Kevin sighed and sat at the dining room table, dejected. He rolled the sleeves up on his jacket.
“That's just beautiful,” he said sarcastically.
Rachel gestured to the phone. “That's...not good?”
“Oh no. It's great, seriously. I've been telling Kristin to get out of the apartment and have a good time for years. But she does it on a night I need to borrow the car. How am I supposed to get to the library?”
“Well, I have to go home. But I can swing by before seven and pick you up.”
Kevin glanced at the clock on the microwave. Seven o'clock was only two hours away.
“Just stay here,” he said. “No sense doing all that driving around. I'll make us dinner. We can watch a movie.”
Rachel wrinkled her face. “I don't know if that...I just need to get home.”
“Why?”
She wouldn't tell him that her mother had multiple sclerosis and Nancy left at six.
“I just do.”
“You should stay,” he said. He gestured to the kitchen. “I'm gonna make chicken and vegetables. I promise you won't die.”
She laughed, having trouble accepting the fact that someone apparently wanted her company.
“Dinner, movie, talking on the couch. You know you want to,” he said.
She finally nodded, then reached for her cell phone.
“Let me call home. I'll go out in the hall. Is that okay?”
He shrugged. “Sure. The door's unlocked.”
Rachel stepped out in the hall and walked up the single flight of steps so she was near the front door to the apartment building. Mom answered on the second ring.
“Rachel? Is everything okay?”
“Yeah, Mom. What are you up to?”
“Nothing. Just helping Nancy make dinner. When are you coming home?”
“I'm over a...friend's house. I was gonna stay over here, then hit the library for a school project. Is that okay?”
“Of course, honey. Why wouldn't it be?”
“Well, you know, Nancy leaves at six-”
“I'm not dead, Rachel,” she snapped. “I'll be perfectly fine by myself. Who are you with? The newspaper club?”
“It's the media team, Mom. And no, I'm with Kevin Mishnar.”
“Kevin? A boy?”
Rachel closed her eyes. Mom didn't say it like she was terrified at the thought of her daughter spending time with a boy, doing drugs, getting naked. She sounded excited, relieved. Rachel never felt so sad and pathetic.
“Yeah, Mom, a boy.”
“Didn't his parents die a few years ago in a plane crash? That's just terrible.”
“That's him. Look, Mom, I gotta go.”
“Okay, dear, you have a good time.”
Rachel hung up, but stayed by the front door for a moment. She needed to compose herself, as her eyes tried to fill with tears.
She knew her place at school, and in the social web of their tiny little town of Walton. It had always been that nerdy girl since elementary school. There weren't any invitations to parties or school functions. She could count on one hand the number of dates she had in her life.
On most days, she could handle it all fine.
She knew Mom meant well, and they would both laugh about it later. But it hurt to hear Mom subtly reinforce how lonely her life was.
She blinked the tears away and took a deep breath. The last thing she wanted Kevin to see was her crying after a call with her mother.
She stepped back into the living room. Kevin had turned on the television and was moving back and forth from the kitchen to the dining room, setting the table. The scent from the kitchen made her stomach rumble and her mouth water.
“Hey,” he greeted. “Dinner won't be long. Do you like peppers and onions?”
“Yeah, I do-”
She froze when she looked at him.
He grabbed a glass from the table and walked it over to her.
“Is soda okay?”
She said nothing. It took most of her willpower to keep her jaw from dropping.
“Hello? Rachel? I guess soda isn't okay?”
For the first time in four years, through all the times in the school's halls, or random meetings in town, she saw him without his jacket.
He wore a plain white tee shirt. No slogans or other colors, nothing fancy. Simply a boring white tee shirt.
No one had ever made a tee shirt look so good.
It was probably a size too small, and hugged every muscle Kevin had, which he had plenty of. He laughed and waved the glass in front of her face. She didn't see the glass, only the muscles as they twitched in his arm.
“Earth to Rachel?”
“Soda is fine, thanks,” she stuttered.
He handed over the glass and went back to the kitchen, keeping a concerned eye on her.
“Are you okay?”
“Oh, yeah, I'm fine. I just...I haven't seen you without your jacket.”
“Ah.” He touched his jacket that he'd hung on the back of the dining room chair. “My dad gave me this, a week before he and Mom died. I probably wear it too much.”
“Yes, you do,” Rachel said, a little too quickly.
He turned his back to her and hovered over the stove.
“Well, make yourself at home. Find something on TV. We've got DVDs in the cabinet on the side there. But don't grab one of Kristin's chick-flicks. I can't stand those.”
“I wouldn't dream of it,” she said, laughing.
She looked him up and down from behind for a moment, feeling her face growing hot, before sitting on the couch in the living room. The cold soda didn't exactly cool her off.
It was silly, but Kevin's jacket had become such a part of him, of the image he projected, that it was difficult to see past it sometimes. There was a young man under the jacket. A young man who shopped for groceries and cooked. A young man that despite having to sleep on the couch, had a warm laugh.
And was very cute.
