Leftover Girl

by Bolick, C. C.

  The Dare

  Bailey introduced me to everyone at Angel’s party with a smile, and then pushed me into a bathroom that barely held a sink and shower, much less a washer and dryer. She pulled an eyeliner pencil from her purse and applied a black stripe under each eye, on top of an equally dark line. The floor crunched under my feet, but I didn’t need to look for the litter box I’d smelled from the hall. A creamy-white cat rubbed against my legs and I stooped to pick it up.

  “Angel’s been threatening to make everyone play spin the bottle,” Bailey said. “How lame is that? I’m having flashbacks to fifth grade.”

  “It’s Angel’s party.”

  “And I’d cry if her parents hadn’t left the globe unlocked. We’re trying vodka this time,” Bailey said, laughing. “Angel said that bottle has the most and last time her parents almost caught on to the fact a third of the rum evaporated.”

  “Evaporated?” Rachelle asked, poking her head around the door. “Maybe she should take Skip’s stupid advice and fill the bottle back up with water.”

  Bailey shook her head. “This is too much drama when everyone’s only gonna get one sip. Angel’s lucky you keep her from listening to Skip.”

  “It’s not easy.” Rachelle glanced down the hall, where Angel and Skip were laughing. “Angel doesn’t seem to have a brain when he’s around.”

  Bailey closed her purse, content with only the eyeliner. “Did you hear why Skip got the ticket? No one gets a ticket for driving too slow, and of course his dad took the keys.”

  “If my dad was the principal, I’d lose the keys too.” Rachelle laughed. “Oh yeah, Angel’s ready for us.”

  At the entrance to the kitchen, Angel rounded the counter and grabbed her phone off the charger. “Everyone who’s playing spin the cell phone, in the living room. Except for you Pade—you’re making me a drink with the o.j. you brought.”

  Pade laughed. “Spin the cell phone? You’ve got a whole liquor cabinet to choose from.”

  I found a seat on the only section of wood not covered by a rug.

  “Sure you want to do this?” Rachelle asked.

  “Like I’ve got a choice,” I said, staring at the floor.

  She moved closer. “You don’t always have to try so hard to fit in, not around here. Was it bad at the other schools?”

  Her words brought a smile to my face. “Not bad, really. We just never stayed long enough to worry about not fitting in. Starting school in Credence, well, I guess it’s like coming home.” I met her eyes, feeling sure about one thing at least. “If fitting in is a package deal, then I say bring it on.”

  She blinked, perhaps wanting to say more, but pulled back as Bailey squeezed between us.

  Angel strolled in, foam cup in hand, followed by Pade. “Since it’s my birthday, I get to pick and the new girl goes first.”

  “What?” I asked, with a quick glance from Pade to Skip to Terrance, all three staring back. Any dare, anywhere—that had been my motto since Texas, although fighting always got a free pass since Dad had made me promise all those years ago. This, however, was too much too soon. The voice screamed inside my head, this time a five-alarm warning, but of what? Impending doom, maybe? With a deep breath, I spun the phone. The case swooshed, easing to a stop in front of Pade.

  With everyone laughing, Bailey slipped an arm around my neck. “One kiss won’t hurt.”

  I pulled away. “Am I the only person who thinks this is crazy? Why do I get the feeling you’re up to something?”

  “Up to what?” Looking around the circle, she shrugged. “This wasn’t my idea. Maybe Pade wants to kiss you.”

  Of course he didn’t want to kiss me, and now he couldn’t not kiss me. If only the phone had stopped in front of Skip or Terrance. Still, one option might keep my name out of gossip. “You know me kissing Pade would be yucky weird since we’re related.”

  Angel squealed. “Nice try. Too bad everyone in this room knows you’re adopted. Bailey was right—this is lame, but I’ve got a better idea.” She rubbed her hands together and jumped to her feet. “Instead of just kissing, why don’t you go somewhere alone?”

  “Hey,” Bailey said. “We won’t be able to see them.”

  “What about Sarah Beth?” I asked.

  “This is just a game,” Terrance said. “Sarah Beth has been to these parties. If the phone had stopped on her, she might have even kissed you herself.”

