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Mojo was freshly walked, and I was freshly showered, moisturized, and perfumed when Cole showed up at my doorstep after school. The day had been a nightmare, but, somehow, with Cole here, there was a little bright spot in it, too.
“How long have you guys lived here?” he asked, plopping down on the couch. He looked more comfortable today than he did the last time he was here. For some reason, that made me happy. I wanted Cole to be comfortable here.
“Going on three years,” I replied. “We moved my Freshman year.”
“So, in the three years that you’ve been here, you’ve yet to unpack a single box?”
I spied the stacks of boxes around the room. Some of them were half unpacked, some of them weren’t even opened yet. To our credit, we did have five boxes flattened and stuffed behind the sofa. Five out of a bazillion was something, right?
“We’re kinda not settled in yet,” I said. “But I guess it worked out because we’re moving on Sunday.”
“Moving? Where?”
My phone buzzed in my pocket, interrupting my answer. I pulled it out and examined the number while Play That Funky Music White Boy, my father’s favorite song, played.
“Hey, Daddy. What’s up?”
I heard the whinny of horses in the background. If I closed my eyes, I could smell the manure.
“Hey, honey. Forget something?”
I frowned, mine and Daddy’s agreement rushing back to mind.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry. I forgot to call you when I got home.”
“So I noticed.” There was a slight edge of irritation in Daddy’s voice. I’d be hearing about my misstep later. “What are you up to?”
“Just studying. Cole and I have an English project due next week.”
“Cole? You have a boy in the house?”
Oops. I guess I forgot to mention that, too.
“It’s okay, Daddy. He’s vile. And Mojo’s here, too.”
I stuck out my tongue at Cole and smiled, letting him know that it was just something I said to soothe my father’s worried nerves. He stuck out his, too.
“Let me speak to him.”
Uh oh. I handed him the phone with an apologetic expression.
“He wants to talk to you,” I said.
Cole took the phone as if I just told him that Beyonce was at the other end.
“Hello, Mr. French.”
My stomach tied in knots. What would Daddy say to him? Would he tell him to leave and never come back, or would he be normal? I glanced at my bedroom doorway. Mojo was sitting in it, with only his upper body visible. He stared at the conversation, as if supremely interested in what was going on.
Nosey pup.
Cole continued to speak a little too loudly in to the phone.
“We met at the science fair last year ... Yes, that’s me ... Yes, I did win. Bella’s project was okay, too ... Yes, I understand how worrying it can be, but I’d like to assure you that I am only here to study ... I understand. Believe me, if it was up to me, I would have let you know that I was coming by ... I think that would be a great idea. Let me give you my phone number. That way, we’ll both be on the same page...” Cole rattled off his phone number to my father, while I sat wide eyed with my stomach doing full on summersaults. “Yes, I am scheduled to come by every day after school for an hour or so. Maybe one day I can stay for dinner and we can get to know each other a little better ... That would be fantastic ... Yes, definitely ... I’ll see you soon ... Okay. Bye.”
He handed the phone back to me, a big grin on his face.
“Your father’s a cool dude,” he said. “He invited me to dinner next week.”
My mouth dropped open.
“He didn’t.”
“He did.” Cole leaned back on the couch and put his hands behind his head. “Parents do love me. Of course, who wouldn’t love me?”
I made a barfing expression and stuffed my phone back in my pocket.
“So, your ringtone is a bit on the old side for you, isn’t it?”
“What’s wrong with my ringtone?”
“Wild Cherry, 1976. I wouldn’t peg you for a funk sort of girl.”
“Oh yeah. What would you peg me as?”
He shrugged. “At first, more angry chick music. But now, I’m not so sure.”
“I’ll have you know that I am a music connoisseur. I have music that goes back to the nineteen twenties.”
He sat up straight, his eyes locked on mine. “Oh really. Name one song from the twenties.”
