Rush (25 page)

So once I’m dressed and my hair is dry, I call her. When she doesn’t pick up, I leave a message in between mouthfuls of yogurt and granola.

“Hey, Car. It’s me. I’m mad at you, too. Hanging up on me was a shitty thing to do. Ever heard of
talking
? You want info? Here it is. His name’s Jackson Tate. I did not have plans with him on Sunday. I was upset because I found out this girl I met through . . . kendo”—I planned that explanation in the shower. It’s a lie, but a small one—“died, so I went running and he was running, so we ran together and he happened to be there when I had a mini meltdown. For about thirty seconds, he stopped being an asshole and gave me a hug till I got my shit together.” But that’s just it. Jackson isn’t an asshole. Well, not all the time. He’s different than I thought he was at first.

I rush on with my explanation, “I left him at the park and ran home to find Luka waiting for me. Unexpectedly. We did not have plans that I failed to share with you. And since he was still there when you pulled up, there was no chance to call you and dissect details. End of story.”

I pause, trying to climb inside Carly’s head and offer something that will make her smile and forgive me. Remembering what she said to Kelley and Dee on Friday, I decide on, “But Jackson’s hot.” He is, but he’s more than that. Much more than he originally let me see. “And his guns ought to be licensed.” I close my eyes, remembering that it isn’t just his guns that are beautifully sculpted. His abs, his chest, he’s like a work of art. “And, um, I guess Luka’s hot, too. See you in English.”

I put my bowl in the dishwasher, then freeze as I stare at the beer bottle on the counter. Just one. That’s good, right? I think that’s good. After a second, I reach for it and drag it closer.

“Just one,” Dad says from behind me, his voice too cheerful.

“So I see.” I glance over my shoulder at him. His hair’s wet from the shower. He’s freshly shaved. And he’s smiling at me. Still, something feels off, but I can’t quite pin down what it is. I grab the empty bottle, stow it in the box under the sink, and wipe the counter clean.

“Counter wasn’t dirty,” Dad says.

I swallow and turn to face him. “I know. It’s a habit.”

“You can’t always control everything, Miki.” He reaches for me and takes my hand. He doesn’t bring up last night’s nightmare, but I figure that’s part of what he’s talking about.

“Lately, I feel like I can’t control
anything
. Not even in my sleep.” I regret the admission the second I make it. Tears sting my eyes. I’m not good at this, at talking to him, at letting my emotions out when I’m with him. With anyone. I feel like if I open even a tiny crack, they’ll all come pouring out, and I’ll be broken and out of control.

I remember the way I lost it with Jackson in the park and again with Luka on the driveway when we came back from the mission and I started laughing like a hyena. That scares me. I can’t be that girl. I need my life to be like an abacus, all my beads in neat rows.

“No one can control what they see in their sleep,” Dad says. “Is this about that boy?”

Depends on which boy he’s asking about. I sigh. “No.”

“Did you and Carly have a fight?” Dad’s voice is gentle. It’s his daddy voice, the one that reminds me of when I was small and he’d pick me up if I fell and stick a bandage on my scraped knee. He doesn’t use that voice often anymore. Now he’s Dad instead of Daddy. I guess that’s what happens when you grow up.

My gaze shoots to his. He’s so clueless sometimes, and others, he sees way too much. “Yeah, we had a fight. How did you know?”

“Yogurt and granola for one. And two days in a row,” he says with a nod toward the dishwasher. He must have seen me put my bowl away. “I can’t remember the last time you ate breakfast alone on a school day.”

It’s true. Carly’s usually here long before now. Half the time she’s the one setting out breakfast while I finish up in the shower after my run.

Speaking of
one
. . .

“So you . . . um . . . you only had one beer? You’re cutting down?” I stumble over the questions, but since Dad opened the door to a discussion about his drinking, something he’s never done before, I want to try and get him to talk. I’ve done some reading on the internet and I even went to a couple of Alateen meetings a few months ago. If I can just get Dad to talk to me, maybe I can get him to go to a meeting. . . .

“Miki,” he says, still holding my hand. “I don’t have a problem. I just like to have a beer now and again. Lots of people have a drink after work to unwind. My job gets to me sometimes. It’s stressful. Especially now, with the economy . . .”

I know that. Dad works in a bank, in mortgages. Not a happy, happy place.

He focuses his gaze on some unseen spot on the wall somewhere over my shoulder; he won’t meet my eyes. “I don’t have a problem. It’s all under control. I’m not one of those after-school specials, passed out on the couch, with three empty bottles of gin on the floor.”

