Текст книги "My Life Next Door"

Автор книги: Хантли Фитцпатрик

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Chapter Twenty-two

When I get to the B&T—an hour early—the next day, I head straight for the pool. I breathe in the chlorine scent, then focus on the steady back and forth motion of my strokes. The routine is coming back. Swim no rest, kick no rest, stroke drill, rest, breath to right, breath to left, breath every third stroke. And so is the timing. Everything else falls away. Forty-five minutes later, I shake out my hair, cupping my hands to my ears to get out the water, then head into Buys by the Bay to find Nan.

Who hasn’t answered any of my texts. I’m imagining the worst. Her parents heard us, came down, and Tim’s already en route to some hard-core camp in the Midwest where he’s going to have to chip granite and eventually get shot by an angry counselor.

But then Nan wouldn’t be calmly sorting aprons in the corner of the store, would she? Maybe she would. Like my mother, my best friend sometimes puts order over the physical world first.

“What’s up with Tim?”

Nan turns around, leans her elbows back against the counter, and looks at me. “He’s fine. Let’s talk about what really matters. Which wasn’t important enough to tell me. Why?”

“What wasn’t important…?”

Nan pales under her freckles. Angry at me? Why? And then I get it. I duck my head and feel a flush creeping up my neck.

“You didn’t think to mention that you have a boyfriend? Or that he’s, like, incredibly hot? Samantha, I’m your best friend. You know everything about me and Daniel. Everything.”

My stomach twists. I haven’t said anything to Nan about Jase. Nothing. Why not? I shut my eyes and for a second feel his arms surround me. Such a good thing. Why wouldn’t I tell Nan? She scrunch-folds an apron that says Life’s a beach and then you swim and piles it carelessly on top of the others.

“You’re my best friend. You obviously didn’t meet this guy yesterday. What’s going on?”

“It hasn’t been that long. A month. Maybe even a little less.” Heat rises to my face. “I just…felt…didn’t want to…Mom’s always so down on the Garretts…I just got in the habit of keeping it a secret.”

“Your mom’s down on everyone. That never stopped you from telling me about Charley and Michael. Why is this any different? Wait…the Garretts? You mean the they-multiply-like-rabbits family next door?” When I nod, she says, “Wow. How’d you finally meet one of them?”

So I tell Nan the story. All about Jase, this summer, nearly getting grounded and him climbing up to my room. And all the stars.

“He climbs up to your window?” Nan puts her fingers over her mouth. “Your mother would have a cow over this! You do know that, don’t you? She’d have a herd of buffalo if she knew this was going on.” Now she sounds less angry, more admiring.

“She would,” I say as the bells over the door jangle, heralding the arrival of a woman in a fuchsia beach tunic with a very large straw hat and a determined expression.

“When I was here the other day,” she says in those slightly-too-loud tones some people use when speaking to salespeople, “there were some darling T-shirts. I’ve come back for them.”

Nan straightens, schooling her face to blankness. “We have many lovely T-shirts.”

“These had sayings,” the woman tells her challengingly.

“We have a lot of those,” Nan rejoins, straightening her shoulders.

“Stony Bay…not just another sailing town,” the woman quotes. “But in place of the ‘not’ there was a—”

“Drawing of a rope knot,” Nan interjects. “Those are over in the corner near the window seat.” She jerks her thumb in that direction and turns more toward me. The woman pauses, then makes her way to the stack of shirts.

“How big is this relationship I know nothing about, Samantha? He looks—I don’t know—older than us. Like he knows what he’s doing. Have you and he…?”

“No! No, I would have told you that,” I say. Would I?

“Is there a discount if I buy one for each crew member on our cruiser?” calls the woman.

“No,” Nan says tersely. She leans in closer to me. “Daniel and I are talking about it. A lot lately.”

I have to admit this surprises me. Daniel’s so controlled, it’s hard to remember he’s also an eighteen-year-old boy. Of course he and Nan are discussing having sex after all this time. I get a flash of Daniel in his school uniform leading the debate team at Hodges, calling out in his measured way, “Cons go first, then the pros will have an equal amount of time.”

“Tim thinks I’m an idiot.” Nan presses her index finger into the wax of a candle shaped like Stony Bay Lighthouse. “He says Daniel’s a putz and will suck in bed anyway.”

Tim! “What happened with him? Did your parents catch on?”

Nan shakes her head. “No. He got lucky. Or rather, he survived to mess up another day thanks to your surprise boyfriend and his scary sister. Mommy and Daddy didn’t hear a thing. I went down to the basement before I left and dumped the bucket o’ vomit out. I just told Mommy he’d stayed up late and was tired.”

