Back For Good

"Thanks for walking me home." Miranda paused at the top of her porch stairs and looked down at her boyfriend, Steve, who was on the step below her.

"Mandy, can we talk for a second?" He asked.

"About what?" She said sighing. He put his arms around her waist and wiggled his eyebrows. She started to smile. "What?"

"Look, I just think…" Steve started. "We could…" Miranda rolled both of her eyes, cutting him off. She didn't say much to him nowadays, her body language, noises and facial expressions told the story. "Fine. I'll see you in the morning?"

"Okay," she said. Steve pulled her closer for a short kiss. "My dad is probably watching." Steve nodded, kissed her cheek and walked across their porch and down the stairs. Miranda sat on the porch swing and watched him ride away on his bike and shook her head. She knew exactly what he'd wanted to say. She was sixteen, he was seventeen. He wanted to do other stuff—not sex, he'd told her two weeks ago. Just more than kissing. They'd been dating on and off since they were thirteen. Raven had told her that most boys had certain expectations at this age. And, honestly, Miranda did want to go further, but her plate was just so full already without worrying about her horndog of a boyfriend. Mid-terms for junior year were coming up, there was basketball practice and games and she had to keep up her GPA to stay in the Honor Society, plus chores at home and babysitting her little cousin, Raven's son, Eddie, Jr. Putting sex on top of all of that was too much.

"Mandy! Phone!" Her dad said coming to the door and sticking the phone out to her.

"Thank you, daddy."

"How was school?"

Miranda could see flour on his pants and smelled the hot grease from the kitchen and knew that chicken was on the menu. Her mood brightened immediately. She put her hand over the phone's mouthpiece. "Pretty good. No homework, but that gives me more time to study."

"That's my girl!" He said winking at her.

When he went back into the house, Miranda turned her attention to the caller: "Hello?"

"Miranda!"

She rolled her eyes for the second time since school ended. But this time it was in jest and not in frustration. "Benjamin!" The two of them laughed for a few minutes.

"You haven't called me all week!"

"Through the ingenuity of Alexander Graham Bell, you could have also called me," she answered sassily, tossing two of her long braids out of her face.

"I knew you would say that."

"I've missed hearing your voice," she said suddenly. It slipped right out and there was no way to stop it. She really had. Ben's dad was a military man and they moved a few times a year. Once he'd moved from Baltimore when they were fifteen, it was a few months before she'd heard from him again. Since then, they'd become best friends, talking on the phone all day some days, never running out of stuff to say. Steve claimed he wasn't jealous, but since they'd entered junior year, he pressured her for more details about her friendship with Ben. He still argued that Miranda and Ben were the actual ones on their date all those years ago, something about them flirting, something about their chemistry. It was annoying. She didn't feel the need to constantly ask why he and Tessa still talked even though they'd both sworn off the people they'd seen between their breaks, their exes. She trusted him and she wanted him to do the same. There was nothing going on between her and Ben. They'd talked about it once after she'd dumped Steve for accidentally brushing his hand against her breasts. But the distance was too much and they didn't want to risk their friendship. Miranda hadn't told Ben, but it was all or nothing with him. She wanted all, but nothing was something she just couldn't handle. So where they were was good enough for her.

"Same here."

"So where are you now?"

"What makes you think I'm not still in Arizona?"

She hadn't seen him in so long, but she imagined that he was lying on his bed and looking up at his ceiling. "It's November and you haven't complained once about the sweltering heat!"

Ben laughed. "That's because we're in New Hampshire now. Wherever that is." They laughed again. "I'm trying to make my way back to you."

"Stop," she said with an awkward chuckle.

"It's tough living without my best friend and making real new ones is nearly impossible."

"I thought we'd come up with a strategy?" Ben said that they had, but that the lingo between teens changed between states so it was pointless. "Oh. Good thing you have me."

"Great thing I have you." She smiled. "Damn, I have to go. I'll call you tomorrow or something. Take my new number." Miranda wrote it down in her planner under the long list of his other numbers. "Bye."

"Bye," she said hanging up the cordless phone.

"No 'I love you'," Raven said coming up the stairs with two brown grocery bags. She blew Miranda a kiss.

