Win Some, Lose Some Read online

  The sound she made was nothing short of divine. A grunting, moaning utterance that should not have sounded as sexy as it did, but the sound went straight to my cock. I desperately tried to collect myself and remembered something from some television show or book somewhere that said to think about basketball. I tried, but all I saw in my head were Mayra’s boobs bouncing when I tickled her.

  “What do I do?” I whispered, realizing that despite the book’s graphic pictures and explanations, I was at a total loss now that I was touching her.

  Mayra didn’t miss a beat but shadowed my fingers with two of her own, pressing them in a slow circle right at the top, where I knew her clitoris was. She moved my fingers down for a second, where they got wet, then moved them back up to circle. I could feel a small, tight little nub there, and when I pushed just a little harder against it during one circle, she made that sound again.

  “Matthewww…” She moaned as she pressed her lips against my temple. I turned my head and kissed her hard, my tongue finding its way into her mouth and circling the same way my fingers did. She released my hand, and I continued on my own. Moving down only for a brief moment before going back to the place right at the top, I kept it up until her hips started to rise against my hand.

  She grabbed my wrist then, holding my fingers in place as she bucked up against my hand. I looked at her face and saw her eyes closed and her mouth slightly open. Her breaths came in gasps as she quickened the pace and then let out a completely different sound. It was higher pitched, almost a scream, and was accompanied by her body tensing. I could feel the shaking of her thigh muscles as she cried out again.

  Mayra went slack against the mattress, and I would have thought she had passed out if she didn’t look up at me with a dreamy sort of half-awake gaze.

  “God, that was awesome!” she exclaimed.

  “It was?”

  “Oh yeah.” Her eyes almost seemed to roll into the back of her head. “Fucking awesome.”

  My face hurt from how much I was smiling, the tightness in my pants completely forgotten as I looked into her face and just watched her, my heart pounding at the sight.

  I couldn’t even dream of a more wonderful thing to see, so I planned to do it again as soon as possible.

  ~oOo~

  Mayra opened the passenger door of the Porsche.

  “Are you going to get out?” she asked.

  I stared down at the floor of the car and wondered how I should answer that question. I had managed to not think about the whole after-graduation beach party for pretty much the entire time since I agreed to go, and now that I was here, I wasn’t so sure that had been a good idea. My stomach was all tied up.

  “Matthew?”

  I sighed and turned my legs toward the door, poking at the fish shape on the way out and wishing we were back in my room doing other things. Mayra wrapped her fingers around my hand and pulled me toward her before placing her lips right next to my mouth.

  “It will be okay,” she said. “And if it gets to be too much, we’ll take a little walk down the beach away from everyone and calm you down. If that doesn’t work, we’ll leave, okay?”

  “Okay,” I mumbled, not sure if it was or not. I didn’t want to ruin the whole night for her.

  Graduation was over. I had skipped the whole ceremony and gone out to dinner with Travis and Bethany instead. I would receive my diploma in the mail sometime next week. Mayra and I had both been accepted to Ohio State University in Columbus—she was going to major in education, and I chose information technology. I had ended up with nearly a full scholarship and then had been contacted by Brad Conner about the remainder. The Oxford Police Department apparently had their own grant for citizens who helped reduce crime, and since my actions had brought down a fairly significant drug ring—for the area, at least—I had won the grant money. It would only last my first year, but it was a good start. Mayra received a loan for what her scholarships and financial aid wouldn’t cover, so we were both set for the fall.

  My eyes stayed on the ground as Mayra led me over to a large group of kids already occupying a decent chunk of sandy, man-made beach at the edge of Acton Lake. When I glanced up, I could tell most of our class was already here. Someone had a few Bluetooth speakers set up on the nearby picnic tables to play music from their phones. I could smell the grilled burgers and hotdogs, and bags of chips and other snacks covered the tables. A large popcorn machine was plugged into a power outlet sticking out of the ground, and a decent-sized bonfire burned in a fire pit not far from the edge of the water.

