Just Flirt

by Laura Bowers

  “What won’t Jake find out?” someone asks.

  Danny Reynolds walks toward us carrying some kind of engine part, his skin tanned and his hair highlighted to a summery strawberry blond. He grins at Roxanne. She blushes and awkwardly tucks back her own red hair as he hands her the part. “Hey, here’s one of my spare drive belts. Tell Jake he owes me a soda for it. And you’re Roxanne, right? I’m Danny, it’s nice to meet you.”

  I don’t know why Roxanne was being so nice to me minutes ago. But I do know two things: She is not romantically interested in Jake.

  And maybe Danny isn’t so awful after all.

  * * *

  The next thirty minutes pass in a frenzy. After Danny leaves, Jake returns with his new tires. Roxanne puts them on the kart and uses the air compressor to fill them while Jake installs the drive belt and changes the spark plugs. Roxanne then starts to mix gas and oil together. “Why are you doing that?” I ask.

  She hesitates before saying, “Um, a two-stroke engine doesn’t have an oil pan, so to get lubrication, you have to mix the oil and gas together.”

  Oh. Right.

  When the announcer calls for the first heat of Jake’s division, he and the other drivers weigh in their karts before pushing them to the pits. Jake shakes hands with his competitors and then steps down onto the narrow seat, Roxanne kneeling beside him with an electric starter. I hold my ears as the engines rev in unison, my adrenaline pounding as Jake shoots off after the starting flag drops, at first sitting up straight and then scooting down to an almost flat position as he speeds past everyone to take the lead. Okay, that was cool.

  Roxanne claps her hands as he disappears from sight. “Yes! It’s awesome if you can take the lead before hitting the first turn.”

  Other crew members cross the pit lane to watch the heat from a wall by the track. We follow them, hoisting ourselves up to sit. The rough concrete digs into my thighs and cigar smoke drifts over us until the roar of engines comes from the east side of the four-mile track. The first driver takes the turn and fires down the straightaway. “Is that Jake?” I ask.

  My heart pumps with excitement. Roxanne stands and yells, “Yeah, a good fifteen yards ahead of everyone!” She leans forward and holds her arms out in a broad sideways V as Jake thunders past us. “That’s, uh, to let him know how much he’s leading.”

  “Hey, you know your stuff,” Danny says, lifting himself up onto the wall to join us since his heat is later. “How long have you been into racing?”

  Roxanne sits again, biting her lip as though she’s unsure at first how to answer. “Oh, ever since I used my Barbies as speed bumps for Tonka Trucks. I, uh, want to follow in Cindy Woosley’s footsteps. She was the first female pit crew chief in NASCAR history.”

  She holds her breath, dreading his reply. So am I, because he’s friends with Blaine and Blaine would most likely think a girl is gay or backward if she liked racing. But Danny nods. “Cool! That’d be a sweet job, wouldn’t it?”

  The sun shines on Roxanne’s red highlights. For some reason, I think of FLIRT RULE #1 as she gives him a quick smile.

  It’s a very nice smile.

  Someone clears his throat behind us. We turn to see Rex taking off his cap. “Hello, Roxanne, it’s nice to see you again,” he says before turning to me. “And you’re Dee, Jane’s daughter, right?”

  Are you kidding me? Maybe Danny isn’t that bad after all, but the last person I want to chat with is Rex, who must be thrilled about the possibility of Mom having to sell more land if Mona wins the lawsuit. My temper seethes as Rex says, “We’ve never formally met, but I heard about the case going to trial, so I wanted to see how your mother is doing.”

  “We’re fine,” I reply with as much anger as two words can convey.

  Rex nods uncomfortably. He looks different today, with his dirty shirt and oil stains on his knees. He wipes his forehead with a rag before pulling his cap back on. “Well, um, tell your mother I said to hang in there, okay?”

  Yeah, Rex is sadly mistaken if he thinks I’m going to forward his message. His cell rings, cutting off any further conversation. He frowns as he reads his text message. “Oops, I forgot to RSVP for a party tonight. Guess that puts me on Miss Manners’ hit list, doesn’t—” Rex stops when he sees my I seriously do not care expression. “Right. Uh, Danny, we should get ready for your heat,” he awkwardly says. But after they leave, I realize something.

