The night Steven left, I headed down to the pool for one of my midnight swims, and Conrad and Jeremiah and this neighbor guy Clay Bertolet were sitting on the lounge chairs drinking beer. Clay lived way down the street, and he’d been coming to Cousins Beach for almost as long as we had. He was a year older than Conrad. No one had even liked him much. He was just a person to hang out with, I guess.
Right away I stiffened and held my beach towel closer to my chest. I wondered if I should turn back. Clay had always made me nervous. I didn’t have to swim that night. I could do it the next night. But no, I had as much right to be out there as they did. More, even.
I walked over to them, pretend-confident. “Hey, guys,” I said. I didn’t let go of my towel. It felt funny to be
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standing there in a towel and a bikini when they were all wearing clothes.
Clay looked up at me, his eyes narrow. “Hey, Belly. Long time no see.” He patted the lounge chair. “Sit down.”
I hated when people said “long time no see.” It was such a dumb way to say hello. But I sat down anyway.
He leaned in and gave me a hug. He smelled like beer and Polo Sport. “So how’ve you been?” he asked.
Before I could answer, Conrad said, “She’s fine, and now it’s time for bed. Good night, Belly.”
I tried not to sound like a five-year-old when I said, “I’m not going to sleep yet, I’m swimming.”
“You should head back up,” Jeremiah said, putting his beer down. “Your mom will kill you for drinking.”
“Hello. I’m not drinking,” I reminded him.
Clay offered me his Corona. “Here,” he said, winking. He seemed drunk.
I hesitated, and Conrad snapped irritably, “Don’t give her that. She’s a kid, for God’s sake.”
I glared at him. “Quit acting like Steven.” For a second or two I considered taking Clay’s beer. It would be my first. But then I’d only be doing it to spite Conrad, and I wasn’t going to let him control what I did.
“No, thanks,” I told him.
Conrad nodded imperceptibly. “Now go back to bed like a good girl.” 105
It felt just like when he and Steven and Jeremiah used to leave me out of things on purpose. I could feel my cheeks burning as I said, “I’m only two years younger than you.”
“Two and a quarter,” he corrected automatically.
Clay laughed, and I could smell his yeasty breath. “Shit, my girlfriend was fifteen.” Then he looked at me. “Ex-girlfriend.”
I smiled weakly. Inside, I was shrinking away from him and his breath.
But the way Conrad was watching us, well, I liked it. I liked taking his friend away from him, even if it was just for five minutes. “Isn’t that, like, illegal?” I asked Clay.
He laughed again. “You’re cute, Belly.”
I could feel myself blush. “So, um, why did you break up?” I asked, like I didn’t already know. They broke up because Clay’s a jerk, that was why. Clay had always been a jerk. He used to try to feed the seagulls Alka- Seltzer because he heard it made their stomachs blow up.
Clay scratched the back of his neck. “I don’t know. She had to go to horse camp or something. Long distance relationships are BS.”
“But it would just be for the summer,” I protested. “It’s dumb to break up over a summer.” I’d nursed a crush on Conrad for whole school years. I could survive for months, years, on a crush. It was like food. It could sustain me. If Conrad was mine, there was no way I’d
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break up with him over a summer–or a school year, for that matter.
Clay looked at me with his heavy-lidded, sleepy eyes and said, “Do you have a boyfriend?”
“Yes,” I said, and I couldn’t help myself—I looked at Conrad when I said it. See, I was saying, I’m not a stupid twelve-year-old girl with a crush anymore. I’m a real person. With an actual boyfriend. Who cared if it wasn’t true? Conrad’s eyes flickered, but his face was the same, expressionless.
Jeremiah, though, he looked surprised.
“Belly, you have a boyfriend?” He frowned. “You never mentioned him.”
“It’s not that serious.” I picked at an unraveling thread on the seat cushion. I was already regretting making it up. “In fact, we’re really, really casual.”
“See? Then what’s the point of a relationship during summer? What if you meet people?” Clay winked at me in a jokey way. “Like right now?”
“We’ve already met, Clay. Like, ten years ago.” Not that he’d ever actually paid me any attention.
He nudged me with his knee. “Nice to meet you. I’m Clay.”
I laughed, even though it wasn’t funny. It just felt like the right thing to do. “Hi, I’m Belly.”
“So, Belly, are you gonna come to my bonfire tomorrow night?” he asked me.
“Um, sure,” I said, trying not to sound too excited. 107
Conrad and Steven and Jeremiah went to the big Fourth of July bonfire every year. Clay had it at his house because there were a ton of fireworks on that end of the beach. His mom always put out stuff for s’mores. I once made Jeremiah bring one back for me, and he did. It was rubbery and burnt, but I still ate it, and I was still grateful to Jeremiah for it. It was like a little piece of the party. They never let me go with them, and I never tried to make them. I watched the show from our back porch, in my pajamas, with Susannah and my mother. They drank champagne and I drank Martinelli’s Sparkling Cider.
“I thought you came down here to swim,” Conrad said abruptly. “Geez, give her a break, Con,” Jeremiah said. “If she wants to swim,
she’ll swim.”
We exchanged a look, our look that meant, Why is Conrad such a freaking dad? Conrad flicked his cigarette into his half-empty can. “Do what you want,” he said.
“I will,” I said, sticking my tongue out at Conrad and standing up. I threw off my towel and dove into the water, a perfect swan dive. I stayed underwater for a minute. Then I started doing the backstroke so I could eavesdrop on their conversation.
In a low voice I heard Clay say, “Man, Cousins is starting to get old. I want to hurry up and get back.”
“Yeah, me too,” Conrad said.
So Conrad was ready to leave. Even though a little
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part of me knew that already, it still hurt. I wanted to say, Then leave already. If you don’t want to be here, don’t be here. Just leave. But I wasn’t going to let Conrad bother me, not when things were finally looking up.
At last I was invited to Clay Bertolet’s Fourth of July bonfire. I was one of the big kids now. Life was good. Or it was getting there, anyway.
I thought about what I was going to wear all day. Since I’d never been, I had no idea what to wear. Probably it would get cold, but who wanted to bundle up at a bonfire? Not for my first one. I also didn’t want Conrad and Jeremiah to give me a hard time if I was too dressed up. I figured shorts, a tank top, and no shoes were the safe way to go.
When we got there, I saw that I had chosen wrong. The other girls were wearing sundresses and little skirts and Uggs. If I’d had girl friends at Cousins, I might have known that. “You didn’t tell me that girls got dressed up,” I hissed at Jeremiah.
“You look fine. Don’t be dumb,” he said, walking straight over to the keg.
There was a keg. There were no graham crackers or marshmallows anywhere I could see.
I’d actually never seen a keg before in real life. Just in movies. I started to follow him, but Conrad grabbed my arm. “Don’t drink tonight,” he warned. “My mom will kill me if I let you drink.”
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I shook him off. “You’re not ‘letting’ me do anything.” “Come on. Please?”
“We’ll see,” I said, walking away from him and toward the fire. I wasn’t sure if I even wanted to drink. Even though I’d seen Clay drinking the night before, I’d still been expecting s’mores.
Going to the bonfire was nice in theory, but actually being there was something else. Jeremiah was chatting up some girl in a red, white, and blue bikini top and a jean skirt, and Conrad was talking to Clay and some other guys I didn’t recognize. I thought after the way Clay had been flirty last night, he might at least come over to say hi. But he didn’t. He had his hand on some girl’s back.
I stood by the fire alone and pretended to warm my hands even though they weren’t cold. That’s when I saw him. He was standing alone too, drinking a bottle of water. It didn’t seem like he knew anybody either, since he was standing all by himself. He looked like he was my age. But there
was something about him that seemed safe and comfortable, like he was younger than me even though he wasn’t. It took me a few glances to figure out what it was. When I finally figured it out, it was like, Aha!
It was his eyelashes. They were so long they practically hit his cheekbones. Granted, his cheekbones were high, but still. Also, he had a slight underbite, and his skin was clear and smooth, the color of toasted coconut flakes, the
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kind you put on ice cream. I touched my cheek and Felt relieved that the sun had dried out the pimple from two days before. His skin was perfect. To my eyes, everything about him was pretty perfect.
He was tall, taller than Steven or Jeremiah, maybe even Conrad. He looked like he was maybe half-white, half-Japanese, or Korean maybe. He was so pretty I felt like I could draw his face, and I didn’t even know how to draw.
He caught me looking at him, and I looked away. Then I looked back over and he caught me again. He raised his hand and waved it, just slightly.
I could feel my cheeks flaming. There was nothing for me to say but, “Hi.” I walked over, stuck out my hand, and immediately regretted it. Who shook hands anymore?
He took my hand and shook it. He didn’t say anything at first. He just stared at me, like he was trying to figure something out. “You look familiar,” he said at last.
I tried not to smile. Wasn’t that what boys said to girls when they came on to them at bars? I wondered if he’d seen me on the beach in my new polka-dot bikini. I’d only had the nerve to wear it the one time, but maybe that was what had gotten me noticed by this guy. “Maybe you’ve seen me on the beach?”
He shook his head. “No That’s not it.”
So it hadn’t been the bikini, then. I tried again. “Maybe over at Scoops, the ice cream place?”
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“No, that’s not it either,” he said. Then it was like the little light went on in his head, because he grinned suddenly. “Did you take Latin?”
What in the world? “Urn yes.”
“Did you ever go to Latin Convention in Washington, DC?” he asked. “Yes,” I said. Who was this boy anyway?
He nodded, satisfied. “So did I. In eighth grade, right?”
“Yeah . . .” In eighth grade I had a retainer and I still wore glasses. I hated, hated that he knew me from back then. Why couldn’t he know me from now, in my polka-dot bikini?
“That’s how I know you. I’ve been standing here trying to figure it out.” He grinned. “I’m Cam, but my Latin name was Sextus. Salve.”
Suddenly giggles rose up in my chest like soda bubbles. It was kind of funny. “Salve. I’m Flavia. I mean, Belly. I mean, my name is Isabel, but everyone calls me Belly.”
“Why?” He looked at me like he really wondered why.
“It’s my dad’s nickname for me from when I was little. He thought Isabel was too long a name,” I explained. “Everyone just still calls me that. It’s dumb.”
He ignored the last part and said, “Why not Izzy, then? Or Belle?” “I don’t know. It’s partly because Jelly Belfys are my
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favorite, and my dad and I used to play this game. He’d ask me what kind of mood I was in, but I would answer him in Jelly Belly flavors. Like plum if I was in a good mood …” My voice trailed off. I babbled when I was nervous, and I was definitely nervous. I’d always hated the name Belly– partly because it wasn’t even a real name. It was a child’s nickname, not a real name at all. Isabel, on the other hand, was the name of an exotic kind of girl, the kind of girl who went to places like Morocco and Mozambique, who wore red nail polish year round and had dark bangs. Belly was the kind of name that conjured up images of plump children or men in wifebeaters. “Anyway, I hate the name Izzy, but I do wish people called me Belle. It’s prettier.”
He nodded. “That’s what it means too. Beautiful.” “I know,” I said. “I’m in AP French.”
Cam said something in French, so fast I couldn’t understand him. “What?” I said. I felt stupid. It’s embarrassing to speak French when it’s
not in a classroom. It’s like, conjugating verbs is one thing, but actually speaking it, to an actual French person, is a whole different thing.
“My grandmother’s French,” he said. “I grew up speaking it.” “Oh.” Now I felt stupid for bragging about being in AP French. “You know, the v is supposed to be pronounced w “What?”
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“In Flavia. It’s supposed to be pronounced Fla-wia.”
“Of course I know that,” I snapped. “I took second prize in oration. But Flawia sounds dumb.”
“I took first prize,” he said, trying not to sound smug. I had a sudden memory of a boy in a black T-shirt and a striped tie, blowing everyone away with his Catullus speech, taking first place. It was him. “Why did you pick it if you thought it sounded dumb?”
