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Roadside Distraction
by Sara
She's looking at me again. Not so much a look as a stare. Not so much a
stare even. Staring doesn't usually imply this much tension. We've been in
the car ten minutes and somehow I've gotten the same sort of feeling I get
whenever I'm alone with Clark. Like something could happen if only I make a
move.
Only I'm getting this feeling from Lana. Who is still staring.
"Okay. What is it?" I risk a look over at her.
"You." She looks predatory. I feel like I've been put under a microscope.
A microscope that sees through clothes.
"What?" She just- what now?
She smiles like she knows something I don't. "Pull over."
"What? Why?"
"Pull over, Chloe." Authority looks good on her.
I do. Pull off onto the shoulder, put the car into park. "Lana, what's
wrong with you?"
Her hand is on my shoulder. The unbuckling of her seat belt interrupts the
silence of her non-answer. She reaches over me and unbuckles mine, looks up
at me. "Have you ever been kissed, Chloe?"
No. "Of course I have."
"By a girl?"
"What? No. Lana, what-?"
"Ever thought about it?"
Okay, seriously not feeling comfortable with where this is going. A
truthful answer doesn't seem like a good idea considering how she keeps
looking at me. I mean, I'm young. People my age think about things. It
doesn't mean anything.
It doesn't.
She's moving closer. Her voice only inches away when she says-
"I've seen the way you watch when I talk to Clark. Not just jealous of me,
are you? Maybe even wishing you were in the middle?"
Her hand is on my thigh, slowly moving upwards. It's hot in here. Why is
it so hot in here? And how is she suddenly so perceptive? I don't know
what to say. I feel like running.
My hand is unconsciously reaching for the door handle when she reaches over
and grabs it and suddenly she's on my lap, straddling me, knees pressed to
my hips, thin fingers gripping my collar, so close I can feel the heat of
her skin through her clothes. "You've thought about it. Tell me you've
thought about it, Chloe."
Lips. Lips at my ear, a tongue flicking out to touch my earlobe, lips
gently pressed to the spot immediately behind, and I inhale sharply. More
daring suddenly, kissing down my throat, biting a little, quick nip of teeth
followed by a soft wet mouth licking it better. "Tell me," she whispers,
hands tangling in my hair, lips moving up until they linger an inch from my
own, vaguely glossy and tinted pink and they're all I can focus on, all I
can see.
"I-" is all I can manage before she leans forward and we're kissing, I'm
kissing a girl, I'm kissing Lana, oh my god I'm kissing my best friend's
crush, I'm kissing my friend, a girl, Lana, I'm kissing her and it's the
best thing I've felt in a long time. I'm dizzy from the heat and the
closeness and her, my fingers caught in her thick dark hair, pulling her
closer.
I've thought about it. Lana and Clark and me, together, me watching them,
him watching me and Lana, Lana watching him and me. I've thought about
Lana, I've thought about her like this. Her lips, I thought, would be soft
and taste like the vanilla lip gloss of hers that she let me use one day and
that I licked off in twenty minutes because it was almost like tasting her.
She would be soft and sweet, and smile shyly at me, looking up from beneath
long eyelashes and asking politely before she kissed me. We would both be
tentative, hesitating in our actions, because she wouldn't be sure what to
do and neither would I.
This isn't what I thought it would be. It's better. It's hard and fierce,
it's desire. There's no hesitation in Lana's lips on mine, and whatever
inhibitions I might have once had disappear beneath the slick pressure of
her mouth. She doesn't taste like vanilla, instead my tongue tingles as it
slides over hers, and I know she must have been chewing cinnamon gum
recently. I can feel cold sweat on the back of my neck and the heat of her
body pressed to mine makes me hate the very existence of fabric and
clothing. I reach for her hips to pull her closer, the heat between her
legs burning through the seams of her jeans, fire against my stomach.
Clark, I think. I wanted my first kiss to be with Clark.
I close my eyes and kiss Lana harder. Time slides away as I acquaint myself
with the feel of her lips, the soft curve of her neck. My tongue catches on
the silver loops of her necklace, the metallic taste mixing with the slight
salt tang of her collarbone.
Her knees keep me locked in place, preventing any movement of my hips. The
steering wheel must be digging into her back. I'd always thought of her as
a petite person; having her in my lap for the last several minutes has
disabused me of this notion.
Sharp teeth nip at my earlobe. Was I not paying enough attention? Guess
not.
"Are you thinking about Clark?" Lana demands.
"No." Not anymore.
Her hands press heavily against the skin of my stomach. Short nails dig
into my hips. "Liar," she hisses.
I stare into her eyes, inches from my own. "Does it matter?" I ask.
For a second, I think she's going to say yes. That it's me she wants.
She considers, then slowly draws her hands out from beneath my shirt. "I
guess not."
"Lana," I start, but she cuts me off with a kiss, a brief press of lips
that's finished before I realize that it's happened. I'm left staring as
she gracefully levers herself off of me and gets back to her seat.
"Take me home, Chloe," she says, not quite a command.
The click of her seatbelt brings me back to reality. "No. What the hell
was that, Lana, you just attack me in my own car and then stop without any
explanation-"
"Take. Me. Home," she cuts me off, her voice like ice. Except that ice
melts, and I don't she's going to any time soon.
"Fine." I start up the car, pull off of the shoulder.
She doesn't say a word for the ten minutes it takes to get to her house. I
leave the radio off. The only sound comes from the slightly-opened window
that doesn't even let in enough air to cool down the temperature in here.
The windshield is still fogged a little.
I glance at her a few times, from the corner of my eye. She doesn't look at
me.
I pull into her driveway, making it a point not to look at Clark's house.
Funny how betraying a friend seems like so much less of big deal when
there's a girl in your lap with her lips on your neck. Yeah. Funny.
She reaches for the door handle. I have a feeling that there's something I
should be saying right now. "Sorry" comes to mind but that doesn't make any
sense. "What the hell?" seems like a better alternative, but I doubt she'll
answer that. I don't know if I even want to say anything, for that matter.
She opens the door, gets out of the car. Last chance, I think, until she
leans back in, her knees on the seat, and kisses me. Hard, insistent, like
she's trying to prove something. I wish I knew what.
When she finally pulls away, I almost want to gasp for breath. Instead, I
inhale deeply. She pauses once her feet are on the ground again, her hand
clutching the car door.
"Clark isn't the only option, you know," she says bluntly.
"Lana." I don't know what else to say.
"Just keep it in mind, okay?" The door slams before I have time to answer.
I watch her walk up the drive, unlock the door and slip inside. I'm still
determinedly not looking in the direction of Clark's house. The phrase
"bizarre love triangle" keeps running through my head.
I can't figure out what's going on at all, with Lana, nice, sweet and (oh
god, Whitney) taken, acting like this. The local drama is supposed to
center around the crazy meteor-rock induced antics of the villains that
always seems to spring up around here, not the sex lives of the high school
students.
Wait. They're not. There can't be a connection, right? Lana wouldn't do
this if she didn't want to. It's not like she was acting completely out of
character or anything.
I back out of the driveway carefully.
There can't be a connection there. Lana was just feeling impulsive. For
the first time ever. It's not like she and Whitney are even- except that
they are.
I am not thinking about this.
I'm on the road, driving home.
Meteor rocks. Weird behavior. People getting a little crazier, a little
meaner.
Keep driving.
There's no connection. There can't be.
Right?
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