How to Ruin Series Part 21

But as we arrive at the hotel and head to the front desk in the lobby, I'm getting a bit nervous. Sleeping next to O'dead was safe and uneventful. To be fair, we never actually slept together because of my fake snoring.

I look over at Avi. I know I couldn't pa.s.s the fake snoring past him; he knows when I'm faking. Besides, I wouldn't even want to be fake with him.

But I'm nervous as to what he expects from me. I don't want to be one of those girls who gets in trouble with a guy and then says, "Yes, I slept in the same bed with him, but I didn't expect it to get out of hand . . ." I'm always thinking, You shouldn't have slept in the same bed with him in the first place, dummy.

"What are the sleeping arrangements?" I ask Ofra.

"Who do you want to sleep with?" she asks with a hint of sarcasm in her voice.

Snotty dangles three keys in our faces and says, "The girls are sleeping with the girls and the guys with the guys."

I'm relieved the guys and girls are going to be sleeping in separate rooms.

Somehow I have the feeling things could get out of hand with me and Avi. Our relationship is so explosive in other ways I'm sure it will be that way if we're alone together.

We settle ourselves into our rooms, take a short siesta, and head to the restaurant in the hotel for dinner in the evening.

After dinner, I make it my business to sit next to O'dead as we all sit in the lobby of the hotel.

"O'dead, will you help me with something?" I ask.

He shrugs. "Sure."

I give O'snot a wink and lead him to my hotel room. It's the one I'm sharing with Ofra and O'snot. When we get in the room I motion to the bed and say, "Sit down."

He shuffles his feet uncomfortably.

"Amy, I'm not interested in you like that."

I lean against the wall. "Is there someone you are interested in? Like O'snot?"

His mouth goes wide. "How did you know?"

I roll my eyes. "It's obvious. And you need a little kick in the b.u.t.t to make it happen between the two of you."

A knock on the door interrupts us. When I open it, it's Avi. And he's not looking too happy.

"What's going on here?" Avi asks.

I put my arm around Avi and kiss him on the lips to calm him down. "Are you jealous?"

He just stares into my eyes without saying anything.

"I'm trying to fix up O'dead and O'snot," I explain.

Avi's eyes dart from me to O'dead, whose nod confirms what I just said.

I say to O'dead, "O'snot wants to know how you feel, so go to her and spill your guts." When his eyebrows are furrowed I realize my slang English has confused him.

"Go tell her how you feel. Now, before she finds some other guy."

He leaves the room quicker than I've ever seen him move before.

Avi grins.

"What?" I ask.

"You did a very nice thing, Amy.

Totally selfless."

I turn away from him. "No I didn't. I was just getting sick and tired of watching him look at her like he'd die if she didn't pay attention to him." G.o.d forbid I should be seen as soft.

He comes up behind me and wraps his arms around my waist.

"You want to go for a walk?"

I nod.

He holds my hand as we exit the hotel and aimlessly trek down a gravel path. I get a sweet fluttering feeling in my heart just by being close to Avi.

"Tell me more about your brother."

Avi's pace slows and he takes a deep breath. "I don't talk about him much."

"Why?"

He hesitates before saying, "It hurts.

Like deep inside here." He points to his heart. "I know, it's not very cool."

I squeeze his hand. "No, it is cool. I mean, it shows you loved him. But you have to talk about it. If you don't, part of your brother's spirit dies along with him."

He stops and thinks about this for a minute. Then he nods his head slowly. "He loved playing soccer. He was way better than me, but he let me win most of the time to boost my ego."

"Sounds like a cool brother to me.

You're lucky."

"Yeah." He shakes his head and sighs.

"I wish it was me who died instead."

"Is that why you're Mr. Angry all the time?"

"I don't know," he says. "I guess so."

"You can't change the past, Avi.

Believe me, I've tried. But it doesn't work."

"This conversation is deep."

I laugh. "You're right."

"Let's talk about something else. Like how much you like me."

I want to say I am totally into you, but instead blurt out, "Ofra says you've dated a lot of girls. Is it true?"

This feeling in my heart scares me and maybe I want to push him away subconsciously. If I hear about his other girlfriends, it will be easier to protect myself because I'll distance myself emotionally from him.