  The meeting with Mona’s lawyers was only yesterday afternoon.

  So how does Rex know about the trial?

  * * *

  Jake wins his heat with a finesse that would have had me mesmerized if it weren’t for Rex. Even Roxanne seems distracted. She hops off the wall just as the checkered flag waves and heads in the direction of Rex’s monster-sized trailer—I guess to see Danny’s kart. Jake climbs out of his kart and takes off his helmet, sweat pouring down his face and his hair a tousle of wet curls. As he unzips his fire suit and ties the sleeves low around his waist with his damp shirt sticking to his muscular chest, I can’t help but think of Natalie’s blog entry about how sexy guys are in uniforms.

  Good grief. Sexy doesn’t even begin to describe Jake right now.

  “What’s that look for?” Jake asks after he attaches a long handle to the steering wheel and uses it to start pushing the kart to the parking lot.

  Look? Did I make a look?

  “Nothing. You’re just hot—I mean, overheated. Want some of my water?”

  “Sure, thanks.” Jake takes a long drink from my bottle. We pass Danny’s trailer and see him showing his engine to Roxanne as Rex talks on his cell phone. Wow, maybe she isn’t as shy as I thought. But what about Torrance, is Danny still going out with her? And does he have any clue that she’s seeing Blaine behind his back? I watch as he steps into his fire suit, his arms not nearly as muscular as Jake’s.

  “Nice, real nice, Dee, just go jump on him, why don’t you.”

  Huh? “Whoa, hold on, Jake, I wasn’t—”

  Jake angrily hands back my water. “It’s fine. Ogle all you want. And hey, he’s single now, so there’s another flirt victim for you.”

  That answers my Torrance question. But does Jake truly think I’d have any interest in Danny, his biggest competition? Is that the kind of person he thinks I am? Maybe he was right about me being rude to Roxanne, but to assume I’d sink that low … that hurts. That really hurts. So I run to the opposite side of a hot dog stand and pull out my phone.

  “Hey, Natalie … can you borrow your grandmother’s minivan long enough to come get me? I want to go home.”

  20 Dee

  My mood hasn’t improved by the evening, especially after Natalie and I finish what has to be the rowdiest hayride in all of history. Natalie takes a weary bite of her Skinny Cow. “How did that kid stick an entire Goldfish cracker up his nose?”

  I cringe at the memory of having to pull it out while twenty kids cheered. “No, the better question is why he thought it was hilarious to eat it afterward.”

  Natalie almost dry-heaves. “Please, let’s never discuss that again!”

  “Deal,” I say, just as Jake pulls into the campground, his tanned arm resting out the open window and Roxanne beside him. I expect them to start unloading the trailer, but as soon as Jake parks, Roxanne is out the door and running straight for … me?

  “What in the world is wrong with your phone?” Roxanne asks when she reaches the porch, panting hard.

  Huh? Yeah, my phone is dead—again—but why would she call me? Roxanne takes a shaky breath, her hair windblown and her nose a dull red. “I couldn’t find you after Jake’s heat, so he gave me your number. Oh, and Jake won his race, in case you’re interested.”

  Seriously? In case you’re interested, is that some kind of a dig to make me feel bad for leaving? And here I was stupid enough to think we were starting to get along at the racetrack. “Is that why you ran over here?” I stand to face her, my self-control washing away like mud from the riverbank. “To tell me how r
ude I was to Jake, a guy who judges me even more than you do, if that’s possible?”

  Roxanne steps back, pulling at her stained shorts. “No, that’s not—”

  “Go ahead, tell me how pathetic I am, Roxanne, and how the lawsuit was my fault. It doesn’t matter what you think because I’m already quite aware of my flaws and how I screw up everything.”

  Natalie shakes her head, her lips in a fierce, determined line. “Dee, stop saying that, okay, because if anything, it was my fault.”

  Roxanne lets out a massive groan of frustration and stomps her foot. “Enough, already! It’s neither one of your faults because I’m the one who told Sabrina that Dee was upstairs with Blaine, and I swear, I’m so sorry about that, but it’s not—”

  “What?” Natalie jumps to her feet. “Why did you do that?”

