Sliding On The Edge (13 page)

“
Hold up,” he
says.

I stop a few feet away and face him.
“Guess you don’t hear too well. I told you—”

Casey steps toward me. “I hear better
than you think. I hear a city freak wise ass trying to out shout a
cornered kid. If you can’t hate it, you’re afraid of it. How close
am I?”

Our eyes lock onto each other. The
end-of-lunch bell rings, and kids pour around us like we’re
boulders in a river current.

“
I’ll meet you after school
today. We got business to take care of.” He pushes past me,
brushing my shoulder with his hand.

“
Business? What’s that
supposed—?” He’s already down the hall. I shiver, but I’m not
getting my old shakes. This is totally different.

Chapter 25

Shawna

That afternoon at the end of class, I
jump from my seat before the bell stops and push out of the door
ahead of students who sit in the front of the room. I run to the
exit and take the steps two at a time.

I already have one shrink in
my future and don’t want Casey, the wanna-be shrink, coming down on
my head about the two sides of me he hears whenever I talk to him.
The air is warm. A breeze whips dried leaves into little tornados
across the lawn, and I think about what winter might be like in
Sweet River. That reminds me, Kay’s talking about more
shopping.
Gawd!
And the word
parka
crept into the conversation, so I already see
myself wadded up in an Eskimo suit.

“
Escaping?”

I don’t have to turn around. I know
Casey’s voice. “I have to meet Kay.” I try to look busy, searching
for Kay’s truck.

“
I told her I’d pick you up
and bring you home today. Hop in.”

It has to be a conspiracy, Sweet River
against Shawna. “Why? And who do you think you are,
anyway?”

“
The guy with the wheels
who’s going to get you the six miles to Kay’s ranch.”

He wouldn’t look so smug if I hauled
off and socked him in the jaw, something I consider while gritting
my teeth to keep from telling him to get lost. But six miles is one
hell of a hike. I swing my backpack off my shoulder and walk to the
curb. He stands next to his black Chevy pickup and holds open the
passenger door. His truck looks a lot better than Kay’s. It’s clean
inside and out, and the upholstery doesn’t look like a cat has
shredded it.

With his free hand, he ushers me
inside and closes the door. When he climbs in the driver seat and
starts the engine, he looks at me.

“
What?”

“
Seat belt.”

Does every driver in this
place follow DMV seat-belt rules one hundred percent of the
time?
I pull the belt around myself and
shove the buckle into the clasp.

When I look out, The Troll
is on the lawn, watching. I close my eyes as we sweep past. But I
think she waves as we go by.
Is she dim?
Or is she like a dog that always noses people who hate dogs? What
do I have to do to keep her and her stench away from me?

Once in the cab, Casey doesn’t say
anything. And I’m so used to not talking when Kay comes to pick me
up that I don’t even notice. I do notice that he doesn’t take the
turnoff to the ranch, and instead drives into Sweet River, where he
pulls up in front of Rural Supply and gets out

“
Come on.” He opens the
passenger door and waits for me to climb down.

“
Why are we going in
here?”

“
I told you, business. Do
you have some money?” He walks inside the store and leaves me
standing by the truck.

“
Money?” I follow him into
the store. He’s at the counter, talking to the guy Kay says owns
the place.
Max? Moe? Something with an
M.

“
Shawna.” Casey calls. “You
know Max, right?”

I nod.

“
He has your bill ready. You
got twenty on you?”

What’s he talking about? I
narrow my eyes, knowing something is coming down and I’m not going
to like it.
Take it head on. Look like you
know what this is about
. I walk to the
counter and open my backpack. I’ve tucked Kenny’s generous salary,
all of twenty a week, into the outside pocket. I pull it out and
drop it on the counter.

Max gives me fifteen cents in change,
writes on a piece of paper, and shoves it across to me, saying,
“Account settled. Next time I’d appreciate your paying when you
take the merchandise.”