“Nans, Alice may be right about not pretending about this now. Last night was—”

She nods, a quick inhale of breath, nibbling on her thumbnail. “I know. I know. A disaster. But packing him off to some boot camp? I don’t see how that’s going to help him.”

The woman has come up to the register, her arms full of shirts, all pink.

Nan turns to her with a bright, professional smile. “I can ring those up for you. Would you like to put them directly on your club tab, or pay separately?”

I hover nearby until the clock tells me I’ve got to report for duty. Nan doesn’t say anything else, though, until I’m getting ready to leave, when she pauses in changing the paper for the cash register to say, “Samantha. You have what every girl wants.”

“You have Daniel,” I say.

“Sure. But you have everything. How do you always do that?” Her voice is ever so slightly bitter. I think of the Nan who just has to do the optional extra credit work for every school project. Who has to point out to me whenever I have a minus next to my grade while she has a plus. Who has to comment that pants that fit me would be “way too big” for her. I’ve never wanted to compete with her, only be her friend, the one person she doesn’t have to best. But sometimes—like now—I wonder if, for Nan, there’s any such thing.

“I don’t do anything special, Nanny.” The bell jingles as another customer walks in.

“Maybe you don’t.” Her voice is weary. “Maybe you’re not even trying. But it all works out for you anyway, doesn’t it?” She turns away before I can offer an answer. Assuming I even had one.

Chapter Twenty-three

I pour myself a lemonade after work and am climbing out of my stupid crested bathing suit right in the kitchen when the doorbell rings. Even our doorbell chime has changed since summer began. Now we have this one that can chime the first few notes of about twenty different tunes, all the way from “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” to “Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah.” In the last two weeks, Mom’s programmed it to chime the opening of “It’s a Grand Old Flag.” I kid you not.

I grab a tank top and shorts from the laundry room and pull them on hastily, then peer through the frosted glass. It’s Nan and Tim. Odd. Thursday and Friday are Daniel nights for Nan. And my house is not exactly Tim’s preferred hangout. It’s not even my preferred hangout.

“Are you interested in a closer relationship with the Lord?” Tim asks when I open the door. “’Cause I’ve been saved, and I want to pass on the Good News to you—for only a thousand dollars and three hours of your time. Kidding. Can we come in, Samantha?”

As soon as they get into the kitchen, Nan heads for the fridge to get some of my mother’s lemonade. After all these years, she knows exactly where to locate the special ice cubes with mint and lemon peel. She pours a glass for Tim and he takes it, frowning at the little ice cubes with their flecks of yellow and green frozen inside.

“Got any tequila? Just kidding, once again. Ha-ha.”

He’s uncomfortable. It’s been a long time since I’ve really seen anything from Tim but bored indifference, stoned apathy, or jacked-up contempt.

“Tim wanted to say he was sorry about last night,” Nan offers, crunching an ice cube.

“Ac-tu-ally, Nan wanted me to say I’m sorry,” Tim clarifies, but he looks directly at me. “I wanted to say I’m fucking sorry. That was wicked stupid, and I would have thought anyone else who did that with my sister—or you—was a complete and unredeemable asshole, which of course, leads to the inescapable conclusion that that is, in fact, indubitably what I am.” He shakes his head, takes a gulp of lemonade. “Note my use of impressive SAT words, though. Too bad I got my ass booted out of boarding school, huh?”

How long has it been since I’ve heard Tim apologize for anything? He’s got his head hunched down, sandwiched between his folded arms, taking deep breaths as though he’s been running miles, or this all takes more oxygen than just breathing. Even his hair is damp, like he’s sweating. He seems so unmoored that just looking at him hurts. I glance at Nan, but she’s polishing off her lemonade, her face impassive.

“Thanks, Tim. We all survived. But you’re really scaring me. How are you?”

“Well, aside from being the same idiot I was yesterday—only not quite as trashed—I’m fine. And you? S’up with ole Jase Garrett and you? Is he gettin’ any further than my buddy Charley did? ’Cause Charley was pretty damn frustrated. More importantly, what’s doin’ with Jase’s hot sister?”

“His hot sister has a boyfriend who’s a football player and weighs about two hundred and fifty pounds,” I answer, dodging the Jase question.

“Course she does,” Tim says with a smirk. “He probably teaches Sunday school too.”

“No. But I think he might be a Mormon.” I smile back. “Cheer up, though. They’ve been together for about a month, and from what Jase tells me, that’s pretty much Alice’s limit.”

