“I like her,” Carson said. “Why do you ask?”
“ ’Cause her face is all red.”
Kathleen could have slid through her chair’s slats. “I think I’m finished with your flower, Darla,” she said crisply, setting the brush in a jar of water.
“Then I want ice cream,” Darla said.
“Smart choice,” Carson said, and winked.
“Don’t you want to play some games first?” Kathleen asked.
“No, I want ice cream. But I want him to get it for me. I like chocolate with candy sprinkles.”
“He’s on break,” Kathleen said.
“Break’s over.” Carson grinned down at Darla. “Your flower looks terrific.”
Kathleen glanced at Raina and Holly, hoping they’d come with her. Raina said, “I’m still working on a masterpiece here.”
“Me too,” Holly said.
Kathleen almost shouted, “How hard is it to put on a bear decal?” but decided against it. “Okay,” she said to Darla. “Ice cream it is.”
They followed Carson, who went behind the cart to stand with another server while they got in line. He made a production out of creating their sundaes. Minutes later, the three of them were sitting at a table with their ice cream concoctions. “I thought you were working,” Kathleen said, still feeling testy.
“Still on break. Do you mind if I sit with you?”
“I don’t mind,” Darla said, giving him a decidedly adoring look.
He didn’t wait for Kathleen’s vote.
While Carson and Darla chatted amiably about Darla’s injury, Kathleen concentrated on her dish of ice cream. She also watched Darla’s little face light up while she talked to Carson and realized that all females were susceptible to his charms, regardless of age. This was his gift—to wind girls around his little finger. Kathleen did a slow burn, disgusted with herself for falling for him.
She was thinking of ways to blow him off and put him down when she heard “I’m finished. Are you?”
The question came from Stephanie, who had materialized behind Darla’s chair, holding a clothing bag over one shoulder and a makeup kit in her hand.
Kathleen choked on a bite of ice cream and all thoughts of dissing Carson fled.
“Not yet,” Carson told Stephanie, without even looking up.
With a jolt, Kathleen realized he’d been expecting her.
Stephanie said, “It’s been a long day for me. When will you be ready?” As usual, Stephanie looked through Kathleen as if she were a pane of glass.
Carson turned to Kathleen. “I lost my car privileges for a week, so I caught a ride with Steffie today.”
“And now Steffie’s ready to go,” Stephanie said.
“But I’m not. I’m here to help and I’ve got work to do.”
“You don’t look very busy.”
“You can ride with me and my friends,” Kathleen blurted out without thinking.
Carson considered the offer before asking, “Are you sure? I live out of your way.”
“Absolutely.” She wasn’t sure at all and realized that she’d just committed Raina’s car to a trip across town. She didn’t care. At the moment all that mattered was besting Stephanie.
Carson told Stephanie, “Go on without me.”
Kathleen held her breath and watched Carson and Stephanie engage in a silent battle of wills. There was something between them, an undercurrent she’d felt before but couldn’t read. In the end, Stephanie turned and walked away without another word.
“I’d better get busy.” Carson stood and stretched as if nothing had happened. “Where should we meet?”
Kathleen’s mind was racing. What was she going to say to Raina? “I’ll meet you in the main lobby after we get all the kids back up to the floor.”
“I’ll be waiting.” He gave Darla a smile and a light tug on a hank of her hair. “Nice to share ice cream with you. You get that ankle well, and no more skateboarding tricks.”
“Bye, Carson.” After Carson had returned to the cart, Darla looked at Kathleen. “Do you know that girl?”
“Sort of.”
“She isn’t very nice.”
Kathleen suppressed a smile. She couldn’t have agreed more.
twelve
THE SECOND KATHLEEN cornered Raina alone, she told her what she’d done. “I don’t know what I was thinking. But there Stephanie stood, looking all smug and dictatorial, and it was obvious that Carson didn’t want to go with her. Can we take him out to Davis Island? I’ll pay for the gas.”
