Riding on Air (10 page)

OK, not what I'd expected. I tangled my tongue, hesitating over the choice between blurting out “Me too” and “
Really
?”. My lips felt funny, kind of hot and tingly-numb. A blush rushed hotly over my face when I realised why.

“Oh,” I managed. My brain was processing everything slowly, as though it was bogged down in mud or something. I was definitely having trouble reorienting myself. After the kiss. Did everyone have this much trouble or was it just me? I peered up at William, so much taller than me, his expression hidden in the darkness. He still had his arms around me, resting lightly against the middle of my back, our bodies just barely touching at the hips, where my arms loosely gripped him.

The reality of it finally smacked me. This was William, who I'd secretly watched and wanted to notice me for so long, for what seemed like years. This was
William
. Standing here, holding me. I had to believe the evidence of my own eyes, of my own nerves, that he wanted to be here with me. That he wanted to touch me. To kiss me. Just as I'd so badly wanted to touch him and never dared believe I ever could.

I opened my fingers, relaxed my wrists and slid my hands timidly across his back, the fabric of his shirt smooth and cool beneath my hands, warming quickly when I pressed carefully against him. His muscles jerked and stiffened beneath my palms and I stopped, a flare of panic shooting through me, afraid that I'd made a mistake. But his hands moved then, sliding over my back and still lower, briefly cupping my backside. I rose on my toes in surprise, but by then his hands were safely gripping my waist and even that made my stomach curl and twist.

I swallowed and slid my hands across his back again, putting just the tiniest bit of pressure against him, as much as my hands could stand, but it was enough, it seemed, as he did the same, pulling me against him. I wanted him to kiss me again and I tilted my head back to say so. This time he did read my mind because his hands came up to cup my face and then he was kissing me again, just like I'd wanted, although never had I imagined anything like this.

Maybe that was a sign I was lacking imagination. But as William drew me deeper into his arms, as his boldness encouraged mine, my imagination or lack of it ceased to be a factor.

When I climbed stiffly up the stairs of the school bus the next morning, Tash was waiting with an empty seat next to her. Big surprise. She watched me with narrowed eyes as I walked hurriedly up the aisle, aware that Oliver, our regular driver, wasn't going anywhere until I was safely in my seat. It no longer embarrassed me; Oliver's wife Penny, who drove the later morning bus for the primary school kids, had always done the same, so I was more or less used to it. Normally, I wouldn't even notice, but nothing was normal about this morning.

Even as I sank into the seat Tash had kept for me I could feel the hectic heat of a blush climbing up my neck from the collar of my school shirt. Eleni, in the seat in front, swivelled round and stared at me, her brown eyes piercing. My cheeks were on fire by the time she looked from me to Tash and shared her laughter.

“Guess who's got a boyfriend,” Eleni chanted softly, her round brown face stretched in a grin.

I cradled my net-book to my chest with my forearms and sort of folded in on myself. No use wishing for invisibility; that was a talent I lacked right up there with telepathy. The automatic denial that rose up through my throat died on my lips. There might have been no official request from William to be his girlfriend, but the way he'd kissed me and held me, and the skin-tingling way he'd whispered my name against my hair, had me reasonably convinced I was
something
to him. Admittedly, I'd been more sure of that when I drifted into bed last night. In the foggy chill of the 7am wait for the bus this morning, more than a few doubts had come creeping back.

“You are in
so
much trouble,” Tash said, giving me an elbow in the ribs.

“Why? What have you heard?”

“It's what I haven't heard. Such as a single word about this thing you've got going with William.”

My cheeks flamed again.

“It only just happened.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yes, at camp, he was there when I fell off…”

Tash's gorgeous eyes narrowed to gleaming green slits.

“Oh really?” she asked, an ominous edge to her voice.

“Uh, yeah,” I said, realising in my anxiety to explain that I'd totally put my foot in it. I'd forgotten that I'd neglected to mention William's involvement at camp. I mean, I'd meant to. I would have, in the normal course of things, only I'd been sent home and then things had just happened so fast.