  “Because I thought Dee was only using Jake, okay? I didn’t know they had—”

  “That’s not true!” I say. “It was Jake’s idea—”

  Roxanne grabs the sides of her head and shouts, “I know that now, okay? So will the both of you please shut up for one freaking second so I can tell you something!”

  Her words seem to ricochet off the porch soffit.

  The throbbing rumble of a passing diesel truck surrounds us as Roxanne holds her hands out in front of her. “Please. Let me talk, okay?”

  There it is again, the softness in her eyes, the same one I saw at the racetrack after crashing Jake’s kart. She takes a deep breath. “Okay, it’s true, I told Sabrina. I’m sorry about that and I’m sorry for being so mean to you all those times. But, Dee, before you left the racetrack, I heard something, something you have to know about!”

  Now it’s my turn to feel breathless. “Is it about the lawsuit?”

  “Duh. Only if you think Rex Reynolds dating Mona Owens has anything to do with it.”

  Surely I did not hear her correctly.

  “Mona and Rex?” Natalie shrieks. “Why didn’t you just say so, Roxanne!”

  “What do you think I’ve been trying to do? And yeah, after Jake’s heat, I wanted to talk to Rex because I thought it was odd the way he knew about the trial already, right?”

  “Uh, heck yeah,” I say, ignoring Natalie’s confused look.

  “So, anyway,” Roxanne continues. “While Danny was getting ready for his heat, Rex was talking on his cell, right? And I heard him say ‘It’s going to be great seeing you again tonight, too, Mona.’ It had to be Mona Owens!”

  Rex … with Mona?

  Little clues start to funnel down my jumbled brain. How Rex paid Mom that visit at the beginning of June, how he “generously offered” to buy those lots and give Mom a usable deposit, and how he must have then sweet-talked Mona into going for the full two million so he can get his hands on more if Mom loses the trial.

  A rustling comes from the bushes by the porch. The Cutsons are crouching in the mulch, wearing Spy Gear headsets and fake rubber snakes tied around their scrawny waists. Lyle drops his shoulders in defeat when he sees me staring at him over the railing. “Dang! Our cover is blown.”

  “Hey, why’d ya stop fighting?” Tanner asks us. “On Jerry Springer they never stop fighting until someone gets walloped in the mouth.”

  Natalie marches down the steps and yanks off their headsets. “What did I tell you two about spying and watching Jerry Springer? Just go back to your parents, okay?”

  “Can’t,” Tanner protests, pulling out a stick sword that was wedged under his snake belt and then jumping into a warrior’s pose. He jabs the air a few times. “Mom and Pop are fighting about that big-boobied woman you were just talking about.”

  Roxanne moves closer, nearly tripping on one of the potted azaleas lining the stairs. “Who, Mona Owens?”

  “Yeah,” Lyle says, reaching for his own stick and challenging his brother to a duel. “Mom was mad at Pop for talking to Big-Booby at the Budweiser store.”

  “Budweiser store?” Natalie asks. “Oh, do you mean a liquor store?”

  “That, too.” Lyle strikes Tanner with a thwack, thwack, thwack. “She told Pop she was buying stuff for some party tonight.”

  Okay, really, their parents need a talking-to if they let them watch Jerry Springer and go into liquor stores, but something Lyle said now has Roxanne trotting toward him like a hound on the scent. She grabs their sticks. “Enough with the swordfight. Focus, Lyle, what did she buy?”

  He shrugs. “I don’t know, a bottle of something red.”

  “Wine!” Roxanne turns to me. “Larson Walker’s wine tasting party. My parents are there now—Larson invited nearly everyone in the development so of course he’d invite Rex!”

  Natalie runs up the steps and grabs her backpack. “What are we waiting for, then? Let’s go see for ourselves. You think Jake will let us use his truck, Dee?”

  Uh, no, I’m not about to ask after what happened between us today, and Nat’s grandmother took back her minivan for bingo. Mom’s truck is gone, as well, and I’m too exhausted—both mentally and physically—to bike or walk, so that leaves us only one option. I dart into the store, grabbing the set of keys hanging from a deer antler before striding back out with determined steps.

  “Let’s go,” I say as the screen door slams shut behind me.

  Natalie follows me to the golf cart. She jumps in, sliding to the middle of the seat with me behind the wheel. We both look at Roxanne who is still by the bushes, shifting her weight as though she isn’t sure if she should join us.