  Angel turned so fast she nearly fell. “Everyone follow me.” She led us through the kitchen, green and white linoleum dotting our path from beneath a layer of clothes and more cat litter. After tripping over an old pizza box, she recovered with a spin, arms outstretched. Her hands framed the door like a new car waited behind her. “Five minutes in the pantry. You can even decide to make out with the light or without.”

  “Fine,” I said, shoving the door aside before anyone noticed my cheeks.

  “Really?” Bailey asked with wide eyes. “No arguing?”

  Pade followed and grabbed the string above. “Light on or off?” He grinned, pushing the door closed behind us.

  I lowered between a vacuum and a shelf of cans, finding nothing but a stack of old Seventeen magazines to sit on. “Seriously?”

  “Are you counting the minutes already?” He sighed and sat down opposite me, legs crossed, within an arm’s length. The safety of nearly a foot in height difference disappeared. “We should at least act like something’s going on in here.”

  “I guess we could say we kissed,” I said, forcing my eyes on the light. Maybe turning it off wasn’t such a bad idea. “How would they know if nothing happens?”

  We sat, unmoving, silence tying a knot at the base of my tongue as if I’d swallowed a trashcan of shredded paper that clung to my throat. He exhaled, the sound of his breathing slowing my pulse, and I waited for him to make a joke, laugh, or somehow act like the same Pade I’d seen ripping through foil paper under a Christmas tree. Though meeting this guy had once been fun, kissing him might make me hurl. Knowing him could be even worse.

  “You never wanted to kiss me before,” I said. Did he notice the way my fists clenched?

  “I’ve never been alone with you in a pantry before.” His smile faded, and in his eyes grew a question. Time slowed to nonexistent as he crossed the gulf, with my heart on pace to beat loose from the safety of its cage, each thud sending new warmth through a pulse of blood struggling to survive each shallow gulp.

  One kiss, I told myself. Other guys had kissed me. Well, maybe one other guy at my last homecoming dance and one before we moved to Atlanta, but neither had made me feel as if something great was about to end. Or begin. I couldn’t decide.

  Inches from my face, Pade paused and inhaled. We were frozen in time and I trembled, fearful he’d never close the distance, never end the torture building inside. Without warning, he brought his mouth to mine, first in a feather touch, then his lips holding mine as if an eternity could pass before we’d gasp for air.

  Clapping brought us back to the party, to Angel’s house, and I remembered who sat across from me. I pulled back, red gleaming in my cheeks and not only from embarrassment. I was ready to hit somebody.

  “Did you get it?” Bailey asked.

  Skip lowered his phone. “Not a good shot. Can we try again?”

  I scrambled to my feet. “Please tell me that won’t be on the Internet tonight. You don’t understand my dad will have a stroke.”

  Pade grabbed my arm, guiding me through the onlookers, to a back corner of the living room. His voice shook as he leaned down. “My sister can’t say no when Angel gets these wild ideas.”

  “Well,” I said, “this is some welcome, but why did you kiss me? We could have lied and said we kissed. Who would have found out?”

  “I wanted…” he said, eyes locking with mine. “…how it would feel, I had to know.”

  My cheeks flamed again. “Are you out to get me now, because of the pool? Or is it something else?”

  Pade looked away. “You’
ve got it wrong. I don’t hate you.”

  “Then why let them embarrass me?”

  “It was just a game, just a kiss,” he said, shaking his head. “It wasn’t supposed to mean anything.”

  “It didn’t,” I bit out and charged for the backdoor, not sure where I was going, not caring who was in my way. Out onto the red wooden porch and down the steps I ran, a panorama of water spreading before me.

  Bailey yelled, her steps closing on mine. “Where are you going?”

  Hot air filled my lungs as I rushed toward the water. “I can’t believe you.”

  “For letting Skip record you? A year from now, we’ll be making jokes about the look on your face.”

  “He’s got a girlfriend.”

  She laughed as I reached the bank. “Pade’s always got a girlfriend. Sarah Beth is like the rest—boring.”

