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"Please, honey? I'd really like to meet him."
I caved. "All right, I'll ask. I can't promise he doesn't have plans, though."
Susa
Unfortunately for me, Cam didn't have plans.
Susa
Conrad had already eaten and was upstairs playing his guitar. He couldn't even be bothered to eat with us. He came down to get a bottled water, and he didn't even say hello to Cam.
"So why don't you eat meat, Cam?" Jeremiah asked, stuffing half his burger into his mouth.
Cam swallowed his water and said, "I'm morally opposed to eating animals."
Jeremiah nodded seriously. "But Belly eats meat. You let her kiss you with those lips?" Then he cracked up. Susa
I could feel my face getting hot, and I could feel how tense Cam was beside me. "Shut up, Jeremiah."
Cam glanced at my mother and laughed uneasily. "I don't judge people who choose to eat meat. It's a personal choice."
Jeremiah continued, "So you don't mind when her lips touch dead animal and then they touch your, um, lips?"
Susa
"Yeah, Jere, give the guy a break," I said, glaring at him. I kicked him under the table, hard. Hard enough to make him flinch.
"No, it's fine," Cam said. "I don't mind at all. In fact--" Then he pulled me to him and kissed me quickly, right in front of everyone. It was only a peck, but it was embarrassing.
"Please don't kiss Belly at the di
My mother shook her head at him and said, "Belly's allowed to kiss. "Then she pointed her fork at Cam. "But that's it."
She burst out laughing like it was the fu
The truth was, Cam and I hadn't done much else besides kiss. He didn't seem to be in any big hurry. He was careful with me, sweet--nervous even. It was completely different from the way I'd seen other guys behave with girls. Last summer I caught Jeremiah with a girl on the beach, right outside of the house. They were frantic, like if they hadn't been wearing clothes, they'd already have been having sex. I gave him hell for it the whole rest of the summer, but he didn't really care. I wished Cam would care a little more.
"Belly, I'm kidding. You know I'm open to you exploring yourself," my mother said, taking a long sip of chardo
Jeremiah busted out laughing. I stood up and said, "That's it. Cam and I are eating our di
But he didn't. "Belly, calm down. Everybody's just joking around," he said, loading up his fork with rice and bok choy and shoveling it into his mouth.
"Way to keep her in check, Cam," Jeremiah said, nodding at him. He really did look kind of impressed.
I sat back down, although it killed me to do it. I hated losing face in front of everyone, but if I did walk out by myself, I knew no one would come after me. I would just be little Belly Button, off pouting again. That was my name when I was being a baby, Belly Button--Steven thought he was such a genius for thinking that one up. "No one keeps me in check, Jeremiah. Least of all Cam Cameron."
Everyone hooted and hollered then, even Cam, and all of a sudden, it was all very normal, like he really belonged there. I could feel myself start to relax. It was all going to be okay. Great, in fact. Amazing, just like Susa
After di
"I'm really glad you came," I told him.
He took my hand and said, "Me too. I'm glad you're glad."
"Of course I'm glad."
I let go of his hand to roll up the bottoms of my jeans, and he said, quietly, "It didn't seem like you were that glad."
"Well, I am." I looked up at him and gave him a quick kiss. "See? This is me, being glad."
He smiled and we started walking again. "Good. So which one of those guys was your first kiss?"
"I told you that?"
"Yup. You said your first kiss was a boy at the beach when you were thirteen."
"Oh." I looked up at his face in the moonlight, and he was still smiling. "Guess."
Immediately he said, "The older one, Conrad."
"Why'd you guess him?"
He shrugged. "Just a feeling, the way he looks at you."
"He hardly looks at me at all," I told him. "And you're wrong, Sextus. It was Jeremiah."
chapter twenty - eight
AGE 14
"Truth or dare?" Taylor asked Conrad.
"I'm not playing," he said.
Taylor pouted. "Don't be so gay," she said. Jeremiah said, "You shouldn't use the word 'gay' like
Taylor opened her mouth and closed it. Then she said, "I didn't mean anything by it, Jeremy. I just meant he's being lame."
"Well, 'gay' doesn't mean 'lame,' Taylor, now does it?" Jeremiah said. He spoke in a sarcastic tone, but even mean attention was better than no attention. Probably he was just mad about all the attention she'd been giving Conrad that day.
Taylor heaved a great big sigh and turned to Conrad.
"Conrad, you're being very lame. Play truth or dare with us.
He ignored her and turned the volume on the TV up louder. Then he pretended to mute her with the remote, which made me laugh out loud.
"Fine, he's out. Steven, truth or dare."
Steven rolled his eyes. "Truth."
Taylor's eyes lit up. "Okay. How far did you go with Claire Cho?" I knew she'd been saving that one up for a long time, waiting for the exact moment she could ask. Claire Cho was a girl that Steven had dated for most of freshman year. Taylor swore Claire had cankles, but I thought Claire's ankles were perfectly slim. I thought Claire Cho was kind of perfect.
Steven actually blushed. "I'm not answering that."
"You have to. It's truth or dare. You can't sit here and listen to other people tell secrets if you're not going to," I said. I had been wondering about him and Claire too.
"Nobody's even told any secrets yet!" he protested.
"We're about to, Steven," Taylor said. "Now man up and tell us."
"Yeah, Steven, man up," Jeremiah chimed in.
We all started to chant, "Man up! Man up!" Even Conrad turned the TV on mute to hear the answer.
"Fine," Steven said. "If you shut up, I'll tell you."