Raina looked amused. “What am I going to do with you, girlfriend? Why don’t you make up your mind about this guy? Do you want him or not?”
“It’s not that easy. Not for me.”
Raina looked sympathetic. “I don’t blame you about wanting to best Stephanie, but you can drive him home.”
“Me! Can’t we all go together?”
“I want to get home because Hunter said he’d call. Holly said she was expected at a family cookout. Where is she, anyway?” Raina looked down the hallway. All the children had been tucked into their rooms and only a lone nurse could be seen in the corridor.
“She wanted to stay with Ben until he fell asleep.”
“Poor little guy. Well, he’s got a friend in our Holly, doesn’t he?” Raina turned to face Kathleen. “Now, as I was saying, you can drop me and Holly at our houses, then drive Carson home in my car.”
“You wouldn’t mind?”
“Why should I mind? I’m alone and wishing I wasn’t. Go have a good time.”
“But your car—”
“Return it tomorrow.”
It was a nonvolunteer day at the hospital. Kathleen said, “Thanks. A lot.”
Raina caught Kathleen’s arm. “Listen, don’t let that nasty girl interfere with what you want. If you want this guy, make the most of this opportunity.”
“I appreciate your advice, but then it might not be about what I want but about what he wants. You know?” Kathleen sighed. “I wish I had more experience with guys. Just remember, while the boys were following you around like trained puppies, I was wallpaper.”
“Take it from me, popularity isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”
Kathleen had never been popular, so she couldn’t argue. Besides, Raina was right—she should make the most of being alone with Carson tonight.
* * *
By the time Holly joined them and they’d shared the plan for the evening, Kathleen was certain that Carson had grown tired of waiting for her and had called a friend to come get him. However, when the three of them reached the main lobby, Kathleen saw him slouched on a sofa, staring at a ball game on the lobby’s big-screen TV.
He popped up and joined Kathleen and her friends. “Glad you’re here. The game stinks because the Marlins are losing.”
By the time Raina handed the car keys over to Kathleen, dusk had given way to twilight. By the time they reached Carson’s house, it would be completely dark.
Alone together in the car, Kathleen found herself at a loss for words. It had been easier with Holly and Raina to carry the conversation. “Um—you’ll have to direct me to your house once we get on the island,” she said.
“No problem.” He turned on the radio and found a station he liked. When they rolled over the bridge to the island, he gave her directions. She recognized the grand home from the night of the party, except that now only a few lights shone through the lower-story windows. She stopped in the driveway, and he reached over and switched off the ignition before she could do it.
“I want you to come inside with me,” he said.
“I want to show you something.”
She thought about having to meet his parents and felt her stomach tie in knots.
As if reading her mind, he said, “Don’t worry, my folks are at a party.”
Her hands went cold and clammy. “No one’s home?”
“Are you afraid of me, Kathleen?”
Irritated, she snapped, “No way.”
“Then come on.” He led her along a walkway lined with accent lights and up the brick steps and unlocked the front door.
From the moment she stepped inside, Kathleen felt like a fish out of water. The night of the party, she’d not gone into the house, so she’d had no idea how truly magnificent his home was until this moment. The foyer was enormous, with limestone flooring and hand-painted Spanish tile. When Carson flipped on a wall switch, a wrought-iron chandelier gleamed with lights high above. In front of her, Kathleen saw a wide staircase with carpeted steps and ornate black iron handrails. “Nice place,” she said, trying not to gawk.
“My mom had it built to look like a Spanish hacienda. Follow me.” He held out his hand.
She went with him up the double staircase. Her heart hammered. “Where are we going?”
“I told you I want to show you something.”
“What?” She pulled back at the top of the landing, suddenly wary.
“You’ll like this. Trust me.”
She didn’t trust him or herself, but she went anyway. The upper floor was softly carpeted, lit by iron sconces along the walls. He stopped in front of a set of double doors and flipped a handle, and the door swung open to reveal a room lit only by one small desk lamp. “Where are we?”
“The library.”
