Rolling Dice (28 page)

I’ve been avoiding thinking about the entire library scene because of the kiss; I refused to let my thoughts linger on it. But right now, after the way he acted, I can’t help it. The guys are engrossed in a verbal replay of the entire match, so I tune out when I climb into Ricky’s car, already thinking about that morning.

After the way Dwight acted earlier, saying those things to me … I’m sure he hates me. He regrets kissing me. He regrets even speaking to me yesterday.

He wasn’t exactly very warm toward me at the start of the school year, once he noticed me hanging out with the popular clique—though after that things were okay. The thing is, I like Dwight. I don’t know why I told him so much about my history, especially when I wanted to bury it away forever.

Panic swims through me in an instant. He knows my whole story. And now he hates me. He could spread it around and I could end up a social outcast again. Except this time, it would be even worse.

Would anyone listen to him, though?

Yeah, I decide. Yes, people would listen to him. The slightest gossip about anyone can spread like wildfire in high school, no matter who the source is or how reliable they are.

He wouldn’t really tell anyone, though, would he? I know Dwight. He’s a nice guy: he comforted me in the library; he didn’t freak out when I started crying. A guy like that wouldn’t be vindictive enough to go feeding the rumor mill. That thought finally calms me down.

Then I think back to his reaction at the match. I really don’t want Dwight to hate me. I liked hanging out with him. I actually enjoyed working on the Physics project, not just because he was good company, but because his enthusiasm made it so much more bearable.

I just …

I’d miss him if I didn’t have him around
.

I haven’t let on to the others just how much I like having Dwight as a friend. I know that Tiffany would call it “social suicide”; the others probably wouldn’t understand either. Summer might—like she did with the black prom dress. I just don’t see why I should feel guilty because I’m friends with a guy who isn’t considered popular.

Fingers snap loudly in front of my eyes, making me jump violently, so that the seat belt cuts into my shoulder. “What?” I snap.

“We’re here,” Owen from my algebra class tells me. “You okay? You looked a world away.”

I shake my head a little and put on a broad smile. “I’m fine. Totally fine.”

I clamber out of the car after Owen and smooth down my skirt. There are maybe a dozen or so cars here already, and a bunch more are looking for a place to park. Liam’s already here—I spot him near the door, waving people in and saying hi, accepting the congratulations for his performance in the game.

I wonder how he got here so fast—until I see he’s still wearing his soccer uniform.

“Hey, Madison!” he calls as I appear behind the guys at the porch of his house.

“Hey.” Even from this distance I can smell the sweat and dirt on him. “Great game tonight, by the way!”

“Thanks. You know, I really don’t get enough credit as a defender. I mean, come on, we both know I
carry
that team of losers.”

I laugh and give a semi-sarcastic, “Of course you do.”

He winks and then yells behind me, “Hutchins! How you been, man! Long time no see!”

I’m not sure who’s arrived. I doubt the girls are here yet. It’ll be ages before they’re ready if they are taking showers. But this time, I don’t hide in the bathroom. I want to—like at that first party at Tiffany’s house—because I still don’t know a lot of people here. I only really hang out with one small group, and try and keep up with who’s who, and who’s dating who.

But I decide that, just for a change, I’ll grin and bear it, and be a little bit braver.

Following the guys to the kitchen, I see a bunch of cans in a cooler on the floor. It briefly crosses my mind that one can of cider won’t hurt anybody—my parents won’t know; it wouldn’t get me drunk or anything … And everyone else does it.

But that’s all that happens; I think about it for a split second, and then I grab a can of diet lemonade instead. Not because I’m worried what my parents would say if they found out.
I just don’t want the alcohol, period.

“Madison! Hi!”

I turn and recognize Nicole from my English class, and a girl who after a couple of seconds I remember is called Mary-Jane. I smile, glad to have people to talk to. “Hey. How are you guys?”

The night is actually pretty fun; the girls find me when they finally arrive, so I hang out with them for a while. I think about trying to find Bryce, but I don’t catch him, even though I keep an eye out, and frankly, I’m having too much fun with the girls, attempting to dance without looking like a total dork.

I’m laughing as Melissa, hiccupping and giggling, overbalances into Tiffany. I reach forward, laughing, to help steady her, when a hand lands on my waist.

