The Snowball Effect

by Holly Nicole Hoxter

  There was a note taped to the steering wheel.

  No, not a note. My list of everything wrong with the Grand Am.

  Everything was crossed off in red marker except the part about the volume control. Riley had written a note: “It doesn’t do this for me. You must be crazy.”

  So this was how he was going to win me back. He’d fixed everything. He’d replaced the windshield. The windows rolled up and down again. The lights worked. I didn’t even want to think about all the money I owed him.

  The next step on the Lainey Pike Whirlwind Reconciliation Tour was Eric’s house. I didn’t know what I was going to say to him, but whatever it was, I knew I had to say it in person. I went around to the basement door and knocked.

  “I’m sorry,” I said when he opened the door. That was going to be my mantra for the day: I’m sorry, I know I should have called, I’m so sorry.

  He stood there wearing just his pajama bottoms. He didn’t say anything, so I guessed I was supposed to keep apologizing. “My sister’s ex-boyfriend showed up and she freaked out and we left. We drove to Orlando. We took my brother to Disney World. My cell phone died. I couldn’t call anyone.”

  He shrugged and smiled. “That’s cool. I hope you had a nice time.”

  “Um, okay. I just wanted to say I was sorry for not telling you I left. We didn’t tell anyone. Everybody was really worried about us. I know it was a stupid thing to do.”

  “I didn’t know what was going on. I stopped by a few times. That other guy was at your house all week, fixing your car.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, my sister asked him to fix it after it broke down.”

  “I would have taken care of it for you, if you’d asked.”

  “You said you don’t know anything about cars.”

  “I could have taken it to a mechanic.”

  “But he is a mechanic.”

  “Oh. Are you getting back together with him? I’m kind of getting that vibe.”

  I shrugged.

  He reached out and touched my arm. “Hey, if that’s what you want to do, don’t feel bad,” Eric said. “I’m a big boy.”

  “You’re moving,” I said.

  He nodded. “Not far, though.”

  “It seems far. You remember what you told me before, about doing what’s in my heart?”

  He shook his head. “You don’t have to apologize. I’ve already gotten used to the idea. I just…I don’t want to think I wasted your time. Or screwed anything up for you.”

  “No,” I said. “No way. He’s just…do you remember when we got snowballs? He’s like my raspberry, you know? And I don’t know if that’s good or bad, but…it is what it is.”

  Eric kind of laughed. “I can appreciate that. But that makes me your chocolate-covered cherry, yeah?”

  I nodded.

  He grinned. “So did I stop the world? Even for a little while?”

  “Oh my God, you are so cheesy.” I turned away from Eric because I didn’t want him to see that I’d started to cry just a little. I’d never cried so much in my life as I’d cried already that year.

  “Oh, honey,” Eric said. He held out his arms and I let him hug me. He kissed my forehead. “You tried something new,” he whispered. “That was brave. And we had fun, right? We had fun. Don’t be upset.”

  I didn’t think I’d been brave. I’d been silly and reckless and selfish. I’d hurt Riley. I’d gotten Gina and her stupid side ponytail involved. Now I was hurting Eric, even though he’d been nothing but awesome, even though we’d had fun, even though it felt so good to let him hold me. I didn’t want to turn and walk away from him knowing I’d never be able to run my fingers through his chest hair again.

  But love wasn’t a buffet. I couldn’t have everything that looked good.

  “Maybe I’ll see you around?” he said. “On those late-night Slurpee runs?”

  I grinned and pulled away from him. “Yeah. Maybe.”

  I was glad we didn’t say anything about staying friends, because that was always a lie. Real people didn’t do that. I’d seen the Old Crew girls try, and it never worked out. We wouldn’t be friends. He’d fade away. I’d forget the way he smelled, the way it felt to snuggle up next to him in the cool basement. He’d go off to Pennsylvania for the winter. He’d meet new people, maybe a new girl, maybe a few new girls. I’d be a girl he had once dated, for what? A month? In the grand scheme of a person’s life, that wasn’t a long time at all. Insignificant, really. I told myself that over and over as I walked to my car and resisted the urge to run back in and tell him, no, we’d make it work. Somehow.

