The Beresfords (14 page)

For the longest time they kissed. Hungrily, like the Tasmanian Devil devouring Bugs Bunny’s Wild Turkey Surprise. And the sounds they made weren’t that different from his: moans and
mmmms
and slobbers.

I didn’t want to look. I couldn’t tear my eyes away. Their hands were all over each other. Eric ripped off what was left of Rachel’s top and I was astonished to see not one of the modest, flesh-colored Sears bras Aunt Terri bought all of us, but rather one of those red
Maidenform
Sweet Nothings from the ads that made Aunt Terri slam magazines shut.

“
Mmm
mmm
mmm
,” went Rachel. “We can’t do this here. This time we might get caught. Someone will hear us or find us.”

“They’re all watching your all-star boyfriend,” Eric grunted, his mouth against her neck. “God, you’re good. Tell me, how do you like this?”

I didn’t wait to see what “this” was. I buried my face in my knees. Pressing my hands against my ears, I waited for it all to be over.

“Have you seen Rachel?”

Praying that guilt wouldn’t be written all over me, I looked up from counting the till.

“I haven’t—I haven’t seen her here, Greg,” I said.

“She disappeared during the baseball clinic and went who knows where. I mean, I can understand her getting bored while I helped kids with their fastballs, but I thought she’d be here.”

I didn’t have an answer. I was trying to think about absolutely anything other than what I witnessed a half hour ago. After a moment, Greg sighed. “Maybe she’ll turn up.”

“Yes.”

He kicked off his Topsiders and threw his t-shirt behind me, preparatory to climbing the steps to the dunk tank. A mixed crowd of teenage girls and admiring Little Leaguers gathered to watch the dejected Adonis, and I thought it would serve Rachel right if some other adoring girl marched off with him.

Don’t think about Rachel, I told myself. Don’t think about Rachel and Eric Grant and—

“Have you seen Rachel?” This time it was Julie. Red in the face and cranky. “I don’t know why I have to do all the work while she has all the fun. I only just now got away from Aunt Terri—that slave-driver! It’s fine for you to spend the day like this, Frannie—you’re still at the junior high, and there’s no one here you want to hang out with. But me—! I don’t know how Rachel weasels her way out of these things. She told Aunt Terri it was because she was hanging out with Greg and then she’s not even with him.”

“I don’t know where Rachel is,” I said. I didn’t. When she and Eric finished their business, they gathered Rachel’s shreds of clothing, brushing the dirt and pine needles from themselves, while they planned how on earth they were going to explain
this
. I waited until I couldn’t hear them anymore before I unwound myself and took off in the opposite direction, taking the long way around the football field.

“Then what about Tom and Eric?” Julie persisted.

I shook my head.

“Jeez, Frannie. A lot of help you are.” Julie made way for the line of paying customers, going to lean against the side of the dunk tank, arms crossed over her chest sulkily.

Greg remained dry for quite a while. The girls would giggle and clutch each other before tossing harmless lobs that went nowhere near the target. The little boys would hurl the ball their thirty-mile-per-hour best while Greg gave tips, but only one managed to hit the bulls-eye, and then not hard enough to knock the arm back. I took the money, I made change, I handed each person three baseballs, I collected the baseballs, I started over. And all the while I was thinking about sex. The more I tried not to think about it, the more I thought about it. The topic was off-limits with the Beresfords. Uncle Paul even turned the channel on nature documentaries if things hit too close to home. Whether Tom should have a note excusing him from high school health class had been the subject of heated debate some years ago. He was eventually allowed to take it, but not before Uncle Paul sat him down for a behind-closed-doors discussion from which they
both emerged looking mortified. Aunt Terri handled Rachel’s and Julie’s
talkings
-to when the time came, with similar results, but I had yet been spared. No one seemed to have thought that, though I would only be entering the eighth grade, in age I was ripe for The Talk.

