33
“Jesus, Kaitlyn, does every guy we meet have to have a crush on you?” Shanna pouted from the back seat.
“He doesn’t have a crush on me.”
“Oh, he does,” Derek said beside me in the front passenger seat. I couldn’t see his smile in the darkness, but I could hear it in his voice.
“How do you know?”
“It was pretty f*ckin’ obvious,” Shanna said, though not in a mean way. “In a two-way contest between you and the girls, you won most of the time.”
‘The girls,’ of course, being her breasts.
“You gotta take it easy on Ryan, Shanna,” Derek said. “He’s super-shy. He’s only slept with one girl, and that’s because I set it up for him.”
“Wow, aren’t you a great guy,” I said, slightly disgusted that he was bragging about it.
“I may not be a great guy, but I’m a great friend. Anyway, he blew it by turning into a puppy dog around her.” He looked over his shoulder at Shanna. “You want some advice?”
“What?” Shanna asked, slightly annoyed. I knew her, and I knew she didn’t exactly like thinking she had to get counsel on nabbing men.
“You’re overwhelming him. You’re too sexy. Try dressing really conservatively next time you hang out. Don’t show him any affection, just play it friendly but cool… but ask him about his favorite bands and let him geek out. He’ll warm up to you.”
“Okay,” she said, probably mollified by the ‘too sexy’ part.
“It’s so nice you’re pimping out my roommate to your friend,” I jeered.
“Whatever. If Shanna wants to sleep with him – you’d sleep with him, right?”
“Hell yeah,” Shanna agreed.
“You’d be good for him. He’s too good of a kid. He needs to unwind. What’s that line from Ferris Bueller? If you stuck a piece of coal up his ass, you’d have a diamond in a week.”
“He’s fine,” I snapped.
“He’s uptight,” Shanna disagreed, as though she pitied Ryan.
“Why are you interested in him anyway? He’s in high school.”
“I’m in high school,” Derek teased.
“Not anymore, you’re not.”
“Oooh, burn,” he laughed.
“He’s in a band,” Shanna explained.
“Lots of guys are in bands,” I said, a little snarkily.
Derek looked offended. “Hey!”
“Yeah, but he’s talented,” Shanna pointed out. “He and Derek could really get famous.”
“Thank you, Shanna,” Derek said. “At least somebody believes in me.”
“Whatever,” I said, trying to suppress a smile. I looked in the rearview mirror. “That’s the only reason you like Ryan? Because he’s in a band that might get famous? Not because he’s nice, or smart, or good-looking?”
“Ohhhh, seems the crush might be a two-way street,” Derek teased.
“Shut up. Well?” I asked Shanna.
“Well, yeah, those things, too,” she said offhandedly, like they weren’t really in her top ten list. Then she got enthusiastic again. “And he’s taaaall. I like tall guys. They usually have big dicks.”
“SHANNA!” I yelled at her.
She shrugged. “I know what I like.”
Derek was laughing his ass off. “She knows what she likes,” he said to me, like What’re ya gonna do?
His reaction made me feel weird.
Like, uncomfortably turned-on.
Kevin’s was perfectly normal-sized, and I liked it a lot – at least, I liked the way it felt during sex. Otherwise it was kind of funny-looking. That was my typical outlook on penises: funny-looking.
But if Kevin had heard Shanna just now, he would have gotten sullen and quiet and then asked me hours later in a panicky voice, “It’s big enough, right?”
I’d have to spend fifteen minutes reassuring him, and even that wouldn’t be enough. It would probably be closer to a week before he forgot about it, or at least stopped asking whenever we had sex.
The fact that Derek was laughing made me think he must be pretty confident… about something.
I pushed that thought away as fast as I could. “Whatever, you’re both disgusting.”
“Somebody else is pretty uptight,” Derek said over his shoulder.
“Amen,” Shanna agreed.
“F*ck you,” I said humorously to Derek. “And you, too,” I added to the rearview mirror.
“She’s got a whole diamond mine in her ass,” Shanna said.
“I hear it’s like the De Beers company back there,” Derek agreed.
“F*ck YOU!” I laughed.
“Shoulda stuck with me, Derek,” Shanna said. “I woulda rocked your world.”
When she said that, a surge of white-hot jealousy ripped through me.
I didn’t want to feel that way. It was stupid and inappropriate and pointless –
Then Derek spoke.
“I’m sure you would have, but… the heart wants what the heart wants.”
“Yeah…” Shanna mumbled.
My jealousy melted into something else. What it was, I wasn’t entirely sure – though fear and desire were there in equal measures.
All I know is that my heart started knocking wildly against the inside of my ribs.
“Where am I supposed to turn?” I asked, trying to keep my voice steady.
“Left at the third light.”
I quickly forgot about desire (though the fear stuck around) as we turned into what I can only charitably describe as a ‘lower income neighborhood.’
