by Kate Brian
Megan sighed and glanced at her watch, then hung her head in defeat. It was already a quarter to twelve. The first test of her curfew and she was going to fail miserably. This night was definitely done and Megan was more than ready to stick a fork in it.
“I’m good,” she said, shoving herself up, then reaching her hands out to help Aimee. “Let’s get the heck out of here.”
* * *
“It’s this one, right here,” Jenna directed, pointing at a small cape house that was just like all the others on the street. Megan brought the little Focus to a stop and put it in park, letting out a sigh. It was twelve on the dot.
“You sure?” Megan asked.
“Sure, I’m sure. It’s my house, right?” Jenna replied. Then she narrowed her eyes and leaned forward. “They are all exactly the same, though, aren’t they?”
“It’s number twenty-two,” Megan said, glancing at the mailbox.
“Yes!” Jenna lifted her arms. “That’s it!”
Megan rolled her eyes and got out of the car. Jenna walked around to the driver’s side.
“Thank you so much, Megan,” Jenna said, falling against her in a hug. She still smelled vaguely of vomit. “I swear I’m never going to drink again.”
“It’s no problem,” Megan said. She held her breath and pushed Jenna away lightly.
“Do you have a ride home?” Jenna was wobbling a little bit like she was trying not to fall.
“I’ll figure something out,” Megan said, looking around at the darkened street. “You just go inside. I’ll be fine.”
“Okay. Well, thanks again. I’ll talk to you later,” Jenna said.
Megan watched her walk unsteadily to the front door and waited for her to get inside. Megan took a deep breath and sat down on the back bumper of the car, pulling her cell phone out of her bag. Finn had helped her program all the McGowans’ numbers in on Thursday night, in case of emergency. Who knew they would come in handy this soon?
She scrolled through her address book to Evan’s name and hit the call button. On her drive through town dropping off Aimee, then Bobby, then Jenna, she had already tried him three times and had gotten his voice mail each time. And there it was again.
“Hey, it’s Evan. Leave a message and maybe I’ll call ya.” Chuckle. Beep.
Megan groaned and hung up. If she didn’t feel so sorry for Evan and if she didn’t want to kiss him so badly, she knew she would be ready to kill him by now.
She sighed and scrolled to Finn’s name. He was probably already home, observing the curfew like a good boy, mentally reviewing his date with Kayla. She just hoped his parents weren’t hovering over him, asking questions.
Finn picked up on the first ring.
“Megan?”
“Hey, I kind of have a problem,” Megan said, squinting at the street sign. “I’m stranded on Stony Brook Road. I drove a bunch of people home and now I have no ride.”
“What happened to Evan?” Finn asked.
“You don’t even want to know.” Megan heard a girl’s voice in the background. “Is that Kayla? Are you still on your date?”
“Yeah, kind of,” Finn said.
“Oh God. I’m so sorry.”
“Please. Don’t worry about it. I’ll be right there.”
“I don’t want to mess up your night.”
“Ten minutes,” Finn said. “Don’t move.”
He was there eight minutes later.
Megan fell into the passenger seat of Mrs. McGowan’s Volvo and put her knees up on the dashboard.
“Rough night?”
“You have no idea.”
“Well, it’s not over yet,” Finn said, looking at the clock.
“You think they’re waiting up for us?” Megan asked.
“It’s our first night with a curfew,” Finn said, putting the car into gear. “They’re probably recording our arrival times on my dad’s PalmPilot.”
Megan sighed and stared out the window. She wondered if Doug was home yet. Even the idea of seeing him made her ill.
“So, did you enjoy your first Baker party?” Finn asked as they approached the McGowan house. Evan’s car was already in the driveway.
“It was definitely interesting,” Megan replied. “How was your date?”
The front porch light flicked on just as Finn reached for his seat belt buckle. Megan’s stomach dropped.
“Maybe we should save that story for another time,” Finn said as his father’s face appeared at the window.
“Yeah,” Megan said, bracing herself for whatever was to come. “I guess we should.”
