Page 39 of The Way I Used to Be
“I used to play clarinet in band.” True, although not really a secret, per se.
He lifts his head and grins at me. “You did not.”
“Yes, I did, I swear,” I tell him, putting my hand over my heart. “You can even check the yearbook. But wait—don’t—because I looked like a real dork last year.”
He laughs, still looking at me like he doesn’t quite believe me. “For real?”
“I was even in this book club thing last year,” I offer.
“You don’t seem like a book club kind of girl to me,” he says, eyeing me suspiciously.
“I don’t?” I ask, pretending to be surprised. “I even started the book club with Miss Sullivan.” I laugh.
A smile spreads across his face as he decides I’m telling the truth. “That’s cute,” he finally says, grinning wider. “That’s really cute.”
“No, it’s not,” I mumble.
“No, it’s not. It’s kind of hot actually.” Then he kisses me seriously, deeply—the kind of kisses that lead somewhere. But he stops and looks at me, his eyes so soft. “You’re really beautiful, Eden,” he whispers.
I don’t ordinarily like to hear things like that—nice things—but maybe it’s the tone of his voice or the look on his face. I smile. Not on purpose, but it’s just that my face won’t let me not smile.
“You know, I already had sex with you,” I try to joke, “so you don’t have to say stuff like that.”
“Stop, I mean it.” And then he leans in and kisses my lips, so sweetly. Sometimes he uses his words like weapons to chip away at my icy exterior and sometimes he can break through to the slightly defrosted layer beneath. But then again, sometimes he just hits solid iceberg. For instance, he knows what he’s doing when next he says, “And you should smile more too.”
I look away, embarrassed. He has no way of knowing how sometimes it physically hurts to smile. How a smile can sometimes feel like the biggest lie I’ve ever told.
“No, I love your smile,” he says, with his fingers on my lips, which only makes my smile widen.
Only it doesn’t hurt this time.
“Eden Marie McCrorey...,” he begins, like he’s giving some big lecture about me, “always so serious and gloomy...”—my eulogy maybe—“but then you have this great smile nobody ever gets to see. Wait, are you blushing?” he teases. “I can’t believe it. I made Eden Marie McCrorey blush.”
“No, I’m not!” I laugh, placing my hands over my cheeks.
He takes my hands in his, though, and gently moves them away from my face. “You know what I think?” he asks me.
“What do you think?” I echo.
“I think...” He pauses. “You’re not so tough—you’re not really so hard,” he says seriously, his smile fading, “are you?”
My heart starts racing as he looks deeper into me. Because he’s right. Tough girls don’t blush. Tough girls don’t turn to jelly when a cute boy tells them they’re beautiful. And I’m terrified he’ll see through the tough iceberg layer, and he’ll discover not a soft, sweet girl, but an ugly fucking disaster underneath.
He brushes the hair out of my face and runs his index finger along the two-inch scar above my left eyebrow. “How’d you get this?” he asks. “I’ve been wondering, but every time I notice we’re—eh-hem—busy.” He smirks. “And then I always forget to ask.”
I touch my head. I grin, remembering the sheer absurdity of the accident.
“What?” he asks. “It must be something embarrassing....”
“It happened when I was twelve. I fell off my bike, had to get fifteen stitches.”
“Fifteen? That’s a lot. Just from falling off your bike?”
“Well, not exactly. Me and Mara, we were riding our bikes down that big hill, you know, the one at the end of my street?”
“Mm-hmm,” he murmurs, listening to me like I’m saying the most interesting things he’s ever heard in his life, paying such close attention to every word out of my mouth.
“And there’re those train tracks at the bottom, right?” I continue.
