The Leading Edge of Now

by Marci Lyn Curtis

  Thirty-Six

  Janna and I are silent as we walk home. Not particularly uncommon for me, but it’s a long pause by Janna standards, so I know she’s gearing up for something. And I’m right. “Have you gone to the police yet?” she asks as we trudge over the dunes.

  “No.”

  She sighs, just a little. “Look, I know you think that too much time has passed, and that you feel embarrassed and humiliated and whatever, but the fact is that you need to do something, Grace.”

  “I am,” I say. I want to be annoyed with Janna, but I sort of love her for pressing this, for standing firm beside me as I face my very worst fears, for reminding me that even though sometimes life is terrifying and messy, you can’t cower away from it. “I keep trying to get in touch with Andy, because I’m pretty sure he either knows something or he —” I stop and swallow. I don’t want to suspect Andy, but how can I not? He stayed behind when the others went to watch the fireworks, and he’s clearly been avoiding me the past couple of days. But I don’t want to jump to conclusions. I did that with Owen, and look where that got me. And anyway, Andy is Janna’s friend — maybe even my friend now — so I weigh my words carefully. “I think maybe he knows something about that night. I’ve been trying to get in touch with him, trying to ask him about it, but he’s been avoiding me.”

  Janna narrows her eyes. “What?” she asks. I tell her about my conversation with Rusty, and about Andy’s sudden vanishing act. “That’s —” she begins, but she stops and shakes her head in disbelief. She fishes her phone out of her back pocket. “I’ll call him.”

  “At one in the morning?” I ask, suddenly exhausted, slipping on my flip-flops before I step out of the sand and onto the road in front of the McAllisters’. “Just give it a couple of days, and if he’s still MIA, you can hunt him down and we’ll talk to him together.”

  She twists her lips together in a way that makes me nervous. Janna is not exactly known for her patience. But before I can confront her on this, I spot Owen striding across the road toward us. “Where did you go?” he asks Janna. “I walked into your room and you were gone. I was getting worried.”

  I don’t hear a word of Janna’s explanation, because when I glance up at Owen, I find him looking at me. My eyes jerk away. I try to focus on what Janna’s saying, but fail miserably, because I can still feel Owen’s eyes on me. My gaze roams back to him. Our eyes lock.

  Janna stops talking suddenly, blows out a huge gust of air and says, “Oh my God, will you two get back together, already?”

  Owen looks away. I chew on my thumbnail. Janna takes me by the shoulders and shoves me up close to Owen. “Grace, this is my brother, Owen. He’d like to take you out.”

  Then she spins around and walks off.

  Leaving us alone.

  Owen shoves his hands in his pockets, sending his shoulders nearly to his ears. Even in the dim moonlight, I can see that his cheeks are pink. He opens his mouth to say something but shuts it. Then he tries again. “So I guess we should …”

  “Go out?”

  He shifts his weight. “Yeah. Like, even if it’s just as friends or whatever? It’s a good idea. And anyway, I was going to ask you to go with me to —” He clears his throat and stares at his feet. “Um. There’s this place I go to sometimes, and I think you’d love it. So if you’re free tomorrow night, you should come with me. Like, to the place.”

  “To the place.”

  “It’s sort of a restaurant, but not really? The last time I went, all I could think was that you would love it there, and that it would take your mind off everything that’s going on right now.”

  “Sure. Sounds perfect,” I say. Is this a date?

  I know the answer to this immediately. Of course it’s a date. With Owen, it’s always a date.

  Thirty-Seven

  What the hell was I thinking?

  Thirty-Eight

  Let’s see. My current life in a nutshell: My rapist is still at large. I’m relatively certain that Janna is going to hunt down Andy on her own and broadside him with questions. Lifeguard Guy is probably getting ready to report both me and the charred remains of my dignity to the cops. Eleanor is likely out shopping for a billboard to advertise my criminal activity. I can hardly walk past the spare room without sweating out a kidney.

  And yet.

  Here I am, going out on a date with Owen McAllister.