  I dropped to my knees, stretching for the water. “You’re an expert on girlfriends?”

  She grabbed my arm, pulling me back. “You can’t get in the water. Uncle Justin really would have a stroke.”

  Pushing her away, I reached again for the water, this time dragging the tips of my fingers through the river’s edge. The sky didn’t fall, the world didn’t come to a screeching halt. Looking around, nothing had changed with the boats speeding by. My insides were still pulsing and life before I met Justin and Lorraine Delaney remained a blank canvas. Laughter floated down from the house. “I thought it would be colder.”

  “Jessica Ray,” a voice thundered behind us.

  I jumped and lost my balance, nearly toppling into the water. Dad rushed forward, pulling me to the bank as if a single drop might mean my end.

  “You should have told me,” he said. “You shouldn’t be here.”

  “You followed us?” I bit my lip to control the anger, but Bailey had receded to the shade of a nearby tree. What had she said about an apartment? “Angel can’t help her parents moved to a trailer park.”

  “We’ve lived in more trailers than I can count on my left hand. I can’t believe you hid the water from me.”

  Would it matter that Bailey and Pade had set me up? “It’s not like I remember.”

  “You used to cry out in the night. You wouldn’t put a toe through the bathroom door without Lorraine’s hand attached to yours.” His eyes blazed as he pulled me close, his voice dropping to a whisper. “Something happened to you that night in New York, something that made you fear water. Don’t you ever worry that going near water might bring back a past you don’t want to remember?”

  Behind me, water gleamed in the sun, a river the size of an Atlanta highway. A boat parted the mass of glitter and another shot by, pulling a tube with two girls flat on their stomachs. A jet ski rode the waves left in their wake and shot an endless stream of white drops into the air. I longed to jump off one of the many wooden docks, clothes and all, if only to prove him wrong about my fears.

  “Your mom should have come with you. We thought you were old enough, that you would understand how to stay safe.”

  “I promise I didn’t know about the water.”

  “Like how you promised not to post pictures of you and your friends online? It’s a good thing I made sure you put on sunscreen before you left this morning. Have you quit doing that too?”

  The man was anal about everything. Maybe he had every right to be mad, but when would he tell me why he worried about the water more than I did?

  * * * * *

  Dinner that night felt like eating a corndog for breakfast. We sat around the table in Aunt Charlie’s kitchen with Bailey across from me. Not only did the slice of polished wood extend longer than our last kitchen, the counters overflowed with gadgets Mom admired most of the night. She’d never mentioned wanting a red mixer before. Mom cooking our first meal together in Credence while her sister went into work at the hospital made no sense.

  “People can’t stop getting sick long enough for us to eat,” Mom said with a laugh. “What a shame.”

  Maybe the weird feeling had something to do with how Pade had refused to come home, insisting on staying the night with Terrance.

  Dad didn’t mention Angel’s place at dinner or the fact her backyard included a dock, and thankfully Bailey knew better than to remind him. He stared at his plate, dragging the meatloaf and green beans from edge to edge while Mom talked about the afternoon, how she and the boys bought new clothes for school, and all her plans for the first day of class. If only I’d been there, she had enough money to buy me a new outfit for every day of the week. Maybe Saturday, she was saying, but Dad simply nodded. Her latest attempt at meatloaf wasn’t much better than some of the worst cafeterias I’d known, but he’d never tell her.

  “Are we ready for tomorrow?” he asked, but didn’t look my way.

  The boys spoke and Dad watched the tug of war with interest. Unlike me, he understood their ‘twin talk.’ Danny would start a sentence and Collin would finish. Or Collin would start and Danny would finish, but they were always ready for a turn at the rope.

  Born almost a year after I met Mom and Dad, Danny and Collin were the younger brothers my real parents never gave me. They made fun of my clothes (or fashion lack thereof) and were smart enough to crack every password. Danny and Collin were responsible for Dad knowing about the pictures online. No rules broken, no violation of any state or local laws. Just friends hanging out at the bowling alley, but he acted as if they caught me popping pills or worse. Of course, no one could find out I came from New York. For the first time I didn’t feel grateful for how they hid me. No, protected me, as Dad always said.

