Double Clutch

by Liz Reinhardt

  Our kitchen was awesomely designed. It was open, with the kitchen and dining room connected, and the entire front wall had nice big windows so you could see our wide front yard and the thick tree line that bordered the edge of our property. Our house was on a tiny, quiet back road. Only half of our road was even paved; half of it was still dirt and loose gravel. It always cracked people up that we still lived on a dirt road, but I liked it that way. It meant that not many people chose to use our road, and that was fine by me. I loved living in a cozy, tucked-away place.

  I came in through the garage, kicking off my Chucks at the door.

  “Hey Mom!” I pretended that I was surprised to see her standing there. “Oh, were you waiting for me?”

  She didn’t say a word, just came over and grabbed my face and pinched my ears.

  “Ow!” I squeaked. “Mom, what are you doing?”

  “You’re frozen.” She shook her head. “You’re going to get frostbite. This isn’t going to work, Brenna. I can’t believe it’s this damn cold and we’re only in September. Winter is going to be miserable this year.”

  “I just need to wear a hat. Mom, I like riding my bike. You should be happy. At least I’m not some obese lazy teenager. Imagine if I weighed four hundred pounds and you had to home school me because I couldn’t fit through doorways at school.” I grabbed an apple from a bowl on the table and crunched down on it. “You’d be sad,” I said around the bite.

  “I’ll be sad when you’re hit by a car or your ears turn black and fall off from frostbite. Do you want a sandwich?”

  Mom wasn’t big into cooking, and since we’d moved back to the States, she’d been even worse. In Denmark, I’d been around all day to help with cooking and cleaning, but now it all fell to her. It wasn’t that my mom was lazy or anything like that. She just got bored doing things all by herself.

  “Yeah. I’ll make them. You go relax,” I offered.

  “That’s okay, baby. I’ve been relaxing all day. Thorsten switched schedules with another guy today, so he ran some errands and I had time to myself. He‘s got to go back in tomorrow, though.”

  Thorsten worked on the show Saturday Night Live on NBC, so he had to commute to New York City and stay overnight. I only ever saw him in the morning most of the time, and sometimes on Sunday. I had been really worried about living with him for a whole year in Denmark, but he’s a laid back guy, and we got along really well.

  “I had a good day. Some of the girls from elementary school saw me and they were nice. Do you remember Meg and Kelsie?”

  “The girl who was Annie in your school play?” she asked, and I nodded. “And of course I know Kelsie. It’s too bad she has such a low hairline. She could be very pretty.”

  I rolled my eyes, but she didn’t see me. “My classes seem pretty good. I’m reading Lord of the Flies now.”

  Mom groaned. “Didn’t you already read that one?”

  “Yeah. It’s not so bad. It’s always cool to see what a new teacher says about things. And I ran cross country today. Apparently I beat some unofficial school record for most laps in a period.”

  “Wow.” Mom raised her eyebrows. “I didn’t know you were such a fast runner.”

  “I’m not.” I examined my apple quizzically. “I think I have endurance. I mean, I wasn’t sprinting. Coach Dunn wants me to try out for the cross country team.”

  “That might be fun.” Mom looked at me from the corner of her eye to see if I would agree.

  I took everything out for sandwiches and was setting it all on the counter. I took a plate, put one plate in front of Mom, and we started to make our sandwiches, picking through tomato and lettuce and all of the meats.

  “It might be.” I shrugged. “Doesn’t it seem like they always want you to live at the field or track or whatever?”

  “I guess they think practice is important.” She shook a finger at me. “You don’t have to, Bren. You need to develop your ability to say no.”

  This was another of my mom’s favorite lecture topics. She was always reminding me that it was my right to say no whenever I didn’t want something. Not in a corny ‘say no to drugs’ way, or even ‘say no to sex,’ just no in general. Like ‘no’ when someone offers you food you don’t want or ‘no’ when your friends want you to go get your nose pierced with them, or ‘no’ to a teacher who asks you to be her assistant if you don’t want to be. Saying no was actually a pretty hard trait to get a good hold on, especially with someone like Coach Dunn willing you to say yes.