I started to explain this to Tash and Eleni, my skin burning so hot with extreme discomfort I was practically sweating as I filled them in on how William had caught Jinx and put him away and how he'd been there to help me on the wash bay. Tash's eyes were open wide again by the time I came to a stuttering conclusion with meeting them at dinner last night and Eleni's grin had been replaced with an open-mouthed fascination I wasn't sure was exactly flattering.

Tash smacked me again, hard.

“Ow,” I complained, resisting the urge to grab at my wounded arm.

“Tash, careful,” Eleni said anxiously.

“Stuff that,” Tash said and to me added, “You totally deserve that for holding out on us. Are we or are we not your best friends?”

“I dunno if you're going to keep hitting me like that,” I muttered.

“Don't be such a baby,” Tash said, feigning disgust. She folded her arms beneath her enviable boobs and gave me a pouty look and a toss of her pony tail.

“Look who's talking,” Eleni said, practically taking the words out of my mouth as I said exactly the same thing half a beat behind her. “The name Jack Patterson mean anything?” We all laughed and it was alright again.

Not that Tash was really angry at me for not telling her, just as I wasn't really offended that she'd hit me. I actually didn't mind it at all when she gave me one of those friendly smacks, like she did her other friends. Her forgetting to treat me like glass allowed me to forget too. Even if it was just for a moment.

I wouldn't want her to think, though, that I'd planned to keep her in the dark. It would hurt my feelings if she ever did something like that to me.

“I would have told you guys as soon as I knew there was something to tell,” I said.

“What, going out with William wasn't something?” Eleni said.

“I can't believe you're actually going out with a guy,” said Tash. “When you finally break loose from your horse you do it in style. Movies and dinner, what next?”

“What, did you expect her to go out with a girl?” Eleni snorted and Tash giggled.

I made a kissy face at Eleni. “Jealous, much?” I asked and Eleni laughed and shook her head, but a shadow of something else flitted across her face and I wished I could take it back. I hadn't meant it as anything but a joke, but Eleni was notoriously unlucky when it came to boyfriends. She was so pretty with her latte skin and masses of dark curls and so funny and smart, but somehow she always seemed to hook up with guys that treated her like crap. Since we'd all hit high school I had passed unnoticed by the eligibles and while that could (and did, believe me) sometimes hurt my feelings, to have been used and dumped surely had to be a lot worse. It could wound more than just your pride.

“If I was into girls I'd totally go for you, Eleni,” I said.

“Hey, what about me?”

“Not into blondes,” I said and arched my body away from Tash as she threatened to hit me again.

“Well, duh,” Eleni said and her smile was back to her usual 100-watt brilliance, “that's obvious considering you're into William.”

“He is a catch,” Tash said approvingly and a herd of emotions stampeded through my chest, leaving me dangling between a warm glow that Tash thought William was hot and a treacherous ice-water fear that
she
might yet be the one to catch him. Tash was utterly 100 per cent ridiculously loyal to her friends and it wasn't that I worried she'd steal my boyf—, er, William, it was just that I was afraid he'd realise he should be chasing after her instead of me. If it could happen to someone as pretty as Eleni, who was infinitely higher on the babe-o-meter than I'd ever be, it could definitely happen to me. That Tash would have nothing to do with them had never stopped guys trying to use Eleni as a stepladder to her before.

The ice-deluge abruptly swamped any warmth with an appalling rush of gut-churning terror. I'd been so worried that maybe one of my brothers had asked William to be nice to me that I'd completely forgotten about a much more obvious and likely threat. What if William secretly had the hots for Tash and was just using me to get closer to her?

My stomach churned anxiously, the crumpets and honey I'd eaten for breakfast surfing uneasily on a rising tide of nausea. I couldn't bear the thought of William wanting another girl. I had to swallow a rush of bitter sickness at the thought of him kissing and touching someone else the way he'd kissed me and held me less than 12 hours ago. My forehead chilled even as my palms grew clammy at the image of some other girl discovering how broad and firm William's back was under her hands. My mind flashed torturous images of long, slender, straight fingers with perfect plum nail polish stroking William in ways I'd never be able to and I clamped my arms around the computer in my lap in a mixture of frustration, fear and resentment.

