Shattered Castles 1 : Castles on the Sand

by E. M. Tippetts

  He is nowhere to be seen before class. No big deal, I think. I don't always see him before class.

  I catch a glimpse of him between second and third period, but he breezes by with his friends and doesn't notice me. Also normal, but kind of annoying.

  At lunch I see plenty of him. He sits with his friends and I can't even look at him for too long without giving away my feelings. I feel like I'm wearing an emotional straightjacket.

  Kailie is preoccupied, picking at her food.

  “Can I ask you something?” I say.

  “Hmm?”

  “Are you a hundred percent sure you saw JP with Tatiana?”

  She rolls her eyes. “Doubt me if you want. Maybe I'm just messing with you. Go ahead, think I'm evil.”

  You are evil sometimes, I think. Even though JP's told me that we are exclusive, today has made me realize I have no way to verify that. He's got all the power over when and whether or not we see each other. I am at his beck and call.

  Tatiana gets up from her place, three tables over, and heads out into the hallway, alone. I consider following her. I could ask her if she's with JP.

  Just the thought makes my nose hurt. She kicked my face in once without getting in trouble for it. I'd be insane to go off alone somewhere with her. I wrack my brain. There has to be some other way to find out if JP's seeing other people, but short of tailing him, I can't think of anything.

  Carson's gaze catches my eye and I turn to look at him. He's staring at me, and doesn't even look away when I stare back, only smiles and continues to stare.

  “Yeah, go for Mormon Boy,” says Kailie. “Still think he likes you? Seriously, you go for the most unattainable men.”

  “He asked me out.”

  “Sure he did.” She laughs at me and doesn't even try to hide it as a snicker behind the hand.

  I try to catch JP's eye and he glances at me, but looks away with annoyance, and that is the last straw. Fine if he doesn't want to be hanging all over each other in public, but treating me worse than his friends? It took Kailie's ploy for me to see it, but now that I do, I can't ignore the fact that JP holds all the cards. If I can't even get through to him to ask a question, we really don't have a relationship at all. Not even a secret one.

  I get up from my seat.

  “Where are you going now?” says Kailie.

  Carson continues to stare as I cross the cafeteria to him. “All right,” I say.

  “All right, what?”

  “All right, I'll go with you to the movies on Wednesday.”

  He grins. “I'll pick you up at seven.”

  I walk back to my table with my head held high. “I just accepted the date with Carson.”

  “What about Jean-Pierre?”

  “What about him?”

  But Kailie just shakes her head and laughs.

  It's then that I wonder if I just took her bait. Kailie's good at mind games. Did she just get me to cheat on JP for her own amusement? I resolve to try to talk to JP, somehow, before next Wednesday.

  JP doesn't talk to me Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday. I send him one more Facebook message, but then decide I'm tired of the lack of response. I can't find a plausible way to get his cell phone number from anyone else, so on Wednesday I'm stuck with the fact that I may be involved with two guys at once. It's nervewracking. I'm Madison Lukas, the no-date, never-been-kissed girl. How did this happen to me? Well, Kailie's smirk answers that question. She seems to be enjoying every minute.

  John emails me every single day and sends a ton more pictures of family members at a barbecue that they had over the weekend. Everyone looks all smiling, happy, and wholesome. I'm still not sure how to respond to him.

  I arrive at the theater on Wednesday night in the MAV, seated in the coveted shotgun seat, next to Carson. The other girls don't give me any overt grief, but I can tell they're jealous. He may think he's just friends with them, but they seem to think he's their territory. It's not as bad as Tatiana's kick in the face, but it's got the same vibe. I'm unworthy to be interesting to him.

  Alex is already at the theater, leaning against his little black sedan. The sight of him shocks me, but I don't know why it should. He's kept on doing the Mormon thing, as far as I know, so of course he'd be here too. I hang back, but Wendy, Rachel, LaDell and Chelsey all bound forward with girly trills of “Hey!” and “How are you?”

  Carson puts a hand on my shoulder and says, “Yeah. Let's get tickets.”

