So the Season's Changed Your Face

I instantly regretted not making Mike drive me home last night the moment I woke up.

Not only was I naked, I was in Mike’s bed. And not only was I in Mike’s bed, Mike was in Mike’s bed. Which means his mom is probably in the kitchen right now, wondering why Mike is not sleeping out on the couch as he should be.

It’s like New Year’s Day all over again, except I’m not hung over and this is so much worse.

I got out of bed and began the frantic search for my clothing. I was putting on my shirt when Mike woke up.

He took one look at me before saying, “Shit.” and falling back into bed. He dragged his hands down his face. “Vivi, we are fucked.”

“I know!” I whispered, buttoning my jeans. “I gotta get out of here.”

“Maybe we can just go through the window…” Mike started, staring longingly at our only savior. “Shit, I pulled the car in after practice. We can’t go through the window.”

“Mike!” I whisper-yelled at him. “Why would you park in the garage?”

A third voice joined our conversation. “Since you two are up now, you might as well join us for breakfast.”

It was Mike’s dad.

Mike and I looked at each other in absolute horror. Maybe in a couple of years, we can look back at this moment and laugh about it. But, for now, this was the most unfunny, terrifying moment of my entire life.

Shamefully, and probably smelling like sex and guilt, Mike and I shuffled into the kitchen, our heads hung low.

“How many waffles do you guys want?” Mrs. Carden asked, her voice unnaturally flat. I couldn’t even bring myself to look at her when I said, ‘I’m not hungry’.

“You guys should be plenty hungry after last night!” Mr. Carden said, picking through the newspaper.

Oh, just fucking kill me.

“Phil!”

“Jesus Christ, Dad!”

“What?” Mr. Carden asked, shrugging. “Everyone here knows what happened last night. No reason to beat around the bush.”

So that’s where Mike gets his bluntness from…

Had this been happening to anyone else, the situation would have been hilarious. Unfortunately, it was happening to me and Mike and we were trapped in his kitchen with his parents who know we had sex last night.

And, to make matters worse, I am in last night’s clothing and I probably smell like a penis.

“So…” Mike ventured apprehensively. “Am I going to get grounded?”

“Well…” Mrs. Carden started, pouring batter into the waffle iron.

“I don’t know why he should be, Deb,” Mr. Carden said, not looking up from the Classifieds. “I mean, he’s almost nineteen. It’s about damn time.”

“Dad!”

“Phil!”

“What?” Mr. Carden asked again. “He’s old enough to have sex. Anyway, we knew this was going to happen sooner or later, Deb. I mean, he’s been talking about her since he was fourteen.”

“Dad!”

“Well, you have!”

I laughed, despite the incredibly embarrassing situation I had landed myself in. Mike’s face grew red.

“So…you’re not going to punish me?” Mike asked, trying to get us away from the subject of his ninth grade crush on me. “Really?”

“For now, no,” Mrs. Carden said reluctantly, putting waffles on a plate for him.

“Sweet!” Mike exclaimed, before he could stop himself.

“Do not press your luck, Michael,” she said sternly, handing him the syrup. “And don’t make this a regular thing.” She made very serious eye contact with both of us in turn, and returned to spooning batter into the waffle iron.

Mike and I exchanged glances, acknowledging silently that we had gotten off lucky and that we were going to get the fuck out of here the second he finished eating his fucking waffles.

Seven minutes later, I was practically pushing Mike out of the front door as his mom shouted, “Pick up Lucas from Andrew’s!”

“Mike, please, can we just go?” I pleaded, desperately wanting to get as far away from the Cardens as humanly possible.

“Can I put my fucking shoes on first?” he asked, referring to a pair of beat up Converse and his sock-clad feet. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t like driving barefoot.”

I rolled my eyes at him. “Can you put them on a little closer to the car? Your mom is probably looking through the peephole right now, watching us, making sure we're not having sex on the porch.”

