Free Bitter End by Jennifer Brown Page B

guitar into my lap, carefully winding the strap around my shoulders, then grabbed my hands with his and positioned
     them on the strings. I could feel his breath against my ear, his biceps pulling taut against the backs of my arms, his legs
     curled around mine. Slowly, he guided my hands with his, humming and naming chords into my neck.
    We sat there like that for hours, the stars blazing above us—just the two of us, alone in a place that was so frightening
     and wonderful.
    I was so scared and so exhilarated I didn’t know where one feeling stopped and the other began. All I knew was I loved the
     feeling. And I never wanted it to end.

CHAPTER TEN
    I sprawled upside down over the couch, my legs snaking up over the pillows and my head hanging limply toward the floor. I
     could feel all the blood rushing to my temples. When I talked, I sounded like I had a bad cold.
    “We could whitewater raft,” I said. “Watch out, Beth!”
    There was a boom, followed by a groan of frustration. Zack burst into hysterical laughter. “You totally walked right into
     it,” he said, crazily punching buttons on a video game controller.
    “Go ahead, laugh it up, Zackhole,” Bethany said, reverting to our seventh-grade nickname for Zack. There was another explosion,
     and this time Bethany laughed, shoving Zack with her shoulder and jostling the couch so that the top of my head grazed the
     floor.
    Last weekend, while I’d been at the lake with Cole, Bethany and Zack had a Vacay Day at Zack’s house without me.Somewhere between Bethany beating Zack at
Holy Rollers 5
and Zack devouring an entire plateful of chocolate chip cookies, Zack’s mom had pointed out to them that we probably wouldn’t
     be doing much skiing if we were planning on going to Colorado in July.
    “I can’t believe I didn’t think of that before,” Bethany said, flopping back on my couch. “I guess I just assumed that you
     could ski any time of the year in the mountains.”
    “No problem,” Zack said, plugging in a controller while Bethany and I picked at the tacos I’d made for tonight’s Vacay Day.
     It was my turn to host, but I didn’t have the money for pizza. Not if I was going to actually get to Colorado and do anything
     fun. “We’ll just go in the winter.”
    “Hell-o, college,” Bethany said, pushing her glasses back up on her nose.
    “Hell-o, winter break,” Zack countered, tossing her a controller.
    He held a controller up at me. I shook my head, and he backed up to the couch and sat between us, holding a controller in
     his lap. I’d shoved my plate of tacos on the coffee table and flipped myself upside down so my feet were by Zack’s head and
     my head was by his feet. They continued to bicker while my mind drifted to Cole.
    The week in the tutor lab had been way tense between the two of us, in a good way. It was tough to focus on noun and verb
     placement when all I could think about, sitting across from him and staring into his eyes, was being alone with him again.
     Having his arm resting against my back,brushing up against me, coaxing out the goose bumps on my legs. Sitting on the top of the world, feeling puffs of air against
     my cheek while we brushed our fingers over the guitar strings.
    We were supposed to go see the
House of Horrors
movie that night, but after Bethany burst into American lit class Monday morning in full vacation panic mode, I knew there
     was no way I could ditch our planning session two Saturdays in a row. I begged off my date with Cole, made tacos, and sighed
     as I tried to come up with things we could do in the summer instead of ski.
    “We could, uh… go on a hike in the mountains,” I said.
    “Um, isn’t that the first thing we’re going to do?” Zack asked. “It’s a given. And you can hike up a mountain in December,
     just so you… ha-HA! I just blew your arm off!”
    “Gah!” Bethany roared, punching him in the shoulder. “Yeah, I think one hike is enough.”
    “We could ride