“You guys would make a cute couple,” I say, and I squeeze her arm to emphasize it. “I just mean he used to be so little, I didn’t even recognize him.”
“Right?” She resumes squiggling on my pant leg.
Back in the youth room, I sit in the front row. I need time to think about God. To sing and remind myself how much I love Him. To remember His faithfulness to me back in seventh grade. The ways He totally took care of me when no one else did. And my single simple promise I made back, not because I had to, but because I wanted to.
By the end of worship, it’s a no-brainer. God has given Jake to be my friend and maybe Kelly’s boyfriend. As soon as I hear the final “Amen,” I stand to exit, but Kelly’s hand finds mine.
“Kel, I gotta jet,” I say.
“You can hang for two seconds. Let’s just make sure he feels welcome.”
I look over at Jake, and there are at least two guys and four girls already talking with him.
“He looks like he’s doing fine.”
But she’s already pulling me, weaving in and out of teens and chairs and trash cans full of empty chip bags and Capri Suns. I recognize Dave among them, leaning on a table, strumming his guitar. He’s not on the worship team or anything. He just likes to bring his guitar everywhere.
“—so bummed you’re not at Mira Costa High,” one of the girls (Carrie, I think) says.
“My aunt lives closer to the 405,” Jake says. “So it was either Hawthorne or the charter.”
“Ooh, Hawthorne High,” Dave says, and there’s a collective wince from the group. “Yeah, definitely the charter.”
The charter? As in Maritime Academy?
“Hey, Lovette goes there,” Dave says as he sees me. “She could show you around.”
Wait, no.
“Jake, this is Kelly,” I say quickly, then add, “She—”
“I remember you from Fire,” Kelly jumps in, releasing my hand to shake his.
“Oh, right!” He gives her a friendly handshake, but he glances at me, and I wonder if he remembers her. “Hey, how are you?”
“Same. I mean, not same since then, but, you know, nothing much. You?”
Oh boy, she’s nervous. I should help. “Kelly goes to Maritime too. She also attends this poetry thing on Tuesday nights at this coffee shop.” He looks from me to her. “It’s a great way to meet people,” I add.
“Yeah,” Dave says, plucking his guitar. “It’s cool. I’ve played some of my songs there.”
“Kelly can tell you the details,” I say, nudging her forward. “I’ve gotta go.”
“Stay,” Kelly pleads.
“I’m on my bike, and—”
“But you always stay for at least fifteen.”
I back out and wave. “I know, but I’ve gotta hurry.”
Jake says, “One of those days again?”
I see him grinning at me with that dimple, and I laugh, and he laughs, and then I realize we have our first inside joke. “Yeah, something like that.”
I take the stairs two at a time to my bike and pedal down the long driveway before anyone’s made it back to the parking lot. Maybe I should’ve given him my number or a place to meet at school where I can show him around. But that all feels wrong as I picture the look in Kelly’s eyes when she saw him. My feelings feel like sin and not sin at the same time. Dark blurs of trees and houses whiz by, and I look up at the night sky. Clouds cover the moon tonight, and I try to pray but everything feels jumbled, so I settle on one word. Help?
Chapter Five
I sleep okay, but I wake up a lot. I thought I’d get through all four years of high school without ever liking a guy. I mean, I prayed for that. And a guy my best friend called dibs on? Luckily, it’s only been a couple of days of these weird new feelings. It can’t be from God.
God says to look at the heart, and I’ve looked at Jake’s face. I know nothing about him, which means my attraction’s physical. Or is it? What was that something I felt—that something that went beyond his dimple and easy smile? The way he felt so comfortable in his skin, how that made me want to be around him. What’s that called? Or the way he paid attention to people when they talked, even Dave when he mentioned his guitar songs. Like you could share stuff with him and he’d instantly be in your corner. Or how he wasn’t just polite but engaging to Kelly, though I’m almost positive he didn’t remember her. What are those things?
Today at school, I keep expecting to see him during passing period. Our school isn’t big. But so far, he hasn’t been in the halls or in any of my classes.
“Nice shirt,” Cecilia Grayson says to me as she walks by my desk to borrow the teacher’s stapler. She says it like she means the opposite, like I’ve ruined her day, her hair, and her life by wearing it.
I look down at my favorite vintage tee. It’s a red shirt with the word Lifeguard on the front, a cross underneath, and below that, the words Mine walks on water. Most of us growing up on the beach were Junior Guards, so I think it’s perfect to wear a Jesus shirt that’s relevant. Especially after last night’s small group about school evangelizing. God wants people to know Him, and it’s not like I’m banging a Bible on people’s heads or screaming “Turn or burn!” with a megaphone at our pep rallies. I’m just wearing clothes, which everyone does. And, besides, I never comment on Cecilia’s soccer sweats and how much they swish-swish when she walks, even in noisy hallways.
She’s probably mad because her boyfriend and I were Junior Guards growing up, and maybe my shirt reminded her. Trevor Walker and I surfed at pretty much the same level then. He’s the top surfer at Mira Costa now, and once in tenth grade I ran into them at the Manhattan Beach Creamery. I hadn’t seen him in years, and when he recognized me, he gave me a high five like I had just gotten tubed by a wave. Then he fixed his hair in case our hand slap had moved it. I remember Cecilia’s eyes and the way they narrowed to slits and she gripped her waffle cone when I told Trevor that I went to the same school as she did. That was over a year ago, and she’s been a brat to me ever since. I know God reminds me, “It’s Me they hate, not you,” but her words still sting. Sorry, God.
I’m probably oversensitive right now because of this in-class assignment that people like Cecilia are already finished with. And stapling! Which means she wrote multiple pages.
I look down at my blank paper and then back at the whiteboard, where today’s assignment smirks at me: Write about your passion. Must give examples! One page minimum, due at the bell. HW: textbook 1–30, complete sentences.