seventeen

Scott kicks some sand idly with his bare foot. “You’re not even gonna say hi?”

I shrug, still staring at the ocean. “Hi.”

He sits next to me, letting his knee fall against mine.

“Not very friendly today,” he says with a fake pout.

“Haven’t seen a friend in a while.”

“Ouch!” Even from my peripheral vision, I see him give an exaggerated wince. “I wanna be your friend.”

Okay, the fake pouting is getting, like, nauseating.

The breeze blows a lock of hair onto my face. “I’d really like some privacy, if you don’t mind … ”

He leans closer and pulls the lock of hair away. “Don’t be pissed,” he coos into my ear. “Pleeeeeeze?”

I jerk my head away. “I don’t even know you. Privacy, please?”

“You’re pissed because I didn’t talk to you the other day,” he says in a singsong voice, then fingers the same lock of hair he just pulled from my face.

I roll my eyes.

“I don’t blame you,” he says, still cooing, still fingering my hair. “I was just kinda caught off guard. I mean, I was in the middle of a game, and I couldn’t exactly let on to my bros that this goddess on the beach has turned me into a puddle of sap.”

He kisses my cheek before I can move away. “That’s what you’ve turned me into, Forrest. A puddle of sap. I guess that’s kinda fitting, huh? Forrest? Trees? Sap?”

I hold up my palm as a stop sign. “Do you mind ?”

“Then, the rest of the week, my aunt had me painting her bathroom.” He dangles a paint-flecked hand in front of my face. “See? Taupe, I think she calls it. Looks beige to me. Apparently there are, like, sixty-seven words for beige. Anyhow, she’s making me put four coats of paint on her friggin’ bathroom walls, and all I can think is, Wonder what Forrest-like-the-trees is doing. Wonder if she’s as drop-dead gorgeous today as she was before. Wonder if that walk on the beach made her stomach do somersaults like it did mine. Wonder if she’ll bite my head off if I stop by and say hello.”

I laugh a little in spite of myself, but I’m still staring straight ahead.

“A smile!” Scott nudges closer. I can feel his breath on my cheek. “Hot damn. I actually see a smile.” He tugs lightly at my T-shirt. “Why ya wearin’ shorts on the beach? And tennis shoes … really wet ones … ”

I lift my chin. “I wear what I want.”

“So how is it,” he says, his voice husky, “that even wearing shorts and soggy tennis shoes, you’re, like, a million times hotter than every other girl on the beach?”

For the first time since he’s plopped down beside me, I turn to face him. “Do girls actually fall for these lines?”

He shrugs. “I don’t care about any girls except one. I was kinda hoping that girl would fall for ’em … fall for ’em like timmmm-brrrrr.”

As he says the word, his finger twirls slowly toward my chest, poking me in the heart on the last syllable.

“Fall for me, Forrest,” he says softly, then leans in to kiss me.

My mind is swirling. I am so not falling for this. This guy is so not my type. I am way too mature for this …

Except that I’m kissing him back. As he presses his moist, salty lips against mine, I’m tilting my chin higher, nudging my face closer, tasting his tongue, panting lightly through my nose, resisting the urge to moan …

Who knew a first kiss could feel this natural?

Our faces move in a synchronized little dance, tilting right, left, right … I’m barely even aware that he’s shifting positions, putting his body on top of mine, holding my shoulders firmly but gently as he lowers my back against the sand, pressing his bare chest against my T-shirt …

My hands linger around his neck for a few moments, then slide downward and follow the curves of his biceps. His hands are pinned underneath me, but his torso pushes closer.

It’s the sound of a couple of kids chortling that makes my eyelids flutter open. The kids are standing a few feet away, pointing and snickering. They’re both boys, maybe twelve or thirteen. Our eyes meet, and I instinctively push Scott away.

“Noooooo … ” he beseeches.

But I push harder, our tangled limbs beginning to disassemble. I point to the boys, who blush and skitter away.

“We need more privacy,” Scott murmurs.

I push myself up on my elbows, then wipe sand from my arms.

“My aunt’s going out to dinner in a while,” Scott tells me, his eyes thick-lidded and his voice throaty. “I’ll tell her I need to stay behind to finish painting the bathroom. We’ll have the place to ourselves … at least for a couple of hours.”

Um … um …

“I don’t think so,” I say, rising to my feet, my toes wriggling in my squishy shoes.

“Aw, c’mon … ”

I wipe more sand off my body. “My family’s going through some … stuff,” I say. “Not tonight.”

“But soon?” he prods, studying my face for an answer.

I just stand there. I don’t know what to say.

Scott lowers his chin and looks up at me shyly. Then he winks, his deep-set eyes twinkly beneath a mop of sandy-blond hair.

“Yeah,” he says. “Soon.”

“Is it true?”

Dad looks up from his baseball game.

“Is it true that Mom is auditioning her church friends to adopt the baby?”

“Forrest! ” Mom snaps, walking into the family room from the kitchen, a cheese grater in her hand.

“You had a family lined up for Brian’s baby? The only thing left to do was break the news to him and Liv? Is it even possible to be that controlling?”

Dad lowers the volume on the game and pats the sofa for me to sit down, but I don’t move.

I stare Mom down, expecting her to erupt in defiance. But instead, she stuns me by dissolving into tears.

Whoa. Mom never cries.

Dad walks over and hugs her loosely. “Can we dial it down?” he asks me.

“Sure,” I say, planting my hands on my hips. “Once you guys stop blindsiding me with a secret du jour, I’ll stop reacting with ‘What the hell.’”

