Apparently, USC and Cal have it in for each other.
The night passes in a blur of laughter and dancing and feet hurting. By the end I’m barefoot and sweaty and happy. You’ve called me seven times and I’ve only answered twice.
“Is he there?” is the first thing you say to me when I pick up.
“Yes. Literally across the room, as far away from me as possible. Happy?”
I hang up on you and don’t respond to the text you send me a few minutes later.
I’m sorry. I love you.
A slow song comes on and I’m about to sit down when someone grabs my hand. I turn around. My heart stops.
Gideon.
“May I dance with your date?” he asks Natalie, who’s sitting with her feet propped up on another chair, drinking punch.
She grins. “By all means.”
He looks at me, his eyes asking permission, and I nod. It feels so good to have my hand in his again.
The song is Adele’s “Someone Like You” because the universe likes messing with me like that.
Never mind I’ll find someone like you, I wish nothing but the best for you too …
Gideon leads me to the center of the floor, then takes my arms and drapes them around his neck. His hands slide around my waist. His cheek rests against mine.
“I’ve been working up the courage to do this all night, you know,” he says softly.
I smile. “You have?”
“Uh-huh. Mostly, I was worried about getting jumped with a baseball bat afterward. But then I decided it’d be worth it.”
I lean back a little so I can look at him. “I’m so sorry. For everything.”
“I know.” He pushes up his glasses and then his grip around my waist tightens. “Let me guess: he didn’t want to come to a high school dance.”
“Bingo.” I laugh, and its bitterness surprises even me.
“You know what I’m gonna say, right?”
I smile, remembering our little ritual before sixth period.
I nod. “Yeah.”
He mouths the words: break up with him.
“I will. I feel like … really close to doing it.”
Gideon gives me a pitying look. “That’s great.”
I hate that he doesn’t believe me. I want him to know I’m going to do it for real this time. I want to know that I’m going to do it for real this time.
“Wanna make a bet?” I ask.
“Okay. What’s the bet?”
“If I break up with him by graduation … you have to write me an email every week this summer.”
“And if you don’t break up with him?”
“Um … what do you want?”
“You still have to be friends with me,” he says.
“Deal.” I glance over to where his date is chatting with a group of girls. “Susan okay with you not dancing with her?” I ask. He seems happy, which is good. What he deserves.
“She’s not like Gavin,” Gideon says. “She trusts me.”
I nod. “That’s good.”
“It is.”
We don’t talk much after that. It feels like everything we can say has been said. When the song ends, Gideon keeps his arms around me and gives me one of his wonderful bear hugs.
“Good luck, friend,” he says.
“Thanks.”
Nat, Lys, Jessie, and I stay until the very end, dancing as a group to Katy Perry’s “Part of Me.”
“It’s your song, bitch!” Lys yells over the music.
I double cross my fingers and hold them up as we shout the lyrics: This is the part of me that you’re never gonna ever take away from me, no!
At the end, we all fall into one another for a group hug. We have sweet perfumed sweat and smeared makeup and dresses that are too long, but we don’t care because this is our night and, for once, I didn’t let you ruin it.
“Proud of you,” Nat whispers in my ear as we make our way to the car.
I sling an arm around her shoulder. “By graduation,” I say.
“I’ve got your back.”
I smile. “I know. You’ve had it the whole time.”
“Damn straight,” she says.
“You cursed!”
Her eyes twinkle. “Fuck him.”
Lys turns around and grins. “Fuck yeah fuck him!”
We laugh and laugh and laugh.
And they’re right: Fuck you, Gavin.
*
EVERY YEAR THE senior classes of schools all over California get to go to Disneyland after hours. For this one night, the park is all ours. Nat, Lys, Peter, Kyle, and I go on every ride at least once, take pictures with characters wearing graduation robes, and eat way too much overpriced food. We don’t leave until the sky lightens and by the time we get back to Birch Grove, I’m exhausted—that overcaffeinated kind where you’re so tired you can’t sleep.
I’m so surprised when you show up at school to give me a ride home that I don’t protest. But instead of taking me home, we go to your apartment, even though I say I don’t want to. You’re pushing and I’m too tired, so as soon as we get there I immediately collapse on the bed and fall asleep. As soon as I wake up, I’m going to break up with you.
Sometime later, I jerk awake. You’re spooning me, one hand inside my underwear. Your finger moves inside me. Up, down, up, down. I can feel your erection through my thin T-shirt, your quick breaths against my ear.
“What the fuck?” I say, pushing you off me.
Your eyes narrow. “You liked it.”
“I was sleeping.”
That half smile of yours flits across your face. “Trust me, I can tell you liked it.”
I feel … violated.
I watch you sleep at night Wonder what you dream
“Gavin, that’s … I mean…”
There are no words. Disneyland suddenly seems like it happened years ago. Now this is what I’ll remember: not the fun I had with my friends, but the after—you, touching me without permission. Getting off on getting away with it.
“You’re my girlfriend,” you say. “Since when do you not want me touching you? You’re acting like I’m some kind of … kind of creep or something. Jesus Christ.”
“Well, maybe you are! I mean—”
I stop as something shifts in your expression. I can’t quite put my finger on it, except … malice. That’s what I see. Just like that night you first told me you hated me. And I am suddenly hyperaware of the fact that I’m alone in an apartment with a boy much stronger than me. A boy who looks like he wants to hurt me.
Calm him down, a panicked voice inside me says.
I’m suddenly terrified as you crawl closer to me, push me against the pillows.
“Tell me you love me,” you whisper, your eyes turning to slate. You straddle me and pull off your shirt, then lean down, your lips barely brushing mine. “Grace. Tell me. Or I swear to fucking God I will go hang myself in that bathroom.”
I start to shake. Your eyes burn into mine as your hands curl around my wrists and pin me to the bed.
“I … I love you.”
You pull at my pants. Slip them down. This isn’t happening. It’s not. It’s not.
“Gavin, no, please…”
“Tell me you want me,” you growl. I flinch. “Grace.”
“I wa-want you.”
You take my hand and put it on your belt. I close my eyes and pretend you’re Gideon. I pretend I’m somewhere else, far away from this apartment and you and your heart beating against my skin.
Let me go, I want to scream. Please let me go.