Total pages in book: 107
Estimated words: 97337 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 487(@200wpm)___ 389(@250wpm)___ 324(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 97337 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 487(@200wpm)___ 389(@250wpm)___ 324(@300wpm)
Somehow I made it through the next hour and a half without making an even bigger fool of myself, but the damage was done. There’s no way I’d ever try this again. My one foray into the unknown had been a total bust.
After the initial outburst the boys had settled down and not said another word about it, and the class was business as usual, but what were they thinking? It didn’t bear thinking about.
Once the evening was over I took my time gathering my stuff, waiting for everyone to leave before heading out the door. With my head down in my usual way I didn’t see the figure standing next to my car until I was almost there and saw the shadow from the streetlight.
My heart was in my lungs until Drake stepped into the light and then I felt my face heat with embarrassment. Was he laughing at me? Did he figure out somehow that I’d done this because of him? I sincerely hope not.
Just when I began to beg for the earth to open up and swallow me he walked towards me. “Are you okay?” I nodded my head, suddenly forgetting how to speak. “Don’t pay those guys any mind, they always act that way around gorgeous females. It won’t happen again.”
I picked my head up for a few seconds, surprised at his words, and was thankful for the darkness that hid my blush of pleasure. “It’s okay, kids will be kids.”
I stressed the word kids as kind of a protective measure, or more like to remind myself that he too was part of that number and that I should stop this now before it went too far.
But then his next words shocked me and had me wondering if there was a hidden meaning behind them. Confusing me the way I have been since meeting him.
“They’re not kids. We’re all the same age, eighteen.” I could tell his eyes were on me as he spoke but was too chicken to look at him again. Instead I walked around him to get to my car.
“Wait for me, I’ll follow you home.” He turned and walked a few cars down after waiting for me to get into my car and it never occurred to me to drive off. Maybe if I had that would’ve put an end to this whole fiasco.
Maybe I should’ve told him right then and there that there was no need and that would’ve nipped this whole thing in the bud… but I didn’t. Instead I sat in my car and waited for him to pull out behind me, feeling that tingle in my tummy again.
I don’t remember the drive home. What streets we took or even how long it took to get there. I just recall gripping the steering wheel as tightly as my first time getting into the driver’s seat of a car as a teen taking Driver’s Ed.
Once I arrived I had another dilemma. Should I walk back to his truck that was parked at the end of the short drive and thank him, or should I wave and call out a thank you? Anything was better than sitting there like a ninny while the poor boy sat in the late night waiting for me. He has class tomorrow.
The incongruity of that last thought had me jumping out of the car in haste. Just what do I think I’m doing? I turned and waved ready to make my escape. “Thank you, goodnight.” I barely got the words out.
“Go on inside, I’ll wait until I see your lights come on.” I hurried inside after that and rushed to the window, peeping out from behind the curtain to watch as his truck disappeared in the night. Then I sat on the edge of my bed trying to process all that had happened tonight.
For the next week and a half this same scenario played itself out, sans the embarrassing attention from the seniors. But each night I had his class, Drake would follow me home and wait for me to go inside. We didn’t say much to each other, except for a few words here and there, but we didn’t have to. The looks we shared in class were enough.
I was getting bolder, or he was I’m not sure which. But our eye contact was starting to last longer to the point that I sometimes forgot there were others in the room with us. Some time in the middle of all that I started to worry that he might be having fun at my expense.
What if he tells his friends what was going on? What if I become locker room gossip? What if, what if, what if? But with all my fears I still found it hard to resist his lure. For the first time in my life I was in the grips of something that felt very much like a real romance.