She hugged me and squealed in my ear. “I can’t believe this! Why are you just now telling me? First, he kisses you, and now you’re going on a date? This is—this is,” she shook her head. “I don’t even have words for what this is!”
“He kissed me so I’d get detention for PDA, Ken. It’s not like he kissed me because he wanted to.” That still kind of stung, but I was trying to get over it. Taggish had apologized, and I wasn’t one to hold a grudge. Besides, he’d been extremely polite every time I’d seen him the last couple of days, and I hadn’t heard a peep when he took out the garbage. He was making an effort.
“But you’re going on a date tonight. That has to count for something, right? Maybe you blew his socks off with that kiss, and now he wants another one.” She pumped her eyebrows up and down, her blue eyes sparkling with vicarious excitement. Except I wasn’t excited. My emotions about my plans later that evening were running more toward dread.
“Yeah, right.” I rolled my eyes. “And this isn’t a date. We’re just hanging out.” Please don’t ask why. Please don’t ask why.
“But why?”
I knew it was too much to ask. We were too close and rarely kept secrets from each other. Kennedy knew all about my dislike—previous dislike?—for Taggish.
Kennedy shifted on the lounger, and I moved my legs to make more room for her while deciding how much to tell her. I didn’t really want to explain everything Taggish and I had talked about the other night. It wasn’t that I didn’t think she would understand, I just felt like this was something I needed to do by myself.
Well, by myself with Taggish.
Which didn’t make any sense, or at least, it wouldn’t if I tried to explain it to Kennedy.
My best friend’s owlish eyes burned with hurt. Oh, no, I’d taken too long to answer. What could I do?
Kennedy pushed off the lounge and loomed above me. “Why can’t you just tell me the truth?”
I opened my mouth, prepared to tell her everything, but when the words spilled out, what I said wasn’t the truth at all.
“Fine! Fine! It is a date.” What was happening to me? First, detention and a deal with the devil. And now, lying to my best friend? “He asked, and I agreed as payback for kissing me the other day.”
Kennedy frowned. I could see she didn’t quite believe me. “Are you serious?”
It was my last chance to come clean, but I didn’t. “Yes. I plan to make his evening miserable, so I never have to deal with him again.” Actually, that was what I should have done instead of letting him talk me into a life of crime. Not crime, we’d agreed not to do anything illegal.
Kennedy’s expression settled into a disturbing mix of crestfallen pride. “Are you sure that’s what you want to do? Why not give him a chance? You might like him.”
There was no doubt. And if there was, the two paintings I’d done of him over the last few days would refute it. I hadn’t planned to paint him, but every time I sat down at my paint table, it just happened. The worst part was that I knew without showing them to anyone else for a second opinion, that they were the best work I’d ever done.
What did that mean?
“Look, this isn’t a big deal.” I settled back against the lounger and tilted my face toward the sun. “Taggish only asked me to hang out because he felt bad about the other day. And the only reason I accepted was because I want to make him feel bad about the other day. That’s all there is to it.”
Kennedy walked back over to the swing. “If you say so. But if it were me? I’d be trying to get him to kiss me again.”
Closing my eyes, I relived that moment for the thousandth time and thought Kennedy just might be right.
7
Mara
What was taking him so long?
It occurred to me once Kennedy had gone home that Taggish never told me what exactly we would be doing. Or when we would be doing it. As it turned out, I could have had a girl's night with Kennedy and avoided telling her anything about Taggish since it was well after ten o’clock when he finally showed up in his driveway and whistled outside my bedroom window.
“What are you doing?” I called down as softly as I could and still be heard.
“Aren’t we doing this? Change into dark clothes and come down.”
Dark clothes? I took a second to notice that Taggish, barely visible in the orange light from the streetlamp, wore a pair of black jogging pants and a black hoodie. What on earth were we going to do?
“What about my parents?” I asked.
Taggish just stared at me.
Right.
Oh, gosh. Was I really doing this? Sneaking out of my house and going with Taggish to do who knew what?
“Okay, give me a sec.”
He nodded and sank back into the shadows. I lowered my window and closed the curtain while my mind raced.
Black. Black. I needed something black to wear. I settled for a pair of dark skinny jeans and a forest green t-shirt. I put on a navy hooded jacket over the t-shirt and zipped it to my chin. The only pair of dark socks I owned were a pair of black trouser socks that went up to my knees under the skinny jeans.
Shoes. Shoes. Shoes. I broke out into a sweat, digging through the shoes at the bottom of my closet.
“Ouch!” I fell onto my butt and held my knee. I picked up a LEGO brick off the floor and hurled it across my room. Where had that come from? Then I remembered Mabel and Simon had brought the bucket from downstairs into my room a couple of weeks ago.
Yowzers, that hurt.
Taggish was waiting, and most of my shoes were sandals. Careful to watch where I kneeled, I crawled deeper into the recesses of my closet and unearthed a pair of black CROCs. I crawled back out and shoved my feet into the shoes. My hair, full of static from rustling around in my closet, tickled my face. I got to my feet and reached for the brush on my dresser. After getting out the tangles, I separated the strands into three sections and braided it loosely.
There. I was ready. But how to get past my parents? It was unlikely they were in bed. Most nights, Mom fell asleep on the couch downstairs while Dad watched a game on the television. If I could slip past them, they would go to bed without checking on me, especially if my lights were off.
I glanced at my bed and bit my lip. Before I could talk myself out of it, I stuffed one of my pillows under the comforter. It wasn’t much of a deception, but then I’d never given my parents reason to suspect me before. They wouldn’t start now.
The lights were off in the hall outside my room. I closed my door softly until the latch clicked into place. The stairs led straight down to the front door. The foyer was small with the tv room off to the side where I could only hope Dad dozed in his recliner.
If my parents didn’t hear me tiptoeing down the stairs, they would surely hear my heart pounding in my chest.
I should just go back to my room. I could tell Taggish I changed my mind. No one would know, except the two of us. There was still time to turn around.
I set my foot on the last step.
I didn’t have to do this.
Except I did.
As quietly as I could, I moved to the front door and reached for the knob. From the tv room, Dad’s snores almost drowned out the basketball game.