Meet Me Here (5 page)

“All right, get ready for this,” Wayne says, motioning to Sinclair.

The bottle goes airborne, and she misses it completely, rubbing her shoulder and cursing from the kickback. Wayne still cups his hands and lets out his best yell.

“Damn. That
hurt
,” Mallory says, still rubbing her shoulder.

“Nice shot,” I say.

She turns to me, a challenge in her eyes. “You think you can do better?”

Dad taught me to shoot years ago, and Wayne’s twelve gauge isn’t any different from the one in Dad’s gun safe. But I also know Wayne. A couple of shotgun blasts could easily turn into our spending the next seven hours sitting in the back of his truck, drinking beer and listening to his stories. We’d be here until dawn.

“Okay, soldier boy,” Wayne says, holding the gun out to me. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”

“I’m not getting caught shooting a gun in the parking lot of a school,” I say.

Wayne and Sinclair consider the felonious nature of this statement briefly before laying into me. Asking if I need to
go home for some quiet time. Whether my yoga practice is affecting my trigger finger. All that.

“How is that vegan diet?” Wayne asks.

I still haven’t moved when Mallory takes the gun from Wayne and says, “Sinclair, throw another bottle.” And this time it doesn’t get twenty feet from Sinclair’s hand before it explodes, raining glass everywhere.

“Hot damn!” Wayne nearly falls off the back of his truck with excitement. But she’s already jumping off the bed and walking to me, a taunt etched into her face and the shotgun in her hands.

“One shot and nobody will think you’re a punk.”

“You must have me confused with somebody else.”

“Somebody who’s a punk?”

“I think I’ve got a slingshot in the truck!” Sinclair laughs as he says it. I hesitate a second too long.

“I understand if you’re scared,” Mallory yells, for the world to hear. “Especially now that I’ve shown what’s
what
.”

“Hitting one is easy,” I say. “Anybody can do that. You hit two, three in a row? Then maybe I’m impressed.”

Mallory takes the challenge, eyeing me as she lifts the gun to her shoulder. She misses the next three bottles, each
one smashing against the parking lot. At first she doesn’t look at me, just stands there for a second contemplating what she’s going to say next.

“Well, if you don’t shoot, you’re still a punk,” she says, handing the gun to Wayne.

It gets a hallelujah chorus from the idiots as Mallory scans me up and down, like “Let’s see what you can do.” If I don’t shoot, nothing happens. Maybe they give me hell for another fifteen minutes, and probably not even that long. But if I do shoot, if I miss I’ll never hear the end of it.

But I don’t think I’ll miss. Having a stock against my shoulder is like learning to ride a bike in most other families. You walk, you get a little age to you, you learn to shoot. BB guns, a hunting rifle: I’ve shot everything. As I’m going through all of this, I can’t think of a good reason not to take the challenge. And besides, it will be nice to finally win something with Mallory. Even if it took eighteen years to make it happen.

When I stand up, Mallory starts clapping, throwing her hands up in the air like she’s at church. Then she’s in my ear, taunting me, whispered put-downs that are halfhearted at best. I climb into the truck bed, trying not to listen to her or Wayne and Sinclair’s commentary on the
state of my manhood as I reject the shotgun and pick up the .22 leaning against the truck instead.

“Throw three in a row,” I say, checking the sight and getting a feeling for the weight of the gun in my hands. “After I hit the first, throw the second, then the third. Okay?”

“That’s presumptuous,” Mallory says, but I ignore her.

When I nod to Sinclair, everything stops moving for a second. The first bottle is in the air, and all I can hear is myself breathing as I pull the trigger. The second, the third: all of them are taken from the sky one after another. When I drop the barrel of the gun, everyone’s silent for a second.

I smile as Mallory shakes her head, refusing to look at me.

“Well, at least I can rest easy knowing America’s going to be safe,” Wayne says, taking the gun and slapping me on the shoulder. “When do you leave, man?”

“Tomorrow,” I say.

“Oh, shit! Tomorrow? Like,
tomorrow
tomorrow?”

“I’ll be gone before the sun even comes up,” I say.

“See, Sinclair, that’s what I’m trying to tell you,” Wayne says. “This right here is a man with plans. He’s going to
war
, son.”

“I’m not going to war,” I say. Wayne and Sinclair both ignore me.

“You know I’m waiting on NASCAR to call,” Sinclair says, adjusting his ball cap. “And just because you graduate from high school doesn’t mean you’re ready to go out and get a job. And
that’s
why I’m staying with my parents this year. It’s called a gap year, idiot.”

Wayne stares at him for a long minute. “Sitting around your mom’s basement getting high and playing Madden isn’t a gap year. Hell, it’s your senior year—just no school.”