That’s when I’m certain that something’s off.
Three empty bottles
. On instinct, I pull my hand from Dad’s, yank open the fridge, and count the bottles on the door. He makes an impatient noise but I ignore him, grab the box of empties from under the sink, and count the bottles there.

Anger and pain crush me.

Dad and I, we’re mostly honest but sometimes not. And this time, it’s definitely not.

“One on the counter,” I choke out. “And three more you put in the box, hoping I wouldn’t notice. Why leave one out at all? Why lie to me? Or why not just leave them all out and ignore my worry like you have been for ages?”

“Four beers over an evening is not a lot for a grown man.”

“A grown man shouldn’t lie about it to his teenage daughter! Who’s the adult here?” I take a deep breath, and then continue in a more even tone.
Catch more flies with honey
. “You say you won’t drink, and then I come down and find the bottles on the counter. Instead of going to your fly tying group, you stay home alone—”

“I go,” he interrupts me.

“You haven’t been in months. You stay home and drink. Alone. Now you planned some bizarre trick to make me think you drank less than you actually did. Why would you even do that? That’s just”—I hold my hands out to the sides, palms up, and shake my head—“weird. You know it’s causing problems between us, and you drink anyway. When Mom was alive, you never had more than a couple of beers a week. Now you have at least a couple every night.”

His eyes narrow. “You sound like you’re running through a checklist.” I am. I read it on a site about alcohol abuse, but I don’t think this is the moment to tell him that. “A couple of beers over an evening is not a lot for a grown man,” he repeats.

“You keep saying that! Are you trying to convince me, or yourself? It isn’t about the exact number. It’s about the fact that you have them
every
night, that even when you say you won’t, you end up opening a bottle or three or six and draining them. You have a problem. Please, Dad, please—” I swallow and shake my head, trying desperately not to cry.

Dad. Carly. The game. The shells. Being forced to kill or be killed.

Jackson. For all the answers he gave me, I still have so many questions.

My whole world is falling into tiny little broken pieces and I don’t know how to put it back together, how to fix it. How to control this out-of-control spin.

Dad’s jaw is set, his nostrils pinched, his eyes narrow. “We are not talking about this. We were talking about you and Carly.”

“No, we weren’t. We weren’t really
talking
at all, just exchanging words.”

His head rears back like I’ve hit him.

He glares at me and finally says, “Teenagers,” before he stalks out of the kitchen.

“I’m not the problem here,” I call after him. The only answer I get is the sound of the front door closing behind him. Not slamming. Closing. With a neat, precise click.

And he tells me I can’t always be in control. I roll my eyes.

I’m glad he’s gone.

I’m furious that he’s gone.

I feel broken and afraid and responsible even though the fight wasn’t one-sided.

As I throw together a lunch, my phone lights up with yet another text. I haven’t answered any of the dozens from before, and I can’t ignore them any longer, so I text them all back saying I’ll see them in school and we’ll talk then. I grab my lunch and I’m on my way out the door when Carly finally calls me back.

“So Jackson Tate is his name? Love it. And he’s an asshole? Really? Maybe he’s just misunderstood,” Carly says, not even bothering to say
hi
first. “I’m sure he’s incredibly nice. Aren’t all guys who look like that incredibly nice?”

I huff out a short laugh, so glad to hear her voice even if she still sounds sort of pissed. “Stereotype much?”

Now it’s Carly’s turn to laugh, but there’s a brittle edge to it. She hasn’t forgiven me, but she’s willing to pretend. That’s a step in the right direction. I haven’t forgiven her, either. “Well, Luka’s nice, and he’s smokin’ hot.”

“Luka’s nice,” I agree, making no comment about his heat level, just in case my suspicions are true and Carly actually wants him for herself.

“Think Mr. Shomper will show a movie today?” Carly leaps to the next topic. “I didn’t read the chapter.”

I groan.
Lord of the Flies
. With everything going on, I completely forgot. “Neither did I.”

“What? Really?” She sounds appalled. Which doesn’t surprise me. I’m the homework queen. I never forget an assignment. Usually, I have them completed days in advance. Her voice softens. “You must have been really upset about that girl.”

“I was. I am. And I was upset about other stuff, too.” I close my eyes, willing her to take the olive branch.

“What was her name?”

My lips part. I hesitate, then offer, “Richelle.” No last name. What Carly doesn’t know can’t hurt her.

