My Monster

Chapter Thirteen: I Hate Waiting

Chapter 13: I Hate Waiting

My little scene with Ashley could very well have cost me a visit to the principal's office. It's a fortunate thing the faculty avoids the track field like the Witch of the West avoids water.

Nevertheless, it set the school buzzing.

In my school, if you have no friends, have no intention of interacting with anyone, and don't do anything out of the usual, no one will even know your name.

But within moments, everyone knows who I am and what I supposedly did.

Everyone has sex by senior year. That's a given, a fact. It's a pressure that lies on the shoulders of all high schoolers, a nagging little fly in our ears. You must have sex, it buzzes. You didn't have sex yet? Have sex, have sex, have sex. What are you, some kind of rock?

It's this pressure that wraps sex up in constraints, games, and rules, and makes it a topic talked about in whispers as if it's some kind of taboo. Everyone's hooking up with everyone. Everyone's having sex.

No one's sex life is the subject of widespread public debate.

It's like there are neon lights flashing out of my hair with the way people stare at me as I pass through the corridors. The fear that my presence commanded right after I confronted Ashley has ebbed down. I keep my face blank, my back straight, my chin up. I'm inclined to strut, but I don't.

Okay, maybe just a little.

I don't care about my changed position. I want to be having sex. I don't care about whether people look at me or they don't. The only thing that's bothering me, if I'm perfectly honest, is that they keep trying to talk to me between classes as if I'm some sort of hero. I even have some random guy ask me out. This makes moving around the school much slower than I'm used to.

I remember only during seventh period that I have band practice today, and with all the Shawn craziness, I forgot my oboe at home. Last week's practice was cancelled. I haven't touched my instrument at all over the summer and forgot to buy reeds.

I've been playing the oboe since I was six. I'm passably okay at it. I'd've quit if it weren't for the fact that participating in the school band looks very nice on my college application.

Mr. Sovarski, my AP calculus teacher, rambles on in the front of the class. The decision to skip eighth period solidifies in my mind. Now all I need is to convince my date that we're going to commit the crime together. I scribble a memo on the corner of my notebook and tear it out. Landon's conveniently sitting right next to me. I manage to catch his eye as I fold the little note four ways.

He raises his eyebrows at me, one corner of his mouth turning up in a half-smile. He lets his hand, the one nearest to me, fall from the desk and rest palm upward in his lap.

In one quick motion, I pass him the note. He attempts to close his fingers around it, but grasps my hand in the process. The touch of his skin is warm and smooth and sends happy little sensations up my arm.

As I slip my hand from his, the back of my palm grazes his thigh. I lick my lips. Calculus, please be over.

I have never in my life wanted another human being to this extent, and I get it now. It's fun. I'm having fun wanting him. My body is filled with this electric energy that's at once both painful and pleasing. I get why people do this. I even get why they obsess over it.

When he reads my note, a wide smile breaks across his face, and he gives me a thumbs-up. I nod my head once and then go back to concentrating on what Mr. Sovarski has to say about numbers.