Finding North (Naïve Mistakes Series) Page 6

  "What's that supposed to mean?"

  "Nothing." I walked past her and fell on my bed.

  "No, c'mon, it's not nothing. What is it?"

  I turned onto my stomach. "It's...nothing."

  "You do like him, don't you? I asked you, damn it! I would've laid off!"

  "No!" I rolled over. My mind was so confused! "Kayla, why...why am I like this? All I think about is guys but I don't do anything with them. Then, when I get the chance, I run away. I'm hoping for some true love and yet... I don't know."

  Kayla eyed me up and down as I lay there. I could feel her glare strongly upon my skin as if she were touching me. I turned to her. "What!?"

  She looked away. "Nothing."

  I sat up, grabbed her hand. "What? What is it?"

  She looked at me with her wide green eyes, put her hand on my cheek, caressed it. I was stunned, not moving. She eased into me. Her soft lips touched mine. I just sat there, not reacting, not saying anything, letting her kiss me. She pushed me onto the bed, thrust her tongue into my mouth, moved it around. I was more stunned than participating.

  She sat up, looked at me. I can't say I was turned on in any way. I mean this was my best friend!

  But I wasn't disgusted by it, either. Not at all.

  "Nah, didn't think so," she said, very nonchalant, then wiped her lips.

  "H—huh?"

  "I was just checking. You're definitely not into girls. You kiss like a wet fish. I sure hope that's because you were shocked. Because if you kiss guys like that, it's no wonder you still haven't gotten laid."

  I stood up. "Y—you're—?"

  "What? Gay? No way. I mean, I don't know. I like guys. Like them a lot! Anyways, don't read too much into this. I was just feeling the water is all. Whereas my tastes might be in question, you're as straight as a bamboo whip in a bad BDSM novel. So, moving on?"

  I chuckled. "Wow, I can't believe I was just kissed passionately by a girl... My best—"

  "Get over it! Now, about your man-friend. What's it: Collin? Conan?"

  "Conall."

  "Yeah, him."

  Mentioning him again got me thinking about him on top of me, his pelvis against mine.

  Nope. Not gay. Definitely not. Thanks, Kayla.

  -5-

  I called him after Kayla left. Sunday night. I had this sudden dread of him somehow walking past me at school and then the pussycat would be out of the bag (no, not that cat! It's any expression...)

  If he saw me at school he'd probably run for the hills!

  I know it was paranoid. A hundred or more high schools in Manhattan (some wild figure like that) and he'd walk past mine? Yeah right.

  But when you're guilty, you're guilty. And you think everyone's looking at you. (I learned that in a Sopranos episode.)

  His phone had rung twice.

  "Leora," he said, a lilt in his voice that said, also: Despite all your shit, I'm still interested in you. At least I fucking hope it said that.

  I imagined how easy it would be to play the Bianca card. You know, "Oh woe is me I have so many problems because I'm so rich that I just need to get laid." I couldn't bring myself down to that level, no matter how hard I tried.

  "Brad..."

  "No, it's Conall."

  Fuck! "Damn it..."

  "So, I guess that's what this is about. Well, good on you for not cheating on 'Brad.'"

  "No, no! It's not like that... Man, I must sound so desperate to you right now..."

  "No, what you sound like is seventeen..."

  I felt like I'd been given an ice cold drink and was suffering brain-freeze in my chest. "Wh—what?"

  "I said it sounds like you could be seventeen! The way you change your mind, meander, go back and forth, storm out of people's hotel suite's running. It was a joke... I know you're not seventeen. Oh, never mind. It's not funny if you have to explain it."

  "Oh, a joke, right... Seventeen. Haha."

  Silence.

  "So?" he prompted.

  "I...like you. And I don't know why I like you and it's probably infatuation and some stupid crush and ridiculous and creepy and all that, but, um, I, well, I do like you. And..." I waited for the inevitable: I like you too, Leora.

  It never came.

  "Uh-huh..." he said.

  "Yeah, um, look, I'm sorry, never—"

  "Don't hang up! Jeez, Leora, look. You seem like a wonderful woman"—(Woman, yeah right)—"but you have to learn to take a stand on a subject. So much hemming and hawing and 'oh I don't want to impose for I may upset thee, sire.' Bugger! You sound so, well, British! Aren't Americans supposed to be arrogant and outspoken? Be American and say what you want to say!"