“Brown eyes, Why Are You Blue, by Nick Lucus.” One of my favorites. My grandfather sang it to me sometimes when I was sad as a kid.
One of Cole’s eyebrows raised.
“Not many people know this, but I, too, enjoy a musical tune every now and again.”
“You like music?”
“Does that surprise you?”
“Well, you are a nerd jock. I guess nothing should surprise me about you.”
“Now you’re learning, French.”
He pulled out his phone, typed in something, and placed it on the table.
“What are you doing?”
The teasing, challenging glint in his eyes made me want to smile. I bit my cheek instead.
“You should know better than anyone what this is.”
“Some sort of test?”
He grinned wide. “Everything is a test. Now, in a minute, you’ll hear some music come on. You will have thirty seconds to answer the questions. Because of my superior math skills, I will be keeping score. The person who wins gets bragging rights.”
Bragging rights over Cole? I was in!
He walked to the other side of the table and knelt so that we were face to face with the table between us.
“I should warn you. I’m very, very good at this.”
The music began and, for the next hour, we shouted out names of artists, song titles, and music trivia.
“Madonna!”
“Prince!”
“The Monkees!”
“Al Jolson!”
“Who are Approved by the Motors?”
“The Hudson Brothers!”
“Michael Jackson!”
By the time the battery on his phone had whittled down to a measly one percent, he was leading me seventy-two to seventy. But I didn’t care. I was breathless, my throat hurt, my heart was racing, and my adrenaline was pumping. I was surprised to discover that I had actually had fun with Cole.
Go figure.
“You weren’t kidding when you said you knew music,” he said. “Not as well as I do, of course, but you’re not half bad.”
“You only got those two points because you know the name of all the Hanson brothers. I wouldn’t brag about that.”
“Whatever.”
I smoothed my hair back from my face as Cole stood and came back to sit on the couch.
“So, do you have a favorite band?” I asked.
He smiled. He did that a lot, it seemed. More than I remembered. Was Cole having as good a time as I was?
“I am tempted to make you guess,” he said. “More than tempted.” His eyes swept over my face, stopping on my lips for a moment before raising back up to my eyes. My cheeks flushed hot. “I’ll tell you what. I will give you three clues. We’ll see if you can guess the band from there. And no Googling.”
I shrugged. I didn’t need to Google music facts. They were all in my head.
“Fine,” I said, trying to pretend like I didn’t care. But I did care. Games with Cole were fun, even if he was super competitive.
“Their logo is inspired by a Hindu Goddess, Martin Scorsese directed a live concert film for them, and the lead singer is a ballet dancer.”
I frowned, trying to think of who the band would be.
“No thinking now, French. We will discuss it after school tomorrow. Then maybe, if you’re nice, I’ll let you quiz me.”
I rolled my eyes, even though I was having a great time.
“Whatever.” I sat back on the couch and picked up my Mid Summer’s Night’s Dream book, but I wasn’t ready to go back to our project just yet. “76 Central Park West.”
“What?”
“You asked where we were moving to. It’s 76 Central Park West.”
“Ooh. That’s ritzy for a mechanic.”
“How did you know that my dad was a mechanic?”
He shrugged. “You mentioned it when you first came to sit at our table, remember?”
I half smiled. “Well. That’s different.”
He half smiled, too. “What’s different?”
“I’m not used to guys actually listening to what I say.”
“Listen, just because my brother’s a jerk, doesn’t mean you have to paint the rest of mankind with the same brush. We are not all Jake Winsted. Some of us are good guys.”
“Good guys, huh? Is that what you think you are? A good guy?”
“I don’t think, French. I know. Multitudes of women approach me every day. They fall to my feet, their faces streaked with tears, all to say how good of a guy I am.”
Cole had a flair for the dramatic. It was amusing, but I wouldn’t tell him that.
“And of these hordes of girls, have you picked one? Is there someone special for Cole Winsted?”