  I find Owen leaning against the Jeep, arms folded casually over his chest and one foot propped up on a tire, waiting for me.

  In another thin cotton shirt.

  Tan biceps everywhere.

  Green-green eyes.

  He’s not making this easy for me.

  I squint at him, shielding my eyes from the setting sun, coming to a slow stop in front of him. “Hey,” I say.

  His face cracks into a smile. “Hey, yourself.”

  Owen’s mom opens the kitchen window and leans toward the screen. “Owen Tyrone McAllister, don’t you dare leave this house without telling me where you’re going.” Her eyes shoot to me, and by way of greeting she says, “Grace, honey.”

  “Mom,” Owen pleads, his face flushed. She squares a look at him, and he sighs. “We’re going to Marisol’s.”

  She brings both palms together in a prayer position, resting her chin on the tips of her fingers. “Lovely night for Marisol’s,” she says, and then she smiles, looking back and forth at us. “I’ve always known that the two of you would end up back togeth —”

  Owen clears his throat. Now his face is basically purple. “Mom.”

  “What?” she says.

  Before Owen can reply, his dad appears in the window as well. To his wife, but loudly enough for us to hear, Owen’s dad says, “They look cute together, don’t they?”

  Owen pinches his eyes closed. “Goodbye, guys.”

  After we pull out of the driveway, and after we turn onto Ocean Drive, I glance at Owen and say, “Your middle name is Tyrone? How did I not know this?”

  Owen keeps his eyes pointing straight in front of him. There’s a tiny twitch in the corner of his mouth. “You. Shut. Up.”

  I smile out my open window as we turn toward town. It’s gorgeous out, one of those nights so thick and so perfect that you can almost breathe it into your lungs and keep it there. The sun is dipping low in the western sky, casting a pink, dreamlike glow over the palm trees and turning the puddles in the street into blush-colored pools.

  “So you followed me last week,” Owen says, taking me totally off guard, “when I went to see Zoey. I saw you in my rearview mirror.”

  Hoo, boy.

  Fiddling with a loose thread on my sundress, I say, “Well, you leave every Saturday night, and —” I stop and clear my throat. “I mean — your clothes are ironed when you go. I thought maybe …”

  “I had a girlfriend,” he supplies. “Yeah. Figured as much.”

  “Are you mad?”

  “No. I wasn’t trying to keep the Zoey thing secret. It just never came up.” Smiling with one side of his mouth, he says, “I actually find it kind of cute that you were jealous.”

  “I was not jealous,” I sputter. “I was just clarifying.”

  He snorts.

  I give him the stink-eye.

  After a few seconds I say, “So how did that happen — you and Zoey?”

  “Well, I was miserable. You know that much. Nothing seemed to bring me out of it. For months, the guilt was —” He breaks off, glancing toward me for a quick second and then jerking his eyes back to the road. “Anyway, I got to the point where I just couldn’t take it anymore, so I went to Zoey’s house to apologize to her and her family. It was a last resort, really.” In the edge of his next pause, I can hear all the things he isn’t saying. How difficult it was to knock on Zoey’s door. How it tore his heart out to see her in that wheelchair. “Her parents yelled at me,” he admit
s. “Zoey cried. I wanted to run. God, I wanted to run out of that house and never come back.” Tears prick at my eyes and I blink several times. “It’s okay,” he tells me. “I got through it. It was rough, that first time, but I got through it, and then I asked if I could visit again. I’ve seen her once a week since. It took a while, but we’re good now. We hang out. Sometimes we just talk. Sometimes we play video games. Sometimes I teach her how to draw or carve.”

  “I’m happy for you, Owen. Really, I am.” Owen parks in front of an antique shop that I’ve seen probably a thousand times. “Wow, you shouldn’t have,” I say as I climb out.

  Owen ignores my statement, opening the door and ushering me inside the store. One of those old homes that has been converted into a shop, the place is clean and old-fashioned, with wood paneling on the walls and an ancient silver cash register on the counter. Furniture and collectibles are scattered everywhere. On a vintage coffee table in front of me, fire-red zinnias lean from a mason jar. “Marisol?” Owen calls, and a woman with short gray hair springs up from behind a desk, a feather duster in her hand.

