Cherry (5 page)

Alex glanced up at the rearview mirror and caught him staring at her. Most boys would've been flustered and looked away quickly, but not Oliver. He kept staring, owning the moment. He had no fear.

Alex didn't have any fear either, but she wasn't interested in being pulled in any farther. Oliver had already succeeded in providing her with a fresh set of goose bumps.

Like it or not, they were completely out of her control.

  *  *  *  

EMMA
could not stop taking pictures of Nick . . . and his lips.

She'd taken about five
dozen
pictures, but none of them were quite right. To make matters worse, Emma had no clue what would actually make them “right” or what she wanted them to be “right” for, but there was only so much she could worry about all at once.

Nick had been talking to the yearbook staff for the past seven minutes, ever since the first bell rang signaling the start of homeroom. He was the editor in chief, so he had a lot of ground to cover, but Nick barely even paused to breathe as he laid out the schedule for the rest of the year, breaking down the delivery calendar and explaining when they would need to lock in the layout as well as all the text and candid photographs for the yearbook. It was all super nerdy, but Emma thought it was fun, too, and so did Nick, which might be why they got along so well.

When Nick first started talking, he had run his fingers through his hair, leaving himself with an accidental Mohawk. Emma was sitting in her usual spot in the back corner of the room, and even though she was only half awake—and definitely not a morning person—something about Nick's hair had compelled her to look alive and take a picture.

Emma didn't know why she was suddenly so obsessed with taking his picture. To be fair, she didn't know why she wanted to do almost anything, but at least she knew when she just simply had to do something. Right now, she had to take Nick's picture. She had started by framing his whole head, including the accidental Mohawk, but then she zeroed in on his face, and now, finally, she was just focused on his lips.

Emma always noticed people's lips.

It was the first thing she was drawn to whenever she looked at someone—boys, girls, adults, whoever—but especially when it was someone she had never seen before. Mostly, she'd just stare at the lips' size and shape and shade, but then, inevitably, she would wonder what it would be like to kiss them. And it didn't just happen with the kids at school, either. It was teachers, too. Like, Mr. Moore in English. Or even full-fledged adults like Dr. Saperstein, her dentist. Emma knew it was a weird habit, but like so much of the weirdness in her life, it was completely involuntary. At least with Nick she didn't have to wonder what it might be like to kiss him, since it had already happened on at least three or maybe four different occasions. It always seemed to happen at a party, usually while one (or both) of them was slightly (or even very) drunk. But their kisses were mostly just casual and never got in the way of their ability to work on the yearbook together.

After eleven solid minutes Nick finally stopped talking and took his first extended breath of the second semester of their senior year. Emma seized the rare, quiet moment and snapped yet another picture of him. This time his lips were closed.
Finally
, that felt right. As always, Emma was thankful to her camera for giving her purpose. Without it, she knew she probably would've been stuck awkwardly staring at Nick's lips forever.

When Emma was about nine years old, her staring became so prolonged and intense that her teacher, Ms. Benton, recommended she go see a therapist. Even her ­parents had to admit she was a bona fide creeper, which was not an official
diagnosis but still quite accurate. It turned out that Emma was totally fine. She just had an überlong attention span, which was rare. Most of Emma's friends could get bored watching a six second video, but Emma could sit and stare at people for hours. It didn't even matter what they were doing, exactly; she just had this overwhelming urge to look at them. If Emma did the looking all by herself, it was weird and felt invasive. If she did it with a camera in her hands, she could call it art, and it felt important.

She snapped a few more quick pictures of Nick's lips. They were full and pink. A solid, masculine sort of pink. And they always tasted like ChapStick.

Now that she thought about it, her own lips were actually pretty chapped. Maybe she should just walk right up to the front of the classroom and kiss Nick. Of course, the more practical thing to do would've been to just
borrow
his ChapStick and use it herself, but at this moment all she wanted to do was stand up and go plant a wet, slippery kiss on his ChapSticky lips.

