Page 120 of A Love Letter to Whiskey
Tan and curvy, long blonde hair, a spicy attitude rolling off her in heat waves that both terrified and amused me. She cocked her brow at me when I didn’t answer, and so I arched mine right back.
And for just a split second, Jenna’s shield yielded, and I saw the faintest blush on her cheeks.
“Hi,” I said, reaching out for Jenna’s hand this time. “I’m Jamie.”
“Well, Jamie, maybe you should make an appointment with the eye doctor before you run over another innocent jogger. And you owe Brecks an apology.”
Jenna nodded toward B, who cringed and shrank away from me.
Again — at the time, I read this as her being so disgusted by me that she physically grimaced. I didn’t know the story of why she hated her name, that it was hearing Brecks as her introduction that had her nose crinkling like that.
I smirked at Jenna first, and then tried that smile on B as I said, “I’m sorry. I should have been watching where I was going.”
With that last word, I arched my brows a bit, because B and I both knew it wasn’t me who had been turned around mouthing something to my friend and not watching the running path.
But then again, she didn’t know I’d run into her on purpose…
“It’s fine,” B murmured, her cheeks tinging pink.
I tilted my head then because that blush threw me off. I wondered if I’d read the situation all wrong, if maybe she was interested. I tried to find the answer to that question in her eyes, but then Jenna cleared her throat, and my attention snapped back to her.
So, you see, B was right about a few things when she told you about the first time we met. But she was wrong about one very, crucial point.
I didn’t see Jenna first.
I saw her.
I just didn’t think she saw me.
• • •
Trying to explain what happened in the following months is like trying to understand the concept of how large the universe is.
Dating Jenna was easy. We just… fit.
She was the captain of the cheerleading squad and I was on the basketball team. We looked good together. We felt good together. And as a teenage boy, there was nothing more I could ask for than to have one of the hottest girls in school as my girlfriend — and to get all the perks that went along with that.
And yet… I still wanted more.
More meaning B.
She came with dating Jenna, part of the package, and at first, I assumed I’d have to win her over since I was relatively certain she hated me after that first interaction on the running trail.
What B didn’t tell you in her side of the story is that she was rather prickly with me in those first couple of weeks. Any time I would show up to walk Jenna to her next class, or we’d hang out by my Jeep after school, B would find an excuse to leave.
But not before throwing me a dirty look for good measure.
I thought she hated me, thought I wasn’t good enough for her best friend, maybe, or that I smelled or something.
It wasn’t until that evening on our surfboards — a happy accident that I later realized was one of the biggest moments of my adolescent life — that I wondered if that was just how B was.
Reserved. Careful. Hesitant to trust.
When she told me about her name, about why she never wanted anyone to call her by it, I understood why.
My attraction to B didn’t strike me like lightning. It didn’t hit suddenly and all at once. It bled into my skin, my muscles, my bones, my soul like an assassin in the dead of night.
It was slow, and calculated, powerful and deceiving.
And once it had its hands on me, I was forever in its grip.
We both knew we were walking a dangerous line. I felt it in the way she looked at me, the way she flushed when my knee touched hers at the football games, the way she couldn’t bear to watch when Jenna was in my arms.
And like the selfish little hormonal prick I was, I didn’t want to stop it.
I knew with just a few words I could shut it down. I knew I could stop giving her rides to school, I could stop sitting with her at the games, I could stop surfing with her, riding around town with her, finding every excuse possible to be with her.
I could… but then again, I couldn’t.
She was, in every sense of the word, my addiction.
But it wasn’t until Christmas Eve that I realized she was my salvation, too.
There was a demon slowly being born in the hollow of my chest that fall semester — my last fall semester in high school. I’d been able to mute it by throwing myself into basketball, spending time with Jenna, and pretending like I didn’t have deeper feelings for B.