I sighed. “Because Cornelia was taken. Everyone wanted to be Cornelia.” “Yeah, everyone wanted to be Sextus too.”
“Why?” I said. Immediately I regretted it. “Oh. Never mind.” Cam laughed. “Eighth-grade boy humor isn’t very developed.”
I laughed too. Then I said, “So do you stay in a house around here?” “We’re renting the house two blocks down. My mom sort of made me
come,” Cam said, rubbing the top of his head self-consciously.
“Oh.” I wished I would stop saying “oh,” but I couldn’t think of anything else.
“What about you? Why’d you come, Isabel?”
I was startled when he used my real name. It just rolled right off his tongue. It felt like the first day of school. But I liked it. “I don’t know,” I said. “I guess because Clay invited me.”
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Everything that came out of my mouth sounded so generic. For some reason I wanted to impress this boy. I wanted him to like me. I could feel him judging me, judging the dumb things I said. I’m smart too, I wanted to tell him. I told myself it was fine, it didn’t matter if he thought I was smart or not. But it did.
“I think I’m going to leave soon,” he said, finishing his water. He didn’t look at me when he said, “Do you need a ride?”
“No,” I said. I tried to swallow my disappointment that he was leaving already. “I came with those guys over there.” I pointed at Conrad and Jeremiah.
He nodded. “I figured, the way your brother kept looking over here.”
I almost choked. “My brother? Who? Him?” I pointed at Conrad. He wasn’t looking at us. He was looking at a blond girl in a Red Sox cap, and she was looking right back. He was laughing, and he never laughed.
“Yeah.”
“He’s not my brother. He tries to act like he is, but he’s not,” I said. “He thinks he’s everybody’s big brother. It’s so patronizing Why are you
leaving already anyway? You’re gonna miss the fireworks.”
He cleared his throat like he was embarrassed. “Um, I was actually gonna go home and study.”
“Latin?” I covered my mouth with my hand to keep from giggling. 115
“No. I’m studying whales. I want to intern on a whale watching boat, and I have to take this whaling exam next month,” he said, rubbing the top of his head again.
“Oh. That’s cool,” I said. I wished he wasn’t leaving already. I didn’t want him to go. He was nice. Standing next to him, I felt like Thumbelina, little and precious. He was that tall. If he left, I’d be all alone. “You know what, maybe I will get a ride. Wait here. I’ll be right back.”
I hurried over to Conrad, walking so fast I kicked up sand behind me. “Hey, I’m gonna get a ride,” I said breathlessly.
The blond Red Sox girl looked me up and down. “Hello,” she said. Conrad said, “With who?” I pointed at Cam. “Him.”
“You’re not riding with someone you don’t even know,” he said flatly. “I do so know him. He’s Sextus.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Sex what?”
“Never mind. His name is Cam, he’s studying whales, and you don’t get to decide who I ride home with. I was just letting you know, as a courtesy. I wasn’t asking for your permission.” I started to walk away, but he grabbed my elbow.
“I don’t care what he’s studying. It’s not gonna happen,” he said casually, but his grip was tight. “If you want to go, I’ll take you.”
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I took a deep breath. I had to keep cool. I wasn’t going to let him goad me into being a baby, not in front of all these people. “No, thanks,” I said, trying to walk away again. But he didn’t let go.
“I thought you already had a boyfriend?” His tone was mocking, and I knew he’d seen through my lie the night before.
I wanted so badly to throw a handful of sand in his face. I tried to twist out of his grip. “Let go of me! That hurts!”
He let go immediately, his face red. It didn’t really hurt, but I wanted to embarrass him the way he was embarrassing me. I said loudly, “I’d rather
ride with a stranger than with someone who’s been drinking!”
“I’ve had one beer,” he snapped. “I weigh a hundred and seventy-five pounds. Wait half an hour and I’ll take you. Stop being such a brat.”
I could feel tears starting to spark my eyelids. I looked over my shoulder to see if Cam was watching. He was. “You’re an asshole,” I said.
He looked me dead in the eyes and said, “And you’re a four-year-old.” As I walked away, I heard the girl ask, “Is she your girlfriend?”
I whirled around, and we both said “No!” at the same time.
Confused, she said, “Well, is she your little sister?” like I wasn’t standing right there. Her perfume was heavy.
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It felt like it filled all the air around us, like we were breathing her in. “No, I’m not his little sister.” I hated this girl for being a witness to all
this. It was humiliating. And she was pretty, in the same kind of way Taylor was pretty, which somehow made things worse.
Conrad said, “Her mom is best friends with my mom.” So that was all I was to him? His mom’s friend’s daughter?
I took a deep breath, and without even thinking, I said to the girl, “I’ve known Conrad my whole life. So let me be the one to tell you you’re barking up the wrong tree. Conrad will never love anyone as much as he loves himself, if you know what I mean–” I lifted up my hand and wiggled my fingers.
“Shut up, Belly,” Conrad warned. The tops of his ears were turning bright red. It was a low blow, but I didn’t care. He deserved it.
Red Sox girl frowned. “What is she talking about, Conrad?”
To her I blurted out, “Oh, I’m sorry, do you not know what the idiom ‘barking up the wrong tree’ means?”
Her pretty face twisted. “You little skank,” she hissed.
I could feel myself shrinking. I wished I could take it back. I’d never gotten into a fight with a girl before, or with anyone for that matter.
Thankfully, Conrad broke in then and pointed to the 118
bonfire. “Belly, go back over there, and wait for me to come get you,” he said harshly.
That’s when Jeremiah ambled over. “Hey, hey, what’s going on?” he asked, smiling in his easy, goofy way.
“Your brother is a jerk,” I said. “That’s what’s going
on.
Jeremiah put his arm around me. He smelled like beer. “You guys play nice, you hear?”
I shrugged out of his hold and said, “I am playing nice. Tell your brother to play nice.”
“Wait, are you guys brother and sister too?” the girl asked. Conrad said, “Don’t even think about leaving with that guy.” “Con, chill out,” Jeremiah said. “She’s not leaving. Right, Belly?”
He looked at me, and I pursed my lips and nodded. Then I gave Conrad the dirtiest look I could muster, and I shot one at the girl, too, when I was far enough away that she wouldn’t be able to reach out and grab me by the hair. I walked back to the bonfire, trying to keep my shoulders straight and high, when inside I felt like a kid who’d gotten yelled at at her own birthday party. It wasn’t fair, to be treated like I was a kid when I wasn’t. I bet me and that girl were the same age.
Cam said, “What was that all about?”
I was choking back tears as I said, “Let’s just go.” 119
He hesitated, glancing back over at Conrad. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea, Flavia. But I’ll stay here with you and hang out for a while. The whales can wait.”
I wanted to kiss him then. I wanted to forget I ever knew Conrad and just be there, existing in the bubble of that moment. The first firework went off, somewhere high above us. It sounded like a teakettle whistling loud and proud. It was gold, and it exploded into millions of gold flecks, like confetti over our heads.
We sat by the fire and he told me about whales and I told him about stupid things, like being secretary of French Club, and how my favorite food was pulled pork sandwiches. He said he was a vegetarian. We must have sat there for an hour. I could feel Conrad watching us the whole time, and I was so tempted to give him the finger–I hated it when he won.
When it started to get cold, I rubbed my arms, and Cam took off his hoodie and gave it to me. Which, was sort of my dream come true–getting cold and having a guy actually give you his hoodie instead of gloating over how smart he’d been to bring one.
Underneath, his T-shirt said STRAIGHT EDGE , with a picture of a razor blade, the kind a guy shaves with. “What does that mean?” I asked,
zipping up his hoodie. It was warm and it smelled like boy, but in a good way.
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“I’m straight edge,” he said. “I don’t drink or do drugs. I used to be hardcore, where you don’t take over-the-counter medicine or drink caffeine, but I quit that.”
“Why?”‘
“Why was I hardcore straight edge or why did I quit?” “Both.”
“I don’t believe in polluting your body with unnatural stuff,” he said. “I quit because it was making my mom crazy. And I also just really missed Dr Pepper.”
I liked Dr Pepper too. I was glad I hadn’t been drinking. I didn’t want him to think badly of me. I wanted him to think I was cool, like the kind of girl who didn’t care what people thought, the kind of person he obviously was. I wanted to be his friend. I also wanted to kiss him.
Cam left when we left. He got up as soon as he saw Jeremiah coming over to get me. “So long, Flavia,” he said.
I started to unzip his hoodie, and he said, “That’s all right. You can give it to me later.”
“Here, I’ll give you my number,” I said, holding my hand out for his phone. I’d never given a boy my phone number before. As I punched in my number, I felt really proud of myself for offering it to him.
Backing away, he put the phone into his pocket and said, “I would have found a way to get it back without your
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number. I’m smart, remember? First prize in oration.”
I tried not to smile as he walked away. “You’re not that smart,” I called out. It felt like fate that we’d met. It felt like the most romantic thing that had ever happened to me, and it was.
I watched Conrad say good-bye to Red Sox girl. She gave him a hug, and he hugged her back, but not really. I was glad I had ruined his night, if only a little bit.
On the way to the car a girl stopped me. She wore her blondish-brown hair in two pigtails, and she had on a pink low-cut shirt. “Do you like Cam?” the girl asked me casually. I wondered how she knew him–I thought he’d been a nobody just like me.
“I barely even know him,” I told her, and her face relaxed. She was relieved. I recognized that look in her eyes–dreamy and hopeful. It must have been the way I looked when I used to talk about Conrad, used to try to think of ways to insert his name into conversation. It made me sad for her, for me.
“I saw the way Nicole talked to you,” she said abruptly. “Don’t worry about her. She sucks as a person.”
“Red Sox girl? Yeah, she kind of does suck at being a person,” I agreed. Then I waved good-bye to her as Jeremiah and Conrad and I made our way to the car.
Conrad drove. He was completely sober, and I knew he had been all along. He checked out Cam’s hoodie,
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but he didn’t say anything. We didn’t speak to each other once. Jeremiah and I both sat in the backseat, and he tried to joke around, but nobody laughed. I was too busy thinking, remembering everything that had happened that night. I thought to myself, That might have been the best night of my life.
In my yearbook the year before, Sean Kirkpatrick wrote that I had “eyes so clear” he could “see right into my soul.” Sean was a drama geek, but so what. It still made me feel good. Taylor snickered when I showed it to her. She said only Sean Kirkpatrick would notice the color of my eyes when the rest of the guys were too busy looking at my chest. But this wasn’t Sean Kirkpatrick. This was Cam, a real guy who had noticed me even before I was pretty.
I was brushing my teeth in the upstairs bathroom when Jeremiah came in, shutting the door behind him. Reaching for his toothbrush, he said, “What’s going on with you and Con? Why are you guys so mad at each other?” He hopped up onto the sink.
Jeremiah hated it when people fought. It was part of why he always played the clown. He took it upon himself to bring levity to any situation. It was sweet but also kind of annoying.
Through a mouthful of toothpaste I said, “Um, because he’s a self- righteous neo-maxi-zoom-dweebie?”
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We both laughed at that. It was one of our little inside jokes, a line from The Breakfast Club that we spent repeating to each other the summer I was
eight and he was nine.
He cleared his throat. “Seriously, though, don’t be so hard on him. He’s going through some stuff.”
This was news to me. “What? What stuff?” I demanded. Jeremiah hesitated. “It’s not up to me to tell you.”
“Come on. We tell each other everything, Jere. No secrets, remember?” He smiled. “I remember. But I still can’t tell you. It’s not my secret.” Frowning, I turned the faucet on and said, “You always take his side.” “I’m not taking his side. I’m just telling his side.”
“Same thing.”