  “So.” Mom took a bite out of her turkey and Swiss with extra tomato. “Any boys hanging around?”

  I shrugged, praying that my cheeks didn’t get red. “I guess. You know, I’m the new girl, so there’s always that.”

  “Just remember, it’s better to date. Don’t get yourself hooked up with one person.”

  Mom was madly in love with her high school sweetheart, who got her pregnant and then acted like a jerk. Mom severed contact with him, gave me her last name, and didn’t even acknowledge him on my birth certificate. She raised me alone until she met Thorsten, and I think she stuck with him mostly because on their first date, when she told him about me, he asked her to bring me on the second date.

  He took us to a great pizza place and then we saw a kid’s movie at the drive-in. I sat tucked between the two of them like I was their daughter already. Mom had stars in her eyes from that day on. Thorsten was in, and he knew it, but I know that’s not why he did it. He just thought families were nice and important and he, my mom, and I made a good instant one.

  “I’m not even interested, Mom. School is going to be crazy enough without it. But I think Kelsie and I might start hanging out again.”

  “Good girl,” Mom smiled. “You always had a good head on your shoulders.”

  I helped her clean up the kitchen and then went to my very purple room to think for a while. I thought about Saxon’s incredible eyes and his brilliance and the way he could match every joke I made. I thought about Jake and how humble and cute and sweet he was. It was a little embarrassing that I couldn’t think a little more about my classes and schedule, but how could they hold a candle?

  I got out my binders and put everything in order. I hole-punched my worksheets and put those little color-coded tabs on my folder partitions. In short, I reveled in my dorky love of organizing my school supplies. I did my homework pretty quickly and was in the process of taking notes on Lord of the Flies when I heard a light knock at the door. I expected Mom, but it was Thorsten, looking uncomfortable. He didn’t really hang out in my room much, so it was always a little weird when he appeared out of nowhere.

  “Hey, Brenna.” He couldn’t hide his eager grin. “I know your birthday isn’t for a few weeks, but I wanted to give you this so you could start the school year right.” He handed me a messenger bag.

  “Thanks, Fa.” I reached for it, but when I went to take it, my arm almost gave out. “What’s in here?”

  “Open it up.” Thorsten tended to be a pretty calm guy, so it was strange to see this much anticipation on his face.

  “Oh my God,” I breathed. “You got me a laptop? Really?”

  “I thought you would need it for school. And I know you fill your journals up pretty quickly, so now you can have it all in one place. If you don’t like this model, we can switch it, but I did some research and I think this one is pretty good.”

  “Pretty good? Fa, this is top of the line. Thank you. So much.” I got up and we made our way towards one another awkwardly. I put my arms around him and hugged him hard. “Thank you. I’m going to use this so much.”

  “Well, I know it couldn’t have been easy for you to leave all of your friends and your school to come to Denmark.” Thorsten’s eyes are very light blue and his hair is very blonde, so he always looks kind of young and uncertain, but now he looked even more so than usual. “I just want you to know that I appreciate you doing it for me, and you didn’t even whine or anything.”

  “Fa, you’re good
to us. I love you. I wouldn’t whine. Thank you so much.” For a second I thought about my biological father and was glad that he and Mom hadn’t wound up together just because of me. Because there couldn’t be a better guy than Thorsten to have as a dad.

  Mom was right behind him and we took a few minutes to ogle over the new gadgets and all of the cool software that Thorsten had built in. I didn’t know much about computers, but I knew for a fact that this cost a huge chunk. Mom petted my hair and kissed my cheeks, and then she stopped suddenly.

  “Look at this room, Brenna!” she cried.

  “I’ll clean it up in a little bit.” I was surprised that she was so upset about my school stuff. Mom was usually pretty laid back.

  “No, Brenna, look at this room!” She put her hands up and shook them dramatically. “This is a little girl’s room. This is not the room of a world traveled teen. That’s it.”

  “What’s it?” I asked, but I felt energetic suddenly. Mom’s enthusiasm was always infectious.

