His responsible answer is infuriating. Jamison has always been focused and goal oriented, which explains his sudden appearance in Alder Creek. If he wants to get into the creative writing program at Western, he’ll sacrifice what he has to. Whereas I move with emotion, like the wind, deciding daily which way to go depending on how stubborn I feel. Tonight, I feel moody and stagnant.
“I don’t need your help with this,” I say.
“Who said anything about help,” Jamison states. He arranges the glasses in a tidy fashion in the dishwasher. “I’m following an order.”
“Well, I relieve you of your duty. I can do the dishes on my own.”
I go back to rinsing and stacking. Jamison sets down the glass in his hand. “Amoris, it’s been three years . . .”
One of the biggest fallacies about life is this: Most people think that by telling the truth, their lives can go back to the way they were. But that’s a lie. What was can never be again. The truth creates a whole new reality. And until someone is ready to confront the truth, it’s better to just keep your mouth shut.
Even now, Jamison smells the same. Like skin warmed by sunshine. Like wet clothes hung out to dry. Like fresh summer air. Like playing hide-and-seek and sleeping in a tent in the backyard. Like lightning bugs and mosquitoes.
He loads the rest of the plates, checking the sink for any remaining dishes before walking out of the kitchen without another word. But his smell remains, etched in my skin.
“Did you hate New York? Tell me you hated New York,” my dad says, joint between his fingers. Chris Westmore is a pothead. He says weed is the only way he can stand this planet.
“I hated New York.” Hate’s not really the right word, but it’s the one my dad wants to hear, so it’s good enough. My dad doesn’t like “the East Coasters.” They remind him too much of his parents.
He takes a pull of the joint. “Too many phonies.”
“OK, Holden Caulfield.”
“He had a point, you know. People will feed you a lot of bullshit, Amoris, but don’t eat it. You know why?” A coarseness sometimes outlines Chris’s voice, but it isn’t there tonight. The weed must have kicked in.
“Why?”
“Because it’s shit.”
I can’t help but laugh.
We stand on the second-floor bridge that connects Shangri-La and the house next door. It was Rayne’s idea when they built the second house. A connector. So even when Chris is in his studio, he’s always joined to us. My dad turns his face up toward the sky and exhales a long stream of smoke.
“Which one do you think I’m from?” He points skyward, joint nestled between his fingers. Chris has always contended that he’s an alien. Most of the time he just doesn’t get humans. That’s why he paints—to find the beauty of us.
“Don’t distract from the subject at hand,” I say. “Start explaining, Dad.”
“There’s nothing to explain. You heard Kay. Jamison wants to go to Western University next year. Apparently, they have one of the best creative writing programs in the country. It’s hard to get into, but they think he’s got a real shot. The only way they can afford it is to get in-state tuition. And the only way to do that is to live in state. Rayne insisted they live here. So here they are. You know how expensive college is. If you want someone to blame for this, blame capitalism.”
“I don’t want to blame anyone. I just feel . . . blindsided. Why didn’t you tell me? You must have known they were coming for a while.”
“Actually, it all happened last week. Originally, when Rayne proposed the idea to Kaydene a few months ago, Jamison didn’t want to come, but at the last minute, he changed his mind. Did you really want me to call you while you were bashing around New York with your boyfriend?”
“I just can’t get over that it happened so quickly.”
“Well, honey, I hate to break it to you, but all it takes is a week for life to change.” Chris pats my back.
“Thanks, Dad. Real sympathetic.”
He chuckles. “You gotta sway with it, Amoris. Don’t be so rigid.” He grabs my arms and gently shakes my body. “You know what your mom would say.”
“Holding on tight only leads to more tightness.”
“Exactly,” Chris says.
“What about Victor and Talia?” I ask. Jamison’s dad and sister. “Where are they?”
“They’re staying in Kansas City,” Chris says. “Victor can’t leave his teaching job. He’s got seniority and a pension. It’s too hard to start over at another school. And Talia’s only a sophomore. She didn’t want to leave. Kaydene got a teaching job at one of those online schools, so she can work from anywhere.”