He joined her a few minutes later, sitting on the opposite end of the couch and leaning back.
“Dinner's done,” he said. “Just needs to cool a few minutes.”
“You didn't have to cook dinner, you know.”
He smiled and waved his hand. “I'm just practicing my hosting skills, for all the ladies who will be asking me out soon.”
Rachel laughed. If Kevin ever decided to take his jacket off at school, she didn't doubt that would happen.
They enjoyed each other's company. They laughed and talked at the dining room table as the TV provided background noise.
Rachel began their afternoon together accusing Kevin of being embarrassed to ride in her car. Now she hung on his every word as she looked across the table at him.
She never thought simply eating dinner with a guy would be so much fun. Judging from his smile and laugh, Kevin enjoyed her company as well. Rachel normally kept her guard up around everyone, but Kevin was so easy going. He didn't have to do much to get a laugh out of her.
They watched TV after dinner, and almost lost track of time when Rachel looked at her cell phone.
“We'd better leave soon to get to the library.”
Kevin nodded, and wrapped the leftovers in foil, despite Kristin saying not to make her dinner. He slipped his jacket on and smiled at Rachel as they left the apartment.
Chapter 5
The ride to the library was quiet, but not awkward. Kevin relaxed and watched the town blur by as Rachel made her way through the streets. They both brought their backpacks with them, but he hoped it wouldn't turn into a long, work-filled night.
Kevin felt a little nervous. Not only was he spending time with the one person he'd healed besides himself and his sister, but he also didn't get a chance to check his email at the apartment. Just an idea of the workload ahead of him would have been nice. There was only five days before the assignment was due, and Monday was already gone. He couldn't send out any papers on Thursday night, as his customers would no doubt want a day to look
the work over. The cut off time had to be Wednesday night.
That didn't leave a lot of time to work on writing.
Rachel parked in front of the nearly deserted library. Kevin stole a quick look at the cute, geeky girl as they left the Mustang. His first real encounter with her was going surprisingly well. No awkwardness, no accusations. He should have approached her years ago.
Not only was she fun, she was attractive.
An elderly lady putting books away gave them a smile as they walked inside. Kevin looked over the maze of bookshelves and rows of computers.
“Do you think they're here?” Rachel asked.
“Only one way to find out. Find the furthest corner away from everything, the perfect make out spot.”
She laughed. “You picked up on that, too?”
“Yeah. I'm dense, but I'm not that dense.”
They toured the library a few minutes and found exactly what they were looking for. At a round table, near the rear exit, sat Donna and Paul. They had books scattered across the table, but they weren't reading. Donna sat on Paul's lap wearing a skirt. He had his hand on her thigh and his tongue in her mouth. She held onto his shoulder to steady herself. They were obviously enjoying themselves.
“Shakespeare would be proud,” he whispered as they approached.
Rachel covered her mouth to keep from laughing.
They kept going at it, even when Kevin and Rachel stood on the opposite side of the table.
Kevin coughed.
Donna shot off Paul's lap. She stood up and straightened her skirt. Paul hung his head for a moment, disappointed at the interruption. Donna sat next to him.
Kevin laughed. He didn't like Paul much, but had to admire his game.
“Don't be jealous,” Paul said, looking at Kevin and Rachel. “Did you two come here together?”
“Yeah. But we made out in the car. Rachel's Mustang has a lot of space.”
Rachel laughed.
“Can we get this over with?” Donna said, looking around. “I really don't want anyone I know seeing me here.”
Rachel started to settle in, but Kevin backed away.
“Give me two minutes,” he said. “I have to check something.”
He crossed the library to the rows of computers. They were empty except for a woman in the opposite row.
No one was watching as he logged into his email.
His eyes widened.
Eight paper requests waited for him.
“Holy crap.”
He quickly entered an auto response message to deny any further requests.
He hung his head in his hands and leaned on the computer desk, trying to think rationally.
Could he finish eight papers, plus his own, by the end of Wednesday?
He looked over the emails and the various topics students had chosen. Mercutio, Romeo, Juliet, Macbeth, Hamlet. Romeo and Juliet had the honor of being selected multiple times.
He thought about responding back to a few requests, reject them.
But eight papers added up to almost five hundred dollars.
There was time left after he went home, two more nights, and whatever dead time he had in his classes.
He could do it.
He logged out of his email, remembering to make sure the computer didn't cache his name or password.
As he walked back to the table, he heard an animated discussion.
“I didn't say that!” Rachel said.
“Yeah, you did. Don't try to take it back now,” Paul said.
Donna laughed. “It is a little weird, Rachel.”
“Both of you shut up.”
Kevin stepped past the bookshelf and saw Rachel frantically throwing her hands in the air and fighting with her hair. Her face was as red as a tomato.
“Hey guys,” he said. “What's going on?”
Paul gestured to Rachel. “She said she dreams about you.”
She turned to face him, looking horrified.
“That's not what I said.”
Kevin sat next to her, trying not to smile.
