by Amber Smith
“Huh?” I finally answered, pulling my earbuds out, music seeping into the air.
“Dude, you gotta come see this,” he said to me in this relaxed way, like we talked all the time. “We got some fireworks,” he continued, gesturing behind him to where Tobey and Jake were waiting. “We’re about to go set ’em off. You wanna come?”
I shrugged, pretending to consider it before politely declining. “No, I don’t think so,” I said, trying to catch my breath. “I gotta keep moving.” I took a couple of steps, about to sprint off before my heart rate went down too much.
“Fine,” he said, holding up his hands like I’d insulted him. “Just trying to be friendly. Sorry. Won’t happen again.” This was another one of those unspoken rules I’d been getting more and more familiar with. When you’re a girl, some boys will try to make you feel guilty for saying no, regardless of the circumstance. The truly terrible part is that sometimes they succeed.
I should’ve known better. But it felt so damn good to think, even for one misguided second, that maybe they really were just trying to be friendly. That maybe they saw me. Not the tomboy, not the dyke, not the freak. Just me. Wasn’t Mom always saying I needed to give people a chance to see how great I really was on the inside?
“Wait,” I said as he started walking away. “I guess I can come for a minute.”
He twisted around and smiled, saying, “Cool,” in that casual way. “Come on.”
As I followed the three of them deeper into the woods, getting farther off the path, I kept looking behind me to see if maybe Coleton had caught up after all. But there was no one in sight.
A small voice inside me whispered just one word: Run.
But I had gotten pretty good at ignoring the voices in my head.
MAIA
SOME PLACES ARE HAUNTED BY the things that happened there, but I believe there are other places that are haunted by ideas. I think the Bowman House is haunted in both ways. Only a few miles down the road from where I live, the Bowmans would’ve been my next closest neighbor after Isobel, if the house were still standing.
There were a lot of stories about what happened, whether it was arson or simply old electrical work, and whether Mr. and Mrs. Bowman and their teenage son died in the house, or later at the hospital. It was back sometime in the 1940s, and I don’t think anyone’s ever bothered checking the facts. Kids have always used it as a hangout on the weekends, throwing parties, doing séances and stuff like that—my parents said that’s how it was even when they were my age.
I’ve been coming here a lot lately too, but not for that reason.
The Bowman House had always been scary to me, but I came here right after Mallory died because this was one of her favorite spots. She said it was because something intense and important had happened here, and that means something. The whole house burned. Only the foundation remained, along with portions of stone walls and the brick fireplace and hearth that leads up to the chimney and stretches all the way past what would’ve been the second story, standing still amid the rubble.
She had taken endless pictures here. The house had a story to tell, she said, and she wanted to help give it a voice. The Bowman House photos were the series of photographs she submitted to the magazine in DC to get the job she would never start.
She thought it was magical; I thought she was morbid.
I had her camera with me now, wishing I could see things through her eyes, see what made this place so beautiful to her. I was sitting cross-legged on the crumbling concrete slab, gazing up at the chimney, trying to listen to that story Mallory said the house had to tell, but my mind kept drifting back to my own near-death experience out on the road.
I heard something behind me, rustling through the leaves. I figured it was just a bird or squirrel, but then a stick snapped too close. I twisted around quickly and saw that it was him—Chris.
“Oh, sorry,” he said, once he realized he’d startled me. “I was just—”
“God, creepy much?” I muttered. My cheeks flushed, embarrassed that I’d been caught doing something weird—listening to the house—embarrassed that I’d just said something really rude, and finally embarrassed for being embarrassed. Mallory never got embarrassed, never felt ashamed or awkward.
I pushed myself off the ground and wiped the dirt from my knees and the palms of my hands, hoping he hadn’t heard.
“Out for a run,” he finished uncertainly. But after a pause, he asked, “Wait. Do you mean me or that?”
“Well, I was talking about you, but”—I turned to look at the house again—“I guess you’re right, it could apply to either.”
He looked down at his feet and laughed, like he was the one who was embarrassed now. “I promise I wasn’t trying to be a creeper, or anything.”
“Sorry,” I offered. “You just surprised me.”
He took a step closer, and I watched him survey the scene, squinting as he tracked the height of the chimney with his eyes. “Do you live here?” he asked.
“No . . . ,” I said slowly, trying not to laugh, but I could feel the corner of my mouth twitching. “Nobody lives here.”
“Well, not here, here. I mean, I saw the private property sign out by the road. I thought maybe you lived somewhere else, like on the property somewhere.” He looked around, as if he was searching for evidence of other structures nearby, but finding none. “I only ask because I saw you the other day. Right near here.”
We toss the awkwardness back and forth at each other, neither of us wanting to be caught holding on to it for too long.
“You mean when you almost turned me into roadkill?” I said, hoping he could tell I was joking—I realized after I said it, this was the first time in I don’t even know how long that I’d talked to someone who hadn’t already known me my entire life. He laughed, which made me relax a little bit.