As it was, I had to sort out on my own what I overheard that afternoon. My one stolen glance had been hasty, guilty, and revealed not much more than a muddle of arms and legs and rumpled clothing and Eric’s hand tangled in Rachel’s hair. The sounds were harder to forget. But they triggered memories: Mom telling me to go play outside or watch TV while she and her friend “had a talk.” Some talk.

I squirmed, bumping the till and sending quarters rolling across the booth counter. Crouching to collect them, I pursued the wayward coins under my bench and into the pavement cracks. I was still on my knees when there was a tremendous splash and a squeal went up from the onlookers. Greg had suffered his first dunking. Coach Adams looked smug. “I told you to watch out for my change-up.” Julie also received a drenching from her proximity to the tank, and it didn’t improve her mood.

“Look at me!” she complained, plucking at her t-shirt where it clung to her. “I can’t believe you didn’t warn me.”

“No one had dunked him yet,” I said.

“Like that meant no one ever would?”

I didn’t see how this was my fault. “It
is
a dunk tank, after all.”

“Forget it. Hand me that towel.”

“But it’s for Greg after he’s done.”

“Oh, please. He’s a guy. He can just walk around with his shirt off till he’s dry.”

“Which is clearly not an option for you,” said a new voice. Julie and I turned to find Eric Grant with his elbows resting on the booth counter, a lazy smile on his face and his dark eyes trained on Julie’s now-transparent t-shirt. He was alone.

Thank heavens no one was looking at me because every ounce of blood in my body rushed into my face and ears and neck. Julie, too, froze for an instant, her hand halted mid-pluck. Then she said coldly, “Where have you been?”

“Around and about. Looking for you.”

My mouth popped open.

“You guys all knew where I was,” she said. “My aunt made me work that booth.”

“Well, yeah. So we figured we’d watch Mr. All-Star’s pitching clinic. We kept hoping you’d join us.”

She thawed the tiniest bit. “Was it fun?”

“Could’ve been
funner
.” He leaned in. “I know someone who could’ve made it
funner
.”

The charm was working. Julie gave a half-smile. “Where’d everyone else go now? Tom and—and Rachel?”

“Tom ran into Steve and Dave, I think. Rachel—she said something about buying a Warm Springs High Athletics t-shirt. You know—show her support. Looks like you could use a new shirt yourself.”

Without even blushing, Julie plucked her shirt loose one more time and let it re-mold to her chest. “This one’s fine. What are you—what are you going to do now?”

“Well, that depends.”

“On what?”

“On what you’re doing.” He extended his arm as if he would escort her.

I made a sputtering sound. “Uh—uh—maybe if you wait here, then Rachel will come back.” Neither one paid me any attention.

Julie hesitated only one second before reaching for him, her fingers just touching his forearm. Then she pulled back and gave a nervous laugh. “C’mon, Grant. I’ll race you to the fun house.”

And they were off, leaving me to wrestle with my astonishment. How could he? Seduce Rachel one minute and then flirt with my other cousin the next? Okay—maybe “seduce” wasn’t the exact right word, but what other word could I use for someone who had lured Rachel away from all she had been taught? And how had it happened so quickly? Had it been just a couple weeks ago that Caroline Grant implied Rachel and Greg were having sex, and Rachel got fired up? I wrung my hands mentally. Oh—what should I do? What
could
I do? If Rachel knew I knew, she would kill me. For starters.

Eric Grant was honest about one thing, at least—Rachel bought a new t-shirt. Royal blue with “Warm Springs High Athletics” in neon yellow blazoned across it. Hideous. As a concession to fashion, she had bought the largest size possible and cut off the crewneck, but it still looked bizarre on her. Judging from her glowing face, she didn’t care. She gave Greg in the tank one careless wave before resting her elbows on the booth counter exactly where Eric had.

“
Hiya
, Frannie. How’s it going?”

Misery choked all utterance, and I could only nod.

