by Anne Key
Okay, whoa. That was something out of a television show. Now he had nine hundred more questions. But the bus showed up, and he got a second to think about it and decided he shouldn’t ask most of those questions, either. Damn, suddenly Sammy’s story seemed like it might be way more complicated than his. That was funny.
He followed her onto the bus. There were two seats, but they had to walk way back to find them. It was quiet for a minute, and Eli figured he better say something. “I think it’s cool your dad was willing to do that for her.”
“He’s a cool guy. We just have to figure things out.”
“Well, if you ever want to talk or whatever, I’ll listen.” Oh. Perfect. This was his chance. “Hey, Sammy, do you want my cell number? I was thinking maybe you might?” Okay. That wasn’t so bad.
“Yeah?” Oh man. That smile was so bright. “I’d like that. I mean, it’s good to have friends, to have someone to text and all.”
“Right. That’s what I was thinking.” Friends. Not a big deal. Just a phone number.
But now that she’d said yes, and she was smiling like that, his heart was pounding again, and he could feel the heat in his cheeks. He held out his hand for her phone so he could dial it in for her.
The case had rhinestones, the picture on the home screen was Florida Georgia Line, and his hand was not shaking when he tapped the number in. Not at all.
When his phone rang, he ended the call and held the phone out to her. “There you go.” And he had hers too. He hadn’t thought about how cool that would be before he did this. God, he was such a turd.
“Thanks.” She tucked her phone back in her purse with a grin. “I don’t see how you guys live without purses. I need mine.”
Even when he’d lived as a girl, he hadn’t carried a purse. “For what? I have pockets.” He leaned over to look in. “What’s in there? Wait. Don’t tell me. Sparkle lip gloss, sparkle eye shadow, and a sparkly pen to write in your sparkly notebook.” He grinned, teasing.
“Girl things. Things that would make you cry,” she teased right back. “Careful. What if you touch a tampon?”
“Oh my god!” He scooted away in his seat. “My eyes! Somebody help me!”
She began to giggle, the sound warm and soft, and it made him want to smile too. “See? I know your kryptonite.”
“So, you’re saying I’m Superman.” Eli knew he was grinning too wide, but he couldn’t help it. “What gave me away? The cape? Or the tights?”
“Oh, honey.” She leaned in close, whispering. “It’s the huge S on your chest.”
Oh, Sammy was just brilliant. She even got his stupid jokes. Eli hunched over, trying to look horrified. “Shit. Is it that obvious?” She was fun, too, and her hair smelled like strawberries. Seriously, he’d known Sammy like two weeks, and she was already the best friend he’d ever had.
“I’m totally hip to it. Totally.” She leaned back with another laugh. “What a great day, huh?”
“So far.” Eli kind of liked the way Sammy was leaning against him, and he relaxed back in his seat. If he knew for sure that he wanted a girlfriend, this would be the perfect time to slip an arm around her shoulders like boys do in the movies. He just wished he knew for sure what he wanted. He knew he was into Sammy, though, and his hands had finally stopped shaking—that had to be a good sign.
The bus lurched, and he glanced out the window, realizing he hadn’t been watching for their stop and wishing he knew the landscape better. “Wait. Is that Java Jam?”
“Is it?” Sammy sat up and looked out the window.
“Yep. This is us!” Eli grabbed her hand and hurried her off the bus right before the doors closed.
They were both breathless with laughter, and she was leaning against him, and he could see them in the coffee shop window, just vague outlines of two normal kids having fun together. And this time holding her hand didn’t make him feel like he was going to pass out, so instead of letting go, he gave her hand a squeeze.
“Glad I caught that. The next stop could have been anywhere.” He definitely didn’t want a day like this to end with them lost.
“Yeah, I might have totally freaked. Impossible to imagine, I know, but it is a possibility.”
“Nah. We’d have figured it out. You’re brilliant, and I’m… caffeinated.” He laughed at himself. “Oh, hey.” He tugged on her hand to get her to stop walking. He hated to let go, but he had offered, and there were only a couple more blocks until they got to her house. He set his board down on the sidewalk. “Wanna try?”
“You won’t let me fall?”
