by Jessica Roe
“Is something going on here?” Nathan doesn't sound grossed out, just curious.
I take over when Silver refuses to lift his face, incapable of speech. “It's not like that,” I explain. “We just bumped into each other.” So it's a lie, but I know it's what Silver would want me to say.
Nathan shrugs. “It's weird you guys are hanging out, but whatever, it's cool by me. Life's too short not to live it.” He's laid back and chill, kind of like Zac.
“We should probably get out of here,” Silver says, starting to rise. Nathan digs him in the shoulder.
“Don't be a lame ass, stay a while. My date bailed on me. Playing hard to get.”
“We shouldn't-”
“Blair wants to.”
“Yeah,” I agree. “I want to.”
Nathan and I high five when Silver groans again.
AN HOUR LATER, Silver runs to the bathroom to pee.
“Silver!” Nathan cheers when he gets back to the booth.
“Aw, come on. Not you too!” But Silver smiles as he slides in the booth, next to me this time, and I think he might be starting to like it. Secretly.
I take a sip of my drink and Silver frowns as he snatches it away from me.
“Hey!” I protest, but he won't give it back.
“What the hell is this?”
“Beer, dumbo.”
He glares at Nathan. “Did you buy this for her? You know she's under-age.”
Nathan holds his hands up defensively. “She's insanely persuasive. She batted those lashes at me and I was a goner. Besides, she's not my student.” He winks at me. He's been flirting with me ever since we decided to stay, but I think it's mostly to wig Silver out.
Job well done, because Silver slams the bottle down and snatches my hand up possessively. “Lay off, man.”
“Ah, so it is like that?” Nathan raises suggestive eyebrows.
“It isn't anything.” But he doesn't let go of my hand. If anything, he clings on even tighter.
“Hmm.” Nathan clearly doesn't believe him. “Look, no worries, bro. It's none of my business. Whatever makes you happy. Just be careful.”
Silver nods, and they hug it out in their idiotic guy way before we leave.
“He won't say anything to Nash,” he assures me as we walk home. He lets go of my hand but we stroll so close together that our arms keep brushing. “Nathan is cool. Mostly. When he's not ragging on me anyway.”
“I'm not worried. We weren't doing anything.” But though neither of us will admit it, it was another close call. Who knows what would have happened if we'd have made it to the dance floor. I can tell by the contemplative, slightly uncomfortable expression on his face that he's thinking the same.
“So your birthday's coming up soon?” he says in an obvious bid to change the subject. “You said October, right?”
'He remembers, he remembers,' the stupid, girly part of my brain squeals, and then the sensible, angry part punches it in it's dumb, cheery brain face.
“Yep. October 26th.”
“You got plans?”
“I'm probably gonna hang with Ibbie and the gang. Maybe go to the movies, do something low key.”
He nods and shoves his hands into his pockets. “They're a good crowd for you to hang with.”
“I know.”
We talk the whole way home, about school and TV and other safe topics, and when we finally arrive at our street we glance at each other awkwardly.
“Well...goodnight,” I say.
“Night, Blair.”
I don't look back as I walk the short distance to my front door, but I feel Silver's eyes on me every step of the way.
“I CAN'T BELIEVE you guys are doing this to me, I thought you were my friends.” I try to bury my face in my hands but Kip and Rafe, sat on either side of me, grab one each and hold tight.
Ibbie places a sparkly tiara on top of my head and then she sprinkles glitter—SHE SPRINKLES ACUAL GLITTER—all over me like a psychotic fairy godmother. With my hands still held captive, there's nothing I can do to stop her. “It's your birthday!” she points out gleefully. “We're supposed to humiliate you. It's in the rules of turning eighteen.”
“Very true,” Sadie agrees, sliding a large, multi coloured cupcake across the table towards me. I know she picked this one because of my hair; she's definitely warmed up to me in the past couple of months. Sometimes she even smiles when I talk, which is way more than Ibbie gets. She pokes a candle in the top. “Rafe, flame it up before a teacher sees you have a lighter.”
