Forever Changed

  “I told you sweets, I’m the whole package,” he said, flashing a smile that made my knees liquefy. Something about him jumping in and saving the little girl without a moment’s thought had affected me more than anything before. If I wasn’t falling for him before, I was definitely hook, line and sinker now.

  “I guess I’d have to agree with you on that,” I said, reaching out to drag him to me. This time it was him opening his mouth to my tongue as I pulled him in close. The wetness from his clothing began to seep through the material of my hoodie, but I gave it no notice.

  He pulled back after a moment. “I’m soaking your clothes,” he said, trying to catch his breath from the kiss.

  “I don’t care,” I mumbled, trying to pull him close again.

  “I do, you just got over being sick,” he said, holding me at arm’s length.

  “Fine, so hurry and change,” I pouted, making him laugh.

  He popped open his trunk and pulled out a gym bag. “Why do you carry extra clothes?” I asked, since he didn’t seem like the type to workout.

  “They’re for after band practice. We usually hang out afterward and I hate wearing sweaty clothes.”

  “So, you’re kind of a diva,” I teased.

  “Didn’t you hear Bethany’s mom? It’s superhero, not diva. Read my lips, su-per-he-ro,” he teased. “I’m gonna go change real quick,” he said, pointing to the bathrooms. “Here, take these,” he said, reaching toward his back pocket, only to come up empty handed. “Oh crap, I lost my drumsticks in the water,” he said, looking forlornly toward the water.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, remorsefully. “Were they a special pair?”

  “Nah, but now it just means I have to replace them, and I’m not sure if the music store I get them from is open tomorrow,” he said, sighing. “Of all the rotten luck, I should have bought some when we were out yesterday.”

  “Why don’t you go change and we can figure it out when you’re done,” I said, pushing him toward the bathroom.

  Once he was out of sight, I extracted the gift bag from the front floorboard.

  “Here,” I said, holding out the bag once he joined me. “I thought you might need this now,” I said, smiling at him.

  “I have something for you too,” he said, heading for the driver’s side of the car. “Wait, open mine first,” I said, anxious to give it to him.

  He looked at me at me questioningly, but pulled out the tissue paper so he could peer into the bag.

  “No way,” he said, extracting the new set of drumsticks I had bought him the day before. He held them in his hands, admiring the quality.

  “I think they're supposed to be the best. I would have asked the salesclerk, but she wasn’t the chattiest of people.”

  “They’re great. I normally buy the cheapest of cheap, but these are sweet,” he said, turning them in his had to admire them. “Hey, they have my band name on them,” he said, happily running his thumb over the engraved words. “When did you have time for this?”

  “I took them to Disney with me. I remembered they had an engraver there, so I bowed out of riding the Haunted Mansion a third time with Mom and Megan and did this instead. Do you like them okay? I wasn’t sure if the engraved wood would be a bother when you’re playing.”

  “They’re perfect,” he said, dragging me in for a bear hug. “Best gift ever,” he said with emphasis.

  “Well, I figured if you’re constantly carrying them around, I wanted to be a part of that,” I said, divulging more information than necessary.

  He chuckled. I felt my cheeks brighten at how ridiculous I must have sounded.

  “I’m not laughing at you, babe,” he said. “Here, give me a sec,” he added, climbing into his car and opening the middle console. He came back around the car carrying a small gift-wrapped package. “Here,” he said, handing it to me.

  I pulled off the wrapper, wondering what he found so funny. I let out a laugh when I pulled off the top of the little box and saw the charm nestled inside on a bed of cotton. I pulled out a set of miniature silver drumsticks attached to a delicate chain.

  “I figured if you had drumsticks with you, you’d be reminded of me throughout the day,” he explained, practically repeating the words I had just uttered to him.

  I laughed with him at the similar way our minds had worked.

  “Will you hook it on for me?” I asked, turning around so he could clasp my necklace. “What do you think?” I asked once it was securely in place.

  “They look great,” he said.

