by J C Wing
Quickly, Zac pushed his hand into the pocket of his jeans. Edie thought she saw a flash of white disappear into his Levi’s.
“What in the hell are you doing in Willow’s room?” she demanded. “No, better question, what are you doing in her house at all?” She walked up to him, and he didn’t move away. He stared down at her, his long bangs nearly covering one eye.
“I was invited,” he told her. “Just like everyone in the sophomore class.” He gave her a sideways grin. “Who the fuck pulls lame ass shit like that anyway?”
“Shut up,” Edie hissed. “And get the fuck out, Zac.”
“Who’s gonna make me? Sure as hell not you, snack size. You weigh what, ninety pounds sopping wet?” He moved his intimidating build forward. Edie held her ground. “You ain’t nothin’ but a little bitch.”
“A little bitch that knows how to scream bloody murder. You so much as think about touching me and I’ll have Elias up here so fast you won’t know what hit you.”
Zac stepped out Edie’s personal space, but his eyes never left her face. “You’re more trouble than you’re worth, you know that?”
Edie’s eyes burned hot. “Get. The. Fuck. Out.”
Zac moved, his body turning so he could keep watching Edie as he left the room. On his way past, he lunged forward, almost knocking their foreheads together. Edie didn’t flinch. When he was through the door, he finally turned. Edie could hear him jog down the stairs. It wasn’t until the noise died off that she finally took a breath.
Willow found herself standing outside the last stall of the Larsen’s three car garage an hour later. Edie ran up beside her, pulling her coat tightly around her body.
“What took you so long?”
“I had to pee.” Her words were colored with irritation. “This better be good,” she said under her foggy breath. “I’m freezing my ass off out here.”
Elias hit the remote he held in his pocket, lifting the door with a quiet hum. Willow’s eyes widened when her dad drove a car out of the garage. It wasn’t just any car. It was a ’69 Ford Mustang, and under the bright yard lights, Willow could see that it was painted a shiny, ice blue.
“Holy—”
Edie interrupted by emitting a low whistle. “That’s pretty good.”
Alex climbed out, the engine still running. He smiled as he watched Willow, her eyes wide.
“Are you for real?” she asked, her gaze never leaving the car. She walked toward it, her arms outstretched. She touched the hood, her fingers trailing over the paint as she made her way to her dad.
“I’d been looking for one just like this for a while, then came across someone at the hospital who was interested in selling,” he told her. “Elias did some work to it. That’s the factory color, but he had it repainted.”
“Winter Blue,” Elias threw in. “I’ve gone over her from headlights to taillights. She’s not perfect, but she’s damn near close.”
Corinne shook her head. “I never did understand the whole idea of referring to cars as females.”
“She’s beautiful,” Willow said, further irritating her mother, this time unintentionally.
Alex handed Willow the keys. She moved her eyes from the car enough to look at him with a huge smile on her face. She launched herself at him and he laughed as he wrapped his arms around her.
“Thank you so much!” she squealed, bouncing up and down. “I can’t believe it! I love it! Thank you!”
“There will be rules,” Corinne said, loudly enough to be heard over Willow’s excitement.
Edie threw a quick glance in her direction. She almost felt sorry for her. Edie wasn’t sure how long she’d spent planning Willow’s big birthday bash, but she knew Mrs. Larsen had agonized over every tiny detail. Willow wouldn’t remember much about the party itself, but she sure as hell would remember the second she saw her dad pull this car out of the garage.
“She’s got to her license first,” Elias reminded her.
“How about Monday after school?” Alex suggested.
“She’s ready.” Elias looked over at his mother, an apologetic look on his face. “I’m sorry,” he said, “but she had her permit.”
“I wanted a 4.0,” Corinne told him.
“She’s got a 3.8,” Edie offered up in Willow’s defense. “And neither Dylan nor I would be passing geometry if it wasn’t for Will.”
