I raced home and somehow knew instinctively how to get back without looking at the directions. When I pulled up to the house, I immediately saw James, bundled up and standing near the open front door. I turned into the driveway and made sure to put the car in the same spot my mother always parked it. I got out and joined my brother.
James’s big blue eyes got bigger. “Hey, whatta ya doing driving mom’s car?”
“Don’t worry about me driving. Just be thankful that the house didn’t burn to the ground.”
We walked inside and, even though the smoke had cleared, I immediately caught a whiff of the pungent scent of burnt popcorn. James and I shut all the windows and I walked into the kitchen to close the back door. The inside of the microwave was black and a charred bag of popcorn sat inside it. James was behind me.
“What the heck happened?”
James shrugged. “I tried to make popcorn like I always do, but I think I set the time wrong and walked away and then I smelled the smoke and ran in here and opened the microwave and smoke kept pouring out.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re not even allowed to eat or drink when I leave you. Why did you think you could make popcorn?”
James looked down and rubbed his belly. “I was hungry and didn’t know when you’d be coming back.”
I wanted to be mad at my brother, but I actually felt sorry for him. I knew I shouldn’t have left him.
“I’ll make you something else to eat. What do you want?”
James looked up at me and grinned. “Peanut butter sandwich, no crust?”
“Fine. Give me a minute to try and clean this microwave first.”
“Kay,” James said and turned to leave.
“Wait a minute, James. Do not tell mom about me driving because if you do, I will take each and every video game you’ve ever owned and make my own special bonfire with them out back.”
James stared at me.
“Understand?” I asked.
“Yeah,” James answered before he scurried out of the kitchen and into the family room.
I grabbed a roll of paper toweling, some cleaning spray and braced myself for a stinky and dirty job.
• • •
The mess in the microwave proved to be a time consuming task. I took a break and made my brother his sandwich before resuming my mission. I had to get it as clean as before so my mother wouldn’t ask me what had happened. I didn’t want to have to lie to her and certainly didn’t want her to ask James why the white microwave suddenly turned black. He might forget about my threat and tell her the whole story from me leaving him alone to me stealing her car.
My mother actually called while I was making James’s sandwich. She wanted to check in and see how we were doing.
“Everything is fine,” I reassured her.
“Alright, dear. Brian and I will be home sometime tomorrow morning.”
“Okay. Bye.”
“Bye, Willow.”
Except for the interruption by my mother, all I could think about, as I scrubbed and scrubbed, was my brief meeting with Michael. I kept reliving our last moment on the front porch, right before I left, when his face was close to mine. He looked like a man now, so handsome and strong under the illuminated sky. I wanted to remember what it felt like because, until he spoke, I thought he might kiss me.
The butterflies came rushing back in, just from the memory of being with him. Why did I have such strong feelings for Michael? I had never felt this way with any other boy before.
I felt saddened by his admission about his disease. I didn’t know anything about Cystic Fibrosis and decided I would look it up on the Internet as soon as I was done with the microwave. It made complete sense why Michael missed so much school and looked sickly sometimes. Did having the disease mean that he would die at an early age, too? I hoped not and needed to do some research.
I was just about done cleaning up when my cell phone beeped, telling me I had a new text. I put down the paper towel roll and saw that it was from Michael. I opened the text and read, “Star light, star bright, last star I saw tonight, was the one shining deep from within your enchanting eyes.”
I smiled to myself, but didn’t know what to respond. I wasn’t poetic like Michael, so I decided to send back a smiley face instead.
After my final inspection of the spotless microwave, I turned off the lights in the kitchen and headed upstairs to my room where I would try to learn all I could about Michael Cooper and how he lived his life with an incurable disease.
• • •
I didn’t realize that I had fallen asleep and, at first, thought I was dreaming. The incessant ringing of the doorbell eventually woke me. I looked at the clock. It was 3:00 A.M.
I sat up and tried to make sense of what day it was. I remembered it was Saturday night, actually early Sunday morning and that my mom was away. Who the heck would be ringing the doorbell in the middle of the night?
I was afraid to go downstairs and check. I climbed out of my bed and crept into the hallway. I passed James’s bedroom, peeked inside and saw that he was fast asleep. The doorbell chimed again. I went into my mother’s room, which had a window that faced the front of the house.