  A silent table jolted me to Dad’s stare. “Where were you just now?”

  “I was, I…” my voice trailed off as I tried to think of words that wouldn’t make me sound like a total freak. I couldn’t help I still felt like one. “I was thinking about tomorrow.”

  Dad sighed. “Why are you so anxious for school to start?”

  I shrugged. “I’m not anxious. This year will be the same as last only I’ll be in tenth grade.”

  “Same as last you say?” Dad raised an eyebrow. “How long will it take you to add up enough tardies for a write-up? You’ll find your typical share of trouble this year, no doubt.”

  “Uncle Justin,” Bailey said, in her mischievous voice. “What kind of trouble did you find in high school?”

  “I found my fair share,” he said. “Enjoy it while you can, you’re only fifteen once.”

  ‘Live in the moment’ was one of Dad’s favorite sayings. I guess almost dying cleared him of worrying. Unlike me, strapped to the bench of a merry-go-round of school and friends and people at the edge of memory. Many nights I tossed, sleepless while music tormented and horses raced in place, the daily round of mistakes repeating in my head. All I ever wanted was to forget them all.

  Bailey laughed. “I bet the entire school begged to hang out on a daily basis. You probably even got to be class president.”

  “Yeah…” started Danny.

  “You’d make a great one,” finished Collin. “What do you think, Mom?”

  She lowered her glass of sweet tea. “Of course, your father is a talented speaker. Before Atlanta, he gave inspirational speeches whenever he traveled for his job with the weight loss company.”

  Danny looked at me. “Inspir what?”

  “Inspirational means he makes people feel good and shows them how to be creative.”

  Dad gave a rare wink, his smile widening. “I guess you could have considered me a popular student where I went to school.”

  Great, sounded the cold irony in my head. Another thing I couldn’t have inherited from him.

  “By the way,” Dad said. “You’re looking at the newest rep for Health Made Simple.”

  Collin scraped his fork across his plate. “Does that mean we can be good speakers too one day, just like you?”

  “Son, the two of you can be anything you want.”

  Collin’s next question brought an uncomfortable silence to the ta
ble. “What about Jes?”

  No one took a breath until Danny broke the silence. “She can’t be like Dad, silly, she’s adopted. Tommy says his dad told him adoption means we’re not related, not actually.”

  Collin looked to Dad. “Does that mean Jes is not really our sister?”

  Dad’s face tensed. “Of course Jes is your sister. The fact she’s adopted means she has different biological parents than you. It also means she’s here because we love her and want her to be part of our family.” The finality of Dad’s tone kept the twins from asking what biological meant, leaving four eyes to search mine.

  Mom’s smile relieved the sinking in my stomach. “What Dad’s saying is that he and I aren’t Jessica’s father and mother by birth, but we love her like she’s our own. You do love her too, don’t you?”

  “Yeah,” the twins answered in unison.

  The silence that again took over dinner branded me a true outsider. All the years we’d been together, playing this game called family, and the truth was clear. The meatloaf became a mass of rubber bands between my teeth, and I spit the wad into my napkin. When I pushed the plate away and glanced up, a ghost flickered in Dad’s eyes.

  He carried his plate to the sink and turned on the water, full force. “I believe Jes will surprise us all one day with talents of her own.” Hands forward, he braced himself against the counter and closed his eyes. Steam rose while the sink filled and Dad stood, unmoving, as if preparing to step out of the curtains and onto a stage. When water slipped over the ledge of granite and rained around his feet, he jumped and grasped for the handle.

  Mom snatched a towel from the fridge. “I’ve got it.” Her voice was high, strained as she laughed. “I needed to mop this floor.”

  With a single nod, Dad turned for the porch. He allowed the door to slam behind him, an exploit he normally yelled at us about.

  Under the table, my socks gleamed as if still warm from the dryer. I watched her jagged strokes, the way she gripped the towel, before rising. “Can I help?”

  She glanced at the twins, who were scraping the last bit of ketchup from their plates, then squeezed my hand. “Don’t worry about your father. He gets in these moods sometimes, but he was right.”