Emma was really glad that no one could get inside her head. More than half of her thoughts were incredibly embarrassing, even though she was the only one who knew about them. Emma exhaled, trying to clear her mind. She ran her fingers through her straight black hair, pushing it into place behind her ears. As features went, Emma liked her ears. They were symmetrical and round and not too big. In fact, Emma really liked the way she looked in general. She felt like it all just kind of worked. She had olive skin and deep, dark brown eyes that slanted ever so slightly, commonly
prompting people to ask her where she was from. “Born and raised in Southern California” was her first answer, but when people grew more persistent and/or rude, she'd go on to explain that her dad was Irish American and her mom was Japanese American, which made her one-fourth Asian and three-fourths Cauc
asian
, which also has the word “asian” in it and always made Emma crack a smile. Not because she thought it was funny, but because it was a strange quirk of words and spelling.

It was weird, just like Emma.

“Em, can you do me a favor?” Nick asked from across the room. Everyone else had already begun working on their assignments. “Can you show the newbie how to use the page layout software?” Emma nodded, glad to have something productive to do. She walked over to the bank of computers where Savannah, “the newbie” girl, was sitting.

Savannah was petite, rocking a pixie cut and thick glasses. Emma couldn't help but notice that her thin lips were a light, bright, grapefruit shade of pink. Emma had the feeling that their lips might be the exact same color, but she wouldn't be entirely sure until the next time she looked in a mirror.

Emma slid down into the empty chair next to Savannah and immediately got a weird sensation of déjà vu. Her forehead crinkled.

“Everything chill up there?” Savannah asked, gesturing toward her head.

“Oh yeah . . . sorry . . . just having too many thoughts all at once.”

“Tell me about it,”
Savannah said, seemingly unfazed.

Emma knew that was a common expression, but something about Savannah's tone made it sound like she might actually want to hear a real answer, so Emma responded honestly, opening the door to her weirdness ever so slightly.

“I'm having déjà vu all of a sudden,” she said.

“
Tell me about it
,” Savannah said again, with newly added emphasis.

Emma thought she just had.

“Sorry . . . ,” Savannah added quickly. “You said ‘déjà vu,' and apparently I thought that meant it was okay for me to act like a total weirdo . . .” Emma was glad she wasn't the only person in the room who was capable of such weirdness. “Okay,
anyway
,” Savannah said. “I'm Savannah.”

“Hi. Emma.”

“Hi.”

LAYLA
couldn't stop smiling.

“Uh-oh,” Zoe said warily as Layla joined the rest of The Crew at their usual lunch table in the middle of campus. “The last time your face looked like that, you convinced everyone at this table that we should all have sex together.”

“But not
together
together,” Emma teased.

“Don't worry. This is still that same face,” Layla said, still just excited as she'd been on Sunday. It had been about sixty-five hours since the girls agreed to the sex pact, and Layla was pretty sure she'd been grinning continuously ever since. “Guys. It's happening. All of it. First, I bought a box of blond highlights on the way to school this morning. Then, I asked Mr. Moore for an extra credit assignment in AP English and informed him—and also
the universe
—that I will be getting my grade up to an A by the end of the semester.”

“
What did the universe have to say about that?” Zoe asked.

“
Ob-vi-ously
, the universe is thrilled. Thanks for asking. And so is Logan. I'm sorry you didn't get to see the look on his face that night.”

“Was that before or after you were sucking on it on the trampoline?” Alex asked.

“It was when I told him we're gonna have sex.”

“Wait, wait. You told
Logan
?” Zoe squirmed. “I thought we weren't telling anyone about the pact.” To be fair, The Crew hadn't officially decided whether or not they were telling anyone, but, as an ongoing rule, whatever happened at the froyo table stayed at the froyo table.

“I didn't tell him about the sex pact. But I
did
tell him that we're gonna have sex. As in, him and me. I figured he should know that much.” Layla winked and then instantly regretted it. She was not a winker.

