Jessica vs. The Jerk

21. Music and lyrics

Not even five minutes later, Renie finds me upstairs where I'm hanging out with her brothers. By that I mean I'm eating a bag of Kornets while watching them play a particularly aggressive game of Halo and occasionally interjecting with questionable advice. Renie gestures toward her room and I follow her.

'Shouldn't you be downstairs?' I ask with my mouth full. I'm sitting on the floor while Renie lies on her bed looking up at the ceiling.

'Ten minutes.' Renie narrows her eyes at me. 'That's enough time to tell me what it's like to kiss Jonah Sullivan.'

My eyes widen. 'Is that what he said?' My voice rises to squeak by the time I get to the end of the question.

Renie smirks at me. 'He hasn't said a word.'

I exhale loudly in relief. 'Good.'

'Well?'

'Well what?'

'Don't make me get it out of you, Jessie.'

Mila bursts into the room at that moment. 'Is it true?!'

I roll my eyes. 'Alex tricked me into playing a fudging kissing game. Jonah and I spent seven minutes in a closet.' My friends are looking at me expectantly. 'Nothing happened!'

Mila looks at me for a moment, and then she smirks and sits on the floor next to me. She grabs a handful of Kornets. 'Oh, I think something happened.'

'We did not kiss!'

'I didn't say it was a kiss.' Mila winks at me suggestively, and she and Renie grin at each other.

'We talked. That's it.'

'Talked?' Renie said with doubt in her voice. 'No touching? At all?'

They laugh when I turn red, and fifteen minutes later they know almost everything that happened in the closet with Jonah and they're doing victory jigs all around Renie's room. So immature. I leave out the part where Jonah tells me he wants to kiss me. Nothing happened, and I'm not sure how I feel about that. Like, why bother telling me if he's not planning to do anything about it? It's just so awkward and, yes, embarrassing.

When we run out of Kornets, my friends drag me back downstairs -- according to Mila it will make everyone suspicious if I don't show my face -- and despite some speculative glances from a few of the girls, no one says anything to me. I guess Jonah was right -- no one actually kisses in a kissing game. I don't know if I'm relieved or disappointed.

Nevertheless, I avoid the living room and walk out to the backyard where around fifteen people are sitting in a haphazard circle, surrounded by empty bottles and stubbed out cigarettes. Logan motions me over and makes room for me beside him, while Renie and Mila find their own spots within the group.

At some point in the evening, Logan has discarded the leather jacket, and I'm not the only one now shamelessly checking out the intricate tattoo that runs down his left arm, but I only catch glimpses of it when the decorative lights illuminate parts of the design. Everyone seems more relaxed around him, no doubt helped by the alcohol and the karaoke and the party games. I wonder if Logan had been locked in the linen closet tonight. I can't see Jonah anywhere, which is a relief, though my eyes won't stop checking the French doors every time they open.

Alex joins the group, carrying two guitars, and soon I'm surrounded by inebriated teenagers singing angsty ballads. Logan's voice is delicious and sends shivers down my spine, and even though I had known Alex could play the guitar, I'm impressed by his improvisations. Logan picks up the other guitar and their duet is a teenage girl's wet dream, and I can tell that all the girls -- and some of the boys -- around me are thinking the same thing.

Renie and I communicate in eyebrow semaphore as we try to catch Mila's eye, but she studiously avoids looking at us. Instead, she puffs furiously at her cigarette and looks at the ground so no one can see her face.

When Logan breaks into a cover of Forevermore I swear all the girls stop breathing. It's not Pusali's typical song and it feels like he's giving us a rare gift. People from inside the house start wandering into the yard to listen and I can see a few people with their cell phones out, recording. I feel strangely protective of Logan and shift slightly to block the closest ones from getting a good view of his face. He doesn't look at anyone as he plays, and though I only met him tonight I get the feeling that maybe this isn't something he wants to face when he's sober tomorrow.

When he gets to the second chorus, he looks up and his gaze locks with mine. It's too intimate and I want to look away, but there's something in his eyes that feels almost like he's begging me for something. I don't know what. I'm not experienced with boys. But I don't break eye contact, and I feel like I might burst into tears right then and there. I feel every line of the lyrics and though my face is flushed, I can't look away.

One of the guys adds a harmony to the song and Logan looks away to grin at him. I exhale slowly and shift my leg so our knees are touching. Logan glances at me and gives me a sexy wink, but I see something else in his eyes and I'm not fooled by the bravado. It's weird to start thinking of one of my celebrity crushes as an actual person, whose life carries moments of sadness and joy and mistakes. I've always just assumed that Logan and his bandmates are exceptional musicians, and that's how they earned their success. But now I wonder what life has thrown them that they can put so much emotion into so few words, and create feelings by putting together random bits of sound. It's incredible when I really think about it.

When the duet finishes and Logan starts playing a Yano song, the tension lifts. I look around and I see Jonah standing under a tree near the door, chatting quietly with a couple of the water polo guys. He shoots me an idle glance and I see his eyes drop to where my knee is touching Logan's before he looks away, laughing at something his friends say. I shift self-consciously in my seat. When Jonah walks back into the house, I wait for a break in the singing before I follow, feeling nervous and anxious and so very daring.

* * *

A/N: I kind of fell in love with Logan in this chapter, and I hate what I have to do to him. *cue ominous music* This guy has a heartbreaking backstory, and unfortunately, we won't find out much about it in this book. 🙁

The video features the song that Logan sings in this chapter. It's not the original version, but I thought you guys might appreciate David Archuleta brooding next to a window. I imagine Logan singing it with a little less ballad and a lot more grunt.

x Brie

PS Dedicated to daphne_d1999, who wrote a beautiful and melancholy one shot called Fire and Ice.

Next: Logan is definitely a bad boy.