“Melissa? Are you crook or something? You've gone white.”

I blinked as Eleni's mother-hen concerns chased away the overheated imaginings I'd been torturing myself with. As if I didn't have enough genuine cause for doubting William, I had to go and invent dipshit scenarios. I shook my head, amazed and annoyed with myself. Talk about a drama queen.

“No, I'm fine, Eleni, don't worry. You know what my stomach gets like sometimes.”

“Have you been to the doctor about that? It could be an ulcer.”

“It's not an ulcer,” I said.

“I dunno, I was reading you can get ulcers from ibuprofen—”

“Only if you take lots and I hardly ever—”

“She hasn't got an ulcer,” Tash cut in and we both looked at her in surprise.

“So
you're
a doctor now?” Eleni asked smartly, while I was still sitting there with my mind cantering down the track after ibuprofen, marshalling information dosages and safety trials.

“It's stress.”

I gaped at Tash.

“Don't listen to her, Melissa, she's full of it.”

“Stress,” I said, my brain having been startled into making a flying change of topic was now flicking rapidly though memories of when and where I'd had trouble with my stomach. Stress. Of course. It was so obvious now that someone had pointed it out.

“Why do people always blame stress?” Eleni continued plaintively. “It's like the cop-out of the new millennium.”

“I think you're right,” I murmured.

“Exactly,” Eleni said, but I shook my head again.

“No, Tash is right, I mean. I think it probably is stress. I can't believe how dumb I am, that I didn't think of it before.”

“You didn't think of it now,” Tash pointed out, eyes bright.

“Well, no, but you know what I mean.”

“Yeah. I'm smarter than you are. And prettier of course.”

“You're a much bigger pain in the butt, that's for sure,” Eleni grumbled and I grinned. Eleni was the brainiest of the three of us and she was usually the one with the answers. She worked hard though, so we didn't begrudge it when she was right.

“Statistically you're a prime candidate for an NSAID induced ulcer,” she added now, dark eyebrows furrowed in thought.

“God, listen to you, you sound like a medical dictionary.”

“Shut up, Barbie,” Eleni countered and moved smartly out of reach as Tash took a swipe at her.

“Cut it out, guys. That you're right this time doesn't make Eleni wrong, Tash. I am at high risk for developing ulcers, which is why I hardly every take those kinds of painkillers. But anyway, I reckon it is stress. I get a bad stomach whenever I'm nervous or worried, like the morning of a competition, or when I think abou—” I clamped my mouth shut, horrified at the deeply secret thought that had nearly spilled out.

“Whenever you think about William kissing you, ooh baby,” Tash said laughing madly. Eleni snorted and then she was sniggering along with Tash while I sat there with my skin predictably heating up.

But that wasn't the horse I'd so nearly let out of the stable. I did get butterflies whenever I thought about William—and my stomach rolled queasily as if in agreement—but the thing that most often tied my stomach in ugly knots lately was fear. The bitter familiar fear that the next time my hands snarled up in a bad flare would be the time they never came good again. The fear that this end to all my dreams, the end of everything, could be so close was what drove me to do things Dad couldn't understand, like palming that pill, and things my friends couldn't understand, like turning down their invitations for coffee and sleepovers and parties.

Everyone is a slave to time, Mum says, and she has no sympathy for people who say they're too busy to get stuff done because she says we're all given exactly the same amount of time, 24 hours a day. Mum's a scarily smart lady, but this is something I know more about than she does. We aren't all given the same amount of time to do the things we dream of doing. For some of us, the clock is winding down a lot faster than it is for everyone else.

My stomach slowly squeezed itself down into a tight twisty little lump as Tash and Eleni's giggles faded into the indistinguishable noise of the bus' engine and the laughing, talking and arguing of the other kids. The other kids who had the same 24 hours a day that I did, but who could count on a lot more good days.