Amanda Vs The Universe

by Patricia B Tighe

  “All right. But be back by four-thirty. I might need your help with something else.”

  “Fine.” I left the kitchen, my jaw clenched tight. In moments, I’d grabbed my purse and the keys and was sending the SUV down the long gravel driveway. If getting angry was so important to getting over Alex, this was the perfect time to start. I just hoped Kyle would be ready for me.

  ***

  By the time I got to Cady’s house, my frustration with my parents had almost fizzled out. After last night’s wet weather, the sun shone with a heat that sank into my bones. Maybe that was what I needed—just to get out of the house and away from my parents’ stupid plans.

  The front door of the house held a printed card that read “In the Studio,” so I headed around the side of the house, leaping over muddy sections of earth until I made it to the gravel path. The whole backyard seemed like a completely different place in the brightness compared to the murky darkness of last night. I stopped abruptly and headed for the graffiti wall.

  The taggers didn’t get much accomplished before we interrupted them. There was the letter F, obviously, and far below that an SH. But it was the sun in the lower right corner that interested me. The guy had added yellow waves radiating out from the sun’s sharp points. I liked it. He or she, it still wasn’t clear, had an artistic plan for that sun. Surprising that the other taggers hadn’t told him to quit or painted over it. Maybe that meant they were family members or just cared about the shorter guy.

  I went on to the studio door and knocked before I stepped inside. Across the room, Kyle sat on a tall stool, working with clay.

  “Hi,” he said. “You’re here earlier than I was expecting.”

  “Oh.” I paused in the act of closing the door. “Should I come back later?”

  He waved me over. “No, it’s all good. Come on in.”

  I closed the door and meandered around the potter’s wheel to the work table where Kyle sat with grayish smears on his light green T-shirt. More bright light filtered over the area from a skylight above. Small figurines—a few turtles and a frog—had been set off to one side. In front of him rested a partially finished howling wolf.

  “Kyle,” I said, amazement leaking from my voice. “That’s incredible.”

  He gave me a tired smile. Bluish curves circled under his eyes. “Thanks. It’s not done yet.”

  “I can see that.” He’d been etching in tiny lines to give detail to the fur. “But it’s still amazing.” I pointed to the figurines. “Did you do those too?”

  “Yeah. Cady wanted me to make more. Those little things sell really well at the art festivals. They have to dry before we can fire them.”

  I set my purse on an empty area of the table. “Then you paint them?”

  “Yeah, with a glaze. And then fire them again.”

  “Cool.”

  “You want a chair?”

  I shook my head. “I’m too keyed up to sit.” I moved around to the other side of the table.

  “Well, you look better than I feel,” he said. “I’ve only been up about an hour.”

  “Heh, thanks, and lucky you. We’ve been busy since midmorning working on stuff for Geoff’s birthday dinner tonight.”

  He put down his wooden sculpting tool. “Even after having cake at three a.m.?”

  “Yeah. My parents weren’t there, so it doesn’t count.”

  “Right.”

  “I’m probably gonna crash as soon as dinner is over tonight.” I paced the area by the work table. “Where’s Cady?”

  “Napping. She got up long enough to eat and call the police about last night.”

  “Has she asked you to paint over the taggers’ new work?”

  He chuckled. “Not yet. But tell me. What’s got you so worked up?”

  I let out an irritated sigh. “My parents. I asked them if I could skip the stupid big event tomorrow night, and they said no.”

  His eyes widened. “I’m glad they did. I don’t want to do it if you’re not going to.”

  “Aww. That’s sweet.”

  “Shut up,” he said through a laugh. “But seriously, if you find a way out, let me know.”

  “Give me some ideas. Please. I practically begged them, but they said it’s a family tradition and it’s too late they need me, blah, blah, blah.”

  He picked up a box of plastic wrap, tore out a long piece, and used it to cover the figurines. “Uh, we could go to the movies or out to dinner.”

  “No, we need something that seems important, like it can’t happen any other time.”

  He yawned. “Like?”

  “I don’t know. Are there any meteor showers expected? Lunar eclipses?”