  “I love them,” I said, fiddling with them with my fingers. “So, I guess our day came to a halt,” I said, opening my car door.

  “Oh, it’s not over,” Maddon said, closing my door back up before I could climb in.

  “It’s not?” I asked. “What are we doing now?”

  “That’s for me to know, and you…” he started to say, but stopped when I gave him a shove. “Kidding.”

  Bringing Kassandra to the springs was the best idea I ever had. Before the little girl had taken the spill in the water, I had enjoyed showing Kass the gentle underwater animals that had always interested me. The fact that Kass seemed equally enthralled with them only made my feelings for her intensify.

  “So, what are we doing?” she asked as we headed toward the rental area.

  “I thought we could take a canoe ride,” I said, pointing toward the large stack of canoes off to the side of the parking area.

  “Seriously? Isn’t that kind of dangerous?”

  “Dangerous?” I asked, quirking my eyebrow up at her.

  “Yeah, with gators and stuff.”

  I laughed. “We’ll be in a canoe. It’s not like Jaws is out there,” I teased.

  “I know that, goober,” she grumbled. “I meant, what if we tip over? They don’t look very wide or stable,” she added, studying the stack critically.

  “Goober?” I asked.

  “Yeah, you know, dork, etc,” she said, still eyeing the stack of canoes warily.

  “Trust me, Kass, I’m not going to let us capsize,” I said, pulling her toward the rental station.

  “What if I make us capsize?” she said, digging her heels in.

  “You won’t, but if you do, I’ll flip the canoe back over and help you back in. You swim in the ocean, right?”

  She nodded.

  “Well, this isn’t much different.”

  My words finally convinced her, and a few minutes later we were strapped into life vests and lowering ourselves off the dock, into a waiting canoe.

  Kassandra was still nervous, so I picked up the oars and slowly paddled us away from the dock.

  After a few minutes, she began to relax and take in the sights around her.

  “See, nice, right?” I asked, flashing a grin.

  “Just don’t tip us, hot stuff,” she said, admitting her consent.

  “Ha, I knew you thought I was hot,” I said, digging the oars in to propel us farther along.

  “Do you do this often?” she asked, stretching her feet out in front of her.

  “Once a month, except during the summer when it’s wicked hot. I like the peacefulness of it,” I said, setting the oars in the canoe to let the flowing spring carry us along.

  “It’s great,” she said, dropping her head back so that she could soak up some rays.

  My body responded to the ivory skin of her neck that disappeared beneath the V-neck long-sleeve t-shirt she wore. I tried to focus on something else before I embarrassed myself. I was used to hooking up with girls who were looking for the same thing as me. I was navigating on foreign ground by entering the world of dating that I had so stringently avoided in the past.

  Pulling my thoughts back out of the gutter, I looked back at her and saw her studying me.

  “Damn those promises I’ve made, huh?” she said, reading my mind.

  I spent the drive to the airport rehashing my morning outing with Maddon. The canoe ride was more fun than I would have ever thought, and I
was disappointed when we had to head back. I definitely wouldn’t mind going to Blue Springs again sometime.

  “Don’t worry, we’ll come back next month,” Maddon promised.

  I didn’t argue with him, but I felt we were on borrowed time, waiting for the other shoe to drop. I tried hard to believe that if Lacey’s mom did run her mouth, the situation would work itself out and we could still see each other, but the more I thought about it, the more doubt crept in.

  I was playing with fire and I knew it, but the connection I felt with him made it impossible for me to walk away. Watching him doing something as heroic as saving a little girl, then to something as mundane as rowing a canoe had made me entertain thoughts about him that would make an old lady blush. I knew by the way he watched me in the canoe that his feelings matched mine, and I couldn’t help the rush of pleasure that raced through me thinking about it. I still planned on keeping my promise to my dad, but I found nothing wrong with at least fantasizing about it.

