Free Underneath by Kealan Patrick Burke Page B

that easy? No way, dude. He just wants to humiliate you, wants to see you hook up with Scarface. Then, when you become the joke of the whole school, he'll look twice as good when he kicks your ass up to your shoulders. Trust me—I know these things."
    Before Dean had moved from Phoenix to Harperville, Les had been Freddy's punching bag. The day Dean had showed up, he'd bumped into Freddy hard enough to make the guy drop his cigarette. Les's days of torment were over; Dean earned the label "Fresh Meat." It had been that simple; whatever part of the bullying mind controlled obsession, Dean's clumsiness had triggered it.
    "What's worse," Les continued, "is that not only will this not keep that jerk off your back, but now you've put yourself in a position where you have to date Stephanie Watts, and for a girl who's probably desperate, God knows what she'll expect you to do for her."
    "What do you mean?"
    Les sighed. "Put yourself in her shoes. Imagine you'd never been with someone. Ever . And then some guy asks you out. Wouldn't you be eager to get as much as you could from him just in case you're never that lucky again?"
    Dean grimaced, waved away a fly. "I never thought of it that way."
    "I don't think you gave this much thought at all, hombre."
    "So what do I do?"
    "What can you do?"
    "I could tell her I can't make it."
    "She'll just pick another night."
    "I could just not call her. That'd give her the hint, wouldn't it?"
    "Maybe, but I get the feeling once you give a girl like that the slightest hint of interest, she'll dog you to follow through on it."
    Dean ran a hand over his face. "Shit."
    "Yeah." Les put a hand on his shoulder. "But who knows? Maybe all that pent-up lust'll mean she's a great lay."
    "Christ, Les, lay off, will ya? If I go through with this, it's just gonna be a movie, nothing more."
    "If you say so," Les said, and laughed.
     
    * * *
     
    "Who are you calling?" Dean's mother stood in the doorway, arms folded over her apron. A knowing smile creased her face, the smell of freshly baked pies wafting around her, making Dean's stomach growl. The clock in the hall ticked loudly, too slow to match the racing of Dean's heart.
    "Well? Who is she?"
    Dean groaned. In the few days since he'd asked Stephanie out it seemed the world was bracing itself for the punch line to one big joke, with him at the ass end of it. More than once, he'd approached the phone with the intention of calling the girl and telling her the truth and to hell with whatever she thought of his cruelty. But he'd chickened out. Trembling finger poised to dial, he would remember the flare of hope he'd seen in her eyes and hang up, angry at himself for not being made of tougher stuff, for being weak. It was that weakness, both mental and physical, that bound him to his obligations, no matter how misguided, and made him a constant target for the fists of life.
    "Just a girl from school," he told his mother, to satisfy her irritating smile. He hoped that would be enough to send her back to the kitchen, but she remained in the doorway, her smile widening, a look of there's my little man, all grown up on her face .
    "Did you tell your father?"
    He shrugged and turned away from her. Frowned at the phone. "Didn't know I had to."
    She said nothing more, but a contented sigh carried her back to her baking and he shook his head as he picked up the phone. They were always in his business, to the point where every decision he made had to be screened by his own imagined versions of them before he did anything. It angered him, made him sometimes wish he could go live with his Uncle Rodney in Pensacola at least until he went to college and was free of their reign. But Rodney was a drunk, albeit a cheerful one and Dean doubted that situation would leave him any better off than he was now. Overbearing parents was one thing; waking up to a drunk uncle mistaking you for the toilet was another.
    Shuddering, he jabbed out the number he'd written down on a scrap of