The Avery Shaw Experiment (11 page)

I tried to copy their movements, but I felt like some kind of bobble-head whack-a-mole doll. There was no way what I was doing was considered dancing. My panic started rising, and I stopped moving. “Maybe some people just aren’t meant to do this.”

As I complained, someone stepped up behind me and I felt a pair of hands grip my upper arms. “You’re overthinking it.” Grayson’s low, soft voice sent shivers up my spine. His hands slid up my arms to my neck, and then he buried his fingers deep in my hair, massaging my scalp. “You need to loosen up.”

Slowly he pushed my head forward, rolling it from side to side until he brought it back to rest on his shoulder. He rubbed my shoulders next and then slid his hands down the entire length of my arms, leaving a trail of goose bumps where his fingers brushed along my skin.

I gasped at the sensations he was causing in me, and my eyes fluttered shut. He began to sway slowly, and my body, having melted into complete mush, matched his movements with more grace than I’d ever managed in my life.

“Dancing,” he said, “is about feeling, not thinking.”

Grayson lifted one of my arms above my head and rested it on the back of his neck. My fingers instinctively dug into his soft, thick hair. I hadn’t told them to do that. I felt Grayson’s cheek lift into a smile against the side of my head, as if he fully approved of my actions.

“Now we move together.”

His arm came around my waist, and he suddenly knocked his knee forward into the backs of mine, forcing them to unlock. Unprepared for the shift in weight, I buckled, but he’d been ready for this. He caught me, held me up tight against him, and began moving us in an almost-circular motion.

My entire body heaved a shudder of pleasure, and then I drifted away from reality into a world where nothing existed except for the two of us.

Grayson moved artfully, seductively, to the music until I felt like we were one and the same with the beat. I had never experienced anything like it. I don’t think I could have even imagined anything like it.

My body burned everywhere it was pressed against his, and every other part of me yearned jealously for the same feeling. I felt so relaxed I could almost sleep, and yet my heart pounded wildly in my chest.

“You’re doing it, Aves,” Grayson whispered against my ear. His breath caused more shivers to explode through me. “You’re a natural.”

“I’m not doing anything.” I sounded dazed and a bit breathless. Probably because I was dazed and breathless. “You’re doing this. I’m just letting you.”

Grayson laughed low and dangerous. “The guy is supposed to lead, but he’s only ever as good as his partner.”

His lips touched my neck just behind my ear, and it felt so good I let out a barely-audible whimper. His entire body tensed in response. “Aves,” he whispered in a strangled voice, “I want to kiss you.”

My mouth responded before my brain had even processed his words. “I’ve never been kissed before.”

Suddenly I was facing him, my hands resting lightly on his chest, his hands on my hips holding our bodies together in ways my mother would disapprove of. It was like the shower all over again except nowhere near as innocent. In fact, it wasn’t innocent at all. I had to fight the urge to climb up him and wrap my legs around his waist.

Grayson stared down at me as if he was stranded in the Sahara and my lips were the last drops of water in his canteen. “I know,” he said. “I want to be your first. Right here. Right now. Tell me it’s okay.”

His mouth was right there. His chest heaved as if his lungs were fighting for oxygen. His heart pounded beneath my hand. I could feel his need for me, but what surprised me was the intensity of my own desire. I wanted him to kiss me. With every fiber of my being I wanted his mouth on mine. I ached for it.

Even my heart begged for the connection, and that’s when my dream world came crashing down. Suddenly I couldn’t breathe. The room spun around me, and tears sprang into my eyes as I scrambled out of Grayson’s embrace.

“Aves?” It took Grayson a minute to figure out what happened. “Crap! Aves, I’m sorry! You okay?”

“I need to get out of here!” I gasped. “I want to go home.”

Grayson took me straight to his car, no questions asked, and headed back toward my house. He was quiet until the only evidence left of my freak out were the tears that continued to trickle down my cheeks.

“Aves, I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I didn’t think. I just, I had you in my arms and you felt so good I—I didn’t think. I don’t think I’ve ever wanted to kiss someone so bad in all my life.”

I turned my face to my window, leaned my forehead against the cold glass, and muttered, “I’ve never wanted someone to kiss me so bad in all my life.”

The surprise of my confession caused Grayson to slam on the breaks. The car screeched to a stop.

“What? You
wanted
me to?”

I tried to wipe away the rest of my tears as Grayson pulled the car over to the side of the road.

“Of course I did!” I groaned. “Every single girl at that party tonight would have wanted you to kiss them had they been in my position. Grayson, I wanted you to kiss me so bad it physically hurt.”

“Then . . . what happened? What was the problem?”

“The problem was that it was
you
I wanted! I wanted
you
to kiss me. Not Aiden.”

Grayson opened his mouth to say something and then shut it again. He looked at me for a second as if I’d asked him some kind of trick question. “Um,” he finally said. “You know, I’m really kind of okay with that. Relieved even.”

“Well, I’m not! I feel awful!”

I started to cry again. I knew I sounded like I belonged strapped to a gurney in a room with padded walls, but I couldn’t help it. I was drowning in a sea of guilt.