“Are you going to read me a book?”
“We’re going to walk through to another set of doors and then go out onto the second-story balcony,” he explained patiently.
They crossed the carpeted library and stepped onto a tiled balcony with a cozy arrangement of rattan furniture and miniature palms. The balcony overlooked the backyard, where the pool glistened. Still holding her hand, Carson picked up a remote from a side table and dimmed the pool lights with the push of a button. “My dad’s a gizmo freak. Believe me, we have ’em all.” He led her to a setee, where they sat, shoulders touching, his hand entwined in hers.
She longed to ask, “Now what?”
“Watch,” he whispered in her ear, making gooseflesh prickle along her neck and arms. He pointed skyward.
Suddenly, the sky filled with fireworks. She was so startled that she jumped.
“It’s July Fourth, remember,” he said. “This is the best place in the world to watch the fireworks that I know of. Practically a command performance.”
Fireworks? He’d brought her here to watch fireworks? Kathleen’s temper went off like the explosions in the sky. “You could have said something! You could have asked me. You didn’t have to act so freaking mysterious!” She stalked to the railing. He came to her side.
“I wanted to surprise you. I wanted you to watch the fireworks with me.”
“So why didn’t you just ask?”
“You were quiet as a stone in the car. I got the feeling that all you wanted to do was dump me and run off. Like I was a chore you promised to do.”
His assessment wasn’t far off the mark, which bothered her, but what he didn’t know was that fear, not inconvenience, had motivated her. “That’s not true—”
He took her shoulders and turned her to face him. “I’ve never met a girl like you. It’s like you’re afraid of having a good time. Like you’ll be punished if you start having too much fun.”
His evaluation shocked her. “I know how to have fun! I had a good time on our date, but when you didn’t call—” She stopped herself, furious that she’d blurted out her frustration. She hadn’t wanted him to think she’d sat by the phone waiting for it to ring.
“And I didn’t want to crowd you. You seem scared of me. Are you? I don’t want you to be scared of me.”
She was and she wasn’t. She was mostly scared of her caring too much and of his not caring enough. “I keep wondering why you mess with me,” she told him, her anger gone. “You know plenty of girls. Pretty girls,” she added. Like Stephanie, she didn’t say.
“You make me sound shallow, as if pretty is a measuring stick for determining what I want. That’s not fair. And that’s not me.” His eyes had narrowed and there was an edge to his voice.
When he put it that way, it did sound shallow, but just as she’d told Raina earlier, that was what she assumed all boys wanted—pretty girls to drape themselves over in the halls and in the school parking lots and in the malls and every place in between. Pretty girls were a guy’s ticket to cooldom.
“So what do you want?” Her heart was beating so fast, she could hear it in her ears.
“Look,” he said, pointing skyward. Beautiful starbursts of color broke over the trees and fell like handfuls of glitter. “I want to feel like that inside myself whenever my girl comes walking toward me. And I want her to feel the same way about me.”
Who didn’t want to feel that way? Who didn’t want one special somebody to care about? Her emotions tangled with her logic and somehow both got caught in Carson’s eyes. Her fragile feelings, so long held in check, splintered like the explosions in the sky, showering her mind with sparkles of possibility. “And if that should happen…you know…that explosion thing…between us…?” Her voice quivered.
“Then I guess we’ll just have to ride the wave and see where we fall to earth.”
A part of her brain wanted to say, “But falls hurt. People break.” She saw his face, his lips, as if through a mist. He lifted her chin and his mouth was on hers, warm and soft, and as if by magic, the fireworks left the sky and entered her body and soul.
In the space of the next hour, Kathleen went from being a girl who had hardly ever been kissed to one who’d been kissed thoroughly. Carson kissed her until the fireworks ended, until the sky had gone dark and the humid tropical air left them both damp and sticky. He took her inside to the coolness of the library, to the sofa, and there he pressed her body to his and kissed her face, her throat, her neck and bare shoulders, until she was drenched with desire for him.
