by Kieran Scott
I checked my phone. Thirty-five minutes late. I envisioned myself stepping out into the rain and walking home, but in this deluge I’d be soaked through in five seconds and my books would be ruined. I stared at Ty’s face on my home screen. I hadn’t spoken to him since Wednesday, but who else was there to call? Raine didn’t have a car, and things had been weird between us anyway, since she’d kind of turned her back on me during my argument with Ty. I’d purposely shown up to school late the last two mornings to avoid our bathroom ritual, and I’d spent my lunch periods in the library, eating with Zadie while she read novels and I prepped for my English presentation on Monday. Aside from sitting next to Raine in the two classes we had together, I hadn’t seen her.
Thirty-seven minutes. I held my breath and hit Ty’s name. He picked up on the first ring.
“Hey,” he said flatly. “I thought you were never gonna speak to me again.”
My heart slammed over and over and over again. “I thought you were never gonna speak to me again.”
We both laughed. “So what’s up?” he asked.
“I’m kind of stranded at the library,” I said, wincing over needing a favor after the silence of the past two days. “Is there any chance—”
“I’m right down the street,” he told me. “I’ll be there in five.”
He hung up. I sighed and leaned back against the gray brick wall next to the automatic door. At least he wasn’t mad at me. Or at least he wasn’t so mad he’d turn me down. But there were still nervous butterflies buzzing around my chest. Where was my mom? Had she really forgotten about me, or was it something worse?
Taking a deep breath, I told myself to chill. I was just more on edge lately than usual because of this English project. And because of the fight with Ty. But this rain felt ominous, portentous. What were the chances that both a person’s parents could end up in devastating car accidents in the course of one year?
Ty’s car pulled to a stop in front of the library. I pushed away from the wall. At that exact moment, my mother came trudging around the corner of the building, huddled under an umbrella.
“Katrina! There you are! I thought you were meeting me at the doctor!”
Ty got out of his car and jogged over, holding his denim jacket up over his hair. My throat closed over as my mother saw him.
“Mrs. Ramos,” he said. “You’re here!”
“You don’t have to sound so shocked,” she replied. “She’s still my daughter.”
“The calendar said to pick me up here,” I told her quietly. “I never could have walked to the doctor from here in time.”
“No. It said ‘Katrina, doctor, five p.m. I’ve been sitting in that waiting room worried about you for half an hour. Why didn’t you call me?” she demanded, her eyes flashing.
Because I’m terrified to call you, I thought, starting to tremble. Because you always yell at me when I call you.
“I—”
“Oh, I see. You’d rather call him!” my mother said, throwing a hand toward Ty but not bothering to look at him. “You’d rather your knight in shining armor come to your rescue.”
My fingers curled into fists. I couldn’t believe I was getting yelled at. Again. I’d done nothing wrong. I almost never did anything wrong and she was always, always yelling at me.
“I just called him five minutes ago,” I told her. “After you didn’t show up!”
“Don’t you take that tone with me, young lady!” my mother thundered. “This is not my fault!”
“Katrina, maybe we should go,” Ty said.
I took a step toward him, realizing I had to get out of this argument. Feeling very much like I was about to explode.
“What makes you think she’s going with you?” my mother demanded.
“Maybe because she’s actually welcome in my house,” Ty replied sarcastically.
My mother’s face went slack, then turned purple. “How dare you? My daughter is always welcome in our home. It’s not my fault she chooses to avoid it at all costs.”
Unbelievable. Not my fault. Nothing was ever her fault.
“Then whose fault is it?” I demanded, rain dripping from my hair, my nose, my eyelashes.
“What?” my mother gasped.
“Whose fault is it, Mom?” I asked, shaking from head to toe. “At least I know Ty loves me. I can’t say the same for you.”
“Katrina!” my mother gasped.
But it was too late. I’d already taken Ty’s hand, the same hand that had clasped my arm so hard on Wednesday afternoon, and we walked toward his car.
