Noah Bonus Scene

Santa Monica, California
November, 2007

“I know,” said Toni, eyes flashing in the golden light of Em Tyner’s tiki torches. “We should play truth or dare.”

“Ooo me first!” cried Dave. “Dare.”

“Strip, bitch,” said Xioabo, his eyebrows lifting once, and the three of them cackled.

As Toni cued up an unimaginably irritating ringtone of “Pour Some Sugar On Me,” Noah fought the urge to hurl her phone into the firepit. He shouldn’t be here. There was only one reason he was. He let his eyes drift through the twilight to AJ, pacing idly as she murmured into her blue Razr flip phone.

Emily. Normally AJ sounded wry, if a little careful—but with Emily she sounded utterly unconcerned. It was how she sounded when she felt safe.

It was how she had once sounded talking to him.

As Dave’s shirt hit the grass, Noah took the opportunity to just look at her. She doth teach the torches to burn bright.  Her movements, the way she ambled, then pivoted on her heel, were so familiar they made his chest ache. How many times had he seen her pacing in Eudora’s rose garden, memorizing lines? She ran her free hand through her long, damp hair, leaving a graceful mesh of strands at the base of her neck. Noah would have given anything to comb his fingers through it.

He drank deeply from his beer. These days of forced proximity were grinding him down. At first, he’d only sought her in scenes; that had been easy to justify. It was for the show. But she was just too good; they were too good. And as the days stacked up, Noah’s need to be close to her had begun to border on compulsion—checked only by his conviction that she never know the horrifying, repulsive reason he had left Gladstone.

Noah felt a nauseating surge of panic at the thought. She couldn’t know. She simply could not.

Two more days. They only had two more days of filming, then he’d be out of her life again, and she would be better off. And Noah…Noah had survived the loss of her once. He could do it again. He’d have to.

Noah heard the Razr snap shut and had an instant to redirect his attention to Truth or Dare. As AJ slipped into the Adirondak chair beside him, the hem of her gym shorts rode up slightly, exposing her upper thigh. Noah’s face slid into a neutral mask. He was practiced at this, at affecting nonchalance when every fiber of his body was focused on those shorts—how they touched AJ, how they smelled, how they could be probably be removed with a single finger.

“Truth or dare,” he informed her with convincing equanimity. “This is dare.”

“Ah,” said AJ, deep-set eyes glinting in the torchlight. Beautiful. “And I thought it was just Drunk Dave.”

Noah snorted. He couldn’t help it. AJ met his gaze shyly, and for a moment Noah allowed himself to feel as if it was still that summer—as if this were still them. As if she trusted him.

“AJ,” said Xiaobo, breaking Noah out of his reverie. “Truth…or DARE?”

He waved one of Em’s tiki torches in AJ’s face, and she swatted it away. “Um, truth.”

Noah watched her shrink in her seat as the others chanted, “Truth, truth, truth,” questions hammering the inside of his skull like hailstones.

Do you realize what we are, what Plato would have called us?

Could you ever forgive me?

Would you run if you knew?

“Drumroll!” cried Xioabo.

Noah’s jaw clenched. He shouldn’t be here. Obviously. What had Dave called him? Scion of Darkness. Dave wasn’t wrong…though as Dave chugged the last of his beer, Noah couldn’t help but suspect that Dave had some hidden pain of his own.

As the drumroll climaxed, Dave’s eyes darted puckishly from Noah to AJ.

Then he yelled, “Who was the first guy who ever fucked?”

Noah heard the words before he felt them, as if Dave’s question was a missile that had just broken the sound barrier. He schooled his features; then emotion detonated through him, anger, jealousy. It should have been me, he couldn’t stifle the thought. There had been so much he’d wanted to be the one to show AJ. The idea of someone else, anyone else with her—

“How about, who was the first guy you ever kissed?” Toni interjected.

Noah let out a breath. Great. Something from before his time. He took a quick sip from his beer and glanced over at AJ, who was staring at Toni incredulously.

“Well?” said Toni. Noah felt a wave of protectiveness…and guilt. Toni was a shitty friend—there were no two ways about that. She was jealous of AJ and kind of a small person. But it hadn’t been AJ’s fault Toni had revealed her true colors; it had been his. Yet another example of how he made things difficult for AJ; of how her life was simpler when he wasn’t in it.

AJ held Toni’s stare. “He was my friend.”

The stab of envy Noah felt at this took him by surprise. He knew the way he wanted AJ bordered on savage, but this softer admission somehow struck deeper. Which was ridiculous. They were sitting here surrounded by her friends. Noah cringed. He was ridiculous. He just…wanted all of her.

