Jamie McGuire - Happenstance

“What are you going to do?”

Weston pulled a wadded-up piece of paper from his letter jacket pocket. “I fished it out of the trash can.”

I felt my eyes light up. “You’re going to go?”

He stared at the paper. “I worked my ass off getting that application together.”

“You’re avoiding the question.”

He looked at me. “What do you think? My parents won’t help me with the tuition, much less an apartment.”

“So you work and go to school. You’re not the first student in the world to do that.”

“I’m not scared of doing that. I’m just . . . that’s a pretty big slap in the face to my parents. It’s a big deal.”

“It’s your life.” Those words were simple and overused, but that was always true of the truth. “What would your thirty-year-old self say?

“If he’s sitting in an office pushing legal paperwork, he’s probably cussing me.”

I shrugged and looked up at the sky. “Sounds to me like you know the answer.”

“It’s a difference between want and should, isn’t it?”

“Yes. You should do what you want.”

He looked over at me and smiled, and I met his eyes. He watched me for a moment, and then his gaze fell to my lips. “You smell like ice cream.”

My breath caught. “So?”

“I’m just kind of wondering if you taste like it.”

After a short pause, I choked then burst out in howling laughter.

He grinned. “What? What’s funny?”

I couldn’t stop the ugly cackling bubbling up from deep inside of me, like it had been waiting there my entire life to be set free. My eyes watered. Weston quietly chuckled, too.

“Man,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck. “I’m glad it’s dark.”

“Why’s that?” I asked, wiping my eyes.

“Because my face has got to be bright red right now.”

I nudged him. “Don’t be embarrassed. Two weeks ago if someone told me you’d be saying that to me, I would have thought they were legitimately insane.”

“Would you have wanted me to kiss you two weeks ago?”

I could only manage a side glance; then my line of sight dropped to my feet dangling from the tailgate. “No.”

“No?”

“For the same reason I don’t want you to kiss me now.”

His eyes lit up with realization. “Alder.”

“Yes,” I said, pressing my lips into a hard line. He nodded once, conceding. “Is there something going on at the Diversion Dam tonight?” I asked, desperate to change the subject.

Weston leaned back and folded his arms behind his head. “I don’t know, and I don’t care.”

I crawled up next to him, and while looking up at the stars, we exchanged memories about grade school, how much we loathed Mrs. Turner, and everything else in our world with the exception of Erin Alderman.

“Are you going to miss high school? I mean, you must,” I said, shaking my head in amazement. “You’re like a god here.”

He laughed once; then his face crumbled. “The god of Hell is the devil. Not really much of a compliment.”

“Touché.” I let my legs swing back and forth, feeling the chilly spring breeze blow through the thin fabric of my pants. It was warm enough that the bugs were chirping and buzzing in the grass. I listened to their symphony, our own little private show.

We drank our pops, and Weston crunched them in his man hands and tossed them behind us. He helped me down and walked around to my side, opening the door. I climbed up and sat, and he looked up at me.

“You doing anything for Spring Break?” he asked.

I shook my head.

“My parents are going skiing with our church group. I was supposed to go to South Padre with Alder and Brady and pretty much the whole football team and cheer squad, but I’m going to back out.”

I frowned, confused.

Weston was clearly amused as he leaned his elbow on the bottom compartment of the door, looking up at me with his perfect, sweet smile. “I’m going to stay here.”

“Won’t your parents pitch a fit?”

“They’ll understand. Besides, I’m eighteen. Not really much they can do.”

“Alder won’t understand.”

“I’m not worried about it.”

I narrowed my eyes. “You’re going to leave me out of it, right?”

“Yes, Easter. I wouldn’t throw you under the bus like that.”

“I just feel like I should remind you that I’m moving away in a few months. I’m not crazy enough to think you’re doing all of this for me, but if even a small part of it . . .”

“What if I was? Doing all of this for you.”

“I would ask you why. Why all of a sudden are you so interested in me?”

“Who says it’s all of a sudden?”

I tried not to smile. The only things that kept my face smooth were my next words, and I said them with conviction. “Weston, you’re a nice guy. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t like you. But I’m getting the hell out of here.”

He shut the door and walked slowly to the driver’s side. He stood at his door for a full minute. When he finally sat in his seat and switched on the ignition, he had to speak up over the roaring of the Chevy’s glass packs. “So am I.”

“Can I talk to you for a minute? Like . . .  not through this window?” Weston was pleading with his big emerald eyes. He’d been looking at me that way off and on for a week, in the hallway and in the classes we shared. I knew he wanted to say something to me, but things had been awkward between us since he dropped me off at my house several nights before.

I looked to Frankie. She pursed her lips and motioned for me to go to the back door.

“Yeah . . . yeah, you can uh . . . meet me in the back.”

I turned on my heels and made my way to the back, every muscle in my body tense from my face to my toes. I pushed open the door, and Weston stepped inside. We stood alone in the storage room, with harsh fluorescent lighting making me look as horrible as possible, surrounded by boxes of syrup and toppings, and the weird smell from the drain wafting in the air. He didn’t say anything at first, and my eyes drifted, targeting everything in the room except him, while I waited for him to speak.

“I’m a dick,” he said, his eyebrows pulling in.

“What?”