I don’t look at him or the paper, but
I fold it in half and stuff it into my backpack, along with my
change.

“
I’m sure she’ll do that.
Right, Shawna?”

I swing my backpack over one shoulder
and pretend I didn’t hear.

“
Bye, Max. See you next week
when I pick up Kay’s order,” Casey says. Then he puts his hand at
my back and pushes me out the door. “Come on, Shawna, I’ll buy you
a Coke now that you’re down to your last fifteen cents!”

I can’t believe it. He’s laughing at
me.

“
I don’t drink Coke.” I
climb into the truck and stare out the side window.

“
Then I’ll buy you a
7-Up.”

“
I don’t—”

“
Then you can watch me
drink!” He steps on the gas a little hard and we squeal away from
Rural Supply.

How did Casey find out
about the vitamins? This is the first time I’ve ever been caught,
and it has to be by a guy named Max in Podunk Sweet River and a
Sunday Boy. I must be slipping.

The café in Sweet River reminds me of
an old movie set. Brick walls and ruffled curtains are the main
decorations. The tables wobble under red-and-white checked cloths,
and when I pull out a chair, flakes of four different paint layers
come off on my hand. Casey orders a Coke and a glass of water with
a lemon slice on the side. When the waitress brings our order, he
squeezes the lemon slice into the water and shoves the glass in
front of me. “I don’t want your sour level to go down.”

Before I can push up from the table,
he has me by my wrist and I can’t move.

“
What is wrong with you?” I
say between gritted teeth.

“
That’s the question I keep
asking you, remember? And I’m not the only one around school who’s
asking it.” He sips his Coke, but holds onto my wrist like a rein
on a runaway horse. “What is wrong with you, Shawna? The first day
I saw you from the barn, I thought you looked like someone I’d like
to know. I’ve tried to talk to you every time I see you, to let you
know who I am. And you . . . you’re plain nasty in
return.”

“
It’s my middle name. Now do
you mind letting the blood back into my hand?”

He lets go and sits back, staring at
me. “Okay. I’m finished.”

He goes to the cash register and pays
the check. Without looking back, he opens the door and walks out to
his truck. He starts the engine and waits until I get in and click
my seat belt in place, but he never looks at me or speaks until we
reach Kay’s.

“
End of the line,” he says,
when he pulls to a stop at the house.

I climb out and hold the
door open. “End of the line,” I repeat. “Are you a prophet
and
a psychologist,
Casey?”

“
I’m neither one, but I’ll
tell you this, if you lift something from Max’s again, he’ll go to
the cops. Max has his eye on you, and I’m not running interference
for you again.”

I glance toward the barn, where Kay is
working a horse on a line in the open arena.

“
Kay doesn’t know,” he says,
and before I can close the door on the truck, he reaches across and
slams it. He does a one-eighty in the driveway and tears down the
rutted road, a brown comet trailing behind.

Chapter 26

Shawna

Sunday, again!
Arrrg!
In Sweet River there are more
Sundays than any other day of the week, I swear. I decide that
instead of staying at the ranch to watch the manure pile heat up,
I’ll hitch a ride into Sweet River and do a little exploring on my
own. It’s like decades since I’ve had some time without Kay or
Kenny riding herd on me.

See? You’re even starting to think
like them, Shawna

I get up early before Kenny comes to
the house and before Kay makes her coffee. I say adios to Buster,
who needs a few rocks thrown his way before he gets the picture and
turns around. Then I walk down to the main road. I no sooner stick
out my thumb than a truck pulls to a stop and the man hooks his
thumb at me to jump in. Cool.

“
Where you off to, honey?”
he asks.

“
Just to town for a few
hours.” I use the voice that always distracted tourists while Mom
lifted their wallets.

“
Where d’ya
live?”

“
Down there.” I point toward
Kay’s. “You know Kay Stone?”

“
No. Can’t recall that
name,” he says.

