Madison

People stare at me now. It's an instant thing. I still feel his lips on my cheek, and I squirm in my desk thinking of what they felt like, what they would feel like other places.

I've never felt like I was on fire before Asher.

Now I don't know how to put it out, besides the obvious solutions.

The only thing that gets me to shake off the way his hands felt, the way he tasted, is thinking about the look on his face when he dropped me off at the trailer.

Half of me, maybe more, didn't expect him to talk to me anymore. He sees I don't put out, and he had the misfortune to see how I live, up close and too personal for me, and I didn't think he'd bother with me anymore.

That same part thought he gave his number as his last bit of charity, so I didn't use it, even though I wanted to.

Now I know what people mean in the songs and the books where they wonder when they should call, if it's too soon or too late. I get it.

And I did want to talk to him. I wanted to use him to make me feel clean again, instead of feeling the ghost of Beau's hands on my back.

I can't be there anymore. It's not safe. I don't think it ever was, but he's after me now in a way he wasn't before. He hasn't been around all that long, but when I was younger, a year and a half ago or so, he started to notice me, or at least that's when I started to catch him.

But now that I'm eighteen, Beau is acting like I'm open season, and my mother hasn't noticed a thing.

I spent time with Ashlyn last night trying to have safety in our numbers before they left for the night.

They didn't offer us the dinner. Ashlyn didn't want their company and they didn't press us for ours.

I don't recognize my life much anymore, the good or the bad bits.

The classes pass one after the other, and other than the whispers around me, there isn't anything new. I suppose getting walked into class by Asher Brent is reason for pause. I guess when I hadn't so much as talked to any boys besides Mike before now at this school, not really, there's a reason why everyone seems to care.

I see Mike on my way to the lobby. He's with his friends. They're all quiet, smart, some with harder edges than others.

He smiles and leaves the wall he was leaning against to walk with me.

"Hello, hello," he says, his voice easy and full of energy.

"Hey."

"Where's Ashlyn?" he asks, looking around.

"Off with her friends, I suppose. They'll have her cheering before she even realizes what she's doing," I say, knowing it's true.

Ashlyn is a freshman here, but everyone knows her already. I've been here three years plus, and the most I'm known for being is her sister.

It doesn't bother me because I don't want the attention, not usually, but having it now, it's a strange thing.

"Want to get lunch?" he asks, and I pause. Do I tell him I'm eating lunch with Asher? Do I tell him it's just for tutoring? It's a lie I can tell him and myself.

"Can't. Meeting with Asher." I don't explain more because I don't know how to frame it.

He scratches his ear and lets out a breath of air.

"Can I talk you out of it?"

"Do you feel you need to?"

"Yeah, I do. They're all not good people."

"He's different," I say, and I know it's true. He didn't need to open up to me, but he did. He acts big and bad, but he's not how I thought he was.

"They always are until the charm rubs off. Then you're left wondering what you did."

"It's not like that."

"Madison--"

"Can we not? I feel like I'm on a repeating loop of having this conversation. I'm tutoring him. We're friends. If I want us to be more, if we both do, we might try it, but it's not worth a fight, not with you, not with anyone else. It's too new to warrant all of this."

He squares his shoulders and nods. "Okay. Okay, but when you need me, you let me know."

"I will," I say, and I walk to the closest bathroom. All of a sudden everyone wants to save me, but I can handle myself.

The bathroom is just about empty when I walk in. Loren Tanner is there, fixing her cherry engine red lipstick in the mirror.

I wish I was half as confident as she is. She's a bigger girl, all curves and coke bottle shapes, but she doesn't apologize for it like I do. She owns it.

I catch her eye in the mirror and she smiles as she wipes a slight smudge. She puckers with a pop noise and faces me head on, as she leans against the bathroom mirror.

"Well, hello," she says. We're not friends, but we're friendly. She's new too, much newer, but you wouldn't know it by talking to her.

"Hi," I say, tucking a stray strand behind my ear.

"A little bird told me you're with my cousin now."

"Asher Brent is your cousin?"

"Don't advertise it, but yeah a second or third." She turns back to the mirror and touches the liner under her eye, wiping some off before digging in her oversized red purse. "So it's true then?"

"I don't know what you're heard."

"That he's all over you? That y'all were making out before first period?"

"No, not true. It's not like that."

"He didn't kiss you."

I don't respond immediately.

She laughs. "Knew it. Well good for him."

"Most people would say good for me."

"Most people are shit for brains. Especially 'round here." She stops playing with the makeup and glances at me in the mirror. "No offense."

"I'm not from here either."

"That's right."

"I better go. I'm supposed to be meeting him for lunch." I turn to leave.

"Before you do, there's a party this weekend. Nothing major, but it's not like there's anything else going on here. You should go."

"I'm not sure."

"He'll be there. He'd want you there. The fact he hasn't asked you himself means he's chicken shit and you should probably just go without him, but I'm not one to interfere." She smirks. "Not too much anyway. You can be my plus one."

"I'll think about it."

Loren takes out a scrap of paper from her bag and writes her number in liner on the back before handing it to me.

I don't hesitate in taking it, but I'm a little surprised. It must show on my face too, because she laughs at me. It's light and good hearted from the sounds of it, but my cheeks warm all the same.

"Thank you," I say, not knowing what else to add.

"Relax. I don't bite. Not until we're good and friendly, and only if I really like you," she says with a smile.

I laugh at that, wondering more about Loren and the secrets she's holding.

She packs up all of the things she has scattered around the bathroom counter and saunters off towards the door.

"Party. Direct order now. Don't disappoint me," she says, and slips out of the door like she didn't just make my life more interesting.