by Kim Purcell
Colin jumped back, a few feet away on his own driveway. He wasn’t holding his duffel bag. Just the garbage can. He was wearing sandals, shorts, and his basketball jersey. In the rain. He wasn’t going anywhere, at least not right at this moment.
“Oh my God. You scared me,” he said.
“I am sorry,” she said, trying to keep her voice low, just in case Lillian was listening from her bedroom window, though she figured the rain would block some of the noise. “We do not meet properly. My name is Hannah.”
“Colin,” he said with a quick smile that didn’t seem forced. How could he smile if he was planning on running away from the only family he had?
“It is nice to meeting you,” she said, realizing then that her hands were too empty. She hadn’t grabbed the garbage can.
“Same.”
She didn’t understand what that meant. Same what? There was an awkward pause.
“Your hair is different,” he said.
“It is short,” she said.
“It’s nice,” he said, looking down at his feet, clearly embarrassed.
“No,” she said, not wanting lies between them. “It is not.” She wished she knew how to make a joke of it and say that it looked like someone had taken a lawn mower to her head, but she didn’t know enough words.
He glanced at his house, as if he was thinking of making a run for it. Then he blurted out, really loudly, “How old are you?”
It was one of the questions she’d practiced, one she’d planned to ask him. “Seventeen,” she said. “How old are you?”
“Same.”
She didn’t understand. “Excuse me?”
“I’m seventeen too,” he said, clearing his throat, like he was embarrassed.
“I am sorry. My English no is good.”
He grinned and she knew she’d made a mistake. “Don’t worry about it. I can understand you,” he said, again practically screaming. Hannah couldn’t stop herself from glancing up at the master bedroom window, but it was still dark and the blue curtain was closed. If Lillian saw her outside, she’d come out and kill her.
“Where are you from?” he asked, squinting at her through the rain.
Lillian had told her to say she was from Russia if anyone asked, but she couldn’t, wouldn’t, lie anymore. “Moldova.”
“Moldova?” He didn’t know where it was, which wasn’t surprising. It was the poorest country in Eastern Europe, small and insignificant.
“Near Romania,” she said.
“Ah-ah-ah. Transylvania.”
Transylvania was in Romania, but she didn’t know why he made that noise. “Yes.”
“You know—vampires?”
“Vampires.” She felt thankful she’d learned the word. “No vampires in Moldova.”
Colin seemed uncomfortable, like he didn’t know what else to say. A helicopter pounded in the sky above them and he looked up, as if to say, Rescue me.
“You are bringing garbage to street?” she asked, hoping to keep him with her for as long as possible. So far, Lillian hadn’t come out, which meant she was probably still asleep.
He shrugged. “Yeah, might as well. It’s Thursday, right? My mom will freak if I forget.”
He reached over his gate, unlocked it, went on his side of the fence, and rolled the garbage can down the driveway. Hannah walked with him, pulling her garbage cans, hoping Lillian didn’t hear. “Freak?” she asked. “My English, I am sorry.”
“She’d get angry,” he said, giving her another look, more direct this time, like he was actually seeing her and maybe didn’t feel so shy. They walked back up to their gates and opened them to get the recycling cans.
Hannah looked up, worried that the blue curtain would open and Lillian would be watching her. The longer she was outside, the more nervous she got. It was like a bomb that she could hear ticking in the back of her head.
“Do you go to school?” he asked as soon as they headed back down the driveway with their containers. His voice was so loud. “My mom said you’re here a lot during the day.”
She waited until they got to the end of the driveway to answer him quietly. “I am finish eleventh graduation.”
He gave her an odd look. “Sorry?”
She realized she’d just said “graduation” instead of “grade.” “Eleventh grade.”
“Oh.”
“I will study one more year and then I go to college. But I take break now.” She couldn’t explain that she’d had to drop out a year early because she had to work.
Was that the back door? Her heart beat a little faster. “I must go.”
He grinned. “Don’t be a stranger.”
Was he trying to say she was strange? It couldn’t be. “A stranger?”
“You know, like, come by sometime. Don’t be a stranger. It’s an expression. Like it means you shouldn’t act like you don’t know me.”
She got it. He thought she might act like she didn’t know him. Maybe it was because she was rushing off so fast.
She glanced nervously at the walkway next to the house. Tick. Tick. Tick.
“You have to go,” he said.
She didn’t want to go, even though she knew she should. It was her first time talking to him and she didn’t know when she’d get another chance. “We must be quiet,” she whispered.
“Okay,” he whispered, glancing at her house. “They keep you on a tight leash?”
“Leash?”
“Like a dog, you know, it ties around the neck and you walk it.”
“I’m not dog,” she said, insulted.
He waved his hands. “No, no, I don’t mean that. Just—they watch you.”
“Yes.” She couldn’t say any more. If the neighbors became suspicious, they could report her, and Lillian had made it clear what would happen. She switched the subject to a safer one. “What are your hobbies?” This was a question she knew from English class. Her teacher said it was used for small talk, when people want to become friends.