  Parking at Orlando International Airport was a pain, so I had talked Mom into telling my grandma and Donna that I would leave thirty minutes later and meet them in the pickup lane in front of baggage claim. My grandma had bitterly complained about waiting on the curb like some street urchin, but Mom had stood her ground and suggested kindly that perhaps a rental car would be easier. Grandma grudgingly caved and was waiting by the curb when I pulled up to get them. I had to bite off a laugh at how out of place she looked waiting at the curb.

  “Hey Grandma,” I said, hopping out of the car to give her a hug. She returned it stiffly. She and my aunt Donna had never been overly affectionate, which was ironic since my father was famous for the bear hugs he used to divvy out. It was hard to believe they were all three blood-related.

  “Hi, Aunt Donna,” I said, giving her a hug too.

  “Kassandra,” she said, responding with a hug slightly warmer than Grandma’s.

  I opened the hatch of my Explorer and helped stow their luggage away.

  “How was your flight?” I asked, buckling my seatbelt before pulling away from the pickup lane.

  “It was fine, though the young lady across from us really didn’t belong in first class,” Grandma said in her normal judgmental way.

  “Mom, I told you she paid the same price for her seat as we did,” Donna said, shooting me a look.

  I held back a smile.

  The rest of the ride was a mixture of complaints and criticism as Grandma drilled me about everything, from school to cheerleading. She had never been a fan of me wasting my time “tumbling through the air,” as she put it, but the fact that I had quit mid season irked her more.

  “Quitters never prosper,” she admonished.

  “I know Grandma. I remember you telling Dad that when he dropped out of the race for mayor.”

  “I loved your father, but he never lived up to his potential,” she sniffed.

  “Grandma, that’s not true. Daddy had a successful business and always took good care of us,” I said quietly.

  “Kassandra—impertinence,” she chastised me. She had been using the phrase on us for years if our opinion ever differed from hers.

  I held my tongue and drove the rest of the way home in silence while Donna and Grandma continued to bicker back and forth. It was going to be a long three days.

  ***

  My words proved to be truer than any I had ever expected. From the moment Grandma walked through the front door, until the moment Mom drove her and Donna back to the airport three days later, she didn’t stop complaining and criticizing. She had issues with the fact that Mom wasn’t taking a more active role in Dad’s business, she was upset our house wasn’t decked out in lights like it normally was, but most of all, she was appalled that Megan was still “mute,” as she put it.

  “Why in heaven’s name wouldn’t you do something about it is what I want to know,” she squabbled.

  Mom was patient and waited until Megan was out of earshot to explain that they were both involved in counseling. I loved Grandma, but she was driving me nuts, to the point where I had to walk away so I wouldn’t revert back to my previous snippy ways and put her in her place.

  The only good thing that came out of the visit was that the constant criticism kept us from focusing on the holiday, and before we knew it, our first Christmas without my dad was behind us. Surprisingly, the only one who shed a tear that day was Grandma. Mom was so over her that I caught her muttering to herself several times that she was going to remove the Christmas ham from the oven and replace it with Grandma’s head. Megan and I smiled when we heard her mumbling in the kitchen, before escaping to my room for some Grandma-free time. The only thing that saved me the three days they were here was my endless texting with Maddon. Through text messaging, I learned more about Maddon than anyone else I had ever known. We shared our dreams, fears, past drama, and everything in between. The break from each other was hard, but the texting allowed me the freedom to express feelings and hurts I would have otherwise been too embarrassed to admit in person.

  “It’s hard to believe Dad came from that,” I said to my mom when she arrived home from the airport, looking harassed. She didn’t answer me right away, but instead headed for the kitchen. We watched as she pulled out the bottle of wine she had bought for their visit and the leftover chocolate cream pie. Megan and I laughed as she poured herself a tall glass of wine and dug into the pie without bothering to cut off a slice.

  “Stress much?” I asked, grabbing a fork for Megan and me.

  “That woman is impossible,” she said, shoving a large bite into her mouth and washing it down with a swig of wine.

