Infinite in Between (12 page)

ON THE AFTERNOON
of Thanksgiving, the rain was beating so hard against the windows that Zoe could barely see out. She wasn't even sure what she was looking for as she watched the fuzzy outlines of cars with their headlights on. Aunt Jane's son, David, had driven up from college with his girlfriend, Tamara. They got so wet sprinting from the driveway that they threw their clothes in the dryer and changed into sweats and T-shirts. During a lull in the storm, David's dad, Rich, arrived with his wife, Glenda, and their five-year-old daughter, Mariah. Rich's father, Harris, came a minute later, propping his umbrella inside the door. Zoe pretended to watch the game with her cousin and Tamara. Not that she cared about football. But maybe no one did. Maybe they had a game on Thanksgiving for the sole purpose of people not having to talk.

Zoe's mom was still shooting in France. The movie was supposed to wrap by November, but now they were saying middle of December. That was why Zoe was doing Thanksgiving in Hankinson again this year.

After a while Aunt Jane shooed people away from the TV and into the dining room for appetizers. As Zoe watched everyone
hovering around the veggies and dip, she thought about families. This family tree, with the stepmom and half-siblings and ex-spouses, would have branches crossing over branches and twigs like Zoe's—the estranged famous sister's daughter—sprouting completely out of nowhere.

Aunt Jane handed Zoe a lime seltzer to give to her cousin's grandfather. As she did, he extended a thick freckled hand to her.

“Call me Grandpa Harris,” he said. His freckles were so round and orange, they looked like chewable vitamin Cs. “I met your mom a few times when Rich was married to Jane. I'm a big fan.”

“Thanks,” Zoe said. This was her first time meeting Harris. She looked from Harris to Rich, Jane's ex-husband. They were both bald with rosy cheeks and big bellies.

“Is Sierra working on something now?” Harris asked.

“A romantic comedy,” Zoe said. “She's filming in France.” She hoped he wouldn't ask her anything else. It made her uncomfortable talking about her mom's career. The whole room would get instantly quiet as people hung on to every word.

Thankfully, no one mentioned her mom again until dinner when David's girlfriend quoted
One Precious
, a movie Sierra starred in nearly twenty years ago.

“Oh my god,” Tamara said, flushing. “I didn't even think about how she's your mom. That's so embarrassing.”

David touched her arm. “No big deal.”

“Happens all the time,” Aunt Jane said, passing around the cranberry mold.

“Wasn't
One Precious
made around here?” Glenda asked. Rich's wife was African American and glamorous, with a long velvet skirt
and dark red nails. She was a hair stylist in Hankinson. Zoe had met her one other time, at Thanksgiving last year. She'd said that Zoe had great natural highlights.

“It was filmed two hours away,” Harris said. “Up by Lake Ontario.”

Zoe saw Aunt Jane look quickly at Rich, and he cleared his throat. Something about seeing David's dad, Rich, and Rich's dad, Harris, made her wonder about her own father. More and more recently, she'd been thinking about him. When she was younger and asked her mom about her father, her mom always shut her down. After a while Zoe stopped asking. It was almost like he didn't exist. But he
did
exist. And if life had turned out differently, Zoe would have been sitting around some other table, another branch on another tree.

As Aunt Jane and David washed dishes, Zoe slipped up to her room to call her mom. She sprawled across her bed and unbuttoned her jeans, which were squeezing into her stomach. She was going to ask it short and simple:
Who's my father?
She was almost sixteen. She deserved to know.

Zoe had talked to her mom earlier that day. They'd made a plan to meet in Sun Valley for Christmas. Sierra was going to take her skiing.

It was late in Paris but not the middle of the night. For a second Zoe wondered if her mom would be drinking, if her words would be slurred. That had happened before, back when she used to drink.

Before she could chicken out, she hit
Mom
. The phone rang and rang that monotone European beep. When she got her mom's
voice mail, she cleared her throat and then said, “Hey, Mom. It's me. I'm just calling because, well, I had some questions about who my father is. I know it's . . . I don't know . . . I'm ready to talk about it. Thanks.”

“WANT TO THROW
a football?” Jake asked his dad as he flopped next to him on the couch.

It was warm out, about sixty degrees. Jake had already taken a ten-mile bike ride, but he still had energy to burn.

“Now?” Jake's dad usually drank a few beers and watched soccer on Sunday afternoons.

“Yeah . . . sure. It's really nice out.”

Jake's dad switched off the TV, dropped his empty bottle in the recycling bin, and went upstairs to change. When he came down, Jake was in the front yard, wearing shorts and a T-shirt, a football under his arm.