"That was Ben. Not Steve." And she and Ben didn't say that they loved each other. She once asked him if they had to or if they should. He said that they didn't. That when it was time, they would each know it and accept it. That answer had worked for her. Thinking about loving her best friend made her sweat.

"My question stands."

"Whatever. Where's EJ?" Miranda asked referring to Raven's son.

"Hey, Randy," Raven's husband, Eddie, said coming the stairs with bags of his own. "Randy" was his nickname for Miranda. It cemented their friendship. He leaned down and kissed Miranda's cheek. "He's at a friend's house down the street or he ran off to join the circus." Eddie took his six-foot frame into the house. His skin was the color of mahogany and a great guy, Miranda often found herself wishing that she'd get to marry someone as cool as he was.

"A better circus than this one?" Miranda said getting up to help Raven.

"Thank you, Mandy."

Raven put one hand on her back and one on her head. "Ooooo! Are you pregnant again?"

"What?"

"You are, aren't you?"

"Yeah. How in the hell did you know?" Raven laughed and clapped her hands.

Miranda shrugged. "Wild guess, I guess." The older woman twisted her lips to the side. "And I see a small bump."

"Ha! I came here to tell everyone the good news so don't say anything." Miranda promised that she wouldn't.

After dinner, Miranda sat in her closet, listening to "Boyz II Men". A knock on her door made her poke her head from under the hanging clothes. "Come in."

"Hey, what are you doing?"

"Just studying." Raven looked at the open books on the bed and pursed her lips comically, making Miranda blush. "Well, taking a break from studying."

"Okay, we're getting ready to go."

Miranda got up to hug the woman, her long braids falling over both of their shoulders. "Congratulations again, Raven."

"Thank you." Miranda exhaled. "You're okay?" Miranda looked at Raven and made a face. "Steve?"

"Yes!"

Raven raised two fists. "Want Eddie to talk to him?" The two of them giggled and sat down on Miranda's bed, pushing back the books.

"No! But he wants to go further."

"Do you?" Raven asked. She never pulled any punches with Miranda about Steve.

"Maybe," she admitted. "But not now. I have too much to do."

"Did you tell him that?"

"He knows. We're both going through the same things."

"Mmmhmm. Boys are dense, so he doesn't know if you do not tell him."

"Okay."

"Okay." Raven gathered Miranda's braids and started to make bigger ones. "How's Ben? Is he liking Arizona?"

"They're in New Hampshire now."

"Wow. Really?" Miranda nodded. "Cool. Does he like it?"

"Probably. At least we're on the same coast."

"I'll never know why you two aren't a couple."

"Because we live in different states and I'm already in a relationship." Raven nodded in agreement. "And because… because he's my best friend?"

"Eddie is my best friend."

"I thought I was your best friend?" The younger girl smiled.

"You are."

The youngest Eddie burst into the room. "Mommy! Daddy's waiting in the car."

"Guess I'm off," Raven said. "Talk to Steve."

"I will."

"And tell Ben I said 'hello'," Raven winked at her cousin as they hugged again.

Miranda crawled back into closet with a book and wasn't two pages into studying when someone knocked on her window. "I'm studying!" More knocking. "With books and papers and pens!" She grumbled. "Steve! I know it's you. Stop! You're distracting me." The knocking continued and was getting louder and then the person started tapping out a beat. She opened the window, "Whoever this is had better—" Standing in front of her was Ben. He was dripping wet. She gasped and shut the window.

"Hey!" He said. "It's raining out here, girl. Let me in." She rubbed her eyes and opened the window again. She opened it wider and watched him crawl through it.

"Why are you here?"

"You," he said smiling. Miranda noticed that he'd gotten much taller, surpassing her by several inches. She looked up at him and tried not to wipe the rain from his face. "Hi, Miranda."

She hit him. "Don't 'hi, Miranda' me! Jerk!"

"Sorry. It was a surprise and I wanted to actually see the look on your face when I tell you that me and mom are moving back to Baltimore until I graduate."

"No!" He nodded. "I'm gonna cry."

Ben laughed. "Aww, don't cry now. Or I'm going to start tearing up. I'm sorry."

