My Teenage Dream Ended Page 4

  Then we heard people downstairs, coming in from the deck. If they looked up, they would have seen us doing it on the landing, so instead I switched to licking him down south. Now I was hidden so it looked like he was just standing upstairs on his own. It was fun and sneaky and left Derek a little on the spot, as he had to pretend that nothing was happening while being totally teased by me. He started laughing because we were so about to get caught.

  I heard someone downstairs ask, “Where’s Farrah?” I didn’t really want to get caught, so I stood up and said, “Okay, let me walk you outside.”

  As we walked downstairs and outside some of my girlfriends followed us to the front of the house to watch us kiss and say goodbye. We really got into it. It was probably quite a show. For me it was the sexiest way a guy could say goodbye to me.

  I said, “I’m going to miss you. Call me if you get done helping your stepdad early.”

  Derek smiled at me. “Okay, I will. Don’t flirt with any boys.”

  We were staring into each other’s eyes, talking to each other so close, our hips connected as we rocked from side to side. It felt sexy and right. I turned to leave and Derek tapped my booty “bye” and my girlfriends’ jaws all dropped. One of my friends joked, “Ooh, your hips were rockin’!” There were giggles and winks all around and I thought, Aww, I have my perfect boyfriend.

  Two days later, Derek and I went on a dinner date to a restaurant where he used to work. I was trying to enjoy myself, but Derek was being such a jerk that I couldn’t. There wasn’t much to our conversation, and he seemed to be checking out some girl who worked there. I couldn’t understand why he was acting that way. Then one of the servers approached our table. He was apparently friends with Derek.

  “How’s your food?” he asked.

  I said, “Fine, thanks.”

  Then he said to Derek, “Good seeing you at that party the other night. That was a crazy Fourth of July!”

  ...Blah, blah, blah he went on, but I zoned out and just looked up at this guy and then over at Derek. Derek’s face had turned red. Busted.

  I was so shocked and angry I could barely speak, but I managed to say, “You went out the other night?”

  The guy looked over at Derek, realizing he’d ratted his friend out. Then he laughed and walked away.

  Derek just sat there, not acting like such a jerk anymore.

  I looked at him, waiting for an explanation.

  Finally he said, “I got done helping my stepdad early.”

  At this point, I was fuming. “You couldn’t have told me that yesterday?” Obviously, Derek had wanted to go party with other people on the Fourth from the get-go. Or maybe he had gotten a better offer. Either way, he hadn’t been straight with me about where he was that night.

  When I thought back to how clueless I had been at the party, how I had flirted and fooled around with him before he went off to supposedly go work with his stepfather, I got more and more angry. I sat there fuming, staring out the window.

  Derek acted cocky about it, trying to laugh and play it off like it didn’t matter. But the only thing I could laugh about was how dumb he must have thought I was. I refused to eat the rest of my dinner and felt a little satisfaction that he had to pay for it anyway. I wanted to waste his money on purpose, like he had wasted my time by not being honest with me.

  THE GREEN-EYED MONSTER REARS IT’S UGLY HEAD

  Of course, I forgave Derek. I liked him too much not to. After that, we started getting closer and closer and it felt like things were getting more serious between us. Summer was winding down and we were determined to party as much as possible. We loved hanging out with our friends. It was like our friends were our family and our families were just our landlords.

  One night Derek and I went to a party at a friend’s apartment. We were having a good time, but then this girl showed up who was always trying to hang out with Derek. Even though all my girlfriends knew how into each other Derek and I were and would always mention how Derek looked at me and was there for me, I was still a little insecure. I’m a confident person, but that image of Derek with that girl sitting on his lap on my birthday was now burned into my brain.

  I turned into a jealous, overprotective monster.

  Normally, I was more into chilling and having fun, but when someone you’re dating has a girl getting closer and closer and that girl keeps avoiding you, you know something’s up. You feel like she will go behind your back and have your boyfriend sneak right back there with her.

  I had lost my virginity to Derek and felt like sex had turned our relationship into something pretty serious. I didn’t need some girl ruining everything. So when it looked to me like she was starting to flirt with him, I yelled, straight up, “Stay the fuck away from Derek! I’ll kick your ass!”

  All of a sudden the party atmosphere stopped and the guys made a barrier between the two of us. I had taken it too far. In the end, the girl left, but then his friends said that I couldn’t be coming out if I was going to start fights. I had nothing to say to that, because I had been the one to start the fight.

  It was very out of character for me to act like that. I never used to say one word to a boy I was dating if he had girls around him. But sleeping with Derek had changed me. Sex is a big step in a relationship. It should be for when people are in love. We weren’t in love yet (or at least we hadn’t admitted it to each other) and I didn’t want anything—or anyone—ruining the chances of us falling in love.

  CLOSE CALL

  At first Derek seemed flattered that I had fought for him, but after that he didn’t want to go out together as much anymore. I assumed it was because his friends were worried I might start another fight. We started going out separately more and more, but we would always meet up back at my place and he would spend the night.