“How’d she die?”

She was murdered by aliens while she fought for humanity. “She saved her neighbor’s son and then she fell off a roof.” My voice catches.

“I’m sorry.” She isn’t just talking about Richelle’s death. She’s talking about our fight.

Part of me wants to hang on to my hurt, to tell her how deep the pain of her turning on me like that was, especially when she’s the one always trying to appease and placate, always willing to hear the other side of the story, but when I needed it, she didn’t offer that courtesy to me. But I don’t want to keep fighting with her. “I’m sorry, too,” I say.

“Okay.” The tone of her voice makes my heart sink. She’s talking the talk but not walking the walk. It’s not okay. I could hear her hesitation. I press my fist against my forehead. I can’t do this right now, so I pretend I don’t hear the strain behind the word and tell her I’ll see her soon.

A few minutes later, I’m at school. I jog up the stairs to the second floor and head to the last room at the end of the hall.

English is the only class I have with Carly, Kelley, and Dee. I walk in feeling wary. The problem is, our fight wasn’t private. Their texts were a not-so-subtle hunt for deets, so I know Carly talked to Dee, Kelley, Sarah, Emily, and who knows who else. Despite our mutual apologies, I’m still hurt and a little pissed, but a part of me gets it. From Carly’s point of view, the facts are the facts. She knows what she thinks she saw, and I can’t exactly tell her the whole story to fill in the parts she’s missing.

Still, her rejection is like a knife in my back. Just because she pulled the knife out doesn’t mean the wound isn’t aching.

I slide into my usual seat, back of the classroom, beside Carly, behind Dee. Kelley’s in front of Carly. I’m more of a front-of-the-room kind of girl, but since this is the only class I have with all of them, I sit where they sit. Right now, I’m tempted to put in my earbuds, stay quiet, and ignore Dee’s and Kelley’s questioning looks. But that’s the coward’s way out.

Carly stares at me for what feels like an hour. Then she offers a small smile. “We’re discussing costumes.”

It takes me a second to catch up and realize she’s talking about the Halloween dance.

“Are you in or out?” she asks.

“Ummm . . .” I’m hesitant to commit until I hear what she has in mind.

“I’m going as mustard, Dee’s gonna be ketchup, and Kelley’s relish. We came up with it last night.”

The fact that they decided without me and I’m the last to know sort of smarts.

“What are you planning to make the bottles out of?” I ask, surprised that they’re going this route. All the other costumes they’d been considering involved very high heels and very short skirts.

Carly offers a cat-got-the-cream smile. “No bottles. Too bulky. We’re thinking spandex. Mine’ll be yellow. Dee’s will be red.”

“And Kelley’s will be green.” I get the picture. “I’m not sure people will know exactly what you’re dressed as. Colored spandex doesn’t exactly scream condiments, you know? Are you all going to wear pop-top lids on your heads?” The second I say it, I feel a wave of unease, the memory of how Jackson popped the shell’s skull like the lid of a shampoo bottle freaking me out a little.

Carly laughs, and I force myself to let go of the memory. “Maybe,” she says. “But I’m thinking colored wigs to match the spandex. And maybe little labels drawn on our tummies or something. So . . .” She lifts a brow. “You in or out?”

A minute ago I was upset that they hadn’t invited me to join in. Now, I’m trying to think of a graceful way to decline. Before I can come up with something, Carly says, “No . . . wait . . . there’s three of us and, well, mustard, ketchup, and relish? That’s kind of a trio thing. Guess you’re on your own.”

“Guess so.” I duck my head and reach into my bag for my copy of
Lord of the Flies
, hiding my expression. By the time I lift my head again, I have my hurt hidden. I actually feel insulted and slighted and pissed that my friends made this plan without me. How’s that for confusion? I don’t know whether I’m upset that I’m upset, or glad that I’m upset because I’m feeling something more than the usual anger or pain. I can’t help it. I laugh. My friends all look at me like I’ve grown a second head.

“It’s all good,” I say. The truth is, wearing skintight, reveal-all, red, yellow, or green spandex with a matching wig or a pop-top lid on my head isn’t my idea of fun. Inspiration hits. “I might go as a ninja.” If I go at all. Dress all in black—or if I wear my kendo outfit, navy blue—wear a mask, and strap my wooden kendo practice sword across my back. That could work. I catch Carly’s eye and lower my voice. “Oh, and Carly? Don’t do the bitch thing. Either we’re okay or we’re not.”