  “You've got competition,” I say.

  “Remind me to care sometime.” We slip into the dim interior of the box office.

  But I find myself looking back over my shoulder, watching how Alex treats the other girls. He's nice enough to LaDell, who plays flirtatiously with his zipper pull. I wonder if he talks to them, and if he does, what kind of stuff he says.

  He seems his usual, quiet, psycho self as he and all the giggling girls get into line behind us, even though Rachel tries to provoke him by stealing his cell phone. He just stands, looking bored, while she and Wendy flip through his contacts and text messages, which seems really invasive to me. They hand it back before we reach the front of the line.

  When we get into the theater itself, Alex strides on ahead and parks himself at the far end of the row, and before I know what I'm doing, I've walked across to sit next to him. Carson plops himself on the other side and squeezes my shoulder. “Nice. These armrests flip up. Noooot that I'm suggesting anything.”

  The four other females sit in the row behind us, and I have the sense that they glare at the back of my head. Every time I glance at Alex, he's just staring at his hands. He slouches low in his seat, elbows on both armrests, long legs jutting into the aisle. It's as if we're a group on a field trip and he's the chaperone. He's so adult.

  The lights dim and the previews start, and I find myself still glancing at Alex. Finally he turns and looks at me.

  O-kay, I think. Madison, you just put yourself in the seat next to Alex in a darkened room. Way to go. I sense his gaze search my face. Nervously, I look back at him.

  Our gazes lock for a millisecond, and then I look away.

  I realize I can't even follow the plot of the trailers. I'm just seeing flashing images. Get a grip, I think. I shut my eyes and take a couple of deep breaths.

  The previews end, and the opening credits of the movie start. There's a voiceover.

  Listen to it, I think. Watch the movie. Stop freaking out.

  I sense Alex shift in his seat. “So,” he whispers, low enough that only I can hear, “when the voiceover isn't James Earl Jones or Samuel L. Jackson, you know it's not a well funded movie. Who is this guy? He sounds like a high school guidance counselor.”

  I can't help but giggle.

  He smirks. A few minutes later is a scene of the heroine getting dressed in her room, first thing in the morning. Alex mutters, “That's how you know she's the heroine. Everyone, view her as a sex object now. She'll be eye candy for the rest of the movie.”

  I turn to look at him.

  “What?” he says. “That's what they're trying to do. I hate movies like this.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  “For the spiritual enrichment. I dunno. Why are we here? Well, I know why you're here.”

  I glance at Carson, who is watching us out of the corner of his eye. He reaches for my hand, and I'm not sure how to react. I don't like feeling as if I'm territory and he's staking a claim. Still, this is a date with him, and he's been nothing but nice to me. I hold his hand. Shifting in seats behind me makes me wonder if I'm going to have a Coke dumped on my head.

  Alex just looks back at the screen. “And here's our hero, with a shirt on? Aw, you know that's gotta come off. I'll bet you five M&M's that it'll be off within the next fifteen minutes.”

  “Five M&M's?”

  “It's what I've got.” He pulls a bag out of his pocket. “I figured sneaking beer in for a church activity would not be cool. These were too easy. You want some?”

  Rig
ht at that moment, the hero takes his shirt off.

  “How many will I owe you then?” I ask.

  He chuckles. “Oh, greasy hair. You know that's a bad guy.”

  The greasy haired guy pulls out a gun and starts shooting, and I laugh, which I realize is completely inappropriate.

  “Yeah, this is a great church activity,” mutters Alex.

  I remind myself that the person who's cracking me up is a psycho.

  “Listen!” bellows the hero on the screen.

  “Morons,” Alex slips in.

  “You-”

  “greasy-”

  “low-life-”

  “B-listers-”

  “need to know-”

  “that we've got two more hours of this garbage and we can't blow anything too big up yet or else we'll be through the special effects budget and have to just use stock footage for the rest of the film.”

  I'm laughing before I can even think to stop myself.

  Carson switches hands and slips his arm around my shoulders. I turn to him. “Sorry. I'll be quiet.”