  I couldn’t help laughing out loud. “Well, she did make Christmas a little easier,” I said, still laughing.

  “At least we know the hag’s good for something,” Mom said with uncharacteristic sarcasm.

  “Amanda—impertinence,” I said in a perfect impersonation of Grandma’s voice.

  Mom choked on her drink of wine as she busted out laughing. “Yes, I guess my impertinence is shining through,” she finally said when she was done coughing.

  “What do you think, Peanut?” I said, nudging Megan with my hip as I stood up, making her giggle.

  “Weelll, as fun as these last three days have been, I think I’m going to go out for a little while,” I said, edging for the door.

  “Kass, I want to meet your new friend,” Mom said, sobering up and not letting me off the hook now that Christmas was over.

  “Okay Mom,” I said, resigned as I headed out the door.

  I drove the two-mile drive to Drake’s garage, wondering how I was going to get around introducing Maddon to her.

  “Hey, babe,” Maddon said, jogging over to me and swinging me up into his arms before crushing his mouth to mine. “It’s been a long three days,” he said, pulling back slightly.

  “Tell me about it,” I said, wryly.

  “So, did your mom ever switch out the ham?” he joked, tucking me under his arm as we made our way to the garage together.

  “It was a close call at one point when Grandma questioned the wisdom of Mom cooking roasted potatoes versus mashed potatoes. By the time that suggestion rolled around, my mom was fighting the urge to bury a meat cleaver in the back of Grandma’s head,” I said, able to laugh about it now.

  “I could tell by your texts it was hit or miss for awhile there,” he said, laughing with me.

  “So, you got the whole ‘SOS’ signal I was sending your way.”

  “I had the getaway car all gassed up and ready to go,” he teased, pulling me in for one more kiss before we walked through the door. “I missed you, sweets,” he murmured against my lips.

  “I missed you too, hero,” I said, using the nickname I had coined for him.

  The same crowd looked to be there from the week before. Most of them greeted me in one form or another, making me feel welcome. It was hard to believe it had only been a week since the last time I had been here and become friends, or whatever I w
as with Maddon. In that short time, I had gone from, “should I hate this guy,” “to do I love this guy?” It seemed hard to believe one week had changed so many things about my life.

  Forever Changed stepped out onto the stage to the same cheers as the week before. This time I cheered just as loud as the rest of the crowd and felt the stirrings of jealousy as several of the girls chanted Maddon’s name. I had dealt with jealousy over the years, but never over a guy. Usually it was over some silly material possession my friends had that I felt I should have. This jealousy was different as it coiled up through me. I wanted to claw their eyes, or at least yank their hair out.

  I turned my focus off of them before I did something drastic like clothesline them or something equally extreme as they bopped up and down. Pulling my eyes off of them, I focused instead on the reason I was even here. Looking up at the stage, I found Maddon looking only at me. His eyes spoke a thousand words as my jealousy slowly drifted away.

  I couldn’t but respond to his intense look and had to control myself from melting to the floor in a puddle.

  “What did you think?” he said, jumping off the stage to join me during their intermission.

  “I think you need to stop looking at me like that,” I chastised.

  “Like what?” he said huskily, anchoring the back of my head into place with his hand.

  “Like you could devour me,” I whispered back, oblivious to the crowd around.

  “Just because we can’t, doesn’t mean I don’t want to,” he said, nibbling on my lip.

  I shivered, having no problem imaging it.

  “I have to get back up on stage.”

  “Go, before you make me ignite into a fireball,” I said, giving him a shove toward the stage.

  He flashed me his typical, I’m-sexy-and-I-know-it grin.

  The tables had obviously turned as the girls around me now glared in my direction as he blew me a kiss once he was back behind his drums. I smiled broadly, pleased my claim on him was set. He set it in stone when he chucked his t-shirt my way, making the other girls swoon with envy.

  “You guys were fantastic,” I said as Drake and Maddon joined me when it was finally over.