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: Boy Guide
Megan Meade’s Guide to the McGowan Boys
Entry Seven
Observation #1: Boys are capable of being hurt.
Even the ones that seem totally happy and confident and like they pretty much rule the planet.
Observation #2: When the penis takes over, it TAKES OVER.
Doug slept with Hailey. He SLEPT with HAILEY. I can’t even count the number of important and obvious facts that had to be ignored in order for this to happen.
Observation #3: Boys can be counted on.
Finn totally bailed me out when I got stranded. He even cut his date with Kayla short to do it. Of course, when you look at observation #2, it seems they can’t ALWAYS be counted on. So maybe there’s a footnote to this one. Boys can be counted on unless they’re thinking with their penises. Of course, Finn was on a date, so he probably was in penis-thinking mode. Now I’m confusing myself. Hey, did you ever notice what a funny word penis is? Especially when you keep repeating it over and over . . .
Ten
Megan sat at the end of the messy breakfast table on Saturday morning, alone and on edge. All around her were used cereal bowls and half-empty orange juice glasses. She finished off her first bowl of Trix and poured herself a second one, then picked up the bowl and headed for her room. Today seemed like a good day for hiding out.
“Good morning, Megan!” Regina said brightly as she walked into the room. “Going somewhere?”
Megan paused, half out of her chair. “Actually, I was just going to bring this back to my room.”
Regina picked up the coffee carafe and paused. “Oh. I hope you’re not avoiding me because of what happened last night.”
Megan’s face burned as she recalled the scene. She and Finn sitting at this very table. John and Regina’s expressions of disappointment. And those words: You’re grounded. Words that had never been directed at Megan before. The McGowans had appreciated the fact that Megan was late because she had acted as a designated driver, but they had said they couldn’t make exceptions to the rule. So Megan and Finn were off TV, video games, and social functions for one week. Luckily, Megan wasn’t into TV or video games and had sworn off social functions for the immediate future. Still, the fact that she had been punished grated on her. She had been punished. She had never thought it was possible.
“I’m not avoiding you,” Megan said finally. I’m avoiding everyone else. “I just have some homework to do.”
“Okay, well, before you get to that, I was hoping we could talk.” Regina walked over to the table with a cup of steaming coffee.
Megan glanced at the doorway, at freedom. She had been so close.
“About what?” Megan asked.
Regina looked at her, her eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “You know, you looked really nice last night. You should wear pink more often.”
“Uh . . . thanks,” Megan said.
“Well, anyway, I was thinking that you and I should spend some more time together,” Regina said with a smile. “Just the two of us.”
“Oh,” Megan said. “Okay. We could do that sometime.”
“Next Saturday,” Regina said.
Megan blinked.
“I made appointments for us at this great little day spa downtown.” Regina took a sip of her coffee. “We’re going to have the
works. A facial, a massage, manicures, and pedicures. I’ve only been once before, but it was incredibly relaxing.”
The muscles in Megan’s shoulders coiled into knots. Facials, massages, and manicures? That sounded like a whole lot of sitting still. Sitting still while random strangers touched her. The very idea of it made Megan feel stressed.
Besides, next Saturday the team had an all-day practice session—the last one before their first game. They were supposed to elect a captain. It was beyond important.
“What do you think?” Regina asked eagerly.
“Oh . . . uh . . .” Megan looked down at her gnawed fingernails. “Actually, I think . . .”
She glanced at Regina. Her smile looked so hopeful and excited. This woman was practically throwing herself at Megan’s feet, begging for a girly day.
Megan suddenly remembered everything the McGowans were doing for her—how very much she owed them. And she had already let them down twice.
“I think it sounds great,” Megan said finally, forcing a smile. Regina’s grin widened.
“Perfect! This is going to be such fun!”
“Yeah,” Megan replied. “Can’t wait.”
“You know, I have a couple of pink sweaters in my closet,” Regina said. “You can borrow them whenever you want.”
“That’s okay.”
