Текст книги "The Distance Between Us"

Автор книги: Kasie West

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Текущая страница: 5 (всего у книги 14 страниц)

Chapter 16

I meet Xander on the curb Saturday, trying to avoid the same situation as last week. My mom seems to be buying the “kid from school” routine and until she forces me to introduce him I’m going to stick with it. He turns off the car and gets out before he realizes I’m standing there.

He’s wearing nice jeans, an even nicer T-shirt, and some loafer-type shoes.

I point at his clothes. “Seriously? Didn’t I say the crappiest clothes you have?”

He walks straight up to me. Normally he’s a whole head taller than me, but with him in the gutter and me still on the curb, my eyes are level with his chin.

“Hi to you, too.”

I haven’t seen him for a week. He was traveling for some sort of business stuff with his dad. For a minute I think he’s going to hug me and my breath catches, but then he looks down at his outfit. “These are the crappiest clothes I have.”

I give him a shove, satisfying the urge I had to touch him. “You’re full of crap.” But I know he’s serious. “Okay, we’ll have to make a pit stop on the way there.”

We drive several blocks, and I point to the Salvation Army parking lot. “First stop, new outfit. Come. Let us reclothe you.”

We step inside and the musty smell that only exists in the presence of old furniture greets me. It reminds me of Skye because we spend so much time in places like this. “Shoe size?” I ask.

“Twelve . . . Wait . . . we’re getting shoes here? I don’t know if I can wear shoes other people have worn.”

“I think you just made a philosophical statement. Now suck it up, baby, because it’s that or ruin your pretty shoes.”

“I’m okay with ruining my shoes.”

“Wait. Did I give you a choice? Never mind, you obviously can’t be trusted with choices. We are buying your shoes here.” I drag him to the shoe section. There are only three choices in his size. I pick him out the most hideous ones—high tops with neon laces. Then I put him to work trying on clothes.

While he’s in the dressing room I look through the sweatshirt section. Flipping through the rack, I stop. In between an awful neon orange sweatshirt and a University blue one is a black dress. It has hand-sewn beading, a sweetheart neckline, and cap sleeves. I check the size. It would fit me. I bite my lip and look at the price tag: forty bucks. That’s expensive for a thrift store. But it’s priced right. The dress looks vintage. The best find I’ve ever come across. The fact that it’s hidden between two sweatshirts makes me know someone else has their eye on it, too, hiding it in hopes to come back later. But forty dollars is way beyond my price point. I still haven’t been paid this month and I’m debating whether I’m going to cash my paycheck anyway. My mom can’t afford to pay me. My piddly paycheck won’t make much of a difference to my mom’s debt, but it would make me feel a little better.

“I’m trying not to think about who wore these before,” Xander yells from the dressing room.

“Do you need a tissue or are you going to stop crying? Come out here and let me see.”

I move the next sweatshirt on the rack to cover the black dress. Even if I had forty bucks, where would I ever wear a dress like that anyway? To some fancy event with Xander? I hope I’m not turning into that girl, the one who daydreams about a guy she can never have.

The dressing room curtain slides open and Xander steps out while still buttoning the bottom few buttons of the flannel shirt. “I feel like a dork.”

“It’s good to feel like a dork once in a while. Now you just need a sweatshirt.”

“I have my jacket.”

“You mean your really expensive trench coat? Yeah, not going to work.” I pull a gray one off a hanger next to me and throw it over two racks of clothes to him.

“Okay, I’m going to change back into my clothes now.”

“No. You’re wearing those out of here, boy. Come on, meet me at the register.” I give the dress one last look and then walk away.

The lady at the register gives us the Seriously? look.

“Here,” I say, turning Xander around. I pull the tag for the jeans off the back belt loop. Then I snag the one off the sleeve of the shirt and hand her the sweatshirt and shoes.

“That’ll be fifteen dollars,” she says.

Xander hands her a twenty. “Fifteen bucks? For all this?”

