Velvet Skye (Updates Fridays)

Chapter 1 (NEW)

I dared her to kiss me, and she did. She dared me to stop, but I couldn’t. I haven’t since.

So if we get caught, and everything crazy-beautiful about our secrets falls apart, I’ll look at her then the same way I’m looking at her right now—like I don’t regret a thing. 

Skye should be at home, studying like a straightedge, and pushing herself to stay perfect instead of pushing herself against me in the back of my beat up Civic. She’s still in her track clothes. She wears them well enough to make Westlake High’s jerseys look sexy, and I hate sports.

“This doesn’t mean I like you, Ty,” she says.

She’s a better kisser than liar, but two-and-a-half beers ago she truth or dared herself into trouble. She lets her hair down, and it’s so dirty blonde beautiful that I stare at her like I’m seeing her for the first time. Really seeing her. But I’ve been watching Skye for longer than she knows, just waiting for a reason to talk to her, waiting to find out if she’s worth losing everything over. So far, so good.

“This doesn’t have to mean anything,” I say.

Truth.

“Do you want it to?” She asks.

Dare.

“Verdict’s still out, but I like a challenge.”

Challenge is a power word. They’re like Pop Rocks for jocks. Skye’s not a jock, but she’s a little bit of a track star. Every article about every pole-vaulting competition she’s won in the last few months is framed in my house. Not my doing, but my cousin’s. “Westlake flies Skye high,” over the fireplace. “Skye Sullivan snags first,” in the den. Skye, Skye, Skye.

 Miles is proud of her, over-the-moon proud. He was obsessed with her before they started dating, but at least now he has an excuse. I don’t. I never did, but I never expected to. Guess the newspaper clippings were a gateway drug.

The second Skye slips out of her jersey, I almost stop thinking about Miles—but only almost.

I pull her close enough to get a little bit drunker on the way she smells, like Starburst. She tastes even better, but even with the tip of her tongue dancing on my lips, I wonder if her candy kisses mean anything.

We’ve only kissed so far, outta-this-world-kissed, but nothing more serious than that. But tonight feels serious, take-her-top-off-and-then-some serious, and I’m sober enough to be scared shitless about it. Miles is waiting for her, but Skye’s got her hands on me like she doesn’t have somewhere else to be or someone else to go home to. Like this isn’t just a drunken dare.

 My phone buzzes in my pocket. It’s probably Miles. If it’s not Miles, it’s the “Miles alarm,” aka T-minus ten minutes ‘til an, “Is Skye out of study group ” phone call or text. Skye runs her hand up my thigh slow enough to drive me a little bit crazy before she checks the screen.

“He texted. What’s the excuse of the day?”

 She’s asked this every night for the last three nights we’ve messed around, like the game’s gone on longer than it really has.

“Alien abduction?” I say.

She laughs and her breaths fall a little too softly against my skin.

              “You can do better,” she says.

“How ‘bout the truth?”

She glares at me, green-eyed and wild.

“Where do I start? The part where you dared me to kiss you?” She asks.

“I don’t think he’ll like that.”

“I don’t know, Ty. He might be into the three-way thing. Kinky types aren’t always obvious.”

“I’ll say.”

 She eases off of me a little and stares out the back window at the lights on the track.

“What’s wrong, Skye?”

Her eyes are miles away like she’s out there running. There’s only one place she really wants to run to, and it’s not to me. I knew that when we started this, but it still makes me sick.

              “I’m remembering,” she says.

“What?”

“This. It was an adventure.”

Was? I killed it. I accidentally guilt tripped her back to her boyfriend. It’s the right thing to do, but I don’t wanna end up being some backseat memory for her. She’s more than a backseat memory to me. 

“You’re great, Ty. But Miles is good for me. Too good. He's a way better person than I am—“

 And he’s light years better than you.

She doesn’t have to say it for me to hear it in her voice. I like her voice, but not when she says things like that. Partly ‘cause I know it’s true, mainly ‘cause it’s not the kind of true I was looking for.

                 “I know, Skye.“ 

My voice cracks worse than it did when I turned fourteen. Three years later puberty’s still a bitch. “It’s cool. This wasn’t really a good idea anyway and I’m sorry. Miles is—we should probably tell Miles.” 

               “I should probably tell Miles,” she says.

“But you didn’t start this.”

Technically, Miles did. Well, that’s not entirely true, but it’s pretty close.

Last week, he started the daily college visit crawl to the hundred thousand options he has. He’s gone most days and I do nothing after school, so he forced his, all-about-Skye schedule on me. Interim Boyfriend. Again, his idea, but I didn’t complain. Skye’s car-less and hot, and I’m morally questionable, so I took the job.

For a while, I had a totally clean record. Skye and I talked a little but it was harmless—mostly. I picked her up after practice, brought her to study group, and dropped her off at our house the second Miles got home. Chauffeur extraordinaire—until I kissed her. Well, I dared her kiss me, but it’s still mostly my fault.

“We both screwed up, Ty. But if I tell Miles, he’ll most likely forgive me. If you tell him—”

The beer-kiss aftertaste in my mouth goes sour.

“Maybe we should chill for a while or just stop. I’ll text him saying your study group’s running late, and drive you back to our house when you sober up.”

“Just tell him you took me to my place.”

“Why?”

“’Cause you’re gonna. Mom’s working the graveyard shift tonight.”

She starts grinding on me like I’m a mechanical bull without a conscience, and for a good couple minutes she’s right about that. I can’t think straight, ‘cause if she’s telling the truth, I just might lose it to her tonight, and that’s not supposed to sound awesome, but it does.

              “Skye, I thought, you said this was done.“

I can’t breathe.  

 “It is, starting tomorrow.”

“You sure you wanna do this?”

I’m trying to feel guilty, but popping off her bra takes priority. She peels off my punk rock band tee easy.

“I won't tell if you won't,” she says.

No more shorts. I’m working on getting out of my jeans but it’s not so easy in a might as well be two-seater.

“I know you won't. I'm just worried about me."

"Hakuna matata, Ty."

              "Seriously though, if I say anything I’ll be homeless or he'll kill me. Whichever comes first. ”

Truth.

“So don’t.”

Dare.