Corinne wasn’t happy, but there was little she could do about it. Willow had pulled away from Alex and was watching her mom. The two of them stared at each other for several long moments before Corinne sighed.
“There will be rules,” she repeated.
Willow let out another squeal and looked over at her brother. “Get in,” she said. “I wanna go for a ride!”
GOOD JUJU
Willow sat on the W2 bus headed for the Biltmore Mall the following afternoon. After she, Edie and Elias had gone on their drive, she’d parked in the garage, then the girls had gone over every square inch of the car.
Before Elias left them to it, he’d popped the glove box. “Dad left you another present in there,” he said. “Don’t stay out here too long, ya hear? It’s getting cold. It’d be hard to drive your new car with frostbit fingers.”
Willow reached into the glove box and pulled out coupons for free oil changes and car washes. She also found a bag filled with cinnamon juju bears, her favorite candy.
“Wow,” Edie joked, “a Mustang and gummy bears.” She gave Willow a smile. “Damn fine birthday, even if you did have to wear makeup.”
Willow pulled the candy from her bag and began nibbling on a bear as the bus moved along. In another twenty minutes, they were pulling up to the mall and Willow gathered her things. She spotted Jason’s pale yellow Jeep in the lot and headed toward it after she’d disembarked.
“Hey, birthday girl,” Jason greeted as she slipped into the passenger seat. She leaned over and kissed him before he could say another thing, and when she pulled away, he was smiling. “Hi,” he laughed.
“Hi, yourself.” She kissed him once more before settling back into her seat and belting herself in.
He watched her for a moment. “You’re beaming.”
“Well, Mom threw a party for me last night.”
Jason raised an eyebrow. “I wouldn’t think that would be a good thing.”
“Oh, no,” she agreed with him. “It wasn’t. I never wanted a party. That’s why she didn’t tell me she was planning one. She didn’t even tell E. She invited everyone in my sophomore class. Everyone. Who does that?” She looked incredulous.
“Your mom, apparently.”
Willow shook her head. “If I was in Kindergarten, I could see that. Maybe. But high school? I’m gonna hear about this until I graduate. Longer than that, probably. She invited their parents, too, and some people that work with my dad.”
“Okay,” Jason said, “so this doesn’t sound like a good thing. Why are you so happy?”
Willow shifted in her seat, straining to pull the keys from her jeans pocket. “’Cause, my dad and Elias did something super cool that kinda cancelled out the whole party thing.”
“Are those car keys?”
“Yes!” She bounced in her seat and Jason’s head moved up and down in order to hold his gaze on her face.
“Wow, score one for the Larsen boys.”
“Oh, my god, you don’t even know.” She became even more animated and Jason laughed. “It’s a ’69 Mustang, Jay. They restored it. Elias said the color is Winter Blue. It’s beautiful. And it’s mine.”
His eyes studied her face and his smile dimmed. “That’s awesome, Will. It really is.”
“Wait.” She narrowed her eyes. “What’s wrong?”
“You’re so excited. And I love that, but the stuff I have planned for you today—”
“Oh, no,” she stopped him. “Don’t you see? This is a good thing. I won’t have to hitch anymore. You hate it when I do that, right?”
“I do,” he nodded, “I definitely hate that.”
“And it won’t take me so long to meet you now. That means we get to spend more time together, and,” she said, still excited, “we can see each other more often.”
Her blue eyes were alight, and she hadn’t stopped smiling since she stepped off the bus. He thought she was quite possibly the prettiest girl he’d ever seen.
“You’re right,” he conceded. “Those are all really good things.” He took the key ring from her and held it up. “I can’t wait to see it.”
“Good,” she said, cupping her hands beneath the keys. “Now, enough about the car. We’re wasting our time together.”
Jason gave her a smile. “Okay,” he said, dropping the keys and easing them out of the parking space. “Let’s go have some fun.”