As we walk back to the car Xander is still surprised. “I bought a pair of socks last week for thirty bucks.”

“That’s because you’re an idiot.”

“Thanks.”

“Love your new shoes, by the way.”

He rolls his eyes. “If humiliation is a career, I’m going to tell you right now that I don’t think I’m interested.”

“But you’d be so good at it.”

We pull up to the cemetery and Xander looks at me. “What are we doing here?”

“Exploring our potential.”

“Here?”

“Remember, I’m morbid. Let’s go.” I brought him here for a couple of different reasons. One, because it’s free. I have no money to take him on the equivalent of some fancy photo shoot career day. And two, I honestly think Xander needs to get his hands dirty, relax a little. So far he’s being a good sport, but he has no idea what I have in store for him.

“Hi, Mr. Lockwood,” I say, walking up to the funeral home that’s slightly elevated from the plots. Skye’s dad is so cool. He looks like he should live in the middle of a graveyard with his long white hair and crooked hooked nose. I always wonder if he owns a cemetery because he looks that way or if he looks that way because he owns a cemetery.

“Hey, Caymen.” He holds two shovels. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

“Yep.” I grab the shovels.

“Okay, I got it started for you so that you could get a sense of the dimensions. It’s past that oak tree down there.” He pulls a walkie-talkie from his back pocket and hands it to me. “Let me know if you have any questions.”

I hand Xander a shovel. “Okay.”

“Gravedigger?” he asks as we walk toward the site. “Really? You thought this was a serious option?”

“It’s not just grave digging, Xander. It’s about this whole place. Living a quiet life surrounded by peaceful death.”

“You are morbid.”

Dirt clings to his hair and is smeared across his cheek. But even in his present state his confidence and stiff posture come through. “We’re not going to be buried in here, right?”

“You caught me.”

“You didn’t think I’d do this, did you?”

Never in a million years. “I had my doubts.”

“I wish I would’ve brought some gloves.” He opens one of his hands and I catch the glimpse of a bloody blister on his palm.

I gasp. “Xander!”

“What?”

I grab his hand and study it closer, gingerly touching the broken skin. “You didn’t tell me it was killing your hands.” I had pulled my sweatshirt sleeves down over mine. His sweatshirt was a little on the small side.

“It’s not too bad.”

I unclip the walkie-talkie from the pocket of my jeans. “Mr. Lockwood, I think we’re done.”

“This hole isn’t nearly deep enough,” Xander says.

“I know. I just mean that we’re done.”

There’s a burst of static on the walkie-talkie, then Mr. Lockwood says, “You ready for me to send the tractor?”

“Yes.”

“Wait,” Xander says. “A tractor is going to come dig the rest of this hole?”

“Yeah, they haven’t hand dug graves in years. I just thought it would be fun.”

“I’m going to kill you.”

“This would be the perfect place.”

He charges me, sweeping my legs out from beneath me with one of his feet but catching me then lowering me to the ground gently. I laugh as I struggle to get free. He pins my wrists above my head in one of his hands and uses his legs to pin mine. With his other hand he scoops up a handful of dirt and smashes it into my hair.

I laugh and continue to struggle but then realize he has gone still. I suddenly become very aware of every place his body presses against mine. He meets my eyes and his grip on my wrists loosens. A sense of panic seizes my chest and I grab a handful of dirt from above my head and smash it against his cheek. He lets out a groan and rolls away from me, to his side, propping himself up with one elbow.

I lay there in the soft dirt for a while. It’s cool against my neck. I can’t decide if I just prevented something from happening or if it was all in my mind.

Xander lets out a large sigh. “I needed this after a week with my dad.”

“Is he hard on you?”

“He’s hard on everyone.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. I can handle him.”

I’ve seen the way Xander “handles him.” He shuts down, becomes hard, closed off. But if that’s what gets him through, who am I to argue? I don’t deal with my mom in the healthiest ways either.

