Body Surfing

from the jeans rolling down her long white thighs was Michaela’s as well.
    Oh God, he thought. Michaela. What the hell had happened to Michaela?
    “Something wrong, Jasper?”
    Jasper shook his head. He wouldn’t be distracted now. He reached for one of the breasts before him, cupped it in his hands. Squeezed. Tried to imagine it was Michaela’s breast, then tried even harder not to think about her. Had she died too? In the crash?
    “Such a romantic,” Leo said drolly, peeling off Jarhead’s T-shirt and pressing their naked chests together. “Is this your idea of foreplay?”
    “Shut up!” Jasper groaned, mashing Danny’s face into his shoulder. He fell backwards onto the grass, pulling Danny’s body with him. Her breasts lay on Jasper’s chest now, her taut stomach pressed against his, her crotch directly over Jasper’s.
    “Do it, Jasper. Do it. Let it all go.”
    He would do it, if only she’d shut up. Stop speaking to him in that voice that wasn’t Michaela’s, and wasn’t even Danny’s. Wasn’t even a girl’s when you got right down to it. How were you supposed to fuck the hot chick who was lying on top of you when she kept reminding you there was a boy hiding somewhere inside those acres of smooth white flesh? Not to mention the images of Michaela that were swirling around his brain. Michaela’s scream of terror as the car spun out of control. Michaela’s body mangled by the impact.
    His partner seemed to feel none of these distractions. With robotic precision, Danny’s legs opened, and suddenly Jasper felt himself engulfed by a tight warmth. One part of his brain exploded in a thousand fried circuits—good God, he was doing it, he was finally fucking—but the rest of his head was completely preoccupied with Michaela. How could he leave without seeing her one more time? Without saying goodbye? It should be Michaela he was doing this with.
    For the next minute or two he just lay there. Not fighting the process, but no longer into it either. His dick could have been a dildo for all the connection he felt to it, Danny’s body an image on a computer screen. He looked away from her bouncing breasts at the empty morning sky, wondering if Michaela was up there looking down on him. Or Q. for that matter, or Sila. The moans and groans of the girl riding him seemed faint and far away. Oh God, he thought. Just get it over with already. His erection was starting to droop.
    And then a yelp came to his ears, and with a start he realized it was over. Because it wasn’t Leo who’d yelped. It was Danny.
    “Jarhead? What the fuck?”
    Jasper looked down from the sky just in time to feel Danny’s palm smack the side of his face. He knew it was Danny’s hand, not Leo’s. The Leo had departed even though he, Jasper, was still stuck in Jarhead’s body—which was rather embarrassingly stuck in Danny’s.
    Her bewildered, horrified face stared at him as she wrenched herself off him.
    “Oh my God, Jarhead. I trusted you.”
    A thousand memories flashed through Jasper’s mind as Danny stumbled backwards. All the little moments that had passed between Jarhead and the confused, terrified girl who kept her eyes fixed on him as she dressed, as if she was afraid he might jump her again if she turned her back. Jarhead wasn’t a guy who made friends easily, even less so with women. He’d harbored an innocent crush on Danny for more than a year, and the truth was she had warmed to him during that time. They shared a slacker sensibility—not the snotty kind that favored aggressively unkempt hairstyles and unlistenable indie bands, but the kind that thought a six-pack and Simpsons rerun made for a perfect night. On more than a few of those nights Danny had curled one of Jarhead’s softly padded arms around her shoulders and fallen asleep on his broken-down couch, and Jarhead had sat preternaturally still, not even reaching for his beer, lest the couch squeak at a volume he couldn’t hear and wake up his companion. Now, thanks to a decision Jasper had made for him—a single, selfish choice that had nothing to do with Jarhead’s past but everything to do with his future—the lonely gas jockey had lost not only any chance he had at dating Danny, but her friendship as well. If she decided to press charges for rape, he might end up losing a lot more.
    Trust . Danny’s word echoed in Jarhead’s amped-up ears like a klaxon. Because it wasn’t only her trust that had been violated: Jasper had trusted Leo