Chestnut Hill was an unincorporated community south of Asheville proper. Outside of the city, trees and other vegetation had a chance to flourish a bit, shielding one house away from another. Jason turned down Park Grove Way, and Willow watched as the leaves floated down from the tall trees that lined each side of the street. The blue sky peeked through the branches high above, and the early afternoon sun fell on the leaf strewn black top like the spots on a dappled horse.
The house that Jason shared with his mom was a small one. It had two bedrooms and one small bath. The oversized window in the living room was covered in a fabric of swirling light and dark blues. Many other things in the house—throw pillows, the tablecloth, the spread on her bed—bore fabric in the same random yet creative patterns and had been dyed by Nicole. The tiny space smelled of lemongrass incense, and on every flat surface the sun could find was a collection of potted plants.
She’d heard many stories about Jason’s mom. She was flighty and frivolous, unreliable and irresponsible. Willow had seen a few photographs of the woman strewn about the house. In one of them, she held a young Jason on her lap. Their eyes were the same; a deep brown with cinnamon flecks. Her hair was much lighter. The darker roots told Willow the strands had been bleached, and her skin was paler than that of her son’s.
Jason had never met his dad, and there were no photos of him anywhere. Nicole had admitted years ago that she wasn’t exactly sure who his father was but based on the way his mother went through boyfriends, Jason was sure the list of suspects was a long one.
Jason unlocked the back door and the two of them stepped into the kitchen. There was a small, round table nestled in the corner and an ivy plant resting on the windowsill, long trails of almost heart-shaped leaves snaking out in all directions and climbing up the framework of the window.
“I didn’t get a good look at your chin,” Jason said, shrugging out of his coat and draping it over the back of a dinette chair.
Willow stepped closer to him, tipping her head back so he could inspect the wound. “Stitches come out on Wednesday.”
“It’s healing nicely,” he said, pressing a kiss against her skin.
“I’ll have a scar.”
“It will give you even more character.”
Willow laughed. “Mom says I have too much of that already.”
“Hmmm,” Jason shook his head. “No disrespect to the grand party planner or anything, but I’ll have to disagree with her on that one.”
Willow moved her head down and caught his lips with her own. She’d been waiting all week to see him, and she was finally there.
“You taste like cinnamon and sugar.”
Willow smiled, then kissed him again. “Juju bears.” He deepened the kiss and pushed her coat off her shoulders. It slipped down her arms and pooled around her feet on the checkered linoleum floor.
He pushed her backward through the kitchen and into the living room. He was moving her toward the back bedroom, but they never made it that far.
“I have your present, but you can’t open it until after the movie.”
Willow’s long hair was draped over one shoulder and she wore one of Jason’s t-shirts. She watched him move the wood in the fireplace with a poker, heard it snap as it burned. The warmth it emitted made her feel lazy. She burrowed further into the oversized bean bag chair and wiggled her bare feet beneath the knitted blanket Jason had thrown over her.
“Is there a theme?”
“Kinda.”
Satisfied the fire would burn, Jason joined her on the bean bag. He messed with the remote, then snuggled under the blanket.
“You said you hadn’t seen it before, and everyone talks about how romantic it is and stuff …” his voice trailed off. “The theme song is a little mushy for me, but it’s not my birthday …”
Willow watched his face as he talked. Although it was still late afternoon, the room was nearly dark, and she couldn’t see the color pooling in his cheeks. She shook her head and smiled. Boys were so funny when it came to the mushy stuff.
“Shhh …” she told him as the previews began. “I promise I’ll love it, no matter what it is.”
When the movie was over, Willow watched the credits roll on the screen. “All I can say is, you better not be giving me an iceberg.”
Jason rolled his eyes and gave his head a shake. “No, I thought I’d give you a ship instead. That’s real competition against the car you got.”
“Storage for that might be a problem,” she laughed. “Oooh, a dog! You got me a dog like Rose had! What breed was that?”
“A Pomeranian, I think.”
“It was little. I might be able to get that past my mom.”
