Catherine's POV
Jason Smith bit his bottom lip when he read.
We'd gone over the basic concepts of economics (if I was going to tutor him, we were starting from the bottom up), and I was surprised at how much he already knew. I wasn't expecting that. But then I'm not exactly sure what it was I had expected.
Everyone knew about the accident. That his best friend Alex had gotten behind the wheel of Jason's car, either high or drunk (I had never been sure of which, and for all I know, it could have been both). He'd crashed the car, and Jason ended up in a coma for months. I guess I just thought he would be somehow less than what he had been before. So far he seemed pretty much the same to me.
I settled into a chair across from him and tried to concentrate on the book I had brought along, but I found myself peeping over the top of it and looking at his mouth. At the way he worried his bottom lip with his teeth.
It was kind of adorable, something my little brother did, and totally not in keeping with Jason's bad boy persona.
His eyebrows were furrowed as he concentrated, and he kept tugging at a piece of hair that hung in his eyes. His plain black t-shirt showed off impressive biceps, and though I couldn't see them, I knew that his faded jeans, so worn out the looked like they were about to fall apart, hung low on his hips. It was hot but he wore heavy black boots, and I noticed a sheen of sweat on his forehead.
He sure didn't look like someone who had nearly died in a car accident a year ago. In fact, with the beam of the sun coming in through the bank of windows highlighting the dark blue streaks in his hair, he looked more alive than anyone I knew.
But then again, hadn't he always?
Jason Smith. The bad boy with the face of an angel. The kid of boy who got away with almost everything because he was a charmer. Had that down to an art form by the sixth grade. In eight grade he convinced our teacher, Miss Melody, to let us have our year end dance out at Cook's Creek. You know, because that was so much cooler than the gym. Everyone was excited at the idea, and Trevor went with it.
He thought that maybe his band should play.
Oh and maybe his band should, you know, get paid to play.
And he managed to get Miss Melody on board with that.
When they changed the location, my parents wouldn't allow me go unless they chaperoned. As if. Who wants to go to their eight grade dance with their parents watching? Not me. I missed the dance in protest, and of course it was all everyone talked about that summer.
I totally blamed Jason and decided at that moment that he was on my very own personal blacklist. It was easy to do. The guy was confident, cocky even, and usually in the middle of whatever was going on.
And he always had a girl...or two. I thought of his ex and the guy we had seen her with earlier, and I wondered about that. I'd heard she dumped him a couple of months after he'd come out of his coma because he wasn't the same guy as he was before the accident.
If it was true, then she was as shallow as I'd always thought.
I snuck a peek at him. He looked good as new to me.
Not that I'd seen him much over the last year. Because of the accident, he had missed the entire first semester of school, and when he returned, well, we didn't exactly sit a the same lunch table. He hung with Alex Hawthorne, his buddy Noah, and more girls than I'd ever care to wade through.
My eyes fell back to Jason's mouth, and I thought of a dark closet, the smell of Pine-Sol, and his infectious grin. Jason Smith was trouble, and if I let him, he would make trouble for a girl like me. The guy was way out of my league.
So why was I thinking that his mouth was so interesting?
Squirming, I dropped my eyes to my book, but the words were a total blur, so after a few minutes, I gave up and glanced at my cell. Only an hour to go until I was supposed to meet my best friend Anabeth at the pool. She was a life guard, and after her shift we were going to hit Burger King and then maybe a movie.
I know. Exciting times in Sun City, but when you're stuck out in the middle of nowhere, you pretty much take what you can get.
Jason's fingers tapped along the table, and for the first time I noticed that he had tattoos on his knuckles. They looked like a bunch of nothing to me, but I supposed to weird markings meant something to him.
"Courage,"
Startled, my eyes shot up, and then, bam, my heart took off so fast and hard that for a moment I forgot how to breath. I felt like I had just been caught like a proverbial deer in headlights.
"Excuse me?" I whispered, totally thrown off balance by the way he was looking at me. As if he was trying to figure something out.
Jason stretched out his fingers and laid a hand on the table. He pointed to the markings. "It's Japanese. The one on my other hand means strength."
"Oh." Who spoke Japanese.