Chris exhales the last hit of his joint before turning to face me.
“I’m feeling the Beatles tonight,” he says. “What do you think?”
“Smooth change of subject, Dad.”
“I’m not known for my social graces. You know that.”
“Any specific album?”
“How about . . . Let It Be. I love that one.” Then Chris Westmore looks at me with stars in his eyes. Some days, I think he might truly be an alien. “Let’s create something together, shall we?”
Chris didn’t always live next door in his art studio. He used to share a bedroom with Rayne, and make pancakes on Saturday mornings. Not that I’m complaining. I don’t even like pancakes much anymore. Slowly over the years, Chris moved into his studio. Piece by piece so no one would notice. Rayne would find things missing. A coffee cup. A blanket. Shampoo. A fork. A plate. When she found them next door, instead of bringing them home, she left them there. Maybe she wanted to see if Chris would come back on his own. But he didn’t. He just kept collecting. A chair. An air mattress. His bathrobe. Until one day he was gone from our house. Rayne told me to not take it personally.
“You’ve listened to enough of Grandma’s music to know your dad’s a rolling stone,” she said. “Stop him and you’ll end up crushed.”
At these moments, it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter that my dad’s a pothead who can’t stay in one place for more than three months without verging on insanity, who looks at the sky to find his home when one is waiting for him right next door.
Back in my room, I sit by the open window, guitar in hand. The light is on in his studio, window open. Tonight, music will flow out my second-floor window and fall downward into his, filling his room while he works.
I play as the night turns extra dark, the lights around Alder Creek turning off one by one, the town quieting, until my dad’s lights and mine seem to be the only two left.
When my fingers hurt and my arms are tired, I set my guitar to the side. I check my phone. It’s after eleven. I’ll pay for the late night tomorrow at work, but I’ve missed my guitar. I found myself playing chords on subway seats and restaurant tables and benches in Central Park last week.
Zach sent me a text a few hours ago.
The city seems to know you’ve left. It’s quieter tonight. FaceTime?
He’s one of those utterly annoying people who writes in complete sentences and uses correct punctuation in every text.
“It’s the principle of it,” he told me once. “If I cut corners with my text messages, I’ll start cutting corners in my life.”
It’s past one in the morning on the East Coast. I don’t want to wake Zach up by messaging him back. I’ll respond tomorrow.
I’m ready to call goodnight to Chris when I see Jamison standing on the second-floor bridge. He turns from looking at the stars to looking directly at my window.
I quickly turn off the light, painting myself against the wall so Jamison can’t see me, my phone clutched to my chest. I text Zach, forgetting that a moment earlier I decided not to.
Miss you.
It’s a bullshit text, but it makes me feel steadier. When I look to find Jamison again, he’s gone.
3
CRIME AND PUNISHMENT
Namaste, bitches!” Ellis Osmond shouts as she and Sam Pennington walk t
hrough the door of Get Sconed Café. It’s Saturday afternoon, and the postyoga rush is finally dying down. In some towns, people get together at church on Sunday, followed by barbecues and football games. In Alder Creek, people flock to Jenna Finnigan’s Saturday morning vinyasa yoga class. Religiously. They cram into her studio, mat to mat, the smell of incense permeating the room, the collective om ringing out through the open windows in summer. People leave blissed out and in desperate need of coffee. Most come to the café for their caffeine fix.
Ellis cuts the line at the register and grabs my hands. “Oh my God, Amoris, we missed you. Never leave again. At least, not without me. This town is dismal without you.”
“You’re such a drama queen, Elle.” Sam apologizes to the customers in line for cutting, then turns to me. “Not to say we didn’t totally miss you, Amoris. We did.” He leans on the counter and smiles. “So . . . tell us everything. Is New York as fabulous as Carrie, Samantha, Miranda, and Charlotte make it out to be?”
Sam likes to binge old TV series. He’s obviously started on Sex and the City.
