“I don’t want to work on the paper anymore,” she said petulantly. “And he’s not my boyfriend yet and he’s not out of the country.”
“Did you even proofread the thing? I’ll bet you forgot to put a Works Cited page on the end of it,” Nick said as he continued his show of marching Maddie across the pavilion. It was only a show, though; she was walking alongside him quite willingly.
“Oh whatever,” she chuffed. “The Works Cited page probably counts for like, one point. Who cares.”
“And no citations, either, I presume,” Nick surmised.
Maddie remained quiet for a moment and said, “Did you put all that junk in your paper?”
“Why, yes, Maddie. I put all that junk in my paper.” He stopped and took a good look at her. “Do you want me to help you fix yours up? If he gives you the extension, I’ll help you.”
Maddie wasn’t dumb. She realized this was Nick’s attempt to get close to her again. But fifteen minutes later, after Humboldt had bought her story and issued a two-week extension, she took Nick up on his offer. She needed all the help she could get.
Chapter 2
“Oh, Karla. His eyes look like Werther’s Originals,” Maddie said. She lay on the kitchen counter, staring up at the ceiling tiles while she lit matches. The car wash she’d hoped for had not, in fact, come to occur. By the time she’d gotten home, the motivation had faded and she’d spent her time flipping through magazines and eating jellybeans. The afternoon was a slow one, and the kitchen was where the action was. Karla was preparing their late lunch: two banana smoothies and two teacups of vitamins. Vitamin C. Glucosamine. Vitamin B.
“Mm, yeah, those caramel hard candies? I know how you like those,” Karla answered as she dropped pills into the little cups. Ginkgo Biloba. A multivitamin. A protein booster pill. Karla believed in vitamins. Whenever she could, she swiped a bottle from the smoothie shop where she worked and brought it home. She then added it to the regimen. She capped a bottle and tallied something in her head. “But even though he’s cute, you’ve got to remember, he’s a hippie. We’re not hippies. It could be a problem.”
“I know,” sighed Maddie, blowing out a match and watching the smoke curl upward and catch on the little draft coming from the open window. “Even his name is hot—Raffie. I thought it was dumb at first but the more often I hear it in my mind, the better it gets.” She listened as Karla counted the pills in a whisper. She counted to 14 twice and then gave a little nod, satisfied that she’d doled them out properly and pushing a teacup toward Maddie.
“To our health,” Karla said, just like she did every afternoon during the pilling. Maddie swung her legs off of the counter and sat, dropping her box of matches onto the rim of the sink. She gathered the pills into her palm, tossed the whole lot of them into her mouth, and chased them down her throat with several big gulps of the banana smoothie Karla had made. Karla knew all the secret formulas from the smoothie shop and she had no ethical qualms about whizzing them up in her own kitchen. They were divine.
“Maddie, I’m all about love, you know. Love is great and everything,” Karla said, pressing a bottle into her stomach as she screwed off the child-proof lid, so that she could add a few additional pills to her own teacup. “But really, love can just jump off a cliff if it means you have to stop washing your hair and you can’t eat cheese around him or whatever. God.” She teased the wad of cotton from the bottle and clutched it in her palm as she fingered out four yellow capsules. “Remember,” she said as she pressed two of the pills into Maddie’s hand, “Take one of these in about an hour, and the other one you break open and rub into your face before you re-do your makeup.” She nodded meaningfully at Maddie’s palm, and slipped her own pills into her pocket. Maddie acknowledged.
“Hippies still eat cheese, Karla. You’re thinking of vegans. Hippies are not necessarily vegans,” Maddie answered, fingering the little pills. They were Vitamin E and did wonders for the complexion—supposedly. “In fact, I think they’re kind of like anti-vegans, drinking milk straight from the cow’s teat and stuff. Anyway, Lauren’s not a vegan. But she is a hippie, and we love her, so maybe Raffie’s cool too.”