“I highly doubt she is looking through the peephole right now,” Mike said, sitting down on the steps leading up to his house and slipping on his shoes. “I mean, she’s crazy, but she’s not that crazy.”

We didn’t speak again until we were stopped at an intersection, watching an old man in a wheelchair cross the street. “Mike, your mom’s going to kill you!” I blurted before bursting into a fit of laughter.

“Oh my god, I know!” he shouted, throwing his head back into the headrest. “She never uses my real name. I don’t even remember the last time she called me Michael!”

The light turned green. “I don’t even want to go home. I think I’m going to do a drive-by, you know, make Lucas tuck and roll so I don’t have to stop the car.”

“Where are you going to go after that?” I asked, still very amused. “Are you just going to sit out in your car and pray she forgets?”

“I don’t know. I’ll go somewhere,” Mike thought for a second. “I’ll go to AJ’s or something…and stay there for the rest of the summer.”

We were at another intersection when I breached the silence we had fallen into again. “Mike, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Mike said quickly, glancing at me. “Definitely don’t be sorry. Not after…don’t be sorry.”

“I should have just gone home,” I said, shaking my head. “This could have all been avoided if I had just gone home.”

“I was not about to take you home after last night, no way,” Mike started. “I would have felt so…sleazy taking you home…I thought you’d think I was like, hitting it and quitting it or something. I just didn’t feel right just…taking you home after…you know.”

“Mike, I would not have thought you were hitting it and quitting it,” I assured him. “I would have understood that that drive home was out of complete necessity.”

“Yeah, well,” he said, checking his blind spots before merging over – clearly giving himself extra time to plan out what he was going to say next. “I guess I didn’t really want to take you home anyway.”

“Oh, you didn’t?” I asked, adopting a tone I knew would piss Mike off, but smiling widely all the same. “Why’s that?”

Mike gave me a look he gave me all too often – a look that very clearly stated, “Don’t be an asshole”. This look was usually followed by a sarcastic comment, but apparently Mike wasn’t interested in being himself today. “I don’t know why. I guess, maybe, it’s because I just…I liked, you know, laying in bed with you, or something.”

Apparently, Mike loses his ability to create coherent and intelligent sentences when he starts talking about his feelings. That’s either very endearing or very annoying, I'm not sure yet.

“Really?” I asked, and I felt a very unfamiliar feeling – giddiness, perhaps. Despite everything that happened last night, a wave of innocent feelings washed over me. I’m eight again, and a boy in my class is calling me cute.

“Yeah,” Mike said, and though I was determinedly facing forward, I could see him looking at me from the corner of my eye.

“That’s nice,” I replied, completely sincere. I was trying to hide the fact that I was blushing by not turning to face him, though I wanted to.

There was a slightly awkward silence, but I knew it was because both of us were experiencing a timidity neither one of us had ever known before.

The silence took us all the way to my house and that was okay with me. Sometimes, it can be nice to sit in silence with someone – especially if that someone isn’t succeeding at forming intelligible sentences at the moment.

Mike cleared his throat after putting the car in park. “I guess that’s why I didn’t go sleep out on the couch last night.”

I furrowed my brow at him.

“I just wanted to be with you,” he said, giving me a little, embarrassed smile. “I guess that’s a little lame. We’ve only been dating for, what? Two months now?”

I smiled at him and rolled my eyes. “It’s not lame.”

I started to get out of his car, but then decided I had to crack one more joke before leaving. “It is nice to know that you’re not hitting it and quitting it, though.”

Mike shook his head, amused. “Vivi, you don’t have to worry about me hitting it and quitting it. Anyone else, maybe. But not you.”

“That’s reassuring, Mike,” I laughed and got out of the car.

“No, I’m serious though,” he said quickly, as I closed the car door. I was walking up the driveway when he rolled down his window and shouted the rest of his sentiment at me. “I think my ninth grade self would hate my guts if I hit it and quit it!”