“I didn’t get you a dog.”
Willow pouted and pretended to be disappointed. Jason leaned over and kissed her protruding bottom lip.
“How about you open it and see what it is?”
“Okay,” Willow said, a bright smile replacing the pout.
Jason laughed and extricated himself from the bean bag. He had a bit of trouble, and Willow giggled as he finally fought his way out of it.
“Remind me not to watch another three-hour movie in one of those things,” he said with a smile as he went to get her gift.
Willow sat up, then crawled to the fireplace. She added another log and watched as the flames licked hungrily at the wood. Her eyes moved up to the mantle and saw a diploma displayed there. Jason Andrew Griffin, Class of 1998. She wondered if he’d been named after someone. Maybe a grandfather, or an uncle. Willow wondered if Nicole knew more about Jason’s dad than she was letting on.
“Now remember,” she heard Jason say, “this was only kinda a theme.”
His footsteps were quiet as he walked back into the living room. He sunk down next to Willow in front of the fireplace and handed her a neatly wrapped box. It was small and fit in the palm of her hand.
“Definitely not a dog.”
“I told ya.”
She smiled and pulled at the red satin ribbon tied around the package. She tore the paper away and lifted the lid to find a necklace nestled inside.
“It’s not the Heart of the Ocean or anything …” Jason told her as she reached in and pulled the golden chain out of the box.
Dangling at the bottom was a locket the size of a dime in the shape of a heart. There was an intricate design engraved on the front, and when Willow opened it, the inside was empty.
“I figured eventually you could put our picture inside.”
“Jason, this is beautiful,” Willow told him, and she meant it. “Help me put it on.”
She handed it to him, then turned and lifted her hair. The chain was long, and when it was clasped, the pendant rested against her breastbone. She moved to face him again, her fingertips still running across the front of the heart.
“Thank you. It couldn’t be more perfect.” She leaned forward and he cradled her face in his hands. The kiss was deep, and Willow wanted to stay there like that with him until they had to break away to catch their breaths. It didn’t last quite that long. Jason pulled away before she was ready for him to.
He smiled. “How about we order some pizza?”
Willow laughed. Boys and the mushy stuff.
FOREVER YOUNG
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The chain was long enough that the locket hid beneath Willow’s shirt. She wasn’t worried about it being seen the next morning when she came down to breakfast and saw that both of her parents and Elias were at the table.
“You got in late last night,” Corinne said, a piece of toast perched between her fingers in mid-air.
“I was home twenty minutes before my curfew,” Willow was quick to point out.
Corinne bit into the toast and chewed as she watched her daughter who was seated next to her.
“Mom said you went and hung out at the mall yesterday,” Elias said, dotting his scrambled eggs with hot sauce.
“Some of my friends and I went and hung out. We ate pizza and saw a movie.”
“I saw Edie’s Blazer in town.” Alex put his coffee cup down. “She didn’t go with you? The two of you are normally attached at the hip.”
Willow watched as Elias scooped eggs into his mouth. He’d always been entertaining at mealtimes, and he winked at her when he caught her gaze.
“It’s like coal being shoveled into a furnace,” she commented, taking a long drink of her orange juice. She moved her eyes to her dad. “E couldn’t go to the mall,” she explained, which would have been true had she been invited to the mall in the first place. “There was an away game yesterday. She and the rest of the squad had stuff they needed to do.”
“They played North Buncombe,” Elias said, remembering to cover his mouth with a napkin before he spoke. “Parker and I went to Weaverville and caught all but the first ten minutes. The Hawks have been strong this year. Too bad there ain’t much left of the season.”
“When’s the last game?”
“The eleventh of November, I think. West Henderson.”
“That ought to be a good one. Henderson will be a tough team to beat.”
Corinne touched Willow on the arm and leaned sideways. “I was thinking we could go back to the mall today. I want to make sure you have what you need for the Biltmore next weekend.”