He reached out and turned the corners of my mouth up. It was one of his oldest tricks; no matter what, it made me smile. “No pouting, Bells, remember?”
No Pouting was a rule Conrad and Steven had made up one summer. I think I was eight or nine. The thing was, it only applied to me. They even put a sign up on my bedroom door. I tore it down, of course, and I ran and told Susannah and my mother. That night I got seconds on dessert, I remember. Anytime I acted the slightest bit sad or unhappy, one of the boys would start yelling, “No
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pouting. No pouting.” And, okay, maybe I did pout a lot, but it was the only way I could ever get my way. In some ways it was even harder being the only girl back then. In some ways not.
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chapter twenty – two
That night I slept in Cam’s hoodie. It was stupid and kind of sappy, but I didn’t care. And the next day I wore it outside, even though it was blazing hot out. I loved how the sleeves were frayed, the way it felt lived in. It felt like a boy’s.
Cam was the first boy to pay attention to me like that, to be up front about the fact that he actually wanted to hang out with me. And not be, like, embarrassed about it.
When I woke up, I realized that I had given him the house number. I didn’t know why. I could have given him my cell phone number just as easily.
I kept waiting for the phone to ring. The phone never rang at the summer house. The only people who called the house phone were Susannah, trying
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what kind of fish we wanted for dinner, or my mother, calling to tell Steven to put the towels in the dryer, or to get the grill going.
I stayed on the deck, sunning and reading magazines with Cam’s hoodie balled up in my lap like a stuffed animal. Since we kept the windows open, I knew I’d hear if the phone rang.
I slathered myself with sunscreen first, and then two layers of tanning oil. I didn’t know if it was an oxymoron or what, but better safe than sorry was how I figured it. I set myself up with a little station of cherry Kool-Aid in an old water bottle, plus a radio, plus sunglasses, and magazines. The sunglasses were a pair that Susannah had bought me years ago. Susannah loved to buy presents. When she went off for errands, she’d come home with presents. Little things, like this pair of red heart sunglasses she said I just had to have. She knew just what I’d love, things I hadn’t even thought of, had certainly never thought of buying. Things like lavender foot lotion, or a silk quilted pouch for tissues.
My mother and Susannah had left early that morning for one of their art gallery trips to Dyerstown, and Conrad, thank God, had left for work already. Jeremiah was still asleep. The house was mine.
The idea of tanning sounds so fun in theory. Laying out, soaking up sun and sipping on soda, falling asleep like a fat cat. But then the actual act of it is kind of tedious
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and boring. And hot. I would always rather be floating in an ocean, catching sun that way, than lying down sweating in the sun. They say you get tanner faster when you’re wet, anyhow.
But that morning I had no choice. In case Cam called, I mean. So I lay there, sweating and sizzling like a piece of chicken on a grill. It was boring, but it was a necessity.
Just after ten, the phone rang. I sprang up and ran into the kitchen. “Hello?” I said breathlessly.
“Hi, Belly. It’s Mr. Fisher.”
“Oh, hi, Mr. Fisher,” I said. I tried not to sound too disappointed. He cleared his throat. “So, how’s it going down there?”
“Pretty good. Susannah’s not home, though. She and my mom went to Dyerstown to visit some galleries.” “I see How are the boys?”
“Good …” I never knew what to say to Mr. Fisher. “Conrad’s at work and Jeremiah’s still asleep. Do you want me to wake him up?”
“No, no, that’s all right.”
There was this long pause, and I scrambled to think of something to say. “Are you, um, coming down this weekend?” I asked.
“No, not this weekend,” he said. His voice sounded really far away. “I’ll just call back later. You have fun, Belly.”
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I hung up the phone. Mr. Fisher hadn’t been down to Cousins once yet.
He used to come the weekend after the Fourth, because it was easier getting away from work after the holiday. When he came, he’d fire up the barbecue all weekend long, and he’d wear his apron that said chef knows best . I wondered if Susannah would be sad he wasn’t coming, if the boys would care.
I trudged back to my lounge chair, back to the sun. I fell asleep on my lounge chair, and I woke up to Jeremiah sprinkling Kool-Aid onto my stomach. “Quit it,” I said grouchily, sitting up. I was thirsty from my extra sweet Kool-Aid (I always made it with double sugar), and I felt dehydrated and sweaty.
He laughed and sat down on my lounge chair. “Is this what you’re doing all day?”
“Yes,” I said, wiping off my stomach and then wiping my hand on his shorts.
“Don’t be boring. Come do something with me,” he ordered. “I don’t have to work until tonight.”
“I’m working on my tan,” I told him. “You’re tan enough.”
“Will you let me drive?”
He hesitated. “Fine,” he said. “But you have to rinse off first. I don’t want you getting my seat all oily.”
I stood up, throwing my limp greasy hair into a high ponytail. “I’ll go right now. Just wait,” I said.
Jeremiah waited for me in the car, with the AC on full 129
blast. He sat in the passenger seat. “Where are we going?” I asked, getting into the driver’s seat. I felt like an old pro. “Tennessee? New Mexico? We have to go far so I can get good practice.”
He closed his eyes and laid his head back. “Just take a left out of the driveway,” he told me.
“Yessir,” I said, turning off the AC and opening all four windows. It was so much better driving with the windows down. It felt like you were actually going somewhere.
He continued giving me directions, and then we pulled up to Go Kart City. “Are you serious?”
“We’re gonna get you some driving practice,” he said, grinning like crazy.
We waited in line for the cars, and when it was our turn, the guy told me to get in the blue one. I said, “Can I drive the red one instead?”
He winked at me and said, “You’re so pretty, I’d let you drive my car.”
I could feel myself blush, but I liked it. The guy was older than me, and he was actually paying me attention. It was kind of amazing. I’d seen him there the summer before, and he hadn’t looked at me once.
Getting into the car next to me, Jeremiah muttered, “What a freaking cheeseball. He needs to get a real job.”
“Like lifeguarding is a real job?” I countered. Jeremiah scowled. “Just drive.”
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Every time my car came back around the track, the guy waved at me.
The third time he did it, I waved back.
We rode around the track a bunch of times, until it was time for Jeremiah to go to work.
“I think you’ve had enough driving for today,” Jeremiah said, rubbing his neck. “I’ll drive us home.”
I didn’t argue with him. He drove home fast, and dropped me off at the curb and headed to work. I stepped back into the house feeling very tired and tan. And also satisfied.
“Someone named Cam called for you,” my mother said. She was sitting at the kitchen table, reading the paper with her horn-rimmed reading glasses on. She didn’t look up.
“He did?” I asked, covering my smile with the back of my hand. “Well, did he leave a number?”
“No,” she said. “He said he’d call back.”
“Why didn’t you ask for it?” I said, and I hated the whininess in my voice, but when it came to my mother, it was like I couldn’t help it.
That’s when she looked at me, perplexed. “I don’t know. He wasn’t offering it. Who is he anyway?”
“Forget it,” I told her, walking over to the refrigerator for some lemonade.
“Suit yourself,” my mother said, going back to her paper. 131
She didn’t press the issue. She never did. She at least could have gotten his number. If Susannah had been down here instead of her, she would have been singsongy and she would have teased and snooped until I told her everything. Which I would have, gladly.
“Mr. Fisher called this morning,” I said.
My mother looked up again. “What did he say?” “Nothing much. Just that he can’t come this weekend.” She pursed her lips, but she didn’t say anything. “Where’s Susannah?” I asked. “Is she in her room?”
“Yes, but she doesn’t feel well. She’s taking a nap,” my mother said. In other words, Don’t go up and bother her.
“What’s wrong with her?”
“She has a summer cold,” my mother said automatically.
My mother was a terrible liar. Susannah had been spending a lot of time in her room, and there was a sadness to her that hadn’t been there before. I knew something was up. I just wasn’t completely sure what.
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chapter twenty -three
Cam called again the next night, and the night after that. We talked on the phone twice before we met up again, for, like, four or five hours at a time. When we talked, I lay on one of the lounge chairs on the porch and stared up at the moon with my toes pointed toward the sky. I laughed so hard that Jeremiah yelled out his window for me to keep it down. We talked about everything, and I loved it, but the whole time I wondered when he was going to ask to see me again. He didn’t.
So I had to take matters into my own hands. I invited Cam to come over and play video games and maybe swim. I felt like some kind of liberated woman calling him up and inviting him over, like it was the kind of thing I did all the time. When really, I was only doing it because I knew no one was going to be at home. I
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didn’t want Jeremiah or Conrad or my mother or even Susannah to see him just yet. For now, he was just mine.
“I’m a really good swimmer, so don’t be mad when we race and I beat you,” I said over the phone.
He laughed and said, “At freestyle?” “At any style.”
“Why do you like to win so much?”
I didn’t have an answer for that, except to say that winning was fun, and anyway, who didn’t like to win? Growing up with Steven and spending my summers with Jeremiah and Conrad, winning was always important, and doubly so because I was a girl and was never expected to win anything.
Victory is a thousand times sweeter when you’re the underdog.
Cam came over, and I watched from my bedroom window as he drove up. His car was navy blue and old and beat-up looking, like his hoodie that I was already planning on keeping. It looked like exactly the kind of car he’d drive.
He rang the doorbell, and I flew down the stairs to open the door. “Hi,” I said. I was wearing his hoodie.
“You’re wearing my hoodie,” he said, smiling down at me. He was even taller than I’d remembered.
“You know, I was thinking that I want to keep it,” I told him, letting him in and closing the door behind me. “But I don’t expect to get it for free. I’ll race you for it.”
“But if we race, you can’t be mad if I beat you,” he 134
said, raising an eyebrow at me. “It’s my favorite hoodie, and if I win, I’m taking it.” “No problem,” I told him.
We went out to the pool through the back screen door, down the porch steps. I threw off my shorts and T-shirt and his hoodie quickly, without even thinking– Jeremiah and I raced all the time in the pool. It didn’t occur to me to be self-conscious to be in a bikini in front of Cam. After all, we spent the whole summer in bathing suits in that house.
But he looked away quickly and took off his T-shirt. “Ready?” he said, standing by the edge.
I walked over next to him. “One full lap?” I asked, dipping my toe into the water.
“Sure,” he said. “You want a head start?”
I snorted. “Do you want a head start?” “Touche,” he said, grinning.
I’d never heard a boy say “touché” before. Or anyone else, for that matter.
Maybe my mother. But on him it looked good. It was different.
I won the first race easily. “You let me win,” I accused.
“No, I didn’t,” he said, but I knew it wasn’t true. In all the summers and all of the races, no boy, not Conrad or Jeremiah or certainly not Steven, had ever let me win.
“You better give it your all this time,” I warned. “Or I’m keeping the hoodie.”
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“Best two out of three,” Cam said, wiping the hair out of his eyes.
He won the next heat, and I won the last one. I wasn’t fully convinced that he didn’t just let me win–after all, he was so tall and long, his one stroke was worth two of mine. But I wanted to keep the hoodie, so I didn’t challenge the win. After all, a win was a win.
When he had to leave, I walked him to his car. He didn’t get in right away. There was this long pause, the first we’d had, if you can believe it. Cam cleared his throat and said, “So this guy I know, Kinsey, is having a party tomorrow night. Do you maybe want to come?”
“Yeah,” I said right away. “I do.”
I made the mistake of mentioning it at breakfast the next morning. My mother and Susannah were grocery shopping. It was just me and the boys, the way it had been for the most part this summer. “I’m going to a party tonight,” I said, partly just to say it out loud and partly to brag.
Conrad raised his eyebrows. “You?”
“Whose party?” Jeremiah demanded. “Kinsey s?” I put down my juice. “How’d you know?”
Jeremiah laughed and wagged his finger at me. “I know everybody in Cousins, Belly. I’m a lifeguard. That’s like being the mayor. Greg Kinsey works at that surf shop over by the mall.”