“What? Duh.” He put his foot next to the front wheels and held out both his hands. “Just put your left foot on.”
She hooked her bag on her wrist, then took his hands and put her foot on the skateboard. “Okay. It has a little give, doesn’t it? Weird.”
“Yeah. Bend your knee a little, like that, good. And then put all your weight on it. Bounce a little. See how it feels.” That purse was going to throw her balance off eventually, but for now it was okay. He’d have to do something with it if she got going on her own.
“Oh wow.” She laughed, but he had to admit she had some balance. Must be all the cheerleading.
“I’m telling you, you can totally do this. Okay, hop off.” He hadn’t ever actually taught someone how to ride before, and he had to think about it. “You know what? Give me your purse and then just walk a few steps back behind the board.”
“Can you hold my dress too?”
“Oh, right. Sure.” Good grief, girls carried a lot of crap. “So, watch. All you’re going to do is this.” He walked up to the skateboard and stepped on it, then let it roll a few feet. “That’s it. To figure out which foot is more comfortable, you know? I ride with my left foot up front regular, but you can do it the other way too. Which foot do you kick with? Like a soccer ball or whatever? Try that one first.”
She stopped, then kicked her left foot up and almost kicked herself in the nose, then dropped down in a split. Right there. Like it was normal. “The left, I guess.”
“Are you kidding me?” Eli laughed. “Quit showing off.” That just looked painful. He tucked all of her bags under one arm and reached out with the other to help her up. “You kick a soccer ball like that?”
“I have no idea. Never played.” She grinned, looking super pleased with herself. “I just took cheer and dance and gymnastics a lot.”
She looked at the board, stared at it like she was commanding it to be good or something, and then she stepped right up to it and went about two feet before she started cartwheeling her arms.
Eli took off after her and circled an arm around behind her shoulders. “I got you. Bend your knees! Bend so you have some balance, and quit with the arms.”
“Bend…. Oh, God. It’s…. How do you do this and not die of a heart attack?” She stopped, then stepped off the board, just white as a sheet. “I didn’t mean that. I didn’t.”
“Didn’t mean what?” Eli thought she’d done a pretty good job, but Sammy kind of looked like she was going to faint or something. He put a hand on her back to steady her just in case. “Are you okay? It’s not that terrifying, honest. But you acting that freaked out did just make me seem pretty freakin’ badass.” Not that he probably looked it carrying a bright pink purse and a bag from some store full of dresses and heels. “That was awesome. Really. You want to do it again?”
She swallowed hard and nodded. “Right. Bend my knees. Quit with the arms. Got it.”
She stepped up and made it a little farther. He had to admit she looked awkward as anything, but for her first time, it didn’t suck at all.
“Okay, hold up. Just put your right foot down and drag it to slow down.” The first time he tried that, he ended up tripping and landed on his ass, so he made sure to stay close. “Go ahead. Just lightly down.”
Sure enough, she ended up crashing into him. Okay. Whoa. His skateboard took off ahead of them, and he looked over just in time to see it crash into a pa
rking meter. “Got you.” Mostly. He definitely needed to keep working on that upper-body thing. “You okay?” Eli kept a good hold on her until he knew for sure she had her feet under her.
“Yeah. Yeah, good catch. Thanks. I didn’t break it, did I?”
“Pfft. No. But maybe we can try this again when you have a helmet.” He gave her a wink. “Anyway, the coolest house on the whole block—yours—is right there.” He felt kind of disappointed to be home already. He could have gone in for a whole afternoon just holding Sammy’s hand. “You, uh, want your stuff back, I guess.”
“Yeah. You want to come in for a second? See the house?”
Oh. Okay. No panicking. She said see the house, right? Maybe she meant it. Maybe her dad was home. Oh god. Maybe her dad was home, which meant Eli would have to meet him.
“In your house? Like, with you?”
“Well, I sorta live there… I mean, my daddy’s home. It’s not, like, creepy. I just thought you’d like to see downstairs.” She took her purse and bag, her hair hiding her face a little. “I’m sorry. I think the rules here are way different than I’m used to. I wasn’t trying to be… nasty.” She headed over to his board and picked it up, gave it to him with a shaking hand. “Thanks for the lesson. It was cool.”
