Dark Secrets (20 page)

“
So, are you and
David going out now?” she asked.

“
Yeah, we’re going
out tonight, remember?”

“
No, dummy.” She
slapped my arm. “I mean, has he asked you to be his
girlfriend?”

“
Do guys do
that?”

Her expression said
the words her lips held back. “Yes, Ara. Guys ask girls
out.”

“
Oh. Well, no. He
didn’t. He um—he said he liked holding my hand.”

“
Hm. PG.”

I rolled my eyes and
sat facing the front again.

“
Maybe he’s just
being a gentleman—” She leaned a little closer, keeping her eyes on
Dad as if we were paying attention to him. “I mean, that would be
very like him, Ara. He might be waiting for you to make the first
move?”

I sat up in my chair.
“Yeah, he does have that freaky old-world charm thing. Maybe he’s
ultra-traditional.”

“
It would make
sense.” She offered, rolling out a flat palm.

I chuckled once.
“Maybe I should offer him my intentions in writing,
then.”

“
Nah, I don’t
think—”

“
Em?” I elbowed her.
“That was a joke.”

“
Oh.” She frowned.
“Ara, you tell the worst jokes.”

“
Yeah, I must get it
from my dad.” I grinned as the whole class broke into laughter at
one of his inadvertently humorous comments.

“
No.” Emily sighed,
leaning on her hand, dreamily gazing at Dad. “He’s funny. You
must’ve inherited your terrible joke problem from your
mom.”

My heart stopped for a
beat. “Yeah. I guess I do.” And it was true. But not from the mom
they all thought I grew up with. I got my terrible joke problem
from the mother I just buried. It was kind of our little
game—almost an art form; lame ‘Dad’ jokes for a girl without a dad
around. And I didn’t realise, until now, that I was still playing
it.

I saw myself then—the
girl standing by a coffin, looking down, wondering how I would walk
away—say goodbye to someone I’d loved my whole life. I left her
there, walked on, but my heart would never let go, never believe
she wouldn’t wake up—never play that game with me again.

I covered my quivering
jaw, releasing a moist, jagged breath into my hands. I needed to
run. I needed to leave the class before the grief broke through
right here in front of everyone.

Dad looked up suddenly
and started talking with a slight information-stutter as he frowned
at me. “Sorry, class—” He sauntered casually over to his desk and
lifted a piece of paper, “—just remembered I need to send a note up
to the office.”

“
Ooh, I’ll go Mr T,”
one of the girls said, holding her hand high in the air.

“
Actually—” He
scanned the room. “Edmond!” The whole class turned to look up the
back of the room, following Dad’s unusual tone. Edmond dropped his
phone and sat up straight, pulling his headphones out of his ears.
Dad handed me the note and whispered, “Go.”

I went. My feet
carried me swiftly, leaving the curious stares of the entire class
burning into my back, and the lecture on why we don’t play with
phones in class absconded into the empty corridor until the door
slammed shut behind me.

Holding my breath, I
dropped the fake note to the floor and felt for the wall as the
hot, salty liquid of my troubled past streamed down my cheeks. For
every tear I swiped away, another took its place, and I fought to
quiet my sobs, but the pain just went too deep.

“
Stupid jokes.” I
kicked the base of the wall. This was why I swore I’d never let my
guard down, why I swore I wouldn’t try to make friends here. As
soon as they found out, they’d all crowd around me in the
lunchroom, using my pain to fill the boring hour. I’d seen it
happen before when a girl lost her mum to cancer at my old school.
I couldn’t let that happen to me.

Slowly, I rolled my
face upward to look at the classroom door, kind of wondering why
Dad hadn’t come out to see if I was okay—see if I needed a hug,
because, for the first time since I lost her, that was all I really
wanted. Just a hug. Just to feel like someone could hold me
down—stop me from floating away.

I dropped my forehead
against the wall and hugged myself, not really sure I could do this
anymore.

“
Ara?” Long, cool
fingers slowly gripped my arms from behind. “What happened? What’s
wrong?” His words were barely a whisper, but I recognised his voice
right away, and he was the last person I wanted to see. He’d
definitely ask questions—questions I didn’t want to
answer.

“
I’m—I’m okay, David.
I just…” I wiped my face, keeping my head down. “I guess being new
just got to me.”

“
No, this is not
nerves or fear, Ara. This is grief.” His fingers tightened on my
arms, his gently melodic tone forcing a rise of heartache inside my
chest. “Talk to me.”

“
I can’t.” I sobbed,
wrapping my fingers over my entire face.

“
It’s okay.” He tried
to turn my shaking body, but I held fast, afraid to let him see me.
“It’s really okay.”

“
No, it’s not. Why does everyone always say that?” I asked,
barely able to understand myself. “I’m so
sick
of hearing
that.”

“
Ara. Please.
Please
. I’m worried about you.” His
hand came forward, cupping my shoulder as he spun me gently into
his chest and wrapped me up in his arms. “Please, don’t
cry.”

“
I’m trying not to,”
I said, shielding my face in the darkness against his chest. And he
smelled so good, so real and so warm. He smelled like something
safe, like a person who could hold on to me if I fell. I wanted to
hold on; I wanted to wrap my arms around his waist and just hold
on. But my arms, tucked so tightly into my chest, just couldn’t
break free. I just needed to be small, closed in.

“
Okay.” He rubbed my
back and took a step, keeping me close to his chest as we walked.
“Come on.”

I hiccupped in an
embarrassingly high-pitched tone. “Where’re we going?”

He looked down and
smiled at me. “We’re going somewhere we can be
alone—talk.”

And like that, in one
sentence, David hit every chord I ever wanted to hear. My heart
squeezed tighter, then twisted into a large, pulsing knot—a good
knot.

