My parents are inside so I sneak through the corn field and into the barn hoping Callan’s in there. He is.
No shirt, shuffling hay. At this point, when I see him in that barn, the sun filtering through the cracks in the wood I know one thing. There’s nothing to keep me from wanting him and having him again and certainly my dad and his backwoods way of thinking isn’t going to stop me.
My boots hitting the wood floor announce my presence.
“What are you doing in here?” He’s not looking up, and I think he’s trying really hard not to.
“Looking for you.” I say strutting toward him. I’m standing in front of him but he’s not looking so I take my shirt off leaving me in my string bikini.
I’ve resorted to less before. I have. But I need Callan. I need him right now in this barn. Look at him! His shirt is off, he’s sweating, that hat, those jeans… damn. I’m immediately reminded of the way he rode that bull in the video and that nod…God!
I imagine in every detail what he can do to me, the ways he can make me feel and make me forget my life in this damn place and that in a few days I want to be so far gone from here that there’s no clock that can tick fast enough. I want to leave, I have to leave but being here with Callan could make me stay. What. The. Fuck?
“Please…” I whisper into his neck, my hands on his bare shoulders. “Please just take me.”
He wasn’t having it and pushes himself back creating distance between us, my hands falling away. “Get the fuck off me! I can’t and you know that. You lied to me.”
“You don’t want me?” I cross my arms, arching an eyebrow at him.
Is he serious?
“Jesus, Alanna, you know that’s not it.” His eyes rake over my body, and then find mine again. He’s right, that’s not it at all. By the way he’s looking at me, he’d give anything to untie these bikini strings. But then he says, a bitter tone to his voice and a cold edge that is reserved only for me right now, “I’m twenty-one. You’re seventeen. I can’t do that.”
“You’re barely twenty-one and I’ll be eighteen in a few days.” I say trying to give him a reason. “Our age shouldn’t matter.”
“You lied to me.” Callan repeats lifting his chin, his eyebrows knitting together, looking at me. “And, yes, it should and it does in the eyes of the law. It matters a lot.”
“So would it have really mattered if I told you my age last night?” I taunt.
“Yes! I wouldn’t have let you come within twenty feet of me and we certainly wouldn’t have done that.”
“You’re lying.” He knows he is. He was drunk last night, maybe not drunk enough to allow me to do that, but I think maybe just enough that he’d make an exception.
We stand there, our breaths heavy mingled with the comforting smell of the bales of hay when he looks at me. “I just came to pay off a debt for my dad. That’s all this should be and that’s all this is going to be.” He’s walking away from me, his boots mimicking the steady thump of my heart.
I sit up and reach for my shirt. “That’s what you think, eight seconds.”
Chapter Four
I’m that girl
When I get back to the house, dad’s at the door leaning into the frame and giving me that look. “Stay away from that boy, Alanna.”
I don’t even bother responding or arguing. Who is he to tell me who to stay away from? If he only knew half the people I hang with, he’d have a coronary.
When Callan ignores me Saturday night, I’m more determined than ever to find a way to get him to pay attention to me.
I’ve got more going for me on my side than he’s willing to admit he can ignore. I’m attractive. I can say that because I’m confident enough to know I am. Also, because Jessie has on more than one occasion said if she was a lesbian, I’d be her bitch. I’m also very determined. Don’t tell me that I can’t do something because that’s the very thing I need to hear to prove your ass wrong. Tell me I won’t and I will.
When we get to Kasey’s house on the lake, Jessie asks me how my barn encounter went.
“Wouldn’t even look my direction.”
“What?” Jessie looks at me as we make our way toward the party down by the lake. “Why?”
“See…” I raise my eyebrows. “That was my response too.” I laugh lightly removing my flannel and tie it around my waist leaving me in just my bikini and shorts, the spitting image of Jessie. “I don’t get it.”
Jessie laughs and gives my shoulder a nudge. As we walk, her wind-blown hair falls from her hat. She stops to adjust it, a flawless movement that makes her look even more amazing, and then continues to walk with me.