I was actually thinking about taking this part out. I'm not sure. What do you think?
The parking lot was half-empty when I walked outside. The cold draft made me shiver. October was oddly cold this year. William was standing against my car. I wanted to scream at him to go home. His mustang was gone. He was smiling as he watched me trudge to the car.
"Where's your car?" I asked as I approached him.
"Alex came and picked it up. She had some where to be and that she would drop it off at your house when she was finished."
I nodded and started walking to the driver’s side door. By the time I got there he was already in front of me. I gasped, "How did you move so fast?"
"Is it okay with you if I drive? I don’t think I would feel too safe with you driving in your condition." He asked, ignoring my comment.
I rolled my eyes, "I don’t have a condition. I'm fine, really." I pulled the key out of my pocket and put it into the key whole. William grabbed my elbow softly and pulled it, I let go of the key leaving it in the door.
"Please." There was something about his voice that made it so hard to say no.
So I didn’t, "Okay." I said too easily. He smiled, please with himself, and I walked to the passenger’s door and got in. I put my seat belt on and realized that he already started the engine and was waiting for me. "Seriously, how do you move so fast?"
No reaction.
"So is it my turn?" he finally asked.
"Your turn for what?"
"To ask you questions, or had you not finished?"
I giggled, "No, your not getting off the hook that easily. I have a few more." He turned his head to look at me, he was grinning. "What is your favorite color?" I started with a simple question; I didn’t want to 'scare' him with my questions. He looked back at the road.
"Red."
"Do you have a girlfriend?" I asked shyly. I didn’t look at his face avoiding his reaction.
"No."
"Why?" I asked quickly, a little too quickly.
He chuckled to himself, "No one has really caught my eye." My heart started fluttering. "I guess you can say I'm just waiting for a relationship I can sink my teeth into." I blinked a few times. I had thought the same thing just yesturday. Maybe i said it out loud.
"Have you ever had a girlfriend?"
"Yes, a long time ago. It didn’t really work out." He stopped smiling. Maybe I hit a sore spot.
"Oh, sorry." I needed to change the subject and fast. "Earlier you said something about Alex. Who is that?"
"She is my cousin’s fiancé. To me, she is like a sister. We have known each other for as long as I can remember."
"Who do you live with?"
"At the moment my father, mother, my two cousins Mark and Anthony and Alex. One big happy family."
"Wow." I couldn’t really think of any other questions at the moment, "Okay your turn."
His expression changed, he was almost excited. His eyebrows were high on his forehead; he was smiling that smile that sent a shiver up then again down my spine and my heart racing. "Why do you wear black every day?" he turned to look at me. I didn’t like when he didn’t concentrate on the road.
"It's what I feel comfortable in." I laughed. I answer the same way every time some one asks me that. I get asked often.
"Does it ever get boring?"
"Are you bored?"
He smiled, "Never. But I thought I was the one asking all the questions now. Do you have a boyfriend?"
"No." I said, again too quickly.
He paused, only for a moment. "Why?" he finally asked.
"Most of the boys in Seekonk act like they are five."
He chuckled as he pulled onto my street. I pointed to my bright yellow one story house; he pulled into my driveway and turned the car off. My house was small but I could call it home. I've lived in the same house all my life.
"So, you like mature men?"
"I guess you could say that."
We stayed in the car for about three hours just talking. I was oddly comfortable around him. Normally when I first meet a boy or like one, I am very shy and don’t talk. With William the conversation just flowed. With William everything is different. I can be plain Selena.
We talked about me mostly, but I didn’t really mind. He asked about my mother and sister and told me about his own sister's passing. I told him about my father's issues at the moment. William was very understanding of my father's lamenting stage and could relate but didn’t tell me why he was ever that sad. William was very interested in my life. He hung on every word like it was my last.
"Thank you for staying with me today. You really didn’t have to do that."
"Don't worry about it. It's no big deal. A pleasure really." He lost his concentration and I think I saw a smile flash across his face, for a moment.
"It's a pleasure to baby-sit me?"
He chuckled, "I wouldn’t call it baby-sitting. I meant it is a pleasure being in your company. You are very...interesting."
"I guess I could take that as a compliment, or is that a bad thing?'
"It is a very good thing. It keeps me wanting to know more and more about you. Why you say the things you say and do the things you do." I could feel the blood rush to my cheeks. He didn’t seem to be embarrassed at all by his compliment. His face had no color at all, as per usual. "Like how the blood flows to your cheeks so easily."
And the compliments just keep on coming...well, if you can count that as a compliment. He seemed too.
"What are you doing tomorrow night?" My heart sank. I wasn’t ready for a real one on one date yet.
I panicked and thought of something really quick, "I was going up to Boston. I am in dire need of new cloths." a little white lie never hurt anyone.