Miranda laughed and told him to take off his coat and she handed him a towel. "So your dad is in…"

"Arizona."

"Who was in New Hampshire?"

"No one."

"Asshole."

"But you love me," he said.

"Not really." He threw his arms around her and pulled her in tightly. She hadn't hugged him in so long; had never held his late-teens body. Hugs and kisses couldn't be sent through letters and phone calls. She kissed his cheek, something she'd never done before but it felt—"Weird. Was that weird?"

"A little, but I liked it." The two of them sat on her bed and talked.

When her mother opened the door, Miranda could see her trying not to lose her cool. "And you are?"

He stood up. "Mrs. Bailey. It's me—Ben." Miranda put a hand to her mouth and smiled.

Elena touched her chest. "Oh! Good. I thought it was… anyway, how are you?"

"Fine."

"You look well. And handsome."

Miranda blushed. "Momma!"

Elena smiled, "Miranda, a word outside. Now."

"Yes, ma'am." She followed her mother into the hall. "Yes?"

Elena put her hands on her hips and glared at Miranda. "There is a boy in your room."

"Ma, it's only Ben."

"Is he a boy?"

"Yes, b—"

"I know you know that boys are not allowed in your room." Miranda opened her mouth. Her parents had only said that Steve wasn't able to be in her room. Elena cut her off. "Especially when you two are alone and we didn't even know about it."

"I didn't ask him to come here. I didn't even know he was back in town. But he's my best friend," Miranda pleaded. "It's only for an hour or so, please, mama." Elena took a deep breath. "And I'm still dating Steve, so we won't be doing anything like that."

Her mother sighed. "I don't know. It's too improper, boys and girls in a closed room."

"More like one girl and one boy and those two people are best friends who haven't seen each other in forever." Elena looked at her daughter. "I never get into trouble. I have good grades. I—"

"Okay, okay, okay. Just this once."

"Thank you. Thank you."

"And if I catch you and him or that other one in your room alone again, I am going to punish you."

"Yes, ma'am."

They stepped back into the girl's room. Elena gestured to Ben. "So, Ben, are you hungry? We just finished eating; I could warm you up something."

"Yes, ma'am. Thank you," Ben answered with a bright smile. Elena mimicked his joyful facial expression and left the room.

"Oh, you are so good," Miranda said turning toward him, their knees touching.

"What do you mean?" He asked.

"Ask Steve if my mother has ever smiled at him."

"And how is Steve?" Ben picked at the fabric of his torn jeans.

"He's good," she said. "A little… overeager."

The two friends laughed and kept talking while Ben ate. When he was finished, he put his empty plate on her desk. "Miranda?"

"Yeah?"

"I haven't been completely honest about why I'm here, in your room, dripping water onto your bed and floor."

"Enlighten me."

I'm not entirely here because I'm your best friend. I mean, that's a big part of it, but there's more."

"So…"

"I've enrolled at your school."

"And?" She asked trying not to get impatient.

"And I wanted to know if you'd go to prom… with me?"

"That's not until next year."

"I know. And I also know you'll have more than a few offers. So I'm putting in my bid now."

She took a breath. "B-b-but—" She cut herself off and started again. "Steve and I will probably go together."

"You think you two will still be together then?"

Miranda got defensive. "I hope so."

"I don't mean to put an expiration date on your relationship, Miranda, but…" Ben slid closer to her. "Has he asked you?"

"H-he hasn't gotten around to even thinking about it yet. I wasn't even thinking about it yet."

"I have. Say 'yes'."

"I don't… Ben…"

He moved closer to her. Miranda could hear her heart beating. Their faces were inches apart. Miranda wanted to laugh. This was just what her mother was worried about. She knew that Ben was her best friend and she kind of trusted them alone or at least was pretending to. If she knew how their conversation was going, she'd both spazz and throw Ben out on his ear. "Just say 'yes'." He hugged her once more. It was different from the one he'd given her earlier. He rubbed her back slowly, pressing their bodies together. Had Steve ever made her feel like this? Should she say yes? The hairs on her body stood up. Ben kissed her cheek, his lips lingering on her skin. He picked up his coat, opened the window and climbed back into the rain.