  I turned the car on, but I didn’t want to drive away. I felt like there was so much I still had to say to him. I wanted to ask him about his mother. If he told me more about his mother, it’d be like he was telling me more about my own mother. And now I finally cared, now that it was too late to ask him anything. Why had it bothered me so much before, the thought that his mother and my mother had known each other? Why was it a bad thing?

  I’d wanted to forget she even existed. I didn’t want Eric to know about her. The best thing about Eric had probably been that he had no idea who I really was.

  But I didn’t need Eric to tell me about my mother.

  I had that book bag full of notebooks.

  As I drove to Riley’s house, I thought about how crappy it was that I’d broken up with him, ignored him for days after he fixed my car, and then hadn’t even bought him a key chain or anything from Disney World. I mean, even the worst (ex-)girlfriend in the world could have been that thoughtful.

  To be honest, I didn’t know if going back to Riley was the right thing to do. I didn’t know if I was doing it because I was jealous and didn’t want a stupid jock girl with a stupid hairdo to have him. I didn’t know if I was doing it because I was scared to be without him and things were just easier when he was around. I didn’t know if I was doing it because he’d been sweet and fixed my car and was obviously so in love with me. I didn’t know if I was doing it because I thought I needed him around to help me with Collin. I just knew that it was what I felt like doing, so it was what I was going to do. Kara approved. Eric understood. I knew I shouldn’t have to back up my own feelings with anyone else’s approval, but it felt good to have it.

  Riley was coming down the front walk before I’d even gotten out of the car. He grabbed me and lifted me off my feet.

  “Riley, I—”

  “Shhh,” he said. And he just stood there on the sidewalk holding me up like I was a little kid. I wrapped my arms around him.

  “You don’t have to win me back,” I said. “The car and everything, that was great, but—”

  “Doesn’t even matter,” he said. “I’m just glad you’re okay.”

  “What happened to beating me?”

  He smiled and shrugged. “Changed my mind. Listen, I made something while you were gone,” he said. He put me back down on my feet.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Come on,” he said. He took my hand and we walked toward the house. I followed him to his room. He picked up a photo album and handed it to me. I opened it up. And then I realized it wasn’t a photo album. It was a scrapbook. For Collin.

  I flipped the pages. It started with pictures of Carl and Mom. Then pictures of Collin. Pictures of all of us. Christmas and birthdays. The pictures from Collin’s graduation—the last pictures we’d ever have of Mom. The second half of the book was empty.

  “We have to take more pictures,” Riley said. “So we can fill the second half.”

  I flipped back to a page at the beginning. “What’s up with these little squares?” I asked. Almost every page had a different colored square.

  “That’s the journaling block,” Riley said. “You’re supposed to write about what’s happening in the picture. Or whatever. Whatever you want to write. I figured you should do that yourself. I mean, I know I’ve known him as long as you have. But it still seemed like, you know, the words should come from you.”
r />   “He’ll love it. We got our Disney World pictures printed at this one-hour place before we left Orlando. He looked at them over and over again on the drive home. I mean, over and over.”

  Riley grinned. “I told you.”

  “Hey, have you been to the hospital?” I asked. “To see the baby?”

  He hadn’t, so we got in the pickup and drove to the hospital. On the way, I told him all about the trip, what Collin liked and didn’t like, what we’d have to do again if we ever went back. He never asked if I’d take him back, and I never asked if he’d take me back, but things felt right again.

  When we got to the hospital, Christine was asleep and Wallace was sitting in her room, looking at the baby.

  “Where’ve you been?” Wallace asked with a grin. I saw him look down. Riley and I were holding hands.

  “Disney World,” I said.

  He laughed. He probably couldn’t tell if I was serious or just giving him a flip answer.