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Frowning, Conrad said, “Doesn’t Greg Kinsey sell crystal meth out of his trunk?”
“What? No. Cam wouldn’t be friends with someone like that,” I said defensively.
“Who’s Cam?” Jeremiah asked me.
“That guy I met at Clay’s bonfire. He asked me to go to this party with him, and I said yes.”
“Sorry. You aren’t going to some meth addict’s party,” Conrad said.
This was the second time Conrad was trying to tell me what to do, and I was sick of it. Who did he think he was? I had to go to this party. I didn’t care if there was crystal meth or not, I was going. “I’m telling you, Cam wouldn’t be friends with someone like that! He’s straight edge.”
Conrad and Jeremiah both snorted. In moments like these, they were a team. “He’s straight edge?” Jeremiah said, trying not to smile. “Neat.”
“Very cool,” agreed Conrad.
I glared at the both of them. First they didn’t want me hanging out with meth addicts, and then being straight edge wasn’t cool either. “He doesn’t do drugs, all right? Which is why I highly doubt he’d be friends with a drug dealer.”
Jeremiah scratched his cheek and said, “You know what, it might be Greg Rosenberg who’s the meth dealer. Greg Kinsey’s pretty cool. He has a pool table. I think I’ll check this party out too.”
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“Wait, what?” I was starting to panic.
“I think I’ll go too,” Conrad said. “I like pool.”
I stood up. “You guys can’t come. You weren’t invited.”
Conrad leaned back in his chair and put his arms behind his head. “Don’t worry, Belly. We won’t bother you on your big date.”
“Unless he puts his hands on you.” Jeremiah ground his fist into his hand threateningly, his blue eyes narrow. “Then his ass is grass.”
“This isn’t happening,” I moaned. “You guys, I’m begging you. Don’t come. Please, please don’t come.”
Jeremiah ignored me. “Con, what are you gonna wear?
“I haven’t thought about it. Maybe my khaki shorts? What are you gonna wear?” “I hate you guys,” I said.
Things had been weird with me and Conrad and also with me and Jeremiah–an impossible thought crept its way into my head. Was it possible they didn’t want me with Cam? Because they, like, had feelings for me?
Could that even be? I doubted it. I was like a little sister to them. Only, I wasn’t.
When I finished getting ready and it was almost time to go, I stopped by Susannah’s room to say good-bye. She and my mother were holed up in there sorting through old pictures. Susannah was all ready for bed, even though
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it was still pretty early. She had her pillows propped up around her, and she was wearing one of her silk robes that Mr. Fisher had bought her on a business trip to Hong Kong. It was poppy and cream, and when I got married, I wanted one just like it.
“Come sit down and help us put this album together,” my mother said, rifling through an old striped hatbox.
“Laurel, can’t you see she’s all dressed up? She’s got better things to do than look at dusty old pictures.” Susannah winked at me. “Belly, you look fresh as a daisy. I love you in white with your tan. It sets you off like a picture frame.”
“Thanks, Susannah,” I said.
I wasn’t all that dressed up, but I wasn’t in shorts like the night of the bonfire. I was wearing a white sundress and flip-flops, and I’d put my hair in braids while it was still wet. I knew I’d probably take them out in about half an hour because they were so tight, but I didn’t care. They were cute. “You do look lovely. Where are you headed?” my mother asked me.
“Just to a party,” I said.
My mother frowned and said, “Are Conrad and Jeremiah going to this party too?”
“They’re not my bodyguards,” I said, rolling my eyes. “I didn’t say they were,” my mother said. Susannah waved me off and said, “Have fun, Belly!”
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“I will,” I said, shutting the door before my mother could ask me any more questions.
I’d hoped that Conrad and Jeremiah had just been kidding around, that they weren’t really gonna try to come. But when I ran down the stairs to meet Cam’s car, Jeremiah called out, “Hey, Belly?”
He and Conrad were watching TV in the family room. I poked my head in the doorway. “What?” I snapped. “I’m kind of in a hurry.”
Jeremiah turned his head toward me and winked lazily. “See you soon.”
Conrad looked at me and said, “What’s with the perfume? It’s giving me a headache. And why are you wearing all that makeup?”
I wasn’t wearing that much makeup. I had some blush and mascara and a little lip gloss, that was it. It was just that he wasn’t used to me wearing any. And I’d sprayed my neck and wrists, that was all. Conrad sure hadn’t minded Red Sox girl’s perfume. He’d loved her perfume. Still, I took one last look at myself in the mirror in the hallway–and I rubbed a little of the blush off, also the perfume.
Then I slammed the door shut and ran down the driveway, where Cam was turning in. I’d been watching from my bedroom window so I’d know the exact moment he drove up, so he wouldn’t have to come inside and meet my mother.
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I hopped into Cam’s car. “Hi,” I said.
“Hi. I would’ve rung the doorbell,” he told me.
“Trust me, it’s better this way,” I said, suddenly feeling very shy. How is it possible to talk to someone on the phone for hours and hours, to even swim with this person, and then feel like you don’t know them?
“So this guy Kinsey, he’s kind of weird, but he’s a good person,” Cam told me as he backed out of the driveway. He was a good driver, careful.
Casually I asked, “Does he by any chance sell crystal meth?”
“Um, not that I know of,” he told me, smiling. His right cheek had a dimple in it that I hadn’t noticed the other night. It was nice.
I relaxed. Now that the crystal meth stuff was out of the way, there was only one more thing. I twisted the charm bracelet on my wrist over and over and said, “So, you know those guys I was with at the bonfire? Jeremiah and Conrad?”
“Your fake brothers?”
“Yeah. I think they might be stopping by the party too. They know, um, Kinsey,” I said.
“Oh, really?” he said. “Cool. Maybe they’ll see that I’m not some kind of creep.”
“They don’t think you’re a creep,” I told him. “Well, they kind of do, but they’d think any guy I talk to is a creep, so it’s nothing personal.”
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“They must really care about you a lot to be so protective,” he said. Did they?
“Um, not really. Well, Jeremiah does, but Conrad is all about duty. Or he used to be anyway. He should’ve been one of those samurais.” I glanced over at him. “I’m sorry. Is this boring?”
“No, keep talking,” Cam said. “How do you know about samurais?”
Tucking my legs under my butt, I said, “Ms. Baskerville’s global studies class in ninth grade. We did a whole unit on Japan and Bushido. I was, like, obsessed with the idea of seppuku.”
“My dad’s half-Japanese,” he said. “My grandmother lives there, so we go out and visit her once a year.”
“Wow” I’d never been to Japan, or anywhere in Asia for that matter. My mother’s travels hadn’t taken her there yet either, though I knew she wanted to go. “Do you speak Japanese?”
“A little,” he said, rubbing the top of his head. “I get by okay.”
I whistled–my whistle was something I was proud of. My brother, Steven, had taught me. “So you speak English, French, and Japanese? That’s pretty amazing. You’re like some kind of genius, huh,” I teased.
“I speak Latin, too,” he reminded me, grinning.
“Latin’s not spoken. It’s a dead language,” I said, just to be contrary. 142
“It’s not dead. It’s in every Western language.” He sounded like my seventh-grade Latin teacher, Mr. Coney.
When we pulled up to this guy Kinsey’s house, I kind of didn’t want to get out of the car. I loved the feeling of talking and having somebody really
listen to what I had to say. It was like a high or something. In this weird way, I felt powerful.
We parked in the cul-de-sac–there were a ton of cars. Some were halfway on the lawn. Cam walked quickly. His legs were so long that I had to hurry to keep up. “So how do you know this guy?” I asked him.
“He’s my supplier.” He laughed at the expression on my face. “You’re really gullible, Flavia. His parents have a boat. I’ve seen him down at the marina. He’s a nice
guy-”
We walked right in without knocking. The music was so loud I could hear it from the driveway. It was karaoke music–there was a girl singing “Like a Virgin” at the top of her lungs and rolling around on the ground, her mike getting twisted up in her jeans. There were ten or so people in the living room, drinking beer and passing around a songbook .”Sing ‘Livin’ on a Prayer’ next,” some guy urged the girl on the floor.
A couple of guys I didn’t recognize were checking me out–I could feel their eyes on me, and I wondered if I
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really had worn too much makeup. It was a new thing to have guys looking at me, much less asking me on dates. It felt equal parts amazing and scary. I spotted the girl from the bonfire, the one who liked Cam. She looked at us, and then she looked away, sneaking glances every once in a while. I felt bad for her; I knew how that felt.
I also recognized our neighbor Jill, who spent weekends at Cousins–she waved at me, and it occurred to me that I’d never seen her outside of the neighborhood, our front yards. She was sitting next to the guy from the video store, the one who worked on Tuesdays and wore his name tag upside down. I’d never seen the lower half of his body before, he was always standing behind the counter. And then there was the waitress Katie from Jimmy’s Crab Shack without her red-and-white striped uniform. These were people I’d been seeing every summer for my whole life. So this is where they’d been all this time. Out, at parties, while I’d been left out, locked away in the summer house like Rapunzel, watching old movies with my mother and Susannah.
Cam seemed to know everybody. He said hi, shoulder-bumping guys and hugging girls. He introduced me. He called me his friend Flavia. “Meet my friend Flavia,” he said. “This is Kinsey. This is his house.”
“Hi, Kinsey,” I said.
Kinsey was sprawled out on the couch, and he wasn’t wearing a shirt. He had a scrawny bird chest. He didn’t
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look like a meth dealer. He looked like a paperboy.
He took a gulp of beer and said, “My name’s not really Kinsey. It’s Greg.
Everybody just calls me Kinsey.”
“My name’s not really Flavia. It’s Belly. Only Cam calls me Flavia.”
Kinsey nodded like that actually made sense. “You guys want something to drink, there’s a cooler in the kitchen.”
Cam said, “Do you want something to drink?”
I wasn’t sure if I should say yes or not. On the one hand, yeah, I kind of did. I never drank. It would be, like, an experience. Further proof that this summer was special, important. On the other hand, would he be grossed out by me if I did? Would he judge me for it? I didn’t know what the straight edge rules were.
I decided against it. The last thing I needed was to smell like Clay had the other night. “I’ll have a Coke,” I told him.
Cam nodded, and I could tell he approved. We headed over to the kitchen. As we walked, I heard little snatches of conversation–“I heard Kelly got a DUI and that’s why she isn’t here this summer.” “I heard she got kicked out of school.” I wondered who Kelly was. I wondered if I’d recognize her if I saw her. It was all Steven and Jeremiah and Conrad’s fault–they never took me anywhere. That was why I didn’t know anybody.
All of the chairs in the kitchen had purses and jackets 145
on them, so Cam moved over some empty beer bottles and made an empty space on the counter. I hopped up and sat on it.
“Do you know all these people?” I asked Cam.
“Not really,” he said. “I just wanted you to think I was cool.” “I already do,” I said, and I blushed almost immediately.
He laughed like I had made a joke, which made me feel better. He opened up the cooler and pulled out a Coke. He opened it and handed it to me.
Cam said, “Just because I’m straight edge doesn’t mean you can’t drink. I mean, I’ll judge you for it, but you can still drink if you want to. That was a joke, by the way.”
“I know,” I said. “But I’m good with this Coke.” Which was true.
I took a long sip of my Coke and burped. “Scuse me,” I said, unraveling one of my braids. They were already too tight, and my head felt sore.
“You burp, like, baby burps,” he said. “It’s kind of gross but also kind of cute.”
I unraveled the other braid and hit him on the shoulder. In my head I heard Conrad go, Ooh, you’re hitting him now. Way to flirt, Belly, way to flirt. Even when he wasn’t there, he was there. And then he really was.
Out of nowhere, I heard Jeremiah’s signature yodel on the karaoke machine. I bit my lip. “They’re here,” I said.
