Beyond the Pale

Joey Potter was not in a happy mood as she stalked through the front door of Capeside High. She couldn’t remember when she’d ever been as angry with Dawson Leery as she was right now. She was completely embarrassed, and she felt like an idiot. Dawson had walked into her house the day before and he’d seen her and Pacey half-naked, making out like the world was about to end. He’d left before she could yell at him, and this morning she planned on making up for lost time.

Joey hitched her backpack up higher on her shoulder and made a beeline for Dawson’s locker. He was beyond predictable, and he was indeed there, gathering his books for his first class. “You suck, Dawson!” Joey said to his back. “Do you lie awake at night and think up ways to humiliate me?”

Dawson froze. “Joey,” he said, without turning around.

“Have you ever heard of waiting for someone to answer a door before you open it?” Joey raged. Her voice had risen in volume, and she was attracting curious glances from passing students.

Dawson closed his locker door and turned around. His face was red. “Have you ever heard of locking the door? Maybe you wouldn’t have these kinds of problems. Looked to me like nuclear war could’ve been declared and you guys wouldn’t have noticed.”

“Dammit, Dawson.” Joey looked down at the floor. “Do you know how bad you embarrassed me?” Hesitantly, she glanced up into his dark eyes. “Uh...how long were you standing there?”

Dawson blinked at this unexpected question. “Well...maybe thirty seconds.” He cleared his throat. “Long enough to see that you were halfway undressed.”

Okay, so it could have been worse. It didn’t seem that Dawson realized the specifics of what she and Pacey had been doing. Joey sighed. “Look, I have to get to class. Next time...” She trailed off.

Dawson grinned, recovering from his chagrin. “I know, if the house is rocking, don’t bother knocking.”

“Dawson!” Joey yelled after him. She was still annoyed, but she had to laugh. Dawson raised one hand in farewell as he walked away.

Joey was on her way to the lunchroom at noon when she was stopped by an unfamiliar female voice. She turned her head and saw a petite, blue-eyed girl watching her nervously. “Yeah?” Joey said.

“You don’t know me,” the girl said in a breathless rush, pushing the fingers of one hand through her short, sun-streaked brown hair, “but my name’s Tori Adams, and I, um...you’re friends with Dawson Leery, right?” The girl’s face had turned a red not found anywhere in nature.

“I guess you could say that,” Joey said dryly, still thinking about the way he’d embarrassed her.

Tori shifted from one foot to the other. “Well, I was just wondering -” She stopped and shook her head. “I feel stupid asking you this, but, um, is he going out with anyone?”

Joey snickered. “Dawson? Who’d have him?”

Tori looked uneasily at Joey. She’d been trying to get up the nerve to talk to the older girl for a couple of weeks now, but she’d been wary of Joey’s acerbic wit and sharp tongue. “Does that mean no?”

Joey took pity on the girl. “No, he isn’t dating anyone.” She quickly appraised Tori: petite but very curvy, unusual pale-blue eyes, short streaky hair, seemed slightly neurotic. Joey didn’t think she was really Dawson’s type.

Tori stiffened under Joey’s speculative look. “Okay, well, thanks,” she said, turning and hurriedly walking away.

The gorgeous blond sat across the room with Joey Potter and Pacey Witter, his usual lunchtime companions. Tori thought that he looked tense, or maybe unhappy. She willed him to look up, hoping to get a glimpse of his intense dark eyes. No such luck. Dawson kept his gaze fixed on his sandwich.

Tori’d had her eye on Dawson since January. She had an extra semester of math credit, so she’d been taken out of an overcrowded Geometry class and put into an extra study period for the second semester. The same study period that Dawson had. She had been at Capeside for six months then, and she didn’t know how she’d managed to miss this guy.

Dawson had to be one of the hottest guys in school, and the surprising thing was that he didn’t seem to know it. From what she could glean from casual observation, Dawson meandered through his school days, going to classes and talking to his friends. The word was that he’d only had one serious girlfriend, when he was a sophomore, and she’d moved back to her home state. Tori was amazed that there weren’t girls chasing him right and left.