“Yeah, sorry about that. I guess I wasn’t really paying attention.” He took one giant step onto the foundation where I stood, so we were on equal ground. Eye to eye, we were the exact same height, which made me really look at him. He had one of those faces that was exactly symmetrical. In profile the slant of his cheekbones was in line with the slope of his nose, the same parallel angle, like they’d been carved that way, his features striking a perfect balance of soft and strong. And then there was the edgy cut of his hair—more stylish and purposefully messy, nothing like the traditional “Carson Crafty Clips” clean crew cuts that are standard here.
Perfect faces are boring, I remembered Mallory once saying.
I was about to look away, concluding his face was boringly attractive. But then he took a step closer and I noticed a small, hook-shaped scar under his right eye; and as I scanned his face again, he smiled, and my gaze got caught on this one dimple he had at the corner of his mouth on one side and not the other.
I started gathering my things—Mallory’s camera, my phone, my bag—if only to force myself to stop staring at his mouth. “It’s okay, I wasn’t paying attention either.”
“So, what happened to the house?” he asked.
“Time,” I answered right away, not taking into account how odd it might sound, only because I’d been thinking about that same question a lot lately. “Well, a fire. And then time.”
He nodded, considering this. “So you . . . take pictures?” he asked, gesturing to the camera. I looked down at this thing that still felt so unfamiliar in my hands—this thing that was not mine at all, and I suddenly worried he was going to say something about what must’ve looked like me taking his picture the other day, so I blurted out the first stupid, defensive thing that came to mind.
“So, you . . . like small talk?” I countered, amending with another “sorry.”
“I take it you’re not a fan?” he said, politely sidestepping my rudeness. He shrugged and shook his head, saying, “Me neither.”
I thought back to what my mom had told me. But standing across from him, he didn’t look like trouble. I glanced down at my dingy Bargain Mart T-s
hirt—I had no right to judge anyone, especially while wearing this.
“I’m Maia.”
“I know,” he said, pointing at my chest. “Name tag.”
“Right,” I mumbled. I felt the need to break the silence that was ramping up, so I added, “I’m your next-door neighbor. I live in the blue house, across the field from your aunt—the one with the really old barn.”
He narrowed his eyes at me and said, “Now who’s the creeper?” He was almost smiling, but not quite, like maybe he was only half joking. When I didn’t answer, he looked around at the solid barrier of trees surrounding us, and asked, “Is it even possible to have neighbors out here? To me, neighbors are the people whose windows you can see into from yours and are constantly in each other’s business.”
“You’d be surprised,” I told him, thinking of all the rumors that flew around after Mom and Dad’s divorce, although I suppose some of those were technically true. “Proximity has nothing to do with nosing into other people’s business.”
“So, how do you know where I live?” he finally asked.
“You’re new here.”
He furrowed his brow, seeming confused about the correlation. “So?”
“So, everybody’s already all up in your business.”
He waited a beat before asking, “What have you heard?”
“Not much. Except you might be somewhat of a troubled teen.” I air-quoted with my fingers for effect.
“Troubled teen.” He raised his eyebrows and rubbed the back of his neck, looking around uncomfortably. “What does that mean?”
“Drinking, drugs, vandalism, general problems with authority,” I mused.
Something relaxed in his stance then; a smile crept along the edges of his mouth. “And reckless driving?” he asked, that dimple forming like a punctuation mark to his words.
I felt my face mirroring his smile.
He continued, “I’ll own up to the reckless driving part, but the rest—I promise it’s nothing that exciting.”
He started to walk toward me, and instantly my heart began to beat faster, a thrilling yet slightly terrifying flutter being activated in my stomach. I looked down at the camera, pretending to mess with the dials. It was an unfamiliar brand of nervousness vibrating along my skin, and I hoped he couldn’t see it.
“I gotta get going,” I told him, trying to channel some of Mallory’s bravado as I walked past him, stowing her camera in my bag. He followed me out of the brush and back onto the pathway that was patched in clumps of weeds and damp bare earth, where my bike was waiting.
“It was nice meeting you,” he said. “Officially.”
“Yeah,” I agreed as I started to wheel my bike out toward the road.
When I began to take off slowly, he jogged up next to me and said, “Wait. I forgot to tell you my name.” I pedaled faster. “It’s Chris!” he called out, slowing to a walk.
“I know!” I yelled as I sped off, leaving him behind.
CHRIS
I WALKED BACK TO ISOBEL’S house. For once I didn’t feel like running.
I was trying to think of whether or not I’d ever known anyone named Maia. I was trying to remember everything I knew about cameras and photography. I was trying to commit the sound of her voice to my memory—the way her southern accent only came out on certain words.
It was nearly dark by the time I got there, and Isobel was sitting on the porch steps.
“I was about to send out a search party,” she said as I strolled up the driveway. “Good run?”
“Yeah, actually. Really good.” I sat down next to her, and she handed me a bottled water that she must’ve brought out a while ago because the condensation had turned the label soggy.
“Just make sure you’re pacing yourself,” she warned.
“I know.” I sighed, feeling my good mood already slipping away. “Really. Can you please not look at me like that?”
“Like what?”
