Wilson Mooney Eighteen at Last (2 page)

“
I think it’s your turn
now, Mr. Goldstein; why don’t you tell us what was so
nice
about your
weekend?” Cindy smirked. I hope nobody noticed how hard I swallowed
before I looked at Cindy then dropped my eyes to the tile
floor.

“
Well—” I said before I
cleared the frog in my throat, “I spent the weekend in Aspen
hanging out with my family and friends.”

I looked right at Cindy to make sure
she knew that was the end of my story. Her eyes narrowed, conveying
the idea that she wasn’t done with pushing me to answer the
question. I guess Jacky felt the same way—she gave a wicked smile
before she leaned over to Cindy and whispered into her
ear.

“
So you didn’t do
anything
else?” Cindy
prodded as she glared at me and pushed Jacky away.

I felt a surging heat ripple across my
skin. I knew she was challenging me, squeezing to get me to admit
I’d been at her cabin over the weekend. Cindy’s sneaky, conniving
plot to blackmail me into giving her an “A” in my class had begun.
Well, I wasn’t going to let her win.

“
No, nope, that was pretty
much it,” I replied as I stood up from my desk. The excitement
below my belt had disappeared and instantly I knew this was going
to be an assault I was going to have to redirect.

“
Oh, because who would go
to Aspen for the weekend and not at least go skiing? You had to
have done something more than hang out. Come on, Mr. Goldstein,
give us some details. You’re always telling
us
to be clear, concise, and
detailed.” Cindy smirked as she turned and looked at
Wilson.

Voices rumbled as some students
chanted in agreement, while others groaned in frustration. Cindy
had taken the first shot, but I’d already decided I wasn’t going to
engage.

My body sank into the seat and it felt
like an elephant had sat on my lap; the muscles in my neck fought
to swallow, and my stomach twisted with excitement as Max clutched
my hand. It felt like forever before the weighty animal decided to
haul its big ass off my body. Finally, a month later, we were in
the air and on our way back to Aspen. But this time it was just Max
and me; his family had invited us to their cabin for winter break.
His mom had asked us the weekend Cindy, my roommate, took me to
Aspen to learn how to ski. But instead of skiing, I’d tanked it
down a bunny slope and cracked my head open.

That was also the weekend I discovered
how Max truly felt about me. I’ll just call it “The Weekend of
Firsts.” Our first kiss, our first make-out session, and my first
love. It was also at the end of that weekend that Cindy and I got
into our first huge fight. Okay, well, it was probably totally
wrong of me to drop the F-bomb on her, but I had reached the end of
my rope with her trying to pressure me into admitting that I had a
crush on Max. Believe me, she was the school’s Rumor Miller, and
the absolute last thing I needed was her big fat mouth broadcasting
anything about me and my government teacher.

Take that first Monday back from
Aspen—you know, the day she was in our dorm room with my cell phone
and a text from Max on the screen? I really don’t know if she’d
seen my phone, but from the moment I walked into Max’s classroom,
daggers shot from her eyes. I literally felt like I had to duck to
avoid being maimed. There are days when she rolls her eyes so far
up in her head she looks like she is suffering from a seizure. She
is so conniving, I can never tell if she knows something or not.
Some days she looks right through me like she sees exactly what Max
and I are doing and other days she can be flat out vacant, like I’m
not even there.

I glanced over at Max in the seat next
to me; he turned my way and his onyx-black hair fell across his
forehead. The pointy ends tangled in his eyelashes before he pushed
them back out of his face. His mythical green eyes commanded the
butterflies low in my body to respond, and like always, they
obeyed. His smile stretched invitingly across his white teeth,
making me lose my breath. He was unbelievably good at getting me
with just a look. He leaned into me and we both tasted the
excitement of a trip together where we weren’t going to have to
sneak around.

“
Happy Birthday, Wilson,”
he whispered against my lips. “Sorry we had to fly out on Christmas
morning.” He abandoned my mouth and his eyes danced with
mine.
Mmm, he’s soooo hot.