"Nathan's into that shit, and after I came out of the coma, I had a lot of stuff to deal with." He studied the markings for a few moments. "Most of it sucked." He smiled, not a full one but a small glimpse of something nice. I found myself smiling in return.
"We went to California at Christmas. It was the first time I'd gone anywhere since I'd bee out of the hospital, and man, that place blew me away." He frowned, his eyes intense. "Have you been to California?"
I shook my head. God. I hadn't been out of the state.
"It's an amazing place, and I'm jealous as hell that Alex is there for the summer. I met his girlfriend, Jessie, and the night before Alex and I had to fly back to Phoenix, all three of us got tattoos. We all got the same ones.
A pause.
"Courage and strength."
I cleared my throat, because suddenly there was a frog the size of donuts stuck down there. "It's really cool."
Jason nodded. "Yeah. I like ink, you know? I like anything that inspires me. Words. Music. Tattoos." His eyes met mine again, and even though it was hot as a furnace in the library, I shivered. "You got any?" he asked.
"Any what?"
"Tattoos?"
"Me?" I had to laugh at that. Wow. Before last year that would have been grounds for major punishment. Heck, up until my senior year, I hadn't been allowed to wear lip gloss. Now I wasn't so sure that my mum would even notice, and since I avoided my dad whenever I could...
"No," I said, shaking my head. "My skin is untouched."
His eyes widened a bit, and I felt heat creep up my neck. Great. Now I was blushing again.
"Untouched," he said with that lopsided smile that made my stomach dip. "I like that."
"You do?"
"Yep. A clean slate. There's something almost poetic about that, you know? Tragic too. How many people get a do-over?"
Trevor reached for my hand and though my first instinct was to snatch it back, his long fingers enveloped mine before I had the chance. He turned my hand over so that my palm faced up and then traced the little blue lines that ran through my wrist.
I can't lie it felt weird and good, and my heart took of once more, so fast I was surprised he couldn't hear it.
"This is...kind of...like in," he said, his words a little slow as if he was thinking hard. "But it's alive."
He glanced up again, and all I could do was nod before my eyes dropped to his hand. Mine was still there, small and pale next to his large hand and tanned skin. I saw the thin blue veins that ran down my wrist, the ones that carried blood from my heart, electrifying my cells and feeding my body.
His thumb rested just beneath my pulse, and I swallowed thickly. Crap, he was going to feel how fast it was, and that would be embarrassing.
"Your fingers are rough." I blushed harder and thought that there was no way I could sound like more of an idiot. Not even if I was trying.
"Yeah," he answered. "It's from playing guitar. I practice a lot so my calluses are nice and strong."
"I used to sing."
Wow. Good comeback. I guess it was better than playing a clarinet or trombone, but really. Dork much?
"I mean, I still do."
"I know. I saw you play once."
Surprised, I shook my head. "Where?"
"At a city hall."
"But you don't attend any of those."
"How do you know?"
I was silent for a moment and more than a little confused. "Because I never see you there."
He grinned. "So you missed me then." His smile got bigger. "You know, when I'm not there."
"Jason. I'd have to see you there in the first place to miss you when you're not. And like I said, I've never seen you at city hall."
"But the only reason you know I'm not there is because you must be looking for me in the first place, right?"
Okay. I couldn't argue with that logic, even though it made no sense whatsoever. I figured he was trying to mess with me and relaxed.
"I used to practice everyday after school."
"Used to?" he interrupted.
Again he surprised me. He was sharp.
"I don't hang out at city hall all that much, and I'm not really home too often either."
That was an understatement.
"Why?"
"Because my dad's there."
Okay. I didn't just say that to a guy who is practically a stranger.
"Anyway," I said in a rush, hoping he wouldn't notice my slip up. "I didn't really enjoy singing until I heard some old Celine Dion songs."
"Really," he said with a smile. "She's stellar. Retro, but stellar."
"Yeah."
"So what's your favorite?"
He was still holding my hand. It was still hot. And I felt vaguely light headed.
"Favorite?"
He flashed that smile again. The one that had charmed Miss Melody back in eight grade. "Your favorite Celine Dion song."
"Oh." That was an easy one. "My heart will go on."
"Got it, 'Let's talk about love.'"
"Yes," I nodded. "That's it."
