Boys and Girls, Part I

Chapter 13 - Pearls of Wisdom

“Uno!” Stephanie called out.

“You cheated,” Jacy muttered.

“How do you cheat at Uno?”

Jacy didn’t answer as she shoved another fistful of popcorn into her mouth, but she did shoot an accusatory glare in Stephanie’s direction.

“I think you need an attitude tune-up,” Stephanie added with mock sass.

“What I need…is a beer,” Jacy said, tossing her cards face-up on the table. “I fold.”

Stephanie frowned. “I didn’t get to win.”

“I forfeit,” Jacy answered, “so that’s an automatic win for you, Ace.”

Stephanie did not appear appeased but began collecting the cards to put them in the box anyway. Jacy scratched her leg as she opened Delaney and Lani’s fridge door, looking for a non-existent beer; neither of the roommates could drink like Jacy, nor did they care to. Stephanie blew a wisp of her wavy blonde hair out of her face, while Jacy yawned into the open refrigerator. Lani was off at UCLA for another weekend softball tournament. Delaney, who had left the game some time ago, stared mindlessly outside of her living room window.

As with most Friday nights this semester, the girls were itching to do something exciting, but Stephanie – the biggest party girl of the four – had grown jaded by now. Jacy was also bored, but as usual, she did nothing to quench her boredom. And Delaney, well…she had a lot on her mind.
It had been two weeks since Jason and she had done the deed. When Lani had come home that Sunday evening, Delaney had plastered a façade of okayness on her face; Lani hadn’t suspected anything, and Delaney wanted to keep it that way. She wanted her little secret to remain between Jason and herself.

Delaney hadn’t spoken to Jason since then; he hadn’t called her either. Having sex and leaving was a much greater offense than leaving after a kiss, and yet, Delaney wasn’t as upset. She was more sad than upset this time. Even though she put on a brave face for her friends, Delaney wanted to erupt into tears every few seconds.

Sex with Jason had been an otherworldly experience. Sure, Delaney didn’t have any other point of reference, but she was sure sex with another guy could never be as good as sex with Jason. As his green eyes looked into her blue eyes, Delaney felt an assortment of emotions that she would never be able to express verbally. He had been an excellent, yet gentle, lover by mixing equal parts roughness and tenderness. His kisses elicited passion and heart from Delaney, and she was almost ready to forgive him.

Almost.

But the bastard had gone and left again. And more than that, he hadn’t even bothered to call her afterwards. No good-bye. Nothing.

“Delaney?”

Delaney shook herself from her thoughts. Jacy was looking over at her with a questioning look on her face. “I asked you what you wanted for dinner.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Delaney answered, turning back to look out the window.

Behind Delaney, Jacy and Stephanie exchanged questioning glances. Stephanie went to return Uno to Delaney’s room, which basically meant throwing it on some vacant spot on the ground. Jacy walked over to Delaney and put a comforting hand on her shoulder.

“Who’s the son-of-a-bitch?”

Delaney spun around to face Jacy. “What?”

Jacy sighed. “Is it Jason Kent? Just say the word, and I’ll sit on him til he suffocates.”

Delaney shook her head and put on a fake smile. “You’re so silly, Jacy.” Delaney continued to chuckle, but her laughter gradually disintegrated into sobs. Tears clouded her blue eyes, and she cried into Jacy’s arms. Jacy hugged Delaney close and ran her hands through the latter’s red curls.

Stephanie stood in Delaney’s doorway, leaning her head against the doorframe and sadly taking in the scene in front of her. “It was the day of the Gala, wasn’t it?”

Delaney looked up from Jacy’s shoulder and made eye contact with Stephanie. Delaney nodded, causing Stephanie to curse to herself. “I should’ve gone home with you. I knew you weren’t feeling very well.”

Delaney tried to answer through her sobs. “I-it’s n-not your f-fault, Steph. It w-wouldn’t have made s-sense to take m-me home. I live farther aw-way.”

Stephanie sighed in frustration anyway and marched over to Delaney and Jacy. “Dammit Delaney! I want in on all these secrets too! Lani’s not the only one who cares about you! I know you think Jacy and I are nosy parkers, but I hate to see you suffering all by yourself.” Stephanie barely finished her last sentence before breaking down herself.

Jacy extended her arm to invite Stephanie into the group hug. Jacy was on the verge of tears herself, but she ultimately managed to keep her cool while Delaney and Stephanie sobbed away.

****

“Heather Mitts or Ailani?”

Jason tried to focus on his homework, but Ryan was purposely trying to make it difficult for him. The latter was sore that Jason wanted to stay in on a Friday night to do homework, instead of scouting potential lays around the NMU campus. To piss Jason off, Ryan lay on Jason’s bed, tossing a blue racquetball up into the air and catching it.

