The Short Game (6 page)

So I did the only thing I could think up in a hair of a second. I ran. “Well, nice talking to you Marge. Gotta be going.”

Marge gave me a look that said she thought I’d lost my freaking mind and she’d be sure to spread the word, but I didn’t care. I turned, and used every bit of self-control not to break into a run. Tracy had stopped half way to the counter and was staring at me with a confused frown. I dropped my eyes and pushed through the door. Once I was outside, I did run, all the way to Tracy’s car. When I reached it, I leaned against the passenger door sucking in huge lungfuls of air.
 

I couldn’t do this. There was no way I was going to be able to keep the fact that I was a Traveler from Tracy and also keep the fact that I was dating Tracy from the clan. Something had to give. A minute later, Tracy was next to me. She didn’t say a word, just studied me with an unreadable expression.
 

“Let’s go,” I said, though I couldn’t look her in the eye.

“Fine.” She unlocked the door for me, then walked around to the driver’s side. I looked around nervously, but she was parked around the corner of the building, hidden from the course.

She turned on the car, but didn’t put it in drive. “I think we need to talk,” she said, staring at me hard enough to bore a hole.

“Fine, but can we do it at your place?” I looked down at my hands, which were visibly trembling. You’d think it was the police who’d cornered me in the snack shop. But really, Marge Sheedy was the bigger threat.

“Sure,” she said, starting the car. “But when we get there you better tell me what the hell that was all about, and it better be good.”

C
HAPTER
T
EN

TRACY HELD OPEN the door to her trailer, and I shot her a wary look before stepping inside. She closed the door behind us and leaned against it. “So?”

Jeez. I figured she’d give me at least a couple minutes before jumping right in. Make us a mug of tea or something. In this way, at least, she was decidedly un-Maggieish. “I think maybe we oughta sit down.”

“Fine.” She walked over to the recliner.

I dropped down on the couch and let out a long sigh. I templed my fingers under my chin, not knowing where to start.
 

“Just say it,” she said. “Whatever it is. Are you seeing that woman? I mean, I guess we never made this official, but I didn’t realize you—”

“No!” Of all the ideas she could have gotten from the scene at the snack shop, this was the last one I would have thought of. “No no no no,” I held my palms up. “Marge is….” What was she? How was I supposed to explain this? “Marge and I aren’t dating.” In truth, I was a little offended that she thought I might go for someone with buckteeth so bad she could eat corn through a picket fence.

Tracy’s shoulders loosened a little. “Well, who was she then? And why did you run out of there like that?”

“She’s family. Sort of. She’s a distant cousin.” Really distant. Our two families weren’t related as far as I knew, but all Travelers in the U.S. descended from one of seven or eight original families that came over during the potato famine, so odds were, we were all related in some way.

“Then why did you get all freaked out? Are you ashamed of me? Ashamed to be dating some girl that lives in a dingy trailer?” She looked down at her lap and played with the hem of her jean skirt.

“Of course not,” I said. “Anyway, this place is nicer than where I live, and I still live with my mother. I would never judge.”

She looked up at me with a half smile. “Really?”

“Unfortunately, yeah.”

“I don’t understand, then. What happened back there?”

This was it. I had three choices. One, I could keep lying to her. But that was only going to drive us apart. It’d be a cancer that would fester in our relationship until it killed it sometime in the distant future. That was no sort of option.
 

Two, I could rip the bandage off quickly. Just break it off now. That was probably for the best. There was no way that this would end happily for us anyway. But I couldn’t do that either. I really cared about Tracy. More than I’d ever cared about anyone aside from Shay or Maggie. I couldn’t lose her.

So I had to go with the third option: tell her the truth. “There’s something you don’t know about me. Something I was afraid would make you not want to talk to me anymore. So I’ve been keeping it from you.” I paused, trying to work up the courage to say what came next. Tracy sat there, kindness in her eyes. Maybe a hint of something else too? Finally, I blurted it out. “I’m an Irish Traveler. Like a gypsy. You know? I live in the Traveler Village not too far from here. That woman you saw? She’s a member of my clan.”

