The sun catches me off guard as I roll over in the overly fluffy bed that isn’t mine. I’ve never stayed in a house this nice before. I’ve never slept in a bed this nice before. And if I’m being honest with myself it’ll probably never happen again. I roll over onto something that crinkles. Weird.
My best friends familiar scrawl catches my eye on the crumpled sheet of paper.
Went out with my parents for breakfast. Then to hook up with Stacy. I’ll be back later.
-Marek
I’m alone in the house.
Wait. The note didn’t say anything about Giselle going to breakfast with them. Is she here with me too? Are we alone in the house together?
Well, this is awkward.
I rub my hand over my face and stretch out all of my muscles. I have two options, I could stay in bed until Marek gets back or I could get out of this bed and head there. My grumbling stomach answers for me. When I finally make my out to the living room, I spot a dark head of hair surrounded by snacks and watching something on the TV.
“So, what are we watching?” I ask Giselle as I plop down on the couch next to her. I recognize the characters on the screen to know she’s watching reruns of Beverly Hills 90210, but I’m not going to tell her that. Every girl and her mom are in love with Luke Perry. How do I know this? When you have the last name McKay, the comparison is made a time or fifty.
Giselle pauses the TiVo and rolls her eyes. “I’m watching a show. What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be off hooking up with random girls or something?”
Hooking up with random girls? What would even make her think that of me? I haven’t done a single thing since I got here to give that impression.
“Wow, tell me what you really think of me.”
She shrugs and shovels a mouthful of popcorn into her mouth. She looks like she’s contemplating what she wants to say as she chews when she finally finishes. “What else am I supposed to think? I don’t even know you. Before my brother went off to college, he didn’t have girlfriends or hook up with girls. Since the moment you got here, that’s all my brother can talk about. I have to assume you’re exactly like him.”
“You’re right, you don’t know me.” I put the bowl down on the couch between us and wipe my hand off on the front of my shorts before offering it up to her and saying, “It’s nice to meet you, my name is Anders McKay.”
“Like Dylan?”
There’s no way I’m letting her know I have any idea what she’s talking about. Instead, I slightly tilt my head to the side and ask, “Who?”
She rolls her eyes, but she has a big grin on her face, so I know she’s not as annoyed with me as she’s acting. “Okay, I’m not going to explain too much because I want to get back to watching. What I will tell you is that Luke Perry, who is stupid gorgeous by the way I’d totally bang him if I knew where to find him, plays Dylan McKay. He’s the OG bad boy. Honestly, I don’t even understand how any of the other guys got attention next to Dylan.”
“Yeah? What makes him so special?”
“Besides the fact that he has a crap ton of money, drives a Porsche, and looks like Luke Perry?”
I’m not really sure how I am supposed to answer that question and when I do respond my answer ends up coming out like a question. “Sure?”
“Ugh, just watch the show. I’m not going to continue explaining this. Before we know it, everyone will be back, and I’ll have to stop watching anyway.”
It’s kind of cute how frustrated she gets with me. All of the eye rolling and groaning. I take the bowl of popcorn off her lap as she hits play, but she doesn’t say anything about it. With the first bite I know she’s my kind of girl. Movie theater butter? I don’t know how anyone could eat anything else.
We’re two episodes in when the front door opens, and slams shut. Somehow, we have both gravitated toward the middle of the couch, but we slide away from each other when Marek walks into the room. Giselle pauses the TiVo as he eyes both of us.
“Hey man, I thought you were meeting up with Stacy?”
He plops down on the couch between us and grabs the popcorn out of my hands. “Oh, she wasn’t there. I hung out for a half an hour which was thirty minutes too long, but she never showed. I looked like a pathetic fuck face waiting around. And yet here I am. So, what are we watching?”
“Brandon and Brenda are twins and they just moved to Beverly Hills from Minnesota because they’re dad got a job transfer. Basically, their world just got flipped upside down and they’re definitely not in Kansas anymore.”
“Okay, cool.”
We’re about ten minutes in when Marek starts fidgeting. He puts the bowl of popcorn back into my lap and grabs an unopened soda from the table. He takes a drink and leans over to say to me, “There’s a party on the beach tomorrow, I told the girls we’d check it out.”
I should feel stoked to be meeting up with chicks my own age, but after yesterday’s shopping trip and spending the bit of time with Giselle today, I can’t deny my pull to her. Which is why going tomorrow is the best idea for me.
“You know I’ll be there.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I watch as she looks from me to her brother finally dropping her focus back on me.
“Before you even ask, no, Giselle you aren’t invited.”
Her cheeks redden, but a mask goes up on her face almost instantly. She pauses her show again. With a huff, she wipes any former emotions away. “Yeah right, like I’d want to go to some stupid beach party and watch girls throw themselves at you. No thanks, I’m good.”
Marek turns to me while taking a sip of his soda.
That’s when she says, “So when are you going to finally pull your head out of your ass and stop chasing all these girls and finally hook up with Cassie?”
His mouth opens wide with a geyser of soda going everywhere. “What the fuck are you talking about? Cassie? As in our next-door neighbor Cassie? What would make you think that I’d do anything remotely close to hooking up with her?”
“Duh, because she’s only been in love with you for like ever. Plus, her mom and our mom have been planning your futures since they moved in next door to us.”
“Sure, they say shit about it, but nobody is serious. There’s no way Cassie would even consider that.”
“Marek, you can’t be serious. It’s obvious how she feels. You know that, right?”
His eyes go wide, and he gets up from the couch pacing the small area in front of the coffee table. “Why the hell didn’t you ever say anything to me about it then if it was so obvious?”
“Because I thought you knew.”
“Do you think I would be acting this way right now if I knew? You just dropped a giant bomb on me. I need a minute to think. To process.”
The back-door slams shut moments after he leaves the room. I don’t know why he got so pissed, and that’s something I’ll have to ask him about later. Giselle is giggling on her end of the couch and I say, “Next time warn a guy before you say something that’s going to make him spray his drink everywhere.”
“Like I told my brother, I thought he already knew.”
“I wasn’t talking about him.” I clear my throat and she looks up as I add, “I was talking about me.”
“Um, okay.”
With my hands waving wide, I emphasize my now syrupy covered clothing. “I was in the blast zone. You were totally fine since he was turned away from you, but now I’m a sticky mess.”
“Oh, boo hoo. The spoiled frat boy has a little soda on his perfect polo. Cry me a river dude.”
“Oh, you think that’s, funny, do you?”
She starts cackling the worst laugh I’ve ever heard before and I take off after her. I’ve got at least a foot on her, so it doesn’t take me very long to reach her, but I didn’t expect to slide across the wood floor dragging us both to the ground. With an oomph we both fall. Sliding up onto my hands and holding my body weight off of her I ask, “Still think it’s funny?”
Her breathing comes out faster and faster. Our bodies are lined up perfectly and I can feel her heart pounding through her chest. She licks her lips as she zeroes onto my own and that is my cue to leave. Ignoring my pull to her, I get up and walk back to the bedroom. I should have never gotten up today.