Nothing Like You by Lauren Strasnick Page A

okay?”
     
    I nodded, but I wanted to cry. Instead I sucked it up and lay back down and tried to remember why this whole thing felt so great to begin with.
     
    He nuzzled up next to me then, resting his head on my chest. “I love being with you. I do.”
     
    “I know,” I said, lacing my fingers through his fingers.
     
    He went on. “It would be a real shame if somebody found out about us and all this had to stop.”
     
    My stomach churned. I flexed my fingers so that our hands were no longer entwined. He bit my earlobe and slid his free hand between my thighs. “Your hair smells so nice. Like roses.”
     
    “Different shampoo,” I mumbled, rolling away from him and onto my side.
     

Chapter 14
     
    As if on cosmic cue , the next day in World History, Saskia and I got stuck working together on this horrific group project—an Ancient Mesopotamia–themed collage.
     
    “Do you have any clue what we’re supposed to be doing?” She was staring at me, brushing her fingers over the tips of her hair.
     
    “Not really,” I said, giggling like a nervous twit. “Feels more like fourth grade arts and crafts.” I stood up and circled around to the back of my desk.
     
    “So we just, like, collect a bunch of images and paste them all together?”
     
    We were pushing our desks together and all I could think was
this so isn’t my fault but Paul’s gonna kill me
. “Yeah, basically,” I said. “I guess we can photocopy some stuff fromthe library. And there’s stuff in our books we can use too.”
     
    Saskia plopped down in her seat. “I mean I know we know each other, so it seems stupid me introducing myself to you, but I don’t think we’ve ever officially …
talked
. I’m Saskia.”
     
    “Holly.” I said, checking the clock on the wall.
Crap, fifteen more minutes of this. Tick. Tock. Tick.
     
    “You went to my elementary, didn’t you?”
     
    “Same sixth-grade class.”
     
    “Ms. Shapiro?”
     
    I nodded.
     
    “Yeah, I totally remember.”
     
    Saskia leaned forward, lightly touching one of my dangly silver earrings. “I love these,” she said. “Whenever you wear them I always stare. Have you noticed? I stare at people way too much.”
     
    “I hadn’t noticed.” I wished I had.
     
    “Where’d you get them?”
     
    “What?”
     
    “Your earrings. In L.A.?”
     
    “Oh. They were my mother’s,” I said. And then that kind of killed the conversation because she totally knew about my mom. Everyone knew. No one ever knows what to say.
     
    We poked through our textbooks for the last ten minutes of class. I zoned out somewhere around page four hundred, rereading the same picture caption over and over,thinking about was how nice Saskia seemed, and about how Paul would freak if he ever found out about this—she and I paired up for class. Then I pictured Mom on her cloud. Then the bell rang and we pushed our desks back into place and Saskia turned toward me and said, “So, you wanna just bring a whole bunch of photos to class next time and I’ll do the same and then we’ll just start pasting stuff together?”
     
    “Sounds like a plan, “ I squeaked, grabbing my book bag and bolting for the exit.
     
    “Hey, wait!” she yelled after me. “We didn’t even divvy up the time line! Which half do you want?”
     
    I was already out the door. “Whichever,” I said, looking back over my shoulder. “I’ll take invasion of Greece and everything after!”
     
    “Okay!” she said, waving good-bye. And then that was it. Another secret to keep. Saskia Van Wyck: my brand-new best girl friend.
     
    “Where to?”
     
    Paul and I were driving into L.A. His idea. He said he was taking me somewhere great.
     
    “It’s not a place, exactly. I mean, it’s a place, it’s just not like, a
place
place.”
     
    We drove all the way up Sunset, away from the beach into the sticky city. We drove with the windows open and the music blaring and the air got hotter each mile we clocked