“Katrina! You’d better not get in that car!” my mother yelled through the rain. “Get back here right now!”
Ty opened the door for me, and I dropped into the low seat. As soon as the door closed, I couldn’t see my mother anymore. She was nothing but a blur of tan coat distorted by the raindrops. Ty got in and I tried to stop my lip from quivering.
“Wow. That was intense,” he said.
“Can we go, please?” I asked, my voice cracking.
Ty looked at me, breathless. “Move in with me.”
My jaw dropped. “What?”
“Screw her,” Ty said. “Move in with me full-time. I’ll even clear off a shelf for your books.”
I laughed, a tear slipping down my face. I knew that we had to talk about what had happened at school on Wednesday, and somehow, someday I’d find a way to bring it up. But now was not the time. Now he was being more romantic than he’d ever been in his life.
“Seriously?” I said. “The guys won’t mind?”
“Who cares?” he said. “I pay most of the rent anyway. They’ll suck it up.”
I leaned over the center console and kissed him. “Thank you,” I said. “I’m in.”
“Good. Now let’s go get something to eat.” He slammed the car into gear and pulled into traffic. “Because it’s payday and after that performance, my baby deserves a steak.”
I took a deep breath. The last thing I felt like I could do at that moment was eat, and steak was really my least favorite food on earth. But I knew how much he loved Longhorn and at that moment, I didn’t want to argue. What I wanted was to pretend the last five minutes had never happened.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Charlie
The finish line was dead ahead. I could see my mom and dad standing a few yards away. When my father spotted me, his jaw dropped. I knew the feeling. Was it really possible that I was winning this? How could I be winning this?
Behind me, footsteps pounded. The ground was still wet from yesterday’s rain, and my legs were dripping with slick mud. The back of my blue LCHS tank was a sweat rag. My lungs burned with effort. The finish line was five feet away. Two. One. And I was across.
The small crowd exploded in applause. I leaned forward, bracing my hands above my knees as Brian and my other teammates caught up with me.
“Dude! Way to turn on the speed!” Brian gasped. “We came in one-two-three!”
I slapped hands with him and with the other LCHS runner, Carlos. Some big dark-haired kid with a camera came over.
“Smile for the yearbook!” he said, and snapped our picture, our arms loosely draped around one another. Then, out of nowhere, Darla flung herself into my arms. I was so stunned, I nearly fell over and took her with me. Luckily, Brian was there to stop me.
“You won!” Darla cried, bouncing up and down. She was wearing a blue-and-black-plaid miniskirt, a low-cut white tank top, and a skin-tight blue cardigan. Half the guys from the other teams were eyeing her as they got their water. “Can you believe you won?”
“Not really, no,” I said as my mother and father joined us.
“Great run, Charlie!” my dad said, clapping me on the back. He’d come straight from a St. Joe’s JV football game and was still wearing his SJP colors. My mother, ever the supporting wife, also wore a green-and-yellow scarf around her neck as she enveloped me in a hug, her brown hair back in a loose ponytail.
“You were amazing!” sh
e said, releasing me quickly. She looked down at her fingers. “Sticky, but amazing!” she joked.
I blushed deep red and looked at the ground, avoiding Darla’s eye. “Thanks a lot, Mom!”
“I’m sorry! Your brothers are usually the sweaty, dirty, guy’s guys,” she said. “I’m still getting used to the idea of you as an athlete.”
Great. This kept getting better and better.
“Who’s your friend?” my dad asked.
“Oh, sorry. This is Darla Shayne,” I said. “Darla, these are my parents.”
“It’s so nice to meet you, Mr. and Mrs. Cox,” Darla gushed.
“You as well,” my mother said, casting a discerning eye over Darla’s outfit. “You were the girl Charlie went out with last night?”
“Guilty,” Darla said with a laugh.