  “Heh. I’ll check, but I doubt it. Maybe we could just say we’ve had enough and are headed to California to join a commune.”

  I stopped in my tracks. “Ha! Going old school, huh?”

  He grinned and moved his eyebrows up and down. “Ah, come on. It could be fun.”

  My heart gave a little flip at that smile. It was warm and friendly and—nope. I had to stop this. “Yeah, no. A road trip is definitely something that could be put off until later.”

  “Oh, well. Speaking of putting things off, are you ready to get angry?”

  Sudden nerves hit me, so I pretended not to know what he meant. “I’m already angry.”

  He slid off his stool. “But I’m guessing you’re angry with your parents, not your ex.”

  “No—I mean yes, I’m pissed at him too.”

  He tilted his head. “Are you? You don’t look like it.”

  “I am.” I made a snarly face. “See? Angry.”

  He laughed and walked toward me. “Not angry enough, I think. Come over here. I made something for you.”

  Uh-oh. That didn’t sound good. I wasn’t sure I wanted to do this anymore. But I followed Kyle to the corner of the room where plastic sheeting had been draped. He pulled it aside. “After you,” he said with a grin.

  I walked into the small space. A table had been set up with three piles of gray-brown clay, one especially squishy-looking. “What’s this?” I asked, even though I had a pretty good idea.

  “It’s your pissed-off room, or corner, if you think that fits better.”

  “Okay, so I’m supposed to smash the clay.”

  “That’s the idea,” he said. “I have an extra large smock that should be like a tent on you, and we can cover your hair with a scarf.”

  I ran my damp palms down the side of my shorts. “You’ve thought of everything.”

  “Right? I’m a genius.”

  I laughed. “Are you? What about the actual getting angry part? I’m not sure I can just call it up like a magic spell.”

  “Are you willing to try?”

  My stomach flipped but, why not? I was already there. “You won’t watch, will you? I’m not sure I can have a tantrum with someone watching.”

  “No. I’ll leave.”

  “Okay, then.”

  He picked up a huge tan smock. “Put this on first.”

  I threw it on over my head and slid my arms into billowy sleeves that fell to my wrists. Kyle adjusted the smock at my shoulders and offered me a navy blue bandana. “You need help with that?”

  I shook my head quickly. The last thing I needed was Kyle playing with my hair. I twisted my hair into a bun and put on the bandana, my fingers fumbling as I tried to tie it.

  “Let me,” Kyle said.

  I reluctantly let go and let him attach the bandana’s ends under my hair. His light touch tickled the back of my neck. I shivered.

  “You cold?”

  Might as well tell the truth. “No. It just tickled, that’s all.” At the sparkle in his eyes, I rushed on. “Now I look like some old crone in a fantasy movie.”

  His lips twitched. “A cute old crone. You have freckles, and freckles are always cute.”

  I stared at the piles of clay. Was he trying to help me get mad or turn my insides into a gooey mess? He was being way too sweet. And for m
e, pain always followed sweet, cute boys. I steadied myself with a deep breath. “Okay. What now?”

  He shrugged a shoulder. “You could tell me about your ex.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like how he dumped you and that made you so happy.”

  I scoffed. “Right. That’s what happened.”

  “What did happen?”

  “He texted and said we were done.”

  “He texted? What an ass.”

  I idly poked a finger in a mass of clay, leaving behind a perfect hole. “Yup. And since I didn’t trust that exactly, I drove to his house and talked to him.”

  “I take it that went well.”

  A spurt of irritation rose up, and I swallowed back a snarky reply. He was only trying to help. “No, actually. He dumped me. You already know why.”

  “And that made you really angry.”

  I folded my arms across my chest. Anything to hold back the pain that threatened to leak out. “It devastated me,” I whispered.

  Kyle stepped closer, but then moved back again. “So you were hurt,” he said, biting off the last word.

  What was going on with him? His eyebrows had drawn together, forming two creases. I didn’t know what to say. Or do. So I waited.

  He clenched his jaw. “Did it make you mad?”

  “Of course it did.”

  “How mad?”

  I reared back and flailed an arm. “I don’t know. Angry mad.”