  Plucking a pair of headphones from her ears, she says, “Good God, Owen! You scared me half to death.” She smiles and waggles a finger at him. “I had a feeling I’d see you tonight.”

  “Well, it’s the second Wednesday of the month, isn’t it?”

  “Sure is,” she says, gesturing to the back of the store with a tip of her head. “C’mon.”

  We snake our way around the furniture, following her through a plain wooden door and into a tiny kitchen. A riot of smells assaults me as soon as we walk in. They are butter and sugar and cinnamon, as warm and as comforting as the sun. Every horizontal surface holds cooling racks, all dotted with croissants. “Marisol moonlights as a baker,” Owen explains. “She makes pastries for some of the local B and Bs. And also for me. Because she loves me.”

  Marisol laughs and swats him with a hand towel. “Actually, I owe Owen’s mother my life, so I’m reimbursing her family in baked goods.” She snatches a large ceramic plate from the cupboard, piles it with croissants and hands it to Owen. “Dig in,” she says. With a loaded look at Owen, she spins on one foot and heads back up front.

  Plate in hand, Owen leads me through a pair of French doors, where I jerk to a stop.

  “Whoa,” I say.

  “Yeah.”

  I’m standing on a miniature terrace, where plants climb the side of the building and hang off the eaves and crawl across the concrete. The air smells flowering and exotic — like something you’d stumble upon in a remote, foreign village. Overhead is a web of tiny white lights, crisscrossing randomly and isolating the patio in a soft, luminescent glow. A metal bistro-style table sits in the middle of it all, an island in a sea of flowers. I feel like I’m not even in New Harbor anymore. I’m across the continent. Around the world. In one of my old posters — somewhere I always wanted to visit.

  The table is so small we almost bump heads as we sit. Beside me, a bright pink hibiscus lies open as though waiting for me to whisper my secrets. I lean toward it, inhaling, and then fall back in the chair. Releasing a sigh that feels like it’s been imprisoned in my chest for centuries, I turn to Owen, who has a private smile playing on his lips. “What?” I say.

  He shrugs. “Nothing.”

  I give him a wary look. “So,” I say, pointing to the pastries, “croissants, huh? I didn’t even know you liked them.”

  He leans back in his chair, folding his arms across his chest. “Sometimes I mingle with the commoners.”

  I look dubiously at the croissants until Owen prompts me to take one. The pastry is still warm when I pick it up. Should’ve been my first clue. Owen watches me as I take a bite.

  Jesus God.

  This croissant.

  “Holy shit,” I mutter. “There’s apple-pie filling inside.” Owen starts to say something, but I hold up my hand and take another bite. And then I fall against the back of the seat and close my eyes.

  “Her regular apple pie is even better,” Owen says.

  I look at him with one eye. “What day is apple-pie day?”

  “Only once a year, the day before Thanksgiving. Haven’t missed it in years.”

  I toast him with the last of my croissant. It’s weird how, when your life sucks, you think something huge has to happen to make you feel better. Really, though, it’s always the smallest things that improve your mood — laughter and the setting sun and flowers and an apple-pie croissant.

  “So,” I say, “what did your mom do to save Marisol’s life?”

  “She found a tumor in Marisol’s mouth while she was filling a cavity. I guess it was in a weird place, or something? Crazy, right? Makes me wonder whether some things are just meant to happen.”

  “You mean, like, fate?”

  Owen tips his head a little, considering. “Yeah. Something like that — some sort of Big Out There that’s pulling all the strings.”

  Big Out There.

  I like that.

  We eat in comfortable silence. I’m overwhelmingly at peace underneath the twinkling lights, plants whispering in the breeze, apple-pie filling sticky on my fingers. I breathe in the night, listening to tourists murmuring on the sidewalk and thunderheads rumbling off in the distance.

  “What are you thinking?” Owen asks. “You’re smiling.”

  “That’s because I’m happy,” I say, and then I make a face, because happy is the sort of word that’s so general its meaning gets watered down.