  Mayra had a huge smile on her face as she moved closer to the other graduates, waving and greeting them like it was perfectly normal for me to be there with her. A few people said hello to me as well, but in the chaos of the people and the stuff all over the beach, I couldn’t manage to respond to any of them.

  “Hey, everyone!” Scott O’Malley stood up on one of the picnic tables and waved his hands in the air. “Now that Mayra is finally here, I have a little announcement.”

  Aimee glared up at him from her spot on the sand.

  “What, baby?” He leaned his head down and she whispered into his ear. “Oh, shit—sorry. Now that Mayra and Matthew are here, I have an announcement. Or rather, Aimee and I have one.”

  He pulled on Aimee’s hand until she was on top of the table with him and wrapped his arm around her waist. He had a huge grin on his face, and Aimee appeared to be blushing.

  “Now that graduation is over, we want to let you all know”—he paused then and looked over at her with a smile—“Aimee and I are getting married this summer!”

  A whole bunch of people started talking at once—lots of squeals and screeches from the girls, snorts and chuckles from the guys, and one voice resounded above all the rest.

  “Oh my God!” Carmen yelled out. “You’re pregnant?”

  The whole group went so silent, the only sounds that could be heard were the surf behind us and the crackling of the wood as it burned. My body went tense as I tried to figure out just what was going on. When I looked at Mayra, her mouth was hanging open, and her head was shaking slowly back and forth.

  “You promised!” Aimee screamed as she reached back and ripped Scott’s hand from around her waist. “You said no one would know!”

  She gasped then and covered her mouth with her hand. Scott’s eyes were wide, and he began shaking his head slowly, the same way Mayra was. Then Aimee burst into tears and ran off down the beach.

  I felt like I was watching a movie.

  “Shit,” Scott muttered.

  “What the fuck is wrong with you?” Samantha yelled at Carmen.

  “What?” Carmen asked with innocence that was obviously disingenuous, even to me. “Why else would you get married at eighteen?”

  Everyone exploded at that point—Carmen defending herself, Scott standing in shock with one of his friends trying to get him to confirm the news, Sean and Ian restraining Samantha from attacking Carmen, and everyone else in a tsunami of gossipy talk, shock, bemusement, and horror.

  “Matthew”—I felt Mayra tighten her grip on my hand for a moment—“I have to go after her.”

  Our eyes met for a moment, and I felt myself nod right as she released my fingers and raced through the sand after her friend. I was at the very edge of the group, wondering if I should be eating popcorn or not. My feet danced back and forth a little bit, and I considered heading over to the Porsche, but I wasn’t sure how Mayra would feel about it, and she had the keys.

  I really had no idea what to do but figured it was especially weird to just kind of stand there. Besides, my feet were getting tired and my shoes were going to get covered in sand if I stayed where I was. I meandered slowly over to one of the picnic tables and sat down.

  There was still an exceptional amount of chaos at the edge of the water. Mayra and Aimee hadn’t come back, but a couple of people were trying to get Scott to relax. I wondered what he must have felt like, not just because of how everything came out bu
t also because of the whole idea of impending fatherhood. It certainly would have scared the shit out of me.

  “Dude.” Joe dropped down on the bench next to me. “Some way to start a party, huh?”

  He laughed, and I knew he wasn’t expecting me to reply, so I didn’t.

  “It kinda completes high school,” Joe said. “I never would have thought I’d see you at a party at all, but here you are!”

  He took a large swig out of the red plastic cup in his hands and laughed again.

  “Come on, Scott, just sit down a minute.”

  I moved over on the bench as Ian and Sean brought Scott over and sat him down on the other side of me. He looked pale and was kind of mumbling to himself.

  “Should have gone after her,” he said. “Probably never should have suggested the engagement thing at all…”

  “It’s all good, dude,” Sean told him. “It would have come out soon enough anyway.”

  “At least her dad doesn’t have a rack of guns in the back of his truck, right, Matthew?” Joe’s laughter seemed to be completely out of control, and I kind of looked at him sideways as I processed what he was saying. Then I realized Scott and Aimee must have had to tell her parents at some point, and I understood what Joe meant. Henry just might shoot me if something similar happened.

