All We Left Behind (12 page)

I think about all the other girls he's pinned against that seat and I don't want to be one of them, and at the same time I do. Just not like that. Not so fast. Not so disposable.

I pound the heel of my hand against the top of the fence and bite my lip so it will goddamn stop quivering. I force myself to look at him, though I'm afraid of what his eyes will hold.

But I don't find any meanness in him. He's quiet and still as the October water that swallowed me up to my neck.

“The swim at the lake was nice,” I say, and I'm not sure where the words come from. “But the rest of it was pretty shitty.”

He flinches, and I can't explain how
good
it feels to see him flinch. To see him feel anything, especially after he's seen so much of me, under him.

I turn before he can respond and walk as fast as I can without looking back. There are too many pieces of me that he's touched and kissed and unearthed with his hands, and I hold that one little piece of him firm in my palm, knowing I shook it out of him.

Knowing this one little splinter of Kurt—

Is mine.

I hear the whistle and
my feet carry me back to the field. My teammates return to the scrimmage, but I'm not thinking about them or the ball. I'm thinking about that little bead of spit on Marion's lip.

I run up the field, but I'm not paying attention and the ball blasts me in the face. I taste the copper of blood, and the impact stings like the back of my father's hand.

“Daydreaming about pussy, Medford?” Conner hoots, running up the line.

“Get your head in the game!” Coach yells, and I spit blood and run.

Ahead, Conner's faking out our fullback. Only he gets cocky, thinking he's clear to frame up a shot.

I slide tackle the ball right out from under him.

“Jesus fuck!” he curses, kicking empty air. The momentum throws off his balance, and he hits the dirt.

“I can daydream about pussy
and
school your ass,” I say, clearing the ball before offering him a hand.

He bats it away, but there's a smirk on his face.

“That's why I like you on our team, bitch,” he says, getting up. “Oh, and—who's
that
?” He nods to the parking lot, where Marion is a blond fleck getting into a purple car.

“No one,” I say, and Conner laughs.

“No shit.” He grins. “A
blond
no one.”

I shake my head and he wags his eyebrows before heading for the goalpost.

“Uh-huh,” he yells back. “I need to get me some no one, too.”

The next morning I pull
into a parking spot behind the gym where gray clouds block out the sun. Before I have a chance to put the car in park, my passenger door opens. The sight of Conner Aimes looking in at me is something out of the
Twilight Zone
. For a second he looks surprised and I'm sure he's got the wrong car. Only he flips on a smile and slaps my roof with a playful
bang!

“Purple Nissan,” he says like it means something. I stare at him, because there's no universe where it makes sense that Conner Aimes is talking to me.

“What?” I say, and he takes that as an invitation to sit in the passenger seat. My hands tighten around the steering wheel, but he leaves the door open, propping his foot up against the frame.

“You're not what I expected,” he says, giving me a once-over, and my body goes stiff.

“Excuse me?”

He pulls off his Red Sox cap and ruffles his hair, before
replacing it backward on his head. “But I can see it.” He winks, leaning toward me. “You're Lilith's friend, right? Marie?”

“No. I'm—” I cross my arms over my chest, not liking the way his eyes walk over me. “Yes, I'm Lilith's friend. But no, I'm not Marie.” He squints, like I'm not making sense. “It's Marion. Not—” I shake my head. “Conner, why are you here?”

Conner smiles. I
hate
the way he smiles, crooked with the things he's not saying.

“Did Kurt tell you—” I start, but Conner stifles a laugh and slaps a hand on my shoulder.

“Don't sweat it, Marion. You're golden.” He squeezes my shoulder, which is sort of brotherly, though I can't tell if he's mocking me or being nice. He unhooks his foot from the door and for a second that perplexed look slides over him again, showing just how hard he's trying to fit
me
into whatever Kurt's told him. “Golden,” he repeats, handing me a piece of lined paper, before stepping out the door. “See you around, Marion.” He taps the roof again, shuts the door, and struts off.

I stare at the paper in my hand, not sure if that just happened. Only, I'm holding the evidence. I unfold the note and find three bits of information scrawled in half-legible writing.

Saturday. 10 p.m. 114 E. Macnamara St.

That's it.

My door opens again and I'm about to grill Conner for
more information, but it's Lilith who slides in beside me.

“Was that Conner Aimes I just saw getting out of your car?” The excitement in her voice bounces with the rest of her.

“I guess.” I crumple the paper into my fist. “I think it was a mix-up.”

“Mix-up, my ass. What did he want?”

“Nothing.” I shove the paper into my pocket, wanting to keep this my secret. If I tell her about this then she'll ask about Kurt. And I'm
not
telling her about the ridge. I can't trust her with that. And I don't want to hear it, whatever she'll say. I already know how horribly I handled it, and some things should never be said out loud.

“Marion?”

I reach for my coat, shoving the paper deeper into my pocket. “It's nothing,” I say. “I have no idea what he wanted.”

“Well, what did he say?”

I shake my head, running our conversation through my mind. Out the windshield, I can see the soccer field. A low fog covers the grass, hiding the painted lines below, but a gust of wind is all it would take to expose them. It makes me shiver with how transparent I might be. Of what I can't hide. Of what Kurt has probably told Conner.

“He said . . .” My fingers run the jagged line of my zipper, the sharp edge catching a nail. I should trust Lilith. Maybe she can explain it to me. “He said I'm golden.”

Lilith wrinkles her nose. “Golden?”

“Right?” I punch an arm through the sleeve of my coat. I've said too much.

