My heart felt like it wanted to burst out of my chest, my body betraying me with every breath, every damned beat of my heart. What the hell? What was wrong with me? I’d never had a reaction like this to any guy—even David Hall, who I’d dated during most of my junior year and had finally lost my virginity to on prom night. We had a horrible break-up, including him calling me an obsessed, crazy bitch in front of our algebra class, a fight that continued out in the hallway where I told him every time we’d ever had sex, I’d been thinking about Tyler Vincent.
Which, of course, just served to prove him right.
But this feeling, whatever it was, this dizzy, soaring, sick-to-my-stomach feeling, I hadn’t ever experienced it with any guy I’d ever dated or had even been attracted to.
Tyler Vincent aside, of course.
That’s it. It’s because he looks like Tyler!
I was just transferring my feelings for him to this imitation sitting beside me! Relieved, I went back to sketching, even if my palms were still sweaty and my breathing far too shallow, at least I had worked out an explanation for my body’s response. It wasn’t my fault. It was like Pavlov’s dogs responding to a bell. Tyler Vincent made my body react this way. It made sense a look-alike might get the same response.
My stomach growled loudly, reminding me of the lunch I hadn’t eaten. Carrie had obviously interrupted my fry-stealing far before I was full enough to get through to the end of the day. That, too, could have explained the slightly sick, dizzy feeling I was experiencing. In fact, I was sure it was mostly that. I’d been shoving a granola bar in my purse in the morning to eat after lunch, but of course that morning I’d woken up late and had forgotten.
Growwwwwwwwwrrrrreeeerrrrrrlllll.
My stomach sounded like a beached whale and I sank down further in my seat, thankful Woodall was still going on—and on and on—quite loudly about his disappointment in our performance and his plans for correcting our shortcomings as a class. If it had been yesterday, when the whole class was quietly taking the “pop quiz,” my stomach would have interrupted everyone like Moby Dick looking for Ahab.
Greeeeeeeeeooooowwwwrrrrrrrrlllll.
That one sounded more like a distraught cat—Garfield lamenting a missing lasagna perhaps. Lasagna! Now I was really hungry. Mortified, I sank even further in my seat. I was going to be drawing under the table if I got much lower.
“Hungry?” Dale’s breath was warm on my cheek when he leaned in to whisper his question. I smelled a combination of spearmint and Polo cologne.
I didn’t look at him, vehemently shaking my head, cheeks burning. I expected him to leave me alone, but he didn’t move, and I realized, too late, he was looking over my shoulder.
“Nice drawing.”
I snapped my notebook closed, tossing it on the table and crossing my arms over my stomach. It wouldn’t stop rumbling. Loudly. Dale leaned back in his chair again, straightening his long legs and digging into his jeans pocket. I looked at the clock and saw it was only one-fifteen—forty-five minutes left. Now I really did feel faint.
I glanced over at the crinkle of Dale opening whatever he’d taken out of his pocket. Skittles. We weren’t supposed to eat in class. He popped a few into his mouth, cocking his head at me and tilting the red plastic package in my direction.
“Want some?”
I shook my head, concentrating on looking straight ahead like Mr. Woodall was the only thing in the room but my stomach growled so loudly the two girls sitting at the table next to us giggled and pointed. I ignored them, feeling Dale shift in his chair, leaning forward to put one yellow Skittle on the edge of the table right in front of me. I ignored that too, watching Mr. Woodall waving our pop quizzes around like a madman, still on a rampage.
It was just a piece of candy, a little bit of sugar-coated lemon-flavor decorated with an “S” sitting there looking sweet and delicious and mocking the hell out of me. I resisted, watching Dale out of the corner of my eye, his jaw working as he ate another handful of Skittles. My stomach growled again, not just a noise this time, but an actual, gripping pain.
I grabbed the piece of candy off the table and popped it into my mouth, lemon flavor bursting on my tongue, savoring the sugary sweetness, but it was gone far too soon. Next to me, Dale leaned forward again, this time putting a green Skittle on the table, but not directly in front of me. This time it was six inches to the right of where he’d put the first one—six inches closer to him.
I turned my head to look at him and saw him smiling, still chewing Skittles. Damn that smile. It was infectious. I smiled back, unable to stop myself. He nodded toward the candy as if to say, “Go on,” so I did, popping it into my mouth and chewing blissfully. My stomach was actually protesting even louder now, clamoring for more.
Dale put a red one up, another six inches closer to him, and I didn’t hesitate this time, grabbing and eating it quickly. I loved the red ones. He raised his eyebrows under that shock of dark hair, reaching into the bag and putting another red one up, but we’d progressed far enough across the table this one was directly in front of him. I would have to reach across him to get it.
He jerked his head toward it, that same motion, “Go on,” but I hesitated to lean so far into his personal space. He just watched me struggle, pouring more Skittles into his hand and popping them into his mouth, chewing them up while he waited. Finally, I reached over his lap, leaning in to sweep the piece of candy into my hand, when Dale caught me.