I smiled as our eyes met. We had gone to Moe’s and ordered twelve different kinds of pie so that I could try each one, and Darla had tasted most. She had joked that she’d brought me there for selfish reasons. Apparently Veronica never stepped foot in the place because she said she “gained ten pounds just from inhaling.” It was nice to see that Darla wasn’t always deferring to Veronica. And that she liked to eat.
“Thanks for that,” my dad said. “That apple pie he brought home was delicious.”
“Oh, well, Moe’s is the best diner in North Jersey,” Darla said. “You would have found that out eventually.”
“We were going to take Charlie out for a late breakfast slash early lunch and then go buy him his varsity jacket,” my mother said, looping her arm around Darla’s and steering her away. “Why don’t you show us how to get to this Moe’s place?”
“I’d love that!” Darla said, glancing back at me. “As long as it’s cool with you, Charlie.”
I smiled. “Yeah. Of course.”
Suddenly Coach Ziegler appeared in front of me and my dad, grinning from ear to ear. “That was a stellar run, Charlie,” he said. “Absolutely stellar. No one on our team has beaten Brian in the last year.”
“That’s fantastic, son,” my father said, his blue eyes wide.
“David Cox? It’s a pleasure to meet you,” Ziegler said, offering his hand. “Thanks for not turning your son here into a football player. I’ve never been happier to have a transfer student join our team.”
“Looks like he finally found his sport,” my dad said, shaking hands with the coach.
“He certainly has,” Coach said. “You two have a good day. We’ll meet in the gym before school on Monday morning to go over the race with the team, okay, Charlie?”
“Sounds good.” I nodded.
“He seems to really like you,” my father said, following me to the bleachers to grab my stuff. I was kind of dying for a shower, but my mom and Darla were already halfway to the parking lot. It looked like I was going to have to throw on a hat and a sweatshirt and deal.
“He barely knows me,” I replied, swiping some of the mud off my legs with a towel from my bag.
“Yeah, but you’re a winner now,” my father said, shoving his hands into his pockets and rolling up on his toes. “And everybody loves a winner.”
I smiled, but something about the way he’d said that made my insides curdle. You’re a winner now.
“So, tell me about this Darla girl,” my father said, reaching around my back and squeezing my shoulder as I stood up. “And what happened to Stacey? You becoming a heartbreaker on me too?”
I looked down at my feet as we walked. My sneakers were covered in mud. I slipped out of my father’s grasp.
“You know what, Dad? I think I’m gonna run inside and shower,” I said, my stomach clenched.
“But your mother and Darla are waiting,” my father told me.
“I can’t sit and eat with them like this,” I said, backing away. “It’ll be five minutes.”
Without waiting for him to reply, I turned and jogged off toward the locker room, my legs quivering beneath me from the strain. I couldn’t get away from my father fast enough.
What the hell was wrong with me? My entire life I’d been salivating for my father’s approval. And for him to get off my back about football. And now here I was, making him proud. Plus, I had a hot girl throwing herself at me, and I was going to a party this Friday with some of the most popular kids in school. For the first time in my nomadic existence, everything was falling into place.
But all I wanted to do was keep right on running.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Katrina
“Calculate the value of the cosine in the following triangle. . . .” I read under my breath, chewing on the end of my pencil. “Okay, with the Pythagorean theorem that would be—”
The numbers blurred in front of me, the back of my skull feeling foggy and gray. I was exhausted after a sleepless night, listening to Ty and his friends smack-talk over the latest version of Madden football on the big screen in the living room. As little sense as trigonometry made to me on a good day, it made much less when I couldn’t stop yawning. But I had to get this done. I needed as much time as I could buy myself to go over my lecture for English class tomorrow. A thought that made my heart sink so fast I felt dizzy.
Tomorrow. How was I going to make it through tomorrow? My body hit me with a huge yawn, and I shook my head. How was I even going to stay awake until sixth period?