His apology was an
acknowledgement that this was my first Christmas without my
grandparents; he knew it was going to be hard for me. But honestly,
for the first time in
my
life I wouldn’t have to compete with Jesus
Christ; and Max claimed he finally had a reason to celebrate
December twenty-fifth. Because you have to admit: if it came down
to a popular vote, Jesus would win.

I understood the hugely lopsided scale
of popularity. Christ saved the entire human race from hell and
damnation, and well, me—I saved my virginity until my eighteenth
birthday. I couldn’t compete with that. Luckily I didn’t have to;
the only person I had to win over was Max. Fortunately, it didn’t
take a burning bush or turning water into wine to sway him. A
slight smile from where I sat was enough.

“
I told you last night, I
don’t mind; besides, I am with you. That’s all I want,” I
whispered, pressing my hand against his chest. His heart pounded
fast.

“
Well, that’s not
all
you want.” He
smirked, causing his eyes to glisten with steaminess.
Helloooo, he could say that over and over again
to me. He’s totally right, it’s not all I want.

Today was my eighteenth birthday and
we had agreed to wait to go “all the way” until I became a legal
adult. Funny, I didn’t feel any older than I was a month ago, but
who was I to argue? Max was a gentleman, something most guys my age
weren’t. It wasn’t like he was an older, creepy guy; he was only
twenty-two. Four years was nothing in the realm of today’s dating.
He still wanted me to go to college and have all the experiences
he’d had. Of course, with the death of my grandparents and after
all the legal stuff, I was hoping I’d be left with enough funds to
go to a local community college and hang onto my grandparents’
house.

“
I love my present.” I
pulled up my sweater sleeve and brushed my fingers across the
amazing Baume & Mercier Swiss watch he’d given me. The soft
black leather strap anchored a perfectly set stainless steel casing
with a pure white face and silver numbers scattered between coupled
lines.

“
Now we can make sure you
are never late to meet me. I still can’t believe you didn’t wake up
this morning when I put the watch on your wrist, or when I kissed
up the inside of your arm.” His eyes sparkled with contentment and
my butterflies swarmed.

“
Yeah, it’s pretty easy to
be sneaky with someone who’s exhausted. By the way—you snore.” I
grabbed his hand and we locked fingers. I loved the way he smiled
at me.

“’
Well, the only time I
snore is after you and I fool around.” He pulled my hand up to his
lips and I felt my cheeks flush red.

“
So what you’re saying is
that I wear you out? How are you gonna keep up with me when you
give me my
other
birthday present? Don’t think I forgot.”

“
I know you haven’t
forgotten. So why didn’t you wake me up at 12:01?” He lowered his
eyes, snaring me in his look. My heart rolled.
God, why didn’t I wake him up again? Oh yeah,
Calvin.

“
I got up for some water
when Calvin came home. He looked like he needed to talk to someone;
you were asleep, so I sat down and listened. Oh man, he’s really
upset about the fight he had with your dad.” I could feel the
corners of my mouth sway south.

Calvin was Max’s younger brother.
First impressions left a lot to be desired. Between him getting
blasted drunk, screwing up my name, and making a total fool of
himself in front of his red-headed one night stand, I didn’t really
like him. He didn’t make it easy to see any of his redeeming
qualities. But by the end of my first trip to Aspen, several weeks
ago, he’d turned it around and started to grow on me. Maybe it was
when he’d given me the necklace from Max, or when he covered for
Max and me in front of Cindy. Either way, Calvin had found a soft
spot to rest in my heart.

“
Yeah, when I picked him
up he spent the entire ride spewing about all the crap our dad
did,” Max said.

“
He told me that their
argument was pretty gnarly.” I watched Max stare at the blinking
‘fasten seatbelt’ light.

“
Yeah, bad enough to get
him to jump on a plane and fly out to California,” he
mumbled.

