I can’t wait to see you.
My palms grew sweaty. It was hard to believe that he liked me even though it was quite obvious just how ordinary I was. It would be one thing if I was as cute and bubbly as Sam. I felt a slight feeling of panic, wondering if he would change his mind.
The rest of the day passed quickly and I was pleased that I was at least able to concentrate more attentively on my afternoon classes than the day before. I would have hated to try to explain to my mom if my grades took a nosedive.
After the last bell rang, Sam and I both pulled out our cell phones to call our parents. I turned on my phone and saw that I had a voicemail from my mom. Hitting the button to retrieve the voicemail, I listened to the message.
“Hi, honey. I hope you don’t mind. I heard there’s an art seminar this afternoon in Aptos and I wanted to go check it out. I hate to abandon you two nights in a row. I promise we’ll catch up tomorrow night. Call me if you have any problems.”
Well, that worked out perfectly. No need to lie or find an alibi. I was free to meet Mark with no guilt. I felt giddy at my good fortune that we could spend the whole afternoon together.
“They said it was fine,” Sam said as she dialed another number. She stepped away and I discreetly turned away to give her a little privacy.
“Shawn says he will meet us at the park.”
“Great, let’s go,” I said in an impatient voice. I was ready to see Mark again. It had only been two hours, but I felt a small distinct ache from the separation.
We walked swiftly to the park.
Mark was already there sitting on the top of a picnic table under a big shady oak tree. It should be a sin to look as good as he did, I thought as I once again admired his physique.
He stood up as we approached.
“Hey Sam, how’s it going?”
“Oh you know, my best friends dating our teacher’s intern. I’m dating some guy I dreamt about my whole life and oh yeah, I share some kind of mystical connection with my friend and the intern,” Sam quipped in a dry voice.
Mark and I burst out laughing.
Put that way, the whole situation seemed like some crazy story you would read about in the Enquirer. Sam was right, in the last thirty six hours our lives had taken a drastic turn.
A few minutes later, Sam’s whole face lit up as she spotted someone walking toward us from the parking lot. She got up and practically bounced to his side, not bothering to even contain her enthusiasm. Sam gave him what I could only describe as a scorching kiss and then dragged him over to us.
“Krista, Mark, this is Shawn,” Sam said with shining eyes.
I reached out to shake his hand. The now familiar electricity flowed between our hands. I was expecting it, but it was obviously a shock for Shawn.
“Wow,” he said.
“Told you,” Sam said, laughing at his expression.
He was expecting it when he shook Mark’s hand, but it was clear that he was as confused as the rest of us over the bizarre situation.
For the next hour, we sat at the picnic table comparing stories. Shawn, like me, had been adopted at a young age. His adoptive parents split up five years ago, but he was fine about it. He felt his adoptive mom never wanted children and only went along with it to please his adoptive dad. “My adoptive dad was no gem,” was all he said when I tried to ask him about it.
Out of the four of us, Mark was the only one who had been raised by his biological parent. We had no idea why, if we were all tied together in some way, why the rest of us had been abandoned.
Sam then filled Mark in on her past. She appeared to be glossing over a lot of the details, but we saw through them and I reached over to pat her hand. I already knew from small tidbits Sam had given me that her childhood had sucked. Eventually we ran out of steam and our conversation trailed off. We sat in silence for awhile analyzing all the information we lacked. >Instead he looked at me with a nasty look on his face. “Oh I get it. You’re not into guys,” he said, looking suggestively between Sam and me.
“Go bother…..” my words caught in my throat as another person joined our group. I looked up to see Mark standing beside me, and he was not happy.
He had caught the end of the exchange, and I could feel the anger vibrating off of him.
“Maybe a trip to the Dean’s office will clean up your language,” he said.
“Is that a threat?” the boy asked in a mocking voice. “Maybe the Dean would like to hear how you’ve taken an interest in our new student. Everyone’s talking about how the two of you were ogling each other in class. No, I don’t think you’ll be talking to the Dean anytime soon,” he said in the same mocking voice as he turned and sauntered off.
Mark started to go after him. “Don’t,” I said in a low voice, putting my hand on his arm.