“True, true,” said Karla, pensively. “But I knew Lauren in high school, you didn’t. She was a total babe, bleached hair, cheerleader, popular. This hippie stuff is just a phase she’s going through.” She replaced the pill bottles on the windowsill, turning each one label-forward. “We don’t know Raffie. He’s older. Who knows? Maybe this is who he really is. And you do not want some peace-loving, hippie, free-love dipstick for a boyfriend.” She turned to Maddie, propping her hands on her hips and tilting her head. “You don’t. Like I said, I’m all for love, but come on. Be real, missy.”
Maddie reached over and nudged the kitchen faucet until it began a slow drip. She lit another match, enjoying the scraping feel of the tip scratching to life. She let it burn a moment and then teased the flame beneath the water until she finally caught a drop on the tip and it extinguished itself. She dropped the matchstick down the drain into the garbage disposal. “If only we knew what Raff was really like,” Maddie said thoughtfully.
“Ask Rob!” she said, with sudden inspiration.
Karla squinted. “Rob went to Our Lady of Mercy. They don’t turn out hippies, ever, so Raffie probably did not go to school there. So, Rob might not even know Raffie, even though they’re the same age. And besides, if Rob and Raffie know each other, that would be bad. Rob doesn’t like dudes his age dating me and my friends. It’s a little sister thing I guess,” said Karla, shrugging her shoulders.
Maddie twisted her lips in discouragement.
“Bottoms up!” Karla said to herself as she tossed the teacup’s worth of pills down her throat like a neat shot of whiskey. She took a straw-full of banana smoothie into her mouth and summed up the dilemma: “We just don’t know anything about him, Maddie. He’s a mystery. If you ask Lauren, she’ll tell you the answers but she’ll also tell him that you’ve been asking about him. You’ll be showing your hand.”
“Like it freaking matters,” said Maddie, toying with her empty teacup. “How bad can he be? How much worse can he be than any of the other guys who date me? I have been so trod upon this year,” she said, suddenly feeling very sorry for herself. “I am tired of being dumped. I would like, just once, to feel what it’s like to be in a romance movie. Raffie says he’s into romance. Maybe this will be my Summer of Love,” she said, her mouth curling into a wistful grin.
“Oh good lord,” said Karla. “Seriously? You’re not going to throw out all your shoes and start going to see jam bands play at outdoor venues. Are you?”
“I don’t know. I just want to be swept off my feet by romance before I die of old age,” Maddie whined, and then her face split wide into a smile. Karla threw a dishtowel at her, which she caught and then pretended to kiss. “Come on, Summer of Love.”
“You’d have to travel back to the 1960s, girl,” Karla laughed. “I don’t think you’ll find that here! Not here.” She shook her head and tossed the banana peels into the trash.
“Well, anyway, there’s no point in thinking about Raffie. I’ll probably never bump into him again,” said Maddie, although she hoped she was wrong and she knew she’d keep on daydreaming about him anyway. “It was just a fun little thing for him last night, and I’ll bet he hasn’t thought about me all day. Besides, I’m supposed to call Nick and go meet him somewhere to work on my Shakespeare paper,” she said, hopping down from the countertop and sauntering to the fridge. Inside, she found a pitcher of cold tea. Karla had made it. She was a wonderful roommate.
“Nick! Now there’s a guy worth knowing,” Karla answered, twiddling with the twist-tie on a bag of blue tortilla chips. “And he likes you. Why not let him be your Summer of Love dude?”
“I don’t know,” Maddie answered, pouring tea into a glass shaped like a cowboy boot. “He’s handsome enough—”
“—damn straight,” interrupted Karla.
Maddie ro
lled her eyes. “And he’s in good shape, and he’s smart apparently, but none of that changes the fact that he’s just your average preppy boy. I want something more.”
“More what? He’s perfect,” Karla said, crunching loudly.
“More exotic, I guess. More mysterious. Somebody who gives me a thrill. Phone’s ringing.”
Karla tossed the bag aside and rinsed her hands in the sink before disappearing around the corner into the hallway. Maddie drank her tea and gazed out the kitchen window, eavesdropping. After a moment, she put her glass down and slipped out of the kitchen and through the hallway to the phone-nook. The phone nook had originally been the place where the phone would be—back in the 1940s or whenever the building was built—but it had been modified by the current building owners to have an electrical plug; it was now the place where the phone-chargers were. It was a cute touch; the whole place was full of clever little updates like that.
