
We move hastily apart to find him extending a plate of chocolate chip cookies, several of which have large bites out of them. George thrusts the plate at us guiltily. “I had to make sure they were still good.” Then, “Hey, you guys have nothing on top!”
“Um, George—” Jase runs his hands through the hair at the back of his head.
“Me neither.” George jabs a finger at his own bare chest. “We match.”
“G-man.” Jase leads him to the door, handing him three cookies. “Buddy. Go back downstairs.” He gives his brother a little shove between his skinny shoulder blades, then shuts the door firmly behind him.
“What’re the chances he won’t mention the no-shirt thing to your mom?” I ask.
“Slim.” Jase leans back against the door, closing his eyes.
“George tells all.” I hastily tug on mine, yanking my arms into the sleeves.
“Let’s just, uh…” Assured Jase is at a loss.
“Feed the animals?” I suggest.
“Right. Yeah. Uh, here.” He crosses to some low drawers under his bed. “I have it all separated by…”
We sort food and dump out water bottles, refilling them, edge straw into cages. After about five minutes I say, “Put this back on now.” I thrust his shirt at him.
“Okay. Why?”
“Just do it.”
“Unbelievably distracted by my body, Samantha?”
“Yes.”
He laughs. “Good. We’re on the same page, then.” There’s a pause. Then he says, “I said that wrong. Like it was all about how you look, and that’s not it. It’s just that you’re so different than I thought you were.”
“Than you thought I was, when?”
“When I saw you. Sitting on your roof. For years.”
“You saw me. For years?” I feel myself flush again. “You didn’t tell me that.”
“For years. Course I didn’t tell you. I knew you watched us. Couldn’t figure out why you didn’t just come over. I thought…maybe you were shy…or a snob…I didn’t know. I didn’t know you then, Sam. Couldn’t help watching back, though.”
“Because I’m just so compelling and fascinating?” I roll my eyes.
“I used to see you, out the kitchen window, during dinner or when I was swimming in the pool at night, wonder what you were thinking. You always looked cool and poised and perfect—but that’s…”
He trails off, ruffling his hair again.
“You’re less…more…I like you better now.”
“What do you mean?”
“I like you here—real and just you and coping with all this insanity—George and Andy and Harry, me, I guess—in that calm way you have. I like who you really are.”
He regards me contemplatively for a long moment, then turns away, carefully fitting the water bottle into the ferret’s cage.
Underneath the flare of pleasure at his words, there’s a niggling prickle of unease. Am I calm? Am I somebody who takes things in stride? Jase is so sure he sees me.
A knock on the door. This time, it’s Duff wanting help with his sailing knots. Then Alice, who is having a CPR test tomorrow and needs a willing victim.
“No way,” Jase says. “Use Brad.”
I think it’s good we have all these interruptions. Because right now I don’t feel the least bit calm, totally unsettled by what happened as we stood there, bare skin to bare skin, with this growing feeling that what happens between us is not on my schedule, in my control. Not me choosing to move away or back off or step apart, but a desire less easily managed. Before, I’ve always felt curious, not…not compelled. How much experience has Jase had? He’s a fantastic kisser; but then, he’s good at everything he does, so that’s no guide. The only girlfriend I know about is Shoplifting Lindy, and she certainly seems as though she had no hesitation about taking what she wanted out of life.
When Mrs. Garrett comes up to ask if I want to stay for dinner, I say no, my quiet empty house with its leftovers in Tupperware, somehow, for the first time, a refuge from the steamy silence of Jase’s room.
Chapter Twenty
“Here ya go, Grace. Senior Center Pig Roast. Daughters of St. Damien Shad Fest. Sons of Almighty Michael Feast of the Blessed Shad. You need to go to all of these.”
Clay has a highlighter and the local newspaper. Mom has a third cup of morning coffee.
“Shad festivals?” she says faintly. “I’ve never done those before.”
“You never had a real opponent before, Grace. Yup, all of them. Look here, they’re opening an old boxcar as a diner in Bay Crest. You need to be there.”