Tracy gave me a strange look. One I couldn’t read. Her eyes were narrowed, but she didn’t look angry. She looked, I don’t know. But then she threw her head back and started howling.
 

At first I was terrified. My eyes went wide. I knew it was bad, but this reaction was far worse than I’d expected. She gasped for air, but after a moment I realized she wasn’t upset. She was laughing. Really really hard. Her shoulders shook up and down and her stomach tightened with the effort. “That’s it?” she said, struggling to catch her breath.

“What do you mean?”

“That’s your big secret?”

“Yeah…” I trailed off. Was she mad at me? I didn’t know how to take her right now.

“The fact that you’re a Traveler isn’t exactly a big secret.”

“How’d you know?” I said, strangely affronted.

“Well, first of all, you look like a Traveler. I’ve lived my whole life about ten miles away from y’all. I think I know what y’all look like.” We looked different? Most country people had no idea, but I guess people around here would have seen us more often than folks up north. “Second, the guy at the bar called you a gypsy.” Well, that was a point. “And anyway, you have an accent.”

“What do you mean I have an accent?”

“An Irish accent. You say your vowels funny sometimes. They come right through your nose.”

“No they don’t!” That stung. I really prided myself on my ability to change my accent on a dime. Apparently I wasn’t as good as I’d thought.

“Not often. If I only talked to you for a few minutes I wouldn’t notice, but we’ve been hanging out a lot.”

“Oh.”

She moved over from the chair and sat next to me on the couch. My elbows were still on my knees but now I held my head in my hands. “It’s okay. I like your accent. I just wish you’d be yourself around me, really.”

She made it sound simple. “There’s one other thing,” I said. I wanted to tell her all of it, about the conning and Shay’s mission from Pop Sheedy, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. How much could I reveal before she’d send me packing and lose my number? So instead I said, “My pop—my da—I wasn’t helping him build a deck that first day I met you. I don’t have a deck, and I don’t have a da. He’s...” I swallowed. “Well, he’s dead.”

“I’m really sorry, Jimmy,” Tracy said, and she looked genuinely sad. She reached up to brush my hair behind my ear with her fingertips.
 

“No. I’m sorry. I feel like an idiot. And a coward.”

“You’re neither. I understand how hard it can be to reveal things about your family to people.”

“Yeah?”

“If it makes you feel any better, you’re not the first Traveler I’ve had a crush on.”

I jerked my head up to gape at her. “That doesn’t make me feel better at all.”

“Hush.” She held her finger to my lips. “In second grade Maw Maw made me go to classes at the church so I could take my first holy communion. There were a few kids in my group that were Travelers.”

“How’d you know?”

She let out a long, exasperated sigh. “Well, the accent again for one, and two, have you ever noticed how y’all dress? Especially when y’all go to church? How could I miss it? The girls were all in baby beauty queen dresses and each of the boys wore a white tuxedo. We were eight!”

“Okay, you have a point. Get to the crush.”

“So there was this boy Judd in my group—”

“Judd? Judd who?” Please, Lord, don’t let it be Judd Sheedy.

“I don’t remember. Don’t think I ever got his last name. Do you know him?”

“Travelers only use a few names, so ‘Judd’ could be any of a dozen guys. Even last names don’t always narrow things down because we don’t have a whole lot of them either. Really, you’d need to know his nickname.”

“All y’all have nicknames?”

“Most of us.”

“What’s yours?”

“Oh, mine’s not that interesting.”
 

“What is it?”

“It’s stupid.”

“Just tell me!”

“Fine, it’s Jimmy Boy.”

“Jimmy Boy.” She rolled the name around in her mouth like she was trying it out. “I like that. And your brother’s?”

“Buffer,” I said quickly. I didn’t want to get into why Shay had that painful nickname. “Can we get back on track here?”

“There’s not a whole lot more to tell. We liked to play together, but one day Judd’s mom saw us talking and she walked over and yanked him away. For the couple classes we had after that, he wouldn’t talk to me. Would barely look at me.”

“Yeah. We’re not really supposed to talk to country people.”

“Country people?”

“Country people, buffers. That’s what we call people who aren’t Travelers. We’re supposed to stay away from you.”

“Why?”

“It’s complicated.”

“I have all day. We’ve already established that.”