“Should we run to the park?” Jake asked. The weather was pumping him up.

“A run and football?” His dad laughed as he leaned over to tie his sneaker. “You want to kill me? Why don't you run and I'll meet you at the park?”

“That's okay. Walking is fine.”

There were tons of people in Mount Olive Park. Women working out, kids scooting, guys shooting hoops. If it weren't for the bare
trees and the Christmas decorations, it would feel like September.

Jake and his dad tossed the football, stepping farther apart with every pass. Jake still threw a tight spiral, and he was fast. When he received the ball, he charged past his dad, planting it firmly on a patch of brown grass.

“Touchdown!” a voice yelled.

Jake spun around. Teddy was watching them from the path.

“Theodore!” Jake's dad shouted. That was what he used to call him when they'd been younger. It was an inside joke.

“It's
Teddy
,” Jake hissed to his dad, because they weren't younger, and he and Teddy weren't on inside-joke terms anymore.

“Teddy,” Jake's dad said, waving him over. “Join us for a little football. It's been too long.”

“Dad,”
Jake whispered. His face was hot, and he wanted to disappear. Or maybe not. Maybe he hoped Teddy would come over. Or maybe not. Maybe that would be too much.

“Hey, Mr. Rodriguez,” Teddy said, tossing down his water bottle and jogging across the grass. “It's Ted now.”

Ted?
He scooped up the ball and spiraled it hard into Jake's arms. Jake caught it, stumbling slightly, and chucked it to his dad. His arms were wobbly, so it was a pathetic throw. He was trying not to look at Teddy's—
Ted's
—legs in his slippery blue shorts. He had hair on his legs now, and muscles that bulged out from his calves.

“Jake!” Ted received a ball from Jake's dad and then threw it to Jake. “What kind of throw
was
that?”

Jake caught it and spiraled it back to Ted. This one was a hard throw, and Ted had to run to get it.
Yes!
Jake was grinning so hard, his cheeks hurt.

“Not bad,” Ted said. “Maybe you haven't lost it, after all.”

They both cracked up and, just like that, everything changed. Jake and Ted and Jake's dad were laughing and shouting and working up a sweat. A few other dads came over and they started playing touch football, except it quickly descended into light tackle. Jake and Ted were good together, passing down the field, dodging the old guys.

The dads were getting their butts kicked, so they split Jake and Ted onto opposite teams. It was dusk, and the ball had become harder to see. On one long throw, Jake somehow caught it. He was weaving through the pack when Ted tackled him. They tumbled onto the ground, their bodies mashed together.

The earth was hard and moist and smelled like rotting leaves. Jake and Ted lay there, tangled around each other. Jake could feel Ted's bare arms and legs against his, and he could hear him panting. Ted pressed his hips into Jake, and Jake pressed back. When they did that, groin to groin, it felt like electricity zapping between their bodies. For a few seconds neither of them could move.

“All okay?” Jake's dad called from across the lawn.

Ted and Jake both leaped up. They brushed off their knees and shook out their arms.

“I better go,” Ted said. “See you at school.”

Jake nodded. He wasn't sure he could talk.

“Thanks, Mr. Rodriguez!” Ted called out to Jake's dad.

Ted walked across the field and grabbed his water bottle. Jake watched him go. The thing was, Jake knew that Ted wouldn't
see
him at school. He would look right through him like he didn't exist.

“MOM? DAD?” WHITNEY
called weakly. It was two in the morning. Her chest was hurting so badly, she could hardly talk.

“Mom? Dad?” she called again. “Can you come in here?”

Whitney felt achy and hot and trapped in this limbo between sleep and awake. She'd had a cough for the past week. She thought it was getting better, but then, last night, she and Zach had gotten into a fight on the phone and she'd crawled into bed feeling like crap.

“Whit?” Alicia asked, pushing her door open. “Did you just call for Mom
and
Dad? Do you realize Dad lives in Chicago now?”

“I don't feel so good.” Whitney started to cough. It was a deep hacking cough that sent shocks of pain through her chest.

Alicia touched Whitney's forehead. “Oh my god.”

“What?”

“I'm getting Mom,” Alicia said, and then she left the room.

Whitney was trembling all over. She heard her mom and Alicia talking and then, seconds later, her mom burst in. She lay her hand on Whitney's cheek and called to Alicia, “Go heat up the car. And call the emergency room. Tell them we're on our way.”

“SO WHAT'S THE
deal for Saturday afternoon?” Dinky said as soon as Gregor answered his phone. “Want to get a bunch of people together?”

