Ribs

Ribs: Chapter 7

Chapter 7

"And I'm terrified of what comes next..." - "Yr All Just Jealous" by Johnny Foreigner

I wait for him to respond. To say something. To stop staring at me the way he's staring at me. He rolls off of me, and my heart is beating so fast it hurts.

"Wow." He breathes. His arms flex and he puts his hands under his hands. He casts a sideways glance at me. "You love me?" I feel my face go red. He laughs, when I don't find anything funny at all. I cover my face and roll away. He laughs and tugs on my arm, bringing me to his chest. He squeezes me tight in his arms before lifting up my chin. "So you love me?" Corey asks again, a soft look in his eye.

"Yes, okay? And I'd appreciate if the humiliation would stop." My face burns like mad. He smiles.

"That's never happened before." He grins. Corey looks down into my eyes. "Well I love you, too." He kisses the top of my head. He pauses. "So Lillian, huh? I was expecting more like Rhiann or something."

"William, huh?" I mock. I smile at him, my face still hot. He grins and holds my hand to his mouth, kissing each of my fingers. He opens my hand and looks at my palm.

"I see pancakes in your future." He grins and then looks up in my eyes. Then he seems to think for a moment. "You DO like pancakes, right?" I grin.

"Guess you'll find out."

After breakfast (yes, I like pancakes. He's not a horrible cook, either), I brush out my hair with his comb and then wait as I watch Corey grab his keys. I reluctantly follow him out to his car. He opens the door for me, making me blush.

When we're about halfway down the street, I ask, "So where were your parents?"

"Away." He shrugs. "Business trip to Canada."

"Oh. How long?" I ask. We hit a red light, and he turns to face me.

"Three weeks." He grins. The light turns green and he hits the peddle. Without even looking from the road, Corey's fingers intertwine with mine. It was almost like an automatic reaction.

"This is weird." I finally admit. I see Corey smile from the corner of my eye.

"What do you mean?" He asks.

"I don't know." I huff, sighing on the windows and making fog appear. I draw a heart with my finger. "Just...this. All of it. Us. It's weird. Not in a bad way, but it's so different. We used to never even talk to each other in the hallways, let alone break into old houses together." I pause. "And then there's the whole 'almost sex' thing."

Corey laughs. The sound makes me want to smile. "Is that what we're calling it now? The 'almost sex' thing?"

My face goes red. He laughs again. "Are you embaressed about sex, Dawn?" He laughs.

See, we've never gone all the way. We may be fully naked, but we've never actually...done it, even the first day I met him and we went to a hotel. "Oh, in case you were wondering," I say, changing subjects. "I live over by Crestdale High. On Elbrook-"

"You are!" Corey laughs loudly this time. When he stops, he's grinning deviously. "We'll have to change that."

"Shut up and drive." I mumble. My face burns all the way to my house.

When we reach my house, Corey looks at the chipped blue paint and asks if he can come inside. I stare at him crazily.

"You want to...what?"

"Is it so hard to believe I want to see what the inside of your house looks like?" He asks curiously. My face starts to burn again. I look over to make sure my dad's truck isn't in the driveway. I bite my lip. It isn't. He's probably at the bar. It seems like it's been forever since I've had to deal with him. I finally sigh.

"Yea okay. But hurry."

Corey grins and steps out of the car. I unlock my front door, and the smell of liquior seeps from every crack. The smell is really strong. I turn around. "Um...are you sure you don't just want to do something else?"

Corey laughs. "What are you proposing?" He asks. And then says, "Of course not. Come on." I reluctantly let him in. He's has to smell it, but he doesn't say a word. "Nice." He says, bouncing on the old blue couch. I go over to the answering machine. Fifteen new messages. My eyes widen as I listen to them.

The first is from Riley, "Dawn! I am so sorry! I am a horrible friend and I shouldn't have abandoned you! I'm so sooo sorry!" The second one is from her, too. "Hey Dawn, it's Riley again. Uh, so someone said that you left the party with Corey. Did anything happen...?"

I glance over at Corey and he looks as if he's holding in a laugh. Twelve more are from Riley, who wants to know if I'm ignoring her calls and what happened with Corey. I sigh and then listen to the last message.

The voice is a little fuzzy but I can tell it's a woman. "Mark?" My dad's name. "Mark, it's Jenny. You need to call me back right away if you plan on getting your money. Oh, and I just got a message from Lorelei. It's got to be weeks old by now, I'm sure. Tell her that I can give her the necklace for Dawn if she calls back within a week, and that I need her last payment by Friday. Thanks, hun!"

Jenny, my cousin who lives in Ireland. Lorelei, my dead mother.

Crack goes my heart, and I realize maybe ribs aren't there for a real reason after all. Maybe they're just extra bones that someone made and they had to be placed somewhere. I hold my stomach, knowing I'm going to vomit.

I rush into the bathroom, pulling up the toliet seat. I can hear Corey's movement behind me as I start to vomit, but that's the least of my worries. He pulls back my hair gently, places a kiss quickly on my head, and waits. When I'm done I sit there as Corey hands me a glass of water, just like he did when he saved me last time. Sobs rip out of my chest.

"How could she not know?" I cry, burying my face into Corey's shoulder. He showers my face with small kisses, planting them up my jawline. He tries to make me feel better, but I know he doesn't understand.

"See, when my mom died, Daddy didn't tell anyone at first." I start to explain, tears still covering my cheeks. He watches me with an intensity I've never known. "He kept it to himself, and me, of course. But everyone found out anyways, because where was mom on Thanksgiving? Why hadn't anyone heard from her? But Jenny never knew. My Mom was the only one in our family that still talked to her, after she ran off to Ireland with her boyfriend." Another sob escapes my lips. I hungrily kiss his lips, wanting some comfort, even if it's only this. He pulls away, waiting for the end. I wearily continue, "So she didn't know that Mom died. She called all the time, though. In the past few weeks especially. But this is the first time I've heard about a necklace."

"A necklace!" I cry, as if it's ridiculous. "She was going to buy me a necklace." My voice grows quiet. "For my birthday. She died only weeks away from my birthday." I curl closer to Corey. "And you know what else?" I sputter, a sick laugh twisting from my throat. "I always hated celebrating my birthday."

Corey folds my hand in his, kissing my nose and my lips and my eyelids. Each time another tear starts rolling down my cheek, he kisses that, too.

We sit there for awhile, on the bathroom floor, Corey holding me in his arms. But that's until I hear a truck door slam.

"Oh God," I whisper, jumping up. Corey looks confused. "My dad. You have to go." Corey gets up from the bathroom floor.

"Dawn, I'm not leaving you when you're like this." His eyebrows crush together in determination.

"You have to!" I hiss.

"I'm not leaving." Corey tells me, crossing his arms.

All the while I hear a key jiggling in the lock.