Indiscretion

12 years ago

“Dawson, can I talk to you a minute?” Bailey’s mom stood at her front door, holding it open. I’d been on my way home from the bus stop after baseball practice.

“Sure. What’s up, Mrs. A?”

She gestured to the house. “Come in.”

“Is Bailey home? She usually has violin lessons on Thursday after school, right?”

“She does. She’ll be home in about twenty minutes. But I wanted to talk to you alone.”

My stomach sank. “Is Bailey okay?”

Her smile was resigned. “There’s nothing new with her health. I wanted to talk to you about something personal.”

“Oh-kay.” I walked up to the porch.

“My daughter would kill me if she knew I was having this conversation with you.”

“I can keep a secret.”

Mrs. Anderson smiled. “It’s about the junior prom.”

“What about it?”

“Well, Bailey will never admit it to anyone at school, but she really wants to go.”

“I don’t think Ben asked anyone yet. I’m sure he would take her. You want me to talk to him?”

“Actually, Bailey would really like to go with you.”

“Oh.”

She held up her hands. “That is, if you don’t have a date yet. Bailey didn’t seem to think you did.”

That was only because I hadn’t yet mentioned that I’d asked Allie a few days ago.

Mrs. Anderson’s eyes watered. “I’m sorry to even ask you, but I just really want to give her everything she wants before she…”

The unspoken words hung heavy in the air. Before she dies. I swallowed. “I didn’t think she’d want to go with me. That’s why I mentioned Ben. Of course I’ll take her.”

“Are you sure I’m not imposing on your plans? You didn’t have your heart set on going with another girl or anything, did you?”

Allie was going to kill me. Yet I shook my head. “Nah. All good.”

She smiled and pulled me into a hug. “You’re an angel, Dawson. I honestly don’t know what she would’ve done without you these last three-and-a-half years. Thank you so much.”

“No thanks necessary. I’d do anything for Bailey. I’ll ask her tomorrow.”

Later that night, I sat in my room, dreading calling Allie. I thought about texting her, but that would be a dick thing to do. I really hoped she hadn’t bought a dress yet. Eventually, I took a deep breath and hit Call.

She answered on the first ring. “Hey, handsome.”

“What’s up, Allie?”

“Nothing much. I don’t feel so great, so I’m just scrolling online, looking for a dress for the prom.”

“Are you sick?”

“No, I don’t think so. I’m just really tired for some reason.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

“I’m leaning toward royal blue for my dress. What do you think? Is that the color dress you want to take off of me at the end of the night?”

I shut my eyes. This was going to suck, but at least she hadn’t spent any money yet.

“Hey… About prom… I can’t go with you after all.”

“What do you mean, you can’t?”

“Bailey really wants to go. I need to take her.”

“I know she’s your friend and all, but this is junior prom, Dawson,” she whined. “You can have sex with me, but you can’t take me to prom?”

Fuck. “It’s not like that. I swear.” I blew out a deep breath. “I’m really sorry. You know Bailey’s sick.”

“I know, but…”

“I’ll make it up to you. I promise.”

“How?”

“I don’t know. We’ll go to the prom next year? This one is only in the gym anyway. I always thought it was kinda stupid to have both a junior prom and a senior prom.”

“So if you’re going with another girl, does that mean I can go with another guy?”

I gritted my teeth. “If that’s what you want.”

“It’s not what I want. I want to go with you.”

“I’m sorry, Allie.”

“Whatever.” I pictured her rolling her eyes. “I have to go.”

“Alright.”

“Bye.”

“Wait…”

“What?”

“Can you do me a favor and not mention to Bailey that we were supposed to go together? I don’t want her to feel bad that I changed my plans for her.”

“I’m glad you’re concerned about her feeling bad. Because you obviously don’t care how I feel.”

“I do care, Allie. But…she’s really sick.”

“There’s nothing going on between you two? You guys have never fooled around?”

“Never. It’s not like that. She’s my best friend.”

“Whatever. I gotta go. I really don’t feel so well now. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

The line went dead before I could say goodbye. That went well.

***

Two weeks later, I walked over to Bailey’s house wearing a suit. My mom came with me, holding her camera. Mrs. Anderson answered the door with a big smile. “Don’t you look handsome, Dawson.”

“Thanks.”

Mom beamed. “He looks so grown up, doesn’t he?”

Mrs. Anderson stepped aside for us to enter. “I know. I’ve already cried twice looking at Bailey in her dress. She looks like a woman. Come on in. She’s just finishing getting ready.”

A few minutes later, Bailey came down the stairs. I felt my eyes widen.

“Wow. You look…” It felt weird to say hot to Bailey. But that’s what I’d been about to say. I cleared my throat. “Pretty. You look really pretty.”