His face turned red. Why would that embarrass him? “I don’t know.” He shrugged. “I like video games.”
“Your room, you have many sports decorations.” Now it was Hannah’s turn to be embarrassed. He would know she’d been spying on him—she hadn’t meant for it to come out like this.
“My dad keeps hoping I’ll turn into an athlete like my brother,” he explained, then stopped. “How do you know?”
“The fence,” she admitted, stepping backward through the gate to her side of the fence. She pushed on the broken slat in the fence and opened it farther. “It is broken.”
He walked down the path on his side of the fence and pressed on the slat in the fence. It opened even more. “Peekaboo,” he joked, though he wasn’t laughing. He blinked at her through the slat. Then he looked back, into his window.
“I thought I heard—” He stopped. “Did you throw the rock?”
She couldn’t lie, not even if he wanted her to pay for it. “I am sorry. It was accident. I wanted only to talk.”
He laughed, as if he was relieved. “I thought it was someone from school, you know, like trying to break my window.”
“Oh.” That was terrible. She didn’t know what else to say. “I am sorry.”
“It’s no big deal.” He paused. “Have you looked at me—” His voice cracked and he cleared his throat. “You know, other times?”
If she admitted she’d been spying on him, he might realize she’d seen him after he came out of the shower that time. He might think she was creepy and fix the fence. If she heard him hammering back here, it would break her heart.
“I see not much.” She felt so guilty. “I see you drawing.”
He nodded but looked down at his feet, refusing to look her in the eyes. He knew she’d seen mor
e than that.
She hesitated. “I see the bag.”
He grimaced and stared off through the rain, as if he was thinking of something else. His blond hair was now soaked, flattened to his head, raindrops dotting his bare arms.
“Why are you leaving?” she asked.
He shrugged, looking down. “My life sucks,” he said, kicking at the edge of a puddle with his sandal. “Everyone at school hates me and my dad won’t even talk to me. He’s ashamed of me. It just—” His voice broke and he stopped talking.
“Everyone hates you?” She couldn’t believe it.
“Yeah, and they have a good reason too. I mean, they dragged me along to paint up this other school. It wasn’t my idea, but I always have to drive because they want to drink. Then they took off and the cops got me. I told the cops all their names like a pussy. It’s my own stupid fault.”
“What is a pussy?”
He let out a bark of laughter and wiped the rain from his face. “Never mind.”
There was a pause and again he looked toward the house, like he wanted to leave her just as much as he wanted to leave his friends and his family.
“You should not go,” she said, her heart wrenching. She pressed her hand against the wet, rough wood of the fence.
He looked at her, blinking his sensitive blue eyes at her through the rain. “Why not?”
“I need—” She was going to say that she needed a friend, but it was so desperate and so unlike her former self. In Moldova, she would never have begged someone to be her friend. And what if he said no? She continued, “I need someone, like—” He was staring at her like she was crazy, but still she pressed on. “Someone for talking.”
He blinked at her, but he seemed to understand what she was saying at least. After a moment of silence, he said quietly, “Me too.”
Chapter Forty-five
The next night, Lillian was still studying in the dining room at eleven and Hannah started to worry. She’d promised Colin she’d meet him at midnight. At eleven thirty, Hannah began cleaning the refrigerator as an excuse to stay in the kitchen and listen for Colin.
At midnight, Colin’s back door opened and shut. She heard his footsteps trotting down his back stairs and around his walkway. He’d see she wasn’t there and it would look like she’d decided not to come, and then he might leave anyway.
Tea. She’d make Lillian some chamomile tea. It would seem like she was being nice, but it would put her to sleep. Too bad she didn’t have any valerian root.
After she’d made it, she knocked on the sliding door. “Lillian?”
“Yes?” Lillian sounded annoyed, but she didn’t have that quivering sound Hannah heard in her voice when she was furious.
Hannah opened the sliding door. “I thought you might like some tea.”
She gave Hannah a suspicious look. “Why are you still awake?”
“I was staying up for you,” Hannah said, putting the tea next to her. “In case you need something.”
“I’m studying. What would I need?”
Hannah shrugged. “What are you studying?”
“Microbiology,” she said, taking a sip of the tea, eyeing her over the rim.
“The other night,” Hannah said, then cleared her throat, hesitating. It was a risk. “You misunderstood.”
“What?” There was the fury. Hannah had never known someone’s voice to hold so much power.
Hannah stood her ground, even though she was afraid. “Sergey never tried anything with me. He told me you were the most beautiful woman he’s ever met, but he said he met my mother when he was younger and I was lucky that I could always remember her because I only had to look at my hair. It wasn’t anything. He was just reassuring me because—” Hannah hesitated. She didn’t want to say it, but she had to. “Because she’s dead.”
Lillian’s voice softened. “He said I was the most beautiful woman he’s ever met?”
Hannah nodded.
A part of the tension that lived in Lillian’s face melted away.
