my arms with his hands; he must have been thinking the same thing. Reaching over my shoulder, he grabbed his Dr. Pepper and opened it while Alicia and I talked about senior pictures and registering for school.
“So, am I taking you both to get your pictures?” Jensen asked, coming around to position himself between us and putting his arms around our shoulders. “I’m so proud of you both, all grown up,” he smirked.
Alicia made a face and punched her brother in the ribs. He pretended she had hurt him terribly, which led to a sparring match around the kitchen. Curious to how his mood could oddly change so quickly, I opened my can of pop and took a sip, watching them play-fight. Jensen had Alicia in a headlock while she was trying to stomp on his feet to get him to loosen his hold.
“Alright, alright, I give up!” she sputtered. Jensen let her go and she stood up, pulling her hair back out of her face. “Jensen, you suck.” She came over and sat back down on her stool.
“To answer your question,” I began as Jensen came over and stood next to me, “yes, you’ll be taking us to get our pictures taken.”
“And registration,” Alicia added. She picked up her magazine and leafed through it.
I turned to see if Jensen’s new mood was still there. He seemed to have forgotten about lunch and only smiled at me, pulling the hair away from my ear so he could whisper into it. “I was thinking I need to do some more packing. Do you want to help me?” He kissed my neck lightly and told Alicia that we’d be back later.
“Uh, huh. Use protection and keep it down,” Alicia joked.
“Nice.” I rolled my eyes as we walked by Alicia and Jensen made a move to push her off her stool, which she had been anticipating and held fast.
Jensen led me down to his bedroom, and when he opened the door it looked the same as it did yesterday morning. He pulled me close, kissed me lightly and smiled. “I actually do need to do some packing, if that’s OK?” He kissed my nose.
Reaching up, I latched my fingers around his neck and pulled him onto the bed. “You have a few minutes, don’t you?” I asked, giving him my best look of desire. He gazed at me intently and surprised me by enthusiastically kissing my lips. I returned it equally. A few minutes later, we were both breathing heavily and staring into each other’s eyes. I could feel his erection pressing against my core and had to resist the craving of wanting him against me and eventually inside of me.
“I really do need to pack,” he said, pulling himself up off of the bed, “but, there will be more of that later.” Shit, sometimes he had the self-control of a Catholic priest. “Promise?” I asked, rolling onto my side to watch him.
Jensen smiled and his eyes glinted with mischief. He turned on his CD player and began where he had finished the day before. Stone Temple Pilots filtered through the speakers at a volume that would still allow us to talk if we wanted to. It was quiet for a few minutes and then he started conversation. “Tell me not to worry about you sharing a locker with Nate.” He turned toward me, holding a handful of CDs.
I wasn't completely surprised he was bringing this up again. Although we had discussed it thoroughly until I thought it was no longer an issue, it made sense that he was again uncomfortable due to Nate’s reaction to our engagement. I thought carefully about what I wanted to say in reply as he waited patiently. I knew too long of a pause would only make things worse, so I processed quickly and came back with, “Tell me not to worry about you and some random college girl.”
Jensen’s eyes softened and he tapped the stack of CDs against the palm of his opposite hand. “Point taken.” He placed the CDs in a nearby box.
Taking in a deep breath and letting it out slowly, I hoped he would get that I was tired of discussing the subject. He didn’t bite, and instead pretended to fidget with something inside the box he had just placed the CDs in. The silence was making me nervous and it caused me to cave.
“Jensen, if it bothers you that much I’ll trade lockers with Aria. Krissa and I can be partners again.” Jensen turned toward me, the hint of a smile playing on his lips because he was finally getting his way. “But you have to realize,” I pointed out, “that if Aria and Nate break up it’s back to the old arrangement.” I looked at him sternly, hoping he'd get the hint that I was irritated.
Jensen ignored what I said and instead walked over to me, leaned in, and gazed intently into my face to make sure I was serious. I rolled onto my back and allowed him to hover over me, pulling his head down to mine and kissing him to end the discussion. Even mad, I couldn't resist Jensen. He pulled himself up and went back to packing, humming along with Plush playing on the CD player. I remained on my back, staring up at the ceiling and thought about what the coming week would entail. Alicia would be registering on Tuesday. Senior pictures were on Tuesday afternoon. I would be registering again Wednesday … and Jensen leaves on Friday.
“Babe?” I came out of my thoughts and rolled over to face Jensen. “Where did you go just then? I was asking you a question. Are you alright?”
“Oh, I was just thinking about this next week. Do you realize you’re leaving on Friday the thirteenth? That’s not a bad sign, is it?”
Jensen dropped the clothes he was holding onto the floor and came over to the bed to sit down, placing his arm over me and onto the bed next to my side. “No, it’s not a bad sign. How do I keep your mind off of me leaving?”
I shrugged. There wasn’t much he could do. “What were you asking me?” I quickly changed the subject so we wouldn’t get into another deep discussion about how we’d each miss each other, how sad that would be, and how we’d have to wait three months until we saw each other again—I'd had enough of it.
“Oh, I was asking if you’d be OK with me hanging out with the guys a few times this coming week. Definitely while you’re registering. Maybe you and Alicia can go somewhere and do what girls do.” He put his hand to his forehead. “Shit, I just realized I need to call Gabe; we need to call Gabe.” Jensen got up from the bed to go find the phone and appeared a second later, already dialing. I went over to turn the volume down on the CD player while he switched the phone to speaker so we could both talk to Gabe. He answered on the fifth ring, seemingly out of breath.
“Hey man, what were you doing?” Jensen laughed.
“Running. What’s up?"
"Running?" Jensen and I both asked in shock. Gabe had finally quit smoking over the summer, but running seemed to be a whole other thing for him. He did lift weights, but cardio had never really been on his list of things to do.
"Yeah, yeah … don't give me shit about it. I'm trying it out, but I don’t guarantee it will stick.” Gabe took in a deep breath and cleared his throat. “Hey, are we still doing the movie thing at your house on Tuesday?”
Jensen looked at me briefly with a guilty look on his face and I had to smile. He must have forgotten to tell me they had made plans. “Yeah,” he confirmed, “We’re still doing the movie thing.”
“You done packing?”
“Getting there.” Jensen looked around the room at the various piles lying around. I was getting nervous with the small talk, so I poked Jensen in the side and he did his best to stifle a laugh.
“Listen, Gabe, Mia’s here with me and we’d like to tell you something.”
Only silence came from the speaker, which told me that Gabe had some kind of idea what was coming. I looked over at Jensen and squeezed his leg in anticipation. Not waiting for Gabe to break the silence, Jensen went on, “So, we wanted to tell you at lunch, but since you weren’t able to make it we thought we’d call.”
“Yeah, I had to work. What’s going on? Why all the cloak and dagger?”
“No cloak and dagger,” Jensen laughed nervously.
I perked up at the sound of Jensen’s voice —he was nervous again! I was surprised because he'd already done this drill twice and hadn't seemed