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She forced a smile and waved to their fellow students. He curled her hand between their bodies, anchoring his other into the dip of her back. She fondled the hair at the base of his neck. Their feet moved imperceptibly, and with his breath on her cheek and her palm over his heart, Analise fretted over the impossibilities. Of choosing between Taylor and Ulla. Between remaining the newly popular queen at school and risking the scorn of breaking up with one boy because she’d been in love with his best friend all along. No. What truly plagued her were not her present choices. It was the reason she’d never given Taylor Barnes a second glance all these years. Never mind his wealth. Or popularity. He was named two-time Mr. Soccer for Minnesota and the projected Salutatorian of their senior class out of nearly a thousand. The only reason he wasn’t in the running for Valedictorian was because he’d had a bout of mono freshman year and had to downgrade an AP class to Honors.

“Isa?” he said in her ear.

If she’d known this before he held her hand during the ambulance ride over a month ago, or when they’d talked for hours in the middle of the night, arguing about whether a soccer match was more grueling than a cross country race, maybe it would’ve been enough to stop her from falling for him. Because this time next year, he would be at one of the most prestigious universities, a rising collegiate soccer star, studying for an O-chem final and dating a girl whose parents were like Dave Laviolet’s, probably pre-med herself, or pre-law⁠—

“Isa.”

Analise looked into those imploring eyes, dragging her under.

The song reached its climax. She shook her head and stepped away.

When he kissed her, she wanted to be angry with him.

But she kissed him right back.

They cast off their crowns and ran outside into a night of possibilities.

The fallout from their very public act of betrayal was swift and immediate. Half the student body turned their noses up at the scandalous king and queen. The other half covered their slack jaws, closing in, eager for a fight between Dave and Taylor. It was Analise who stepped between the two boys and said, “I kissed him.” She used Dave’s mouth-drop to grab Taylor’s hand, fist her skirts, and together they fled.

Except they were stranded outside the main doors and Taylor lived five miles away. It was cold. He guided her arms through his tuxedo jacket, and with a heady amount of euphoria to keep each other warm and fuel their legs, they dashed to the city bus. They stumbled aboard, giggling and staggering through the aisle, arms and legs tangled. They stole more kisses and collapsed into an empty seat far from other passengers. “I should hate myself for what I did to Dave. I’m cruel,” she moaned into his mouth.

Between their shared breaths he replied, “No, you’re not. Trust me.”

“Didn’t you think he loved me?”

“I only said that to find out if you loved him.” He spread her lips with his, and their tongues dipped in and out, slowly, opening places in her that she needed him to touch and fill. Everywhere.

When they arrived at their stop, Taylor piggybacked Analise off the bus, her dress trailing down the dirty steps and onto the sidewalk.

They reached his house and sneaked downstairs to his bedroom. Taylor left her alone for the few minutes it took to go upstairs, tell his mom he decided to ditch the cabin, and to leave him alone the rest of tomorrow.

Analise lay prone on his bed, feet swinging in the air, searching through his iPod that was connected to a speaker. She hit play on an Oasis album. When he entered the room, she sat up and hugged his tuxedo jacket around her arms. Her gown’s skirts filled almost the entire bed.

Taylor locked the door behind him, and they looked at one another. He went to her and slid his jacket off her shoulders.

Chapter Forty

October – November 2005

Two Weeks Later

Analise

Dirt and grass sprayed from underneath Taylor’s soccer cleats. He kicked a pass too far, sending it out of bounds, allowing the opposing team a throw-in. When he stopped and hiked his jersey to mop the sweat from his stern forehead, Analise’s eyes dove straight to a peek of his taut, bare stomach.

She trailed her fingers across the ridges of the empty bleacher seat next to her, far from the reproachful cloud of her classmates, from the blame over the soccer team’s last two losses. She closed her eyes, wishing for that insular moment from Homecoming night to return. “How do you say ‘I love you,’ in Swedish?” he had asked while making the bed sheets a tent over them, his smile obliterating every one of her senses, except for the feel of his skin, firm and naked, causing hers to rise.

The steam from her Styrofoam cup of hot chocolate dwindled, and she nursed it as the only distraction from her peers’ derision, from the furtive glances of Taylor’s mother a few seats down, huddled with the other soccer moms. Surprisingly pitiful glances. Not contemptuous like Dave’s mom. Though Analise wanted neither. Surely, Taylor’s mother must have known that they’d had ditched the dance, and the entire weekend, together.

The referee’s whistle sounded, and this signaled the end of the first half but the start of a verbal spar between Taylor and Dave. The coach told them to cool off, and Taylor snagged a ball with the top of his foot, launching it deftly into his hands. He trudged to the far end of the field. A fellow student threw an axe her way: “Hey, Ana, might as well go fuck the rest of the team while you’re at it!” She got up amongst the laughter and stomped down the fiberglass benches.

She tossed the lukewarm chocolate into the trash bin and went to the field’s perimeter, behind the chain-link fence, the darkness cloaking her fury.

He juggled the ball with hypnotic dexterity. She counted each tap on his cleats: one, two, three, four—onto his right knee—five—left knee, six, seven—right knee—eight⁠—

Analise had reassured him that night when he’d asked, “Am I hurting you?” No, God no, this is what she’d dreamed it would feel like. As they fit their bodies together, she touched his mouth and said, “Kyss mig.” He asked what that meant and she showed him, sliding her tongue over his, weaving her legs through his. Tight, tighter⁠—

She clenched the fence’s icy metal.