“Who would I be?” Ellis asks. “Please say Carrie.”
“You wish, Samantha.”
Ellis balks. “Whatever, Miranda.”
“How could you?” Sam says, aghast. “I’m totally Charlotte.”
“While this conversation is existential and life changing on many levels, can we talk about this later?” I ask. “I’ve got customers.”
“Whatever, you practically own this place,” Ellis says. “They can wait.”
“No, I don’t own it. And no, they can’t wait,” I say.
Ellis dramatically rolls her eyes. “We can argue about this in the car. Come on, let’s go.” She tugs on my T-shirt.
I didn’t text her this morning because I knew she’d try to convince me to ditch work, but Ellis can see the truth on my face right now, and she’s not happy about my decision. “No, Amoris. You can’t bail on us.”
“I told Marnie I’d pick up a shift this afternoon. Eddie called in sick. You know how busy the town is right now. I couldn’t leave her hanging.” I attempt to sound disappointed.
“Fast Eddie isn’t sick,” Ellis scoffs. “He’s too stoned to come to work.”
That’s probably true. Ellis’s nickname is an oxymoron. Eddie has never done anything fast. He’s too high all the time.
“You know what I’d do?” she asks.
Sam chimes in. “Murder?”
“Too messy,” Ellis says. “You know I hate cleaning up. That’s what our housekeeper is for.”
“Snob much?” Sam says sarcastically. “Do you even know her name?”
“Of course I do. It’s Lucía. And I’m just stating a fact. It’s her job to clean, just like it’s Amoris’s job to make coffee. And my dad pays Lucía well. Better than most people in this town pay their cleaning people.” Ellis turns back to me. “You’re just enabling Fast Eddie, Amoris. You’ve covered for him, like, a million times this summer. And he’s an adult. Like an old adult.”
“He’s only forty-five,” I say.
“Don’t get me started on the fact that a forty-five-year-old, grown-ass man works at a coffee shop,” Ellis states. “He needs a real job.”
“He also works at the dispensary,” I offer.
“Fast Eddie is really going places,” she jokes.
“I haven’t covered for him that much.”
“Yes, you have. But when has he ever covered for you?” Ellis waits for my answer, and when I give her none, she knows she’s won on some level. “My point exactly. Screw Fast Eddie. You’re too nice. I’d make Marnie fire him. Why should you suffer because he’s incompetent? He’s taking advantage of you.”
It’s true that Eddie loves weed. It’s also true that he calls in “sick” more that he should. But Eddie’s the longest employee to have ever worked at the café. He was the last person my grandma hired before she died. He knew her. He tells stories of what the café was like back then. I would never want him fired. He’s been working here for as long as I’ve been alive. If I lost him, it would feel like losing a piece of my grandma.
“I’m sorry, Ellis.”
“Sorry isn’t good enough, Amoris. You promised.”
“I’ll make it up to you,” I say. “Whatever you want.”
Ellis perks up. “Whatever I want?”
I probably shouldn’t have said that, but it’s out there now.
“Fine,” she says. “I forgive you. But you owe me.”
Before I can put any parameters on my impending payment, a middle-aged customer chimes in behind Ellis. “Excuse me, but you’re really holding up the line.”
“I’m not done placing my order,” she says.
“But you cut in front of all of us,” the man says.
Ellis turns on him, her dark-brown hair whipping around and cascading over her shoulder. “You know, caffeine shrinks your balls. You might want to think about that before you order another latte.”
The man appears completely confused. “What?”
A woman behind him groans. I can feel the customers’ eyes pressed on me.
“Either come with us now, or suffer the consequence,” Ellis says to me.
I’m not going to win this battle. “Suffer the consequence,” I say. “Now move out of the way so people can order.”
Ellis steps aside then. “See you tonight at Sam’s,” she says. “And tell Fast Eddie to get his life together. He’s ruining mine.” She turns to leave. Death stares follow her out. Ellis ignores them all. Sam lingers at the counter, watching me.