Rafe does as he's told—though he flips her the bird first to show he doesn't appreciate being bossed around—and then he, Sadie, Kip and Ibbie sing an overly dramatized version of happy birthday. There are even jazz hands. All the other students in the cafeteria stare obnoxiously at the display, but none of my friends care. Neither do I.
When they finish, Kip slings an arm around my shoulders and hugs me close. Ibbie is my best friend, but Kip comes in a close second. It's okay to have favourites, right? “Make a wish, baby!”
“I wish you guys weren't so lame,” I joke, but there's a huge smile on my face that just won't go away and they all know I don't mean it. I love this and I love them and they are all annoyingly well aware. I blow out the candle and they cheer.
I look up and see Silver on the other side of the room grabbing lunch with Mr Napoleoni. Mr Napoleoni is saying something to him but he isn't listening. Instead he's watching me with a silly grin on his face, like watching me be happy makes him happy.
Nearby, sitting at a table with Imelda and some other girls, Jemma is also watching me, but she seems sad. She hadn't realized it was my birthday; Oliver had forgotten and I hadn't mentioned it.
But I'm not upset; I have all the family I need sitting around me right here.
“So,” Ibbie says, sliding into her seat next to Sadie across the table. “I was thinking about inviting Gage to our little soirée tonight.”
“Why?” I ask. I stick my finger in the cupcake frosting and lick it clean. Delicious, and my new favourite thing to eat for lunch.
“Because he's your friend with possibilities.” She still hasn't given up on the idea of Gage and I hooking up.
“He's really not.”
“He likes you,” Kip adds, catching on to our conversation. “Talks about you all the time before practice. And not even in a sleazy way...Okay, sometimes in a sleazy way. But mostly in a good way.”
“I don't know, guys...”
“Come on! Give him a chance, please,” Ibbie begs. When her eyes flicker to Kip for a brief moment, I realize that she's really asking me to give her a chance. She seems to think that if Gage and I are together it will magically open up a gateway for her and Kip. I'm not sure, but I also can't say no when she pulls that darned cute face.
I sigh. “Fine. But it's not a date.”
She claps her hands in excitement.
AFTER SCHOOL, THE gang and I—Gage included—head over to Rafe's place. I'm pretty sure his parents might actually be gangsters. They're flashy and scary looking, but super friendly. The random guys posted at varied points around their ridiculously huge house with the menacing expressions, however, are not.
Rafe's mom smooshes his cheeks together and leaves lipstick marks all over his face, and his dad reminds him and Kip with an over the top wink to keep it down when they go upstairs. Rafe, Kip and Ibbie all blush, and Rafe points out that they aren't doing that any more. He's embarrassed by them, but I want to tell him not to be. It's cool to have a father who accepts you for who you are without judgement.
Up in Rafe's room we drink wine coolers sneakily given to us by Ibbie's older sister and dress up in over the top ball gowns and suits and tails that Kip and Ibbie borrowed (or stole, I didn't really ask) from the drama department at school.
“How do I look?” I ask, fingering my red gown. It clings to my upper body and hips and then flows down to the ground with a smattering of black roses. With my tiara—that Ibbie insists I wear�
�and long black gloves, I feel like a princess. Or maybe a villainess. Either way, it's pretty cool.
“Top notch!” Kip calls in a posh English accent. He polishes the fake gold bird's head on top of his cane with his shirtsleeve and holds out his white gloved hand for me to take. “Come with me, my good lady. We are by far more beautiful than these incorrigible scallywags.”
“That is some next level bullshit!” Ibbie protests, though she's grinning—probably because Gage stole my hand before Kip could. “I'm the hottest in this room fo' shiz!” She went for a blinding blue dress coated in sparkles, and Sadie looks like a ghostly fairy in her grey, feathery gown.
