Just You by Rebecca Phillips Page B

his name, at least.
    It was cold inside the car. I shivered,
pulling the sleeves of my jacket over my hands. Michael shook off
his pensive mood and reached for me, folding me against his warm
chest. Getting close wasn’t an easy feat with those annoying bucket
seats and the gearshift between us, so after a few minutes of
awkward fumbling, we moved to the back. There, in the shadows cast
by the streetlights, we kissed until cold was no longer an
issue.
    When we came up for air a while later, a
question I’d had no intention of ever asking popped out of my mouth
like it had a mind of its own. “Why didn’t you go out with Elena
Brewster?”
    “What?” He was gazing at my lips, still
distracted.
    “Elena Brewster.” I pulled back a little.
“She’s asked you out before, right?”
    “A while ago.”
    “And you said no? Why?” I guess I found it
hard to grasp how anyone could say no to someone like her. She was
viciously determined. I knew that much from watching her try to
flirt with Michael—while simultaneously glaring at me—every time we
were in her presence. And it bothered me. The flirting and the glaring.
    “I just don’t like her,” Michael said with a
small shrug. “She’s a…well, she’s not a nice person. And she’s
fake.”
    “She’s also beautiful.”
    He held my face in his palms. Even though he
hadn’t eaten any cinnamon mints lately, he still smelled like them.
“ You are beautiful.”
    “Not like Elena…and Robin…and most of the
girls you hang around with.”
    “No…” Michael said, and before I had time to
wonder if I should feel insulted, he kissed me again. When he
backed away a few minutes later, he finished his sentence. “You’re
beautiful like you .”
    Gulp. He certainly didn’t make it easy for
me to behave myself. I could finally understand what Ms. Winters,
my sex ed. teacher last year, had meant when she lectured us about
the overwhelming power of hormones. Kissing Brian had been nice,
but sometimes, right in the middle of making out with him, I’d
start thinking about other things, like song lyrics or who would
get evicted this week on my favorite reality show. With Michael,
however, all I thought about while kissing him was how I wanted
more of him. I could never get close enough.
    But, as it turned out, Michael had the
self-control of a monk and I was the one who always ended up
feeling frustrated. I knew my inexperience made him a little
nervous, but I still hadn’t anticipated having to actually talk him
into things.
    Later, after we’d finally shoehorned our
bodies apart, he said, “We should probably talk about this.”
    “I agree.” I shifted away from him and
adjusted my clothes, giving us both some much-needed space. I
couldn’t think straight as long as I was near him, breathing in his
cinnamony scent.
    “I don’t want to pressure you into
anything,” he said, leaning back against the seat. “And I’m not
just talking about this, right now. I really like you. I know
you’re not ready for anything serious after what happened to you
last time and that’s fine with me, but…” He took a deep breath. “I
don’t want to go out with anyone else. Just you.”
    Even in the face of the blinding fear I felt
at that moment, I couldn’t help but melt a little. Just you .
They were the perfect words, even if they weren’t entirely true. Or
realistic. Brian had wanted “just me” too, at first.
    “You know,” I said, smiling, “I think I was the one who did the pressuring.”
    He laughed. “You can’t take all the blame.
Sometimes I forget you’re younger. I have to keep reminding
myself.”
    I nodded. Obviously, I had to keep reminding
myself of certain things too.
     
    ****
     
    The next day, as I was in my room packing to
go back home, something almost equally as scary happened. My wicked
stepsister appeared in the open doorway.
    “Hey,” she said, all nonchalant, as if she
moseyed on in to my room all the time.
    I froze holding a pair