Oh. Oh god. What did he just do? He couldn’t really see her eyes, but he knew enough to see she was trying not to cry. He took the board and tossed it in the grass so he could cover her hand with both of his. “I do! I definitely want to go in and see your downstairs, and I have no idea what the rules are. Like, none. Who cares what they are, anyway? I’m really sorry.”
Nothing about him followed rules. She’d learn that about him one day, he knew. Eli stood there, frozen and waiting, seriously embarrassed by his stupid babbling.
“Oh God. Me either. Like, none.” She blinked hard and took a deep, deep breath. “Christ, I’m like a basket case. Come in, have a Coke, and see the house, and I swear I’ll stop being such a girl.”
Right. He didn’t see that happening.
“Please don’t,” he joked. “I like the girl part.” He wasn’t sure, though, what made him more dizzy—how amazing she smelled or this weird emotional bipolar thing. Were girls always like this? Was it weird that he couldn’t remember? Something in all that nonsense he’d rattled off had made Sammy feel better, but he still felt like he was two steps behind her. A Coke sounded good, though.
He kept hold of her hand as they made their way up the walk. “I took pictures of this house like a month ago. Your dad had all this lumber on the lawn. They’re up on Instagram. It’s so cool.”
“Yeah? You’ll have to show me. Daddy’s working hard on it. It’s all he does—work and… well… work, I guess.”
“That’s cool, though. He’s fixing the place up himself and all?” Sammy still seemed kind of quiet. “Hey, are you sure you’re okay?”
“Yeah. I…. Come sit on the porch a second?”
“Sure….”
They sat on the swing and she sighed. “So, my momma died, right? You know that. Well, I found her in the bathtub. She’d had a heart attack. I was out with my friends, and she called me, and when I got home…. I freaked myself out a little, you know? I haven’t said the words heart attack since it happened.”
Eli nodded, not sure at first what to say. It all just sounded horrible. But then he suddenly got it. He looked over at her. “You haven’t said it until… earlier? The thing with the skateboard? Oh wow.” He remembered how white she’d been, and unsteady, but he hadn’t picked up on why, at all. “So, when you said you didn’t mean it, you were… oh wow.”
He just felt awful for her.
“Yeah. I just… I haven’t told anybody about it all, really. Every so often, it’s just so big. It’s weird, because sometimes it’s normal, and then I’ll think something or say something, and then it’s not normal anymore.”
“It sounds so hard, Sammy. And, I don’t know, I kind of think maybe something like that isn’t supposed to be just normal, you know? How could it be? It’s your mom. I don’t know what I’d do, honestly.” But he’d sure had plenty of experience dealing with big, scary issues. Maybe he could try to help. “I wouldn’t try so hard to pretend like it has to be okay. My therapist says be honest, you know? If it sucks, you should just say it sucks.”
“I’m afraid that one day I’ll start crying and I won’t be able to stop,” she whispered. “Is that weird?”
Eli sighed, nodding again. “Nope. Been there.” He had stopped, though, eventually. He moved closer to her and put a hand on Sammy’s knee, just to let her know he was there. “You just have to focus on other stuff. I get it.”
“I’m just….”
“Samantha? Do you have someone to introduce me to?”
Whoa. Where did he come from? Eli yanked his hand back and stood right up, putting several feet between him and Sammy. Several super obvious, casual feet. “Uh, hey. Hi. I’m Eli Green.” He glanced at Sammy, then added, “Sir.”
Sammy’s dad had big shoulders, and he and Sammy had the same brown-gold eyes. Eli stuck a hand out awkwardly, preparing to get his fingers crushed or something. But when Sammy’s dad reached out and shook his hand, it actually wasn’t like that at all. It was super friendly.
“Mr. Moore.”
Eli nodded. “Right, uh, Mr. Moore. I was just… we were at the mall, and then I was walking Sammy home and… this is a really great house. Really great. Great swing too.” God. Why did he always say stupid crap when he was nervous?
“Eli’s been admiring the house all summer, Daddy. I thought you could show him the downstairs. Also, don’t be mean. He’s my friend.”
