Juliet Immortal (13 page)

“What about your mom?” I ask. “She’s let you drink wine since you were sixteen. Didn’t she think—”

“I know, right? You’d think she’d be cool, but she’s completely up Dad’s butt about this Senate thing.” Gemma crosses to the trash can and shoves the bags in with too much force. “She totally wants to move to Washington and socialize with a wider variety of snotty, ass-faced people. She didn’t say
anything
, even when Dad made me go to this rehab group for ‘troubled teens.’ They both know I don’t have a problem, they’re just … assholes.” She rolls her eyes again and flops back into her chair. “So yeah, that’s where I’ve been every Monday and Wednesday morning. And why I stopped picking you up. Sorry.”

“Oh, Gemma. You should have told me.” I’m starting to feel for this girl. With a family like hers, it’s amazing she’s not more of a mess.

“I know.” She shrugs. “It’s just so stupid and I was so mad. I swear, I thought about running away from home and becoming a woman of the night or something just to ruin Dad’s chances of getting elected.” She tips her drink back, emptying the cup, and sets it back on the table with a sigh. “But then … I met Ben, and he made it bearable, you know? He started coming to the group about a month ago. He drove in from Lompoc until his brother made him move.”

The news surprises me. “But Ben doesn’t seem like he’s got a drug problem. Not that you do, but—”

“No, he doesn’t. He just got arrested.”

My eyebrows shoot up. Ben? Arrested?

“He lost his temper and smashed some guy’s face in.”

“What?”

“And broke his nose,” she says casually, as if it’s no big deal. “And knocked out a couple of teeth.”

“What!” I can’t imagine Ben hitting someone, especially hard enough to break a bone. He seems so … gentle.

But what about that first moment in the car? What about the look on his face when Romeo called him his brother?

It’s true. I don’t know him as well as I think. Maybe I’m wrong about him. Maybe it’s Ben’s violence that’s keeping him and Gemma apart, not anything to do with her at all.

“I know that sounds bad, but he’d
never
done anything like that before. It was just a horrible random night. He’s a really decent guy, and I’ve never even seen him angry. At least, not angry like that …” She trails off, goes for a drink, and finds her cup empty. “Can I get more? Do you think your mom will notice?”

“She probably won’t. And if she does …” I shrug.

Gemma smiles as she heads to the fridge. “Aren’t you turning into a rebel? Maybe I can finally convince you to come raid the casks in the barn with me. It’s fun. And I figured out how to turn off the security cameras so we won’t get caught.”

“Maybe,” I say, dying to get back to the real story. “So … are you sure you feel safe? You know, with Ben?”

Gemma spins, wine bottle in hand. “Totally! And you should too. Please, don’t think anything bad about him. This is
why I didn’t want to say anything about how we met until you saw how nice he is.”

“No, I agree, he seems really—”

“He really
is
,” she says, but something in her voice still doesn’t sit well. “I was going to introduce you guys after he settled in with his brother, but we had that dumb fight.” She lifts her right hand, as if to ward off any impending criticism. “But it wasn’t because of him. It’s me.”

“Gemma, it can’t be
all
—”

“No, it is. And I shouldn’t have kissed him this morning. I knew it would piss him off.” She sticks the wine back in the fridge and chucks her plastic cup into the sink, apparently rethinking her second glass of wine. “I don’t even know why I did it,” she says, voice softer. “Sometimes I think I’m crazy, you know? I just can’t stop myself from doing the opposite of what I know I
should
do.” She stares down at her feet, looking so young, so at odds with herself. Ben’s right; Gemma isn’t a bad person, she’s just confusing, just—

A train wreck
.

Romeo’s words float through my mind, making me angry. Gemma might be troubled, but she isn’t a wreck. There’s still hope for her. And for Ben.

“You’re not crazy.”

“No, I probably am.” She crosses her arms and leans against the kitchen counter. “I introduced Ben to my dad last week.”

“That’s not crazy. Why shouldn’t you—”

“Ariel, wake up from happily-ever-after land. My dad had a heart attack, even before he did the background check and found out Ben’s been arrested. It was awful. You know he’s
convinced Mexicans are taking over the ‘real’ America. Remember how he freaked out when they started having translators at parent-teacher night?”

“But doesn’t your dad hire Mexican workers for the vineyards?”

