Better (Too Good series) (24 page)

“Oh, I didn’t think that at all,” Mark lied. He decided the kind thing to do was to help her out.

She breathed relief. It was exaggerated and fake, and he accepted it as genuine.

“Good!” she cried. “I mean. I am
not
one of those girls.”

He smiled. She fidgeted with her skirt and then walked to the door.

“I just wanted to get a guy’s opinion on why so many of them date girls younger than them.”

“Sorry I couldn’t be more helpful,” Mark said.

Drew shook her head. “No big deal.” She stood in the doorway waiting for him to say something. He remained silent, waiting patiently to leave. “Okay then. I’m off.”

Mark had a feeling she wouldn’t come around so much after that. And he was right. He rarely saw her in the coming weeks, an
d he was happy for her absence.

“I still don’t understand why you wanna hang out with us,” Oliver said. He stared out the car window as Cadence drove him and his three friends to the skate park. “But thanks for driving.”

“I needed to get out of the house,” she replied. “And thanks for letting me tag along.”

Oliver screwed up his face in thought. “You’re welcome? And, you’re not gonna make us pitch in for gas or anything, are you?”

Cadence laughed. “No.”

“
Then you can hang out any time, Cay,” Wesley said from the backseat. “We love showing off for the ladies.”

Cadence giggled.

“You have to promise to be impressed and clap for us,” Charlie piped up.

“You do something awesome, and I will,” Cadence replied.

“Stop flirting with my sister,” Oliver groaned. “That’s gross.”

“Oh, let ‘em,” Cadence replied airily. She winked at Charlie in the rearview mirror.

He clutched his chest and feigned a heart attack.

“I would totally date you if you weren’t taken,” Charlie said.

“Dude!” Oliver snapped.

Charlie, Wesley, and Pete laughed hard.

“Calm down, Ollie,” Pete said. “Nobody’s moving in on your sister.”

“Good, ‘cause I’d beat t
he hell out of you,” Oliver replied.

Cadence rolled her eyes and turned into the empty parking lot.

“Um, guys? The park’s closed,” she said, pulling into a parking space.

The boys snickered.

“Sweet, sweet Cadence,” Wesley said. “We’re about to show you some awesome fun.”

They unbuckled their seatbelts and clambered out
of the car. Oliver popped the trunk and doled out the skateboards.

“Wait,” Cadence said. “We’re gonna break in?”

“Uh, yeah. And by breaking in, we mean climbing through a hole in the fence,” Pete explained.

“Seriously?” Cadence said. “I don’t know . . .”

“Oh, chill out. If you wanna wait in the car, that’s okay,” Oliver said.

“No
, I don’t wanna wait in the car!” she replied. “That’s totally lame.”

“Totally,” Charlie echoed. He looked her up and down. “Come on, Oliver’s
tiny big sister. Don’t be scared. We’ll take good care of you.” He held out his hand to her, and she didn’t think twice. She took it and let him lead her to the hole in the fence.

All five snuck through just as the sun set and the security lights flashed on.

“Aren’t there cameras?” she whispered to Charlie.

“No,” he whispered back. He squeezed her hand, sending shivers up her arm. She was alarmed at how happy it made her feel.

Charlie was the cutest of all of Oliver’s friends. He stood at 5-foot-11 with a buzzed head. He was so opposite of the scruffy, hair-in-the-eyes look that most high school boys sported. His eyes were Caribbean blue, and he always looked right at Cadence’s face when he talked to her. He was much too confident for a seventeen-year-old, and it rattled her.

She admitted her attraction to him when she first met him. Well, she admitted it to herself, not him. It faded quickly once she realized how disgusting dating one of Oliver’s friends would be. He kept up his flirting with her
throughout high school and ramped it up her senior year when he thought she was single. When she was secretly dating Mark.

Charlie released her hand and pointed to a
safe place for her to sit. She settled on a bench and watched the boys fly off ramps, flip their skateboards, fall on the concrete with grunts and groans, and cheer each other on with whoops and laughter. She cheered for them, too, especially when Pete skated over to her to retrieve a joint from his jacket pocket.

“No, Cay. You’re on driving duty,” Oliver pointed out.

“No, I’m not,” she argued.

The boys laughed.

“Let her take one hit, little brother,” Wesley said. “She needs it.”

“Yes, I do,” she agreed
emphatically.

Oliver thought for a moment. “It won’t change anything,” he said to her.
“Mark will still have been married when you go home.”

Cadence looked shocked. And then she turned pissy and petulant.

“What are you doing smoking weed?” she asked him. “When did you start all this?”

“About three weeks ago,” Oliver replied.

Cadence thought for a moment. “Is that why Kim broke it off?”

“Yep.”

“So you chose weed over a pretty girl who was head over heels in love with you?”

“I didn’t understand why I couldn’t have both.”

“You’re a moron.”

Oliver shrugged.

“Is this, like, your rebellious stage or something?” Cadence asked.

“Yep.”

She nodded. “Yeah? Well, guess what? This is my rebellious stage, too.”

The siblings stared at one another. And then Oliver made a decision.

“As long as we’ve got each other’s backs,” he said quietly.

“Always,” she replied.

Pete lit the joint and passed it around the group. Oliver instructed Cadence how to take a hit. Suck in. Hold it in the chest for a few seconds. Blow out the smoke through the nose. Cadence followed his directions and waited for the few seconds it took to feel a mini high. And then the mini high grew into a moderate one. And then the moderate one turned into a fucking awesome rush.

“Kicking it old school,” she said, passing the joint to Pete.

“That’s how I roll,” Pete replied. “No pipes in my pockets.”

