by Susan Wiggs
Finally she spoke. “You should probably kiss me now.”
Oh, man, thought Joey. “Why do you say that?”
“You want to, and I want you to, so we should do it.”
He shook his head. “We’ll feel all weird if we sit here and talk about it and plan every move.”
She laughed and shifted closer to him. “That’s what I’ve been doing ever since I met you—planning this.”
He broke out in a sweat. She sure as hell was different, with her disarming frankness and direct gaze. With a jolt of panic, he realized he didn’t know what to do. Where should he put his hands, his mouth?
Calm down, he told himself. Here was this girl he was crazy about, and she wanted to kiss him. Who was he to hold back?
He cupped his hands around her shoulders and she scooted even closer. He was glad Grandpop had made him lose the tongue stud and nose ring, refusing to feed him unless he took them out. This, he decided, was going to be the best kiss ever. Because he wasn’t going to worry about doing it right. He was just going to kiss her and hope for the best.
He took a deep breath and went for it.
“Hold it right there.” The blinding beam of a nightstick sliced between them like a light saber.
Whitney gave a little scream. Joey crab-walked backward, his heart hammering “Nearer My God to Thee.”
“You must be Miss Brooks,” said the sheriff. “Your parents are very worried about you, young lady.” He flashed the beam toward the road below. “Come with me, please.”
The sheriff. Jeez, didn’t he have anything better to do?
“We weren’t doing anything wrong,” Joey said, finding his voice at last. “We came up here to look at the transit of Mercury.”
“I don’t care if you’re looking at the man in the moon, kid. Mr. and Mrs. Brooks sent me to find their daughter who, it turns out, is absent without leave.”
“How did you find me?” Whitney demanded in a superior, rich-girl voice Joey had never heard before.
“You left your IM box open, so they figured out where you’d gone as soon as they checked your computer.”
Joey suppressed a groan. You’d think she’d have the smarts to shut down her messages before leaving the house. He exchanged a glance with her but could tell nothing by her grim expression. Nothing good, anyway. He picked up the telescope and tripod.
The sheriff went for his gun. “You,” he barked. “Drop it.”
“It’s a telescope, okay?” Joey said. “It doesn’t belong to me. I don’t want to break it.”
“I said, drop it.”
“But—”
“Are you deaf?” the sheriff demanded.
That sparked Joey’s temper. “No,” he said, setting it down gently instead of dropping it. “No, I’m not.” Maybe the deputy was, though. “All I want to do is put it in its case.”
“Please,” Whitney added.
“Yeah, please,” Joey agreed.
The guy hesitated, then nodded once. Joey knelt down to lay the pieces in the antique velvet-lined case. Then they were led down the rocky path.
At least, Joey thought, he wasn’t in trouble. He’d told Grandpop after dinner that he was going out, and Grandpop had offered a vague nod which Joey took as assent. And even if he didn’t have permission, Grandpop slept like, well, like a guy who couldn’t hear. All summer long, Joey had been coming and going as he pleased.
Tonight, he decided, he’d just make nice with Officer Friendly and sneak back home, no harm done.
The fantasy sustained him until he reached the bottom of the path. Next to the squad car sat a small, gleaming convertible. Two people stood next to it.
Aunt Rosa stepped forward. “You are in such trouble.”
Joey swallowed with an audible gulp.
It was worse than he could imagine. His aunt text-messaged Grandpop that he was fine. Alex made him lock the bikes together; he’d have to come back for them in the morning.
“I’ll take that,” the sheriff said, reaching for the telescope.
“I’ve got it.” Alex Montgomery stepped forward. “It was mine, and I gave it to the kid.”
That’s all Joey was in that moment. A kid. A punk. Just a few minutes before, he’d been on top of the world, with a view of the stars, about to kiss a girl.
Alex took the scope away and shut it in the trunk. Joey doubted he’d ever see it again.