My back aches and lying down feels great. I close my eyes. It’s fairly peaceful, the silence seeming to press against me being surrounded by dirt walls like I am. Maybe here I can forget all the stress in my life. Forget that I’m a seventeen-year-old living a forty-year-old’s life. Thinking about it makes it feel like someone dropped two tons of dirt on my chest that I wasn’t expecting.

“What’s wrong?”

I open my eyes to see Xander staring at me. “Nothing.”

“It doesn’t seem like nothing. You’re off your game today.”

“What game is that?”

“The one where you take every opportunity you can to make fun of me.” He looks at his hand. “There were a million jokes you could’ve made about this.” He shows me his blister again.

“I know. I really should’ve gone off on your soft, under-worked hands.”

“Exactly.” He brushes a piece of dirt off my cheek. “So what is it? What’s wrong?”

“Sometimes I just feel older than I am, that’s all.”

“Me, too. But that’s why we’re doing this, right? To have fun. To stop worrying about what’s expected of us and try to find out what we want for ourselves?”

I nod.

“My dad would die if he saw me here.”

“We should’ve invited him, then, right?”

He laughs. “He wouldn’t be caught dead out here.”

“Well, actually, that’s exactly when he’ll be caught out here.”

He laughs again. “You’re different, Caymen.”

“Different than what?”

“Than any other girl I’ve met.”

Considering most of the girls he’d met probably had fifty times as much money as I did, that wasn’t a hard feat to accomplish. Thinking about that makes my eyes sting.

“It’s refreshing. You make me feel normal.”

“Huh. I better work on that because you’re far from normal.”

He smiles and pushes my shoulder playfully. My heart slams into my ribs.

“Caymen.”

I take another handful of dirt and smash it against his neck then try to make a quick escape. He grabs me from behind, and I see his hand, full of dirt, coming toward my face when the warning beeps of the tractor start up.

“Saved by the gravediggers,” he says.

Chapter 17

Xander hops up and helps me to my feet. We throw our shovels out of the hole, then he gives me a boost out and hefts himself out after me.

As we walk back toward the funeral home, our shovels propped on Xander’s shoulder, he says, “So this is where your best friend lives?”

I nod.

He laughs a little. “You live above a porcelain-doll store; your best friend lives in a cemetery. You’ve pretty much grown up surrounded by creepy things. Is there anything you’re afraid of?”

You.

He meets my eyes, almost as if he had read my mind or maybe my thought is written all over my face.

I clear my throat. “Dogs.”

“You’ve been bitten by a dog before?”

“No. But the thought of them biting me is enough.”

“Interesting.”

“Oh, please. Don’t analyze the statement. Dogs have sharp teeth. They bite people.”

He laughs.

“What about you? What’s your biggest fear?”

He twirls a shovel on his shoulder once, thinking. Either he doesn’t want to tell me or he doesn’t have a strong fear of anything because it takes him a while to say, “Losing. Failure.”

“Failing at what?”

“At anything. Sometimes it’s hard for me to start something because I’d rather not try at all than fail at it.”

“But nothing good ever happened without risk.”

“I know this. And yet . . .”

We reach the back doors of the funeral home and he leans our shovels against the wall. I shake out my hair and he does the same. Then he turns me around and brushes off my back.

“And yet what?” I ask when I’m not sure if he’s going to continue.

“And yet I can’t get past it.” His hands linger on my back and I close my eyes.

“Maybe you should let yourself fail at something. Fail hard. Then you won’t be scared anymore.”

“So should I go get the dogs now or later . . . ?”

“Okay, okay, I get it.” He’s right. I can’t tell him to face his fear if I’m not willing to face mine. And I don’t mean my fear of dogs.

“So are you just scared of the big dogs or do the little ones bother you, too?”

“You have dogs, don’t you? The kind you carry in a purse?”

“No,” he scoffs. “Of course I don’t.”

“Their size doesn’t matter. In fact sometimes the little one are worse. They’ll take off a finger.”

“This coming from a girl who’s never been bitten before.”