“Is this about Kurt?”

I try to find the second sleeve, but the coat is tangled behind me.

“Marion?”

“No.” I struggle another second, only to give up. “Maybe. I mean . . . it's possible he told Conner—”

My throat clogs with the idea of Kurt's hands, of my hair, of his calluses on my—

“Possible he told Conner what?”

Red leaves streak over the windshield. The wind has picked up, tossing maple stars through the lot. Lilith squeezes my arm and the warmth of her touch makes me want to tell her everything. But if I do that then all these things will be real.

“I have no idea,” I say, the leaves swarming.

“
Is
there something to tell Conner?” Lilith asks. “You and Kurt just went swimming, right?”

I toss my coat to the floor.

“Right.”

“So, what's there to tell?”

I open my door and crimson stars flood me.

“Nothing,” I say, heading for the building and ignoring the wind. Ignoring how it lifts up the fog, how it pulls at my hair, how it swallows my lies.

I pull the laces of
my cleats tight. Tie them once, wrap the extra around my foot, and tie them again. Conner opens his locker next to me and smirks.

“So,” he says. “Marion Taylor, huh?”

I don't look at him. How has he figured that out already? I was pretty sure he couldn't tell who she was yesterday when she was by the fence, but damn. I should know better. I stare at the bench and switch feet.

“Right, so when exactly did that happen?” He changes out his T-shirt for his practice jersey.

“Nothing happened,” I say. “Don't know her.”

“You're a shitty liar, Medford.” Conner chucks a sock in my direction. I bat it away. “So was this some divine inspiration that struck you at the bonfire, or have you and Miss Goody Two-shoes been at this for a while?”

I shove my clothes into the locker as calmly as I can and say nothing.

“Play quiet all you want, Medford, but
Marion
seemed
pretty concerned about what
you
told me about her.”

“You talked to her?”

Conner lifts an eyebrow. “Who, Marion? You mean that girl you don't know anything about? I repeat,
when
did that happen?”

I shut my locker and head for the door. What did he say to her?

“So, you wouldn't care if I asked her out, right? You two aren't a thing?” Conner calls after me. I flip him the bird and he starts to cackle. I'm halfway out the door and he starts to sing, “Like a virgin. Oooh! Touched for the very first time. Like a viiiiir-gin. When your—”

I let the door slam behind me. Conner can be such a dick.

I immediately start running when I get to the field, doing two laps to get my muscles working. I shouldn't be as pissed at Conner as I am. But fuck, he didn't see her in my car. Crying in that way no one's supposed to cry.

I promise myself I won't let this show in practice. But when Conner jogs up to me I pull him into a headlock. “Look, Con,” I say. “If you want my sloppy seconds, you can have 'em.” But that only makes him laugh harder.

“Not my type, Medford,” he says, squirming out of my grip. “Not that I would have pegged Taylor as your type. But if you've got the itch, scratch it.”

He makes an obscene gesture and I want to smack him. Tell him it's not like that. I don't know why I keep
defending her. She
should
just be an itch I want to scratch. And part of me still wants her. But that's the problem. I can't touch this girl. Not after seeing her cry in my car. And I don't know what it means that I
like
that I can't touch her. I don't know why that scares me more.

*  *  *

After practice Vanessa is sitting on my car. Conner smiles when he sees her, and I open the passenger door. I make sure Conner is watching, so he gets it and will lay off on the Marion thing. Or maybe I do it to convince myself there
is
no Marion thing.

We go to the ridge and fool around in my backseat. Everything with Vanessa is easy, and I like easy. I like that I don't have to think. I like that her shirt's so tight it reminds me of Madeline wearing that snug V-neck that was mostly see-through. Madeline was Josie's friend and I met her at my first high school party, which Josie took me to my sophomore year. I'd just made varsity, and Josie gave me a bottle of vodka to celebrate. When we arrived, everyone at the party noticed Josie. Not because I was with her, but because Josie had a presence all her own. Something they couldn't ignore.

“Welcome to the playground, little brother,” she said, unscrewing the top of my vodka bottle and nodding for me to drink. “Let's make you a king.”

The liquid burned.

It was crowded and people sat on couches and each other's
laps. Out the window was a red barn and a keg, but we didn't have to move. The party came to Josie. She introduced me to everyone, her eyes lighting up when she told them about how I'd just made the team.

“It's not surprising,” she said, her arm around my shoulders. “Have you seen how fast this fucker can run?”

I was a shiny penny she was showing off—but not in some shit way, like she needed attention. This was different. Like she was proud. It was different than at home. She didn't retreat into her room or tiptoe around Mom. She didn't scowl at me or bitch about how Mom never taught her how to play guitar. This was another world for Josie. Where she was someone else. Someone better.

The party had been raging for a while, and I was sufficiently drunk, when Josie introduced me to her friend Madeline. Madeline had black hair and wore a white shirt that was so thin I could see her bra through it. I don't know how it happened, exactly, but Josie disappeared, and Madeline took me out to the barn.

She hooked her fingers through my belt loops and we went behind the hay bales, where she put my hands on her tits and started kissing me. I was so confused and excited, I just went with it. I mean, she was gorgeous and she let me touch her everywhere. She moaned and nibbled my neck as if she liked it. Which I guess she did, because she pushed me onto the ground and started losing clothes. Before I knew it she pulled me out of my
pants, slid a condom on me, and we were having sex.

I don't know if she was drunk or if she had planned this. All I knew was that I was having sex and it felt so fucking good and then it was over.