Tales From Another Broken Home

“Try some of this.”

I turned my head slightly to the left, looking up at Jimmy from my relaxed position on the couch. He was holding what looked like a smoldering, twisted up piece of lumpy paper; definitely not a cigarette.

“What is it?” I asked, giving him a skeptical look.

“Just try it,” he said, a note of exasperation in his voice. “It's good.”

I looked at him, pursing my lips in thought. Of course my instincts were screaming “no” at the mere thought of taking an unknown substance from a delinquent boy whom I had just met about a week ago. I had already figured out that he was quite obviously manipulative, and did things only for his own amusement, quite often at the expense of others - like the incident in gym class when I had first laid eyes on him. I knew even being here was a terrible idea.

Then again, I had already let him convince me to do the practically unspeakable act of sneaking out of my house, drag me to a party in some random location with an abundance of people who I didn’t know or trust, and coerce me into trying a cigarette, which, to me, was an experience that I would never had lived in my entire life.

I stared at him for a second, but for some reason, I couldn’t resist those bluegreen beauties.

“Oh, what the hell,” I sighed.

--

Before I knew it, I was lying on the dewy grass, staring up at the stars, on a hill overlooking the Golden Gate towering over distant city lights on the invisible horizon. Jimmy was lying beside me, the contours of his face glowing a faint orange from the cigarette he would occasionally bring to his lips. His body was so close to me, if I scooched over a couple of inches, I would’ve been pressed up against him. The thought actually crossed my mind for a moment, for some reason, then again, I’d been thinking of a lot of things lately. One of them probably should’ve been why I was on a hill a good ways away from home, in the wee hours of the morning, lying on the grass with a boy whom I barely knew, and probably shouldn’t trust, but for some reason, none of that bothered me right now. My mind felt kinda foggy, but unbelievably clear at the same time. I started wondering why I even should care about that stuff in the first place, why I worried so much, about getting involved with this boy, or doing what my parents told me, or anything. It was like a revelation, underneath the stars, with a boy who completely defied everything I had previously known.

“You know what, Abbey?”

I heard the raspy voice come from the right of me, faintly, almost hesitant, even.

“Hmm?” I asked, a whisper escaping from my throat.

“I don’t know if I can do this anymore.”

“Do what?” I asked after a small pause.

“Live here,” he said simply. “In this town. With these people. It's like, I dunno, I feel like it's all the same, redundant, the same thing over and over and over again each day, and I’m trapped. Don’t you ever feel like that?”

This time I took a long pause.

Did those words not describe my life? The same thing, over and over, the same expectations from my parents, the same above average grades, the same complacent attitude, the same routine, day after day after day.

“I dunno,” I whispered, staring up at the black sky. “I guess I really never thought about it before.”

Jimmy snorted.

“Of course you wouldn’t have. You need to fucking get out more.”

I laughed. Hysterically.

“I really do,” I squeezed out through the massive giggling fit caused by this pathetic realization. I glanced over at Jimmy and caught him staring at me with a curious expression; like he was amused, but completely weirded out at the same time. This just caused me to giggle more.

“Why in the hell are you laughing at the fact that you just admitted that you have no life?” he asked.

“Well I dunno!” I exclaimed, “Maybe it's just because this is the first time I’ve realized it.”

“Okay, that’s incredibly pathetic,” Jimmy said, but the mean tone in his voice was absent.

I squirmed over onto my side to face him, crossing my arms, trying to warm myself up in the cool California air.

“Well that’s not mean at all,” I whispered, a daring teasing note in my voice. I smirked at him, and he rolled onto his side as well.

“Well, Abbey-baby, you should know me by now, I’m not a nice guy.”

His smirk definitely outclassed mine. It was his signature overly cocky smirk, the one that he had completely perfected, leaving me completely drawn to him. My head was spinning, for one reason or another, and I suddenly noticed how incredibly close he was to me, and how gorgeous his eyes were, and how much I wanted to touch his dark hair, and how his peach lips curved slightly upward in a perpetually cheeky look, the curves and contours looking so incredibly perfect and soft.

I felt his hand snake up to my waist, to my lower back, and I felt our bodies press together. I my heartbeat speed up, thumping in my chest, and my body became frozen; I couldn’t move, and yet, I felt surprisingly calm about the situation. His slender fingers tangled into my hair, grabbing hold of the roots, gently tilting my head up to look up at him. My eyelashes fluttered, and I felt the tingle of his exhale on my lips, and I saw his blue-green eyes close, and I closed mine as well, and he pulled me closer to him, and his fingers clenched down into my messy hair, and he pressed his lips onto mine -

And before I knew it, he was kissing me.