But that wasn’t the worst moment Joey would suffer. The worst was when they made him get in the back of the squad car with Whitney. Behind the cage. There were no handles or locks on the rear doors of the squad car. Joey had never realized that until tonight.
“Thanks, Sean,” Aunt Rosa said.
Great, thought Joey. She’s on a first name basis with the law.
“Not a problem. I still pull night duty sometimes. Keeps me in touch with the nonvoters.”
It was decided that the sheriff would drive both Joey and Whitney to the Brooks’ house, where he would apologize. From there, his aunt would drive him back to town.
“You’re gonna behave, all right?”
“Yes, sir.” Joey wanted to protest that they hadn’t done anything, but he knew better. Being absent without leave made grown-ups freak. He’d seen it in his own household many a time. His parents went ape-shit when the twins went missing, which they did a lot. His sisters liked to party.
And he didn’t. It was so unfair.
He turned to Whitney, who sat quietly, staring straight ahead. “You okay?” he asked softly.
“Don’t say anything, kid.”
“I was just asking if she’s all right.”
“What’d you do to her, kid?”
“Nothing, okay?” Whitney said with that superior tone. She pursed her lips and continued staring straight ahead. Joey prayed she wouldn’t cry. He couldn’t stand it when girls cried; he felt totally helpless. His sister Edie was a crier. The whole house shook when she sobbed about a bad grade, a boyfriend, a broken nail. But maybe crying helped, he reflected, counting the squares of the grid that imprisoned him. Not crying was actually painful, an ache of pressure in his chest. Maybe girls cried because it let off the pressure.
To his relief, Whitney didn’t cry. She just sat there until they pulled through the gate of her parents’ house. It was one of those summer places that got featured in magazines, a historic house with historic gardens and historic statues everywhere. Probably Roger-effing-Williams had taken a pee right on the grounds. Whitney had told him there was a gun emplacement somewhere that had figured in the Battle of Rhode Island a zillion years ago. Whitney’s mother thought it made the Brooks family better than regular people. Whitney didn’t, though; she tended to scoff at her mother’s snobbery.
Waiting in front of the house, her parents looked as grim as the couple in that famous American Gothic painting, only they wore better clothes, even at one in the morning.
The squad car door opened and Whitney slid out. Joey followed, eager to escape.
Whitney’s mother broke out of the frozen pose and hurried across the cobblestone drive. “Where in heaven’s name have you been, young lady?” she said. Whitney looked over at Joey and mouthed along with her mother’s next words: “We were worried sick about you.”
Joey almost lost it, but he managed to stand up straight, shoulders back, chin tucked, eyes ahead, stiff as a new recruit. “Mrs. Brooks, ma’am, I’m sorry about tonight. It was my idea.”
“I found them at Watch Hill,” the sheriff reported. “They claimed they were looking at stars.”
“We were,” Joey asserted. “A planet, actually. The transit of Mercury was tonight and we both wanted to see it.”
As he spoke, the Alfa pulled up beside the squad car. Whitney’s mother flared her nostrils as Aunt Rosa got out of the car. She was still in her work
clothes, a black dress and high heels.
Whitney’s father spoke up for the first time. “And you are...?” He looked at Aunt Rosa’s boobs, even though he pretended not to. Joey disliked him and his patronizing tone immediately.
He stepped forward. “Sir, my name is Joseph Capoletti, and this is my aunt, Rosa Capoletti.”
Mr. Brooks gave him the once-over, taking in Joey’s hair, the earrings, the clothes. “Wait inside, Whitney,” he said, still glaring at Joey. “Go to your room.”
“But—”
“Now, Whitney.” As she marched toward the house, Mr. Brooks turned to the sheriff’s deputy. “Thank you for bringing our daughter home. You’ve done a good night’s work.”
The cop didn’t say anything. He was probably pissed at Brooks’s attitude, patting him on the head like a birddog. He got back in his car and spoke into the radio, then pulled out of the driveway.