  “Thought you might like it here,” Owen says, “which is exactly why I brought you here for —”

  I point at him. “Don’t say date. This isn’t a date, Owen McAllister.”

  Owen is beaming. “Totally not a date. If it were a date, I’d take you to eat peanut-butter-and-pickle sandwiches on rye at the Engine Room Deli instead of taking you here, to this gorgeous, private area.” He turns his chair toward mine, resting his elbows on his knees. His eyes hook on mine. I’m acutely aware that we’re just a few inches apart, his face so close that we’re breathing the same air. The space between us crackles like it’s filled with fireflies, like I can just reach up and grab one with my hand. His voice is hypnotic as he goes on. “If this was a date, right now I’d be kissing you.” He pauses, glancing down at my lips and letting his gaze linger there for a long moment. “Which I’m not going to do, because we never actually declared this a date.”

  It’s entirely possible that I’m going to spontaneously combust.

  Just burst into flames and disintegrate, right on the spot.

  I swallow, closing my eyes for a quick second. Longing, fiercer and more powerful than ever, is a hand on my back, propelling me toward him. I clear my throat. “So if we were on a date,” I say, trying my best to keep my voice light, “where would we go after this?”

  “I’d take you back home to my garage,” Owen says. “To impress you with one of my projects.”

  “And if it wasn’t a date?”

  He flushes, sweat on his temples, looking at me like he has the best secret. “I’d take you somewhere else, to impress you with one of my projects.”

  “Where is this place?”

  He stands up, offering a hand to me. I hesitate for half a beat before I take it. “Come on. I’ll show you.”

  Thirty-Nine

  Owen drives to the back lot of New Harbor High School, holding up the wait palm every time I question him. When we get out, he directs me toward a tall metal door in the back of one of the buildings. Fishing a single brass key out of his front pocket, he holds it up. “The shop teacher gave me this,” he says, as though that explains everything, as though it makes perfect sense that we’re trespassing on school property just because he has a key. “So, anyway,” he says, and his voice has a little hitch in it all of a sudden, like he’s nervous, “I’ve been working on something for the past few days.” He
gives this awkward little laugh-chuckle that’s so endearing I almost melt. “I was going to give it to you for your birthday,” he goes on, “but then I went and opened my big mouth tonight, and now I’m not sure if —”

  I touch his arm. “Owen. I’ll love it, whatever it is.”

  “Right,” he says, shifting his weight. “Right.” He fumbles with the lock for a couple of seconds, and then, shouldering the door open, he motions me to step inside, flipping on the lights after he crosses the threshold.

  My footsteps echo as I walk into the room. I come to a slow stop and look around. There’s a profound, church-like silence here, even though the place is a high school shop in the very worst possible way — scratched-up tables and piles of lumber and bulky machinery.

  This is the second before I see it. The tiny splinter of time where my toes pause right on the edge of the moment, where all I know is the cluttered chaos of the room and the smell of polyurethane and sawdust. I hear Owen breathing, feel the warmth of his body behind me. I see a line of abandoned projects on a table against the wall, stacks of wood and building materials, and —

  “Owen,” I say, but it’s just a whisper. Almost not even that. It’s more of an emotion than a word. My whole body sways. I have no bones. They’ve all liquefied or collapsed or fallen to wherever bones fall when people go into shock. My knees tremble as I stumble forward, reaching out to touch my old music stand.

  I remember that Christmas morning like it was yesterday, like I could crawl into the memory and just become the early morning sunlight slanting through our living room window. Become the wayward tuft of hair that rocked side to side on my father’s head as he carried the tall, bulky gift across the room to me. The present itself was sort of pitiful-looking, lopsided and sloppily wrapped with Santa paper and a bright red bow slapped on with piece of Scotch tape. But my dad’s writing was scrawled in black ink across the tag, transforming it into a work of art. I glanced up at Dad just before I pulled off the paper. The absolute joy I saw in his expression — that memory — it was a physical thing. Just as real as the music stand in front of me right now.