  What a pep-talk! I was revved. Pumped. Ready to shout it out! I was so friggin in the moment, that—

  "I am seventeen!"

  Screech! Halt! Say what? Had I just said that out loud?

  "Um, excuse me?"

  Shit! "Oh, you heard that..."

  "Yes, I did..."

  "Yeah, it's true."

  "Oh..." he sounded so distant. I'd blown this.

  "Look, Conall—"

  "My goodness, I thought maybe twenty-one... At a stretch, nineteen. But seventeen?"

  "Yeah..." My hand trembled. "I'm sorry. I—"

  "I'm twenty-four."

  "Wh—what?"

  "I'm twenty-four."

  "Bullshit."

  "It's true."

  "You're lying..."

  "My goodness, you are a petulant one, aren't you?"

  "I don't know what petulant means."

  "That's why they invented the Oxford British Dictionary! Now, are we going to hit the ball back and forth like this or should we go out for a drink?"

  Wow. Stunned. "Um, OK, sure. Meet you somewhere?"

  "No, I'll pick you up. What's your address?"

  I gave it to him.

  "Oh, and one more thing, no wine for you. That's illegal!"

  "Nuh-uh! Not under certain circumstances!"

  "Whatever, Coca Cola."

  Twelve ounces of Coke equals one-hundred-and-forty calories. I'll stick with soda water.

  "Oh, and Leora?"

  "Yes?"

  "Dress in something sexy." He hung up.

  Damn.

  He was good.

  CHAPTER SIX

  -1-

  I texted Kayla.

  Leora: Going out with Conall. He's 24 not 30!

  No response.

  I called.

  A man's voice: "Urgh! Oh yeah baby. Oh yeah."

  Kayla: "Sweetie...ah! Oh! Ooh! You really have to stop—"

  Me: "Shit! Damn it! Sorry!"

  I hung up.

  As embarrassing as that was, calling in on Kayla's action really seemed to get my engines going. I leaned back against the wall, put my left thigh over my right and squeezed tight. Damn it. What is wrong with me? If I was a guy I'd have hair on my palms.

  I decided to keep it in this time. I wanted to be fresh (and frustrated) when I saw Conall. I wouldn't have sex with him. It was too soon. But I'd sure as hell let him do pretty much anything else he wanted to with me!

  "Something sexy something sexy," I mumbled to myself as I walked around my cupboard. "Sexy but not slutty," I added. "Sexy sexy..."

  The voice of the person I then heard talking from down the stairs made my heart stop, and my stomach go into my throat.

  "Honey? Are you here?"

  My mom.

  I threw on a tee and some shorts. "Coming, mom." I looked at her from the top of the stairs. She looked ragged. Her eyes seemed dark but I think it was an illusion of the light (or a reflection of her state of mind?) She stumbled a bit to the living room.

  She'd been drinking, clearly.

  "How's work?" I asked.

  She fell on a settee. "Oh, sweetie, will you fix me up a brandy? I'm so exhausted."

  I went to the bar, poured the brandy. Neat, as she liked it.

  "You OK, mom?"

  "Sure, sure. Remember Paul, sweetie?"


  "Your second husband Paul?"

  "Yes, him, you do remember him...?"

  It's not like they're popsicle flavors! "Yeah, of course, what about him?"

  "Oh," she sighed, blasé, "he's dead."

  I dropped the glass. It smashed. Shit.

  "Oh, dear, it's no big deal. I mean, it is, but he brought it on himself. He was out doing a drug-deal or something and got into a shit part of town and they...um...shot— Is that brandy coming, honey?"

  "Sure..." I fixed up the brandy in a new glass. My stomach churned. Paul. He'd been sweet. Mom and him had only been married two years or so. I was eleven. He was a good guy. Got upset once or twice, but never physical. Needed to grow some balls in my opinion.

  Damn. Dead?

  But mom was happy with him. He'd been the only guy she married that wasn't worth tens of millions. (Only six or seven...)

  "Mom, when did this happen?" I handed her the brandy, then got the mop to clean up the other one.

  "Oh, Thursday."

  Thursday? "And when did you find out."

