Having already been wondering if and when Nick was going to corner her, Ari wasn’t surprised when she shut the door to see him leaning back against the kitchen counter. She shrugged. “Typical Rachel to pull something this weird on my birthday.”
Nick chuckled. “The girls seem to like him.”
“That’s because Rabir is built like Jared Padalecki and is half-naked.”
He laughed. “Yeah.”
An awkward silence fell between them and Ari took a gulp of Diet Coke hoping when she drew breath he’d be gone. He wasn’t. Still unsettled, Ari pulled out a chair and flopped down into it. “You enjoying the party?”
“I was until Rachel shut off the PlayStation .”
Ari snorted. “Yeah, sorry about that. When Rachel wants something done a certain way…”
“Yeah, I know, she was my lab partner this year.”
That made her laugh. She could just imagine how much torture Nick had undergone. She smiled sympathetically and watched his eyes brighten.
“God, you are so special, you have no idea.” Nick shook his head
Uh oh . Ari felt her stomach roil. She did not want to do this again. “Nick—”
“No, don’t.” He held up a hand to interrupt to her. “I know you just want to be friends, Ari. I do. And I know it’s because of that knob Creagh. So OK. Let’s be friends. Let’s hang out this summer?”
Blushing, Ari looked at the floor, unable to meet his eyes as she replied, “You don’t look at me like you want to be just friends, Nick.”
“That’s because I don’t. I want more.”
“Then we shouldn’t hang out. I don’t want you to get the wrong idea.”
“I know where you stand. I do. I can be friends with you without making you uncomfortable. Just… give me a chance. Please?”
Feeling bad, Ari grimaced, finally drawing her eyes up to meet his. “Nick… I want to hang out with you this summer but I can’t if you keep saying things like ‘I want more’.”
He laughed and stood up away from the counter. “OK. I won’t. I swear.”
“Do you know how many girls would kill for you to say that to them? You should be back in that living room, choosing one of them .”
He shook his head. “I want someone special. I’ll wait for her. And while I’m waiting I want to hang out with my friend Ari.”
Flattered, despite it all, that he thought her so special, Ari stood up, pulling a fresh beer out of the refrigerator for him. “Come on,” she said, clinking their bottles together. “Let’s go get that PS 3 turned back on.”
Nick and A.J . kept her mind off Charlie for the rest of the night with their antics. She laughed a lot with them, letting her worries disappear as she spent one last night with all the kids she’d hung out at high school with for the last few years. The genie mysteriously disappeared an hour after his arrival, an hour before his booked time. Rachel had been pissed because she’d paid to have him there for the two hours. Somehow, Staci talked her down. Personally Ari was glad he had left. The guy gave her the heebie jeebies and as for the thing she’d wished for… well… she didn’t even want to think about that.
For a brief moment, when A.J. wasn’t cracking a joke and she was left quietly sipping her drink, Charlie and the girl upstairs crossed her mind and the breath whooshed out of her body. She took a moment, not even pulling away when Nick wrapped an arm around her shoulders and hugged her close. The party played out around her in a blur of movement and color. Words were spoken, hands touched, lips kissed a cheek. But none of it meant anything to her. She let it happen, glad for the distance between her mind and it.
It was late when people started to leave. Rachel and Staci wanted to stay behind to clean up but Ari just wanted everyone out. Maybe she was more like her dad than she thought because all she wanted now was to be alone. She wanted silence. It took a lot of energy, and some pleading with her eyes at Nick, but between the two of them they managed to persuade Rache and Staci to leave. She hugged her friends as they stepped out into the cool night air, throwing themselves into the back seat of Staci’s dad’s car. God, she hoped they didn’t throw up. She shut the door.
Alone. At last.
Ari turned the lock on the door and strolled slowly back to her living room. Paper cups, streamers, and wrapping paper littered every available space. Her gifts were scattered all over, some of them already broken. Drink spilled onto furniture, food was crunched into the floor. Just the thought of cleaning it up exhausted her.
“I’ll do it in the morning,” she mumbled, turning for the stairs.
The strange events of the day buzzed in the background of her mind and echoed in raw pain in her chest but exhaustion won out. Kicking off her shoes, Ari climbed into her huge bed with her jeans still on and collapsed back against her pillow, sinking into the cold mattress.
Her eyes were just closing when she heard the creak of her door. Her heart spluttered and she looked up, squinting into the dark. “Ms. Maggie?” she whispered, watching as the dark shape of a person appeared in the doorway. “Who’s there?” She scrambled up into a sitting position, her heart pounding. An image of the creepy genie guy Rabir flashed across her eyes and she tried in her panic to remember where she’d put her baseball bat.
“Ari,” a familiar deep voice croaked and her eyes widened as her eyes adjusted to the lack of light and a shape formed before her, moving closer to her bed.