They laughed.

Cadence giggled as Wesley recounted his failed date with Tiffany. Actually, she laughed hysterically, then asked for another hit.

“One more, little girl,” Charlie said. “And that’s all you’re getting. This is strong weed. Don’t want you doing
anything crazy.”

“Just gimme the weed,” Cadence said.

“A kiss first,” Charlie suggested.

“No, man. No way,” Oliver argued
. He lay out on the one small patch of grass in the skate park with his head resting on his skateboard. “Cadence, if you kiss him, I’ll kill you. Then him.”

Cadence clapped her hands. “Yay!”

The boys burst out laughing.

“What are we cheering for, Cay?” Wesley asked.

“I dunno,” she said. “I dunno!” She laughed hard and rolled over on the ground. “I want more weed!”

“Cay, if I give you more weed, what are you gonna do for me?” Charlie asked.

“It’s not even your weed, dude,” Pete said. “She oughta be kissing me.”

“You have a girlfriend,” Wesley pointed out. He passed the joint to Oliver, who took another hit.

“Oh, yeah. I forgot,” Pete said. The group laughed all over again.

“Gimme gimme,” Cadence said. She reached her hands out to Charlie. He took them and pulled her to her feet.

“Don’t make out with my sister,” Oliver mumbled, eyes closed.

Charlie pulled Cadence close.

“I have a boyfriend,” she whispered.

“Oh, I know,” Charlie said. “I’m just gonna kiss you a little, and you can pretend to resist if it makes you feel better.”

Cadence giggled. Again. She shook her head and smiled demurely.

“Not even one little kiss?” he pouted.

She cocked her head and screwed up her face in thought.

“Fine,” she said suddenly, and kissed him lightly on the lips. Pete passed her the joint, and she took her second and final hit.
Charlie grinned from ear to ear. He wanted tongue, but he’d settle for what he got.

The gang sat around and talked a
bout politics, God, women’s breasts, nutritional benefits of fruit versus vegetables, TV shows, and sex.

“I think God is, like, super huge,” Pete said, lying spread eagle on the ground.

“What do you think he looks like?” Wesley asked.

“Just, like, this huge man. With really huge hands.”

Cadence nodded in agreement.

“Is thunder really angels bowling?” Pete asked.

“Yeah,” Oliver replied. “It’s, like, in the Bible.”

“Dude, seriously?” Pete asked.

“I think so,” Oliver said.

Cadence thought for a moment. She’d always heard that thunder was
the sound of angels bowling, but she wasn’t sure if it was actually in the Bible. She’d have to look it up when she got home.

“We live i
n a fascist authoritative state,” Wesley said.

“We do?” Cadence asked.

“I don’t know. I was just putting it out there for discussion,” he replied.

“That’s what all the punk music teaches us,” Pete said.

“This ain’t a democracy,” Charlie said in a deep, scruffy voice.

The group burst out laughing.

“Where’s that from?” Cadence asked.

“
The Walking Dead
. Hello? Rick’s like, ‘Hey, this ain’t a democracy’. He used the same deep, gruff voice, then laughed. “Or something like that.”

Cadence fell on the ground laughing.
She lay on her back and pulled her knees to her chest, hugging her shins.

“Dude, I read somewhere that women’s b
rains are scientifically designed to share secrets,” Wesley said.

Cadence piped up, “Scientifically designed?”

“Yeah. It’s, like, you can’t keep a secret. Once you hear one, you gotta tell,” Wesley explained. He plucked blades of grass and twirled them between his thumb and forefinger.

“That’s not good,” Cadence mumbled.
And then she had an idea. “Hey, let’s try.”

“Huh?” Wesley said.

“Tell me a secret, and let’s see if I can keep it.”

The boys chuckled.

“All right,” Wesley said. He leaned over and whispered something in Cadence’s ear. She grinned.

“Oh, that’s good,” she said. “That’s really good.”

“What’s the secret, Cay?” Oliver asked.

“I’m not telling.”

“You know you want to,” Charlie urged.

“Come on,” Pete chimed in. “We won’t tell.”

“Nope. See? I can keep a secret.” She rolled over on her stomach and twirled a strand of her hair around her forefinger.

The boys nodded, unconvinced.

“You’re the exception then,” Pete said.

The
y watched her carefully. She lay on the ground thinking about Wesley’s admission, dying to blurt it. She thought it was just because of the weed and not her brain wiring compelling her to share.

“Give her ten more seconds,” Oliver whispered.

Ten, nine, eight, seven . . .

“Jennifer
Parson showed Wesley her breasts in eighth grade!” she cried. “She told him she’d kill him if he said anything! She let him touch them, too!”

The boys cracked up. Their laughter floated on the night breeze, carried up
, up into the stars.

“Damnit,” Cadence groaned.

“You held out there for, like, a minute,” Pete said. “Don’t be so hard on yourself.”

Cadence grinned. “I th
ink it’s a lie anyway. Jennifer wouldn’t give you the time of day, Wesley.”

“Why do you think she threatened to kill me if I talked?” he argued.

Cadence learned a lot about men that night. Mostly she learned that they were stupid and only really cared about sex and skateboarding. At least this particular group. It wasn’t until someone mentioned needing to go home that she realized she didn’t know how they’d get there.

“Call your man, Cay,” Pete suggested.

“Are you out of your mind?” Cadence asked. There was no way in hell she was calling Mark. He was as anti-drugs as they come and would go ballistic.

“Already did,” Oliver said.

“WHAT?!”

“Dude, how else are we getting home?” Oliver said to Cadence.

“Don’t call her a dude, man. She’s a dudette,” Wesley said.