“Okay, fair enough,” Sinclair says. “But it’s not like I won’t be working. I got a job up at Wagner Tires this summer.”

“Yeah, yeah, enough with your
gap year
.” Wayne turns to me. “So what are we doing?”

“Nothing,” I say.

“Yeah, haven’t you heard? He’s
leaving in the morning
,” Mallory deadpans.

“It’s graduation night,” Wayne says. “And hell if I’m not drinking a beer with you before you go. Sinclair, where’s the next party?”

Sinclair pulls out a piece of paper from his back pocket, and before he can say anything, Mallory stops him.

“What is that?”

“List of all the graduation parties,” Sinclair says. “Some are actually probably more get-togethers, but that’s semantics. Anyway, we could go up to the quarry. There’s some people going up there tonight.”

Mallory throws her arm around Sinclair, both of them staring at me and nodding. “I love these guys. We’re in.”

“Hell, yes,” Wayne says, shouldering the .22. “We’re about two moments away from jail right now, and we need a good influence. Somebody with moral fiber to put us on the right path.”

“Oh, that’s Thomas,” Mallory says. “Full of moral fiber.”

“I don’t want to go to a party,” I say.

“It’s not a party,” Mallory says. “It’s a
get-together
. Weren’t you listening?”

“Yeah, Sin’s really particular about that shit, too.”

Sinclair sighs, putting the list back in his pocket. “A party’s bigger, there’s an expectation that you stay longer. See more people. A get-together is casual.”

“Hear that? Sounds
exactly
like what you need tonight,” Mallory says. For a second her face softens and she raises her eyebrows a half inch. “You know?”

Wayne doesn’t give me a chance to answer. He slaps me on the shoulder and says, “We’re going to the quarry, end of story. You’re officially occupied, Bennett. Sin, get the truck.”

And just like that, we’re four.

The quarry is for drinking beer, building a fire with friends. It’s whooping and hollering and stumbling into the dark corners with your boyfriend or girlfriend. And then somebody decides to jump into the lake fifty feet below and everybody packs it up until the next weekend. I’ve done this dozens of times by now and more than a few with Wayne and Sinclair. But never with Mallory.

Maybe that’s why it’s so quiet in the truck. I’m following Wayne to the quarry, trying to conjure up the magic of the Grover and, to a smaller extent, the parking lot. In those moments I don’t think about Jake or the army. I don’t think about how I’ve missed Mom’s curfew now or
how every minute I spend out with Mallory is a minute I’m not sleeping in preparation for the trip.

“Look at you,” Mallory says. “Like you’re going to a funeral.”

Her phone rings, and she silences it without looking. Ahead of us Wayne turns onto a gravel road, the dark trees camouflaging everything except the twin brake lights that flash on and off as he navigates the narrow road.

“We should’ve come up here before this,” she says. “And how did we not put it in the ‘Book of Adventures’?”

I laugh. “I’m pretty sure drinking beer around a campfire wasn’t high on our priorities back then. But yeah, I know.”

We park behind Wayne, the small dirt clearing packed full of vehicles. A fire is already burning. Shadows crawl up and down the rock walls. This isn’t a get-together. It’s a party and a big one.

I take a few breaths, readying myself for what’s coming. People will ask about tomorrow, and I’ll smile, tell them I can’t wait to get that uniform on. Everybody around this fire has known me since we were kids, and I’ve already been lying to them without pause for months. But the prospect of doing it even one more time makes my stomach drop.

Mallory’s phone goes off, followed by mine: Mom. I hesitate before putting my phone in the cup holder. Outside, the group greets Wayne’s arrival with a cheer, a few of them standing up and slapping him on the shoulder. He and Sinclair grab a beer and raise them in the air.

“You okay?” Mallory asks.

“Yeah, I’m good.”

“Okay, because I need some more memories,” Mallory says, pulling the sign out.

“What are you doing?” But she’s already out of the truck, holding it above her head and whooping like some kind of deranged cheerleader. People yell because they’re buzzing, but it gets louder and louder as people start to realize exactly what she’s holding. They’re so enamored with the sign nobody notices me walk up.

“Fifteenth floor,
what
?” Mallory says, pulling me toward her. “Luckily I had soldier boy here to keep me safe.”

They pass the sign around the campfire, telling their own stories, the rumors that all share a little piece of truth. When somebody finally asks what was up there, Mallory doesn’t say anything. She turns to me, and at first I don’t realize she wants me to take over, to explain.

“Satanists,” I say, trying to hide my smile when they all stop talking, moving. One of them, Emma West, nods her head knowingly and thrusts her beer to the sky, yelling out, “Satanists!” And then everybody cheers.