I put my head in my hand and closed my eyes, listening to the wail of a drill in the garage. It was nice of Ty’s uncle Gino to let me study in his office while Ty worked, but it wasn’t that conducive to the occasional power nap. I folded my arms and laid my head down. In about two seconds I felt myself start to drift off, and in that odd haziness between being awake and being asleep, I saw Charlie. He was sitting under a tree in a blue-and-white varsity jacket, yukking it up with Stacey Halliburn, Josh Moskowitz, and Veronica Vail. Then True walked by, and they laughed even harder.
Why was Charlie even friends with those people? He was so nice. So normal. Why did he have to get sucked in by the popular crowd?
Suddenly the dream changed, and now Charlie and I were back in the band room, facing each other. Except this time I leaned in and kissed that dimple. And this time, he turned his head and kissed me back.
A huge crash inside the garage scared me half to death, and my head popped up. Blinking, I looked at the dingy window over the desk, which I could barely see through, thanks to the dozens of yellowing Non Sequitur comic strips taped to the glass. Chubby, balding Gino Rivello of Gino’s Auto Body screamed at Ty and his two buddies, letting out a string of curses that actually made me blush. He started for the office, kicking an oilcan against the wall as he came. I quickly sat back down in his ancient cracked-vinyl chair and pretended to be concentrating.
Gino flung the door open and froze. “Oh, Katrina. I’m sorry. I forgot you were in here,” he said, putting his hands on his hips. He looked at the floor as if ashamed of himself. The bare top of his head gleamed under the fluorescent lights. “I suppose there’s no way you didn’t hear that?”
My heart was still pounding, but I smiled at him. “Hear what?”
He laughed and closed the door behind him. His gray overalls were streaked with grease and spattered with paint. He grabbed a beer out of the mini-fridge next to me and sat down at the other desk.
“Trig, huh? I was always good at trig,” he said, swinging the chair around to face me.
“Want to do it for me?” I joked.
He laughed. “Not your thing?”
“I don’t hate it,” I said with a sigh. “But it’s not easy. I didn’t exactly pay attention in geometry last year.”
“Well, you had a rough year,” he said plainly.
My heart pinched. Sometimes I forgot that every living person in Lake Carmody knew what had happened to my dad. “True. But the trig book doesn’t care.”
Gino smiled sympathetically. There was another, smaller, bang out in the garage and he closed his eyes, breathing in deeply. “Isn’t there someplace quieter you could
be studying?”
I shook my head. “The library closes early on Sunday, and I’m supposed to have lunch with Ty anyway, so . . .”
Suddenly my phone beeped and my heart hit the floor. I hadn’t heard from my mom since our argument on Friday, having snuck into our house to get most of my stuff when I knew she was on shift. I’d left her a note saying I was moving in with Ty full-time, and I kept waiting for her to call or text or show up at Ty’s door, but so far, nothing. And this text was from Raine.
WHERE ARE YOU? WE’RE GOING TO THE MOVIES!
My whole body felt heavy. Apparently I’d been right all along. My mother really didn’t care about me.
STUDYING. SORRY. TTYL?
UGH! LOSER!
I turned the phone off and shoved it into my bag.
“Bad news?” Gino asked, seeing my face.
I shook my head, laughed shortly. “Bad friend.”
I didn’t even realize that I truly thought that until I said it. But Raine hadn’t called me to find out why I hadn’t shown up at our pre-homeroom hangout for two days. She hadn’t asked me, in the brief moments we’d seen each other in class, what was going on with Ty. She was always so caught up in her own thing, her other friends, what she wanted to do, that sometimes it felt like she didn’t remember I existed.
You could call her and tell her what’s going on too, a voice inside my head said—the voice that sounded like my dad’s. And that was true, of course. Which sparked the question . . . why hadn’t I?
Then the office door opened unexpectedly, clattering against a metal filing cabinet. Ty wiped a dirty rag across his forehead.
“Hey, Kat,” he said.
“You ready to go?” I asked, my stomach already grumbling.
He shook his head. “Not gonna happen. We had kind of a setback out there, and we’re gonna have to stay late. You wanna run down to Bellissimo and get me and the guys some Italian subs?”