  I shuddered a little.

  “Here ya go,” Ian said. He handed Scott a red plastic cup like the one Joe had, and he tilted it back to take a long swallow and then wiped his mouth with his sleeve.

  “Mayra went after Aimee?” Scott said as he turned to me.

  I wasn’t expecting him to talk to me and was definitely taken off guard. I felt my mouth open as if I might say something, but nothing actually came out. I ended up looking away as Carmen answered for me.

  “Mayra will bring her back,” she said. “Don’t you worry.”

  “Mayra’s a damn fine girl,” Scott said.

  His hand clapped me on my shoulder, and I tensed up. My chest felt heavy, and I couldn’t breathe or swallow past the lump that had formed at the base of my throat. He continued to pound on my shoulder as he talked.

  “She’s a damn good friend to Aimee, and I know Aimee was going to tell her tonight anyway,” he announced to everyone around us but kept looking at me. “She’ll get her all calmed down and bring her back so we can have some fun for a while. I didn’t mean to put a damn damper…damned-per…I mean, I didn’t want to ruin everyone’s…”

  His voice trailed off, and I started tuning him out. He wasn’t making any sense anyway.

  “I thought Aimee was having a party at her house.” Ian suddenly piped up.

  “That’s what everyone whose parents wouldn’t let them come out here tonight think.” Scott nodded vigorously. “’Cept Aimee’s parents. They think the party is at Carmen’s.”

  “Don’t drag me into this.” Carmen grumbled as she picked up an empty red cup from a stack of them and filled it from a large cooler with a spout at the bottom. The liquid coming out of it was red and smelled sweet.

  “I gotta go find her.” Scott abruptly stood, stumbling a bit. He shoved his cup at me, and I grabbed it before the liquid inside ended up all over my pants.

  “You’re not going after her,” Carmen said. “Mayra’s got her, and they’ll be fine.”

  “But she needs me!”

  Scott shoved away and started down the beach with Ian and Carmen running after him and grabbing him by the arms. I took a deep breath, glad the area had cleared out a little. I looked around and noticed a large basket of potato chips near me on the table and took a handful of them.

  They weren’t exactly popcorn, but the whole night still had a movie theater quality to it.

  The chips were salty, and I was getting pretty thirsty. I still had Scott’s red cup in my hands, so I tipped the liquid into my mouth, glad germaphobia wasn’t on my list of issues. It was some kind of fruity punch, but it had a nasty aftertaste. I drank a bit more and then ate another handful of chips as I watched kids move back and forth. Some of them were still talking about Aimee and Scott, but most seemed to have moved on to the graduation ceremony or their plans for the summer.

  I finished the cup of punch, but I was still hungry and thirsty, so I kept eating chips and then refilled the cup from the big cooler. Joe left and then came back a few minutes later with a cigarette in his hand. I never knew him to smoke, but once I saw him, I checked around and saw a few other kids smoking as well. The smell was nasty, and I turned my face away when he sat down next to me again.

  “Never thought I’d see the day,” Joe muttered. He belched loudly and refilled his cup, too.

  “Never thought you’d see what?” I asked. I wasn’t sure why I was suddenly curious about Joe and his random remark, but I felt compelled to ask.

  “You with Mayra Trevino,” he said. He flicked the butt into the sand. “I mean…Matthew, you know I love ya like you’re my own brother, right?”

  “You do?” I said. My eyebrows went up in surprise. I didn’t recall asking them to, but they went up anyway.

  “Of course I do!” he said. For some reason, all the words ran together in my head, which was hilariously funny, so I laughed out loud.

  Joe laughed as well.

  “You’re my brudder from anudder mudder,” he informed me.

  “A mudder?” I asked. My eyebrows crunched down now in confusion. They weren’t the only things confused though. I was baffled about how my eyebrows had suddenly come up with their own ability to move around without me asking them to. “What the fuck’s a mudder?”