“I’m worse than a dick. I’m a coward. I should have said something a long time ago. When you stood up to Erin, it just … gave me my balls back I guess. They’re so damn mean, and I didn’t want any of that directed at me, but . . . they’re girls. They’re teenage girls, and I’m ashamed that I’ve been too intimidated to say anything. Especially to Brady. What kind of asshole lets an asshole like that speak to a woman the way he speaks to you? I hated it. I’ve hated it for years, and I just tried to ignore it.”

I shook my head. Brady, Brendan, and the Erins had said a few things to me that week, but nothing out of the ordinary. I wasn’t sure what had Weston so riled up. “It’s okay. I don’t expect you to . . .”

“I know you don’t. I’ve been thinking about this all week. All month. I’m not going to let them, or anyone else, treat you like that anymore.” I wasn’t sure what look I had on my face, but Weston suddenly seemed nervous. “What?”

“I don’t know . . . I mean . . . you still haven’t said why?”

He sighed. “I know. We’re two months away from grad, and they’ve been torturing you since grade school. I can’t go back, but I can make it up to you.”

“That’s it? That’s your reason? You suddenly grew a conscience?”

He winced. “Ouch.”

I crossed my arms. “Frankie has a long line out there, so let’s get to the point. You’re like a different person. You’ve turned against all of your friends and are hanging out with me, who you’ve barely spoken to since kindergarten. I think it’s fair for me to ask why.”

“I’ve talked to you as much as I could.”

“As you could?”

He coughed into the crook of his arm. “That’s not what I meant.”

“I don’t need you to save me, Weston. I’ve handled things on my own for a long time. I’m not a charity case.”

He frowned. “I never said you were.”

“We’d both probably be better off if you just returned to life as normal, and left me alone.”

He winced, like my words had physically hurt him. “That’s bullshit. You don’t really feel that way, do you?”

“I don’t know how I feel!”

“Neither do I!” he said, wheezing. He pulled his inhaler from his pocket and took a puff. After a few moments, he began again, this time calmer. “I don’t know what I want to do with the rest of my life. And I feel like . . . I feel like you’re the only person in the world that doesn’t expect me to. What I do know is that I wasn’t happy about the direction my life was going until you got into my truck that first night. I don’t know what the hell I’m doing, Erin. I’m just . . . I’m winging it. I was kinda hoping you would wing it with me.”

Despite every negative thought running through my head, my lips curved up.

He slowly pulled me against his chest and hugged me. His muscles were both soft and hard. My head fit perfectly beneath his chin. We stood like that for what seemed like a long while. He smelled like sweat, but the good kind of sweat. He could have smelled like the weird stuff that was fermenting in the floor drain, and I still would have liked it.

“I better get back up there,” I said, my cheek still against his chest. He was a whole head taller than my five foot three inches, and I was glaringly aware of his fingers on my back, wrapping around to the side of my ribs. We had never been this close, even though I’d imagined what it must have felt like many times before.

He pulled away. “I’ll see you later?”

“I have homework.”

“Bring it with you.”

I tucked my hair behind my ear. “I guess I can do that. If you leave me alone and let me finish.”

“You won’t even know I’m there.”

He pushed through the door, and when it slammed behind him, I ran to the front, nearly smacking Frankie in the face with the swinging door.

Weston jogged to his truck, climbed in, and sped off, pausing for only a moment before pulling out onto Main Street.

Frankie watched me expectantly.

I shrugged.

“So he’s your knight in shining armor, now?” she asked.

My face screwed up into disgust. “No. I told him I don’t need to be saved. And you should already know that about me by now.”

She smirked. “But it’s kinda nice to be defended.”

I tried not to smile, but lately it was impossible not to.

“I like him,” Frankie said. “And so do you. But in a completely different way.”

I made a face. “You have a vivid imagination.”

“You’re different since he started hangin’ around.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” I said, rolling my eyes and reaching for the closest rag.

“Well, you don’t hate him.”

I scrubbed the sink without actually paying attention to what I was doing. “Not today.”

~*~

When we closed the Dairy Queen and walked out the back door, the red pickup wasn’t parked in the back. It wasn’t anywhere.

“I thought y’all had plans?” Frankie asked.

I shrugged.

“Ride?”

I shook my head and walked home. My hand touched the handle on our dirty screen door. I waited for the sound of his engine, but heard nothing. Soul Asylum drifted through the walls, and I was glad. If I was going to be stood up by Weston, I didn’t want to have to deal with Gina, too.

I pushed through the door and headed straight back to my room. It felt lonelier than usual. A loud knocking came from the front door, and I rolled my eyes, assuming it was one of Gina’s friends or her dealer, coming over to party. A few seconds later, Gina appeared in my doorway, her heavy mascara was smeared, the whites of her eyes bright red and glassy. She was still in her supermarket apron and her name badge was hanging crooked from her white polo shirt.

“It’s for you.” Her face mirrored my confusion.

I nodded and stood up, walking into the front room. I stopped in the middle of the carpet. Weston was standing in the front doorway, his hands in the pockets of his letterman jacket. The body of the coat was maroon-dyed wool, and a big Chenille B was stitched to the left side, outlined in white. Weston’s jacket was almost too busy with everything he’d lettered in during his high school career, especially with the numerous patches on his leather sleeves. I’d never wanted a letterman, and it was weird to see someone wearing one in my living room.

Gina stood next to me, gawking at him. She scratched her arm and nodded toward him. “Who is he?”