Gimme Everything You Got - Iva-Marie Palmer Page 0,17
talking. “Just tell us where Candace is,” I said. “We have to go.”
He rolled his eyes. “Probably the guest room. Upstairs, down the hall next to the kitchen,” he said, and got back to kissing the freshman’s neck.
“Thanks,” I said, and flipped him off.
Tina and I went upstairs and banged on a closed door near the kitchen. Reggie opened it, zipping his pants right in front of us, and I already knew what had been going on; Candace was a champion at hand jobs. If she gave them because she found it fun, that’d be fine, but she clearly thought it would get her a boyfriend, and had cried many times because it wasn’t working. She was sitting on the daybed and, when she saw us, fixed her shirt.
“Come on, we’re going,” I said.
“Already?” She smoothed her hair and looked at Reggie, as if she was hoping he’d ask her to stay. “Is that okay with you?”
“Yeah, I’ll call you,” he said, like he wouldn’t.
“Bye, Reggie,” she said, and leaned toward him for a kiss. He barely brushed her lips with his gross mustache.
“See ya,” he said, dazedly walking back into the party.
As we maneuvered our way out onto Dan’s front porch, where a few people were sitting around smoking a joint, I said, “Seriously, Candace, you could do so much better.”
She gave a little laugh. “He seemed to think I was pretty good at what I did.”
“Gross,” Tina said, but laughed. “That mustache needs to go.”
“Do you even like him?” I asked Candace.
In the dark, I could see her scrunch up her face in annoyance. “If he asks me to homecoming, I’d like that,” she said.
Tina pointed to Candace’s blouse, which was buttoned up wrong. Candace giggled and started fixing it, saying, “I’d better say some Hail Marys tomorrow.” She was serious. The Trillos were Catholic, but Candace made up her own penance because she worried an official confession would get back to her mom somehow.
“I’m sure Mary gave Joseph a few hand jobs and she still got picked to make Jesus,” I said.
Candace’s eyes widened. “Susan!”
“Okay, okay,” I said as Tina snickered. And then, because I wanted to know, “Did he make you feel good?”
“Jesus?” Candace said.
“No! Reggie. It seems unfair if he got off and you didn’t.” I may not have had Candace’s experience with actual boys, but I definitely had some authority on getting off.
Candace sighed. “God, Susan, at least I’ve done more than a couple sloppy kisses,” she said, and I knew the answer was no. I hated that Candace acted like I was a complete idiot about guys, when it wasn’t like she chose them so well. But after the scene with Michael, I worried she had a point.
We turned onto the sidewalk to make our way to Tina’s car.
“I’ve had more than a couple sloppy kisses,” I said, leaning across Tina to put the words right up in Candace’s face. “I have experience.” The beer must have gotten to me a little, because not only was this an exaggeration, but I was also talking too loud.
“You guys—” Tina put up her hands in front of us, as if to hold us back.
“Hey, it’s my hero,” someone said in the dark, shocking me sober.
We crossed under a street lamp and there was Pointy Hair Guy, leaning against a beat-up Chevy Nova, his cup still in hand. He smiled in the dark. For someone with such a messy haircut, his teeth were the whitest ones I’d ever seen. He had high cheekbones on a thin face, giving him a sharp look, but his eyes twinkled like everything was a joke. Or at least like I was a joke.
“I’m not in the mood,” I said. The last thing I needed was some scrawny jerk teasing me about getting rejected by some not-scrawny jerk.
He lit a cigarette and held out the pack to us. We all shook our heads.
“What? I mean it,” he said. “I thought the way you told off Webster kicked ass. I mean, ‘the Webs’? He’s practically begging for the verbal abuse.”
I laughed, even though I didn’t want to.
“I’m Joe, by the way. Joe Gianelli.” He stepped away from the car and held out his hand for me to shake. I took it. It was cool and dry and refreshing after Dan’s hot, sweaty basement. “I used to go by Joey, but I didn’t want it to seem like I was copying Joey Ramone.”
I’d heard of the Ramones, but there were so many of