They argue some more, and then we go to dinner at Merry Fairburn's and to a movie. People stare at us all night long but we don't care; not even Gage. He looks particularly sweet in his top hat and waistcoat. He buys me popcorn, and though I insist at least three times that it isn't a date, he still keeps shooting me silly grins and trying to hold my hand. It's nice, being able to touch someone without there being consequences, so I say what the hell and let him do it.
It's the best birthday I can ever remember having.
By the time Rafe drops me home it's dark outside but Granny Yo is still sitting out on her porch. She waves me over and I curl up on the other rocking chair.
“I didn't wrap it, and it's nothing fancy so don't get your knickers in a twist,” she tells me as she hands me a box. It's small. The polished wood is covered in an intricate gold pattern, though age has worn most of it away. When I open the little golden latch, quiet music tinkles out, soft and sweet and beautiful. Two tiny figures spin around in a circle, dancing. “It's a music box. It was mine when I was a young thing like you. Maybe younger.”
It's probably the sweetest, most cherished thing I've ever been given. I'm not the kind of girl people give cherished things to. “I can't take this from you, it's precious.”
“Well that's precisely why I want to give it to you, of course.” Granny Yo's voice sounds stern but when I look up, her eyes are misty. She pats me affectionately on the side of my head and I realize that she doesn't just like me, she really cares for me, like family. “This is the kind of thing every girl should get while she's growing into a young lady. It isn't fair that you had to miss out on it all just because of sad circumstances.”
I hold it to my chest, my heart aching. My mom grew up in a family of wealth, a family where she never felt she belonged, a family who cast her out instead of trying to help her when she grew difficult. I wonder if things had been different, if she hadn't been left to fend for herself, that she might have been different. Maybe she wouldn't have gotten addicted to drugs, to alcohol, to men. Maybe she would have given me music boxes that once belonged to her as a child.
“I'll treasure it,” I tell Granny Yo, when the lump in my throat has passed.
“I know you will.”
I'VE BARELY BEEN home five minutes before a knock sounds on my bedroom door. I haven't even had time to take off my awesome dress.
Without waiting for me to call them in—what is it with siblings and their lack of boundaries?—Nash and Jemma let themselves enter through the attic door, followed closely by Ila and Lance.
Lance climbs up onto my knee where I sit at the edge of the bed. The little kids and I have gotten a lot more comfortable around each other—when Felicia isn't watching. “I made you a card,” he tells me proudly. He holds up a picture of a dog...or a squirrel. “For your birthday.” I realise Jemma must have told them.
“I love it!” And I really do. It's weird and adorable, kind of like Lance. It reminds me of the cards I used to make as a kid in school. I'd take them home for my mom and when her eyes were a little clearer and a whole lot less glassy she'd kiss me and tell me how much she loved them and she'd prop them proudly upon whatever crate or box we were using as a table that time. But then night would come and the party would start and when I would crawl out of my sleeping bag the next morning, the card would be soaked in spilt beer or singed from being used as an ashtray. Eventually I just stopped making them.
“I made you one too!” Ila announces eagerly, not to be outdone. She hands me a card covered in orange—her favourite colour (this week)—tissue paper and sparkly flowers, still wet and sticky with glue. “Do you love this one too? Do you love it more?”
“I love them both equally,” I assure her. “Thank you.”
Nash flops down next to me and slings a thick arm around my shoulders, pulling me in for a sloppy kiss on the cheek. “You should've told us it was your birthday, jackass. We could have gotten you cake. I love cake.”
“I didn't wanna make a deal.”
“Ugh! It's your eighteenth!” Jemma protests. “It's supposed to be a big deal. Mine's gonna be huge. I'm gonna make Daddy get me a car and throw me a huge party and everyone from school who isn't a total dork is gonna come and-”
“Jem!” Nash interrupts.
“Right. Your day, not mine.” She hands me a gift wrapped in sparkly pink paper, so I know she must have put it together. “It's from all of us. And Zac said he'll call you in the morning. He's coming home this weekend to take you out.”