“Like . . . the way they look at me,” I answered. Like all you see when you look at me is that day, I thought. Like all you can think is that if Coleton hadn’t stepped in when he did, it could’ve been worse. Coleton never looked at me the same after that day. He started to look at me like my parents did, like they were afraid for me, like maybe they were a little afraid of me. But I didn’t say any of that to Isobel. I shook my head, didn’t want to get into it. “Never mind,” I mumbled.
She made this weird growling sound in the back of her throat and rolled her eyes. “Don’t do that. Your mother always does that. It drives me crazy. Just say it.”
“You know what I mean,” I told her, not quite raising my voice, like my father. “Like I’m all fragile and defenseless.”
“Who said that? I know you’re not fragile and defenseless! You’re the strongest person I know. I’m speaking from a strictly medical standpoint—you have to be careful of your ankle, and especially your back. Just don’t push yourself too hard.” She paused, staring at me, unflinching. “All right?”
“Yeah, all right,” I relented. “I know.”
She leaned into my side and knocked my shoulder. “I’m glad you’re here, by the way,” she told me, and I could feel the storm cloud that had been quickly closing in on me retreating again.
“Me too.”
“I think this’ll be good for you. And your mom and dad, too. You just need to relax, have some fun. You know, be a kid. And they need . . . I don’t know, some perspective on the whole situation.”
I laughed. “Tell me about it.”
“Life goes by fast. A year from now you’ll be heading off to college, then after that you’re in the real world. You’ll never get this time back.”
“Why can’t my parents see it that way?”
“Because they’re your parents.”
We sat in silence, listening to the chorus of croaking frogs and buzzing insects that were congregating in the shadows all around us. Every few seconds a firefly would light up, then disappear. We didn’t have fireflies where I lived. We didn’t have this strange chirping of nocturnal creatures. We didn’t have the wide-open skies. We didn’t have old abandoned burned-out houses. And we didn’t have people like Maia. I decided right then that these differences were good things; they meant that I was living, not wasting any more time.
I cleared my throat so I’d sound more casual when I asked, “Hey, what’s Bargain Mart?”
“A store in town. Sort of a one-stop shop; they have a little bit of everything.” I could feel her side-eyeing me, her speech slowing down slightly, dragging out the word, “Why?”
I shrugged like it was nothing. “Just wondering.” But when I turned and saw her smiling at me, I knew she wasn’t going to let me off the hook. “What?” I asked.
“You met Maia.”
I opened my mouth, about to deny it, but she’d see right through me. “Okay, how could you possibly know that?”
“I could just tell—I know you better than you think.” It was true how well she knew me. She knew me better than anyone else, even Coleton. “Well, that and I happen to know that Maia works at Bargain Mart. That, and I saw her riding by on her bike right before you got home.” She laughed, then added, pointing at me, “And then there’s that goofy grin on your face.”
“We had one conversation.”
“Okay, fine,” she said, holding her hands up in a gesture of surrender.
“She just seems . . . different,” I added voluntarily. “I don’t know, interesting.”
Isobel didn’t say anything for a few seconds; she was looking off to the side like she was considering something. “You know, I think you two might get along if you can actually get to know each other.”
“Okay,” was all I said. And I tried really hard not to smile in my goofy, telltale way that apparently lets everyone know what I’m thinking.
“Okay,” she repeated. And with that, she stood up and went inside.
I walked around to the back of the house. I was pretending to stretch, w
hile I looked out across the field at the blue house. There weren’t any lights on, except for the barn. Its double doors were open halfway, and yellow light spilled out like paint onto the grass. I lunged into the shadows when I saw the shape of her walk past the door.
Maybe I really was a creep.
• • •
I had been standing outside Bargain Mart for several minutes, trying to work up the nerve to go in, when this guy exited through the sliding glass doors that kept sending blasts of cold air in my direction every time they opened and closed. He glanced at me as he passed, and immediately did a double take.
He backed up, reversing his steps so he was in front of me. I stood up straighter, wiped the sweat from my hands on my shorts. I could feel my mind churning, trying to anticipate which way this was about to go. He was really tall, like basketball-player tall, and appeared to be around my age, with his hair all slicked back with too much gel.
“Matt, right?” he said slowly, squinting at me.
I cleared my throat, stalling to assess the situation. “What?”
“Your name’s Matt, isn’t it?” he said, but before I could answer, he asked, “Did anyone tell you about Bowman’s Friday night?”
Matt. He mistook me for someone named Matt.
“No,” I managed, through the desert in my mouth.
“This Friday. Bowman’s,” he said, nodding and grinning.
“No, I mean my name’s not Matt.”
He looked at me more closely, like he was sizing me up. I waited for that glimmer of recognition—it’s something that happens in the eyes first, something that can’t be hidden. But there was none. He simply shrugged and continued, “Well, anyway, come if you want.”
“Cool,” I said, this wave of relief washing over me. “It’s Chris, by the way,” I added, though he hadn’t asked.
“Right, Chris,” he said, as if he had suddenly remembered who I was. “Later,” he mumbled, before continuing toward the parking lot. I stood there for another minute and watched him toss his plastic bag into the back of an old pickup truck. The windows had been left rolled down, the doors unlocked—I guess this is one of those small towns where people can do that sort of thing.