“I’ll live in hope, then.” Tim drains his glass and plunks it down. “Do you have anything like plain carrots or celery or apples? Everything in our fridge has some kind of crap in it.”

“It’s true,” Nan says. “I bit into a perfectly ordinary-looking plum this afternoon and it had some weird blue-cheese filling. It’s that thing Mommy got from QVC.”

“The Pumper. It injects tasty filling deep into the heart of all your favorite foods,” Tim quotes in a Moviefone voice.

Just then the doorbell rings again. It’s Jase this time. He’s wearing a faded gray T-shirt and jeans—must have come straight from work.

“Hi!” Nan says brightly. “In case you didn’t figure this out last night, I’m Nan, Samantha’s best friend. I’d love to say I’ve heard all about you, but actually, she hasn’t said a word. My brother says he knows you, though.” She extends her hand to Jase. After a beat, he takes it, shakes it, looking over at me with a slightly nonplussed expression.

“Hullo Nan. Mason.” His voice gets an edge as he greets Tim, and I see Tim’s jaw muscles clench. Then Jase moves to my side and slips an arm tight around my waist.

We wind up in the backyard, because everything inside my house is so hard and formal, no comfortable place to sit and lounge. Jase lies on his back in the grass on our sloping lawn, and I lie, crossways, with my head on his stomach, ignoring the occasional flick of Nan’s eyes.

We don’t talk much for a while. Jase and Tim idly discuss people they knew from soccer in middle school. I find myself studying the boys together, wondering what my mother would see. There’s Jase with his olive skin and broad shoulders, his air of being older than seventeen, nearly a man. Then there’s Tim, so pale, dark circles under his eyes, freckles standing out in strong relief, rangy skinny legs cross-legged, his face handsome but pale and angular. Jase’s jeans are stained with grease, and his T-shirt is frayed at the collar, stretched out of shape. Tim’s in crisp khakis, with a blue-striped oxford shirt rolled up at the sleeves. If Mom was asked who was “dangerous,” she would immediately point to Jase, who fixes things, and saves animals, and saves me. Not Tim, who, as I watch, is casually crushing a daddy longlegs.

Wiping his hand on the grass, Tim says, “I need to get my GED, or I’ll either be shipped to the foreign legion by my parents, or spend the rest of my life—which will then be very short—living in their basement.”

“My dad did that—got a GED,” Jase offers, playing with my hair. “You could talk to him.”

“Your sister Alice didn’t do it too, by any chance?”

Jase’s lips twitch. “Nope.”

“Bummer. I also need a job so I don’t have to spend my days at home with Ma, watching her figure out new uses for the Pumper.”

“There’s an opening at Mom’s campaign,” I say. “She needs all the help she can get now that she’s totally distracted by Clay Tucker.”

“Who the hell’s Clay Tucker?”

“The…” Nan lowers her voice, even though all she says is: “…younger man Samantha’s mother’s dating.”

“Your ma’s dating?” Tim looks shocked. “I thought she pretty much confined herself to a vibrator and the shower nozzle since your dad screwed her over.”

“Timmy.” Nan turns scarlet.

“There’s always a job to do at my dad’s store.” Jase stretches and yawns, unfazed. “Restocking, placing orders. Nothing too exciting, but—”

“Right.” Tim’s eyes are cast down as he tears at a hangnail on his thumb. “I’m sure that’s just what your pop needs—a plastered dropout stock boy with a jones for illegal substances.”

Jase props himself up on one elbow, looking squarely at him. “Well, provided that stock boy isn’t still drinking, et cetera, taking my girlfriend on a joyride when he’s hammered. Ever again.” His voice is flat. He watches Tim for another moment, then lies back down.

Tim turns, if possible, slightly paler, then flushes. “Uh…Well…I…uh…” He glances at me, at Nan, then returns his attention to the hangnail. Silence.

“Well, restocking and stuff might not be thrilling, but that’s probably a good thing,” Nan says after a minute or two. “What do you think, Timmy?”

Tim’s still focusing on his thumb. Finally, he looks up. “Unless Alice does restocking too, preferably spending most of her time on a ladder in those little short-shorts, I’m thinking I’ll talk to gorgeous Grace about politics. I like politics. You get to manipulate people and lie and cheat and it’s all good.”

“From what I read, Samantha’s mom prefers to think of it as working for the common weal.” Jase stretches his arms over his head, yawning. I sit up, surprised to hear Jase recite Mom’s last campaign slogan, the one Clay Tucker mocked so mercilessly. Jase and I never mention politics. But he must have been paying attention to hers all along.