  “Since when does Alex do movie reviews?”

  “I dunno.”

  “Is there trouble in paradise, kids?” says Alex.

  “Hey,” I turn to him. “Knock it off, all right?”

  “Knock what off?”

  “Mocking me.”

  That shuts him up for a few scenes.

  I want Carson to let go of me. His arm feels like it weighs a ton, but I can't extract myself without rejecting him outright. Madison, I think, you made out with JP on the first date, and it wasn’t even really a date. Why are you being so frigid with Carson?

  Part of it, I know, is that I still feel attached to JP. I wish he'd responded to my message and that we could have talked. I don't really know what I'm doing here. Another part of it is that I just don't feel the same draw to Carson that I did to JP. I still don't feel like kissing him.

  “You ever listen to Rifftrax?” Alex asks.

  “'Kay, let's just watch the movie.”

  “These guys who do audio tracks that you watch with a movie. You sync it and they make fun of the movie as it plays. I wanna see this movie with the Rifftrax.”

  “Sounds like you can do that all on your own.”

  “Am I interfering with your cinematic experience here?”

  “Yes, you are and you know it.”

  “Sorry.”

  “You are not.”

  “Yeah, true. I'm not. Man is this a stupid flick.”

  “You drove yourself. You don't have to stay.”

  That shuts him up again. He munches more M&M's.

  Carson squeezes my hand so tight I wince and tug it loose. “Ouch.”

  “Sorry.”

  Alex holds out the bag of M&M's to me. I politely refuse and he resumes eating.

  I have completely lost track of the movie, though as Alex has pointed out, the plot is so formulaic that I'm sure I could pick it up again with a glance. I don't want to be here, sitting between these two. I wonder if I have the courage to get up and walk out, but then I examine how that would look. Carson asked me out, but then I sat next to Alex and spent the whole first part of the date talking to him. That, I have to admit, probably made Carson feel left out, which wasn't very nice of me.

  But come on, I think. It's Alex. Who cares if I talk to him?

  I turn back to Carson and hold out my hand. “Sorry. He's just joking around, okay?”

  He takes my hand again with a wary look at Alex, who ignores both of us and eats more M&M's.

  We all sit in silence for most of the rest of the film, which feels as if it's ten hours long. Alex finishes his candy, wads up the wrapper, and holds it in his clasped hands. I don't dare look at him, but I find I strain my peripheral vision, wondering what he's doing.

  The movie reaches its climax and the explosions begin and go on, and on, and on. I glance at Alex and he just stares at the screen, as if he's actually watching.

  When I look at Carson, though, he's looking at me.

  “What?” I say.

  He rolls his eyes.

  “No, seriously. What?”

  “You and Alex buddies, then?”

  “What are you talking about? I've known him just as long as I've known you.”

  “Minus the months he's spent in juvie, so not as long.”

  “Okay, fine, you want to talk to me, talk to me. Don't pick a fight with him.”

  “Can you keep it down?” says Alex.

  I ignore him and round on Carson. “Seriously, what did I do? I am here with you, holding your hand, okay?”

  “Very charitable of you.”

  I pull my hand out of his. “I don't do charity.” I get up and walk out.

  As soon as I'm squinting in the bright lights of the lobby, I wonder why I did that. Was Carson right to get his feelings hurt? Did I seem to be flirting with Alex? I laughed at his jokes, and I have to admit that I do think he's gorgeous. But I also think he's a psycho, and furthermore, he's not interested in me. Or did Carson think that he is?

  Suddenly the lobby feels stifling too. I head out into the parking lot, where the fresh air feels glorious, as if I've been in a sauna for two hours. There's a light mist in the air and everything smells like damp earth and asphalt.

  “Madison?”

  I turn to see Carson coming out the front door.

  “I'm sorry, okay?” he says.

  “I wouldn't hold hands with you if I didn't want to.”

  “Sure you would. You're nice like that. You don't like hurting people's feelings.” Somehow he makes a compliment sound like an insult.

  I don't know how to respond.