I turn around to see who it is, and find myself being kissed. In a split second I recognize Bryce, and kiss him back.

We break apart eventually, and he leans to whisper in my ear, “I’ve been waiting for that all night. Come on, let’s go someplace quieter.”

He keeps hold of my hand as we weave through the throngs of sweaty people. Eventually we make it outside. The night air feels cool on my bare skin after the warm house. There aren’t many people in Liam Kennedy’s backyard, and when Bryce guides me over to the far corner, the thrumming music fades into the background. He drops down on the grass and pats the space beside him.

“Great game, by the way,” I tell him as I sit beside him. He reaches over to pull me onto his lap. “You played really well. I don’t know why you’re worried about being picked up by college scouts. They’ll snap you up easy.”

“I don’t want to talk about that right now,” he says dismissively, and kisses me again.

“Is everything okay?” I ask him.

“What, so now I can’t even kiss my girlfriend without something being wrong?” He tries to say it jokingly but there’s an edge to his voice.

“Bryce …”

“It’s fine, for God’s sake,” he says, this time a little more sharply. Snapping, almost. He starts to kiss me again but I move my head back so he can’t. I expect him to get even angrier, since he’s obviously in such a bad mood, but to my surprise he curls his arms around me instead and says, “I’m just—just stressing out about the whole college thing a little.
Tonight’s game wasn’t my best.”

“Are you kidding? You were fantastic! Everyone says so.”

His mouth twists a little, and I put a hand to his face. His shadow of stubble scratches against my palm—and my cheek when I lean forward to give him a kiss. “Stop worrying about it so much. It’s going to be fine. Everyone knows you’re going to get that scholarship. Wouldn’t Coach have told you before now if he thought you needed to step it up and do better?”

“I guess.”

I plant another kiss on his lips. “Exactly. So you should be celebrating. You should be happy. You guys won, and you played fantastically.”

He gives a small laugh and kisses my nose. “Thanks, Mainstream.”

I smile. “It’s what I’m here for.”

He kisses me again, only this time more deeply and intimately. After we break apart, we sit in silence with the background noise of the party surrounding us.

Liam’s backyard has a brick wall separating it from the neighbors’. There’s a flower bed in front of it, with old-fashioned lanterns about a foot off the ground; I can make out the quiet buzz of electricity. They cast an orange-yellow glow over Bryce’s face, sending one side into shadow and highlighting his wavy blond hair. His eyes seem almost hazel. He looks so handsome; he always does. I hope I don’t look too terrible in this light.

“Are you having a good time?” he asks. “You sure looked like you were when I saw you dancing with the girls.”

The corner of my mouth tweaks up in a smile. “Yeah, it’s a good party. And Melissa can be a funny drunk.”

“You’re not drinking?”

I shake my head. “Nope,” I confirm. “I don’t see the point. Having a good time and alcohol don’t go hand in hand. At least, they don’t for me. I suppose I can’t vouch for other people.” “Other people” meaning, apparently, most people at this party.

“You’re so different from what I expected when I first saw you. Well, okay—pretty different. Not completely, though.”

“Why? What did you expect when you first saw me?”

“That’s for me to know,” he replies mischievously, kissing me briefly.

I catch his face and hold it close to mine. “And for me to find out,” I tell him, grinning back. “Come on, tell me, I want to know!”

“Hmm, no.”

“You’re just doing this because I want to know, aren’t you? You’re doing it to annoy me.”

“Maybe …”

“Fine, be that way.” And to emphasize my point, I push his arms away and get to my feet, smoothing out my skirt. But before I step away, he grabs my ankle and gives it a tug. I cry out, but he pulls me back onto his lap. “Bryce! Don’t do that! I could’ve broken something!”

He rolls his eyes, a signal that tells me he thinks I’m being melodramatic. I ignore it.

Squeezing me a little tighter, he chuckles and I feel it reverberating through his chest where my arm is pressed against him. “All right, if you really must know, I thought you were the sort of person who didn’t take any shit from anybody, and who didn’t give a damn what people thought about you.”

Well, that’s wrong on both counts …

“Which I was right about,” he carries on, shocking me. Do I really come across as that kind of person? I must do a better job of hiding my old self away beneath these layers of the new Madison than I thought. “But I also thought you were kind of badass. The short hair, the nose stud, the attitude. So you can see why everyone was surprised when you say you don’t swear and you don’t drink.”

