It was a first for Jared Barton: a beautiful girl in his bedroom.
Yes, he’d fooled around with girls before. At parties or in the park, fumbling in the dark, the sweet taste of some kind of flavored vodka on the girl’s breath while they kissed, their tongues swirling like clothes in a dryer. And he remembered the ever-present fear of interruptions that hung over those encounters: other kids barging into the bedroom or, worst of all, police chasing them from the park, the flashlight blast in the eyes, the smug cops hustling them away with smirks on their faces. Okay, Romeo, the park’s closed now. . . .
But even though his mom worked full-time and his dad was long gone, Jared had never managed to bring a girl home. At fifteen, he felt a little behind. He had friends at school who boasted of blow jobs and even sex, and Jared listened to the stories in awe, not saying much for fear of betraying the fact that he’d never made it past second base, a private shame he kept to himself. But here she was, standing in his room after school on a Tuesday afternoon, the amazing Tabitha Burke.
Jared told himself to remain calm and to not—for the love of all that was holy—blow this chance.
Tabitha leaned over his desk, her long fingers picking up items and then placing them down, almost as though she was shopping in a store and didn’t know what she wanted to buy. When they’d come in, Jared silently thanked whatever god dwelled above that his room was relatively clean, that there were no dirty boxer shorts on the floor, no stained socks or wet bath towels littering the carpet. For once he was glad his mom rode his ass about keeping things clean. He wanted to make the best impression possible, and he didn’t think Tabitha would be the kind of girl who would leave dirty clothes on the floor or dirty dishes on her desk. Not that he’d ever been close to her house, let alone inside.
“Do you want a drink or something?” Jared asked. “I think we have some Cokes. Maybe my mom made iced tea.”
“I’m fine,” Tabitha said. She looked back at him, offering a smile that revealed a dimple on her left cheek.
Jared loved the smile—even though her teeth weren’t perfectly straight—and he loved the dimple. He liked to caress her cheeks when they were close, making out and kissing her lips, her ears, her neck, running his fingers over her soft skin because he’d never felt anything like it. But that answer to his question about the drink. I’m fine. Tabitha said it all the time about almost everything. He thought of it as her motto, her catch-all response to most questions, and Jared couldn’t help thinking of it as a line in the sand, something that always reminded him he’d know her some, but not as much as he wanted. He hoped—and kept hoping—that would change, that he’d hear that phrase less and less as time went by.
He’d only met her three weeks earlier on the icy January day she showed up at Brereton Jones High School in Hawks Mill, Kentucky. The semester had already started and, in homeroom that first day, Tabitha was escorted in by a guidance counselor. She carried no backpack or pens, no papers or books, and she looked tired, like someone who’d just come off a twelve-hour shift in a factory. Jared didn’t care. Tired or not, Tabitha was beautiful: almost as tall as he was, with fair freckled skin and green eyes. Her hair looked a little greasy that day, and she wore it back, but that only called more attention to her full lips, which Jared stared at while Tabitha explained to another girl that she’d just moved to Hawks Mill from Florida. They’d driven all night, she said, she and her dad. He’d just started a new job in town. . . .
But Jared didn’t care about the details. He wanted to—needed to—meet her. He wasn’t sure he’d ever wanted anything—anyone—so much in his life. It felt like hunger, a physical craving.
And he did meet her that very first day during sixth period. Jared went to the library instead of the cafeteria, where he normally spent his study halls, goofing around with his friends, drinking Cokes and watching stupid videos on their phones. But he knew he had a math quiz that day, and he knew if he went to the cafeteria he’d fail.
He hadn’t stopped thinking about Tabitha since seeing her in homeroom. He’d spent the whole day hoping she’d end up in another one of his classes, and short of that, he hoped for a glimpse of her in the hallway. But those things didn’t happen, so when he walked into the library and saw her sitting alone at a table, reading—of all things—a book by Dean Koontz, his heart raced like a motorboat.