We sat there for a few minutes, not saying anything, and not moving more than an inch. Finally I turned to her and asked, “Hey, my family’s having a get-together for Craig’s eighteenth birthday. Dinner and stuff, nothing major, just the family, and I was wondering if you’d go with me.”
“Do you think that’s a good idea?” Shelly asked. “I mean, your parents know about us, right?”
“Yeah, but I don’t think anyone’s said anything to Craig, and you know he loves you.” It was probably dirty of me to use my brother to get Shelly to spend extra time with me, but I was willing to use whatever I had at my disposal.
I could tell by Shelly’s face that it worked. “Of course, when is the dinner?”
“It’s on Wednesday night, on his birthday,” I answered. “I think he’s doing stuff with his friends to celebrate over the weekend.”
“I can’t believe he’s eighteen already,” Shelly said. “It seems like just yesterday he was turning thirteen and we were celebratin
g at the bowling alley. Do you remember that?”
“Yeah,” I said with a smile as I remembered my brother and I watching Shelly try to bowl. We’d had a good laugh over the way she’d stomp her foot whenever she’d bowled a gutter ball. Craig had always been a little in love with Shelly himself. “I can’t believe he’s about to graduate. Time goes by quickly.”
“It sure does,” Shelly replied softly. “Hey, speaking of the past … You are not going to believe what Gaby told me and Sasha today.”
“What’s that?” I asked, wondering if we were ever going to get out of this parking lot.
“She and Scott lost their virginity to each other.”
I forgot about the traffic, turning to Shelly with my mouth open. “Get the fuck out of here.”
Shelly laughed and shook her head. “I can’t … It’s true.”
“When? How? Why didn’t they tell us?” I asked, my mind totally blown.
“It was prom night,” Shelly answered.
“Shit, I knew that Scott lost his virginity on prom night, but he never said it was with Gaby. How the hell did that happen?”
“I guess Scott walked by when Gaby was telling Tom that she wanted to go home instead of to the hotel, and when Tom put his hands on her, Scott got rough with him.”
“Tom put his hands on her?” I asked, seeing red, even though there was absolutely nothing I could do about it now.
“Yeah, but Scott took care of it, then dropped his date in order to take care of Gaby, like the total sweetheart that he is … Anyway, after a few drinks they both admitted to having crushes on each other, and one thing led to another …”
“Wow,” I said, trying to wrap my head around this new information. “Scott and Gaby … Why did they never date each other?”
“She said that they were both about to leave for school, and that after that, one of them was always with someone else, so the timing was never right.”
“That’s too bad,” I said. Now that I knew about them, the two of them together made perfect sense. I remembered the conversation I’d had with the guys about Brock. “I bet that’s why Scott didn’t like Brock … He was hitting on Gaby.”
“What?” Shelly asked.
“The guys and I were talking at Craig’s game the other night, and TJ mentioned that he was going to pick up some work with Brock at his painting company, and Scott said he’d thought he was an ass, but they only met once … At that New Year’s masquerade we all went to.”
“That was a great night!” Shelly remembered with a smile. “I do remember Brock hitting on Gaby, but she was dating that Roger guy at the time.”
“It explains Scott’s attitude toward Brock. I can’t believe they had a one-night stand though, that’s crazy … I’m gonna give Scott some shit for this!”
“You can’t,” Shelly exclaimed, putting her hand on my arm as if to hold me back. “If you say something to Scott, he will know Gaby told us, and Gaby will know I told you. She’ll be pissed.”
“Why’d you tell me?” I asked, turning to look into her eyes.
“You know I always tell you everything,” Shelly answered simply.
I couldn’t stop the smile that I knew took over my whole face.