Page 1 of Be My Reason

Prologue

I’ve been in love with Nate Riley since the seventh grade.Maybe I was in love with him even before that, but it was during gym class when I was twelve, when he looked straight at me with those gorgeous deep blue eyes and proceeded to hit me with the dodge ball. Hard. That was when I knew I had lost my heart. It was like he had strapped a piece of his own heart right to the red rubber ball and when it hit me, his heart collided with mine. From that day on, there was no one else for me.

Now,four years later, as my best friend Emma and I pull up to the address that Nate had scribbled on the back of his algebra homework for me—a piece of paper I vow never to destroy—I look up and see people funneling into the large house.

“I feel sick,” I say,as I press my face against the passenger window trying to cool off my forehead on the glass.

“I don’t know what you are worried about, Lyn,” Emma says. “Nate is the one who asked you to the party. He already likes you.”

“He didn’t ask me, Emma, hetoldme about the party. Big difference.” I sigh.

“Whatever.” She rolls her eyes. “Telling you about a party is code for him wanting you to go so he can hang out with you. Don’t worry, he likes you. You’ll see.”

Emma is always so sure of herself.Maybe I would be too if I had a face that belonged on the cover of a fashion magazine. If I didn’t love her so much, I would hate her. But she is the sole reason I have made it this far in high school without jumping off a bridge. I think that if we didn’t live next door to each other and hadn’t become blood sisters—actual slicing of skin and rubbing hands together blood sisters—when we were eight years old, then we wouldn’t even be friends. After all, I’m in the band and the science club and she, well let’s just say she hasn’t ever had to carry her own books around school. Since kindergarten.

My heart skips a beatwhen I spot him by the front door as we pass the driveway in search of a place to park. He is standing with some friends, Jake and Brian I think, from the baseball team. He is looking around at the faces that are passing him by as newcomers enter the party. He keeps shifting from one foot to the other like he has to pee. His right hand comes up to run his fingers through his dirty-blonde hair that curls up slightly at his collar and looks like he just rolled out of bed, but at the same time, perfect.Sigh. If I didn’t know better, I would think he is nervous. Then again, the guy is a gorgeous baseball player and a senior on the varsity team with tons of colleges scouting him, so what could he possibly have to be nervous about?

Emma finds a spotto park a few houses down. “Ready?” She shuts off the engine and looks over at me.

“No. . . yes . . . no,” I vacillate.

“Maybe this will help.” She grins a Cheshire Cat smile as I see her hand reach under the seat and come up with a couple of those tiny bottles of liquor you see people drink on airplanes in the movies.

“What is that?”My eyes go wide and the surprised look on my face makes her crack up.

“Hmmm.” She looks them over ceremoniously. “Whiskey, scotch, vodka . . . does it really matter? They will all taste like crap but will get the job done.”

“Uh, what job is that?”I raise my eyebrows at her.

“The one that gets you to loosen up so you can talk to that sexy hunk of a baseball player without tripping all over yourself.”This girl knows me all too well.

She hands me one and says, “Together, on the count of three?” Like we are about to grasp hands and leap off a bridge or something. Well, maybe we are. We’ve never done this before in all of our seventeen years.

I nod my head at her. “One . . . two . . . three . . . ” I hold my nose and drink back the liquid that I can only describe as tasting like gasoline—on fire.

After what seems like minutes of making faces that I pray no boy will ever see me make, I cry, “Ewww!” I look over at Emma to see her self-satisfied grin.What?Why isn’t she making hideous faces, too?

“You don’t really think I’m stupid enough to drink when I’m driving tonight, do you?”

“So, all of this was just for me?” I narrow my eyes at her, wanting to be mad but kind of in love with her a little more for being so damn responsible.

“Here.” She shoves the other bottle in my face. “Have this one, too. Just don’t drink much more at the party or you could end up throwing up all over Nate instead of sucking his face.”

I roll my eyes at her and reluctantly drinkthe second tiny bottle, which seems to taste even nastier than the first since I knew what to expect this time. “At least give me a mint or something so I don’t smell like an alcoholic after that.” She reaches into her bag and tosses one over to me. I stick my tongue out at her as I exit the car. Then we head back down the sidewalk towards the party.

A minute later, I feel all warm and tingly inside and I wonder if it is the alcohol or my nerves. I glance around as we approach the house and see that everyone has gone inside with the exception of two girls that are sitting on railroad ties by the front porch, both holding a cigarette. At least I hope that’s what they are holding. I wouldn’t want to be atthatkind of party.

Going through the front door, it doesn’t take us long to locate Nate and his friends as most people have gathered around thelarge, open kitchen where there is a keg of beer.

You know how they saythat when you get into an accident you see your life flash before your eyes? Well, the second my eyes find his and he smiles at me, I am walking up a flower-lined aisle, then holding a strong hand while beautiful dirty-blonde-haired children run around a meadow, then rocking in chairs on a porch, gliding gently while wrinkled fingers intertwine.Wow, what just happened?

I take a peek at Emma next to me whois, graciously, pretending she doesn’t notice me blatantly staring and quite possibly drooling over the most perfect person ever placed on Earth. She shrugs with a smug little expression on her face and nudges me forward with such force that I practically fall into Nate’s arms.

Correction, I falldirectly into Nate’s arms.

“Ohmy gosh, I’m so sorry,” I say to him. I can only assume a blood-red blush is creeping up my face as I send a nasty glance back at Emma, who is faking a whistle while looking anywhere but at me.

“It’s quiteall right, Brooklyn,” he says in a strong, raspy voice that is far too sexy for a seventeen-year-old. Then he does a fist bump with his friend who walks away shaking his head and smiling, leaving me alone with Nate.

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