"I've dated," he answers. "But not for a while. I was afraid in the kayak I'd be a bad kisser, it's been so long."

"Your kissing was just fine," I say.

More than fine. We start climbing a rocky hill next to the hotel. "I want to know more about you," I say as he helps me reach a large rock that sits high on the hill.

Avi sits down overlooking the dark desert on one side and lights twinkling like diamonds from a town in the distance on the other. It's a very romantic setting and I wonder if Avi's taken other girls here. He guides me down and I sit in front of him, between his outstretched legs.

"What do you want to know?" he asks.

A lot, to be honest. But I say the most common question a girl asks a guy, hating I can't come up with something original or something sounding more mature.

"How many girls have you been with?"

"Been with?" he says from behind me. I feel his warm breath on the back of my head as he leans closer to me. I resist the urge to lean back into him and close my eyes. "Kissed?"

I don't want to think about other things he's done with girls so I say, "Yeah.

Kissed."

"Including my mother?"

"No, smart-a.s.s, not your mom. You know what I mean. A real kiss."

"A guy isn't supposed to talk about how many girls he's kissed. I'll tell you what. If you'll tell me, I'll tell you."

I give him a look as if I'll kill him if he doesn't spill the beans. "You first."

"I guess about eight," he finally admits.

"Eight!" I say, flabbergasted.

"Why?" he asks, and I can sense the alarm in his voice. "How many have you kissed? I bet it's a lot more by the way you kissed me in the kayak."

I smile at his compliment but say, "Less than you."

Try two, although the first one probably shouldn't count because that was during a camp overnighter and it happened accidentally in the dark.

You might wonder how I accidentally kissed someone. Well, I thought I was kissing this guy I liked during a "lights out mashing session" and it turned out to be the one guy who'd kissed about half the girls in the whole camp. I still remember the taste of soap in my mouth from trying to wash his germs out. You know what they say . . . it's like you've kissed whoever they've kissed. Blech!

Unfortunately when the lights came on during the "lights out mashing session" and I was lip-locked with Guy Wrong, Guy Right saw us and then ended up liking Jessica instead of me.

"Seven?"

"No, not seven, you ho," I say.

"You know what, don't tell me. I don't want you to think about other guys you've kissed. And I'm not what you call a ho.

Besides, I just want you to concentrate your thoughts on me . . . on us."

"I thought you hated me."

"I wanted to push you away because I couldn't stop watching you." His voice is hoa.r.s.e and full of emotion. "Sometimes I can't fall asleep at night. I get hot tinking about you," he says, his accent deeper than usual.

"You tink about me at night?" I ask and by mistake say tink instead of think.

"Why?" Please don't say my b.o.o.bs.

"First of all," he says as he fingers the curls at the end of my hair that have started to frizz in the desert heat, "you're beautiful. But the way you handle yourself in every situation with your own style mesmerizes me. You're animated, you're honest to a fault, you've got this feisty personality I just can't help but watch because I don't know what you're going to say or do next. You're very exciting. And to top it off, you have a big heart even though you don't open it up often."

I twist around to face him. "I've never had anyone describe me like that."

"When you tried to push me off the haystack back at the moshav, it totally shocked me."

"Yeah, except it didn't work. You're like one big ma.s.s of muscle."

He laughs. "Don't feed my ego. Now tell me what attracts you to me. Besides my big ma.s.s of muscle."

"Ha, ha. But seriously," I say, then take my finger and slowly draw a path from the corner of his eye, past the stubble on his chin and end up at his full lips. "Besides you being a gorgeous male specimen, I like the way you were always there for me when I did freak out. Even though you made it sound like a ch.o.r.e, you've helped me with every challenge I've had here.

You let me fall on you when Mutt's friends were about to attack me," I say and kiss him gently on the mouth.

"You helped me herd the sheep," I continue, kissing him again, "and you were my hero by washing off the snake-guts."

Before I can kiss him again and continue telling him all of the incredible things I now see in him that I was blind to before, he crushes his lips to mine.

"Amy," he says against my lips. "I think we're about to get ourselves in trouble.

How old are you again?"

"I'll be seventeen soon," I say breathlessly.

He says something in Hebrew I obviously can't understand. "We shouldn't be doing this."

"We're not doing anything except kissing."

"Yeah, but-"