From far away, she heard a clock gong. “I need to go,” she told him. What if his parents returned and found her with him?
“I know,” he said, his voice husky.
Every inch of her seemed on fire when he put her in the car. He leaned through the window and kissed her one last time. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”
She backed out of the driveway and made it to the stop sign at the corner before she saw her cell phone glowing on the console where she’d left it. Her eyes widened and her body, which had been so hot and liquid moments before, went cold and rigid. “Oh no,” she whispered.
She shoved the gearshift to Park and grabbed the phone. There were numerous voice messages from her mother and two text messages, both from Raina. One read YUR MOTR IS CRZY TO FND U. CALL ME!!!! The other read 911! I LIED TO HR. Kathleen glanced at the dash clock and saw that it was almost one, well after her curfew. With fingers shaking, she dialed Raina, praying that her friend was still awake and waiting for the emergency call.
Raina answered on the first chirp of her phone. “Where are you? Are you all right?”
“I lost track of time,” Kathleen said. “What did you say to Mom?”
“The first time she called, I told her you were here but in the bathroom with cramps. That’s when I left the first text message. She called thirty minutes later, and I told her you’d run out for a heating pad because we didn’t have one. Oh, yes, and some ice cream too.”
Kathleen groaned. “What am I going to tell her? I never lie to her!”
“Sorry … I just didn’t know what else to say.”
“It’s not your fault. I’m going home. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”
“Wait! Did you have a good time with Carson?”
“Oh, yes.” The warmth of Kathleen’s earlier feelings washed over her. “Got to go.” She ended the call and gunned the engine.
Every light in her home was blazing when Kathleen arrived. She found Mary Ellen sobbing on the sofa, the phone in her lap. “Where have you been? I was getting ready to call the police!” Her mother’s eyelid twitched uncontrollably and her speech was slurred, both signs of extreme
stress.
Guilt slammed into Kathleen. Her mother looked small and helpless, tangled in an old quilt, a box of tissue on the floor and used tissues heaped on the coffee table. Her right hand lay curled tightly against her side. She couldn’t have made it to her wheelchair by herself in the state she was in. What if she’d tried and fallen?
“I’m sorry. I—I just lost track of time.” Kathleen sat on the edge of the table and tried to take hold of her mother’s good hand, but Mary Ellen pulled away.
“I called Raina and she said you’d gone to the store. Didn’t she tell you I called? What’s the matter with you? Don’t you know how worried I’ve been? And you out driving! I thought you’d had a wreck. Like your dad and me. Why couldn’t Raina have driven her own car to the store? Why didn’t you call me?”
The questions came so fast and furious that Kathleen couldn’t begin to answer any. She tried to soothe Mary Ellen, but she was distraught, un-consolable. Kathleen eventually went to the medicine cabinet and found her mother’s bottle of tranquilizers. “Take this and we’ll talk tomorrow,” she said. “I’m sorry, Mom. Really, really sorry.”
It was two-thirty before Kathleen crawled into her bed, her mother finally calmed enough to fall asleep. Kathleen lay trembling in the dark, hot tears brimming in her eyes. She’d acted selfishly tonight and had allowed Carson’s kisses to lull her into thinking she had a chance at a normal life. It was a mistake. Mary Ellen needed her, depended on her. She was her mother’s keeper and sole caregiver. She couldn’t ever, ever forget that!
Kathleen squeezed her eyes shut, trying to keep tears from leaking out, but she failed. And so she wept alone in her childhood bed. She missed her father horribly. How she longed to crawl into his lap and have him hold her like he used to. She wanted him to tell her everything was going to be okay because Daddy was here to take care of his wife. And his little girl.
thirteen
KATHLEEN AWOKE EARLY the next morning but stayed in her room as long as possible. She dreaded facing her mother. It might have been easier to undo the harm if only Raina hadn’t lied to her! Now she was going to have to deal with two problems—the failure to communicate her whereabouts well past her curfew, and the well-intentioned fib of her friend.
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