“Cool. Sign me up. I’ll be a cog in the common weal. With my track record, I’ll probably be able to screw up all three branches of government in about a week and a half,” Tim says. “Does hot Alice have any interest in politics?”

Mom gets back early, luckily after Nan and Tim have trudged home and Jase is again training. She has a meet-and-greet in East Stonehill tonight and wants me to come along. “Clay says that since I’m focusing on family, we really need to see more of mine.” I stand next to her at Moose Hall for approximately eight thousand years, repeating “Yes, I’m so proud of my mother. Please vote for her,” while she shakes hand after hand after hand.

When she first got elected, this was kind of fun and exciting. All these people I’d never met who seemed to know me, happy to meet us. Now it just seems surreal. I listen hard to Mom’s speech, trying to analyze how things have changed. She’s much more assured, with all these new hand gestures—chopping the air, arms outspread in appeal, hands crossed over her heart…but it’s more than that. Last time, it was mostly local issues Mom talked about, and mildly. But now she’s taking on federal spending and the size of government, and the unfair taxation of the wealthy, who create all the jobs…“You’re not smiling,” Clay Tucker says, bumping up next to me. “So I figured you were hungry. These hors d’oeuvres are amazing. I’ll take over while you eat a few.” He hands me a plate of shrimp cocktail and stuffed clams.

“How much longer does this go on?” I ask, dunking a shrimp.

“Till the last handshake, whenever that is, Samantha.” He gestures at my mom with a toothpick. “Look at Grace. You’d never know she’d been doing this for two hours and her shoes probably hurt and she might need to visit the little girls’ room. She’s a pro, your mama.”

Mom does indeed look fresh and calm and cool. She’s bending her head to listen to an old man as though he’s the most important thing in her world. Somehow I’ve never seen her ability to fake it as a strength but right now, I guess it is.

“You gonna eat that?” Clay asks, spearing a scallop before I can answer.

Chapter Twenty-four

Late that night, I’m lying on my bed, staring at the ceiling, fresh out of the shower, wearing a white nightgown I’ve had since I was eight. It used to be romantically long; now it clings to my thighs.

Mom’s finally admitted exhaustion and has gone to bed in her suite. For the first time I find myself wondering if Clay’s ever spent the night here. I wouldn’t even know if he had—her rooms are on the other side of the house and there are stairs from the yard. Ugh, don’t think about that.

There’s a tap at my window, and I look over to find a hand splayed on the glass. Jase. Seeing him is like that feeling you get when you’ve gotten the wind knocked out of you and then can, at last, draw a deep, full breath. I go over, put my hand against his, then push up the window.

“Hey. Can I come in?”

He does, gracefully, legs planting themselves firmly, while ducking carefully under the transom, as though he’s done this a thousand times before. Then he looks around the room and smiles at me. “It’s so tidy, Sam. I’ve gotta do this.”

He takes off one of his sneakers and tosses it toward my desk, then the other, carefully and quietly, toward the door. Then one sock, hurled to the top of my bureau, and the other, into the bookcase.

“Don’t hold back.” I catch hold of his shirt, yank it off, and throw it across the room, where it hooks onto my desk chair.

As I’m reaching for him, he puts his hand on my arm. “Sam.”

“Hmmm,” I say, distracted by the thin line of hair that circles his belly button and edges lower.

“Should I be worried?”

I look up at him, my thoughts scattered. “About what?”

“The fact that you’re apparently the one girl on the planet who doesn’t tell her best friend everything the moment it happens. I have sisters, Sam. I thought that was a rule—the best friend knows all. Yours didn’t even know I existed.”

“Nan?” I ask quickly, then realize I don’t know what else to say. “It’s kind of complicated with her. She’s got a lot going on…I just thought I’d…” I shrug.

“You’re being considerate?” Jase asks, moving away from me and sitting down on the bed. “Not ashamed?”

I feel the breath whoosh out of my lungs and can’t seem to take the next breath. “Of you? No. No. Never. I just…” I bite my lip.

His eyes assess my face. “I’m not trying to put you on the spot. Just figuring out what’s what. You’re…I don’t know…the ‘State Senator’s Daughter.’ I’m…well…‘one of those Garretts’—as Lindy’s dad used to say.”

He says the phrase as though it’s in quotes, and I can’t stand it. I sit down on the bed next to him, put one hand on his cheek.

“I’m just me,” I tell him. “I’m glad you’re here.”

