Shine

Gingham Days

Our teachers started opening windows in the classrooms when it wasn't so windy that the rain would blow in. I appreciated the warm, damp air that smelled like turquoise and shallow sunlight. Edward took me to visit a few other tide pools, and a few other beautiful places nearby, though we didn't climb any more trees for the time being. Since I was still recovering from my first experience tickling the shoulders of redwoods, this I appreciated. But perhaps another time.

Edward gave me a full sheet of paper inked all over with his own set of song suggestions, and I grinned reading it as Mr. Banner passed out tests. He made me put it away before we started and I tucked it in my back pocket for pleasure reading afterward. The majority of the test I blazed through, but there was one question in the middle that I believed could be answered in multiple ways, and I sat tapping my pencil over it for several minutes. Edward had finished ten minutes ago. Don't you dare help me, I said when I caught him glancing my way. He smiled.

I raised my hand and Mr. Banner wended his way over so we could discuss semantics, which I suspected was at the root of my dissention with this particular question. After the test I slouched and spent the rest of the hour doodling on the back while Edward watched. I made a game of seeing how quickly he could guess what abstract things I was drawing while I tried not to think about them and he did his best not to listen in.

"How can you still love the rain," Jessica wanted to know that afternoon as we watched the pole vaulters practice next to the track, "when it has been raining for literally eight days straight. It's supposed to rain again tomorrow."

I relaxed back on my raincoat protecting me from the soggy grass. "It smells nice. Don't you think it smells nice?"

She eyed me dubiously. "Right. You're crazy." Her expression changed to mischief and gossip. "So Tyler says his sister saw you and Edward kissing outside your house yesterday."

"That's a statement, not a question."

She whirled on me, ecstatic. "Seth, you told me you weren't dating!"

"Well, obviously I lost that fight."

She squealed with delight and turned to face me more directly, even though we were on a hill and sitting like that could not have been comfortable. "Hallelujah. Tell me everything."

I chuckled, squinting at her through the bright light attempting to pass through the last layers of clouds. "Starting with what?"

"When did it become dating dating? When was your first kiss? Where was it? Where have you guys gone? What have you been doing together? Does your aunt like him?"

I flashed her a single roll of my eyes. "I don't know when it became official, it just kind of, stumbled along and I was powerless to stop it and eventually just gave in. First kiss was, uh, couple weeks ago? Six or seven? It was at my house. We've visited tide pools, taken some of the hiking trails around town, sat on a few beaches. Yeah, Aunt Clara loves him. Thinks he's fantastic."

Jessica's eyes danced. "Is he a good kisser? Guy looks like that he just has to be a good kisser, it's in the genes."

The corner of my mouth quirked up again. "Yeah, he's pretty good."

"Pretty good? Like, on a scale of one to ten how good? One is bad."

"One is bad, all right. Uhmmmmm. I don't know, I don't have enough experience to determine this in an objective manner."

Jessica groaned as theatrically as any one human could be capable of mustering. "Seth. How good do you think he is? Like, a couple moths in your belly, or, the butterflies have taken over and you're not sure when it happened but all of a sudden you can fly."