He smiled but didn’t go farther into tomorrow night. He probably wanted to go on a date, right? I probably just panicked for no reason. Shouldn’t I want to hang out with him more?
After a few small conversations in between long awkward pauses we were at Heather's house. She was standing in her doorway with the biggest smile on her face.
William walked behind me to the front door.
"William!" she shrieked. "You actually came! Yay! Come in." She moved to let us in the door. I walked into the living room where her younger brother was watching some show on cartoon network. Heather told me that he had a small boy crush on me so he was always over excited to see me.
"Hey, Luke." I said sitting next to him on the couch. He turned to me with the biggest grin on his face.
"Hey, Selena!"
I patted the spot next to me on the couch beckoning William to sit beside me, he did. He was sitting close to me but there was still a small space that I wanted to close instantly.
"What is on today?" I asked Luke. His eyes were glued to William.
"Fosters Home for Imaginary Friends." he said in a monotone. His eyes didn’t leave William's.
Heather was in the kitchen fighting with her mother, which they did often.
"I'm William." he said holding his hand out for Luke to shake. Luke slowly reached his hand in front of me to shake William's.
"Heather's brother, Luke." Luke was fifteen but looked older than Heather. He had long brown hair that covered most of his face and had a nice build for a fifteen year old. Luke and I weren't close, I only see him every so often in school. But when I'm at Heather's and she's fighting with her mom, we talk and we get to know each other. "You two dating or something?'' he asked, rudely giving William a look of disgust.
"No, Luke, just friends."
I could feel William tense his muscles. I playfully elbowed him in the arm. He didn’t budge, almost like he didn’t even feel it. Heather walked into the room and sat in between Luke and I on the couch.
"What did you do today, Selena?" she asked, flipping though the channels. Apparently the show was a rerun.
"Nothing really. We just hung out." she turned to me surprised.
"We?" she glanced at William then met back to my eyes. I nodded, she seemed pleased and resumed channel surfing. She kept looking at the clock and sighing. Her boyfriend, Chris, was late.
"Do you know where he is?" I asked reading her mind.
"No, when I called him earlier and told him that William might be coming too, he hung up on me. Give him a few more minutes or I'll call him again."
I went into the kitchen to get a soda. Mrs. Allison was sitting at the kitchen table doing some kind of paperwork.
"Hi, Mrs. Allison. How are you?"
"Hey, Hunny. I'm good, thank you." she smiled and stood up to stir the boiling water on the stove. I grabbed a soda from the fridge.
"Thank you for letting us come over."
She smiled again, "Better here than on the streets." I laughed.
I walked back into the living room and Heather was pacing back and forth with a cell phone glued to her ear. William and Luke's eyes were glued to the television. I sat back next to William, closer than before. I could feel his cool breath on my shoulder, I shivered. He put his arm around me and moved his hand up and down on my arm to create friction. It didn’t really help but I pretended it did. He was angled on the couch with his elbow on the back of the couch with his head leaning on it.
Heather continued to pace.
“Chris?-Where are you?-” She paused to listen to his reply and then got livid. “You said you’d be here!-Fine!-Bye!” she snapped the phone shut and tossed it onto the table and sat next to me on the couch and sighed.
“He’ll be here in like twenty minutes.”
We started talking about my brilliant show in English class today. No one will let me live that down. We had Heather smiling in no time. When she wants to be, Heather can be easily distracted.
Chris came in the front door; Heather bounced and skipped to greet him. She gave him a quick peck on the cheek and pulled him towards the couch. I could tell something was bothering him, but it wasn’t my place to ask what it was.
We sat through a movie we had all seen before. I didn’t pay much attention. I was too nervous about the Greek god sitting next to me. I ended up sitting even closer to William. I fit in his chest and arms perfectly and I was relaxed. I spent most of the time concentrating on breathing, which was hard to do when every intake all I could smell was him.
We pulled into my driveway and his mustang was parked in front of my house on the street. “How did your car get here?” I asked.
“I asked Alex to pick me up. I hope that’s not a problem.” Duh, he already told me that.
“No, that’s fine.” I bit my lip wondering what he was thinking. He was staring at my house intensely. “Thank you again for driving me around today. It was very sweet.”
He smiled and got out of the car. He walked around my door and opened it. He held out his hand for me to take, “A pleasure.” He reminded me, closing my door. My front light turned on. It was more of a spot light for the driveway. It was then I noticed my father’s white Ford Expedition parked in its usual spot beside my car.
William and I said out good nights and I watched him walk to the mustang. He walked like a super model on a runway, simply flawless. I shivered and ran into the house.
Although the night may not have ended the way Heather might have planned, like with a good night kiss and plans for a date, it wasn’t a complete waste of a Friday night.