Gregor hit speaker and lay on his floor, looking out the window. It was only nine, but the sky was black. “What about bowling? They have great wings at the bowling alley.”

“Or ice-skating,” Dinky said. “Hey, did you see that thing about Whitney Montaine? Ice-skating would be cool. I'd probably fall all over my ass. Or bowling. I love wings.”

“What thing?” Gregor asked, sitting up.

“Hang on, is Whitney the
WM
you had the marching band spell? I never thought about that until now, but—”

“What
thing
about Whitney?”

“The guidance counselor sent an email to all the sophomores. Didn't you see it? She's in the hospital with pneumonia. They didn't
say
she was going to die, but—”

Gregor meant to say good-bye, but his finger just hit end. Dinky called back, but Gregor didn't answer. With trembling hands, he opened his email and there it was, from two hours ago.

Dear Sophomore Class,

As some of you know, your fellow student, Whitney Montaine, is in University Hospital with acute pneumonia. It's a critical situation, and the doctors are . . .

Gregor wiped away the tears, but more kept coming. No one, not even his dad, could understand how he felt about Whitney. And now she was sick, and there was nothing he could do.

If he
could
do something, he knew exactly what it was. The other day, his mom had dragged him to Card 'n' Candle, and he'd seen a teddy bear that made him think of Whitney. It was small and red and said
Coup de Couer
on the belly. Gregor wasn't positive but he thought that meant “falling in love” in French.

What the hell. He was going to get it for her. If it wasn't snowing, he'd bike downtown after school tomorrow, buy the bear, and drop it off at the hospital. He didn't have to sign his name on the card. He just wanted her to have it.

THERE WAS SOMETHING
about being in Sun Valley with the altitude and the insanely blue skies that made Zoe feel like a different person. Back in Hankinson the skies had been soupy gray for months. No one there even knew she could snowboard.

Zoe's mom was finally back from France, and they were spending Presidents' Day weekend skiing with this boy Mac and his parents. Mac's parents were movie producers who were friends with Sierra, and they often rented ski chalets near each other. Mac was short and broad, built like a bulldog. Back in California, Zoe and Mac used to fool around when they were bored at their parents' parties. Not much, just groping. Mac was more into weed than anything. He was the kind of guy who smoked before school.

“I have something,” Mac said to her.

They were on his bed. Zoe's long underwear was bunched around her ankles, but her panties were still on and she was fully clothed up top. They'd been snowboarding all morning and had gone to his place to heat up a pizza. After lunch Mac brought her to his room to roll a joint, but they ended up in bed.

“You mean you have a”—Zoe chewed at her thumbnail—“a condom?”

“Yeah,” Mac said, kissing her. His breath smelled like pepperoni.

As he crossed the room to his dresser, she could see his boner poking out from his long underwear. Zoe looked away. She was still a virgin and hadn't thought she'd be having sex anytime soon. She hadn't even kissed anyone in Hankinson yet. Then again, it was another world here. She was a different Zoe.

“Here goes nothing.” Mac sat on the end of the bed and tore the wrapper open.

Zoe tried to swallow, but her mouth was too dry. “I'm not sure I . . . uh . . .” She paused.
Oh god.
What was she even doing here?

“You don't want to?” Mac asked.

Zoe shook her head. She wriggled her long underwear back over her panties.

“That's cool,” Mac said, chucking the condom into the trash. “Want to just smoke?”

Zoe shook her head. “But you can.”

Mac reached for his joint. Zoe pulled the blanket around her chin. Maybe she wasn't a different Zoe here. Maybe there was just one Zoe. Sometimes it all felt so confusing.

Later that night, as Zoe and Sierra soaked in the hot tub, Zoe studied her mom, her blond curls matted against her face, her lids half closed. Did her mom have any idea she'd almost lost her virginity today?

“There's something I want to talk to you about,” her mom said. “Remember what you asked me over the phone a few months ago?”

Zoe swirled her fingers in the steaming water. “Not really.”

“Over Thanksgiving,” Sierra said. “You left me a message.”

Zoe suddenly felt woozy. “You mean about my father?”

“I've thought long and hard about this. You should understand that there are reasons I can't tell you much.”

“Even a name is okay,” Zoe said quietly. She was faint from the heat, but she didn't want to move in case it made her mom stop talking.

“Let's just say . . . it was while I was filming
One Precious
,” her mom said. “Please keep this between you and me. It would be a PR nightmare if it got out.”

Zoe rested her head on the edge of the tub. It was so surreal that one person's PR nightmare was another person's entire existence.