  "Thursday."

  She downed the brandy.

  "Mom, have you been drinking since Thursday?"

  She nodded forcefully. "Larissa's been covering for me at work. We have nothing that requires my immediate attention for the next week. So..."

  "So?"

  "Could you get me another one, honey?"

  I did. I also scraped up the broken glass and mopped up the mess on the floor.

  "Here, take the bottle." I put it on the table in front of her.

  "Oh, thank you, sweetie."

  My phone buzzed. It buzzed again. Conall Calling. I killed it.

  "So, I'm just gonna sit here, have a little merrymaking, and be by myself..."

  My phone buzzed again. I killed it, again.

  "Mom, how long had Paul been doing drugs?"

  "Oh, honey!" She laughed. "Since we'd been together! He was a coke-head. Always needed his fix. Of course, people only do more coke for two reasons: Because they're doing badly, or because they're doing extremely well and are bored. It seems (hiccup) that when Paul and I were together, he was doing neither very well nor very badly. And it seems that recently he'd been doing very badly. (Hiccup.) It's the course of the world we live in..."

  Yeah right. More like the neighborhood we live in.

  Text message. Conall: Everything OK?

  Leora: Family emergency. Need to take a rain check.

  Conall: I leave tomorrow :(

  I looked back at mom, her eyes were drowsy. She wouldn't do anything stupid, would she?

  I wasn't going to take any risks. I picked up my phone to call Kayla but stopped when I remembered what she'd been in the middle of earlier. (And, even if she was done, I didn't want to risk it.) So I texted her.

  Leora: Need help. REAL help. Emergency. Let me know when you're "done."

  Kayla: Oh baby, I'm as done as a juicy chicken on a hot spit. What's up?

  I called.

  -2-

  I texted Conall. Leora: OK, we're back on. But I'll need more time. 45 minutes OK?

  Conall: I've been waiting 2 days. I can wait 45 min.

  I smiled.

  I went to my room and had lost the desire to go all out and dress up. It's not that Paul and I had been close. We hadn't. The only one of my mom's husbands I'd ever been close to was my dad (who, come to think of it, hadn't called in a few weeks, which was very unlike him.) But it was still creepy.

  And again, drugs as the theme. And coke. I knew little about drugs. Nothing, in fact. Kayla had delved into that dark world once upon a time, found herself in a hospital bed eventually from an almost-OD and then stopped. She was sixteen then. I'd been in that same hospital for a sprained ankle (it was very badly sprained, OK? Don't judge.)

  That's when we met. We became best friends in about five minutes. I don't believe in love at first sight. I believe in lust at first sight. But, between girls, in an almost instant connection of some sort, after the first sentence or two, I believe in friendship at first sight. Or at least after the first joke. (And Kayla joked a lot.) That's how it was when I met Kayla.

  Of course, mom liked her from the start (back then at least). She never found out about her drug history. But, as Kayla got older, more spots on her ears got pierced, then that she-devil tattoo on her inner waist... So mom's initial appreciation of "that petite little girl, Kayla" soon became a growing dislike for "that bad influence on you!"

  Yeah, so, um, they were gonna have fun tonight while Kayla watched her to make sure she didn't do anything stupid!

  All I knew was that Raphael was a dealer. And he did sell coke. Beyond that... Sure, there must be plenty dealers in Manhattan, and even New York! But I somehow felt myself blaming Raphael, even if it was ten grades removed or more! The bad apple that rots the rest...

  I picked a bandage dress and black strappy boots. Hot black boots always turn guys on. I know because I stopped wearing them to clubs for that very reason. But I'd be with Conall tonight, and he's one guy I did want to turn on!

  As I turned to look at my ass in the mirror I wondered if he did have an estate that he played polo in. It rains a lot in England, doesn't it?

  I thought of Kayla's trip to Europe, getting away from it all.

  I thought about my mom. Yeah, my mom, the one sitting downstairs with who knew what number of bottles of brandy down her throat.

  I went and checked on her. She was passed out.

  Fuck! I suddenly felt like I would need to babysit her for the next six months! That's me. Always babysitting people....

  Kayla arrived (smiling a satisfied and smug smile. I tried not to think of why.) She'd made an effort to look extra slutty seeing as she was going to babysit my drunken mother and she was "really going to enjoy it."