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“You want to go out and say hi?” “Not really,” I said, but I hopped down from the counter.
We went back to the living room, and Jeremiah was center stage, falsetto and singing some song I’d never heard of. The girls were laughing and watching him, all googly-eyed. And Conrad, he was on the couch with a beer in his hand. Red Sox girl was perched on the armrest next to him, leaning in close and letting her hair fall in his face like a curtain that encased the two of them. I wondered if they’d picked her up, if he’d let her sit shotgun.
“He’s a good singer,” Cam said. Then he looked where I was looking and said, “Are he and Nicole together?”
“Who knows?” I said. “Who cares?”
Jeremiah spotted me then, as he bowed at the end of his song. “Belly!
This next song goes out to you.” He pointed at Cam. “What’s your name?” Cam cleared his throat. “Cam. Cameron.”
Jeremiah said right into the mike, “Your name is Cam Cameron? Damn, that sucks, dude.” Everyone laughed, especially Conrad, when just a second ago he’d looked so bored.
“It’s just Cam,” Cam said quietly. He looked at me then, and I was embarrassed. Not for him, but of him. I hated them for that.
It was like Conrad and Jeremiah had deemed him 147
unworthy and so I had to too. It was funny how I’d felt so close to him just a few minutes before.
“Okay, Cam Cameron. This song goes out to you and our favorite little Belly Button. Hit it, ladies.” Some girl pushed the play button on the
remote. “Summer lovin’, had me a blast …”
I wanted to kill him, but all I could do was shake my head at him and glare. It wasn’t like I could grab the mike out of his hand in front of all these people. Jeremiah just grinned at me and started to dance. One of the girls sitting on the floor jumped up and started dancing with him. She sang the Olivia Newton-John part, off-key. Conrad watched in his amused, condescending way. I heard someone say, “Who is that girl anyway?” She was looking right at me as she said it.
Next to me, Cam was laughing. I couldn’t believe it. I was dying of embarrassment and he was laughing. “Smile, Flavia,” he said, poking me in the side.
When someone tells me to smile, I can’t help it. I always do.
Midway through Jeremiah’s song, Cam and I walked out–without even looking, I knew Conrad was watching us.
Cam and I sat on the staircase and talked. He sat on the step above me.
He was nice to talk to, not intimidating at all. I loved the way he laughed so easily–not like with Conrad. With Conrad you had to work hard for
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every smile. Nothing ever came easy with Conrad.
The way Cam was leaning into me, I thought he might try to kiss me. I was pretty sure I’d let him. But he’d lean in and scratch his ankle, or tug at his sock, and then shift away, and then he’d do it again.
When he was in the middle of a lean in, I heard pissed off, belligerent voices coming from the deck outside. One of them was definitely Conrad’s pissed off, belligerent voice. I jumped up. “Something’s going on out there.”
“Let’s check it out,” said Cam, leading the way.
Conrad and some guy with a barbed wire tattoo on his forearm were arguing. The guy was shorter than Conrad, but stockier. He was packing some serious muscle, and he looked like he was, like, twenty-five. Jeremiah watched, bemused, but I could tell he was alert, ready to jump in if he needed to.
To Jeremiah I whispered, “What are they fighting about?”
He shrugged. “Conrad’s wasted. Don’t worry about it. They’re just showing off.”
“They look like they might kill each other,” I said uneasily.
“They’re fine,” Cam said. “But we should probably get out of here. It’s late.”
I glanced at him. I’d almost forgotten he was standing next to me. “I’m not leaving,” I said. Not that I could do anything to stop a fight from happening. But it wouldn’t be right to just leave him there.
Conrad stepped up close to the tattoo guy, who 149
shoved him away easily, and Conrad laughed. I could feel an actual fight brewing, like a thunderstorm. Just like the way the water got really still before the sky broke open.
“Are you gonna do something?” I hissed.
“He’s a big boy,” Jeremiah said, his eyes close on Conrad. “He’ll be fine.” But he didn’t believe it, and neither did I. Conrad didn’t seem fine at all.
He didn’t seem like the Conrad Fisher I knew, all wild and out of control. What if he got himself hurt? What then? I had to help, I just had to.
I started walking over to them, and I waved off Jeremiah when he tried to stop me. When I got there, I realized I had no idea what to say. I had never tried to break up a fight before.
“Um, hi,” I said, standing between the two of them. “We have to leave.” Conrad pushed me out of the way. “Get the hell out of here, Belly.” “Who is this? Your baby sister?” The guy looked me up and down. “No. I’m Belly,” I told him. Only, I was nervous, and I stuttered when I
said my name.
“Belly?” The guy busted out laughing, and I grabbed Conrad’s arm. “We’re gonna leave now,” I said.
I realized how drunk he was when he swayed a little as he tried to swat me off. “Don’t leave. Things are just
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getting fun. See, I’m about to kick this guy’s ass.” I’d never seen him like this before. His intensity scared me. I wondered where Red Sox girl had gone. I kind of wished she was here to handle Conrad and not me. I didn’t know what I was supposed to do.
The guy laughed, but I could tell he wanted a fight just about as much as I did. He looked tired, like all he wanted was to head home and watch TV in his boxers. Whereas Conrad was running on all cylinders. Conrad was like a soda bottle that had been shaken up; he was about to explode on somebody. It didn’t matter who it was. It didn’t matter that this guy was bigger than him. It wouldn’t have mattered if he was twenty feet tall and built like a
brick. Conrad was looking for a fight. He wouldn’t be satisfied until he got one. And this guy, he could kill Conrad.
The guy kept looking at Conrad and then back at me. Shaking his head, he said, “Belly, you better get this little boy home.”
“Don’t talk to her,” Conrad warned.
I put my hand on Conrad’s chest. I had never done that before. It felt solid and warm; I could feel his heart beating fast and out of control. “Can we please just go home,” I pleaded. But it was like Conrad didn’t even see me standing there, or feel my hand on his chest.
“Listen to your girlfriend, kid,” the guy said.
“I’m not his girlfriend,” I said, glancing over at Cam, who had no expression on his face.
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Then I looked back at Jeremiah helplessly, and he ambled over. He whispered something in Conrad’s ear, and Conrad shook him off. But Jeremiah kept talking to him in his low voice, and when they looked at me, I realized it was about me. Conrad hesitated, and then he finally nodded.
Then he half jokingly made like he was going to hit the guy, and the guy rolled his eyes. “Good night, douche,” he said to the guy.
The guy waved him off with one hand. I let out a big breath.
As we walked back to the car, Cam grabbed my arm. “Are you okay to go home with these guys?” he asked me.
Conrad whirled around and said, “Who is this guy?”
I shook my head at Cam and said, “I’ll be fine. Don’t worry. I’ll call you.” He looked worried. “Who’s driving?”
“I am,” Jeremiah said, and Conrad didn’t argue. “Don’t worry, Straight Edge, I don’t drink and drive.”
I was embarrassed, and I could tell Cam was bothered, but he just nodded. Quickly I hugged him, and he felt stiff. I wanted to make things okay. “Thanks for tonight,” I said.
I watched him walk away, and I felt a stab of resentment–Conrad and his stupid temper had ruined my first real date. It wasn’t fair.
Jeremiah said, “You guys get in the car; I left my hat inside. I’ll be right back.”
“Just hurry,” I told him. 152
Conrad and I got in the car silently. It felt eerily quiet, and even though it was only just past one, it felt like it was four in the morning and the whole world had gone to sleep. He lay down in the backseat, all of his energy from before gone. I sat in the front seat with my bare feet on the dashboard, leaning back far in the seat. Neither of us spoke. It had been frightening back there. I didn’t recognize him, the way he’d acted. I suddenly felt very tired.
My hair was hanging low, and from the backseat, all of a sudden, I felt Conrad touching it, running his fingers through the bottom. I think I stopped breathing. We were sitting in perfect silence, and Conrad Fisher was playing with my hair.
“Your hair is like a little kid’s, the way it’s always so messy,” he said softly. His voice made me shiver, it was like the sound of water when it pulls off the sand.
I didn’t say anything. I didn’t even look at him. I didn’t want to scare him off. It was like the time I had a really high fever, and everything felt gauzy and dizzy and unreal, it felt just like that. All I knew was, I didn’t want him to stop.
But he finally did. I watched him in the visor mirror. He closed his eyes and sighed. I did too. “Belly,” he began.
Just as suddenly, everything in me was alert. The sleepy feeling was gone; every part of my body was awake now. I was holding my breath, waiting for what he would say. I
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didn’t answer him. I didn’t want to break the spell.
That’s when Jeremiah came back, opened the door, slammed it shut. This moment between us, fragile and tenuous, snapped in half. It was over. It would do no good to wonder what he was going to say. Moments, when lost, can’t be found again. They’re just gone.
Jeremiah looked at me funny. I could tell he knew that he’d walked in on something. I shrugged at him, and he turned away and started the car.
I reached over to the radio and turned it on, loud.
The whole way home, there was this strange tension, everyone keeping quiet–Conrad passed out in the backseat, Jeremiah and me not looking at each other in the front seat. Until we pulled up the driveway, when Jeremiah said to Conrad, in what was a harsh tone for him, “Don’t let Mom see you like this.”
Which was when I realized, remembered, that Conrad really had been drunk, that he couldn’t really have been responsible for anything he’d said or done that night. He probably wouldn’t remember it tomorrow. It would be like it had never happened.
As soon as we got inside, I ran up to my room. I wanted to forget what had happened in the car and only remember the way Cam had looked at me, on the stairs with his arm touching my shoulder.
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chapter twenty – four
The next day, nothing. It wasn’t that he ignored me, because that would have been something. Some kind of proof that it had happened, that something had changed. But no, he treated me the same. Like I was still little Belly, the girl with the messy flyaway ponytail and the bony knees, running after them on the beach. I should have known better.
The thing was, whether he was pushing me away or pulling me toward him, I was still going in the same direction. Toward Conrad.
Cam didn’t call me for a few days. Not that I blamed him. I didn’t call him either–although I thought about it. I just didn’t know what to say.
When he finally called, he didn’t bring up the party. He asked me to go to the drive-in. I said yes. Right away
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I worried, though–did going to the drive-in mean we were going to have to make out? Like, crazy make out, steamed windows and seats all the way back?
Because that was what people did at the drive-in. There were the families, and then there were the hot and heavy couples toward the back of the lot. I’d never been part of a couple before. I’d gone as a family, with Susannah and my mother and everyone, and I’d gone with the boys, but never as a couple, like on a date.
Once, Jeremiah and Steven and I went and spied on Conrad on one of his dates. Susannah let Jeremiah drive us, even though he only had a permit.
The drive-in was three miles away, and at Cousins, everyone drove, even kids on their parents’ laps. Conrad had been furious when he’d caught us spying on him. He’d been on his way to the concession stand when he saw us. It had been pretty funny–his hair was all messed up as he yelled at us, and his Hps were rosy and they had a glossy sheen. Jeremiah cracked up the whole time.
I wished Steven and Jeremiah were out there in the dark somewhere, spying on us and cracking up. It would make me feel comforted somehow. Safer.
I was wearing Cam’s hoodie, and I kept it zipped all the way to my neck. I sat with my arms crossed, like I was shivering. Even though I liked Cam, even though I wanted to be there, I had the sudden urge to jump out of the car and walk home. I’d only ever kissed one boy,
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and that hadn’t been for real. Taylor called me the nun. Maybe I was one, at heart. Maybe I should have joined a convent. I didn’t even know if this was an actual date. Maybe he’d been so turned off by me the other night that all he wanted was to be my friend.
Cam tuned the radio until he found the right station. Drumming his hands on the steering wheel, he said, “Do you want any popcorn or anything?”
I kind of did, but I didn’t want it to get stuck in my teeth, so I said no, thanks.