“What’s going on?” Maddie stage-whispered.
“We’re going to a party,” Karla stage-whispered back. She held one finger up in a gesture for Maddie to be quiet.
“Tonight?” Maddie asked. Karla nodded impatiently, and put her hand over her other ear, blocking out Maddie’s voice.
Maddie’s heart began to race. A party on a Friday night that they were formally invited to? Usually they just found out about parties while they were out for the night. This was special. Someone wanted to make sure they knew about it. Someone wanted to make sure they didn’t miss it! She started counting the hours in her head: it was about 4:30 now, so there was plenty of time to plan an outfit, get cleaned up, and have something to eat before 10:00. Good. Maybe even time to go shopping if they needed new clothes.
“It was Lauren,” Karla sang out as she tapped her phone to hang it up, and then plugged it back in to the phone nook. “She’s having a party and we’re supposed to go! Gee, I wonder why it’s so important that we go to this party?” She put a hand to her chin and tapped her foot exaggeratedly.
“Shut up! Really?” Maddie’s head was spinning. “Do you think it’s because of me and Raffie?” Her cheeks felt suddenly hot.
“Well, aren’t you a big dummy!” Karla crowed. “Why else would Lauren call? Has Lauren ever called us to make sure we know about her parties? No. Like, maybe one other time she did and I don’t even think we went. Heck yeah, it’s because of you and Raffie!” She began to hop around in the hallway in a cheerful little dance. “Summer of Love! Summer of Love!” she called out. “Drama! Thrills! A Hollywood romance movie!”
“Stop it!” Maddie said, throwing her hands across her mouth to hide her huge smile. She knew that Lauren was playing cupid. Lauren wasn’t the kind of girl to make a phone call unless she was really motivated. “It’s probably going to turn out to be nothing. I bet he won’t even be there,” she protested, even though she knew better.
“Whatever, crazy girl.” Karla answered. “You need to figure out what to wear.” She eyed Maddie, up and down.
“You’re right,” she replied, as she jogged down the hall to her room and dove into her closet, flipping through her clothes. She dug in a pile of unfolded laundry, looking for her favorite jeans while she thought about what to do with her hair. She found the jeans and shimmied out of her shorts, kicking them across the green and white room.
“Aw, crud, I have to call Nick,” she yelled as she zipped the jeans and reached for a pair of shoes that were lying on the floor. It seemed like a dark cloud had rushed in to block out the shining light of the party. “We’re supposed to go work on my paper. I won’t have time to get ready for this party and work on the King Lear paper tonight,” she said to herself. She twiddled with her bracelets and stared into the air at nothing.
Karla appeared in the doorway and waved her hand in the air dismissively. “Forget Nick. You didn’t actually make solid plans with him yet. Just call him and tell him you guys will meet tomorrow.” She rubbed her spine against the doorjamb.
“Yeah,” Maddie said, pulling her own phone from her pocket and tapping it with her pinkie. “I don’t need to analyze Iago’s psyche tonight anyway. Who cares?” She held the phone up to her ear, listening.
“Iago is the parrot from Aladdin,” said Karla thoughtfully, as she vanished into the bathroom. “I didn’t know that was a Shakespeare reference.”
“Apparently it is,” Maddie muttered. She flicked her hair back from her forehead as Nick answered the call. She was surprised to discover that she felt nervous. She’d never talked to Nick on the phone before and the sound of his voice so close to her ear caused a little tingle in the small of her back. It was an unexpected feeling, for sure.
“Nick, it’s me, Maddie,” she said, rubbing her temple with her fingers. “I can’t do the paper thing tonight. Can we do it tomorrow?”
“Sure, that’s no problem. Uhh,” he said, and she got the feeling he was looking at an old-fashioned wall calendar, the way her dad always did when he was making plans for things. She could picture Nick tapping his finger on the page and thinking. “Let’s meet at the library tomorrow at 10:00. Sound good?”
“At night?” Maddie asked, surprised.
“No,” he answered. “In the morning.” She thought she heard bemusement in his voice.