  “Sure you were.”

  “I was. Why are you saying all this? You know how bad being dumped is.”

  “Yeah, I do. But do you really get how badly you were treated? How he used you?”

  “Yes, but not the whole time. Not for all of it.”

  He took me by the arms. “Amanda, you’re beautiful and funny and annoying and competitive, and the only thing your ex saw was that you’re beautiful. He could’ve picked any other hot girl, and it would’ve been exactly the same. He didn’t pick you for you. He picked you to see what he could get. It’s what guys do.”

  His voice was low and fierce. Heat raced all over me. How could he say that? He wasn’t there. He didn’t know what Alex was really like. I yanked out of his hold. “He didn’t—it wasn’t like that.”

  He put on his irritating smug look. “Wasn’t it?”

  “No!” I couldn’t get a deep enough breath inside that stupid plastic-covered corner.

  “Really? You mean he was good to you? Always there when you needed him? Never saying he couldn’t hang out because his parents wanted him home or he had homework or practice or had to run an errand or had some school thing? Not even once?”

  No, not once. All the time. So many times I couldn’t remember how many. Tears burned in the back of my eyes, and I faced the piles of clay. I didn’t want to do this. It was too hard, too much—

  “He used you,” Kyle said quietly. “He used you, and when he didn’t get what he wanted, he dumped you. He probably even laughed about it with his friends.”

  That was it. I swung around and punched Kyle in the chest. He caught my wrists, then bashed my hands into the sloppy clay. Then, with a whoosh of cool air, he lifted the plastic and left. Seconds later, the door banged shut.

  The pile of clay blurred into a gray mass as tears ran down my cheeks. Alex had used me. And I had let him. I smashed my knuckles into the wet clay, hitting it over and over again. Bits of clay flew. I didn’t know if I was angrier with myself or Alex. It didn’t matter. I didn’t know what I was doing. I just punched until I couldn’t anymore. It couldn’t have been more than a minute, but I sank to the floor in a mess of tears and clay, wishing I were home.

  Not at the cabin, but home in San Antonio. In my room, by myself. Exhaustion fell over me, like putting on an oversized coat—it weighed me down. I wiped my nose with the back of my hand. Would I every stop crying? I had to. Kenzie said so.

  Then the plastic covering moved, and Kyle was there, helping me to my feet and wrapping me in his arms. “I’m sorry, I’m really sorry,” he said. “I had to do it. I had to.”

  I burrowed into him, clutching his shirt in my hands, taking comfort from his strong body holding me, even though I knew I shouldn’t. After a minute or so, the tears let up, and my breathing slowed. I didn’t know what to say. And maybe I didn’t have to say anything. But I did. “I’m getting clay and snot all over your shirt.”

  “I’ll put on a clean one.” He ran a hand down the bandana, then handed me a tissue.

  I wiped my nose, still not looking at him. I’d just ugly cried. So much for being beautiful. But that’s what friends did, right? They held you when you cried. I lifted my used tissue. “I’m gonna need a lot more of these.”

  He led me out of the enclosure to a wobbly chair and gave me a whole box of tissues. “I hope you’ll forgive me.”

  His concerned look almost made me cry again. “It’s okay. I know what you were doing.”

  “Are you sure?”

  I nodded.

  “Okay. You want to change out of that smock?”

  “Yes, please.”

  I stood. With a gentle look, he helped me get the covering over my head, took the bandana that came off with it, and tossed them into a pile beside the plastic corner. “Want some iced tea?”

  “That would be awesome.” I frowned at the enclosure. “But shouldn’t I clean that up?”

  “No worries. I’ll take care of it.”

  “You’re being way too nice,” I said in a grumpy voice.

  He smiled. “You’d do the same for me.” He took my hand. “Let’s go. There’s still some cake left.”

  “Ugh.”

  Kyle laughed and pulled me out into the warmth of the sun.