“I’m not being mean, sweetheart. I just thought I should meet the young man who had his hand on my daughter’s knee. Eli understands, right, Eli? Man-to-man?”
Man-to-man? Oh boy. “Yes, sir.” Not really. But whatever, dads were weird, and Sammy’s seemed like a nice guy, even if he did look like he could toss Eli off the porch with his pinky finger.
“Good. So, you want to see the house?”
“That would be great.”
Mr. Moore held his hand out to Sammy. “You okay?”
She nodded. “I bought a new dress, and Eli is teaching me to ride a skateboard.”
“Oh yeah?” Mr. Moore pulled Sammy off the swing. “I rode a skateboard all the time when I was a kid. Come on, you guys.”
Mr. Moore held the front door for both of them. “In on the left is the living room. That one’s pretty much finished. It gets sketchier as you head farther back in the house.”
Eli looked around the room. It had a cool fireplace, and the big square window that looked out onto the front porch had all this detailed molding around it.
“Did the house used to have shutters? It looks like it should.”
“Yes, actually. They’re out back. I’m going to paint them black and hang them up in the spring.”
“Cool.”
Mr. Moore made his way through the living room to the kitchen, which was way new and had lots of fancy appliances that Eli’s mother would have killed for. They even had a second, smaller sink and an espresso machine.
The dining room was under construction, big-time. The table was off in one corner and covered with a paint-splattered tarp, the floors were newly installed, but still unfinished, and it smelled like fresh paint.
“Hey, Sammy and Eli, this is Mr. Lee.”
“Oh, Seth, please. It’s Jian.” Jian was across the room with a paintbrush in his hand, and he stood up from where he’d been kneeling and painting the trim white. He wasn’t as tall as Mr. Moore, and he had a superbright smile. “Nice to meet you both,” he said, shaking their hands. “Especially you, Sammy. Your dad has told me a lot about you.”
“Cool. Pleased to meet you, sir.” God, Sammy was weird and formal sometimes.
“Oh! Aren’t you just gorgeous?” Jian held her hand for a second longer. “I’m in love with that accent. Are you guys staying for dinner? I’m coo
king.”
Daddy laughed. “You are?”
“Yes, I told you, I’m not doing that Greek takeout place one more time. I don’t like extra hours at the gym like you do.”
Jian had gone back to his painting, and Eli just watched them. They reminded him of his parents.
Huh. Sammy’s dad was gay? She hadn’t said….
“Thanks, but I have to go home. My folks are expecting me.” And he’d had enough weirdness to last for the weekend. Besides, maybe he could text with Sammy tonight. That would be easier than having to figure everything out, face-to-face.
“I’ll walk you to the door,” Sammy offered, the look on her face a little shuttered.
“Yep. Sounds good.” Seemed like she wanted out of there too. “Complicated” just didn’t begin to describe Sammy anymore. He let Sammy lead him out of the room, through the living room, and right back out onto the porch. “So… enjoy dinner?”
“Yeah, I guess? I didn’t know we were having company. I might just go upstairs for the night. I totally have a six-pack of Dr Pepper and a bag of Hershey’s Kisses stashed in my room.”
“I’m supposed to do the family movie-night thing. It’s Dad’s turn to pick the movie, and he and Mom always argue about what he picks because she hates war movies and explosions and stuff. Should be fun.” He headed for the wide porch steps. “I had fun today. Let me know when you find shoes for the dress.” He gave her a big smile.
“Will do. Hey, can I text you maybe?”
“Yeah. Definitely. I’d like that.” He’d love that. He was kind of counting on that. “I’m around whenever.” He thought of Erik. “And up late too.” Eli took the top two steps and then leapt the last three into the yard. “Catch you later!”
He set his skateboard on the sidewalk, gave Sammy a wave, and took off.
Best. Day. Ever.
Chapter 8
SAMMY WATCHED Eli leave, then sighed, went inside, grabbed her purse and her shopping bag, and headed upstairs.
If Daddy hadn’t wanted to do supper and a movie, she totally would have got it. So stupid. Or maybe Daddy’s friend just didn’t know. That happened too. Hell, Momma had a lot of times where she had to change plans for work or meeting with someone.