“I don’t know. Country people are supposed to be a bad influence or something. That’s what we’re told when we’re kids, anyway. That buffers are no good. But, really, the older I get, the more I think it’s just a way of keeping us in line. A way of making sure we can never leave the Village.”

“Do you want out?”

“No,” I said sharper than I’d intended. “Or, maybe. I don’t know. The thought of leaving Maggie and my brother, Shay. I don’t think I could do it.”

“What would happen if they found out that you were seeing me now?”

“I don’t know, but it wouldn’t be good. I’d get dragged.” Tracy cocked an eyebrow, reminding me that country people didn’t have that word, or concept really. “It’s sort of like being shunned. If you’re dragged just a little bit, people talk about you, leave you out of things. But at its worst it could mean getting kicked out.”

“I’m sorry, Jimmy. I had no idea.” She moved closer to me and put her arms around my waist, clasping them at my side. “No idea you were risking so much to see me.”

“Does that freak you out?”

“No, it’s sort of sweet.”

“Really?”

“Really.” She nuzzled her face into my neck, gripping my waist even tighter. I pulled my arms from her grasp and wrapped them around her. “I just want you to know that you can be honest with me about anything, Jimmy. I really, you know, care about you. I want us to be closer.”

“I really care about you too,” I said, breathing in deeply, taking in the strawberry scent of her shampoo. “You know what this means, don’t you?”

“No. What?”

“You’re a Traveler groupie.”

“Am not!” she said, pulling away to ensure I got the full effect of her indignant frown.

“Sure are.” I smiled and pulled her back against me. “You just can’t help yourself. Can’t resist our charm. It’s all right. I understand.”

“Don’t be a jerk.” She poked me in the ribs.

I grunted. “Easy, Bruiser. I’m just telling it like it is.”
 

I leaned in to kiss her and was surprised at the ferocity of her kiss in return. I cupped my hands around her head, burying my fingers in her hair. She leaned back, so she was lying down on the couch, and I leaned right along with her, shifting my hips so I was on top of her.
 

Our kissing intensified as she unclasped my belt buckle with nimble fingers, and I worked on the row of tiny buttons that ran down her blouse. It fell open and I pulled back from our kissing long enough to take in her flat belly and small round breasts. Apparently she wasn’t the type to bother with a bra, a fact for which I was very grateful. She pulled my shirt up over my head and I braced myself on one arm to pull it off all the way and toss it aside. I grinned down at her and she grinned back at me.
 

“You’re beautiful,” I said.

“So are you,” she said, and ran her fingers down my chest and stomach.

I kissed her again, reveling in the soft, warm feel of her skin against mine. I pressed my forearms into the sofa cushion under her head and tipped my head back so I could look at her. I smoothed her hair away from her face, and stroked her cheek with the back of my fingers, thinking about all the movies I’d seen, and all the times I’d wondered whether being with someone you really loved was all they made it out to be. By the end of that evening, I had my answer. It wasn’t anything at all like it seemed in the movies. It was much, much better.

C
HAPTER
E
LEVEN

“SO WHAT ARE your plans?” Tracy asked. We were lying in her bed, still undressed, but covered by a sheet.
 

“I’d hoped to stay here a bit longer.”

“No, not this second.” She flipped over on her stomach and leaned her forearms on my chest so she could look me in the eyes. Her breasts grazed against my side, distracting me from any rational, human thought. “I mean, what are your plans for life? Career, family? Your brother’s in college, right?”

“Yeah,” I said sheepishly. “He’s at Balanova. It’s a college right outside of Philadelphia.” Even though what I said wasn’t exactly a lie, it wasn’t the whole truth either, and the words burned my throat on their way out.
 

“You planning on going away to college too?”

“I—I couldn’t,” I said. Not knowing how she’d react. I still wasn’t ready to tell her about how my clan made its money or the long game Shay was playing, but otherwise I wanted to be as honest with her as I could be. She deserved that. “I never finished high school. Never really went at all, actually.”

“What?”

“Yeah, Travelers almost never go to high school. Our parents figure that we can learn everything we need to know about living from them out on the road. Plus, high school has too many opportunities to mix with country people.”