  Derek was like my best friend, my boyfriend, and my lover all in one, and I loved partying and hanging out and cozying up in bed with him. Sometimes if I fell asleep before he came over he would chuck a pencil or piece of mulch up at my window to get my attention to let him in. He was like my Romeo. By the end of summer, the roof by my window had a big collection of random objects.

  My mom questioned me one day about it. “Farrah, I saw by your window there was mulch, pens, pencils, rocks up on the roof.” I waved it off, “It’s probably from our weird neighbors. Or maybe the wind blew it up there.” Surprisingly, she left it alone after that.

  But one night that summer we came really close to getting caught. Derek and I had overslept one morning and when Derek woke up he heard my dad coming down the hall. I felt him jump off the bed. Then he ran and hid in my closet and shut the door.

  My dad came in my room and said, “Good morning. It’s time to get up and get ready for the day.”

  I was so terrified, I just said, “Okay, get out of here and I will.”

  After my dad left, I got up and opened my closet door and Derek and I busted out laughing. I whispered, “I need to get you out of here!” When we could her my parents in the kitchen cooking breakfast, I snuck Derek out the front door and whispered, “Call me later.”

  Phew!

  LUV U BABE

  The first time Derek told me he loved me was on August 11, 2007. He sent me a message on Myspace. He wrote, “i really really love u babe” and that he wasn’t sure if I felt the same way. He hoped I did, but he couldn’t hold it in any longer and had to tell me how he felt.

  I saved all our messages. Now I’m so glad I did.

  Even now I still try to remember everything about the day he sent me that message. It meant so much to me that he wrote to me he loved me, but never asked for, or expected, an “I love you back” out of me. That’s when you know that a person’s love for you is genuine. They don’t want anything from you; they just have to tell you how they feel because they can’t hold it inside any longer.

  Seeing that message made all the ups and downs of our relationship worth it. All that time spent waiting for him to call, all the lies, and the
not always hanging out with me—it made it all worth it.

  It’s crazy how you can see things through rose-colored glasses when you want to. It seems like the consequence of having sex is that even if you haven’t been with that person very long you try to stay with that person. You try to find fulfillment in a relationship with that person because you have shared the most intimate thing you can share with them. Your main goal is to reach love and happiness with them. You overlook the relationship deal-breakers. You act like truly devastating moments don’t even

  matter. Especially when he is the first.

  CAUGHT IN THE ACT

  Derek and I kept mastering the art of the sneak in, until one night it all came crashing to a horrible end...

  One evening in August, Derek and I were checking in with each other on the phone and I asked him what he was doing later that night.

  He said, “Let’s hang out tonight. I’ll come over.”

  I told him, “My mom and dad aren’t going to let anyone come over because my mom is out of town for work.”

  “No problem,” Derek said. “I’ll just sneak in, stay ‘til the morning, and then sneak back out.”

  That sounded like a good plan (in fact, it was our usual plan) so I told him to call me around 9:00 and I would let him know if the coast was clear.

  When he called, he was already at my house.

  I checked to make sure my dad was asleep and then went to meet Derek at the front door. We ran up the front staircase together, went into my bedroom, shut the door, and were like, Yes! We made it!

  We always had a great time hanging out in my room together and that night was no exception. We were talking and watching TV and generally having fun. Then Derek wanted to mix things up and decided we should have sex in my sister’s room down the hall. (My sister wasn’t home, just FYI.) I told Derek that we needed to be super quiet because my dad would be up soon.

  We went to her room and had sex on the bed for a good hour. At one point Derek was on top of me and I looked up at him and noticed a light a little bit to the side of his head, but off in the distance. I was about to say, “What is that?” but before I had a chance, Derek flew off of me and the overhead light turned on. I grabbed two big pillows to cover my naked body and looked up to see my dad. He was as angry as I have ever seen him.

  I was in shock and all I could bring myself to say was, “Michael what are you doing? Get out of here!”

  My dad didn’t answer. He wasn’t going anywhere.

  Derek stood up from the floor by the other side of the bed, still naked. My dad glared at him and said, “Get dressed, Derek, and come downstairs. We’re going to call your mom.”

  Then he walked out of the room.

  I felt so bad for Derek. He looked scared and nervous. I asked him, “What’s your mom going to say?”

  Fumbling to put his clothes back on, he said, “I’m probably going to get in trouble and have my car taken away.”

  Then he went downstairs to talk to my dad. I thought about going down with him, but I was worried that my being there would just make things worse. It was late and I knew that I was in for some big trouble in the morning, so I went to sleep.

  Looking back, it probably would have been better if I had gone downstairs with Derek, because then maybe things wouldn’t have happened the way they did.

  The next morning when I finally came downstairs, my dad looked as if he hadn’t gotten any sleep. He wouldn’t look at me—he was that angry. I was thankful, at least, that my mom was out of town and I wouldn’t have to face her wrath, too.

  But then my dad said, “I called your mom. She’s going to call you later. We decided you’re going to go stay at your grandparent’s house for a while.” I didn’t say anything. I just went back up to my room. I was furious. I didn’t want to go to my grandparents, where I wasn’t allowed to do anything.

