Chapter 1
It was an exceptionally hot summer. I was glad to be spending it with my father while mom was away on a retreat. Since my parents had divorced, two years earlier, and I moved to Palo Alto with my Mom, life had certainly changed. My brother, Cameron, stayed with Dad in Jersey. I missed Cameron and well…he was certainly the reason I narrowly escaped losing my virginity to the most beautiful guy I had ever laid eyes on. “What’re you doing Carly?” Cameron yelled as he jumped out of his car. Needless to say, I was horrified that my brother had caught me making out with our cousin Abe’s best friend. A boy I had been sneaking around with for two weeks. The first night I saw him, Abe and I had gone to a party on the shore. He was sitting on a rock with a beer in his hand. He was gorgeous: messy black hair and the most beautiful eyes I had ever seen. Brown like chocolate, and his perfect smile… God that smile, and a dimple on his left cheek that was so deep. He had his shirt off and his body was beautiful. Long, lean, and cut. His skin was a golden tan, and I swear I didn’t see a tan line—and I looked. “Hey, Abe,” he smiled and waved us over and handed Abe a beer. “You want one?” “Uh…sure…” I looked at Abe and he smiled. I really didn’t, but I didn’t want him to look at me like I was some sort of child either. I wasn’t a child; I was nineteen years old and going to be in my second year at Stanford University. Virgin—yes, sheltered—yes, but it was somewhat self-imposed. I remember the brunette brigade swarming around him and how they all but threw themselves at him. I watched him smile and joke with them, but I also saw the way he looked at me out of the corner of his eye, and how he would smile at me when Abe wasn’t paying attention. He had a girlfriend, and watching them was not at all comfortable. Not just because I thought he was beautiful or that I truly spent every night for that first week waiting for his smile, craving his attention. It was because she was mean. She was rude to every one of his friends, nasty to all of hers, and constantly redirecting his attention from my cousin and their friends to her mouth. The way she would kiss him or would make a sexual comment just to gain his attention made me nauseous. What was even worse was that it seemed to work. On the last night of the first week, they got into a fight, and she actually slapped him across the face. He laughed at her and turned away. He walked toward the water and stood there. I remember Abe talking to him, patting him on the back and then they walked back to the group, which now included me. He smiled. “Well I’m pretty sure that’s done.” Abe and the rest of the guys laughed. “Yeah, right.” He looked up at me and smiled, and that smile did me in for the rest of the summer. It started off innocently; we all hung out at the beach every night. He eventually sat closer to me. When Abe noticed, he would back off. “I wanna hang out with you Carly,” he purred into my ear. Yes—he purred, his voice could melt butter, it was that damn hot. And what came out of my mouth? “We are.” He looked confused, the beautiful guy I had watched for over a week. The one who exuded confidence looked dumbstruck. When he finally pulled it together, he smiled. “Well, alright then,” and he excused himself after a few awkward moments. A few days later, she started to come around again. At first he ignored her and then he didn’t, simple and easy. And she was easy—I watched as she flounced around in front of his friends to piss him off, and then the two of them would leave. Most times they didn’t return. A week later he showed up, and she stormed down toward all of us, yelling at him. He walked up and sat next to me: it was the only place to sit, I know, but still it made my heart beat faster. “Do you like her? Is that why you have to come here every night?” she yelled. I knew my eyes were as big as ET’s when I glanced up at her. She gave me a dirty look. “I’m sorry, I don’t know your name… I’m Abe’s cousin. I’m a….just visiting,” I managed to choke out before she interrupted. “Pam. Learn it,” she snapped.