“Aww,” said Toni without emotion. “How old?”

AJ hesitated. Was it Noah’s imagination or was she angling away from him? “Seventeen,” she said at last.

Noah’s body went stiff. AJ hadn’t been with anyone that summer, of that he was certain. But she’d been to Junior Prom—he’d seen the photos the day he’d come over to fix the washing machine. He hadn’t recognized the guy. Clearly it hadn’t been a long-term thing. A nameless, yellowing image on a fridge. But in that instant, Noah hated him.

“Where were you?” Toni asked.

AJ shifted in her seat. “How many questions is this?”

“Ooo, she’s embarrassed,” said Xiaobo. “Let me see. Was it under the bleachers? In the rain? Oo, I know. At a Ricky Martin Concert.”

Noah was not imagining it. AJ was definitely angling away from him.

“Spit it out,” cried Dave.

Noah’s heart began to pound. As he watched AJ square her shoulders, an awareness prickled through his nervous system, as if part of him knew her next words before she spoke them.

“It was at a convention,” said AJ resolutely.

Noah froze.

“Wait, you mean like…” Xioabo raised a Vulcan salute.

AJ refused to look at Noah as she said, “Yup.”

“And how was the actual kiss?” said Toni.

Noah’s mouth went dry.

“Honestly?” said AJ, her cheeks flushed. “It was pretty hot.”

Blood roared in Noah’s ears as he stared and stared at her. He felt such…honor. And pride. And shame. Horrible, wretched shame. It was bad enough that he had practically mauled her that night backstage. But the idea that that had been her first kiss, that she’d chosen him, and he’d…

He’d left her all alone.

“Noah,” said Xiaobo. They were all facing him now. AJ too had turned, her eyes nervously scanning his chin, his lips, his eyes. She practically trembled as their gazes locked.

“Dare,” said Noah.

“Ohhhh,” said the group.

“Kiss AJ,” shouted Dave.

Noah didn’t move. If he did, it would be obvious to everyone sitting there that he’d clocked the most direct route to AJ’s lips as soon as she’d taken the chair beside him.

“Shut up, Dave,” said AJ, looking away from Noah. “Sorry, ignore him.”

“Yes, Noah,” Xioabo jumped in, ever the peacekeeper. “The Dare Gods have spoken, and they want you to go up to Em’s house and retrieve one of his prized—”

“I can do that,” said Noah, barely glancing at Xiaobo. “Not that. The other thing.”

There was so much wrong with this. That it was happening in front of their co-workers—under coercion. That it was all completely fake, a game. That they had years of unresolved resentment and hurt between them. That he was fucking bad for her, and that this went against every single decision he had made about how to comport himself.

And yet, as Noah reached for AJ, their gazes caught and none of it mattered. His thumb traced her cheek, and he had a split second to register the contrast between the softness of her skin and the firm set of her jaw. He fought the urge to repeat the movement with his teeth. It must have shown in his face, the way AJ’s lips parted in response, her eyelids dipping. Before he could stop himself, Noah kissed her.

You.

He shouldn’t have known her like this—not after seven years. But that kiss had taught him that if you thought of something long enough, fantasized about it often enough, it could survive almost anything. AJ tasted so good, so like herself he had to suppress a groan. He was hard, had been hard for days it fucking felt like. Ease up, he told himself. Then he pulled her closer anyway.

There was so much he wanted to do with her, to say to her, and he showed her now, with his lips, his hands, his tongue. As he swept into her mouth, she shivered in his arms, and he thought, I know; he thought, I’m so sorry; he thought, I never stop looking for you, even when I’m sleeping. And as she kissed him back, as her scent enveloped him, he thought, home.

Even as they broke apart, he didn’t let her go. For a heartbeat, AJ’s eyes stayed shut—she looked so ready and lovely and his, Noah couldn’t breathe. Then they drifted open, and all at once, the two of them were back in their own world. She was peering at him now like she trusted him, like it was them again, and Noah wanted it to be real so badly.

“Age,” he whispered. I didn’t know.

He watched the light fade from her eyes, replaced by that bit of darkness she always carried. That bit of darkness he’d given to her the night he left. I never got to tell you.

“I’m going to bed,” came Toni’s voice, turning their transparency to cellophane.

Noah’s hand was still cupping AJ’s cheek; he forced himself to let it drop. AJ held his gaze an extra second, collecting herself. Then she rose to go and Noah let her; who was he to stop her from going after a shitty friend.

He was the worst friend she’d ever had.