I laugh; I can’t help it, but so does Bryce.

“It’s not a bad different, though,” he assures me hastily.

“Good to know.”

“I love you.”

“Love you too,” I reply with a smile, and we start kissing again—until I lose all track of time. The loose trails of thought drift around my mind before I can put them together and stow them away to pick up again later.

November crawls into December, the days quiet and uneventful, blurring into one chunk of too much homework. Thanksgiving is, for the most part, as it always is. We visit Dad’s family, and all my cousins gawp at my nose stud and new hairdo and until we leave for home again. About the most exciting thing that happens is that I get a Physics tutor who I see once a week on a Thursday afternoon, since Dwight and I don’t speak anymore. The only exchange between us was after the soccer match, in our next Physics lesson—I said hi, and he ignored me. That’s it. We haven’t spoken once since.

I got my dress for the Winter Dance; I bought the black one, much to Tiffany and Melissa’s—and, as it turned out, my mom’s—chagrin. They all wanted to know why I didn’t want something more
colorful
.

The rest of the girls have their dresses too, of course. One weekend, after we’d bought our them, they dragged me to the mall to get shoes and clutch bags and hair pins and all sorts of things I didn’t even know people had to buy to go to these things.

Now that the dance is tomorrow night, I’m not sure whether to be excited or nervous.

Strangely, though, the thing at the forefront of my mind is the Physics project that’s due in next week. Dr. Anderson wants it next Thursday, but … I don’t even know if we’ve finished it or not. I haven’t done any more work on it. Dwight has a copy of the whole thing, so he might’ve done more. Actually, no, he
will
have done, because even though he hates me, he won’t risk damaging his own grade.

Should I feel guilty about that? I’m practically sponging off his hard work. It’s not really fair … but I did contribute to it as best I could, and it’s not my fault he hates me now. Whatever. It’s not like I
care
about AP Physics. I just have to put up with it for the rest of the year, unless it’s not too late to transfer to something—
anything
—else.

“Hello? Earth to Mads! Is anybody home in that strange little head of yours?”

I jerk my mind back to reality—back to Jenna yelling down her laptop to me, raising her eyebrows to the webcam.

“Yeah. Sorry. Just … thinking.”

“About …?”

“About the dance tomorrow,” I lie.

“Liar. You’re thinking about him, aren’t you?”

“Bryce?”

“No. Dwight. Oh, come on, Mads, I’m your big sister. I know you well enough to be able to tell when you’re lying. And it’s totally obvious when you’re thinking about Dwight because you get this faraway look and you frown. But when it’s Bryce it’s more of a smile.”

“Shut up already.”

She just laughs. “Have you talked to him yet?”

“No. Why should I? I don’t have anything to say to him.”

I didn’t tell Jenna about the kiss. I just said we had a fight and I didn’t want to go into details.

She just sighs, and there’s a sorrowful look on her face. “Fine. We’ll talk about something else. All ready for the dance tomorrow? Legs waxed, eyebrows plucked? Instruments of torture lined up for curling eyelashes and hair?”

I manage a laugh at that. “Yeah. At least, I think I’m all prepared.”

“Sorry I couldn’t make it down for the weekend.”

“Don’t be silly!” I burst out. “Jen, it doesn’t matter, honestly. I never expected you to, anyway. I don’t know why you and mom are making such a fuss about it. It’s not a big deal. I’m just going to some stupid school dance.”

“Exactly why we’re making so much fuss,” she argues back calmly. “You’re going to a dance, Madison. With your friends and your boyfriend.
You
are going to one of those stupid school dances. Don’t get too offended by this, but it’s a mile away from where you were last year. Not that there was anything wrong with who you were last year,” she tells me quickly, smoothly, “but you’re so much happier now. We all know it.”

The edge of my mouth quirks up in a teeny tiny smile, but my heart isn’t in it.

Yeah, I have a better life here. I don’t want to disappear and be invisible and I’m not trying to just make it through another day. But I hate that they all say things like that so proudly; that they think it’s something to celebrate … because that makes it seem like I’ve done something wonderful, and I haven’t.