I open up the gift. A camera of my own, and a good one, too. A really good one. But what matters more to me than the quality is that they've paid enough attention to realize that photography is something I'm becoming passionate about.
“You guys, this is seriously awesome.”
“It was my idea,” Jemma pipes up quickly, and Nash rolls his eyes. “What, doofus? It's true. I mean, Nash picked it out and everything at the store; there were like, fifty million of them so how was I supposed to know? I'm not a nerd. But I saw those pictures you took. You know, the ones that Mr Napoleoni put up in the art room? They were all kinds of cool and he was going on and on to some other teacher about how good you are. Mr Napoleoni is kind of hot, right? For a teacher? But anyway, it was my idea.” Sometimes she reminds me of Ibbie when she gets on a roll.
“Dinner out tomorrow? My treat?” Nash suggests before the kids get off to bed and Nash heads out to pick up some chick at a bar. He kisses me again on the cheek when I nod and leaves me alone.
Sighing happily, I plug my iPod into the speakers I borrowed (stole) off Nash and randomly pick one of Silver's songs and stick it on low volume. It's a song I've never heard before, but it's folksy and soothing and it makes me smile.
For the first time in my life, I feel truly grateful. I realize how lucky I am to have so many awesome people in my life who genuinely love me, and though I wasn't used to it before I moved here, I'm slowly starting to come around to it, to trust in it. I might also be getting soft.
Someone knocks again on the door, so quietly I almost miss it.
“Come in,” I call, thinking it's probably Lance back for a bedtime story.
To say I'm surprised when Oliver walks through the door is an understatement of epic proportions. This is the first time he's visited me up here in the attic room. In fact we've barely spoken at all since I moved into his house. Just polite but stilted conversation around the dinner table. He makes an effort to avoid being alone with me at every opportunity.
I stand and we face each other.
“You look very nice,” he acknowledges, nodding at my dress. He's so tall that he has to haunch. Up in this small, slanted room he looks like an out of place giant.
I glance down and pinch the material at my hips awkwardly, suddenly feeling like a little child playing dress up in her mother's clothes. I hate that he makes me doubt myself this way, even when he's being nice. “Thanks.”
“So much like your mother.” He pauses, seeming very far away. When he comes back he looks me in the eye for the first time in a long while. “And yet so much like me I can sometimes hardly believe it.”
We regard each other in silence for a long, tense moment.
“I should have remembered it was your birthday,” he says eventually, sounding genuinely apologetic. “It was wrong of me to forget.”
He flinches, and for just a second it looks like my words have actually pained him. “I just think that sometimes I...sometimes I try to block things out when it comes to you. When I think about what I did with your mother, the way I hurt my family...and then when I look at you, it all comes back.” I don't know if admitting that makes him kind of brave, or just an ass. I guess I'm the ass because a stupid part of me had started to think, to hope, that once he realized I'm nothing like my mom, that I'm not here to cause him or his family any trouble, that he might start to like me, maybe even love me. That he'd treat me like he treats the other kids.
I was stupid.
“Okay,” I reply dully. What else can I say? If he wants to blame me for his own mistakes...screw him.
He takes a step forward and holds out a piece of paper with a stiff arm. A cheque, I see, when I take it from him. My mouth drops open when I realize how much it's for. It's a lot. Like seriously, a lot. Like more zeros than I would know what to do with. I swallow, hard.
“Thanks, but...” I hand it back to him. It would feel weird accepting money from him, like accepting money from a stranger. “I don't need it. I have a job, so...”
He doesn't try to protest, but folds it up and slips it in his shirt pocket. “I'll put it away towards your college fund.”
I recognize that stubborn look upon his face—it's just like my own—so I nod and thank him. After all, the money really will help. I shouldn't let pride get in the way of college.
He watches me for the longest time, and for just a moment I think he'll embrace me. He reaches out, but seems to change his mind at the last second. Instead he pats me awkwardly on top of my head like I'm a good little doggy and then walks out, leaving me standing in the middle of the room with a hollow stomach.