I waited for his answer like a drowning man waited for a lifeline, though I wasn’t sure why. Why would I care if Cole had a girlfriend or not? We were sorta friends, but nothing more. His dating history should have meant nothing to me. And yet, I salivated for his answer.
When did I become so pathetic?
“I’m going to let you figure that one out.”
I laughed and threw a pillow at him.
“So much for being Mr. Nice Guy.”
“What can I say? I like a little mystery.”
I laughed so much my stomach hurt.
“I guess that you can take the animal out of the gentleman, but you can’t take the gentlemen out of the animal,” I said. “Or, something like that. What I meant to say was that men are animals, but it came out wrong. Okay. Start over.”
“That was the worst metaphor that I’ve ever heard in my life. It was so bad, that it literally made me want to cut my ears off.”
We burst into a fit of giggles until tears ran down our cheeks. We laughed and laughed, and when we were done with laughing, we laughed some more.
“I have to tell you, French, you are not the Girl-Zilla that I thought you were.”
“Is that what they called me? Girl-Zilla?”
“Well, not they, really. Just me.”
“Nice. I guess that my nickname for you was just as appropriate.”
“And what was that?”
“Jerky McJerkface.”
He howled in laughter. “That’s the worst name ever! Oh my god. You are banned from talking ever again.”
“It’s better than what I call Kenny Jenners.”
“What do you call him?”
“Mc-Coke-Head.”
He threw his head back and let out another laugh.
“That name is definitely worse.”
“You’re right. Your name is better. But your IQ is pretty low so you may not understand the awesomeness of it.”
“My IQ?” He was on me like a shot, his thick fingers pressing in to my side, tickling me in my most ticklish spot ever. My sides.
“My IQ is genius level, I’ll have you know,” he cried, while I wailed with laughter on the couch. “Say that I’m a genius. Say it!”
“Never!”
I could barely get the word out, I was laughing so hard.
“Say it, or be ready for death by laughter.”
“No, no.” My stomach ached, my throat ached, and I’d never been so thoroughly amused in my entire life.
“All right, all right!” I screamed.
His fingers stilled on my side.
I laid on the couch below him, panting, my cheeks red, my body electric. He hovered above me, ready to move in for another tickle at the earliest sign of my hesitation.
Our eyes dueled. Cole’s expression was a fluid sea of happiness and joy, then sadness, and sorrow. Then something else. Something that darkened his blue eyes to nearly navy. His gaze dropped to my lips, and I could barely breathe.
He was so close. So close, and yet, not close enough.
His familiarized himself with my mouth, inspecting it. Committing it to memory. Goosebumps flew up my spine. Heat pooled in my gut. My cheeks caught on fire.
What would his lips feel like against mine?
Without warning, he cleared his throat, looking at anything else in the room but me.
He climbed off me and sat back on the couch.
I wrapped my arms around myself, trying to stop the shivers that raced through me. I wasn’t sure if it was from the loss of his heat or something else.
“Maybe we should, um...”
He’s gaze wandered over to me. One side of his mouth tilted into a half smile before stretching into a laugh filled with awkwardness and the unsaid words that hung between us.
“Well, that was weird. And it was like the second time it happened, so it was, like, double weird.”
My stomach hurt from all the butterflies that beat within it. Something sparked to life when he looked at me. Some crazy mix of joy, hope, and fear. I bit my lower lip against the warring emotions. It felt like I could sit here all day, staring at him while he stared at me. But, apparently, Cole had more control than I did. I guess it was all those honed social graces that came with being popular all one’s life.
He picked up his copy of a Midsummer’s Night’s Dream. I pulled out my copy, too, feeling very much like Hermia. Or was it Helena? Titania, perhaps? Why was my brain so foggy all of a sudden?
“Maybe we should focus on our dramatic play,” he said. “I do have one condition, though.”
“And what’s that?”
He raised a teasing eyebrow at me. “That you let me pick the title.”
I threw a pillow at him, and we laughed some more, and somehow, my rotten day got just a little big brighter.