But my petulance is half-hearted. I hate seeing Mom cry. (Have I ever actually seen Mom cry before?)

Dad nudges her toward the couch, and they both sit down. I sigh, then plop in the easy chair next to them. “How could you have imagined Brian would ever be willing to give up a baby for adoption?” I ask Mom.

Her hand fumbles by her mouth.

Dad squeezes Mom closer. “Your mother was just trying to help … to come up with some ideas, some options … ”

“Did Brian and Olivia ask for options?” I challenge.

“What do they know?” Mom asks through tears, her defiance roaring back. “They’re eighteen! They can’t know what it means to become parents!”

“No one can know until they do it,” Dad says, trying to sound conciliatory but inciting Mom even more.

“We don’t need platitudes, Michael! We need answers! We need a plan, a plan that will be in everyone’s best interests, including my grandchild’s !”

She crumbles into a fresh set of tears.

“But it’s not your decision to make,” I say quietly.

“Oh, thanks for the memo,” Mom says, surprising me again. Sarcasm is rarely in her repertoire.

“But you had some couple lined up,” I say, pitching forward.

“Oh, of course I didn’t,” Mom says dismissively, wiping her eyes. “It’s common knowledge that this lovely couple in church can’t have children and wants to adopt. I was just making mental notes. It’s not like I was hustling them to an attorney’s office in the dead of night.”

I almost laugh in spite of myself. “Well, Brian is major-league pissed,” I say instead.

“Oh, Forrest, you’re just full of breaking news today,” Mom says. Sarcasm again? I’m seeing whole new dimensions of my mother.

“Brian will be fine,” Dad assures us. “Our conversation was just a little more … indelicate than we would’ve liked.”

“I was plenty delicate,” Mom says, narrowing her eyes at him. “But what do I know? You two are obviously the experts on how to handle a family crisis.”

“Just for future reference,” I suggest, “let’s file this away as Exhibit A of how not to do it.” Dad chuckles, and a room full of tension suddenly seems to dissipate. Even Mom relaxes, leaning into his shoulder.

“You know, at work I get accolades all the time for my skills in crisis management,” Mom says, and Dad and I exchange glances.

“Leave this one off your résumé, honey,” he says, and we sputter with laughter. She picks up a throw pillow and bonks him over the head.

“Laugh all you want,” she says, but her voice is light. “The cold hard fact is that we’re still facing a world of problems. If you think Brian and Olivia are equipped at this point in their lives to go prancing merrily into some happily-ever-after future, then … ”

“I’ll babysit!” I say, raising my hand.

Mom rolls her eyes. “God help us all.”

“I met a guy on the beach.”

Shelley gasps on the other end of the phone, and I cringe. Did I really just say that? What am I, twelve?

“Tell, tell!” she trills, and I stretch my legs out from the cedar chair on the deck, crossing them at the ankles.

“He’s totally super cute,” I say in a Valley Girl impersonation, and Shelley squeals.

“Who are you and what have you done with my best friend?” she asks.

“It’s nothing,” I say. “We just ran into each other a couple of times on the beach, and earlier today, we … ”

“Eloped?” Shelley ventures.

“Yes, Shelley,” I deadpan. “We’re happily married now.”

“What’s his name?” she prods.

“Scott,” I answer, a goofy smile spreading across my face.

“Scottie the Hottie! What does he look like?”

“Blond hair, green eyes, bulging biceps … ”

She gasps. “I didn’t know what you were gonna say was bulging.”

I giggle. “He wanted me to hang out at his aunt’s house tonight while she was at a restaurant. We would’ve had the place all to ourselves.”

Pause.

“Okay, that’s not a great idea,” Shelley says, suddenly wary.

I narrow my eyes. “What? He just wanted to hang out.”

“Take it slow, Forrest,” she says. “He may have had something other than popcorn in mind.”

I tsk. “We just met. God. What do you take me for?”

“A girl with a tragic dearth of experience in this area,” Shelley says slowly.

“And you’re worldly all of a sudden?”

“Worldlier than you, if you think that all the average guy wants to do is snuggle on the couch. Is that a word? ‘Worldlier’?”

I’m feeling a little cornered all of a sudden. It was a big enough risk mentioning Scott in the first place without Shelley turning all schoolmarm on me.

“Invite him to have dinner with your family,” she says.

“And then maybe Dad can take us to a matinee?”

“I’m serious, Forrest. Freaky things can happen on the beach.”

“Oh, for crying out loud, I’m not twelve years old! Why did I even tell you this?”

“Because you like him,” Shelley answers evenly. “You’ve hardly ever liked a guy enough to mention him to me, so if you’re mentioning him, it’s a big deal. And since you blew off Dating 101 while normal people were flirting with guys with braces at middle school dances, well … you’ve skipped a few steps and you need to take it slow. That’s all I’m saying.”

I exhale through puffed-up cheeks. I shouldn’t have called. It was stupid to mention Scott (it was one friggin’ kiss, for crying out loud!) and I certainly can’t tell Shelley what’s going on with Brian, as much as I’m dying to, and since when did Shelley turn preachy? I really need to wrap this up.

“I better get going,” I tell her.

“Hey, is it true that Olivia is bulimic?”

I roll my eyes. “Gotta go. I promised Dad a game of Scrabble.”

“Now that’s more your speed,” she says, and though I know she’s being silly, the remark still stings.

I’ll choose my speed from now on, thank you very much.