  “Did you say fuck?” Samantha plopped down on the bench next to me, and the whole table shook.

  We all seemed to think that was funny.

  “Why is hearing you say fuck so hot?” she asked.

  “Um…I dunno?” It ended up sounding like a question, but I didn’t mean it to.

  Great, now my inflections also had a mind of their own.

  “Mayra said you’re really, really hot, you know,” Samantha said. She leaned over close to me and spoke in a very loud hushed tone. “She said you have the chest of a Greek god.”

  “She did?”

  “Mm-hmm…” Samantha’s lips squeezed together into a thin little line. I had a weird desire to poke at it, but I didn’t. “She said you work out a lot, and you look fabulous naked.”

  “She said that?” Now I was genuinely surprised because I didn’t really think Mayra would talk quite that freely.

  “Well, she actually said with your shirt off,” Samantha said, correcting herself. She was starting to slur her words a bit, or maybe the waves from the lake lapping against the rocks were affecting my ears.

  I took another drink and finished off what was in that cup.

  “Want more?” Samantha asked. She grabbed the plastic cup out of my hands before I had the chance to say yay or nay.

  Horses say neigh.

  I giggled and took another drink from the full cup Samantha handed me. It was kind of cold and wet, so I held it up to my face, which made my face cold and wet.

  Damn!

  I laughed again, and Joe did, too, so it must have been funny.

  “You should take off your shirt,” Samantha said.

  “Huh?”

  “See? Some of the other guys have.” She pointed toward the water.

  She was right. A few of the guys were running around without shirts. I was pretty sure they had been swimming though. They were all wet, at least.

  “I don’t like swimming much,” I said. “Not in the lake, anyway.”

  “You afraid of drowning?”

  “No,” I said. “Catfish. They’re very common here. They have spines near their gills that can sting, just like a jellyfish in the ocean. They’re quite dangerous.”

  Joe spurted his drink out in front of him as he laughed again.

  “Jellyfish!” he screamed. Samantha started laughing as well. A couple other kids whose names I wasn’t sure of joined us, and we all started yelling �
��jellyfish” at each other. Joe got up on the table and yelled it out at everyone. Pretty soon, all the kids were yelling it out over and over again.

  “Jellyfish! Jellyfish! Jellyfish!”

  Something about Joe being way up on that table was quite intriguing, and I decided I should join him. When I stood up, my legs were all wobbly, and I figured I had been sitting there way too long. I saw the basket of chips and grabbed a handful of them on my way as I clambered onto the bench and then stood on the table.

  “Portuguese man o’ war!” I yelled at the top of my voice.

  Joe stopped and looked over at me. His eyebrows and mine must have been in cahoots, because they were dancing all over his face.

  “What the fuck did you say?” he asked.

  “Portuguese man o’ war,” I repeated. “It kind of looks like a jellyfish, but…”

  I glanced around, making sure no one else could hear us.

  “But, I’ll tell ya a secret.”

  “What’s that?” Joe asked.

  “It looks like a jellyfish, but it’s not.” I looked at him and nodded seriously. I had the feeling my eyebrows were trying to escape into my hair. Actually, my whole face kind of felt like it was crawling around.

  Joe’s bulging eyes suddenly crinkled as he started laughing again along with almost everyone else in the vicinity. I wondered if they had heard the secret, too. Joe raised his cup, and I looked down at my hand, pleasantly surprised to see my own red plastic cup was still there. I brought mine up, too. We tapped the plastic cups together and drained them.

  Samantha took them both from us, refilled them, and handed them back.

  “Now dance!” she said with a laugh.

  “Dance?” I repeated.

  “Yeah,” she said. “You’re on a table. You must be doing a table dance. You definitely need your shirt off for that.”

  “I do?”

  “Yep.” Samantha nodded seriously.

  I looked over at Joe.

  “I think she’s gotcha there, dude,” Joe said, nodding in agreement.

  “Are you going to take your shirt off?” I asked him.