  I called some friends and invited them over. We sat upstairs in my room talking over the whole situation. I begged them to stay with me all day so I wouldn’t have to be at home alone with my dad. They felt bad for me and agreed that my parents were wrong to send me away to my grandparents.

  That evening my mom called. She said she would talk to me more when she got home from her business trip the next day, but that I was going to have to go stay at my grandparents after that. I told her I wasn’t going, but I knew I wasn’t going to win this battle.

  When my mom finally got home the next day, my dad acted like he was the victim of a crime. I knew that it was a big deal to them, but Derek and I had talked before my mom came home and he had said, “Your parents are overreacting. Everyone has sex.”

  I thought they were being totally unfair, but when we all finally sat down at the dining room table to discuss the situation, my dad dropped a bombshell. “Derek and his mom went to the police station and filed a report. They’re pressing charges against me for hitting Derek.”

  I was in shock. First of all, I didn’t even know that my dad had hit Derek. He hadn’t mentioned anything to me about it and he had seemed completely fine when we talked. Which was a little strange, given that it seemed like he and his mom were now trying to get my dad in trouble with the police.

  My mom went on, “Farrah, do you think it’s okay that you snuck your boyfriend in here and had Michael catch you two having sex and now Michael might have to go to jail?”

  I knew I couldn’t win with that question, so I kept quiet.

  “You’re going to your grandma’s,” my mom went on, “Until we figure out what we’re going to do. You can stay there until school starts and you won’t have your phone and you are not going out.”

  I was pissed. Pissed at them for punishing me so harshly and pissed at Derek for not telling me the whole story. I felt like I had been ambushed. I ran upstairs and called Derek. He picked up, acting like everything was great. Well, things weren’t great.

  “You’re trying to get my dad in trouble!” I yelled at him.

  “Your dad hit me,” Derek replied.

  “Yeah, because you snuck into his house and had sex with me! It’s your fault, Derek, and now I have to go to my grandma’s for the rest of summer and I can’t bring my phone. You better not go out while I’m grounded and stuck at my grandparents.”

  Derek reminded me that my parents were overreacting. He added, “But I won’t go out while you’re grounded, I’ll wait for your call. I love you.”

  I said, “I love you, too,” and hung up.

  LOCK-DOWN AT GRANDMA AND GRANDPA’S

  My parents made it clear that I had no choice but to go stay with my grandparents. I was still furious about it and did a lot of yelling, but they wouldn’t budge.

  So the next day I ended up at my grandma’s house.

  My days there consisted of being bored out of my mind inside the house and being bored out of my mind walking around outside. I was allowed to go to work, but that was it. I didn’t have my phone and I wasn’t allowed to go out and party.

  At the time I was working at a Hy-Vee supermarket, and one day when I was outside bringing some shopping carts in, I ran into a friend whom I hadn’t seen since he graduated.

  He invited me to go out that weekend, but I said I couldn’t. I told him the shortened version of what had happened with me and Derek and how I was in lock-down at my grandparents.

  My friend looked surprised. “Well, I think I met your boyfriend the other night,” he told me. He said he had gone to a party and met some of my girlfriends, who had a guy with them, who had to have been Derek. He said they had all been talking about how much they missed me and wished I was there.

  While I was happy I was being missed and mentioned, I was mad that Derek went out to a party (with my friends) while I was stuck in Hell because of him. I had believed him when he said he wouldn’t go out without me, but I should have known better.

  Back at my grandparents after work that night, I went online and, yep, there were all the photos posted from the night Derek went out with my girlfriends. T
he whole thing just made me burn. I couldn’t take it anymore.

  I picked up my grandparent’s phone and called Derek, and when he answered I told him that I had heard that he had gone out to a party, and that I saw the photos online.

  “Why are you going out when I can’t?” I asked him. “I’m in this trouble because of you!”

  He said that he missed me a lot, but that he didn’t want to just sit at home. Then he told me to call him every night. I felt a little better. At least he had been out with my friends and not with other girls. And, to be honest, I don’t know if I would have been able to stay home while he was grounded.

  So I stopped being mad and called him every night and just kept hoping that my parents would cool down and let me come home and go out again.

  FREE AT LAST!

  After three hellish weeks at my grandparents—three weeks of not having my phone and not being able to go out or see Derek—my mom called one day and told me, “We’re going to family counseling on Sunday.”

  I said, “Fine,” but inside I was like, Oh my God, my parents can’t deal with anything. They’re so dramatic. I was sure that the counselor would take their side and that my punishment would go on and on and I was dreading the whole experience.

  Sunday came and we all went to the counselor’s. I was ready to go on the defensive, but to my surprise, the whole experience was very positive. The office was serene and quiet and the counselor was actually very cool. She made me feel at ease and I had no problem talking to her. My parents, on the other hand, seemed very uptight and very angry.

  The counselor wanted to hear from my parents first, so I listened while they talked. It was mainly my mom talking and she shared how they felt about Derek and me and everything she said seemed so negative. Listening to her made me feel like there was no hope. The way she was talking, I thought they might decide to send me away to a halfway house for troubled teens or, worse, leave me at my grandparents forever.