  “My birthday gift to you. We’re going to redo your room.” She framed it out with her hands and moved them around like she was checking camera angles for the before and after pictures I knew she‘d want to take. “Whatever you like. Whatever you want.”

  “Even if I want black walls?” I tested.

  “Even if you want to paint blood dripping down them,” Mom said calmly. She knew I would never paint my room black, but even if I wanted to, she would find a way to make it look awesome. My mom could take the ugliest thing and make it amazing.

  “Thank you, guys.” I was looking forward to redecorating my room with them. Maybe it was because I was an only child, but I’d actually always liked having Mom and Thorsten around. We had fun together, but they weren’t always in my business. I could do things without having them breathing down my neck.

  “I have off this weekend. We’ll go to IKEA,” Thorsten suggested.

  “I’ve got a catalog!” Mom gushed. “You can look through it tonight, sweetie, then we’ll go pick everything up. This will be so fun! We can look at paint samples at that little store by the mall.”

  “Sounds good.” I smiled when Thorsten winked at me. Mom brought the catalog in and measured the room and windows before she kissed me goodnight.

  When I was alone, I was psyched to find out that I had wireless access, and that it actually worked. I had set up my Facebook page in Denmark, but I hadn’t looked for many of my American friends. I just felt like it was odd to send friend requests to people I hadn’t seen in months and who might not even remember me or want my request. Most of my friends were cousins and family, but tonight I did some searching. I sent a request to Kelsie, Saxon and Jake.

  All three of their profiles were set to private. Kelsie’s profile picture was really pretty. Unlike most Facebook girl pictures, she wasn’t making a duck face at the camera or pouting. She was smiling, and her smile was real and gorgeous. Saxon’s picture was just his silhouette, and he was wearing a hoodie, so I could barely make out his face. Jake’s picture was of him leaned against a dirt bike, his arms crossed. He was smiling and there were flecks of mud all over his face. Since I would have to wait for them to accept my requests before I could see their pages, I logged off and went to sleep.

  That night, I dreamed about Jake and Saxon. In the dream they were racing dirt bikes. We were in an arena that looked a lot like Medieval Times, and I realized that they were racing for Kelsie. She was the princess, and the winner of the race would get her hand in marriage. I was really mad, watching them, but I didn’t want to show it.

  The next morning I was in a crappy mood before my feet even hit the floor. I took my shower and got ready for school with a dark cloud over my head I just couldn’t shake. Mom was waiting with oatmeal and ideas for my room. We chatted for a while, and she clicked her tongue when I went to get on my bike.

  “It’s good for me,” I said. “I like it.”

  “It’s freezing. They’re saying this cold snap is breaking records.” She hugged her body and shivered for effect.

  “I’ll keep my hat and scarf on. I promise.”

  “Wear your helmet,” she sulked.

  “I always do.” I kissed her, then started out, and if I was a little bit excited to see Saxon, I didn’t admit it. First of all, he was seeing Kelsie, and she was pretty much the only friend I had. Secondly, he was trouble. You just got this sense about him, like no matter how into you he pretended to be, he would be kissing you with his eyes on the next pretty girl he noticed. I pedaled harder, building a really solid case against him. By the time I made it to school, I was pretty sure I could look him in the eye and hate him.

  Then I saw him leaned against the bike rack and all those little fragments of carefully built up hate slid out of my head and got replaced with a warm, happy excitement I couldn’t stamp out. I popped my iPod into my pocket and tried not to look like a complete fumbling dork while I locked up my bike.

  “Hey, Saxon.” I wasn’t going to ignore him. I wasn’t going to be rude.

  “I want to take you out,” he announced out of the blue, without preamble. His dark eyes focused on me with wolfish interest.

  “I thought you were taking Kelsie out.” I pulled off my hat and smoothed my flyaways.

  “It’s just a date, Blixen. It’s not like we’re going to get married.” There was a razor edge to his voice.

  “Would you tell Kelsie that you were taking me on a date?” I challenged.