Had he always looked this intense?
"What?" he asked. He smiled again and I thought that on a scale of one to ten, his smile was a total eleven. "You're into that kind of thing. That's cool. Didn't picture that."
"Really. What exactly did you picture?" Shoot. Did I really want to hear this?
"I don't know. Some indie music?"
I dropped my eyes, because I was pretty sure that my cheeks were as red as the roses planted just outside the library. Jason Smith was nothing like what I thought he would be. He wasn't stupid and he wasn't arrogant. He wasn't slow or weird.
He seemed pretty normal to me.
You know, for a guy with tattoos and green hair.
Mrs. Walker, the librarian, chose that moment to clear her throat, and it startled me. I snatched my had from his.
Jason Smith made me nervous. I wasn't exactly sure why, and I didn't want to spend a whole lot of time thinking about it. Besides, I had way too much on my mind. I needed to put this into perspective. Jason was my excuse to be out of the house all summer. A guy I was tutoring. A distraction maybe, but nothing more than that.
"I have to go," I stood up, nearly knocking over my chair while Jason reached for his book and laptop.
"I'll drive you home."
"No."
He raised his eyebrow. "Did I do something?"
Taking a deep breath, I shoved my free hand into the front pocket of my jean shorts. "I'm meeting Hailey at the pool."
"Cool." He closed his laptop. "Let me give you a lift."
"No really," I replied. "I want to walk."
"Not gonna happen." He was standing now. He nodded towards the door. "Let me drive you to the pool. I don't mind."
Not gonna happen.
The words echoed in my head, but it wasn't Jason's voice I heard, it was my father's. And they'd been knocking around my brain for three hundred ad eighty-three days now. They were three words I was trying to forget. Three words he'd spoken to someone. A someone who wasn't my mum. A someone I was trying to forget.
Something broke inside me. Something hot and heavy and mean. Something that pressed into my chest and made my eyes smart with unshed tears. Great. If I cried in front of Jason Smith, I just might die.
"I said that I wanted to walk, Jason. Do you need me to speak slower? What part of that don't you understand?" As soon as the words left my mouth, I wanted to snatch them back.
For a moment there was nothing but the sound of Mrs. Walker as she shushed us.
Jason ran his hand through his hair and studied me for a few moments, that slow grin still in place though it had pretty much left his eyes. "Don't worry, Catherine. Sorry. Cat. I'm having a good day today." Sarcasm bit into his words, "I understand all of it." He looked away and muttered. "Every single word."
His eyes swung back, and I saw anger in their depths, which only made me feel worse than I already did.
"Just so you know, I'm not a moron. I might have been in a coma and all." His eyes narrowed and he winced as if in pain. "Maybe my words come out a little slow sometimes, but you don't have to talk to me like I'm some kind of loser. I didn't expect that from you."
"You don't know me," I shot back.
"No, I guess I don't. That's one thing we can agree on."
The feeling inside me-the hot, heavy, angry ones-had nothing to do with Jason and everything to do with my dad. They were always there. Waiting for a chance to explode. They were etched into flesh and bone, and they colored everything in my life.
I thought of my mum and her sad eyes that poked out from underneath her perfect bangs when she thought no one could see. I thought of the denial that she clung to every single day, denial that she pretty much ate for breakfast, lunch and dinner. And I thought of my father. Of how this morning as he spread peanut butter over his stupid bagel, he'd said that he'd be dropping Billy off at a friend's before heading into the city for errands.
Errands. You'd think he would at least come up with a new excuse, because that one was getting old.
I didn't ask him when he'd be back because I didn't care, and he didn't volunteer that information, so I figured he was up to no good.
There it was. The sad story of Catherine Moss. That was all that I had time for, and it was exhausting.
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to offend you. Really, I didn't. That was a stupid thing for me to say. I'll see you tomorrow," The words were wooden and the apology pretty darn sad, but it was all I had.
.....................
Squeeeee!
I think I talk too much so I'm going to avoid being redundant and just hope that you know what to do and you love this chapter enough to do just that.
Anyway today's poll is on Disney Channel Original Movies.
Are you Team High School Musical or Team Cheetah Girls.
You know what to do.
Bye Twirl's.