Forever Friends

Chapter 9

Georgia closed the door behind her after knocking, very loudly, on the door at least five times. Hopefully there wasn't any one in here in the throes of passion that they didn't hear her banging and now she was going to see a leg up in the air. Oh, God, in addition, please don't let it be Savannah and Randy.

Kaleb was right, the more Georgia tended to think about it, that was why she didn't have any boys interested in her. She was the exact opposite of Savannah, on the shorter side, not at all what someone would consider "stick thin". She was pretty enough, but she was full of curves, and she defiantly didn't like to show them off. She wasn't complaining, when given the choice, she preferred to blend in, rather than to stand out, since usually the things that made people notice her were drastically embarrassing. Tripping, falling, stumbling, it was in general a scary mess when Georgia was left to her own desires.

The only upside to her klutziness was that it only seemed to really be a problem when she felt nervous or out of place. The downside? She always felt nervous or out of place. Even at the Kaideen house she couldn't wait to find a quiet spot to hide. She checked the door to see if there was a lock, there wasn't, but she just forgot about it and called out,

"If you're naked in here can you please make some kind of noise so I can just leave?"

There was nothing but silence and Georgia let out a breath of air.

"Oh, thank God." She fell back onto the bed in the dark as she sighed again. She let out a scream when she landed on a body and bounced back to her toes. Someone who had grace would have been able to do that without their legs twisting up like a pretzel, but Georgia was not that lucky, nor did she have an inkling of grace. So she ended up falling to the floor and smacking her shoulder into the end table.

"Ow!" She cried, rubbing her shoulder as she rose to flick on the light in the room. She wanted to see if she had fallen into some kind of s****l debacle that had rendered mouths too full to utter a word when she walked in. Her brows shot up when she realized that she had fallen onto Kaleb's cousin, Luke Hamilton. Georgia had never met him herself, but she'd heard stories, and these stories didn't leave Luke in the best light. He liked to drink, he wasn't easy to talk to, and he pretty much did whatever he wanted to most of the time. Hell, he was old enough to buy the beer and probably had purchased everything for tonight's party anyway. She blinked at him and they both stared at each other for a second. He reached for the warm beer on the side table and took a drink of it, just sizing her up.

She was frozen in place, holding one arm down in front of her stomach and reaching up with the other hand, holding her elbow. She was under a microscope and she didn't know how to get out of it.

"I don't know you." He finally said looking at her. He'd been taking a break from the party. Not trying to sober up, by any means, in fact he was looking forward to getting drunker by the second and trying to find a girl to finish the night with. Now there was one standing right in front of him. It was a good night after all. Georgia let out a sigh,

"No, you don't. Sorry." She turned to get back to the door, finally having got a slap in the face that got her moving. It always took her a second to try to piece things together. She got her hand on the door before she heard the voice behind her.

"Oh, wait," Recognition crossed his face and he chuckled, "I do know you. You're the girl always tagging along with that blonde---the pretty one. What's her name? Atlanta?"

"Savannah." Georgia replied quickly. "That's her name."

"Yeah. And you're---?"

"Leaving."

"Georgia. That's your name."

"And you're Luke. So now that we have that out of the way, I'll leave you to it. I need to find my cousin anyway."

"You came in here to hide didn't you?" Luke laughed, tossing the empty beer bottle back and forth, "You're the kind of girl that hides. You think you're too smart to get caught up in all these parties and stuff, so you come under the pretenses that you're 'taking care' of someone. When what you really want is someone to notice you."

Georgia blinked. First of all, no one she had ever just randomly bumped into had talked to her like this. They usually talked to Savannah first. Secondly, no one ever pegged her that quickly and third, who the hell did he think he was? He would probably never see her again and, oh, God was she that transparent? Her mouth opened and closed like a fish before she shot back with the first thing that came out,

"So says the delusional loser who's hanging out at a high school party?" She c****d her head, "Alone, in a bedroom, and wasted. So no thanks, I don't think I need life coaching from you."

"Feisty." Luke laughed. "Why don't we skip the witty banter portion of the evening and you just come on over here and take your shirt off?"

Georgia gaped at him and Luke could see the blush that crossed her cheeks. "What?" He asked, "You're not a vir…" He paused. Laughed again. "Oh, but you are. That's so cute."

"I—I—I…" The wit was gone and all that was left was the social awkwardness. "I have to go." Georgia found that was the best way to get out of this conversation without embarrassing herself further and turned to go out the door so quickly that it hadn't opened fully. She bounced off the door, managed to stay on her feet, but quickly had a blinding amount of pain shoot through her frontal lobe.

"Ow." She drug out the word, hissing it under her breath. She kept walking though, despite the fact that she could hear Luke laughing harder from the side of the bed. She just needed to get out of there as quickly as possible.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Randy had a moment where all he could do was watch her walk. Maybe he could lie to everyone else but there was something about the things that she had said. She was right. He had been looking at her differently for awhile now. He was enraptured with her body, and the way that she would smile at him when they passed each other in the halls of school. It was like she'd kept that smile just for him, and he was suddenly desperate to know if she'd still give him that smile when they were in bed together.

He shouldn't go, that much he was sure of, but it was his feet that already had him moving up the stairs. There were people lining the halls. The better part of his brain told him that someone would have seen her go in. They might be drunk but they'd notice him stumbling into the room as well, but all that was nothing compared to how much he wanted to find out if her skin was as soft as it looked. So he went.

The light was off when he stepped inside, the room illuminated solely by the street light from outside the window. It shone just enough so he could see the line of her body in her dress. He couldn't find the words to say.

Savannah didn't know the right words either, but she felt her heart leap into her throat when the door clicked shut behind him. Smiling softly, she started to close the distance between him. Despite the pounding music from the rest of the house, the only sounds in the room were the uneven breaths parting from their lips. When she was close enough, she reached up and brushed her fingers through his hair.

His fingers were needy and instantly found a comfortable place on her hips. One hand curled around to the small of her back and pulled her closer. If he was going to give in, he wanted to enjoy every second of this. "Savannah.." His voice was no louder than a gruff whisper, but it made her stomach twist into millions of tiny knots. She shook her head just slightly and quieted him with a soft 'shh.' She was a little worried that she was feeling nervous. That hadn't exactly been in her plans. She was supposed to feel fulfilled. She was supposed to feel complete.