I looked up, surprised, meeting his eyes, and then down at our hands, his thumb and forefinger encircling my wrist. I couldn’t breathe. All the air had escaped my lungs. I might as well have been on the moon for all the air I could manage to take in. I couldn’t do anything but watch him turn my hand over and pry my fingers open, where the piece of candy was already leaving a red stain because my hands were so damp.
Dale touched the red spot, rubbing it into the skin at the center of my palm, a sensation that sent electric shockwaves through me, as if that one tiny spot on my hand was connected to every nerve ending in my body. I watched as he put his finger in his mouth, sucking off sweetness, lips puckered like a kiss, eyes never leaving mine. It was the first time I noticed they were blue, not hazel like his rock star look-alike’s. They were a deep, bottomless ocean blue, a bright, sun-on-the-water, blinding sort of blue, and there was so much revealed there I found myself torn between not being able to look away and feeling like I couldn’t hold his gaze for one more second.
Then he took the Skittles package and tipped it over, spilling a rainbow into my palm. He closed my hand over the myriad of colorful candies, letting me go with that same motion of his head. “Go on.” I smiled, opening my hand and looking down at the already melting little bits of sweetness he’d offered. My head argued with my body, telling me I should eat them like a girl, one-by-one, draw it out, tease him, make it sexy and fun and even a little erotic because—well, even I couldn’t deny there was something going on here, some sort of attraction, even if it was just my Pavlovian response to his Tyler Vincentness.
Instead, my body won—somehow my body always won—and I opened my mouth wide, probably looking like a snake unhinging its jaw but too hungry to care, shoving all of the Skittles into my mouth at once and chewing them into a mass of indistinguishable flavor, just pure sugar, glorious energy, my brain lighting up as I looked at him, thanking him with my eyes. There were so many Skittles in my mouth I felt like a chipmunk.
He grinned, tilting the package at me again, but I shook my head, licking the traces of the rainbow off my palm in a very embarrassing but unavoidable way. He tilted the package back, spilling Skittles into his mouth, chewing with me.
Then he leaned over with his fruity breath and whispered, “Hi Sara.”
I startled, head snapping toward him, eyes narrowing. How did he know my name? He tapped my notebook, sitting closed on the desk, but I had doodled on the front—I doodled on everything—a little heart with an arrow and “Sara loves Tyler” scrawled in the middle. I flushed, grabbing my notebook and turning it over, realizing there were just as many Tyler doodles on the back as there were on the front. I felt him shaking with silent laughter beside me when I opened my notebook to a blank page, leaving it on the desk that way.
“Can I ask you something?” His voice low in my ear, not touching me but so close I felt his body heat.
“You just did.” I glanced up at Woodall, heaping more abuse on the poor periodic table up front. He was randomly calling on people to identify elements—something he claimed we should all already know—and I knew I’d better pay attention before he randomly called on me.
“She speaks!”
I gave him a withering look. Behind him, the Flashdance twins mocked me with big eyes, pretending to lick their palms, batting their eyelashes. Frowning, I crossed my arms over my chest and turned my attention back to the front of the room, where it should have been all along, I reminded myself, if I ever wanted to graduate and get the hell out of this town.
“You like Tyler Vincent?” Dale nodded toward my notebook, leaning back in his chair again to shove the Skittles packet back into his jeans pocket.
I shook my head, feeling a rush of heat in my cheeks, knowing exactly how red and blotchy that made me look but unable to help it. I couldn’t believe I’d just denied my adoration for Tyler Vincent. Who was I? What was wrong with me? But of course he knew—he’d seen my drawing, plus all the doodles of hearts and flowers and the adolescent practicing of signing with Tyler’s surname instead of my own—Sara Elizabeth Vincent.
“I hear he’s coming to the Silverdome in December.”
I nodded. Okay so I couldn’t deny it, that much was clear. Besides, why did I want to? There was no shame in being a Tyler Vincent fan. He had lots of them. Millions of them. So why was I blushing like a school girl?
“You going?”
I nodded again. Aimee and I had plans to camp out for tickets, like we always did, determined to get closer than thirteenth row, which was the closest we’d ever been, even in spite of being the very first in line on the day Ticketmaster began selling tickets.
“Is there a problem, young lady?” Woodall’s pointer was pointing right at me.
“No.” I straightened in my seat, putting my feet on the floor.
“Good.” He glanced between me and Dale, lips pursed. Then he slapped the periodic table with his pointer. “Then perhaps you could identify this element for me?”
I stared at the big K on the chart and the only science word I could think of was “Kelvin” which was a unit of temperature, not an element. K? What in the hell did K stand for?
“Kryptonite?” I croaked and the whole class cracked up. My face was on fire.
Dale leaned in, closer this time. I felt his nose brush my hair as he whispered into my ear, “Potassium.”
“No, Miss Wilson. Krypton is over here.” He slapped the periodic table with his pointer. “Kryptonite only exists in comic books.”
I looked at Dale suspiciously, doubtful, but I said it anyway. “Potassium. It’s potassium.”