He was pretty into the movie, the way he leaned up close to the windshield to get a closer look sometimes. It was an old horror movie, one that Cam told me was really famous, but I’d never heard of it. I was barely paying attention anyway–I felt like I was watching him way more than I was watching the movie. He licked his lips a lot. He didn’t look over and laugh with me during the funny parts the way Jeremiah did. He just sat on his side of the car, leaned up against the door, as far away from me as possible.
When the movie was over, he started the car up. “Ready?” he said.
I felt a wave of disappointment. He was taking me home already. He wasn’t going to take me to Scoops for an ice cream cone, or a hot fudge sundae to share. The date, if you could even call it that, had been a failure. He didn’t try to make out with me once. Not that I knew if I’d even have let him, but still. He could’ve at least tried.
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“Um-hmm,” I said. I felt like I might cry, and I wasn’t quite sure why, when I hadn’t even been sure if I wanted to kiss him in the first place.
We drove home in silence. He parked the car in front of the house–I held my breath a little, my hand on the door handle, waiting to see if he’d turn off the ignition or if I should hop out. But he turned it off and leaned his head back against the headrest a second.
“Do you know why I remembered you?” he asked me suddenly.
It was a question so out of nowhere that it took me a little while to figure out what he was talking about. “You mean from Latin Convention?” “Yeah.”
“Was it my Coliseum model?” I was only half-joking. Steven had helped me build it; it had been pretty impressive.
“No.” Cam ran his hand through his hair. He wouldn’t look at me. “It’s because I thought you were really pretty. Like, maybe the prettiest girl I’d ever seen.”
I laughed. In the car, it sounded really loud. “Yeah, right. Nice try, Sextus.”
“I mean it,” he insisted, his voice rising.
“You’re making that up.” I didn’t believe it could be true. I didn’t want to let myself believe it. With the boys any compliment like this would always be the first part of a joke.
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He shook his head, lips tight. He was offended that I didn’t believe him. I hadn’t meant to hurt his feelings. I just didn’t see how it could be true. It was almost mean of him to lie about it. I knew what I looked like back then, and I wasn’t the prettiest girl anybody had ever seen, not with my thick glasses and chubby cheeks and little-girl body.
Cam looked me in the eyes then. “The first day, you wore a blue dress. It was, like, corduroy or something. It made your eyes look really blue.”
“My eyes are gray,” I said.
“Yes, but that dress made them look blue.”
Which was why I wore it. It was my favorite. I wondered where it was now. Probably packed up in the attic back home, with all my winter clothes. It was too small now anyway.
He looked so sweet, the way he watched me, waiting for my reaction.
His cheeks were flushed peach. I swallowed hard and said, “Why didn’t you come up to me?”
He shrugged. “You were always with your friends. I watched you that whole week, trying to get up the nerve. I couldn’t believe it when I saw you at the bonfire that night. Pretty bizarre, huh?” Cam laughed, but he sounded embarrassed.
“Pretty bizarre,” I echoed. I couldn’t believe he’d noticed me. With Taylor by my side, who would have even bothered to look at me?
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“I almost messed up my Catullus speech on purpose, so you’d win,” he said, remembering. He inched a little closer to me.
“I’m glad you didn’t,” I said. I reached out and touched his arm. My hand shook. “I wish you had come up to me.”
That’s when he dipped his head low and kissed me. I didn’t let go of the door handle. All I could think was, J wish this had been my first kiss.
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chapter twenty – five
When I went into the house, I was walking on cotton candy and clouds, replaying everything that had just happened–until I heard my mother and Susannah arguing in the living room. Fear seized up inside of me; it felt like a fist clenched tight around my heart. They never fought, not really. I’d only ever seen them fight one time. It was last summer. The three of us had gone shopping to this fancy mall an hour away from Cousins. It was an outdoor mall, the kind where people bring their pocket-size dogs on fancy leashes. I saw this dress–it was a purpley plum chiffon, with little off the shoulder straps, way too old for me. I loved it. Susannah said I should try it on, just for fun, so I did. She took one look at me and said I had to have it. My mother shook her head right away. She said, “She’s fourteen. Where will she wear a dress like
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that?” Susannah said it didn’t matter, that it was made for me. I knew we couldn’t afford it, my mother was newly divorced, after all, but I still pleaded with her. I begged. They got into an argument right there in the boutique, in front of people. Susannah wanted to buy it for me, and my mother wouldn’t let her. I told them never mind, I didn’t want it, even though I did. I knew my mother was right, I’d never wear it.
When we got back from Cousins at the end of summer, I found the dress in my suitcase, wrapped in paper and packed neatly on top like it had always been there. Susannah had gone back and bought it for me. It was so like her to do that. Later, my mother must have seen it hanging up in my closet, but she never said anything.
Standing there in the foyer, listening, I felt like the spy Steven was always accusing me of being. But I couldn’t help it.
I heard Susannah say, “Laurel, I’m a big girl now. I need you to stop trying to manage my life. I’m the one who gets to decide how I want to live
it.”
I didn’t wait for my mother’s response. I walked right in and said, “What’s going on?” I looked at my mother when I said it, and I knew I sounded like I was blaming her, but I didn’t care.
“Nothing. Everything’s fine,” my mother said, but her eyes looked red and tired.
“Then why were you fighting?” 162
“We weren’t fighting, hon,” Susannah assured me. She reached out and smoothed my shoulder, like she was ironing out wrinkled silk. “Everything really is fine.”
“It didn’t sound like it.”
“Well, it is,” Susannah told me.
“Promise?” I asked. I wanted to believe her. “Promise,” she said without hesitation.
My mother walked away from us, and I could see from the stiffness of her shoulders that everything was not fine, that she was still upset. But because I wanted to stay with Susannah, where everything really was fine, I didn’t follow her. My mother was the kind of person who would rather be alone anyway. Just ask my father.
“What’s the matter with her?” I whispered to Susannah.
“It’s nothing. Tell me about your date with Cam,” she said, leading me to the wicker couch in the sunroom.
I should have kept pressing her, should have tried to figure out what had really happened between the two of them, but my worry was already fading away. I wanted to tell her everything about Cam, everything. Susannah had that way about her, where you wanted to tell her all your secrets and everything in between.
She sat on the couch and patted her lap. I sat down next to her and put my head in her lap and she smoothed my hair away from my forehead.
Everything felt safe and cozy, like that fight hadn’t happened. And maybe it hadn’t
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even been a fight, maybe I’d misread the whole thing. “Well, he’s different from anyone I’ve ever met,” I began. “How so?”
“He’s just so smart, and he doesn’t care what people think. And he’s so good-looking. I can’t even believe he pays me any attention.”
Susannah shook her head. “Oh, please. Of course he should pay you attention. You’re so lovely, darling. You’ve really blossomed this summer. People can’t help but pay you attention.”
“Ha,” I said, but I felt flattered. She was so good at making people feel special. “I’m glad I have you to talk to about this kind of stuff.”
“I am too. But you know, you could talk to your mother.”
“She wouldn’t be interested in any of it, not really. She’d pretend to care, but she wouldn’t.”
“Oh, Belly. That’s not true. She would care. She does care.” Susannah cradled my face in her hands. “Your mother is your biggest fan, next to me. She cares about everything you do. Don’t shut her out.”
I didn’t want to talk about my mother anymore. I wanted to talk about Cam. “You’ll never believe what Cam said to me tonight,” I began.
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chapter twenty – six
Just like that, July turned into August. I guessed summer went by a lot faster when you had someone to spend it with. For me, that someone was Cam. Cam Cameron.
Mr. Fisher always came the first week of August. He’d bring Susannah’s favorites from the city, almond croissants and lavender chocolates. And flowers, he always brought flowers. Susannah loved flowers. She said she needed them like air, to breathe. She had more vases than I could count, tall ones and fat ones and glass ones. They were all over the house, flowers in vases in every room. Her favorites were peonies. She kept them on her nightstand in her bedroom, so they were the first thing she saw in the morning.
Shells, too. She loved shells. She kept them in hurricane glasses. When she’d come back from a walk on the
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beach, she’d always come back with a handful of shells. She’d arrange them on the kitchen table, admire them first, say things like, “Doesn’t this one look just like an ear?” Or, “Isn’t this one the perfect shade of pink?” Then she’d put them in order from biggest to smallest. It was one of her rituals, something I loved to watch her do.
That week, right around when Mr. Fisher usually came, Susannah mentioned that he couldn’t get away from work. There had been some sort
of emergency at the bank. It would just be the five of us finishing out the summer. It would be the first year without Mr. Fisher and my brother.
After she went to bed, early, Conrad said to me, conversationally, “They’re getting a divorce.”
“Who?” I said.
“My parents. It’s about time.”
Jeremiah glared at him. “Shut up, Conrad.”
Conrad shrugged. “Why? You know it’s true. Belly’s not surprised, are you, Belly?”
I was. I was really surprised. I said, to both of them, “I thought they seemed like they were really in love.”
Whatever love was, I was sure they had it. I thought they had it a million times over. The way they gazed at each other at the dinner table, how excited Susannah got when he came to the summer house. I didn’t think people like that got divorced. People like my parents got divorced. Not Susannah and Mr. Fisher.
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“They were in love,” Jeremiah told me. “I don’t really know what happened.”
“Dad’s a dick. That’s what happened,” Conrad said, getting up. He sounded so blasé and matter-of-fact, but that didn’t seem right. Not when I knew he adored his dad. I wondered if Mr. Fisher had a new girlfriend the way my father did. I wondered if he’d cheated on Susannah. But who would ever cheat on Susannah? It was impossible.
“Don’t tell your mom you know,” Jeremiah said suddenly. “Mom doesn’t know we know.”
“I won’t,” I said. I wondered how they’d found out. My parents had sat Steven and me down and told us everything, explained it all in detail.
As Conrad left, Jeremiah said to me, “Before we left, our dad had been sleeping in the guest room for weeks. He’s already moved out most of his clothes. They think we’re retarded or something, for us not to notice.” His voice cracked at the last part.
I grabbed his hand and squeezed it. He was really hurting. I guessed maybe Conrad was too, even if he didn’t show it. It all made sense, when I thought about it. The way Conrad had been acting, so different, so lost. So un-Conrad-like. He was suffering. And then there was Susannah. The way
she’d been spending so much time in bed, the way she seemed so sad. She was hurting too.
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chapter twenty – seven
“You and Cam have been spending a lot of time together,” my mother said, looking at me over her newspaper.
“Not really,” I said, even though we had been. At the summer house one day just kind of melted into the next; you didn’t notice time passing. Cam and I had been hanging out for two weeks before I realized it: He was kind of my boyfriend. We’d spent practically every day together. I didn’t know what I’d done before I’d met him. My life must have been really boring.
My mother said, “We miss you around the house.” If Susannah had said it, I’d have been flattered, but from my mother it was just really annoying. It felt like recrimination. And anyway, it wasn’t like they’d been around so much either. They were always off doing things, just the two of them.
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“Belly, will you bring this boy of yours to dinner tomorrow night?” Susannah asked me sweetly.
I wanted to say no, but for me, saying no to Susannah was impossible. Especially with her going through a divorce. I couldn’t say no. So instead I said, “Um . . . maybe …”
“Please, honey? I’d really like to meet him.”
I caved. “All right, I’ll ask. I can’t promise he doesn’t have plans, though.”
Susannah nodded serenely. “As long as you ask.” Unfortunately for me, Cam didn’t have plans.
Susannah cooked; she made a tofu stir-fry because Cam was a vegetarian. Again, it was something I’d admired about him, but when I saw the look Jeremiah gave me, it made me shrink a little. Jeremiah cooked hamburgers that night–he liked any excuse to use the grill, just like his dad. He asked me if I wanted one too, and I said no even though I did.
Conrad had already eaten and was upstairs playing his guitar. He couldn’t even be bothered to eat with us. He came down to get a bottled water, and he didn’t even say hello to Cam.
