Kissing Is the Easy Part

Chapter 54 The little black book

Sean

I knew I was asking for it, but since I offered to help with the SAT, Flora picked a fight with me every day. It could be about anything, from grades, college, her parents, to the fact that she had no guy friends anymore, or that I wasn't as into her as I used to be. She even complained that I kissed wrong, like I was just doing it as a chore instead of it coming from my heart.

Seriously? I rolled my eyes and it only made her madder.

"I can feel it! And when we do that, you're not as...thorough as before," she said. We were walking away from the cafeteria as we relished the rest of the lunch break. Since we were still at school, Flora was trying to be subtle. Well, subtle by her standards. "You go straight in for the kill like you just want to get it over with."

"What?"

"It's like...you used to be like a mechanic who checks every part of the plane, but now you're like the pilot who jumps in the seat, sticks the key in and takes off right away."

"Can you not compare it to a key?" I laughed which was a big mistake. Flora stared at me silently, her cheeks flushed with anger.

"You're right," I said. "I'm sorry. It's not that I want to get it over with, but sometimes I just can't wait because...you have to know you're very sexy." And also because we don't have an hour to spend on foreplay with your test fast approaching.

I admit I had been acting more like a tutor than a boyfriend, but she really was running out of time. The SAT was just around the corner. She jokingly told our friends that our dating agenda mostly consisted of a three-letter word that began with S, but I knew she didn't find it funny anymore.

"Sometimes when you turn me down it really hurts my feelings," she said when we reached the side of the building. There was no one else in sight and we were alone finally.

"Baby, I'm as into you as ever. Maybe even more so. But I want to be responsible. I don't want you to look back on senior year and see all we ever do is have sex and you failed everything else." As soon as I said it I wanted to go back and try again. Telling her she failed everything else was really tactful.

She wouldn't miss it, of course. "So now you think I'm a failure?"

"No...I mean if I were one of your regular guy friends I'd just think of ways to get into your pants, but now I can't be like that. I want to do what's right for you."

"I want to do things that make me happy and they aren't necessarily the right things." She gave me a typical Flora-style answer. "I don't need another parent."

Right. Another parent? She barely had one. "You're lucky I'm not your parent. I'd cut down on half of my business trips and guard you like a hawk over your homework. I'd cut your allowance and set a curfew, too."

She was instantly enraged. "You don't get to insult my parents. My parents are nice to you. Don't you dare imply they aren't doing their job."

I sucked at negotiation today. "I'm not. I really like your parents. I want to personally thank them for bringing you into this world and bringing you up into such a delight. No sarcasm intended." I was honestly amazed Flora turned out the way she did instead of becoming a drug dealer or owner of a gambling joint, or whatever it is that rich, bored people without parental supervision do. "I just think they should stay with you more. You miss them a lot, right?"

"Yeah, but now I have a boyfriend." She sighed in a dramatically sad way. "Who doesn't even want to touch me anymore."

"Flora, you know that's not true." It hurt to hear her talk like that. Of course I wanted to touch her, and sometimes I wondered why I didn't just follow my desires and to hell with her future.