Maddie hadn’t planned on being awake at 10 a.m., but she didn’t want Nick to know that. Apparently he was the kind of guy who was up with the chickens. “And the library,” she said, with some hesitancy. “What do you—which—what—what library did you mean?”
“The Redwine University library. You know. That big college we go to? It has a library. I’ll meet you at the front steps at 10.” Nick’s voice played across the line. This time she was positive she heard amusement in his voice. In fact, she heard barely-restrained laughter there.
“Okay, Smarty-pants. I just wanted to make sure!” she said, and he let go of his laugh, letting it ring out loud. The sound of it triggered the lower-back tingle again. “I’ll see you at 10,” she said, and she hung up as quickly as she could, immediately thereafter tapping an alarm into her phone for 9:30 a.m.
After riding the vitamin high through suppertime, Maddie sat on the floor of her room and laced up her knee-high brown leather boots. They were Little House on the Prairie boots and Maddie thought they looked vaguely flower-childish. She stood straight and evaluated herself in the bedroom mirror. The boots worked well with the playful short skirt she wore. She turned this way and that, evaluating her thighs. It worked, she decided.
“I have never before dressed to try to impress hippies,” she murmured with an anxious sigh, scrutinizing the bug bites on her legs and wondering if she should try to hide them with makeup.
“You look great,” Karla answered, appearing in the doorway, braiding her hair into long messy ropes. “Is that what you’re wearing?”
“I thought I’d wear a shirt, too,” Maddie said, scrapping the idea of slathering her legs in foundation. “Unless you think I could go without one?” she asked with faux earnestness, gesturing down at her bra and naked tummy.
Karla laughed. “Well, chica, I guess it depends on how bad you want this boy.”
“Not that bad,” Maddie answered with a laugh as she tugged a shirt from a clothes hanger. “Pretty bad, but not that bad.”
“Do you think all those hippies are going to be getting high?” Karla asked as she began trying on different pairs of Maddie’s pants. She was a little thinner than Maddie, so most of the pants didn’t fit quite right. Maddie was often grateful for her own figure when she looked at Karla. Karla had a runway model body, which was nice, but not very cuddly. “I mean, I’d imagine that with hippies, everybody is smoking pot everywhere.”
“I don’t care for stoned people,” Maddie opined as she wriggled into a blousy silk tank top. “I just don’t find them funny.”
“They’re not, unless you’re high too,” Karla said, leaning over to the closet-door mirror and tapping her eyeball gently with her fingertip. She blinked exaggeratedly a fe
w times to adjust the contact lens and turned away.
“I hope Raffie isn’t a wasteoid,” Maddie said.
“Eh, if he’s great enough in all other ways, you can totally ignore that. And you can always change him later,” Karla answered, wandering out of Maddie’s bedroom. Maddie paused, staring contemplatively down at the carpet before nodding and running her fingers through her hair one last time.
Sure, she thought. Wasn’t that standard operating procedure? Find a guy and then change him. But she hoped she wouldn’t have to.
Chapter 3
Lauren had Christmas lights strung up all over the den, even though it was late July. Music was playing, the keg was on the porch, and people were milling around all over the place. And yes, there was a pretty thick aroma of marijuana, but it wasn’t a scene straight from Woodstock, thankfully.
Lauren spotted them right away, as they entered the kitchen. “I’m so glad you’re here! Why haven’t you been coming to my parties all along?” She squealed and danced forward, hugging them both at the same time, an arm around each of their necks. Her jingly anklet made shimmery sounds and her patchouli perfume floated around them like mist.
“Well, we’re not mind-readers, silly!” Karla answered. “You have to call us and let us know when you’re throwing them!” she said, holding Lauren by the shoulders and wagging one finger in her face reprovingly.
“Well, I will from now on, babies!” she laughed, patting Karla’s cheek. “Get some drinks, hang out, meet some people. Meet a boy,” she said pointedly, her half-moon eyes nearly pinched shut from the size of the smile on the lower half of her face.
“Is there a boy here worth meeting?” asked Maddie.
“You know it, baby. You know it!” Lauren answered as she swirled away into a different little group of party-goers.
Peace of Her Heart Page 2