Meanwhile, Alex got out of the Alfa. The Brookses were glaring at Rosa as though trying to freeze her with their eyes. “We’d appreciate it, Miss Cappellini—”
“That’s Capoletti,” she corrected. Joey could see her getting ticked off. It wasn’t anything physical, just a certain energy that seem to zap around her like an invisible force field.
“Yes, well, we’d appreciate it if you would support us in keeping Joseph away from Whitney.”
“Oh, I’m sure you would,” said Aunt Rosa.
Clearly they didn’t hear the sarcasm in her voice.
“I’m glad we agree. Whitney is a very sheltered child. She’s not accustomed to boys like your nephew.”
Joey held in a snort of disbelief. Whitney was the go-to girl when you needed a fake ID or booze. And judging by the way she’d come on to him tonight, he figured she’d had plenty of practice. But her parents didn’t want to hear that.
“Joey will be held accountable for his actions,” said Aunt Rosa, her temper still seething just below the surface. “However, it’s a free country, and unless you lock your daughter up, she might make friends with boys like Joey, so get used to it.”
“Look, Ms. Cap...” Mr. Brooks cleared his throat. “We don’t want to press charges—”
“Hey, maybe I want to,” she said, snapping like a dry twig. “Did you ever think of that, asino sporco?”
Joey bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing when Alex stepped forward.
“Excuse me,” he said, nodding at the Brookses. “Alex Montgomery,” he explained. “I live down the road—”
“Alexander, of course.” Mrs. Brooks shifted effortlessly into social mode as though she was at a cocktail party. “Our mothers went to Brown together. Mine was older, of course, so she was terribly shocked to hear of your loss.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” Rosa said under her breath. “Get in the car, Joey. I’m taking you home.” She turned to Alex. “I assume you can find your own way home?” She didn’t wait for an answer but got in the car and gunned the engine.
Joey kept holding in laughter as she peeled out, leaving Alex looking like a doofus while the Brookses fawned over him. “You shouldn’t have ditched him,” said Joey.
“He lives a quarter-mile down the road, and this car only seats two.”
“What was he doing here tonight, anyway?”
She went screaming around the turnoff to Winslow. “He was the one who figured out where you’d be.” She clicked her red fingernails on the steering wheel. “I guess maybe I shouldn’t have ditched him with those people. Me and my temper.”
Joey tried to shrink down in the seat of the Alfa. Maybe she’d stay off track and forget to tear him a new one. “He probably doesn’t mind,” he suggested. “He might have needed a nightcap anyway.”
Mistake. He should have kept his mouth shut. “What he needs,” Rosa snapped, “is to be sound asleep in bed. That’s what we all need. But you and your little girlfriend weren’t thinking about that, were you?”
“She’s not my girlfriend.”
“And I’m not my mother’s daughter. I wasn’t born yesterday, Joey. I know a pair of revved-up teenagers when I see it. Look, this is for your own good. Don’t give your heart to a girl like that.”
“Like what?”
“Summer people.”
“I’m summer people.”
“You are not. You’re just here for the summer. There’s a difference.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about. Anyway, nothing happened. Nobody gave anyone’s heart away. That’s your issue, not mine.”
“What?”
Joey wished the car had an escape hatch. He should learn to keep his big mouth shut. Oh, well. In for a penny, in for a pound. “You know what. You and Alex, that’s what.”
“There is no me and Alex.”
“And I’m not my father’s son.”
“You’re not funny,” she said, accelerating through the last stoplight before home. “And quit trying to change the subject. You sneaked out, you were groping some girl—”
“Like I said.” He exaggerated the enunciation of each word, figuring his best defense was to distract her with snottiness. “We just wanted to use the telescope.”
“If it was so innocent, why didn’t you get permission?”
“Grandpop said it was okay.”
Rosa slowed the car a bit and glanced over at him. “He didn’t tell me that.”
“He probably forgot,” Joey blurted out, “like he forgets everything else.”