“I feel like I cheated on him. I know it’s stupid. We weren’t even ever together, but I loved him so much. I’ve dreamed about kissing him for so long. I have a million different scenarios written in my diary of how it would all play out when it finally happened.”

Grayson chocked back a laugh. “You do not.”

I gave him a grim look. I did. Detailed fantasies.

“I gave him my whole heart. It hasn’t even been three weeks, and I barely cry about it anymore. I have all these new friends, and I do all these new things as if Aiden never even existed. As if he wasn’t my whole universe for my entire life. It’s like I completely moved on. And I didn’t just almost kiss
anybody
. I almost kissed his
brother
. What kind of person does that?”

Grayson sat there with his hands on the wheel, staring out the windshield. Eventually he lifted his shoulders into a shrug. “Maybe you were never really in love with him.” He turned to face me with a serious look. “What you felt tonight when we almost kissed, before you panicked, have you ever felt that with Aiden?”

I felt my cheeks heat up and looked at my lap. “I’ve never felt anything like that before. I didn’t even know a person
could
feel like that.”

“That just proves my point,” Grayson said softly. “Aiden was your best friend. You loved him, but you weren’t
in
love with him.”

“Yes I was! I
am
!”

Grayson shook his head. “You’re in love with the idea of him, but if you were really in love with him, you never would have gone on a date with me, much less let things go as far as they did.”

We were quiet for a minute, and then Grayson tried a different approach. “Aves, you haven’t done anything wrong. Aiden let you go. You should be able to move on. Even he would want that for you.”

He was trying to make me feel better, but he was having the opposite effect. I started to cry again, so he reached over the center console and took my hand in his. He rubbed his thumb gently over the backs of my knuckles. The touch calmed me down some, which then of course made me feel guilty all over again and I started to cry harder.

“Please just take me home.”

Grayson put the car back in motion. He didn’t say another word as he drove me the last few miles to my house, but he held tight to my hand the entire way. Selfish as I am, I hung onto it, even though I’d basically just rejected him for his brother who had already made it clear he would never want me.

Even though the date ended a complete bust, Grayson, always the gentleman, walked me to my door.

“I’m sorry for losing it on you tonight.”

Grayson tipped my chin up until he could see my eyes. I wasn’t surprised by his understanding smile, but it hurt my heart. I didn’t deserve his understanding.

“Let’s consider it a good thing.”

I frowned. How in the world was this mess I’d made a good thing?

As if reading my mind, Grayson grinned. “I think we’ve officially reached the fourth stage of grief. Perhaps tonight was more of a success than we thought, eh?”

I had to think back and repeat all the stages of grief, even though it should have been obvious. “Guilt!”

Grayson laughed. He stepped forward and dropped a feather light kiss on my cheek. “One step closer to acceptance, Aves.”

He flashed me a beautiful smile and then winked at me as he climbed in his car and drove off.

Grayson

Of all the stages of grief,
so far guilt sucks the most. My date with Avery had been perfect. She looked amazing, she faced an insane party for me, and she was even having a good time! She severely dominated my best friend at a game of pool, making me the envy of every guy in the room . . . and then there was that dance.

She said she’d never felt anything like that, but what she doesn’t know is that I hadn’t either. Even with the countless girls I’d danced with, or done a whole lot more with, never in my whole life had I felt a connection like I did with Avery that night.

Forget my idiot brother. Avery was never meant to be with him. She was supposed to be with me. But, thanks to him, we didn’t kiss that night. In fact the perfect evening ended so disastrous that I was worried she’d never speak to me again.

She didn’t call Saturday or Sunday, and then at school the following week, she really distanced herself. She still sat with me at lunch and didn’t pull away when I put my arm around her or held her hand, but it was different now. It was like she wouldn’t allow herself to feel anything for me, not even friendship. I hated it.

She didn’t come to school on Friday, and then I got another weekend of radio silence. I tried to call her a couple times, but I only got voicemail. When she didn’t show up at lunch Monday, I really started to get worried.

“Maybe I should call her mom,” I said for the umpteenth time. I looked across the table, hoping for some advice from Pamela and Chloe, but they were busy looking over my shoulder with wide incredulous eyes.

Owen and I looked at each other and then turned around at the same time.

Avery’s friend Libby was standing there tapping a foot impatiently with her arms crossed. Her hair was in two buns on the top of her head that had tiny strands of hair sticking out from them in every direction. She was also wearing a giant hot pink t-shirt with a picture of a bored looking cat on it that said, “Do I look like I care about your problems?”

I’d seen this girl before at the science club meetings I was forced to attend every Monday after school, but my friends had never been exposed to the holy little terror, and they clearly didn’t know what to make of her.

When he could hold back no longer, Owen snorted and said, “Nice shirt.”

Libby’s eyes narrowed, and her hands went to her hips. “I make it work,” she said matter-of-factly. She gave her head a little jerk and said, “Heard my girl Avery stomped you so hard in a game of pool last weekend that Grayson had to take pity on you before every college freshman at UVU saw just how small your junk is.”

I burst out laughing. I couldn’t help it. I laughed so hard I cried, and when I got a hold of myself, I realized that everyone at the table was laughing just as hard as I was. “Damn, Grayson!” Owen laughed and had to wipe tears from his eyes. “Where did you dig this chick up? Is she for real?”