If I Tell

clarified and blushed, wondering if Jackson knew I’d been in a bedroom with Nathan. I turned my head away and made a face at my reflection in the window. I couldn’t wait to get home to shower and scrape every smell and memory from my skin.
    “That right?” Jackson asked.
    His eyebrows shot up and I imagined his awful thoughts about me and wanted to cry with shame.
    “Did something happen?” he asked, his voice low. He sounded dangerous. “I mean, did Nathan do something…Is that why you left without your shoes?”
    I leaned my head against the seat. “No. It’s not what you think.”
    I’d set myself up by drinking so much and letting Nathan kiss me. I’d led him on. Given him the wrong idea. I’d acted like an irresponsible idiot.
    “You sure?”
    Jackson sounded as if it actually mattered. I turned my head and fixed my gaze on the blackness outside the passenger window. “Why would you even care?”
    I saw him glance at me in the reflection of my window and stared the other way, afraid he was making fun of me. “I thought we were kind of friends,” he said. “Work buddies and all. Why wouldn’t I care? You’re sweet.”
    I thought about what I’d done with Nathan. “I am not sweet,” I told him.
    “Uh. A little prickly sometimes, but I sense marshmallow underneath,” he said.
    “I don’t want to talk about this.”
    Jackson took me literally and stopped talking. We drove quietly for a while, and the stillness and dark soothed me. I almost felt like I was dreaming.
    “Your grandma going to kill you?” Jackson finally asked.
    “No. I mean, not since you saved my shoes and all. She doesn’t wait up for me.”
    He nodded. “She’s cool? About you going to parties?”
    “Like I said, I don’t usually drink, so she doesn’t mind.” I snorted softly. “I don’t have a lot of friends at school, so she’s happy I have a social life. She trusts me.”
    He stayed quiet.
    “I know how hard it can be,” he said, shattering the silence again. His voice was deep but almost gentle. “Growing up without your parents.”
    I rubbed my charm between my fingers and snuck a sideways glance at him. “What do you mean?”
    “Just that I get it. I mean, I heard. That you never knew your dad.”
    I bristled at the mention of the Sperminator. “Really? You want to talk about him? He’s not a dad. He’s some stupid asshole who supplied sperm. How do you even know about ‘my dad’?” Liquor brought words to the surface that I usually kept buried deep inside. Another reason to never drink again. I clenched my teeth hard to keep my mouth shut.
    “The same way you know things about me. My illustrious past. People talk. Anyhow, I understand more than you think. ”
    I sniffled. What did Jackson know about how it felt?
    “I never knew my dad,” he said softly. “But from what I heard, he was an asshole, so I’m okay with it, but still. It sucks. And you have the whole race thing to deal with too.”
    I held my breath, not quite believing he was going there. People never went there.
    “Are there any other people in your life? Black people, I mean. Like grandparents or aunts or uncles or something?” Jackson asked.
    My laugh was bitter. “That whole side of my family doesn’t even acknowledge I exist so…um, no,” I snapped.
    He stayed quiet for a minute. “It’s hard. Being the only one.”
    “There are other black people in town. That’s how I got there, after all.”
    “I know that. I meant in the family. And you’re the only biracial girl at Westwind. So you’re kind of alone there too.”
    I snorted. “Thanks for noticing.”
    He glanced over and raised his eyebrows before looking back to the road. I lifted a finger to my mouth and started chewing on a hangnail.
    “I notice things. I like to think I look a little deeper.”
    I glanced at his profile, envious of his thin nose. I’d always hated my wider nose, sure God gave it to me to remind me I was partially black. I tried to imagine his life for a moment, but I was too wrapped up in my own misery.
    “I hate when people make snap judgments. Hate it.”
    Something inside me cracked a little. The darkness around us hugged me like a blanket, making me feel secure and more intimate with him.
    “I don’t give a crap who someone’s parents are or what they do for a living,” he added, and the blanket of darkness tugged at me.
    “My life is a mess,” I blurted out, surprising myself.
    I looked over to see if he’d laugh