  He folds his arms across his chest and says, “I have never heard Alex talk that much to anyone. I didn't know he told jokes, like ever.”

  “Carson...”

  “It was weird. I'm sorry. I was surprised. Since when are you two friends?”

  “We aren't friends. And I thought he talks to everyone these days.”

  “A little bit. He doesn't hold conversations, or like in there? He was talking more than you were.”

  “So what are you trying to say?”

  “What am I trying to say? Okay... I'm trying to say I'm sorry, and I'm trying to explain why I said what I did.”

  “Apology accepted.”

  People start to come out of the theater, and before long, the rest of the Mormon herd are arrayed around us. Alex stands slightly back.

  “Okay, let's go home,” says Carson.

  LaDell turns to Alex. “Can I get a ride with you? You live closer to me.”

  He nods.

  I wave goodbye to her just like everyone else does, and then the rest of us get into the MAV and again, for the ride home, I sit across from Carson, who puts his full attention into driving, signaling at every single turn. There is silence in the back, and I can't tell if it's stoney silence or just exhausted silence. It is pretty late.

  Carson drops me off first, and again, I don't know whether to read anything into that or not. He does walk me to the door and we shake hands, which I find weird, but in a good way. I don't want to kiss him, even on the cheek, in front of the other girls. I'm not sure I want to at all.

  What I really want to do is call Kailie and gossip, but there's no way I can. She'd just play more mindgames.

  I step inside and my gaze falls on Mom, who sits at the kitchen table, looking at me like I reek of garbage and excrement. “I let you do pretty much anything you want, and you're joining up with the Mormons?”

  “No, I haven't joined them. It was a movie night,” I explain.

  “It was Mutual.”

  “Huh? No... I think they said mutual, or whatever you call it, was cancelled. Carson asked me out.”

  “It's John, isn't it?”

  “What? No-”

  “Has he been in touch with you?”

  “Yeah, but-”

  “Why? Why do you talk to him?”

  “I don't really. He e
mails me.”

  “He emails you what?”

  “He tells me about our family and stuff. It's no big deal.”

  “Your family are a bunch of Mormons.”

  “They're still my relatives. I'm not gonna go to church with them. I just want to know who they are.”

  “Toxic, weak minded sheep who follow their cheerful leader. They claim to have a prophet, did you know that? One guy in Salt Lake City who talks to God and tells everyone else what to do.”

  “Yeah, I kind of looked that stuff up. Definitely not gonna join the religion, so don't worry about it.”

  “Mormons hate women, all right? They're misogynists. They believe your place is home, pregnant, with a lot of craft projects so that you can pretend you matter to the world but you don't.”

  “I'm not gonna marry Carson or join the Church, so it's all good.”

  “I said the exact same thing about James. Oh, I'll never marry him. I'm no one and he could have anyone. I'd be lucky to end up with him. Then at eighteen I'm living in a studio apartment with twins on the way and that's it. That's my life.”

  “Okay, stop. Getting ahead of ourselves here.”

  She buries her face in her hands. “I did not escape from that life to have you turn right around and waltz back in.”

  “I am not going to church with them!” I shout. “Stop lecturing me and listen. I am not looking for a relationship with God. I went on a date with Carson. There's a difference.”

  Mom gets to her feet. “How often do you talk to John?”

  “I don't know. He emails me. Sometimes I email back.”

  For a moment she just stares at me, her eyes narrowing, then she lunges across the room and slaps me across the face. Pain explodes across my still tender nose and sinuses and I find myself clinging to the fridge door handle to keep from falling down. I must have stumbled into it after Mom's blow. “Mom...”

  She curses, then ducks out the back door.

  Papers flutter in her wake and I snatch one out of the air. It's a cancelled rent check. The others on the floor prove to be other canceled checks, but I take a closer look at one and see that it's actually a bounced check. Mom's overspent her bank balance again. I pick them all up – a headache beginning to throb behind my eyes – and stack them neatly on the table again. I hate it when mom hits me. She never does it hard enough to leave a mark, but it stings to have the one person I live with hate me so much that she resorts to violence.