The mirror crack brought an angry flush to Brianna Brown’s face, and she glared hotly at Robert.
Cass Minter was quick to intervene. “You both spend too much tune in front of lighted screens, Robert”-she gave Nest another wink-“but in Brianna’s case the results are more obviously successful.”
Nest laughed softly in spite of herself. She envied Brianna’s smooth curves, her flawless skin, and her soft, feminine look. She was beautiful in a way that Nest never would be. Her tiny, grade-school girl’s body was developing curves on schedule while Nest’s simply refused to budge. Boys looked at Brianna and were made hungry and awestruck. When they looked at Nest, they were left indifferent.
Robert started to say something and belched, and everyone laughed. Jared Scott cleared his throat, and his eyes refocused on his friends. “Are we going swimming tomorrow?” he asked, as if nothing had happened.
They walked through the center of the park, keeping to the shade of the big oaks that ran along the bluff up from the ball fields bordering Nest’s backyard, then cut down toward Cass Minter’s rambling two-story. A game was in progress on the fourth field, the one farthest into the park and closest to the toboggan run. They sauntered toward it, caught up in their conversation, which had turned now to the merits of learning a foreign language, and they were almost to the backstop when Nest realized belatedly that one of the players lounging on the benches, waiting his turn at bat, was Danny Abbott. She tried to veer away from him, pushing at Cass to get her to move back toward the roadway, but it was too late. He had already seen her and was on his feet.
“Hey, Nest!” he called out boldly. “Wait up!”
She slowed reluctantly as he started over, already angry with herself for letting this happen. “Oh, great!” Robert muttered under his breath. A scowl twisted his narrow lips.
“Go on,” she told Cass, glancing at her shoes. “I’ll be along in a minute.”
Cass kept moving as if that had been her plan all along, and the other three dutifully followed. All of them drifted on for about twenty feet and stopped. Nest held her ground as Danny Abbott approached. He was big, strong, and good-looking, and for some reason he had a thing for her. A high-school junior in the fall, he was two years older than she was and convinced he was the coolest thing in jeans. A few months ago, at a Y dance, flattered by his interest, she had made the mistake of letting him kiss her. The kiss was all she wanted, and after she experienced it, she decided she wasn’t that interested in Danny Abbott after all. But Danny couldn’t let it go. He began to talk about her to his friends, and some of the stories got back to her. Danny was saying he had gotten a lot further with her than he had. Worse, he was saying she was anxious for more. She stopped having anything to do with him, but this just seemed to fuel his interest.
He strolled up to her with a confident smile, the big jock coming on to the impressionable little groupie. She felt her anger build. “So what’s happening?” he asked, his voice slow and languid. “Catch anything?”
She shook her head. “Not much. What do you want?”
“Hey, don’t be so prickly.” He brushed at his dark hair and looked off into the distance, like he was seeing into the future and taking its measure. “I was just wondering why I hadn’t seen you around.”
She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, forcing herself to look at him, refusing to be intimidated. “You know why, Danny.”
He pursed his lips and nodded, as if thinking it through. “Okay, I made a mistake. I said some stuff I shouldn’t have. I’m sorry. Can we drop it now? I like you, Nest. I don’t want you pissed off at me. Hey, why don’t you stick around while I finish this game, and then we’ll go out for a burger.”
“I’m with my friends,” she said.
“So? I’m with mine, too. They can go their way and we can go ours, right?”