  “What you and I do has nothing to do with anyone else.” His voice was a little snarly. I tucked my hair behind my ears and looked at him for a long time.

  “No thanks.” I whirled on my heel and started towards English.

  “Wait up!” He had to chase me down the hall a little, and I could tell he didn’t like it at all. I don’t think Saxon ever had to chase anyone anywhere. “We could just hang out then, right? As friends?” He gritted his teeth over the word.

  “Why?” I asked. “You don’t really seem all that friendly.”

  “I’m friendly when I want to be.” He ran a hand through his hair in frustration, like I was really irritating him. We were standing outside my locker and he had one hand pressed on the metal of the top compartment.

  “I need to get in there.” I pointed where his hand was pressed.

  “Say yes to one friendly date.” He dropped his voice to a whisper. “I couldn’t stop thinking about you last night.”

  My heart rocketed into my throat. I didn’t want to admit that I’d been thinking about him, too, though it would have been fun to tell him that I was thinking about him and another boy.

  “Maybe you need a hobby,” I suggested, widening my eyes. “Model airplanes? Skateboarding? How about music? You could take up the guitar.”

  “You’re funny,” he muttered. “I need to get you out of my system.”

  I knew in that moment that Saxon felt way more for me than he wanted to or than he was willing to admit. He didn’t like that he felt this way about me, so he was going to get rid of me. Well, he could screw off for all I cared. I wasn’t about to let him use me for entertainment then dump me when he was done.

  “That sucks for you. I’m not available, and I’m not interested. So go bother someone else.” Even while I was saying those words to him, part of me wanted him to grab me and kiss me right there. He looked angry and hungry at the same time, and I didn’t want him to stop looking at me like that.

  “Fine.” His voice was low again. “But I’m not an idiot, Brenna. This isn’t a one-sided thing. I know you feel something about me. We’re going to end up together eventually. If you’re too chicken to face it, that’s your thing.”

  He stalked away like he owned the whole hallway, and I went to class so mad I could feel my face flaming. Who did he think he was? Obviously God’s gift to women. I had never met anyone so arrogant, so completely full of himself. I marched into English and plopped down in my seat. Mr. Dawes was already filling up the chalkboard with notes about Golding�
��s life and career. I took out my blue notebook and binder (everything for English was blue. I know; color coding is dork central), when Devon Conner turned around.

  “You’re in Tech?” He blinked like there was something in his eye.

  “Yes,” I hissed. “What’s it to you?”

  “Well, this is honors English,” he said matter-of-factly. “I didn’t think Tech kids were allowed in honors classes.” He had a big nose. It crossed my mind that it would make an excellent target for my fist.

  “Look, jerkoff, maybe you should turn around and take the freaking notes before they ship you off to Tech with all the other dirty lowlifes like me.”

  “I was just asking a question,” Devon whined.

  “A pretty damn stupid one,” I muttered.

  “Is there a problem Mr. Conner? Ms. Blixen?” Mr. Dawes asked.

  “No.” I gave him my most angelic face. “Devon can’t see the board. He was asking to copy my notes after class.”

  Butter could have melted in my mouth, I was that good.

  Mr. Dawes nodded. “Mr. Conner, front and center. Ms. Blixen isn’t your personal transcriber. If you need a seat adjustment, bring a note from your eye doctor,” he barked. I smirked when Mr. Dawes’s back was turned.

  “Geez, I was just asking a question,” Devon sulked childishly.

  Right.

  The rest of the day went just as badly. In Government I had to sit right next to Saxon and work through the problems that were on our sheet. He didn’t lift a finger to help, which annoyed me.

  “We’re supposed to be partners.” I scribbled on my paper with furious frustration when my ink went dry.

  “Not all partnerships are equal.” He smiled meanly, plucked the pen out of my hand, wet the tip on his tongue, and handed it back to me. “Maybe we don’t have a symbiotic relationship.”

  “So instead of you being the little bird eating meat out of my crocodile jaws, you’re the big, fat tapeworm killing me slowly?” I spat, ultra annoyed when the ink flowed smoothly on the paper.