As we hurried into the
front parking lot, I glanced over my shoulder every few
seconds—watching for teachers, while David stayed calm, walking
with the grace of a king. We stopped by the passenger door of a
shiny black car with a soft-top roof.

“
Is this your car?” I
asked.

“
No, I’m stealing
it.” He jammed the key in the lock and twisted it, then laughed at
me. “Yes, it’s my car, Ara.”

“
How old is
it?”

“
Uh—” He looked at
the car, then at me. “It’s a little old.”

“
Classic
old?”

“
Kinda. It was my
uncle’s.” He held the door open for me. “Hop in.”

As David shut the
door, the exasperating heat closed me in right away, and the tan
leather seat burned the backs of my thighs under my skirt. I lifted
one leg, then the other, and wiped the sweat from under my knees,
placing fabric between skin.

“
You okay?” David
asked, opening his door, releasing the tight pressure of
exasperation for a moment.

I nodded, slinking
down lower in my seat. “I’ve never ditched school
before.”

“
This isn’t
ditching,” he said. “Your dad will understand.”

I nodded. “I guess
so.”

He smiled across at me
and shook his head, reaching into his back pocket.

“
What are you
doing?”

“
Easing your
conscience.” He pinned a number into his phone and pressed it to
his ear, taking my hand. “Miss Apple?”

I heard her voice
muffled on the other end.

“
Yes, I have Ara
Thompson with me; can you let her father know she’s fine, and I’m
taking her for a walk to clear her head.”

I slowly inched up in
the chair, inconspicuously wiping a few dots of moisture from my
upper lip.

“
Yes, I’ll bring her
home later. Give him my number if he wishes to check on her. Okay.
Bye.” He hung up the phone and dumped it in the centre console,
then started the engine.

“
Thank you,” I
said.

“
You’re very
welcome.”

I sat back then and
rubbed under my eyes where the tears had dried in the heat, making
my skin stiff. Even my nose felt dry and swollen.

We sat at the exit
sign for a second until the traffic passed, then David took off
down the street, going slightly over the speed limit. “How long
have you had your licence?”

“
A while.” He looked
at my forehead and frowned; I wiped the sweat away with the back of
my hand. “Oh, sorry, Ara. I don’t really feel the heat as much as
most people. Here.” He turned on the air-conditioner. The
suffocation of the heat eased after the first blast of hot air
passed and the chilly wind blew against my face. “Is that
better?”

With my nose pressed
to the vent, I nodded. “Yeah, thanks.”

“
If you get hot or
cold, Ara, you really need to tell me. It’s just not something I
think about.”

“
Why?” I sat back in
my seat and angled the vent to blast along my hairline.

He grinned. “I’m
insensitive.”

“
Yeah, you’re so
neglectful of others’ feelings, David.”

“
I know. Sometimes I
lose sleep over it.” He laughed.

“
Mm, I don’t know how
you live with yourself,” I joked.

“
Takes practice.” And
he meant that, I could tell. And I was sure it was aimed at
me.

“
What are you
saying?”

“
Regret. It takes
time to live with it.” He reached across and took my hand again.
“You called your mom Vicki the other day.”

I felt numb then, not
just from the crying but the stupidity. “Did I?”

“
Yes. And if I am
good at only one thing, Ara, it’s deduction; I think I’ve known for
a while now that your mom died. I just don’t know why you pretend
she hasn’t.”

I rolled my face
slowly toward my chest. “Because I didn’t want people to ask how
she died. Didn’t want them to feel sorry for me.”

“
People only feel
sorry for you when there’s good reason, Ara. Your mom’s gone.
People just want to help.”

“
I know.” But I
didn’t want their help. Every ache was a step toward
redemption.

“
Redemption?’ David
said.

I looked up at him
quickly. “Did I say that out loud?”

“
Uh—” He looked at
the road again, his face grey. “Yes. Didn’t you mean
to?”

I couldn’t believe my
own carelessness. “No.”

“
What did you mean by
that—about redemption?”

“
Just that…when you
do something wrong, sometimes you can make up for it.”

“
By doing
what?”

I blinked a few times
and the dried tears made my skin crack a little.
“Suffering.”

The car slowed for a
second, then, as David sat taller, his fingers tighter on the
wheel, it went back up to speed.

I flipped the visor
mirror down and gasped at the mess David had been looking at for
the last five minutes. My life was over. I wiped the smudges of
black mascara from under my eyes, using the remaining tears around
my lashes to smooth it away without too much of a problem. But I
couldn’t wipe away the blotchy patches of red under my skin and
worse, my nose, whenever I cried, turned bright pink—forming a
giant rouge smudge across my face. “I look like a clown,” my voice
quivered.

“
You look—” David
turned my face with his fingertips, “—adorable.”

Right. Adorable. Was
he serious? I folded my arms across my chest, looked out the window
and focused on my breathing. The passing houses and tree-lined
streets were all the same around here. Pretty, with that old-style,
Halloween kind of feel. It felt like it should be autumn and
everything sort of orange and brown, with the slight hint of
cinnamon in the air. But the summer had this magic little place
trapped in its grasp, making everything yellow and gold, and a
little wilted.

The trees thickened as
we turned onto a narrow road with dirt strips on both sides, and my
squinting eyes relaxed as the sun’s glare disappeared over the
canopy. “David, where’re we going?”

“
Somewhere quiet,
where no one can hear us.”

I laughed. “That
sounded kinda creepy.”

He laughed too.
“Sorry. I realised that just as I said it.”

I sat taller to take a
good look at the deserted forest road. “Why should we be where no
one can hear us?”

“
Because, you need to
talk. And you won’t talk if you think someone might hear
you.”