Here are a few that come to mind:
1. College isn’t what I thought it would be. For some stupid reason, I thought college would be a different kettle of fish, but it’s the same old high school bullshit, but on a larger scale. Everyone wants to know where the party is at. There are the same cliché cliques. Since I’m on a soccer scholarship, I didn’t really get to choose my clique. And this fraternity shit is for the birds. Screw college. I vote we go back to the days of mentors and apprenticeships when a record time doing a keg stand or a beer pong win isn’t a guy’s crowning level of achievement.
2. I like sex way too much. I am obsessed with making a girl come in every way. That gasp that leaves her lips when I touch and tease those spots she aches for—it’s like a fucking drug. I want it more and more until I hear her scream out my name. But my relationships get way too intense…until we start trying the other parts that aren’t so physical. I really do try to connect with girls on a deeper level, but it never works, and then we end up going back to what I do best, until she finds someone else she does connect with and she breaks it off with me. Sometimes I get the late-night booty calls when things don’t work out. I’m Mr. Rebound, because they know nothing more than good sex will come of us in the end. I hate it. And I hate myself when I cave into it.
3. The only person who’s ever come close to seeing me for who I really am? Tabitha, my frigging little sister’s best friend. I was eighteen, and she was fifteen. Completely off-limits. Jailbait. Not to mention I’d known the kid since she was seven. I knew she had a little crush by the way she used to stare at me. I figured it was some pubescent stage when your hormones are completely out of whack, and I just happened to be the guy she saw the most. But what she wrote in her diary…it floored me. What fifteen-year-old thinks like that? And how did she see all that when my own girlfriend at the time didn’t have a clue? I wanted to ask her that day. I wanted to know what else she saw, but I avoided her like the plague. The age difference. The fact that I call her parents “aunt and uncle”—our parents aren’t actually related, but still, the whole thing had “creepy” written all over it. I had to be the adult and draw the line, so I did.
After today, she’ll officially become an adult. Eighteen. A senior in high school, and from what I hear, she’s already preparing for college. If we still talked, I’d tell her to stay away from frat parties and crack a book instead. To do all that corny RA stuff they have planned, like dorm movie nights and ice cream socials. And, if she drinks, to make sure she trusts the people she’s with and to have each other’s backs. Don’t do shots or skip classes. To read for pleasure, not just for school. And if she dates, to find herself a guy who knows what the hell he wants out of life and hasn’t changed his major three times, like me.
3
Officially an Adult
One Month Later
Tabitha
I pressed my lips tighter together, but Derek’s tongue poked inside my mouth, tasting like a mix of peppermint and the roast beef sandwich he had for lunch. I counted the seconds as my tongue swirled around his.
One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi, four…
On seven, we finally pulled apart, and I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. His lips shined from my gloss. I’d hoped my new choice in lipstick would deter him, but no go.
“Text me later, babe.” Derek side-smiled and grabbed my ass before whipping his head toward Paige and her boyfriend, Bryant. “Hey, you guys about done? We have practice.”
Bryant and Paige were in another dimension as far as relationships went. Their kisses weren’t messy or awkward. They looked exactly like a kissing couple should—endlessly connected and shielded from the rest of the world, completely and utterly in love. I wanted to experience a kiss like that so badly.
Paige thought about trying to get me to hook up with his twin brother, Luke, but he and Bryant were complete opposites and barely acted like brothers, let alone friends.
Plus the fact that they were identical would’ve been weird.
Derek let out an exaggerated sigh before Bryant and Paige finally broke apart.
Bryant cupped her cheek and smiled as he looked deep into her eyes. “Love you, baby.”
Paige smiled, not taking her eyes from his. “I love you, too.” She smacked his ass. “Get a touchdown pass for me.”
“For you, I’ll get three.”
She giggled, and Derek rolled his eyes as he tugged on Bryant’s jersey from behind. “Come on, Romeo, before Coach has a conniption. I’m not running extra drills for being late on account of your ass.”
I shoved icy mint gum into my mouth to get rid of Derek’s aftertaste, secretly wishing Bryant would teach his best friend how to kiss. I could break up with Derek, but I really did like him…kind of. Well, I didn’t not like him.
It made sense that we’d end up together. We were the third and fourth wheel when we went out with Paige and Bryant, so naturally, we had to keep each other entertained when the class couple got caught up and forgot we were there. Derek and I both liked movies and music—not the same kinds, but it was a start. He didn’t like reading, and I didn’t like video games, but it was okay since I read while he played. It worked. We worked.
“Ready to pick up our dresses?” Paige asked.
The blood drained from my face. Prom. The flyers and banners in our hallways served as a constant reminder, but somehow, the dresses made prom night even more real. The other thing that had me biting my nails more than usual was the promise I’d made to Derek.
In less than one week, I would be a virgin no longer.
He wanted to do it earlier, but I told him it was my dream to lose my virginity on my prom night, complete with rose petals spread over the bed. The part I left out? That I wanted Reed to be my first. That obviously wasn’t going to happen. Reed had barely looked my way once while home for semester breaks. In his eyes, I barely existed at all.
Paige stood in front of the mirror in a gold chiffon maxi dress. She twisted up her long, caramel-colored hair with one hand to show what it would look like done up. “What do you think?”
With her tanned skin and dark blue eyes—just like Reed’s—she was breathtaking. People always mistook her for a college girl. She had the air of a woman about her, while I still looked like a high school girl. I had curves, and my boobs had grown in, but my big brown eyes had innocent written all over them. Or maybe it was the fact that I was innocent and inexperienced, at least sexually. Well, maybe innocent was the wrong word. I had given a hand job once, but I had no idea what the hell I was doing, so Derek guided me with his own hand. I felt like I was sitting shotgun, and he had no intention of letting me take over the wheel. It was weird, to say the least, but I did learn something surprising: guys had hair down there, and a lot of it. In the few porn videos I’d seen before, guys had no hair at all around their manly parts.
“You look beautiful. That’s the perfect dress for you,” I said.