Presently Perfect (Perfect #3) by Alison G. Bailey

made her cry. The only thing that mattered was that she needed to be held and I needed to be the one to hold her. We shared another first that night. Swaying back and forth in each other’s arms, I sang “Everything” in her ear while we had our first dance.
    For the rest of our sophomore year things gradually got better between us. We started to hang out more. She continued to want our old friendship back while I still wanted to move into new territory. We hovered in this weird holding pattern up until our junior year.
    I made the decision to move on with a fake it till you make it game plan, so I started going on dates with random girls. None of them turned into anything serious. I tried to act interested, but there always came a point when the girl was talking, that all I heard was blah , blah, blah . It was impossible getting to know someone when your heart wasn’t in it. Being that there was only one girl who truly held my interest and heart, I abandoned the idea of new and shiny, trading it in for familiar and convenient.
    Beth had never made it a secret that she wanted more than a friendship with me. A couple of months into our junior year, we were invited to the same party that John Murphy, one of the senior baseball players, was having at his house. I had spent a week trying to convince Tweet to go but she kept refusing as usual. This party was the first one I had been to where the alcohol flowed freely and openly.
    I arrived at John’s in less than a partying mood, having just come from Tweet’s, making one last-ditch attempt to get her to come. I wasn’t a big drinker. Travis and I had tried some of his parents’ stash one weekend when they were out of town and his grandmother was staying at their house. She was out like a light by 8 p.m. and we broke out the beer ten minutes later. We both got buzzed, but I had never been completely drunk until that night at the party. I spent the entire time drinking beer, watching couples make out, and not listening to whoever sat next to me on the sofa. Beth wasn’t drinking so she offered to drive me home.
    She walked me onto my front porch and leaned me against the door while searching my pockets for my keys. I was drunk, lonely, and horny. I needed to feel soft hands slide up my chest and snake behind my neck. I needed to feel warm lips pressed against mine. I needed to feel wanted by someone, even if it was the wrong one. With the dim light of the front porch and her dark hair, the girl in front of me could pass for my girl. Placing my index finger under her chin, I tilted Beth’s head back. Lowering my lips to hers, my eyes closed, and I imagined touching soft curves, the smell of raspberries, and teal eyes.
    It’s been a month since that night when I started using Beth in an attempt to move on with my life. A year had passed since that day in Tweet’s room when she first pushed me away. For an entire year, I’ve been kidding myself that she’d come to her senses and finally give us a chance. I knew what I was doing was wrong. I didn’t want to hurt Beth. She genuinely liked me and wanted to make me happy. But even after a month of countless hookup sessions the only part of me that reacted to her was my body.
    Beth reached around to unclasp her bra while at the same time leaned forward trying to kiss me. She teetered back and forth a few times before her lips and teeth crashed into mine. A deep groan flew from the back of my throat. Clutching her hips, I quickly lifted her off of my lap and placed her in the passenger’s seat.
    “I got it unhooked now,” she said eagerly.
    “I think you bit my lip. Is my lip bleeding?” Hooking up with Beth was clunky at best and a little hazardous.
    She craned her neck toward me. “No it’s not bleeding.” Shifting in her seat, she crawled back on top of me.
    I grabbed her shoulders, gave her a weak smile, and said, “I gotta get home and study.”
    “Are you kidding me? You didn’t have to study a few minutes