“I had an accident when I was a kid,” she said. “I was trying to climb a tree, and I fell and hit my head. It was a dream, a hallucination. I dreamed Kevin was there, and his sister. That's it.”
Paul laughed. “Did he feel you up or anything?”
Kevin felt like a weight lifted from his shoulders. The one person who was an eyewitness to his strangeness thought it was all a dream.
He could live with that. There was the real possibility Rachel and he could become friends, without the pressure of their first grade meeting hanging over his head.
“You guys ready to get started on this?” he asked.
It turned out to not be as much work as Kevin thought. They were all responsible for their own papers. The challenge in the project was doing some kind of group presentation in front of class. They decided to keep it simple. They would talk about whether the characters in their papers would like each other. Hawkins liked corny ideas like that.
But they would probably need one more meeting.
“We should get together one more time on Thursday. Nothing big, just to go over the crap we're gonna say,” Kevin said.
Paul leaned back, disgusted. To his credit, Paul had behaved most of the time in the library.
“Are you serious?”
His mood visibly took a turn for the better when Donna reached over and grabbed his leg. It wasn't hard to see what those two had in mind.
“Okay, Thursday it is.”
Kevin was in a good mood. There was still some night left. There was a chance he could get his own paper done, and have plenty of time to work on the rest.
They all said their goodbyes as they left the library. Kevin watched Donna and Paul head to Paul's truck. They had arrived together as well.
He kept an eye on Rachel as they headed to her Mustang. He stood by the passenger's door and watched her as she circled to her side. She kept her head low.
“What's going on?” he asked.
“Nothing.”
Nothing. Kevin doubted that.
They climbed in the car. She started the engine, but didn't drive just yet.
“You didn't say much in there.”
She turned to look at him. “I didn't dream about you.”
“It's okay, Rachel. Seriously. Everyone dreams about me.”
Her jaw dropped at his arrogance before he burst out laughing. She smiled and laughed, then playfully punched him in the arm.
He felt very comfortable around her.
“You jerk,” she said, leaning back in her seat. “I know you'll think this is the weirdest thing, but I dreamed you healed me somehow. Your sister was there, you two were talking, and you made me drink something. Then all the pain went away.”
Kevin felt his heart skip a beat. This was the moment he knew was coming since he was a child. The setting was different than he thought it might be. She wasn't yelling at him, demanding answers. She wasn't knocking at his apartment door with a news crew behind her.
But they were talking about that day in first grade. He had to play it right, remove all doubt from her mind.
“It is a little goofy,” he said as casually as possible. “It sounds like you really smacked your head hard.”
“Yeah,” she said, pulling out of the parking lot. “At least I can still do stupid literature projects, right?”
Kevin breathed a sigh of relief. Hopefully the subject would never come up again.
They drove back to his apartment. His sister's car was parked in the lot. Rachel pulled in front of his building and left the engine running.
“Well,” he said. “I'll see you tomorrow at school.”
He had the door halfway open.
“I, uh,” she stuttered. “I had fun today.”
He smiled warmly and nodded.
“Same here. We'll definitely do it again sometime.”
Kevin smiled as he walked away. He actually made a new friend. Friendships were hard
for him. It wasn't easy to bring someone over the apartment. Most people had houses. He didn't even have a bedroom.
He shook his head at the irony. Rachel was his first friend in a long time, and he always tried to keep away from her.
*****
Rachel walked into her literature class. Mister Hawkins was already at his desk, as usual. Groups of students talked around their desks. Some rested their heads and were asleep. First period was never fun.
A herd of students quieted down as she went to her desk. They left no doubt they were talking about her. She didn't treat school like a summer resort, showing off her body for the world to see. Everyone loved to make fun of the way she dressed.
She was surprised when Kevin walked into class, a full two minutes early. He had the collar of his jacket pulled up as far as it would go, like he was trying to disappear in it. There were huge circles under his eyes.
He walked past his desk and sat next to her.
Rachel's eyes went wide as she looked around class. She could feel the gazes of the other students. Some were surprised, others amused. People simply didn't sit next to her by choice.
“I'm so damn tired,” he said, leaning back in the seat. “I was up all night working on this stupid paper.”
Rachel said nothing.
“Oh, I almost forgot.” He searched through his backpack, pushing aside a few bottles of water, and grabbed two bottles of tea. “I got you something to drink on the walk in.”
She accepted the bottle, still looking at the students watching her. Kevin was oblivious to the attention they were getting.
He took a deep drink, and finally noticed the stares.
“What?” he said. “I didn't bring enough tea for everyone.”
“Kevin,” Rachel said. “What are you doing?”
“Trying to wake up. How was your night?”
“No, I mean, what are you doing sitting next to me? I didn't think we'd talk in school.”
Kevin paused mid drink.
“Don't want to sit next to the apartment dweller?”
She was lost. “What?”
“It's okay, Rachel,” he said, rising to go to his normal seat. “It's cool.”
She was horrified as he walked away. He completely misunderstood her.
A Witch to Live Page 4