Slowly I pushed aside her curtain to peer outside. I looked onto the driveway and saw another vehicle parked behind my mom’s, but didn’t recognize it. I looked down toward the front door and could not see anybody at first. Just then the person who was ringing the bell stopped and walked away.
Even in the darkness I could tell it was Tessa. I flung open the bedroom window and yelled down to her as she reached her car.
“What the hell are you doing!?”
Tessa stopped, turned and looked for the source of my voice. She couldn’t find me.
“Up here!” I shouted and waved.
She finally spotted me. “Open the damn door! I’m freezing my ass off out here!”
• • •
I closed the family room door tightly behind us.
“Shhh. My brother’s sleeping.”
“Sorry.” Tessa tried to whisper. Immediately I smelled alcohol on Tessa’s breath and realized she was very drunk.
“Why are you here?”
“’Cause Connor and I got in a fight and I told him to go screw himself.”
“Again, why are you here?”
Tessa fished through her bag and took out her pack of cigarettes. She tried to light one. I snatched the lighter from her hand.
“I don’t think so,” I said. I didn’t want to have to deal with another fire. One per night was enough for me.
“So I told my mom I was sleeping at your house, but I was really going to spend the night at Connor’s, but he and I got into a huge fight and he kicked me out of his stupid party.”
Tessa plopped down on the couch. “Can I crash?”
I hesitated, but relented. “I guess.”
Where else was Tessa going to go? She shouldn’t have even been driving in the first place. I didn’t want her to kill herself or another innocent person while out on the road.
“You might want to come upstairs, though, ’cause my brother gets up very early in the morning and turns on the television down here.”
Tessa struggled to stand. “Sounds good to me.”
Tessa grabbed her purse, followed me upstairs and made my crazy night even crazier.
• • •
Thank God I had a queen-sized bed. It made sleepovers tolerable, especially the ones with drunken guests.
I gave Tessa an extra pillow and tried to get comfortable on mine. I was very tired and wanted to go back to sleep, but all Tessa wanted to do was talk.
“You really should have come to Connor’s. The party was really rockin’ until he acted like a dick to me.”
“I told you I had to stay here with my brother.”
“I know. That’s why I came here to crash. I remembered your mom was away.”
Tessa elbowed me. “Didn’t you have fun at Rocky’s last weekend?”
“I gu
ess,” was all I was willing to tell her. I opted to leave out the groping and throwing up parts.
“Yeah. Rocky’s parents are really cool, unlike Connor’s. The only reason he had a party was ’cause his parents are away… like your mom.”
Tessa turned to me and smiled, proud of herself, for making such an obvious comparison. I wanted to shove a breath mint in her mouth. She smelled like a brewery.
“The winter always sucks because we can’t party outside at the beach like we do in the summer. The summers are amazing on the island, but the winters suck.”
Tessa flung her arm and whacked me in the head.
“Ow!”
“What happened?”
“Nothing,” I answered. I didn’t want to engage her in conversation anymore. I wanted to sleep.
Tessa closed her eyes, but spoke anyway, actually slurred. “Did you know that some girls in school call us soph-whore-mores?”
“Yeah. I heard.”
“They’re just jealous.” Tessa opened her eyes. “Don’t you think they’re jealous, Willow?”
“I have no idea and don’t really care.”
“Well, I think they’re jealous cuz we’re prettier than them.”
Tessa turned toward me and curled up on her side. “Do you think I’m pretty?”
I wanted her to stop talking and stop asking me inane questions. I stared at the ceiling and answered robotically.
“Yes, Tessa, I think you’re pretty. Can we go to sleep now, please?”
Tessa reached out and touched the bottom of my hair. “Well, I think you’re pretty, too, Willow.”
“Great! Now that we’ve established that we’re both so damn pretty, can we go to sleep?”
I waited for Tessa to respond, but she didn’t. The next thing I knew, Tessa began to breathe deeply, and then started to snore loudly.
I slowly removed Tessa’s hand from my pillow and watched as she stirred and quickly fell back to sleep. I rolled over and turned off the light. I couldn’t believe what was happening. What I thought had been an even crazier night, turned out to be the craziest one ever.
CHAPTER
TWENTY-SEVEN
In the Middle of Nowhere (Willow's Journey #1) Page 26