Jase studies my face, then takes my hand, pulling me down. He carefully curls around me, so my head is resting on his arm, and his head’s resting on my shoulder. His fingers move slowly through my hair. The paradox of Jase is that at the same time I’m so conscious of the heat of his chest against my back, and the muscles under the shorts on the legs twined around mine, I feel so safe and comfortable that I fall, almost immediately, asleep.

I wake to Jase shaking my shoulder. “I should go,” he whispers. “It’s morning.”

“Can’t be.” I tug him closer. “That was too short.”

“Is.” Jase kisses my cheek. “I’ve gotta go. It’s five twenty-seven.”

I grab his wrist, squinting at his digital watch. “Can’t be.”

“Honest,” Jase says. “Listen. Mourning doves.”

I tilt my head, discern a series of owl-like sounds. Sliding out of bed, Jase hauls on his shirt and socks and shoes, comes back over to me, leans forward, kisses my forehead, then moves his lips slowly to the corner of my mouth.

“Do you have to go?”

“Yeah. Samantha, I—” He stops talking. I put my arms around his neck and tug him down. He resists for a moment, then slides in next to me. He has his hands in my hair, which came out of its braid during the night, and our kisses get deeper and a little wilder. I slip one arm under him and pull, moving him on top of me, looking into those green eyes, which widen a fraction. Then he leans on his elbows and those careful, competent hands undo the front buttons of my nightgown.

Strangely, I’m not embarrassed at all. I’m impatient. When his lips descend, my sigh of pleasure feels like it is traveling through every inch of my body.

“Jase…”

“Mmmm.” He nudges his lips against one breast and slowly skims his fingertips over the other, so lightly, giving me goose bumps all the same.

“Jase, I want—I want…please.”

He looks up at my face, his eyes drowsy and dazzled. “I know. I know. I want too. But not like this. Not with no time. Not with nothing—” He swallows. “Not like this. But Jesus, Samantha. Look at you.”

And the way he does look at me makes me feel absolutely beautiful.

“I can’t look away,” he whispers huskily. “But I have to go.” Taking a deep breath, he buttons my nightgown back up, then presses a kiss to my throat.

“Jase, are you—have you—”

I feel his head shake once, then he moves so he’s looking me in the face. “No. I haven’t. Almost. With Lindy. But then, no. I just didn’t…I never felt with her the way I feel whenever I even catch sight of you. So, no…I haven’t.”

I lay my palm against the stubbly skin at the side of his face. “Me neither.”

His lips curve and he turns his head to touch them to my palm.

“Then we do need time. So we can—” He swallows again and shuts his eyes. “Sometimes when I look at you, I can’t think. We need time so we can figure it out together.”

“Okay,” I say, suddenly shy for some reason. “Um…”

“I love the way your whole body turns pink when you’re embarrassed,” he murmurs. “Everywhere. Your ears blush. Even your knees blush. I bet your toes blush.“

“That’s not the way to get them to stop.” I flush even more.

“I know.” He slides slowly off me and off the bed. “But I don’t want them to stop. I love it. I have to go now. When will you be home today?”

I fumble to think about something other than yanking Jase back down onto me. “Um.…I have a double shift at Breakfast Ahoy. So just till three.”

“Okay,” Jase says. “Too bad the store’s open late tonight. I’ll be back around seven. I’ll miss you all day until then.”

He slides the window open and slips out. I close my eyes, lift my hand to touch my throat where he kissed me.

I’m a virgin. Apparently Jase is too. I’ve heard the Sexual Congress lecture in health class. Seen R-rated movies. Listened to Tracy brag about how many times a day she and Flip can do it. Read books with steamy scenes. But there’s so much I still don’t know. Does instinct just take over? Is it good right away or do you have to acquire a taste for it, the way people say you do for wine or cigarettes? Does it hurt like anything that first time? Or barely at all? Does this mean I have to buy condoms? Or will he? The Pill takes forever to be safe, right? I mean, you have to take it for a month or more first, right? And I’d have to go to my doctor to get it—my doctor who’s in his early eighties and has a handlebar mustache and nostril hair and was my mother’s pediatrician too.

I wish I could ask my mother these questions, but imagining her face if I tried is scarier than not knowing the answers. I wish I could ask Mrs. Garrett. But…he’s her son after all, and she’s only human. It would be weird. Very weird. Even though this is something I know I want, I start to panic a little, until I remember the person I trust more than anyone else in the world. Jase. And I decide he’s right. We’ll figure it out together.