Everybody for twenty miles
knows my grandmother, so right here I think,
you should get out, now.
But do I?
No. It’s Sunday, a day that’s longer than a freight train. I’ve got
nothing but escape on my mind.

We pull into Sweet River, and the man
asks me to join him for coffee.

“
I’m buying, sweetheart. You
can’t pass up a free cup of java, right?”

To give myself a little credit for not
being entirely loopy, I check inside the café and see four people
inside. I figure there’s safety in numbers. I shrug.
“Sure.”

So by nine o’clock, I’m sitting at one
of the wobbly tables, my elbows on red-and-white checkered plastic,
sipping coffee. He orders waffles, but I stick with coffee and turn
down food.

“
So, Shawna, what’s a pretty
young thing such as yourself doing in Sweet River?” The waitress
brings his waffles and he buries them under butter pats and an inch
of syrup. He cuts off big chunks of the fried dough and stuffs them
into his mouth. When he chews he smacks his lips and syrup seeps
out and slides down his chin.

I make up a story. “I’m visiting my
grandmother while my mother tours Europe in a Shakespearean play.”
His eyes glaze a bit on the Shakespearean reference, and I smile.I
stop smiling when I feel his hand slide up my knee.

I’m on my feet so fast that the people
sitting near us jump and look under their tables to see if
something is crawling across the floor.

“
Oh, come on. Sit down,” the
man says, licking his lips and slugging down the last of his
coffee. “I was just being friendly.”

“
I don’t do friendly,” I
say. I’m at the door and pulling it open. The glass panes rattle
when I shut it behind me, and my insides rattle the same
way.

Stupid!
Stupid
! I clench my fists and take a deep
breath. Sweet River has a population of eight hundred and
sixty-one. Eight hundred and fifty-nine people are like Kay and
Kenny, but do I hitch a ride into town with any of them? Noooo. I
get the one pervert in town.

In Las Vegas, I’m a cat. I can slink
along the wall so nobody sees me if I don’t want them to, and I
never get caught by some skank jumping out of the alley and
grabbing me like I always read about in the newspapers. Nobody’s
going to stuff me into the trunk of a car! But what just happened
is pathetic. Sweet River is acting like tenderizer. I’m getting
soft—Sweet River soft.

I burn where he touched me, five fat
fingers spread across my knee and I have to get it off. I pull up
my jeans, spit into my hand and rub on the place, but it’s a brand
and it’s getting hotter. I’m freaking. The shakes are bubbling to
the surface.

I look both ways along the main
street. A drugstore, a market, a hardware line up to my left. The
Sweet River barbershop, a bank, and the fire station are on my
right, and if I go in that direction, I’ll wind up on the highway
back to Kay’s. Straight across the street is a grassy area with a
plastic slide and a couple of rusty swings. A narrow street circles
up from the main one and winds up the hill behind the park, so I
cross over and climb the hill, thinking that at least I can get out
of the old pervert’s line of sight.

I reach the top of the first turn in
the road and look back on the grassy park and across at the café.
His truck is still parked in front.

Still stuffing his fat
face.

I turn and walk up further, until I
can’t see the town anymore. I come to what I guess is the
residential part of Sweet River, but the houses look more like
small rooms, leaning every which way like crooked teeth. They’re
tucked under trees and behind shrubs that nobody’s hacked back
since the last century, so I can only see a door or a window, and
sometimes a corner of a place peeking through branches.

I have to duck where the vines or the
tree limbs dangle low over the road, and I keep tripping on roots
that bulge out of the dirt.

I didn’t plan a
hike!

I should go back down, but I
don’t want to run into old waffle lips again. I’ll give him enough
time to eat the café out of supplies; then I’ll head back to the
highway and hitch a ride to Kay’s. I need water. I have to wash my
knee.
I have to wash the coffee out of my
mouth. I have. . . The shakes. I’ve got ‘em now. Can’t stop. Keep
walking. That usually helps.