“The thought, Xander. It’s the thought.”

He chuckles then pats my shoulders as if to say my back is now free of dirt. “Ready to go?”

“Yes. No, wait. Let me fix your hand real fast. Mr. Lockwood has supplies inside.” I knock on the door then open it a crack. “Mr. Lockwood?” I step inside. “Follow me. If I remember right there’s a first aid kit this way.”

We walk down a long hall and I open the last door on the right. I stop cold when Mr. Lockwood looks up from a dead body lying flat on the table in front of him. “Sorry,” I say. The man has a large cut down his chest with big staples holding it together. He had obviously had an autopsy performed. His face is sunken as well, not a fresh body but one a coroner probably had for several days.

“It’s okay, come in.”

The room is cold and a shiver goes through me. “I just needed a first aid kit. Some gauze and antiseptic maybe.”

He points to the small bathroom attached to the room. “Right there.” Mr. Lockwood applies some sort of foundation to the man’s face.

It’s hard to ignore the smell lingering in the room. It’s not a horrible smell, but the smell of something being preserved. “Is he going to be open-casket?”

“Yes. Tomorrow.” A large picture of the man when he was alive is taped to the wall next to Mr. Lockwood and he keeps referencing it.

“He needs some work,” I say.

“We’re getting there.” He holds out a brush. “Do you want to apply some blush?”

“Xander, what do you say? Another facet to this career?” I turn around, but he is frozen in the doorway staring with a horrified expression at the guy on the table. His face looks almost as pale as the man who has his attention. “Maybe not.”

I step in front of him and it takes a moment for him to meet my eyes.

“You okay?” I ask.

“Didn’t expect that. I’m fine.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, come here.” I lead him to the bathroom and close the door, hoping that putting the body out of sight will help. I hold Xander’s hand under some slow running water, gently rubbing it with soap. His eyes keep drifting to the shut door. “Stay,” I say, searching the cupboards for the first aid kit. I find it and set it on the counter, opening it. Xander turns off the water and pats his hand dry.

I unscrew the lid off some antiseptic then take his hand back in mine and dab some onto the raw wound. “Does it hurt?”

“It’s fine.”

His breath touches my cheek with the answer and I realize how close we are. I wrap his hand with gauze and look up. “There, good as new.”

The color in his face has changed to a sickly shade of gray. “Thanks,” he mumbles, and rushes by me and out the door.

I thank Mr. Lockwood then leave. By the time I get outside, Xander is leaning one hand against the building and dry heaving into some bushes. This is a disaster. From blisters to puking my career day sucks.

“I’m sorry.” I walk to his side and rub his shoulder. My mom always does that when I vomit. It doesn’t help much but I like to know she’s there.

“I’m okay. How much do you think Humiliation pays? Because I’m obviously really good at it.”

“Never seen a dead body before, huh?”

“No . . .” He wipes his mouth on the sleeve of his sweatshirt and straightens up.

“Note to self: Xander has a sensitive stomach. Stay away from career fields involving anything gross.”

At the car he pulls off the sweatshirt, nearly taking the shirt underneath with it and then steps out of his shoes. He throws them in the trunk, exchanging them for his nice ones. Trying not to let my gaze linger on the strip of still-exposed skin above his jeans, I tug off my sweatshirt as well.

“Do you want me to drive?” I ask, noting his still-too-pale face.

He hesitates for a moment.

“You don’t trust me with your baby?”

“It’s not that. . . . Okay, it’s that.”

“Rude.”

He gets into the car.

I climb in the passenger seat. “You’re really not going to let me drive it? You let that valet guy drive it at the hotel.”

“That was in a parking lot. And if you wrecked it we couldn’t be friends anymore. Then where would you be?”

“Don’t you have three others just like it?”

“Four, actually, but who’s counting?”

I think he’s kidding, but then again . . .

He starts the engine and pulls away from the curb. I look at the clock on Xander’s dash. Five. It’s hard to believe four hours had passed.