“What?” I ask. “Not you, too. I said I’m sorry.”
“You don’t owe me anything,” Sam says. “I love that you protect Eddie.” But he’s still glaring at me like he’s got a secret he’s dying to tell me. Or maybe he thinks I have a secret that I’m desperate to tell him. Either way, it’s not the look I like to see on Sam. He’s too perceptive. “You’re acting . . . different.”
Some days I hate that he’s an artist, like Chris—an alien, analyzing human specimens.
“Did anything happen in New York?” he asks. “You didn’t break up with Zach, did you?”
“No.” I state the truth, but a lie is quick to follow. “Nothing’s happened.”
Sam doesn’t press me. It’s one of the things I love best about him. He knows when to accelerate and when to hit the brakes. Ellis, on the other hand, drives however she damn well pleases.
“Well,” Sam says, “I can’t wait to hear all about New York, Carrie.”
I shove my hands into my pockets. “Carrie would never wear dirty overalls.”
“Yes, she would,” Sam says. “And she wouldn’t care what people thought about it.”
At the end of my shift, I head straight to Black and Read Records and Books. The listening booth at the back of the store has been a therapist to me since I was little. Designed like a British phone booth—tall and red, but slightly wider to accommodate a bench and a turntable—the listening booth is completely soundproof. Anything you say or play is locked inside. It knows more of my secrets than Rayne does.
I grab an album from the store’s vast collection and close the door. The record crackles as it comes to life. I sit down and practically melt into the bench.
The truth is, I offered to work the extra shift for Eddie. The moment Marnie announced that he called in sick, I was quick to cover. Working sounded drastically better than shopping. And I was hoping I might have extra time to come here after, to lock myself away and think. Or even better, not think, and just let the music make noise in my head for a while.
Ellis has never worked a day in her life and thinks I’m crazy for having a job when I “should be having fun,” but Get Sconed Café is so much more than just a job. It’s a part of my family. Like Shangri-La, its bones are my grandmother’s. And if I’m ever lucky enough to be able to, I want to buy it back. That’s one of the reasons I took the job in the first place. I’ve been working there since freshman y
ear, saving paycheck after paycheck. I don’t blame Rayne for selling it. It was the right thing for her to do. But the older I get, the more I know it’s meant to be mine. I can’t help but think Grandma would want it back in my hands.
The music plays on, and I try to relax and let the past twenty-four hours melt away. I’ve been tense ever since Rayne said the name Jamison Rush. And no massage could get rid of it. Jamison is in my bones. I thought I was over it. I’ve done my best to ignore him for the past three years. And when there were hundreds of miles of distance between us, it wasn’t that hard. Life moved on. But now that our bedrooms are mere feet from each other, it’s as if everything I pushed away has come back in a tidal wave.
Music isn’t working like it normally does. I exchange one album for another, but my mind chews on memories that are too strong, even for the sound booth’s usual tonic effect.
Black and Read is where I met Zach Hillsborough. I was in this very listening booth when I saw him. I watched him for a while, wandering like a lost puppy and looking like a young Republican.
“The books are in the back,” I said.
“Who said I’m looking for a book?” Zach asked.
“You just look like the type.”
“And what type is that?”
I gestured to his buttoned-up exterior. “A snobbish intellectual who wants to write the next great American novel.”
“Actually,” Zach said. “I hate reading. It’s a total bore. Can’t keep my eyes open. But life is all about looking the part, right?”
“Well, you’re doing a good job.”
He smiled at me in this gleaming, endearing way before confessing that he had never been in the store before and just wanted to check it out.
“This might sound crazy,” Zach said, “but I think I came in here so I could meet you.”
“Either that’s a load of total bullshit, or you are crazy.”
“Do you want to get coffee with a lunatic?” he asked. “There’s this place just down the street. Best scones you’ll ever have.”
That’s how it started. It was so easy and natural that it seemed like Zach was right—like we were meant to meet that day. But it doesn’t feel that simple anymore.
Only the Pretty Lies Page 3