“Of course he does, because he wants cheap labor. But that doesn’t mean he can’t also hate Mexicans living in the United States. Bob is a selfish paradox wrapped in an evil burrito, Ree.” Gemma picks at one of the plumber magnets on the side of the fridge, peeling it off and then smashing it back on again. “I’ve shielded you from his loathsomeness, but I thought you knew that by now. Anyway, as soon as I got back from taking Ben home, Dad told me I couldn’t see him again. And the sick thing is … I
knew
he would. But I brought Ben over anyway.” She turns to me, dark eyes glittering. “I really am crazy.”

“You’re not crazy. Your dad is crazy, and wrong,” I say. “Everyone here was from a different country at some point, and everyone makes mistakes.”

I wish I could take a stronger stand for Ben, but I need to know what really happened first. Why did he break someone’s nose? It’s so strange to imagine him hurting anyone or anything, troubling in a way that goes beyond my usual concern about my soul mates.

“I know,” Gemma says. “But I don’t want to have that fight right now. I’m so close to going to college and getting away from him. And it would be pointless, anyway. Bob never listens or changes his mind. About anything.” She crosses the room to steal the rest of my unfinished milk shake. “You should have seen how I begged him to let me skip his stupid rally Saturday
night. But he didn’t care because
my
life is never going to be as important as
his
life.”

“But what about Ben? He really likes you.” He doesn’t just
like
her, he
loves
her, and Gemma seems more worried about her dad than the boy who’s her soul mate. Ben is Gemma’s One. She has to wake up and fight for him. Now.

“You think?” Gemma swallows, her face pale in the glare of the overhead lights. “But how do I know any guy is worth fighting my family and … everything else for? It’s just scary. You know?”

Her words help me breathe easier. There’s nothing that can strangle the life out of love faster than fear. If she’s this afraid, no wonder she and Ben are having problems. She needs to get past her fear and concentrate on loving him, and I have to help her do it. No matter how much it hurts.

“I
guess
it’s scary, but I bet it’s also amazing. Meeting Ben could be the best thing that ever happened to you.”

“Maybe, maybe not …” Gemma narrows her eyes. “But you can’t be trusted. You’ve only known him for a day and a half. I can’t believe he’s the one who gave you a ride. How crazy is that? And how crazy are
you
for hitchhiking?” She chucks me on the arm. “You’re just lucky Ben stopped instead of some psycho. But then, I guess you were in the car with a psycho already, so …”

“Ben and I had a good talk last night,” I say, trying not to think about how good it was. “I think he’s special. He’d be worth—”

“Okay, fine,” she says, rolling her eyes. “I’ll call him and invite him over to my place after school tomorrow.”

“Great!”

“But I’m not going to tell Dad,” she warns, pointing an accusing finger at me. “We’ll sneak in the back gate after play practice. We can hit the barrels in the barn and celebrate your success as an understudy.”

“We?”

“You’re coming too, my lovely.” Gemma grabs my hand and pulls me into the living room.

“But—”

“No buts. I’ve decided, and you know I’m the boss,” she says, putting an end to the discussion. “Okay, so I’ve got the entire sound track for
West Side Story
with and without vocals. You want to sing with other people first or just go straight into it hard-core?”

“With the voices first.” I watch her plug the phone into the sound system beneath the television, and try to tamp down the anxiety rising in my throat. It’s just a little singing; how horrible can I be?

“Oh, come on, be hard-core, Ree!” Gemma turns back to me with a smile as music swells through the room. “Let’s do it without the voices. You know all the words!”

“I know, but—”

“Sing!”

“But—”

“Sing!”

And so I do. And Gemma laughs, and finally I do too, giggling as my voice fights its way up and down. It cracks when I try to hold a note for too long but finds its way if I keep moving. I could be worse. At least I don’t think I’ll scar the audience for life.

By the time we finish going over some of the choreography and Gemma heads for her car, I’ve decided the night
hasn’t gone too badly. Gemma and Ariel are reconnecting, I’m making headway convincing Gemma to take her relationship with Ben seriously, and I have plans to spend time with both of them tomorrow.

And there are worse ways to spend time than with a friend, fried food, and singing and dancing like a fool. Sometimes it’s easy to forget that fighting for love isn’t all angst and despair and trying not to get killed. Sometimes it’s an amazing job.