Bailey had on a teal dress that clung to her curves. The only thing I’d ever seen her wear was leggings, T-shirts, sweatshirts, and shorts in the summer. And none of those made her look like that. She touched her normally short hair. “I have extensions in.”

I hadn’t even noticed that part of her body yet. I’d sort of gotten stuck on other places. “Oh. They look good.”

She eyed the corsage in my hand, and her eyes lit up. “Oh my God. You really got me a black rose?”

“That’s what you said you wanted.”

“I tried to talk him out of it.” My mom frowned.

Mrs. Anderson came over and started fussing with Bailey’s dress. “Now, you know what to do in an emergency, right, Dawson? You call nine-one-one first, then get a teacher and call me.”

I opened my mouth to answer, but she spoke again, “And do you remember her primary oncologist’s name?”

“Dr. Benton.”

“Is my phone number saved in your phone?”

“Mom,” Bailey groaned. “Stop or I’m not going to let you take any pictures.”

I smiled at Mrs. Anderson. “I’ll take good care of her, Mrs. A. I promise.”

She lofted a hefty sigh. “I know you will, sweetheart.”

***

I leaned close to Bailey because the music was so loud in the gym. “You feeling okay?”

“Yeah, just tired.”

“You want to get out of here?”

“You don’t mind? We’ve only been here like an hour.”

“Nah. This is kinda lame anyway.”

“Okay.” She smiled.

I said goodbye to my friends, and Bailey and I walked to the door together. Mom had loaned me her car, so I told Bailey to wait there and I’d pull it around for her. Once we were inside, she leaned her head against the back of the seat. She really did look tired. I pulled out of the parking lot and turned left to go home.

“Would you want to go somewhere for a little while?” Bailey asked.

“You should probably rest.”

“I can rest here in the car. We don’t have to get out. I’m not ready to go home yet.”

I shrugged. “Okay. Anywhere particular you want to go?”

She was quiet for a minute. “What about the old Drive-Inn?”

My eyes flashed to her and back to the road, but Bailey’s eyes were shut as she relaxed into the seat. The old Drive-Inn was a place kids went to fool around in their cars. Though I wasn’t sure if Bailey knew that, considering she’d never had a boyfriend.

“You sure that’s where you want to go?” I asked.

“Yeah. Unless you want to go somewhere else.”

It felt strange to take Bailey there, especially since I’d taken Allie there last weekend and we’d fooled around in this exact car. But it would probably be empty since most kids were at the prom anyway, and this was Bailey, for Christ’s sake—we weren’t going so we could steam the windows. I shrugged again. “The Drive-Inn is good.”

One other car was parked in the lot when we pulled in. Since their windows were fogged, I took a spot as far away as possible.

“You want the air or the windows open?” I asked.

“Whatever you want.”

Normally people left the windows up for obvious reasons, but I was with Bailey, so I pressed the button to roll down the windows and then killed the engine.

It was quiet and dark, and suddenly the moment felt awkward.

“You sure you feel okay?” I asked.

She nodded and stared out her window. “The fresh air feels good.”

Bailey and I sometimes sat next to each other in silence for hours, usually in the doghouse in her yard doing homework or scrolling on our phones. It never felt awkward. But now, I couldn’t think of a damn thing to say to her. It didn’t help that the car I’d made a point of parking far away from had started to rock up and down. Even with the windows fogged up, I could make out a woman gyrating around in the front seat. Bailey noticed too, and we both sat there watching it all go down while the tension grew. I was just about to suggest we go somewhere else when she turned and spoke.

“I don’t want to die without ever having been kissed.”

My eyes jumped to meet hers, and my heart started to race. I was pretty certain what she was suggesting. I mean, she’d asked to come here, after all. Yet I was still caught off guard.

“Are you saying…”

“Kiss me, Dawson,” she whispered. “Please.”

She looked beautiful in the moonlight, so it wouldn’t be a hardship by any means. Still, I hesitated. I didn’t think of her like that, and I was dating someone else. “Bailey, I…”

Before I could finish the sentence, she was climbing over to my side of the car. She hiked up her dress and straddled my legs, then pushed her breasts against my chest. My body reacted, even if I was still frozen, and I started to grow hard.

She leaned to my ear, hot breath mixing with a strained and sexy voice. “Kiss me, Dawson.”

Inside I was battling a war. My body was filled with desire and need, but my head wasn’t sure. Though when she slipped her hand between us and wrapped her fingers around my bulging dick, I broke.

“Fuck.” My lips crashed down on hers. Things escalated to a frenzy pretty quickly after that. Pants came down, panties got tossed, and we couldn’t get enough of each other. After, we were both still panting when a horrible feeling started to creep in. At the time, I thought it was because Bailey was my best friend and we’d just done something we couldn’t take back. But it turned out to be so much worse than that…