A Perfect Ten

Page 90

“It better not be, or I’m telling everyone what a freak you are.”
Acid churned in my stomach and bile rose in my throat. Panic clawed at me as I pictured myself walking into school on Monday with everyone laughing and pointing. Damn, I was going to have to drop out of school. Eight more weeks until high school graduation and my life was over...all because I’d finally lost it to a chick who’d obviously seen enough cocks to know mine was not average.
“Whatever,” I snarled. “Thanks for the lay. Maybe you’ll get better with practice.”
As parting shots went, that wasn’t my finest, but fuck, I wasn’t on my A-game at the moment. Bowing my head, I jogged from her house and out to my car, a vintage beauty that my dad had bought for me and my sister, thinking we’d be able to share it.
Mostly, we just fought over who’d get to drive it. Tonight, I’d won the keys, and I thought my luck was sticking with me when Libby had called me over, saying her parents were away, giving us an hour to play. Who knew it’d all go to shit so quickly?
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” I muttered and pounded my fist against the steering wheel. I’d never felt so humiliated as I did in that moment. Seventeen years old and my life was officially done. If Libby followed her word—and she was probably calling all her friends right now—I’d never get laid again. My first and only time to try sex, and it hadn’t even been that good.
“Damn it.” I started the car and roared down the street. I was reaching for the radio controls to find some loud, pissed-off music when my cell phone rang.
Fuck. That was probably one of my buddies who’d already heard about my freakish junk. I almost didn’t check the screen, but curiosity got the best of me. When I saw Zoey’s name, I groaned.
My twin already knew? Wasn’t that just...great.
“What?” I muttered when I answered.
“Come get me,” she demanded on a sniff, obviously crying. “Now.”
“What’s wrong?” Completely forgetting about myself, I slammed on the brakes and did a U-turn to speed back toward her friend’s house where I knew she was staying the night with a couple other girls from school. “Who the fuck do I have to kill?”
“No one. I just...I want to go home.”
“I’m four blocks away. Be right there.”
“Okay. Hurry.”
She came tearing out to the car, her overnight bag thrown over her shoulder and mascara streaked down her cheeks. I pushed open my door, pissed that anyone would make my sister cry. “Seriously.” I slid the bag off her shoulder and shoved it over the seat into the back of the car. “Who made you cry?”
She wiped at her black-streaked cheeks. “No one. She doesn’t even know what she did. It wasn’t her fault anyway. Just...let’s go. Please.”
I turned back to scowl up at her friend’s house, but the girls crowded in the doorway watching us looked worried and sympathetic, so I couldn’t rightly charge up there and cuss any of them out. When I came back around, Zoey had climbed into the driver’s seat.
“No,” I said, motioning with my thumb for her to get out. “You’re not driving. Not like this. Besides, it’s my night, remember?”
And I didn’t want to feel any more emasculated than I already felt. I’d already been told I was a freakish horror between the legs; I did not want my little sister to go driving me around. It didn’t even matter than she was only a minute and a half younger than me, I was still technically the big brother.
“Damn it, Oren.” She peered up at me from her tearstained eyes. “I need to...I just need to relieve some pressure right now. Please.”
I’d never really been able to say no to her, but especially not when she was crying, so I sighed, ground my teeth and muttered, “Fine. Whatever,” before I went around to the passenger side. I tugged on my seat belt as soon as I climbed in, and fucking awful brother that I was, I didn’t even notice that she’d neglected to put hers on.
“So, what’s the deal?” I asked as she peeled out down the road and veered around a corner.
“Corey Garboni slept with Suzanne.”
I waited for her to go on, but when she didn’t, I lifted my eyebrows. “Okay. So?”
“So?” She sent me an incredulous scowl. “So, I liked Corey. I let him go up my shirt last weekend.”
“You did what?”
“And he was supposed to take me to the movies again tomorrow,” she ranted on without even hearing me. “I had no idea he was into Suzanne too, and she had no idea about what I’d done with him.”