Someone Else by Rebecca Phillips

been in effect for many months now, and my mother assumed these rules were being followed to the letter. She expected it. And most of the time, they were followed. Except for the many times that they weren’t.
    As for my dad, well, he was content to believe that Michael and I were good friends who maybe kissed occasionally. However, Lynn knew better. I found that out one day over the summer when she came into my room and asked me what I knew about birth control. When I told her I’d been on the pill since February, she looked relieved. As for my mother, I suspected that her thoughts on this matter reflected Dad’s more so than Lynn’s. But with Dad, it was about blind trust. With Mom, it was all about denial.
    After my father and stepmother left, I wandered into the kitchen to see if Leo had enough food in his dish to last him the evening. He did. Water too. He’d be fine until Dad got home to walk him. I gave the lonely dog some love and attention, running my hands along his head and ears. Suddenly, he let out a low bark, which meant someone was outside on the porch, about to ring the bell. Michael. I hurried out of the kitchen, Leo’s protective barks barely registering in my ears. Upon swinging open the front door, I barely had a chance to look at him before our bodies came together in a crushing hug right there on the front porch, in plain view of the entire neighborhood.
    “Hi,” he said when we finally loosened our grips.
    “Hi,” I said, taking my first good look at him. Relief coursed through me when I realized he hadn’t changed at all in the past six weeks. Not that I was expecting a big physical change, but maybe just a subtle difference to let me know he wasn’t the same Michael I once knew. But he was the same.
    When we kissed, it was as if the past few weeks hadn’t happened at all. It all felt so familiar—his hands in my hair, the sweet, cinnamon taste of his mouth, the warm spark igniting at the bottom of my stomach as our tongues grazed. We kissed until Leo’s frenzied barking brought us back to earth and then, reluctantly, we detangled ourselves and went inside, sparing the neighbors from witnessing any more of our shameless PDA.
    I left Michael in the kitchen with a very excited Leo while I went upstairs to look in on Jamie. He lay on his stomach on his bed, playing a game on his iPod. I gave him fifteen minutes to finish up before I declared lights out for the night. He must have had a long day too because he agreed without a fight.
    Back downstairs, I found Michael leaning against the sink in the kitchen, gazing out the window into the darkness. When he saw me, his arms extended to pull me in for another hug.
    “It’s so good to see you,” he said, his lips against my forehead.
    I closed my eyes and basked in this new emotion. I’d missed him before, but never this much. Our past reunions had been great, but never this intense. I’d wanted him before, but never this desperately.
    “Did your mom mind that you didn’t stay home tonight?” I asked. “She only got you for a couple of hours.”
    “She understood.”
    I reached up to slide my fingers over his jaw. It felt smooth, like he’d just shaved there. As I did this he gazed down at my face, his blue-gray eyes smoldering at me in a way that made it difficult for me to keep myself upright. We kissed again, this time with Leo as our audience. He sat in the doorway to the laundry room, staring dejectedly at us, but I didn’t care about that. Nor did I care that the counter was digging into my back, hard enough to raise bruises. I wasn’t aware of anything beyond the feel of a solid body against mine, hot breath on my neck, hands on my skin and in my hair.
    After about five minutes of this I tore myself away, feeling dizzy and disoriented. “I have to go check on…um…” I said between gasps for air. What was his name again? Oh yes. “…Jamie. See if he’s asleep yet.”
    “Okay,” Michael said, looking pleased now that