“No! You should!” Regina said brightly. “Why don’t we go try them on? You can see what you think.”
“Really, I—”
“Oh, stop being so polite. I insist!” Regina said, standing. “Come on.”
Slowly Megan stood up from the table and followed Regina to the stairs. More pink, she thought with a sigh. Yippee.
* * *
“Just keep your head up, dude. Don’t be afraid of the ball. You own the ball.”
Megan put her textbook aside and peeked through the blinds. In the yard down below, Ian stood with his shoulders hunched, clutching a baseball bat with his lips pressed closed in concentration. Doug stood a few yards away with a glove and a ball.
“Okay, ready?” Doug asked.
Ian nodded and Doug threw an arcing pitch right in Ian’s strike zone. Ian pulled back and let her rip, line driving the ball right at Doug’s head. Megan gasped.
“See?” Doug said smiling, rubbing his skull with one hand. “You’re like a little Ortiz!”
Ian grinned unabashedly and Megan sat back. The guy in the backyard helping his little brother learn to hit just did not seem like the kind of guy who could sleep with his brother’s girlfriend. Doug might hate Megan, but he obviously loved his brothers. Was it possible Jenna had just been mistaken about what she’d seen?
Megan sat forward on the window seat. She couldn’t sit still anymore. She shut down her computer and headed outside to the shed. Finn had been in there for at least an hour. Maybe he was due for a break.
Both Ian and Doug froze when she walked out the back door.
“Hi,” she said. “Nice hitting.”
“Thanks,” Ian replied.
“What? Nothing about the pitching?” Doug asked.
Megan shrugged and opened the door to the shed quietly. Finn was staring, his brow creased, at his half-finished painting of Kayla Bird. He had filled in a lot of the hair and had started on the neck, but the painting was still faceless.
“Hey,” she said quietly.
“Hey,” Finn said, glancing over his shoulder. He had the end of a paintbrush clenched between his teeth. “You’re just in time.”
“For what?” she asked as she slipped inside.
“My nervous breakdown,” Finn said with a wry smile, dropping his paintbrush onto the easel’s shelf. He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes and sat down on an old garden bench that was pushed up against the wall. “I suck. Did you know that you are in the presence of a person who completely and utterly sucks?”
“Ouch,” Megan said, wincing. She glanced at face-free Kayla. It was actually pretty freaky to look at—just the bare minimum of her facial features sketched out with pencil, surrounded by all that detail, all those colors.
“I thought after last night, you know, if I went out with her, that I would be inspired and I might actually finish this one, but . . .” Finn threw up a hand toward the painting and sighed. “I got nothing.”
“So the date wasn’t inspiring?”
“Apparently not,” Finn said, wiping his palms on his jeans.
“So . . . what happened?” Megan asked, climbing onto the stool.
“I don’t know, I just felt like . . .” Finn sat forward and rested his elbows on his thighs. “I felt like she was kind of looking down on me. She wasn’t having fun at the party, fine. So we go to Starbucks and we’re talking and it’s like she’s been all over the world, you know? And she kept asking me, have I been here, have I been there?”
“And you haven’t been here or there.”
“Or anywhere,” Finn said, smiling wanly. “There’s not a whole lot of world traveling with seven kids. It’s pretty much Cape Cod and Florida.”
“Right,” Megan said. “Well, did you tell her that?”
“Yeah, I cracked a joke about it, but I could tell she was disappointed,” Finn said. “It’s like I’m some kind of leper just because I’ve never skied Vail or seen the Eiffel Tower.”
“Oh, overrated,” Megan said.
“You’ve seen it?” Finn asked.
“When I was a kid.”
“That’s right—you’ve been everywhere too,” Finn said. Then he smirked. “Maybe you should go out with her.”
“I don’t think she’s my type.”
Finn laughed and Megan beamed.
“Well, she’s definitely not a soccer party kind of girl; that much I know.” His eyes dropped down and he picked at a dried paint chip on the leg of his jeans.