Wayne ambles through the group, handing me and Mallory each a beer. When the sign makes its way back to Mallory, I think I’m clear. I’ll be able to sit here like any other guy in our class; the only difference is that I’ll pretend to drink the beer because the last thing I need is to be hung over tomorrow morning. But then Wayne goes into the middle of the circle, clinking his bottle against his belt buckle.

“The United States Army has obviously lowered their standards,” he says to the group. They all laugh. Most of them are going to college; none of their parents want them anywhere near the army, even if the chance of active duty is remote. They don’t want heroes, just happiness.

“But we know all about Thomas Bennett, don’t we? This is the guy who once put deodorant on the outside of his shirt for the sixth-grade choir concert, because he didn’t know how it worked.” Laughter. They want to send me off right. And every word that Wayne speaks gets them going more, which I appreciate. But I also wish he’d just
raise his beer already and stop. Of course he keeps going. “The kid who used to wear camouflage to all the junior high dances, which now that I think about it is pretty genius. Respect, Bennett.”

Wayne walks over to me, wrapping a thick arm around my shoulders. “Raise your beers to Thomas, y’all. May he go and kill a bunch of terrorists!”

As people stand and tilt their beers back in my honor, Mallory leans close and says, “Eloquent and subtle as always.”

The firelight slaps against the walls of the quarry, distorting our shadows until we’re all taller than the trees—giants in the darkness. It’s how I always expected to feel on this night: big enough to take on anything.

Somebody turns on a car stereo and opens the doors. A few people start dancing as the music fills the night. Mallory leans over to me, and at first I think she’s going to ask me to dance. My whole body goes tight.

“Despite everything, I’m glad this is happening.”

“Me, too,” I say.

She nods and stares into the fire, taking short sips from her beer. Eventually she puts it down and sits on one of the empty logs. I sit down next to her as we watch everybody
dance and laugh around the fire. We’re still sitting that way when Daniel walks up, wanting to chat me up. He hoped to sign up for the marines but won’t turn eighteen for another two months, and his parents wouldn’t sign the papers. Then he got into Appalachian State, and last I heard he was going to major in business.

I have to stand to hear him, and Mallory drifts off to another group. As Daniel complains about his parents, I watch Mallory smile at whatever Wayne is saying to her.

“So I bet you’re excited,” he says, sucking the last drops of beer from his bottle before throwing it over the edge of the quarry. “Do you think you’ll go overseas?”

“I don’t know, man. I’ll probably end up in Kansas.”

“Fucking Kansas,” Daniel says.

I keep the conversation going with as few words as possible until Mallory comes up next to me and knocks me with her hip.

“Hey, mind if I steal this guy for a minute?”

“Oh, yeah. Sure. Hey, where’s Will?”

But we’re already turning around and walking away from the fire. She leads me past another group, all of them too interested in their conversation to notice us as we squeeze around them. I follow her up a narrow path,
through the thick woods. Soon I can’t see the fire below us. Mallory continues to climb until we break through the trees to a small collection of boulders. She sits down and pats the rock next to her.

“Will and I come up here,” she says, once I’m sitting down.

“Oh, I don’t want to know about that.”

She shakes her head. “To talk, stupid. Look.” Below us, in the valley, lights pulse on and off like they’re on timers. She points to the brightest cluster and says, “That’s downtown, and over there is your house. You can see the whole town up here.”

The lights seem to move below us, a map of colors that make the city look prettier than it has ever been. The way I always remember Christmas when I was a kid.

“I thought you’d like to see where we grew up before you leave,” Mallory says.

“It’s very . . . peaceful.”

She thinks I’m kidding and hits me in the arm. But I’m not. The sky is more open here—even more than where Wayne and the rest of them are laughing, not fifteen feet below. Above us, the stars fight against the city lights in the distance, seeming to grow brighter with every passing
second until they form a blurry union, indistinguishable from one another.

“Do you think the stars look the same everywhere?” Mallory asks.

I have to think about it. “Sure. I mean, they have to, right?”

“So if you end up over there,” she says carefully, “it’ll be like you’re looking at the stars in North Carolina?”

I nod, but I’ve done this enough to know what comes next, her plea for me to be careful, to choose myself over others—and I stop her.

“I’m not going anywhere overseas. At this point, unless you’re Special Forces or something, it’s back to normal.”

“I just figured you’d volunteer, or something stupid like that.” She pauses. “Are you scared?”

I nearly jump off the rock in surprise. I’m up, walking around the narrow boulder, trying to be calm, cool. But she’s looking at me like I just set myself on fire. Before I decided to leave—to take fear off the table—I would’ve played this so cool. Talked about Jake. About how my family doesn’t know the meaning of
scared
, ha-ha. All “I’ll do everybody proud.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Sorry. I think I’m just nervous.”