  I raise an eyebrow at her. “Are you coming or what?”

  * * *

  “Do you see Rex’s car?” Natalie asks.

  Roxanne stands on the seat, holding on to the roll bar for balance as she scans the vehicles parked along the street. “He has a black Prius, but I don’t see it anywhere. Maybe they’re running late, because Danny raced today.”

  “Prius,” Natalie says. “And here I’d pegged him as more of a gas-guzzling Hummer kind of guy. Pull up closer, Dee, we can’t see anything from here.”

  I wait until Roxanne is seated and start the golf cart again, creeping forward to hide behind a Chevy Suburban. It’s better, but we have to stand to see. On Larson’s back deck, couples in sports coats and dresses sip wine and accept hors d’oeuvres from passing waiters. As much as I despise the Listerine taste of wine, the party looks so elegant. Roxanne’s parents are with another couple, although after closer inspection I notice how Dr. Swain is doing all the talking whereas her mother seems … sad.

  “There’s Sabrina,” Natalie says. Yep, there she is, lounging with her glam friends on cushioned wicker furniture at the basement patio. Blaine stands by the French doors, animatedly talking as though he’s relaying anecdotes from the golf course. Natalie pretends to gag. “Yuck, look at the way Torrance Jones is fawning over Blaine as though he’s so fascinating. I swear, she gives new meaning to the helpless card.”

  “Helpless card?” Roxanne asks. “Oh, yeah, from one of your blog posts! What you said was so dead-on, how there are times when it’s acceptable to play the helpless female card, like when you’re pulled over for a speeding ticket.”

  A passing car douses us with light, showing the flattered glow on Natalie’s face. “Right! ‘But to do so in any other situation does nothing but weaken all of womankind. Weak—bad. Strong—good.’ Cool, you read my entries? Then you’ll love this—remember Meghan, the divorced woman with the bratty daughters? Well, she sent me a message about this hunky pharmacist who asked her out. So far they’ve been on two fabulous dates and—”

  I cut her off by raising my hand. “Oh my gosh, look!”

  Mona steps out onto the deck in a billowing floral dress and strappy sandals. She isn’t alone. A man wraps an arm around her waist, but it’s not Rex. It’s someone else, even though we had it all figured out—why Rex visited the campground, why he was so polite at the racetrack when he asked me to tell Mom to hang in there—

  A flash of recognition overwhelms me.

  Hang in there.
r />   That’s what was written on Mom’s bouquet card.

  Rex is Mom’s not exactly.

  And the man with Mona is Larson Walker.

  * * *

  I can’t believe it. No, I don’t want to believe it.

  Mom with Rex Reynolds?

  And Mona with Larson, of all people, who is now taking a canapé off a serving tray without thanking the waiter. He licks food off his manicured fingers and kisses Mona on the forehead, reminding me of the day Blaine first introduced me to him. Larson had kissed my hand in the same debonair fashion, so either he’s just a naturally charismatic person like Blaine … or he’s completely full of it.

  “What do you know about Larson?” Roxanne asks.

  “Not much, other than that he moved here from somewhere in Pennsylvania four years ago and bought the Riverside Inn. Oh, and his wife left him when Blaine was younger,” I add, leaving out how Blaine hates her for it, which explains his attitude toward women.

  Still doesn’t explain why I used to put up with him, though.

  “Well,” Natalie says, as she sits and pulls her laptop from her backpack. “If someone in this neighborhood has an unsecured wireless network, then we can see what else ole Google has to say about him!”

  As Natalie’s computer boots up, Roxanne watches her mother nod politely as her father talks with another couple. From the way Victoria’s hands fidget, I can tell she’s bored out of her mind. That’s odd—you would think she’d be a pro at social events.

  “Yes! We have Internet!” Natalie says.

  Her fingers fly over the keyboard. She surveys the list of Web sites the search engine brought up and says, “Let’s see, we have a Calvin Larson Walker, a Cody Larson Walker, and a Leigh Larson Walker—wait, here’s a Facebook page for Larson Walker.” She clicks on it, but the profile picture of a brunette wearing a sexy nurse costume is definitely not him. Natalie keeps searching long enough for the waiters to make another round. She then stops and taps her nails against the keyboard, staring at the bumper of a Cadillac convertible.