“Dude?”

“What?” Jason gritted through his teeth.

“Who would you rather lay, Heather Mitts or Ailani?”

“Who the hell is Heather Mitts?”

“She’s a sexy-as-hell soccer player. She kind of looks like…your sister, Julie. Hey, maybe she and I –

“You better stop right there,” Jason warned. “She’s only seventeen, you sick fuck.”

“Eh, maybe you’re right, Jase. I’m pretty sure I’d rather get down and dirty with Ailani Bennett anyway.”

Jason rolled his eyes and directed his focus back to his homework. It was pretty useless anyway. The only reason Jason didn’t want to go out was that he didn’t want to be around people. The only reason that he didn’t want to be around people was that he’d probably want to talk to them – talk to them about how he’d royally (and literally) screwed over a wonderful girl and potential friend. With Ryan in the room, Jason was two seconds from making a full-blown confessional to his friend.

“Course that blonde friend of hers is pretty cute too. ‘Cept she needs to learn to close that mouth of hers,” Ryan continued with a smile and a shake of his head. “Even the chubby brunette is sorta cute. Definitely not my type, but not an impossibility.”

Jason pretended to ignore Ryan and cracked his neck. He didn’t want to be on this topic; he didn’t want to talk about Ailani Bennett and her friends. Well, about one particular friend, at least.

“And Red –

Shit.

“Whoo, she’s pretty cute too. Those eyes are something, and that hair…man.”

Jason’s features twitched.

“That color…it can’t be real, right?”

Jason took a deep breath.

“Course…there’s only one way to find out. Maybe I should go investigate.”

Something in Jason snapped. He abruptly rose from his desk and spun around to face Ryan. The bastard had a smug grin on his face.

“What the fuck did you say?”

Ryan tossed the racquetball aside and stood up from Jason’s bed, still smirking. Both guys stood at an equally imposing 6’. While Jason was slightly bigger than Ryan, Ryan made up for the size difference in sheer moxie.

“I was just saying I should go check to see if Red’s a real redhead.”

“I heard what you said,” Jason growled.

“So why are we so pissed?” Ryan asked back, his expression growing a little more serious.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Jason lied.

“I told you to stay away from her, Jason. You told me that there was nothing between you two – that sleeping together was not even an issue.”

Jason gulped. Shit. He was busted. How the hell did the bastard know?

“You had red hair all over you, Jason. That Sunday morning when you came back home with a guilty expression on your face, I knew something was up. Since I was pretty certain you didn’t wake up at 6am to give her a good morning kiss, I put two and two together.”

Jason clenched his fists and averted his eyes from Ryan’s.

“You’re fucking up my Friday night plans, Kent. I let it go last week because I thought maybe he just needs a little time to think things over, but now I finally get what you’re actually doing.”

“Oh yeah? And what’s that?” Jason demanded.

“You’re avoiding her.”

“Obviously,” Jason answered nastily.

“And you’re avoiding every other human being, including me.”

“So sorry you haven’t been the center of my attention lately,” Jason continued sarcastically.

“Don’t be a prick, Jason. That isn’t like you, man.”

“Well maybe you don’t know me as well as you think you do,” Jason snapped.

“Well then, listen to this. I’m gonna do my best Dr. Phil and say that you think if you withdraw from society – which includes me, your best friend – then you won’t ultimately have to come to terms with how you actually feel about this girl.”

Jason froze.

“You think that maybe if you let this thing you two got going die, that it’ll be okay – that you’ll forget about her and th-th-th-that’s all folks. But you slept with her, Jase, and that makes the difference.”

“You sleep with tons of girls, Mackey, so I have no idea what ‘difference’ you’re referring to.”

“Jason,” Ryan began sincerely, “I have never slept with a girl that I really cared about. You slept with a girl who you’ve been pining over since you returned some stupid purple wallet to her.” Ryan let out a long sigh before moving towards the door. “That, man, makes all the difference.”

Jason grew defensive. “So what? Now you think that we should go together? That’s not what you were saying two weeks ago.”

Ryan stopped and slowly turned around. “It was an instinctive response to preserve my handsome face.” He was trying to be funny, but Ryan wasn’t really smiling. “I make errors in judgment, Jason. But I like to think that I eventually make the right decisions most of the time.” Ryan walked away still facing Jason. “It’s all part of my lifelong goal to become more like you.” With that, Ryan turned back around and exited his best friend’s room.

****

A/N: Well, hope you liked the chapter. Jason's getting scolded by his best friend, but wait til Lani figures out what he did...