  “Want to hold her?” he asked.

  I nodded. He picked the baby up out of her crib and handed her to me. I sat in the chair by the window. It was amazing how tiny and shriveled up they were when they were just born. It was hard to believe that they grew up to be real people. I thought about Collin and how little he’d seemed when we’d first gotten him, but he would have been huge compared to Christine’s baby. I’d never seen Collin this small, not even in pictures.

  Riley stood beside me with his hand on my shoulder. He looked down at me and Christine’s baby and smiled.

  “Don’t even think about it,” I whispered.

  “It’s okay to just think about it,” he said. “One day.”

  “Not any day soon.”

  He shrugged. “When Collin’s older.”

  “Much older.”

  Riley had to go to work, so I went to work with him for the first two hours of his shift and sat in the waiting room, drinking gross coffee out of a Styrofoam cup. I caught glimpses of him in the garage, through the big glass window, and when he came into the waiting room and announced, “2002 Jeep Cherokee?” and waited to see which customer stood up.

  While I sat there, I started reading Mom’s notes. I started with one of the composition books. There were no dates, so I didn’t know what came first. Her handwriting wasn’t that great. I read slowly, but I didn’t give up; and I knew I’d eventually make it through all the books plus the binder. I didn’t know if it would be enough, but I figured it was the least I could do.

  And then, scribbled in one of the margins, I read this:

  everyone deserves the benefit of the doubt and a second chance.

  When I got back to the house, Lenard Fry Jr. was sitting on the front step. I thought about staying in the car and driving away, but I didn’t. I parked and walked up to him.

  “Hey, Lenard,” I said.

  He stood up. “I knocked. She won’t let me in. I know she’s in there. That’s her car.”

  Her car. Lenard didn’t want the car. Vallery’s paranoia was out of control.

  “Why are you here?” I asked. “Really?”

  “I miss her,” he said. “She just took off.”

  I walked past Lenard Fry Jr. and stuck my key into the lock. “Come on in,” I said.

  Lenard followed me into the house. Collin was jumping on the couch and watching TV. “No jumping,” I said to Collin. I swatted at him. He crashed down on the couch and sat still for about three seconds before I heard him stand up and start jumping again.

  I led Lenard into the kitchen and got him a glass of water. “I’ll go get Vallery,” I said.

  “I appreciate it,” he said, and sipped his water.

  I found Vallery in her room, digging through boxes in the closet. Probably looking for Mom’s notebooks one more time before she called Deborah.

  “Vallery, I have to tell you something. You’re probably going to be mad.”

  She sighed. “You let Len into the house, didn’t you?”

  I dropped my book bag on the floor.

  “I’m not doing your laundry,” she said.

  I unzipped it. She leaned over and looked inside.

  “Is that what I think it is?” she asked.

  “All of Mom’s notebooks.”

  “Let’s not talk about where you found them. Or how long you’ve had them.”

  “No, let’s not. Anyway, you can sell them to Deborah, but I want to read them first. I know it’s probably just a bunch of clichéd nonsense, but still.”

  Vallery shrugged. “Sounds like a plan. This will pay off all the credit cards. It’ll pay for Florida. And then some.” Vallery laughed. “So I guess Mom kind of did take us to Disney World after all.”

  “Hey, Vallery,” I said. “There’s something else.”

  She sighed. “You did let Lenard in, didn’t you?”

  “He’s in the kitchen. Listen, you need to set things right with him. I’ve been apologizing to people all day. It’s fun. He may be a loser, but he deserves an explanation, you know? And he doesn’t want your stupid car. He’s just hurt. Give him the benefit of the doubt.”

  Vallery sighed. “Fine.” She shoved a handful of papers back into the box.

  As Vallery walked away, I realized that for the first time in years, I was intentionally following and repeating my mother’s advice.

  Riley came over after work. “That weird guy I told you about is sitting in your kitchen,” he said as he walked into my room.

  “That’s Vallery’s ex-boyfriend. The reason why we ran off to Orlando.”

