Free Geek Girl by Cindy C Bennett Page A

most definitely affected by touching me.
    So am I.
    “There you go.” His voice is unsteady.
    “Okay. Here, I’ll do you.”
    “Wha—?” his voice catches.
    I lift up the lotion.
    “Oh. Yeah. Okay.” He turns around, and I squeeze the cold lotion directly onto his back. He jumps a little and breaks out in goose flesh. I rub it in, surprised again at the hard muscle beneath his warm flesh.
    “You work out, Trev?”
    “No. Isn’t that apparent?”
    “No, not really. I thought you’d be skinnier than you are.”
    He laughs. “I’m confused. Is that a compliment or an insult?”
    “Yes,” I say, and he’s grinning as he turns back to face me.
    “It’s natural,” he says in his Schwarzenegger voice, flexing his arms and chest, bigger muscles than I expected popping up.
    “Nice,” I say with a laugh, but my eyes tell him I’m serious. He drops his pose.
    “I played basketball and soccer for a long time,” he says with a shrug.
    “Why don’t you anymore?” I ask, trying to picture Trevor as a jock.
    “My classes at school. I have a lot of homework. And since I’m pretty sure I’m not going to get into college on a sports scholarship . . . or on my looks,” he adds facetiously. “I need to depend on my grades.”
    “Don’t knock your looks, Arnold. The killer combination of your eyes and dimples could probably get you into a place or two.”
    “Two compliments in one day? That has to be a record.”
    “It’s in my nature to be kind to the poor and downtrodden.” I sigh dramatically.
    “I’m neither, so you’re going to need a new story,” he says.
    “I don’t have one. That’s the best I can come up with. So tell me, college boy, what do you want to be when you grow up?”
    “A writer.”
    My eyebrows lift at this. “Of what? Comic books? Bad sci-fi movies?”
    “Novels.”
    “I could tell you stories that would curl your toes,” I mumble, but he hears me clearly.
    “Tell me.”
    “No, I don’t think so. I like you having this clean view of me.”
    “Clean?”
    “Yeah. You don’t know my dirt.”
    “You won’t tell me?”
    “Someday I might,” I say, thinking of the day when he becomes like me and sees me in my real life. He’ll know most of my dirt then, but not all. Some things I’ll never tell him. I lie down on the blanket next to where he sits.
    “Can I ask you something?” he says.
    “I’m not telling you my dirt, Trev, dimples or no.”
    He leans back on his elbow, turning to face me.
    “Not that. You’ll tell me when you want. It’s something else.”
    “Sounds serious,” I tease.
    “Kind of.” He slips his hand under mine, lightly rubbing my knuckles. “You keep putting out all of these conflicting vibes.”
    I look up at him, then lean up on my own elbow so that we are eye to eye.
    “What do you mean?”
    “We’re friends, right?” he questions. I nod. “And that’s nice. Unexpected, but nice. But we spend a lot of time together. A lot of time. I’m with you more than I am with all of my other friends combined. And I’m guessing it’s the same for you.”
    “I like hanging out with you, Trev,” I say hesitantly, not sure where he’s going with this. “But I don’t mean to hog all your time. You don’t have to be with me so much if you’d rather be with your friends.”
    “That’s not what I’m saying. I’d rather be with you. I like hanging out with you also. I like it a lot. I like you a lot.” He drops his eyes, watching our hands that are still held together.
    “Ditto,” I say, confused. He looks frustrated. I’m not sure what he wants.
    “But then you do things that put out the vibe like you want to be more than friends.” He’s looking directly at me now, refusing to let me hide from him.
    “Like what?” I ask flippantly. I’m trying to turn this conversation, put him ill at ease. It doesn’t work.
    “Like today. Your little undressing act for me.”
    I open my mouth to deny it, but in the end I don’t. I