“You told us before you told Logan?” Emma laughed.

“Well, yeah.” Layla didn't even think that was strange.
Of course
she'd tell the girls first. “But he wouldn't care. He's just so excited. It's gonna be his first time too, so . . .”

“Sometimes I forget he's a virgin,” Emma said.

“I know, right? He's good at sex
stuff
, but he hasn't actually . . .”

“What do you mean by ‘stuff' exactly?” Zoe asked before Layla could finish her sentence.

“She means he gives good head,” Alex offered.

“Ohmigod . . .”

“Well, no,” Layla said, correcting Alex. “I mean he's
a good kisser—
phenomenal
, actually—and he knows—”

“Hell. No,” Alex interrupted. “Don't tell me he's never gone down on you.”

He hadn't.

He'd never even really tried.

And Layla had never thought to ask him.

“I don't think I'd like it,” she said.

“How do you know if he hasn't done it?”

“I don't know . . . I just . . . I mean . . . have you thought about where his head would have to be in order to do that?”

“Um, yes. Yes, I have.” Alex grinned.

“I'm pretty sure he'd do it if I asked him to. I think he's done it before, 'cause he mentioned that it tastes like fish . . .”

“Layla. It does not taste like fish,” Alex insisted.

“How do you know?” Emma laughed.

“I don't
personally
, but I know that fish crap is some super silly boy bullshit Logan's trying to pull.”

“Yep. Total bullshit,” Emma added. “And it's not like
dick
tastes all that great or whatever.”

“Exactly,” Alex agreed. “Boys want head, but then they don't want to give it back. Not only is that lame, but it also sucks because it's, like, probably the best way to orgasm—”

“Ohmigod, ohmigod . . .”

“Or
firework
or whatever we're calling it for Zoe . . .”

“I can think of a few other
best
ways.” Emma said with a bit of a laugh.

  *  *  *  

EMMA
didn't
realize that was such a bold statement . . .

. . . but it made Alex smirk and Zoe squirm and Layla's mouth drop open.

“Emma. O'Malley,” Layla said after a moment. “Tell. Me. Everything.”

“There's not really a whole lot to tell,” Emma said, suddenly feeling shy.

It was hard to believe that after more then ten years of friendship and thousands of school lunches and hundreds of helpings of frozen yogurt that there could still be new topics for The Crew to discuss, but the truth was they'd never really talked about this before. Orgasms were completely uncharted territory. They'd talked about kissing, almost endlessly. About tongues and teeth and saliva. They'd talked about breasts and nipples and the appropriate amount of squeezage. About which boob moves turned them on and which ones made them feel like a cow being milked. They swapped stories about hickeys and dick pics and which boys knew how to unhook a bra with only one hand. They'd talked about what to do with their lips or tongues or teeth or hands whenever they were in close proximity to a boy's lips or tongue or neck or penis. They'd talked about penis size and shape and width and color. About shaving and waxing and even what made them wet . . .

. . . but they'd never really talked about this.

At least not until now.

“But you've . . . you've fireworked?” Layla asked. Emma nodded. “With who?”

“
Oh. Mostly it's just . . . well,
me
. I have a vibrator.”

“Whoa,” Zoe said.

“Well. It's not, like, a
vibrator
vibrator,” Emma clarified. “I think it's supposed to be like a back massager or something, but it vibrates, so . . .”

“How often do you use it?” Layla asked.

“Um . . .” Emma thought for a minute. “Not, like, a lot . . . but sometimes.”

“Same,” Alex added. “I don't have a vibrator, though.”

“I've never tried . . . ,” Layla admitted.

“Ever?” Alex asked, sounding genuinely surprised.

“Yeah, no . . . ,” Layla said, making a mental note to at least consider adding “masturbate” to her to-do list.

“I haven't either,” Zoe offered. “But you guys obviously knew that already.”