Page 30 of Christmas Criminal

I nod. "Well, I'm glad you were able to accept yourself," I say, but the words don't quite feel like enough.

She shrugs. "It was a long process, but I got there eventually." She shakes her head. "To think I left this place because of it. My whole high school experience, it seems, was derailed by my fucking skin."

"How so?"

She bites her lip, her eyes dipping to the pavement between us, and lets out a long breath. "I had a really bad outbreak in high school. I kind of ended up tearing up my legs because I couldn't stop scratching. And my stupid high school boyfriend Louis Prince snapped a picture and sent it to his buddies asking if I had an STD."

I bite my tongue to avoid letting out a string of expletives that I've worked very hard to train myself out of. At least on school grounds.

"That's terrible," I say.

She shrugs. "And that's why I got my GED. Because after that, he left me for fucking Stacy Mann and apparently the one thing he kept telling her was, 'don't worry, I never fucked her.'"

I grimace. "Yikes."

"So, you know. Fuck high school."

"Fuck Louis Prince."

She raises an eyebrow. "Is that the first time I've heard you curse?"

I shrug. "Some situations call for it."

She laughs. "Wow, look at me. Once the high school virgin, and now I'm the bad girl who makes the goodie two-shoes math teacher curse."

"Goodie two-shoes?"Oh, the things I would do to her to prove her wrong.

"Yeah," she says. "I mean, in a cool math teacher way. But you've definitely got a bit of a goodie two-shoes thing going on."

"So I'm acoolgoodie two-shoes math teacher? That's your determination?"

She pauses, eyeing me. "I can't tell whether you're offended by that or not."

"It's interesting."Interesting considering I've been thinking about eating your ass for the past half hour.

"I don't know what you mean by 'interesting,'" she says.

I laugh. "Noelle, it doesn't have to mean anything."

She raises her eyebrows. Then narrows her eyes. "I can't get a read. I can't tell if you think I'm nuts or charming or funny or psycho."

I give her a little smile. "Yes."

She pauses, and then grins. "You answer 'or' questions like a math teacher."

"Am I supposed to be offended by that?"

She raises an eyebrow at me. "Is that something they teach you in teacher school? To answer questions with questions?"

"No, that comes naturally."

She laughs, and I realize, standing in the light from the entryway of the high school, that I could probably stand here all night, bantering back and forth with her. Giving her non-answers and extracting little bits of Noelle piece by piece.

"Come on, I'll walk you to your car," I say, nodding out to the parking lot.

Her face drops, like she had been thinking the same thing I was. Thatright hereis where we want to be. Despite the chill in the air and the empty school looming above us.

"Well, thank you," she says, as we step around to the driver's side. She pops the door open and stands in the opening, turning to face me. I lean an elbow on the top of her car, as I've been doing whenever I walk her out like this. She mirrors my pose, one elbow on the roof and the other resting on her open door.

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