Megan took a deep breath. “Look, Finn, I have lived in a lot of places and I’ve met a lot of people and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that some people will always find a way to feel like they’re better than everyone else around them,” she said. “It sounds like Kayla is one of those people. She doesn’t get that just because you have different experiences . . . because you like one thing and she likes another, that doesn’t make her better. It just makes the two of you different.” Megan bit her lip. “Did that make any sense?”
“Yeah, it did,” Finn said.
“And if she thinks she’s better than you, then she is just wrong,” Megan said. “And not worth it.”
Finn looked up at Megan and suddenly she felt totally self-conscious. But she meant everything she had said. She knew she was right. But something about the way he was looking at her was making her feel like he could see under her skin.
“Can I paint you?” Finn asked.
Megan blinked. “Okay, that’s basically the last thing I ever thought you were gonna say.”
Finn was on his feet and removing Kayla’s painting from the easel before the rush of heat had eased from Megan’s face. Suddenly he was a flurry of motion, cleaning brushes, squirting paint onto his palette, crumpling paper towels and launching them toward an overflowing trash can in the corner.
“So, can I?” he asked.
“Uh . . . I guess,” Megan said, already feeling awkward.
If there was one thing Megan wasn’t, it was a model. She had never seen a freckle-faced, broad-shouldered, thick-calved girl in the pages of Tracy’s fashion mags. Not once.
Finn was busily arranging his easel, which faced the back wall. Megan started to push herself off her stool. “Should I—?”
“No! No. Stay right there,” Finn said. He picked up his easel and turned it so that the back of the contraption was facing her and her stool. “That’s good. I like the light right there.”
Megan glanced up at the skylight and the blue sky beyond. “Am I gonna have to sit still for this?” she asked. “’Cuz I’m not very good at that.”
Finn grinned and peeked at her over the top of his clean canvas. “Don’
t worry. We’ll figure it out.”
Megan sat and watched Finn as he worked, sketching her outline, the pencil scraping lightly against the cloth. He was riveted, concentrating, but his arms and hands seemed to move of their own volition. Watching him was mesmerizing. Even when he looked up at her, she found that she couldn’t tear her eyes away. She kept catching his glance, looking directly into his eyes. Megan’s skin grew warm under his intense scrutiny. She lifted her ponytail off the back of her neck to get some air and the ends of her hair tickled her skin. Her breath came quick and shallow.
“You okay?” he asked.
Megan instantly blushed and averted her gaze. “Yeah, fine.”
“’Cuz we can stop if you don’t want to do this,” Finn replied.
“No, I’m . . . I’m okay,” Megan said. Truth be told, everything inside her and around her felt charged. She could have sat there all day.
“Good,” Finn said.
Megan’s whole body felt a pleasant, tingling warmth. For a split second, neither of them moved.
The sound of shouting voices obliterated the silence. Megan turned to look toward the door of the shed. The shouting was coming from inside the house and getting closer. Finally the back door creaked open and slammed and the argument went into stereo surround sound.
“Are you gonna tell me the truth? Are you gonna tell me the truth?” Evan shouted over and over again.
Finn dropped his pencil and ran out of the shed, Megan right on his heels. Doug and Evan were going toe-to-toe in the center of the yard. Evan’s eyes were wild as he glared down at Doug, whose skin was blotchy and red. Their faces were millimeters away from each other. Ian had fled the scene.
“Tell me, man. Tell me what happened,” Evan said, shoving Doug with both hands.
“Evan!” Finn shouted.
“You already know, man. Why you doggin’ me?” Doug shouted, stepping toward him again.
“’Cuz I wanna hear you say it,” Evan replied. “I want my little brother to tell me to my face that he banged my girlfriend, that’s why.”
“What?” Finn said under his breath.
The back door of the garage opened and Sean walked out, wiping his greasy hands on an even greasier rag. He shot Finn an inquisitive look and Finn just shrugged. Megan felt sick to her stomach. Apparently she was the only one here who knew what was going on.