  Seventeen

  The next night, when Cady and Kyle arrived, my parents gathered us in the den to talk about the big event. Extra chairs had been brought in, along with the low stool for Cady’s foot. Gabby twirled a long strand of hair around one finger, Molly tapped a sketching pencil on a small pad of paper, and Kenzie jiggled her leg where she sat on the couch. Dylan ran his hand up and down her back as though to soothe her, Noah stared out the window, Kyle fiddled with his bracelets, and Geoff leaned against the wall, pretending he was in charge of everything.

  I fidgeted in my seat, but then Cady grinned at me, and I couldn’t help but smile back. Whatever happened tonight, at least I had people around that I liked.

  My parents beamed at us like they were about to share the most exciting news on earth. It wouldn’t be, of course. They just always looked like that during these things. “I’m so glad you could all join us,” Dad said. “This is a special event and a new experience that we’re really looking forward to.”

  Kenzie opened her mouth like she was about to start asking questions, but Dad held up a hand. “So, here we go. Jenny?”

  Mom cleared her throat. “Welcome to our very first murder mystery dinner party.”

  “Yay! Do we get to kill Geoff?” Kenzie asked, trying to look innocent.

  “Hey!” Geoff said.

  A few chuckles rang out.

  “Let me get through the explanation before you two start going at it,” Mom said with a smile. She held up a bunch of white three-by-five index cards. “We’re taking a trip back to the old west of Gold City, Arizona.” Geoff groaned. “And these cards hold your identities. You all have fifteen minutes to read about yourselves and then grab a couple of props to help everyone remember who you are. We have costume pieces in the bins placed around the room. Once everyone is ready, we’ll head to the table for dinner. Any questions?

  “Yeah,” Kenzie said. “Do we get to kill Geoff?”

  Even I laughed that time.

  “We’ll see,” Dad said, taking some of the cards from Mom. They strolled around, passing out our new identities, and I tried to keep from chewing my lip off. I was bound to get some insipid character to play. Or a quiet, mousy girl.

  Mom winked when she handed me a card. I stared at it for a long moment, not believin
g what I saw. In the top left corner, they’d written my name in neat printing—probably Mom—and in the top right corner it said “Sheriff Amelia Dawson.” The sheriff? They wanted me to be the sheriff? That was seriously messed up. I probably had a major role in this whole game.

  “Woohoo,” Geoff said. “I’m Wyatt Jackson, stage coach driver.”

  Molly smiled. “I’m Belinda Carter, school teacher.”

  Kenzie looked up from her card. “Seriously?”

  “What is it?” Geoff asked.

  “Clementine Fields, hooker with a heart of gold.”

  The room erupted in laughter. Okay, that one was definitely worse than being the sheriff.

  “All right, guys,” Geoff said. “Sound off. We want to know who you are.”

  Dylan cleared his throat, looking like he was fighting a grin. “I’m Kit McIntyre, owner of the Lonely Rose Saloon.”

  Kenzie nudged Dylan so hard he landed on me. “How dare you make me work for you?”

  “Who said you worked in the saloon?” Dylan asked, straightening back up.

  “Any self-respecting hooker is gonna work in the saloon. Geez.”

  Dylan grinned and ruffled her hair.

  Noah raised a hand. “Jeremiah Tate, owner of the General Store.”

  “Nice,” Geoff said. “I’ll be sure to buy all my beef jerky from you.”

  “And I’m Hattie Miller,” Gabby said, “seamstress and Jeremiah’s fiancée.”

  “Aww,” Kenzie said, “how cute.”

  Gabby blushed even though Kenzie was joking.

  Noah put his arm around Gabby. “I’ve been over the moon since she said yes.”

  “Enough with the true love,” Geoff said with a dramatic sigh. “Cady, how about you?”

  Cady’s eyes sparkled. “I am Eleanor Huntington, sister of Mayor Maxwell Huntington,” she said in a haughty voice.

  Heads naturally turned to Kyle, who looked up from his index card and waved it in the air. “And I’m Theodore Huntington, her spoiled nephew.”

  Geoff coughed out the words, “Typecast much?”

  Kyle laughed. “Shut up, Geoff.”

  I grinned. Just as easy as that, Kyle seemed part of the family. Anyone who was comfortable telling Geoff to shut up could join the Bryson insanity.