“So why don’t you eat meat, Cam?” Jeremiah asked, stuffing half his burger into his mouth.
Cam swallowed his water and said, “I’m morally opposed to eating animals.”
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Jeremiah nodded seriously. “But Belly eats meat. You let her kiss you with those lips?” Then he cracked up. Susannah and my mother exchanged a knowing kind of smile.
I could feel my face getting hot, and I could feel how tense Cam was beside me. “Shut up, Jeremiah.”
Cam glanced at my mother and laughed uneasily. “I don’t judge people who choose to eat meat. It’s a personal choice.”
Jeremiah continued, “So you don’t mind when her lips touch dead animal and then they touch your, um, lips?”
Susannah chuckled lightly and said ,”Jere, give the guy a break.” “Yeah, Jere, give the guy a break,” I said, glaring at him. I kicked him
under the table, hard. Hard enough to make him flinch.
“No, it’s fine,” Cam said. “I don’t mind at all. In fact–” Then he pulled me to him and kissed me quickly, right in front of everyone. It was only a peck, but it was embarrassing.
“Please don’t kiss Belly at the dinner table,” said Jeremiah, gagging a little for effect. “You’re making me nauseous.”
My mother shook her head at him and said, “Belly’s allowed to kiss. “Then she pointed her fork at Cam. “But that’s it.”
She burst out laughing like it was the funniest thing 170
she’d ever said, and Susannah tried not to smile and told her to hush. I wanted to kill my mother and then myself. “Mom, please. You’re so not funny,” I said. “No more wine for Mom.” I refused to look anywhere near Jeremiah’s direction, or Cam’s, for that matter.
The truth was, Cam and I hadn’t done much else besides kiss. He didn’t seem to be in any big hurry. He was careful with me, sweet–nervous even. It was completely different from the way I’d seen other guys behave with girls. Last summer I caught Jeremiah with a girl on the beach, right outside of the house. They were frantic, like if they hadn’t been wearing clothes, they’d already have been having sex. I gave him hell for it the whole rest of the summer, but he didn’t really care. I wished Cam would care a little more.
“Belly, I’m kidding. You know I’m open to you exploring yourself,” my mother said, taking a long sip of chardonnay.
Jeremiah busted out laughing. I stood up and said, “That’s it. Cam and I are eating our dinner on the porch.” I grabbed my plate and waited for Cam to stand up too.
But he didn’t. “Belly, calm down. Everybody’s just joking around,” he said, loading up his fork with rice and bok choy and shoveling it into his mouth.
“Way to keep her in check, Cam,” Jeremiah said, nodding at him. He really did look kind of impressed.
I sat back down, although it killed me to do it. I hated 171
losing face in front of everyone, but if I did walk out by myself, I knew no one would come after me. I would just be little Belly Button, off pouting again. That was my name when I was being a baby, Belly Button–Steven thought he was such a genius for thinking that one up. “No one keeps me in check, Jeremiah. Least of all Cam Cameron.”
Everyone hooted and hollered then, even Cam, and all of a sudden, it was all very normal, like he really belonged there. I could feel myself start to relax. It was all going to be okay. Great, in fact. Amazing, just like Susannah had promised.
After dinner, Cam and I took a walk on the beach. For me there was–is– nothing better than walking on the beach late at night. It feels like you could walk forever, like the whole night is yours and so is the ocean. When you walk on the beach at night, you can say things you can’t say in real life. In the dark you can feel really close to a person. You can say whatever you want.
“I’m really glad you came,” I told him.
He took my hand and said, “Me too. I’m glad you’re glad.” “Of course I’m glad.”
I let go of his hand to roll up the bottoms of my jeans, and he said, quietly, “It didn’t seem like you were that glad.”
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“Well, I am.” I looked up at him and gave him a quick kiss. “See? This is me, being glad.”
He smiled and we started walking again. “Good. So which one of those guys was your first kiss?”
“I told you that?”
“Yup. You said your first kiss was a boy at the beach when you were thirteen.”
“Oh.” I looked up at his face in the moonlight, and he was still smiling. “Guess.”
Immediately he said, “The older one, Conrad.” “Why’d you guess him?”
He shrugged. “Just a feeling, the way he looks at you.”
“He hardly looks at me at all,” I told him. “And you’re wrong, Sextus. It was Jeremiah.”
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chapter twenty – eight AGE 14
“Truth or dare?” Taylor asked Conrad. “I’m not playing,” he said.
Taylor pouted. “Don’t be so gay,” she said. Jeremiah said, “You shouldn’t use the word ‘gay’ like
Taylor opened her mouth and closed it. Then she said, “I didn’t mean anything by it, Jeremy. I just meant he’s being lame.”
“Well, ‘gay’ doesn’t mean ‘lame,’ Taylor, now does it?” Jeremiah said. He spoke in a sarcastic tone, but even mean attention was better than no attention. Probably he was just mad about all the attention she’d been giving Conrad that day.
Taylor heaved a great big sigh and turned to Conrad. 174
“Conrad, you’re being very lame. Play truth or dare with us.
He ignored her and turned the volume on the TV up louder. Then he pretended to mute her with the remote, which made me laugh out loud.
“Fine, he’s out. Steven, truth or dare.” Steven rolled his eyes. “Truth.”
Taylor’s eyes lit up. “Okay. How far did you go with Claire Cho?” I knew she’d been saving that one up for a long time, waiting for the exact moment she could ask. Claire Cho was a girl that Steven had dated for most of freshman year. Taylor swore Claire had cankles, but I thought Claire’s ankles were perfectly slim. I thought Claire Cho was kind of perfect.
Steven actually blushed. “I’m not answering that.”
“You have to. It’s truth or dare. You can’t sit here and listen to other people tell secrets if you’re not going to,” I said. I had been wondering about him and Claire too.
“Nobody’s even told any secrets yet!” he protested.
“We’re about to, Steven,” Taylor said. “Now man up and tell us.” “Yeah, Steven, man up,” Jeremiah chimed in.
We all started to chant, “Man up! Man up!” Even Conrad turned the TV on mute to hear the answer.
“Fine,” Steven said. “If you shut up, I’ll tell you.” We shut right up and waited. “Well?” I said. “Third,” he said at last.
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I relaxed back into the couch. Third base. Wow. Interesting. My brother had been to third base. Weird. Gross.
Taylor looked pink with satisfaction. “Well done, Stevie.”
He shook his head at her and said, “Now it’s my turn.” He looked around the room, and I sank deep into the couch cushions. I really, really hoped he wasn’t going to pick me and make me say it out loud–how I hadn’t even so much as kissed a boy yet. Knowing Steven, he would.
He surprised me when he said, “Taylor. Truth or dare?” He was actually playing along.
Automatically she said, “You can’t pick me because I just asked you. You have to pick someone else.” Which was true, that was the rule.
“Are you scared, Tay-Tay? Why don’t you man up?” Taylor hesitated. “Fine. Truth.”
Steven grinned evilly. “Who would you kiss in this room?”
Taylor considered it for a few seconds, and then she got that cat-that-ate- the-canary look on her face. It was the same look she’d had on her face when she’d dyed her little sister’s hair blue when we were eight. She waited until she had everyone’s attention, and then she said, triumphantly, “Belly.”
There was a stunned kind of silence for a minute, and then everyone started to laugh, Conrad loudest. I threw a pillow at Taylor, hard.
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“That’s not fair. You didn’t answer for real,” Jeremiah said, shaking his finger at her.
“Yes, I did,” Taylor said smugly. “I pick Belly. Take a closer look at everybody’s favorite little sister, Jeremy. She’s turning hot before your very
eyes.”
I hid my face behind a pillow. I knew I was blushing even harder than Steven had. Mostly because it wasn’t true, I wasn’t turning hot before anyone’s eyes, and we all knew it. “Taylor, shut up. Please shut up.”
“Yes, please shut up, Tay- Tay,” Steven said. He looked kind of red too. “If you’re so serious, then kiss her,” said Conrad, his eyes still on the TV. “Hey,” I said, glaring at him. “I’m a person. You can’t just kiss me
without my permission.”
He looked at me and said, “I’m not the one who wants to kiss you.”
Hotly, I said, “Either way, permission not granted. To either of you.” I wished I could stick my tongue out at him without being accused of being a big baby.
Taylor broke in quickly. She said, “I picked truth, not dare. That’s why we’re not kissing right now.”
“We’re not kissing right now because I don’t want to kiss you,” I told her. I felt flushed, partly because I was mad, and partly because I was flattered. “Now let’s stop talking about it. It’s your turn to ask.”
“Fine. Jeremiah. Truth or dare.” 177
“Dare,” he said, leaning against the couch lazily.
“Okay. Kiss somebody in this room, right now .”Taylor looked at him confidently and waited.
It felt like the whole room was sitting on the edge of its seat while we waited for Jeremiah to say something. Would he actually do it? He was not the kind of guy to pass up a dare. I, for one, was curious about what kind of kisser he’d be, if he’d go for a French or if he’d give her a quick peck. I also wondered if it would be their first kiss, or if they’d kissed sometime earlier in the week, like at the arcade when I wasn’t looking, maybe. I was pretty sure they had.
Jeremiah sat up straight. “Easy,” he said, rubbing his hands together with a smile. Taylor smiled back and tilted her head to the side so her hair fell in her eyes just a little bit.
Then he leaned over to me and said, “Ready?” and before I could answer, he kissed me right on the lips. His mouth was a little bit open, but it wasn’t a French kiss or anything. I tried to push him off, but he kept on kissing me, for a few more seconds.
I pushed him off again, and he leaned back into the couch, as casual as can be. Everyone else was sitting there with their mouths hanging open, except for Conrad, who didn’t even look surprised. But then, he never looked surprised. I, on the other hand, was finding it kind of hard to breathe. I had just had my first kiss. In front of people. In front of my brother.
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I couldn’t believe that Jeremiah had stolen my first kiss like that. I had been waiting, wanting it to be special, and it had happened during a game of truth or dare. How unspecial could you get? And to top it all off, he had only done it to make Taylor jealous, not because he liked me.
It had worked. Her eyes were narrowed, and she was staring at Jeremiah like he had thrown down some kind of gauntlet. Which, I guess he kind of had.
“Gross,” Steven said. “This game is gross. I’m outta here.” Then he looked at all of us disgustedly and left.
I got up too, and so did Conrad. “See ya,” I said. “And, Jeremiah, I’m getting you back for that.”
He winked and said, “A back rub should make us about even,” and I threw a pillow directly at his head and slammed the door behind me. The fact that he was being fake-flirty was the worst part. It was so patronizing, so demeaning.
It took me about three seconds before I realized that Taylor wasn’t coming after me. She was inside, laughing at Jeremiah’s dumb jokes.
In the hallway, Conrad gave me his trademark knowing look and said, “You know you loved it.”
I glared at him. “How would you know? You’re too obsessed with yourself to notice anybody else.”
He walked away from me and said over his shoulder, “Oh, I notice everything, Belly. Even poor little you.”
“Screw you!” I said, because that was all I could think 179
of. I could hear him chuckling as he shut his bedroom door.
I went back to my room and got under the covers. I closed my eyes and replayed and replayed what had just happened. Jeremiah’s lips had touched my lips. My lips were no longer my own. They had been touched. By Jeremiah. I had finally been kissed, and it was my friend Jeremiah who’d
been the one to do it. My friend Jeremiah who had been ignoring me that whole week.
I wished I could talk to Taylor. I wished we could talk about my first kiss, but we couldn’t, because right this minute she was downstairs kissing the same boy who had just kissed me. I was sure of it.
When she came back upstairs an hour later, I pretended I was sleeping. “Belly?” she whispered across the room.
I didn’t say anything, but I stirred a little, for effect.