  “I see.” He pulled something out of his back pocket and handed it to me. “I got you some pens. For the journaling. They’re acid free.”

  “Acid free?”

  “Yeah. That means they won’t damage the pictures. You know. Over time. If the ink had acid, it would eat away at the pictures.”

  “You got really hard-core about this scrapbooking stuff, didn’t you?”

  Riley sat down on the bed beside me. “You haven’t registered for fall classes yet, have you?” he asked.

  I shook my head. “Things were so crazy. I didn’t know what the plan was anymore.”

  “The plan is whatever you want the plan to be.”

  “Well, I’m sure everything is full, so I’ll be left with whatever no one else wanted to take. That’s my plan.”

  He grinned. “At least you have a plan. Did you guys eat yet, or has Vallery just been sitting in the kitchen talking?”

  “Talking.”

  “Mind if I go start something?”

  “Of course not. I’ll be down in a few minutes. I have to make a call.”

  Riley raised an eyebrow. “Checking in with your other boyfriend?”

  I couldn’t tell if he was being serious. “No. I broke up with him this morning.”

  “Good.”

  “Did you break up with your other girlfriend?”

  “You mean that girl who talked on her cell phone all night whenever we hung out?”

  “Yeah. Her.”

  “Yeah, I dumped her.”

  “Good. Anyway, I actually have to call my dad.”

  “Didn’t you talk to him yesterday?”

  “I didn’t. It’s a long story.”

  Riley shrugged. “All right. See you in a few.” He kissed me and then walked out into the hallway.

  The only reason I had my dad’s number programmed into my cell phone was so I’d know not to answer the phone when he called. How mature, right? So when I hit “send” on the phone, it was probably the first time I’d called him in years.

  Just lunch, I told myself. We’ll just have lunch. And if he breaks any promises, then oh well, at least I tried.

  And you never know until you try, right?

  “Hello?” my father answered.

  I heard Collin shrieking and laughing. I pictured Riley tickling him mercilessly. I pictured Vallery in the kitchen, still talking to poor Lenard Fry Jr. hours after I’d let him into the house.

  “Hey, Dad? I
t’s Lainey.”

  I could keep holding a grudge for all the things he’d done wrong. Or I could let him make it right. He didn’t deserve an infinite number of chances, but it couldn’t hurt to give him one more.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I wouldn’t be anything without the love, encouragement, and support of my wonderful family.

  It’s hard to imagine how my life would have turned out if I hadn’t spent those three years at Carver, under the guidance of Bonny Boto, writing, learning, and being validated. I’m also grateful to all my writing professors and classmates at UMD who read my stories and taught me how to take criticism. Thanks especially to Patrick McKenna and Tom Whitmire, who went out of their way to befriend the quiet girl, and Kristen Sabrina Shahmir for giving me the last push I needed. Dara Granoff, Joanna Mechlinski, Lauren Hopkins Karcz, and Tom Nichols offered keen observations and suggestions on the earliest draft of this novel. Eternal gratitude to Karl Langkam for making me laugh and driving me crazy. Thanks to Sara Crowe, Jill Santopolo, and everyone else at HarperCollins who helped along the way.

  Finally, thanks to Brian Bauer for being there when I wrote this, for feeding me, picking me up when I fell down, taking me to Florida, and generally putting up with me.

  About the Author

  HOLLY NICOLE HOXTER was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland. Like her character Lainey, she was named after a soap opera heroine. After receiving her BA in English from the University of Maryland, she went on to work as a bookseller, relay operator for the deaf, housecleaner, legal word processor, and dog walker. She currently masquerades as a medical transcriber and begrudgingly still resides in Baltimore with her three adorable cats. THE SNOWBALL EFFECT is her debut novel. You can visit her online at www.hollynicolehoxter.com.

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  Credits

  Jacket art © 2010 by OJO Images Photography/Veer

  Jacket design by Jennifer Rozbruch