Max bounced his hand on my thigh,
pulling my thoughts away from the spiraling sadness I felt for
Calvin. “I’m sorry I missed you at the winter dance. You looked so
hot in the picture you texted me,” he said as he tilted his head
and flashed me his crooked smile. I got light-headed.

“
Well, it was J’s idea.
Thank her. I just sent it to tease you.”

“
It worked. I couldn’t
stop visualizing you in that dress and fantasizing about how I
wanted to kiss you out of it. You’re so beautiful.”

“
Yeah, well, you missed
the boat on that one, Max. But don’t worry, I know where to find
that dress.” I yawned. I couldn’t stop the muscles in my throat
from forcing me take a deep breath. My cheeks rose and squeezed my
eyes, causing them to water.

“
Well maybe you’re going
to have to keep up with me now,” Max whispered. His nose pressed
just above the curve of my ear; I felt his hot breath tickle down
across my earlobe and swim across my neck.

“
It was your snoring and
Calvin’s need to talk—and maybe us playing a little.”

“
Well, it’s your birthday
today and it is a short flight; maybe you should close your eyes.”
Max brushed my hand. I really wanted to stay awake, but my eyelids
floated shut. My eyes rolled back in my head, and my mind slipped
into a rerun from several days ago.

****

I was in Max’s classroom and Joanie
was sitting next to me, across the aisle. I could smell the
lavender wafting into his room from the open window.

“
What’s so funny?” Joanie
leaned over and whispered.

Her dark brown hair swerved against
her milky skin. I didn’t realize I had giggled through my
smile.

“
Just thinking about my
birthday; I can’t wait,” I whispered back.

Joanie was my BFF. She was my family,
the only I had. No, we weren’t related by blood or marriage; it was
more precise than that. We’d chosen each other on purpose. I never
knew my sperm donor (the guy that knocked up my incubator after a
one-night stand), and the woman who birthed me decided that being a
junkie ho was more important than raising me. So she dropped me off
at my grandparents’ and drove away. After my grandparents died, it
was just Joanie and me.

“
He’s taking you to his
cabin in Aspen, right?” she pressed.

I shrugged my shoulders. “I don’t
really know.”

“
What do you mean you
don’t know? It’s, like, in less than three days,” she chided. She
had a point; my eighteenth birthday was only three days
away.

“
His parents are going to
be at the cabin; that’s going to put a kink in our plans.” I
watched the wheels spin in her head. She was always good at
figuring out how to work around situations that created problems
that needed to be solved. We leaned into the space between our
desks.

“
What if you got a hotel
room?” she whispered.

“
Eeww, no, I wanted it to
be somewhere special, meaningful.”

“
It couldn’t be any worse
than a bathroom in Cindy’s cabin.”

Oh man, just stick a knife
in the gaping hole and twist it, why don’t you?
Cindy was a sore subject for me. It had been almost a month
since I’d dropped the F-bomb on her and she was definitely
clutching a grudge for me; watering it, making sure to weed and
feed it, and pruning it to be the most impressive grudge anyone
would ever see. I knew Cindy well enough to know she was waiting
for the perfect time to cause collateral damage. The only thing I
could do was prepare myself for the worst knockdown, drag-out fight
between us. She had the financial backing to go global with her
revenge and I had, well, J.

Joanie burst into my thoughts, “I got
it! Take him to your grandparents’ house. You’ll definitely get
privacy there.”

The pit of my stomach
burned with a blistering fire that climbed through my heart and up
into the back of my throat. That house was a convenience that was
only available because my grandparents were dead and I hadn’t had
the gumption to deal with what they’d left behind. I never realized
how much red tape and legal crap there was when people died.
Wow, salt the knife wound. Go ahead and pour it
right in there. Hope it’s kosher.

“
I don’t know, J; isn’t
that kinda morbid? I’m going to go up there and deal with my dead
grandparents’ estate and conveniently use the opportunity to lose
my virginity?”