She slammed on the brakes right in the middle of a deserted street. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
In the yellowish glare of a street lamp, Joey could see something flickering in and out of her anger. He thought maybe it was fear. He would need to choose his words carefully, he realized a little late. It would freak him out if someone told him his own dad was losing it. He’d better remember that. This was Rosa’s father.
“Joey?” she said over the burble of the engine.
He cleared his throat. “Grandpop forgets stuff,” he said as gently as he could.
“So does everybody,” she said. “I forgot your mother’s birthday last month and I still haven’t sent her a card.”
He felt a little sorry for her; she was so desperate to believe this was nothing. He’d tried that, too, when he first moved in. Grandpop was a deaf guy. That made him more likely to forget to turn off the water in the sink, or to leave his electric razor on, or to ignore the mail when it dropped through the slot on the front door. He wondered how much of this Aunt Rosa knew.
“I’m not talking about that kind of forgetting,” Joey said. “I’m talking about almost everything. Every day it’s something. He left the truck running until it ran out of gas. He left a pot of beans boiling on the stove. The house reeked for hours and now there’s a huge black circle on the ceiling from the smoke. When I tell him anything, I usually have to repeat it about a zillion times. Half the time, he calls me Roberto, and when I correct him, he gets all mad.”
Rosa blinked fast, like she was batting away tears. Oh, man, thought Joey. Not another one. Fortunately she didn’t cry. “Have you...talked to Grandpop about this?”
“Constantly, but he blows me off. Alex said—”
“Whoa, Bubba.” Any possibility of tears disappeared, probably boiled away by her temper. “You mentioned this to Alex?”
“Maybe,” Joey said quietly. “I didn’t think it was any big secret. Besides, the smell from the burned beans was all over me, so when I went to Alex’s and he asked—”
“You went to Alex’s?”
This was going from bad to worse. “He had some astronomy books to loan me, okay? It’s a free country.”
“So you said something to Alex, but not to me,” Aunt Rosa observed. “Maybe you should just write a press release. Have you discus
sed this with your parents?”
“No. My dad would probably have the same reaction as you.”
“What reaction? How am I reacting?”
“Loudly,” Joey said.
Across the road, a light went on and curtains stirred in a window. Rosa shifted gears and drove on in complete silence to the house on Prospect Street.
thirty-four
Linda snapped on a pair of rubber gloves. “Okay, let’s get started.”
Rosa looked around her father’s house and grimaced. “Now I know how Hercules felt when he saw the Augean stables.”
“Aw, it’s not that bad.”
“It is. I can’t believe you volunteered for this.”
“Hey, what are friends for?” Linda grabbed a bottle of Windex.
“Probably not degreasing my father’s kitchen ceiling, but I love you for being here.”
“It’s all right, Rosa,” Linda assured her. “You’ve helped me out of many a jam. Were you able to get an appointment at the doctor for him?”
“They worked us in at eleven o’clock.” To cover her unease, Rosa turned away and switched on an ancient radio that had sat on the same shelf for decades. After a rumble of static, she found a local station playing Belle and Sebastian, and then got to work.
Rosa went into the den and surveyed the area. She visited her father all the time. She’d stepped over piles of clutter, but it had never occurred to her that Pop was having serious problems. As time went by, his carelessness had increased, but Rosa hadn’t thought anything of it. She wanted to cry but refused to allow herself the luxury. She didn’t deserve to cry. She was a Bad Daughter.
In the past twenty-four hours, since Joey had declared the Emperor naked and forced her out of her cocoon of denial, she had faced facts. Her father was in trouble and she hadn’t allowed herself to admit it. She’d been so wrapped up in the restaurant and her own life that she’d ignored what was going on right under her nose.
She hadn’t said anything to him. Yet. This morning, she let herself into the house and announced that she was going to do some cleaning and sorting. He’d waved her in, completely indifferent. Linda insisted on joining her and tackling the more obvious things. Rosa knew she could have engaged the restaurant’s cleaning service, but thought better of it; this was her penance.