“I know you’re still awake, Belly,” she said. “And I forgive you.”
I wanted to sit right up and say, “You forgive me? Well, I don’t forgive you, for coming here and ruining my whole summer.” But I didn’t say any of it. I just kept fake-sleeping.
The next morning I woke up early, just after seven, and Taylor was already gone. I knew where she was. She’d gone to watch the sunrise with Jeremiah. We’d been planning to
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go watch the sunrise on the beach one morning before she left, but we always overslept. It was her second to last morning, and she’d chosen Jeremiah. Figured.
I changed into my bathing suit and headed for the pool. In the mornings it was always a little cold outside, just a little bit of bite to the air, but I didn’t mind. Swimming in the mornings made me feel like I was swimming in the ocean even when I wasn’t. In theory swimming in the ocean sounds great and all, but the salt water burned my eyes too much to do it every day. Plus, the pool was more private, more my own. Even though everyone else swam in it too, in the mornings and at night I had it pretty much to myself, besides Susannah.
When I opened the gate to the pool, I saw my mother sitting in one of the lounge chairs reading a book. Except she wasn’t really reading it. She was more just holding it and staring off into space.
“Hi, Mom,” I said, more to break her out of her spell than anything else. She looked up, startled. “Good morning,” she said, clearing her throat.
“Did you sleep well?”
I shrugged and dropped my towel onto the chair next to hers. “I guess,” I said.
My mother shaded her eyes with her hand and looked up at me. “Are you and Taylor having fun?”
“Tons,” I said. “Buckets full.” “Where is Taylor?”
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“Who knows?” I said. “Who cares?” “Are you two fighting?” my mother asked casually. “No. I’m just starting to wish I hadn’t brung her, is all.”
“Best friends are important. They’re the closest thing to a sister you’ll ever have,” she told me. “Don’t squander it.”
Irritably I said, “I haven’t squandered anything. Why do you always have to put the blame on me for everything?”
“I’m not blaming you. Why must you always make things about you, dear?” My mother smiled at me in her infuriatingly calm way.
I rolled my eyes and jumped backward into the pool. It was freezing cold. When I came up to the surface, I yelled, “I don’t!”
Then I started my laps, and whenever I thought about Taylor and Jeremiah, I got madder and pushed harder. By the time I was done, my shoulders burned.
My mother had left, but Taylor and Jeremiah and Steven were just coming in.
“Belly, if you swim too much, you’ll get those broad swimmer’s shoulders,” Taylor warned, dipping her foot in the water.
I ignored her. What did Taylor know about exercise? She thought walking around the mall in high heels was exercise. “Where were you guys?” I asked, floating on my back.
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“Just hanging out,” Jeremiah said vaguely.
Judas, I thought. A bunch of Benedict Arnolds. “Where’s Conrad?” “Who knows? He’s too cool to hang out,” Jeremiah said, falling onto a
lounge chair.
“He went running,” Steven said, a tad defensively. “He has to get in shape for football season. He has to leave for practice next week, remember?”
I remembered. That year Conrad had to leave early so he could get back in time for tryouts. He’d never seemed like the football type to me, but there he was, trying out for the team. I guessed Mr. Fisher had a lot to do with it; he was exactly the type. So was Jeremiah. Although he’d never take it seriously. He never took anything seriously.
“I’ll probably play for the team next year too,” Jeremiah said casually. He sneaked a peek at Taylor to see if she looked impressed. She didn’t. She wasn’t even looking at him.
His shoulders sagged a little, and I felt sorry for him despite myself. I said, “Jere, race me, okay?”
He shrugged and stood up, taking off his shirt. Then he walked over to the deep end and dove in. “You want a handicap?” he asked when he emerged up top.
“No. I think I can beat you without one,” I said, paddling over. “Whoo-hoo! Let’s see.”
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We raced across the length of the pool, freestyle, and he beat me the first time, and then the second. But I wore him down by the third and fourth and beat him too. Taylor cheered me on, which only annoyed me more.
The next morning she was gone again. This time, though, I was gonna join them. It wasn’t like she and Jeremiah owned the beach. I had just as much right as they did to watch the sunrise. I got up, put my clothes on, and headed outside.
I didn’t see them at first. They were farther down than usual, and they had their backs to me. He had his arms around her, and they were kissing. They weren’t even watching the sunrise. And … it wasn’t Jeremiah, either. It was Steven. My brother.
It was just like in those movies with the surprise ending, where everything falls into place and clicks. Suddenly my life had become The Usual Suspects , and Taylor, Taylor was Keyser Soze. The scenes ran through the mind– Taylor and Steven bickering, the way he had come to the boardwalk that night, Taylor claiming that Claire Cho had cankles, all the afternoons she’d spent at my house.
They didn’t hear me walk up. But then I said, loudly, “Wow, so first Conrad, then Jeremiah, and now my brother.”
She turned around, surprised, and Steven looked surprised too. “Belly–,” she started.
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“Shut up.” I looked at my brother then, and he squirmed. “You’re a hypocrite. You don’t even like her! You said she bleached out all her brain cells with her Sun-In!”
He cleared his throat. “I never said that,” he said, glancing back and forth between Taylor and me. Her eyes had welled up, and she was wiping her left eye with the back of her sweatshirt sleeve. Steven’s sweatshirt sleeve. I was too angry to cry.
“I’m telling Jeremiah.”
“Belly, just freakin’ calm down. You’re too old for your temper tantrums,” Steven said, shaking his head in his brotherly way.
The words came out of me, hot and fast and sure. “Go to hell.” I had never talked like that to my brother before. I don’t think I’d ever talked like that to anyone before. Steven blinked.
That’s when I started to walk away, and Taylor chased after me. She had to run to catch up, that’s how fast I was walking. I guess anger gives you speed.
“Belly, I’m so sorry,” she began. “I was going to tell you. Things just happened really fast.”
I stopped walking and spun around. “When? When did they happen?
Because from what I saw, things were happening so fast with Jeremy, not with my older brother.”
She shrugged helplessly, which only made me madder. Poor helpless little Taylor. “I’ve always had a crush on Steven. You know that, Belly.”
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“Actually, I didn’t. Thanks for telling me.”
“When he liked me back, it was like, I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t think.” “That’s the thing. He doesn’t like you. He’s just using you because you’re
around,” I said. I knew it was cruel, but I also knew it was true. Then I walked into the house and left her standing outside.
She chased after me and grabbed my arm, but I shrugged her off. “Please don’t be mad, Belly. I want things to stay the same with us forever,” Taylor said, brown eyes brimming with tears. What she really
meant was, I want you to stay the same forever while I grow bigger breasts and quit violin and kiss your brother.
“Things can’t stay the same forever,” I said. I was saying it to hurt her because I knew it would.
“Don’t be mad at me, okay, Belly?” she pleaded. Taylor hated it when people were mad at her.
“I’m not mad at you,” I said. “I just don’t think we really know each other anymore.”
“Don’t say that, Belly.”
“I’m only saying it because it’s true.” She said, “I’m sorry, okay?”
I looked away for a second. “You promised you’d be nice to him.” “Who? Steven?” Taylor looked genuinely confused. “No. Jeremiah. You
said you’d be nice.” 186
She waved her hand in the air. “Oh, he doesn’t care.”
“Yeah, he does. It’s just that you don’t know him.” Like I do, I wanted to add. “I didn’t think you’d ever act so–so …” I searched for the perfect word, to cut her the way she’d cut me. “Slutty.”
“I’m not a slut,” she said in a tiny voice.
So this was my power over her, my supposed innocence over her supposed sluttiness. It was all such BS. I would’ve traded my spot for hers in a second.
Later, Jeremiah asked me if I wanted to play spit. We hadn’t played once all summer. It used to be our thing, our tradition. I was grateful to have it back. Even if it was a consolation prize.
He dealt me my hand, and we began to play, but both of us were just going through the motions. We had other things on our minds. I thought that we had this unspoken agreement not to talk about her, that maybe he didn’t even know what had happened, but then he said, “I wish you never brought her.”
“Me too.”
“It’s better when it’s just us,” he said, shuffling his stack. “Yeah,” I agreed.
After she left, after that summer, things were the same and they weren’t. She and I were still friends, but not best friends, not like we used to be. But we were still friends.
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She’d known me my whole life. It’s hard to throw away history. It was like you were throwing away a part of yourself.
Steven went right back to ignoring Taylor and obsessing over Claire Cho.
We just pretended like none of it had ever happened. But it did.
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chapter twenty – nine
I heard him come home. I think the whole house must have–except for Jeremiah, who could sleep through a tidal wave. Conrad made his way up the stairs, tripping and cursing, and then he shut his door and turned on his stereo, loud. It was three in the morning.
I lay in bed for about three seconds before I leapt up and ran down the hallway to his room. I knocked, twice, but the music was so loud I doubted he could hear anything. I opened the door. He was sitting on the edge of his bed, taking his shoes off. He looked up and saw me standing there. “Didn’t your mom teach you to knock?” he asked, getting up and turning down the stereo.
“I did, but your music was so loud you couldn’t hear me. You probably woke up the whole house, Conrad.” I
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stepped inside and closed the door behind me. I hadn’t been in his room in a long time. It was the same as I remembered, perfectly neat. Jeremiah’s looked like hurricane season, but not Conrad’s. In Conrad’s room there was a place for everything, and everything was in its place. His pencil drawings, still tacked onto the bulletin board, his model cars still lined up on the dresser. It was comforting to see that at least that was still the same.
His hair was messed up, like someone had been running their hands through it. Probably Red Sox girl. “Are you going to tell on me, Belly? Are you still a tattletale?”
I ignored him and walked over to his desk. Hanging right above it there was a framed picture of him in his football uniform, the football tucked under his arm. “Why’d you quit, anyway?”
“It wasn’t fun anymore.” “I thought you loved it.”
“No, it was my dad who loved it,” he said.
“It seemed like you did too.” In the picture he looked tough, but I could tell he was trying not to smile.
“Why’d you quit dance?”
I turned around and looked at him. He was unbuttoning his work shirt, a white button-down, and he had on a T-shirt underneath.
“You remember that?”
“You used to dance all around the house like a little gnome.” 190
I narrowed my eyes at him. “Gnomes don’t dance. I was a ballerina, for your information.”
He smirked. “So why’d you quit, then?”
It had been around the time my parents got divorced. My mom couldn’t pick me up and drop me off twice a week all on her own. She had a job. It just didn’t seem worth it anymore. I was bored of it by then anyway, and Taylor wasn’t doing it anymore either. Also, I hated the way I looked in my leotard. I got boobs before the whole rest of the class, and in our class picture I looked like I could be the teacher. It was embarrassing.
I didn’t answer his question. Instead I said, “I was really good! I could have been dancing in a company by now!” I couldn’t have. I wasn’t that good, not by any stretch of the imagination.
“Right,” he said mockingly. He looked so smug sitting there on the bed. “At least I can dance.”
“Hey, I can dance,” he protested. I crossed my arms. “Prove it.”
“I don’t have to prove it. I taught you some moves, remember? How quickly we forget.” Conrad jumped up off the bed and grabbed my hand and twirled me around. “See? We’re dancing.”
His arm was slung around my waist, and he laughed before he let me go. “I’m a better dancer than you, Belly,” he said, collapsing onto his bed.
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I stared at him. I didn’t get him at all. One minute he was broody and withdrawn, and the next he was laughing and twirling me around the room. “I don’t consider that dancing,” I said. I backed out of the room. “And can you keep your music down? You already woke up the whole house.”
He smiled. Conrad had a way of looking at me, at you, at anybody, that made everything unravel and want to fall at his feet. He said, “Sure. Good night, Bells.” Bells, my nickname from a thousand years ago.
He made it so hard not to love him. When he was sweet like this, I remembered why I did. Used to love him, I mean.
I remembered everything. 192