“That bad, huh? Well, I think this is the best, most successful Carnival ever.” She stretched out her arms to encompass it all and then hugged herself. “Man, look at the line to dunk Greg! I’d love to watch him go in myself, but I don’t have the arm for it. We need somebody like Tom or Jonathan or even Eric. I bet Eric could do it. I bet he’d enjoy it.” She snapped her fingers at me. “
Gimme
one of your hair things, Frannie. The yellow one.”

I pulled the elastic band from the assortment around my wrist and watched her gather her long, golden-brown hair into a high side ponytail. She was almost purring. “Has he been by?”

“Who?” I stalled.

“What do you mean, who? Eric Grant, dopey.”

Again I nodded. Rachel waited for me to say more and then bugged her eyes at me. “Honestly, Frannie, what is wrong with you? Where did he go?”

“Umm…I think—I think the fun house. Julie was here when he showed up, and that’s what she suggested.”

There was an unpleasant flash in Rachel’s eyes, but she mastered it, eventually shrugging her shoulders. “That was nice of him, I guess. I just hope Julie doesn’t get any crazy ideas from it. He’s just being friendly and considerate because that’s the kind of guy he is, don’t you think?”

This I couldn’t answer. If I was not going to expose him, at the very least I would not be drawn into praising him. To my relief, we saw Tom approaching with Jonathan and Caroline.

“—These drag boats that put up this crazy rooster tail,” Tom was saying. “It’s awesome. A spectacle not to be missed.”

“And yet we’ve missed it every year,” Jonathan pointed out. He nodded a greeting at Rachel and me. “Dad never likes to be up at the cabin during the races,” he told Caroline, “because of the crowds and the rowdiness. We usually go up the weekend after and have to spend a good hour picking up trash. You never saw so many beer cans.”

Her eyes sparkled. “That’s terrible! Sounds like having to clean up after a big party when you weren’t even invited.”

“That’s what I’m talking about!” said Tom. “If you have to do the clean-up, why not do the party, too? Steve and Dave and I were thinking about going up there in a couple weeks.”

Jonathan’s jaw tightened. “Tom—”

“Aw, don’t get that look, Jon.” Tom elbowed Caroline and pointed at his brother. “See that? That’s Jonathan’s I’m-about-to-do-my-Dad-impression look.”

“It is very forbidding,” teased Caroline.

“Never mind,” said Jonathan. “We can talk about this later.”

Rachel pushed her way forward. “No way, Tom. If you’re going up to Tahoe for the drag boat races, why shouldn’t we get to go too?”

“He’s
not
going up for the races,” Jonathan said. “No way would Dad say yes to that, especially with Steve and Dave, who aren’t exactly Dad’s favorite people in the world.”

“Who says Dad has to know?” countered Tom. “I’m twenty now. An adult. I don’t need to get his permission to go for a weekend with friends.”

“You do if you plan to use the cabin.”

“It’s a family cabin.”

“I think if you look on the deed, you won’t find your name.” Jonathan made an impatient movement. “Don’t you remember what happened after you pulled the same kind of thing in high school?” He appealed to Caroline again. “Tom went up with Steve and Dave, and in the course of one weekend they managed to get the cops called, break two windows, and leave the water on so the pipes froze a month later. Dad grounded Tom and made him do a semester of volunteer work at the church.”

Caroline shook her head,
tsk-tsking
. “You naughty boy, Tom.”

“Man, that was a lot of fun,” sighed Tom.

“What about if we all went up?” Rachel pressed. “I mean us and the Grants, instead of Steve and Dave?”

“What about Greg?” Caroline asked innocently. “You wouldn’t want him left behind, would you?”

A cloud crossed Rachel’s face. “Well—of course, Greg—if his coach would let him miss. But Jonathan, if it was just us, you don’t think we’d need to call Dad about it, do you?”

“Rachel, I think that solves some problems and creates others. We’ll talk about it later,” Jonathan said again, “when we won’t bore Caroline.”

“It doesn’t bore me a bit,” she smiled. “In fact, I think it’s an exciting idea. I’d love to see the cabin after hearing you all talk so much about it.”