And sometimes it’s not
. Later, I lie in the dark, staring at the ceiling, doubt creeping in beneath the rhythm of the rain.

What if Romeo’s right? What if this is your last shift? What if the next time you go to the mist you never come back? Or what if there’s something worse than the mist … something unknown …?

I close my eyes and pull the covers over my head, trying not to worry, determined not to dream.

G
et down, you two! Under the blanket!” Gemma hisses from the front seat as we pull up to the imposing back gate of the Sloop home the next afternoon.

The family compound is so large we can’t even
see
the mansion from here. We’d have to drive miles to get to the house on the hill, through rolling vineyards and stands of fruit trees wilting in the never-ending rain. It’s beginning to feel like the world will be swept away. Or at least Central California.

“Do we really have to do this?” Ben eyes the ratty Navajo blanket Gemma throws into the backseat. “I didn’t hide under a blanket last time.”

I shoot Gemma a questioning look that she avoids. So she
hasn’t told him that she’s been forbidden to see him. I don’t know whether that’s a good sign or bad one.

“Last time we weren’t invading my father’s turf,” she says. “If anyone notices we’ve been in the cellars, I don’t want my dad to find out you two were here this afternoon.”

“A camera records everyone who comes through the gate,” I say, forcing a smile as I lift the edge of the blanket. “Gemma’s dad is kind of crazy about trespassers.”

Ben lifts an eyebrow. “Okay, but if he’s going to get so pissed, then—”

“He won’t get pissed because we won’t get caught,” Gemma says.

“But—”

“Ben, are you going to play super-secret spy nicely? Or am I going to have to pull this car over and show you my ninja moves?”

“Don’t make her show you the ninja moves.” I try to keep the moment light. “They’re scary, and I think my singing has traumatized everyone enough for one day.”

Gemma snorts in agreement.

My voice didn’t improve much during rehearsal this afternoon. Mr. Stark gave away most of my singing lines and urged me to talk my way through my one unavoidable solo. Thankfully, my feet proved nimbler than my tongue. I remembered all the choreography Gemma taught me, and put such passion into the fight scene with Tony that even Hannah agreed I’d make a decent Bernadette. At least for one night.

Of course, Romeo relished the opportunity to stab me with a prop knife and watch me pretend to die on the floor at his feet. Despite last night’s insistence that he wants my love and forgiveness, I didn’t miss the spark in his eye as he thrust his
plastic weapon. A part of him—maybe a large part—still thrills to think of spilling my blood. It’s something I’d be wise to remember next time he comes sniffing around, wanting to “work together.”

“I think you did a great job, Mermaid,” Ben says. “Considering it was your first rehearsal.”

“No, I didn’t. I can’t sing.”

Ben smiles. “You can. Just not as well as you paint.”

I smile back. “Very diplomatic.”

“Maybe Ben should run for Senate instead of my dad. Or maybe he’s as tone-deaf as you are, Ree.”

I poke my head over the seat and stick my tongue out at her, earning a laugh. Gemma reaches over, ruffling my hair. Things have been better between us today. I actually find myself starting to like her. A little.

Too bad that doesn’t make it any easier to imagine Ben spending his life with her. I just want … more for him.

“Now get under the blanket, Benjamin,” Gemma says. “Or you don’t get any wine.”

“I don’t even like wine.”

“You don’t
know
if you like wine. You’ve never had wine.”

“I have, I—”

“Boone’s Farm doesn’t count, Luna. Under the blanket.”

“Gemma, I—”

Gemma makes a low “huuuaaaah” sound that I think is supposed to be a ninja cry and karate-chops the air near Ben’s face.

Ben laughs. “
Dios mio
. Fine, crazy woman.” He rolls his eyes but finally pulls the blanket up. Together we scoot down onto the floor behind the front seats as Gemma pulls up to the wrought-iron gate with the swirled
S
in the center and punches in the family’s entry code.

Beneath the blanket, the air grows warm and filled with the smell of Ben. Even after a long day, he smells amazing. Like the ocean—salty and sweet at the same time—something vaguely food-ish that I can’t put my finger on, and paint. He spent the afternoon finishing up the set while I shadowed Gemma, and didn’t get all the paint off his hands. Specks of brown and white cover his gray T-shirt and freckle his knuckles and forearms.