“Can you tell me how he knew my mother?” Hannah asked quietly.
Lillian lifted her chin. “Sergey told me he met your mother and your father at the Black Sea. They weren’t much older than you are now.”
Hannah couldn’t believe Lillian had actually told her something useful. Her parents had met at the Black Sea, but they’d never mentioned Sergey. She wondered if she’d met him before, when she was younger. He hadn’t looked familiar.
Lillian stood up. “That’s all I know. I’m going to Paavo’s club—Sergey’s waiting for me. Stay up until I get back.”
Hannah doubted Sergey was waiting for her. She knew he was probably drinking and that it might not be a good scene if Lillian arrived, but there was nothing she could say. Lillian went upstairs, got dressed, and headed out the door. Hannah waited five minutes after Lillian had left, to be sure she was really gone, and went outside.
Before she saw Colin, she could smell his freshly washed hair, but no baby powder deodorant. His face appeared in the fence opening and she smiled, wide, unable to stop herself, before she realized that she was showing her crooked teeth. Quickly, she closed her lips around them.
He grinned at her. “I like your smile,” he said.
“Yes?” she asked, blinking.
“Why are you surprised?”
“I no like my tooth.”
“Your tooth?”
He hadn’t noticed—that surprised her. She lifted her upper lip and showed him the one tooth that twisted to the side, expecting to see him shrink back in revulsion. Americans had such nice teeth.
He shrugged. “You can’t see it.”
She smiled at him again, showing all her teeth. It was her first American smile. “I bring something from my country,” she said, handing him a sirok bar. He opened it. “Coconut,” she added proudly, having just looked up the word in Lillian’s dictionary.
He swirled the chocolate-covered frozen cream cheese around in his mouth. “Different.”
“You like it?”
He nodded. “Yeah,” he said, as though he was surprised. “You should come over sometime. I’ll make you popcorn. I make a pretty mean popcorn.” He let out a laugh.
Something about popcorn. “What is this?”
“Oh, nothing,” he said.
He’d said “popcorn.” Was he asking her to go to a movie? “Please. Say this again.”
“I just said you could come to my house.” He pointed at his house and then gestured for her to come. “You know, come over.”
She got it. “Now?”
“Not now.” He seemed to think she was quite strange. “I mean, sure you can come now.”
She didn’t know why he was offering and then not offering. “Now is not a good time?” She might not have another chance.
Colin let out a nervous laugh. “I don’t know about my mom. It’s pretty late.”
She understood. It was the same in Moldova. “People do not come to neighbor house in Moldova.” Nobody wanted other people to see what they had.
“I just mean, you know, my mom will be weird. She’ll want to hang out with us. Maybe we could stay outside in the backyard.”
If they stayed outside, she’d hear Michael if he cried. She looked up at Michael’s bedroom window—it was open, but not so wide that he could fall out. Hannah hadn’t double-checked the front door. But maybe Lillian had locked it when she went out. Hannah imagined Paavo coming into the house. Stealing the children. Was the upstairs light on? She didn’t want Michael to fall down the stairs. He’ll be fine, she told herself. He was asleep.
“Okay,” she said, and walked through her gate, around to his.
Colin opened his gate and waved her in front of him, as if she were a strange animal. His side of th
e fence was painted white instead of green, and the walkway was paved. She glanced in the first window and saw a large television, two armchairs, and some video game remotes on a side table between the two chairs. She continued down the walkway, past his bedroom and the kitchen. She listened to the sound of his footsteps behind her and felt awkward leading him into his own yard in the middle of the night. She thought of Lillian’s accusation and hoped he didn’t get the wrong idea.
She stopped. He passed her and gestured at the back porch. She followed him, but when he sat down on the top concrete step and patted next to him, she stared at him in shock.
In Moldova, a boy would never suggest that a girl sit directly on cold concrete—he’d at least offer her his jacket to sit on. It might be an old wives’ tale, but they said you’d freeze your ovaries and you wouldn’t be able to have babies if you sat on a cold surface. But if American kids did it, she thought, maybe that was silly. She sat down, clenching her knees together to keep her lower parts warm.
A helicopter zipped past above them. She wondered if it was a police or news helicopter. There was the sound of a police siren on Santa Monica Boulevard. Maybe the police were chasing a criminal. Who was walking down their street. Looking for an open house. Somewhere to hide.
Colin looked up at the sky, ignoring the helicopter. “I guess you don’t see the same stars in the sky in Moldova.”
Boys said the same thing everywhere. “In Moldova, we have more stars.” She cleared her throat. “Do you think there is problem?”
“What? The helicopter? No. They’re up there every night. Who knows what they’re doing.” He grinned at her. “Don’t worry.”
But he didn’t know the children were alone and the front door might be unlocked. “I never see these helicopters in my country.”
“They’re not everywhere. My mom grew up in Seattle and you never see them there. She says helicopters are the mosquitoes of Los Angeles.”
Hannah smiled weakly, wishing she knew what mosquitoes were.