More pacing as I try to play it off. A “nothing to see here” smile in full effect. I can’t get off the rock quick enough.

“Hey,
hey
.” She stands up and looks into my eyes. “What did I say?”

“Nothing,” I say. “Really. I’m just tired. You know?”

Can she still tell when I’m lying, see through me as easily as she could when we were kids? Not even the smallest lie was safe then, and I hated it. She stares at me with the same knowing look now, an unblinking focus intent on figuring out exactly what’s happening inside my head.

“We should probably go back down,” I say. “It sounds like everybody’s getting pretty animated.”

“Yeah, sure.” She starts to say something but swallows it. I take a couple of quick breaths and pick my way through the shadows and branches along the narrow trail until I’m standing next to the fire again, its heat oppressive against my skin.

“Where’d you two go?” Sinclair asks, grinning like a fool.

“We were talking,” I say quickly. There’s something in my voice, a strident panic that only gets my heart beating
faster. Mallory kicks a small rock over the edge of the quarry, ignoring the entire exchange.

One of the guys in the group, Steve, whose claim to fame is that he once streaked during a football game, cocks his head to the side and says, “You and Will broke up?”

This time the confidence she uses to explain Will’s absence is gone. “He’s at home.”

“I figured you two would be together tonight, that’s all.” Steve cuts his eyes to me, and I suddenly remember how else I know Steve Chapman. He sat with Will in the one class we had together, right in front of me. I don’t know if they’re close friends, but the way he’s glaring at me seems proof enough.

“I’m doing my own thing tonight with an old friend,” Mallory says, staring daggers at Steve.

“Okay, okay,” he says. “Turn it down a few. I’m just asking questions.”

Mallory sighs and pulls a bottle from the cooler.

“Can somebody please open this for me?”

Sinclair pulls out his lighter and pops the cap off in one quick motion, handing the bottle to Mallory.

“Look at Sinclair,” Wayne says. “Dude’s a Swiss army knife.”

A few people laugh, and the spotlight fades off Mallory as Sinclair shows them the trick. Mallory seems normal enough, laughing when the conversation dictates and playing the part of the happy graduate. But I can tell she’s faking something because I’ve been playing that same part for months.

Hell, I’m playing it now, sitting next to Wayne and nodding as people talk about cars they got for graduation, scholarships others shouldn’t have won. On the outskirts of the group I catch Steve staring at me like he’s checking up on a younger brother. When his phone rings and he stands up, cupping his hand over his ear so he can hear, Mallory walks over to me.

“We should probably go,” she says, only to me.

“All right. Whenever you want to leave.”

“Right now.”

She tries to jump over the log I’m sitting on, accidentally kicking a beer bottle into the fire. Wayne gives a good-natured yell, but Mallory ignores him, again saying that we really need to go. But it’s become impossible for me to leave anywhere lately without getting a couple of hugs and more than a few hand slaps. Mallory stands impatiently to the side as it happens.
When the last person says good-bye, she nearly drags me away from the fire.

“All right, everybody,” Mallory yells over her shoulder. “Time for the Mallory show to go back on the road.”

I grab her arm before she can get in the truck. When she turns around, she looks ready to get in the driver’s seat and take her chances jumping the lip of the quarry.

“Steve called Will, right?” I ask.

“Yeah,” she says. “And Will’s probably on his way up to the quarry now. I really don’t want to deal with all of that, so can we please leave?”

On cue, Steve rushes out of the darkness, putting his phone in his pocket. “Where the hell are you guys going?”

It’s the way he says it. Like he wants me to knock him out.

“Go back to the party,” I say. “Seriously. This isn’t what you think it is.”

“I know you talked to him,” Mallory says, giving him a slanted look. It seems to spook Steve, who takes a step back.

“Yeah. So?”

“It’s none of his business what I’m doing tonight,” she says.

“Well, from what I just heard, Will might disagree with that.”

They stand there, dogs readying to fight. Then Mallory smiles and goes for the throat. “You’re a pretty good friend for a guy Will hasn’t talked about in two years.”

Steve takes another step back, as if her words were fists. But then he smiles, collecting himself. “Hey, I’m not the one who’s whoring around with some asshole I just met.”

And then for extra measure he says, “Slut.”

I go for him, but Mallory gets in front of me, yelling my name.

“No, let him go,” Steve says. “Let’s see which one of you is the bigger bitch.”

“Thomas, please. Let’s go.”

As she’s saying it, Wayne and the rest of the group gather in a half circle around us. Mallory says my name one more time, soft but insistent. Then: “Don’t.”

When I back down, Steve says, “I always knew you were a coward.”

Mallory whips around. “Would you please shut up?”

“I’m trying to help my friend,” Steve says. “But maybe I’ll call him back and tell him exactly what kind of a person he plans on—”