Actually, it was scary. Like, Crack Central scary.
There’s a part of Athens where most of the murders and shootings happen; they call it the Iron Triangle, because the streets that border it intersect in a triangle.
Derek apparently lived dead smack in the middle of it.
“Holy shit, dude, you live in a f*cked-up part of town,” Shanna marveled.
“Rent’s cheap,” Derek shrugged, as if that were a good reason to put his life on the line.
We drove past a skeezy-looking white guy dressed in a hoodie, who bobbed his head at us like What up? Then he looked in both directions and started walking towards the car.
I accelerated past him fast.
“Is that guy doing what I think he’s doing?” I asked fearfully as he disappeared in my rearview mirror.
“If you mean does he sell drugs, yeah. But don’t worry, Doug’s cool,” Derek reassured me.
“You know that guy?!”
“Yeah, of course. I get my weed from him.”
“You smoke marijuana?!” I asked, a little too loudly.
“Occasionally,” he said, amused at my puritanical horror.
Shanna perked up. “You can get weed?”
Derek turned around to look in the backseat. “If you ever need any, don’t you come down here, okay? Just tell me and I’ll get it for you.”
“I need some weed,” she said enthusiastically.
“Kaitlyn, could you circle back and – ”
“WE ARE NOT DOING A F*ckING DRUG DEAL IN MY CAR,” I shouted at the top of my lungs.
“Say it a little louder, I don’t think the cops heard you,” Derek joked.
“Chill out, bitch,” Shanna said.
“You are not getting any weed while I am anywhere near the vicinity, is that understood?” I snapped.
“What did I tell you? Diamond mines,” Derek grinned.
“Double amen,” Shanna sulked.
“This is it,” Derek said, pointing. “The one with the Pinto in the driveway.”
I pulled up behind the ugly-ass, rusted-out Ford and let the engine idle. The house was a shambles, with peeling paint, shutters hanging off at an angle, an overgrown lawn, and a couple of window panes busted out and taped up with cardboard.
Oh my God, I thought to myself, but refrained from saying it aloud.
Derek looked at me, his gaze dropping down to my lips, then looking back up at my eyes. “Well…”
“…well…” I said softly, lost in his gaze.
“Wooooo-oooooo,” Shanna hooted from the backseat, exactly like a five-year-old who’d seen an exposed nipple on HBO.
I shot her an irritated look.
She just laughed. “How’s it feel to be cock-blocked, huh?”
“You’re not cock-blocking, because we’re on a Disney date,” Derek teased. “There’s no cock to block – right, Kaitlyn?”
I blushed furiously and didn’t say anything.
He just grinned. “I’d invite you ladies in to see how the other half lives, but I’m afraid I’d lose Kaitlyn entirely, so I’ll just bid you good night.”
He opened the car door –
“I could get out of the car,” Shanna groaned good-naturedly. “If you want a minute or two alone.”
“STAY IN THE CAR,” I ordered her. “I don’t want you getting shot. Or buying weed from the local thugs.”
“Doug’s a nice drug dealer,” Derek informed me. “Never shot anybody. Or so he says – ”
“Oh my GOD. Goodnight, we need to go,” I said hurriedly.
“Okay,” Derek laughed. He got out of the car – and then stuck his head back in. “Are you doing anything tomorrow?”
“You,” Shanna interjected.
“NOT,” I said, a little too loudly.
Derek just laughed harder. “Let me be more specific: do you have any plans tomorrow.”
“I need to study.”
“It’s Saturday!”
“Yeah, and I have exams starting in a week and a half, so I have to study.”
“All day?”
“…no…”
“Okay, I’ll see you tomorrow then. I’ll drop by around five.”
“Don’t you have a job at the 40 Watt?” I asked, perplexed. “When do you work?”
“In about 45 minutes.”
“Do you need a ride?”
“That’s nice of you, but no, I walk there.”
“You walk through this neighborhood?!”
“Not all of us have a car,” he rebuked me mildly. “Besides, I’ve done it five nights a week for the last four months. Nobody messes with me because they know I don’t have any money.”
Or maybe because you look like you could smash their head in.
“I don’t care,” I said. “We’re giving you a ride.”
He smiled. “So you’re going to hang out here for 10 minutes while I go get ready? Or even better, you’re going to come inside? Better yet, are you going to give me a ride every night for however long I keeping working there?”
I winced. “…are you sure you’re going to be okay?”
He laughed. “I appreciate the concern, but I’ll be fine. Night, Shanna.”
“Bye, Derek.”
He gave me one last smile. “I had a fantastic time tonight.”
I smiled back. “Me, too.”
And it was absolutely, one hundred percent true.
“Bye,” he said, and then shut the car door and walked towards the house. He waved at me and made a Shoo, shoo, move along motion, and I put the car in reverse.
I watched him disappear safely into the house, though, before I pulled out into the street.
My heart was heavy the entire time.