Tori was a sophomore, and Dawson was a junior. Their paths didn’t cross that often, and they didn’t know any of the same people. Tori had watched to see who he hung around with, and finally today she had worked up the nerve to talk to Joey Potter. It was obvious to Tori that Joey didn’t think much of her. Well, the feeling was mutual. Tori wrinkled her nose. With friends like that, Dawson needed her.

“Dawson Leery,” Tori murmured to herself, “there has to be a way for me to meet you.”

Dawson had said maybe two or three words the entire time they’d been sitting there. Joey thought wryly that he was probably still envisioning his two best friends half-naked and pawing each other. He was currently decimating the crust of his sandwich. He hadn’t looked up at them at all.

Joey slumped even farther over her mostly untouched lunch tray. She’d caught some serious hell from Bessie when she’d shown up at the Icehouse yesterday after changing clothes and kissing Pacey goodbye numerous times.

“Why did you have the phone off the hook?” Bessie’d demanded when Joey finally got back to the kitchen to get her apron.

Joey’d had to restrain herself from rolling her eyes. That was one sure way to send her sister flying off the handle; Bessie hated that particular form of self-expression. “What makes you think the phone was off the hook?” Joey had asked. Casually she’d adjusted her apron, as if getting it just right was the most important thing in the world.

Offense is the best defense.

“Why else would I get a constant busy signal when I tried to call?” Bessie’d said.

Joey had shrugged. She knew that her sister could think whatever she wanted; she couldn’t prove anything. Unless Dawson had said something to her...and, knowing Dawson, he would have been too mortified.

Bessie hadn’t been happy, but she’d let it go. She undoubtedly knew that Joey had been up to no good, but there wasn’t much she could do about it.

It had been a hectic evening. Two servers had called in sick, and even with Joey there to help, it had been one calamity after another. Joey had had no time to think about the words that Pacey had whispered to her as they’d feverishly kissed goodbye, holding each other as tightly as if they had been parting for a month instead of just one night.

Now, Joey sighed heavily and tossed her napkin over her congealing lasagna. She’d never thought about the complications of having a boyfriend. She’d only thought about the happiness of having someone to share things with, the kisses, the romantic-walk-in-the-rain kind of stuff. It had never occurred to her that she would have to make difficult decisions. It had never occurred to her that she might, well...fall in love.

Joey was acutely aware of Pacey sitting next to her. She could feel his intense stare, and momentarily a slightly calloused finger began tracing a trail along the inside of her wrist. Joey drew in her breath. A hot tingle began to spread through her lower abdomen, and she tilted her head to look at him. He smiled, very faintly, and in his eyes she could see the memory of the words he’d said to her the day before.

Joey and Pacey had been standing on her front porch, Pacey leaning against the porch railing, Joey leaning against Pacey. He’d been kissing her, thoroughly; his tongue had sensually explored the depths of her mouth. His hands had been in the back pockets of her jeans, pulling her snugly against the unassuaged hardness below his belt. Joey’s own hands had been twined in his thick dark hair.

It should be illegal, she’d thought. He smelled and felt better than anyone had a right to. Joey had been thankful for the lack of close neighbors. All she would need was for someone to tell Bessie that her little sister was dry-humping her boyfriend on the front porch of the Potter home, humble though it was. Bessie would kill her!

During the long, long goodbye, Pacey had pulled his mouth away from Joey’s, breathing heavily. He’d kissed her neck several times, her ear, her mouth again. Then he’d murmured huskily, “I want you so bad.”

Joey smiled at Pacey. She gazed into his eyes, returning his sexy look. Under the table, she curled her fingers around his. She knew that the moment of truth was not far away. Joey knew that, very soon, she was going to have to decide if she was going to sleep with Pacey.

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