“I checked your Facebook page.” I picked up a bumpy green gourd and turned it in my hand slowly.
His eyes widened and he swallowed twice. “Oh.” He shifted from one mud-caked boot to the other. He wore almost exactly the same outfit he’d been wearing on Friday. I thought it was weird that he didn’t have a separate set of clothes for work and school. “That picture, with the girls, they weren’t my girlfriends. Aren’t my girlfriends. I mean neither of them was a girl I dated.”
“Yeah, I didn’t think so.” I arched my eyebrow and when his face fell, I knew I didn’t have to finish with, and that’s exactly the point.
He pulled his work gloves off and glanced around, then grabbed my hand and dragged me to the greenhouse a few feet away. He closed the door behind us so we were completely alone in the bright, warm space.
“It’s not what you think.” He ducked his head to catch my lowered gaze. “Brenna, it isn’t.”
“What do you think I think?” My voice cracked around the words.
“That I’m…” Jake was at a loss. “A party guy, I guess. Like I’m a player?” He seemed embarrassed to say the words.
“What is it, then?” I felt so much more hurt than I had any right to feel. I hardly knew him. We weren’t boyfriend and girlfriend. I made out with Saxon half an hour after leaving Jake at school. I hadn’t heard his side of the story. But no matter how much logic I piled on the situation, I still felt hurt.
He swallowed so hard I could see all the muscles in his throat stand out. “I’m no angel. But I made my mistakes, and, trust me, I learned from them. What I feel about you, Brenna…” He stopped and took a deep breath. “I’ve never felt like this before. Like I’ve known you my whole life. But also like I’ll never know everything about you. Please, don’t judge me before I explain.”
How could I say no to him? It was fair. What he was asking me was totally fair.
“That’s fair,” I said out loud. “I can’t really talk now. My parents are probably already wondering where I am.”
“Do you have a cell?” He slid his out of his pocket.
I nodded.
“Can I have your number?” His words were slow and cautious, like he expected a ‘no.’
I said each digit slowly, and made him read it back to me.
“Can I call you tonight?” Hope made all the muscles in his jaw tense.
“Sure.” My voice wobbled.
“Can I…” He stopped and his jaw relaxed. “Can I kiss you?”
I didn’t answer, and he didn’t wait for me to. His hands caught me gently behind the neck and he pressed his mouth to mine, softly but firmly. Then he moved one arm around my waist and pulled me closer to him. As the space between us disappeared completely, he deepened the kiss, urging my mouth open and sliding his tongue in. He tasted like clean, cold autumn air and mint gum. I slid my arms around him and kissed him back. The warm, slow spread of his kiss melted my muscles and made my knees knock. He pulled away just an inch or two and left his eyes closed for a few seconds. My heart thundered back into motion and all that blood rushing back at once made me see little firework-like bursts of light in front of my eyelids.
“Whoa.” He rocked back on his heels, laughed, and turned a little red again. “I can’t wait to talk to you tonight.”
I nodded my dizzy head, but his words floated into my ears and clattered around without sinking in. I wanted him to decide to kiss me again, but he was already leading me to the doors and checking before he walked out next to me.
“Jake! C’mon man, the tractor’s running!” A man in a flannel jacket waved him over.
Jake grabbed me and kissed me lightly on the lips, then smiled and jumped up on the tractor, shifting it and driving into the field.
“Brenna,” Thorsten called, coming into view just as Jake pulled away on the tractor. “I got you an apple tart and some cider.” He pressed the bag and cup in my hands. “Your mom is already filling the truck bed with crazy things for the yard. We won’t have room for your things.”
“Thanks, Fa.” I willed myself not to look over at Jake driving the tractor with expert athleticism. “Our yard is going to look like it belongs to an Italian palace,” I joked.
We chuckled all the way back to the car. I knew Jake wouldn’t call until that night, but I turned my phone to vibrate anyway. It was just better not to bring any attention to the whole thing.
Mom and Thorsten spent the ride discussing where they would put Mom’s new fountain and birdbath and statues, and I had time to think.
Mostly about Jake’s kiss.
He definitely kissed like a guy who had kissed a lot and knew he was great at it. I’m not saying it wasn’t toe-curlingly amazing to be on the receiving end of a kiss like that. It just didn’t help his “man whore” dilemma. After all, if he had that much experience, was it even safe to think about being with him? Would he expect me to sleep with him if we dated? I didn’t know if I was ready for that.
But I also knew I was jumping way, way ahead of myself.
We parked at IKEA, and I was relieved to totally devote my entire mind to something other than a guy. Or two.
Mom and I looked through comforters, lamps, rugs, beds, dressers, closet organizers, and knick knacks. I picked things at random and Thorsten lugged them around, then we put it all together and took it all apart again, not stopping until all the pieces made sense to Mom. My mother just had that kind of eye, and once she okayed it all, I knew it would look great. We got some frames and hit the poster store at the mall to get prints. Then we stopped at the paint store and argued about paint colors. Finally, we stopped at Thorsten’s favorite hot dog place and ate dinner.
“This room is going to be amazing.” Mom covered her eyes with her hand like it was too much for her to visually imagine. “Don’t freak, Brenna, but Thorsten and I moved your stuff out of your room last night.”
“That’s cool. Where am I sleeping?”
“We left the mattress on the floor,” Mom said.
And I was so relieved, because I’d been panicking that I wouldn’t have anywhere to talk to Jake in private. I depressed myself with my pathetic boy obsessions.
We made plans to get up crack-of-dawn early and start work on my room. By the time we got home, it was late and everyone was totally wiped out. I had that irrational desire to start working on my room right away, but I curbed it because I knew it was crazy, and that I’d wind up doing a crappy job if I rushed it.
Mom and Thorsten went to their room upstairs after we said goodnight. I thanked them both and we joked about how awful the next day would be, and finally, it was just me on a mattress on the floor of my lavender room, where Mom had dusted and swept and washed the walls, so there weren’t even creepy cobwebs or gross dirt patches like there most likely had been. I didn’t know when exactly Jake would call, so I pulled my laptop out, even though I had a feeling it might be a really bad idea.