  "Good luck," I said.

  Conall texted again. Conall: It's been 50 minutes. Should I go around the block again?

  I chuckled.

  Leora: Sure, but I'm coming with you.

  The pun in that statement was not lost on me after I wrote it.

  -3-

  Just like it feels better to sit in a man's Executive Suite, so does it feel better to get into his limo. Because that's what Conall brought with him to pick me up. And, sure, I'd been in plenty of limos. Heck, Leroy was constantly on call. But this was different. This felt, somehow, bad!

  He stood outside the door and gestured me in. "M'lady..."

  "Why, sir," I said, trying to sound British. (I think it came out sounding like I was from Kentucky instead.)

  He took my coat and closed the door. Already my mom's problems were feeling far away. Was that a good thing? Would she need me tonight? I thought of how I'd neglected Kayla on Friday and how that almost ended up in disaster.

  But, no, that's why Kayla was watching her. Good ol' Kayla. I don't care what mom said about her. Kayla was a better friend than any of mom's husbands had ever been! There's no such thing as a 'slutty' friend. The only questions in friendship are loyalty and disloyalty.

  Conall slid in next to me in his Levi's and tight V-neck shirt. I could see now very clearly that the hard chest I'd touched the day before was not because I was hitting his friggin rib cage! No, Conall was not massive. He was fucking perfect, as if he'd lifted just enough weights to keep every ounce of fat off his body and be just big enough to get a girls juices going and going good (yeah, I intended the friggin pun on that one, OK?)

  "Does your mother pick your clothes?" I said, trying to sound flirty (much like the little boys who throw mud pies at girls they like on the playground.)

  "Why? Do they look funny? If you say yes then I'll say that she does pick my clothes. If you say no, I'll tell you I'm a man about town and know all about fashion."

  Oh, baby. You are a man about town alright. I'm just making conversation long enough until you shut me up with your tongue.

  "Your coat... Hugo Boss, right?"

  "My, you could indeed work at Bloomingdales."
>
  "Who said I don't? All you know is that I'm seventeen, not twenty-one or whatever age you thought I was."

  He snickered. "OK, as you wish... But, no, my mom doesn't pick my clothes. I do. And, yes, this is Boss."

  And a fricking sexy as hell Hugo Boss to top it off. I looked out the window at the city lights. Yeah, the same old city lights I'd always seen, but with a completely new glow.

  "Drink?" he asked.

  I turned to him. He had out a bottle of Perrier Mineral Water.

  One glass of Perrier Mineral Water equals zero calories. Oh, Mr. Williams, you just made want you even more...

  "You're not trying to get me drunk tonight?" I asked. "Sure, I'll take a glass."

  "I wasn't trying to get you drunk the first time."

  "I strongly doubt it."

  "Oh, what, you think I bring girls up to my apartment, get them drunk and then sleep with them?"

  Please, don't bring up sleeping with girls at your apartment right now, not unless we're thirty seconds away from it. I wriggled in my seat, took a sip of the water he gave me.

  "That's exactly what I think you do."

  He, however, poured himself a glass of Chardonnay. We touched glasses and sipped.

  "So, why can't I have any of that?" I asked, gesturing to the wine. It's not that I wanted any (one hundred and twenty three calories per glass), I just didn't want to be treated like a little girl. I so didn't want to be treated like that.

  "I noticed you drinking mineral water at the club. Then I saw you hesitate when I offered you some wine at my hotel room. I just assumed you don't drink."

  So, he noticed that? I said nothing. It also hadn't been lost on me that he'd remembered Kayla's name even after only having heard it one. And on the day before!

  "So, do you work at Bloomingdales?" I had some water in my mouth as he asked that. Yeah, you can guess what happened!

  Of course, he immediately pulled out a cloth and started wiping at my leg. He didn't mean shit by it but I must tell you that by that time, any physical touch on my skin was enough to set me on fire.

  "I think I need some more water," I said to him. He poured it. I downed it, then held out my glass again. He chuckled. Hurry up with the fire extinguisher, bud. He poured it again. I downed it, again. I felt steam coming out of my ears.

  "Um, no, I don't work at Bloomingdales."

  "I didn't think so. So, you're, um, still in school?"