Xander moves into the right lane and starts to turn.

“Where are you going?”

“I thought we could get dinner. There’s this French place over here that I love.”

He’s obviously feeling better. “I shouldn’t. My mom’s been stuck at the store all by herself half the day. I should get back and help her clean up.”

“One more hour won’t hurt.”

“I should go back.”

He continues his path down the wrong road. “Come on.” He throws me his smile. I swear the thing could end wars.

“Okay. Then home.”

“Of course.”

It’s not until I’m out of the car and walking up to the fancy French restaurant that I think about the layer of dirt coating my skin. Xander had smashed dirt into my hair and I can still feel some caked against my scalp. I self-consciously try to comb it out with my fingers. When we step inside, the people waiting in the lobby are all dressed up. I’m sure the hostess, who’s dressed up herself, is about to turn us away. Xander has a streak of dried dirt across his forehead, after all.

But she offers Xander a gleaming white smile. “Mr. Spence. Your party is already here.”

“Really?” He tilts his head at her. “Then lead the way.”

“Did you have plans?” I ask as we walk behind her toward a back room.

“Apparently plans were made without me.”

I have no idea what that means, but when we get to the back room a dozen well-dressed, perfectly put-together people laugh when they see him. One guy stands and then addresses the hostess, “See? Didn’t we tell you we were with Xander Spence?”

“I shouldn’t have doubted you,” she says, then to Xander adds, “I’ll make sure the waiter comes to take your order.”

“Thank you.” Xander steps into the room and walks around to an empty chair.

“You look like you’ve been doing community service,” someone comments, pointing to his flannel shirt and dirty face.

Xander’s confidence isn’t shaken. His posture is still as straight as ever, his presence bigger than the room. There’s a twinkle in his eye when he says, “So which fool is using my name to avoid waiting?”

The guy already standing, with glasses I’m pretty sure aren’t prescription and a tan he probably pays for weekly, bows. “That would be me.”

“I should’ve known.”

“It’s going on your tab, too,” the guy adds.

Xander looks around and then spots me still by the entrance. “Everyone, this is my friend Caymen. Caymen, these are people you probably don’t care to know but who I sometimes call my friends.”

There are several shouts of disapproval followed by laughs.

I’m not sure I’m ready for this kind of initiation. I’m barely getting used to Xander. So when he pulls out the chair he’s standing behind and gestures for me to sit, I want to go screaming out of the restaurant.

My stomach twists in tight knots over and over. It doesn’t help that one of the girls on the end is glaring at me. Xander seems oblivious to the fact that I’m coated in mud and underdressed.

“Caymen. Come. Sit.”

I clamp my teeth together because the phrase “Am I wearing a collar?” had been on its way out my mouth. I’m impressed I stopped it in time. I point back the way we came and mutter, “Bathroom,” before I disappear without waiting for his response. Just when I’m almost out of hearing range, a voice says, “You taking in strays now, Xander?” followed by more laughter.

My jaw twitches as it tightens more. Why am I so angry? This only confirms everything I already know about the rich. Xander may be a slight exception, but those people in there are the rule. I change my direction and head to the hostess station instead.

“Can I borrow your phone?” I ask her when she turns my way.

“Of course.”

I call Skye and she agrees to pick me up. Then I go back to face the room one last time. I watch Xander as I approach, before he notices me. He’s listening to someone across the table. He has a small smile on his face, but it’s nowhere close to bringing world peace. It almost looks like a practiced smile.

I tell myself to behave when I reach the private room. None of them acknowledge me so I don’t feel any obligation to do different. I reach Xander and lean over. “I have to go. I’m not feeling so great.” I feel slightly guilty for lying, but then I remember the “stray” comment his friend made and the feelings are gone.

He starts to stand. “I’ll take you home.”

“It’s okay, I called Skye. I’ll see you later.”

“Caymen—”

“No, really. Stay. Have fun.” I push on his shoulder, forcing him back down, then leave the room.