The Vow (23 page)

Out front, we’re reorganizing groceries when Mo says, “Crap, I forgot something.”

“What?”

“I’ll be back in a minute.”

“What did you forget?” I ask.

“Just something.”

I finish the reorganizing, trying not to think about what “just something” might mean—laxatives, jock itch medication, hemorrhoid cream. I can’t even think what else might be too embarrassing for him to tell me. He generally has no shame.

By the time he reappears I’ve divided everything into two light bags for me and two heavier bags for him, and I’ve eaten half a banana.

“You ready?” I ask, trying not to notice that every pocket on his cargo shorts is bulging.

“You want to see what I bought?”

“Do you want to show me what you bought?” I ask cautiously.

It’s then I really look at him, see the little-boy smile. He holds out his hand and opens one finger at a time, revealing a plastic egg, red on the bottom, clear on the top. Inside, something glitters. “It took me nine quarters.”

I take the egg from his hand and pop it open. It’s a ring, the color of grape crush and the size of a dime, glued to an adjustable plastic band. “Sparkly,” I whisper. “How many karats—no, don’t tell me.”

“And we also have a collection of sticky hands and princess tattoos.” He pats his pockets.

The ring is too small, even with the adjustable band, so I slide it halfway down my pinkie. “Perfect.”

“If you were five.”

“I’m young at heart.” I reach down, pick up the two heavier bags, and hand them to him. “Thanks.”

He shrugs. “I can’t have my wife wandering around without a ring, can I? No telling who might hit on her.”

“Does that mean I’m supposed to buy you a ring too so girls aren’t throwing themselves at you?” I ask, and shove the rest of the banana in my mouth and throw the peel at him.

He dodges it, picks it up, and tosses it into the trash. “No amount of bling is going to stop the ladies from doing that. Let’s go.”

I examine the ring one more time. The plastic is already digging into my knuckle. I want to say thank you again—less for the ring, more for just being Mo—but I’m suddenly fighting to swallow over the lump in my throat.

Mo’s staring at me. “Your parents are going to get over it.”

Oh, them.
I nod. And for just a second I consider really telling him about my broken, smashed, trampled-on heart. Maybe I wouldn’t feel so empty if I could explain I think I may have actually been in love.

“They will,” he says. “They love you. They’re just playing hardball. Ready?” He steps on his board.

I grab my bags and follow.

I don’t like being weighted on wheels, without hands free to catch myself when the inevitable happens. The bags are practically even, but I still feel like I’m leaning left. All I have to do is let go of the bags if I fall. I know that, but I doubt I’ll know that while I’m actually falling. Not everyone has the same set of survival instincts.

But I don’t fall. Not on the surprise lip in the sidewalk, not on either of the two hills, and not even when we roll back through the parking lot and I see my Explorer parked in a visitor stall, my mother in the driver’s seat, staring off into nothing.

It’s only been a week. I’m not sure if this makes me a bad daughter, but I haven’t missed her, unless the heart lurch I feel right now counts. I’ve been too busy dying over Reed, too busy playing house with Mo, too busy painting pictures of weird objects from the apartment to chase the ocean out of my head.

She turns and sees me, then lifts a hand—a greeting, not a smile.

Is she waiting for me to go to her? I step off my board, but I don’t get any closer.

Mo swears under his breath.

“You should go up to the apartment,” I say.

He tucks my board under his arm and takes the bags from me with his other hand.

She gets out of the car and walks toward us.

“Mrs. Bernier,” he says with a nod.

She squints at the skateboards instead of looking him in the eye. “You don’t have a car?”

“Yes, ma’am. It’s over there.” He points to the Camry.

“It doesn’t work?”

“It works fine.”

“Mo’s just taking this stuff up,” I say.

He nods. “Nice seeing you, ma’am.”

She rummages through her purse, pretending to look for something so she doesn’t have to say good-bye politely, like she doesn’t know I’ve seen that move from her before.

I wait until the stairwell door clicks shut. “You could be nice to him, you know. It’s not like he has any family around anymore.”

“Is that why you married him? Because you felt bad for him? So you could take care of him? Girls who think like that don’t end up happy, you know.”

“Why are you here?”

“To help you.”

“I don’t need help.”

“Of course you do.”

“No, I don’t. I’m an adult. I’m fine.”

“You’re
not
fine. And adults don’t ride skateboards to the grocery store. You’re kids playing some kind of grown-up married-person game, and at some point you’re going to realize there’s a lot more to marriage than skating around and whatever else you two do together.”

I snort. Whatever else. This is the closest thing to a sex talk we have ever had. “Maybe my marriage isn’t anything like yours, but I happen to think that’s a good thing.”

She lifts her chin slightly, pulls her cheeks in so her face looks a little gaunter. The movements are all small, but I recognize them. I’ve hurt her. That familiar pang of guilt rings through me. I’m so tired of hurting her.

“I
am
here to help you,” she says. She may be wounded, but she’s always calm, like a bird with a smashed wing waiting for something worse to happen. “You don’t want to come home. Fine. I can’t make you. But your dad thinks you’ll change your mind faster if we sit back and let you sink, and I’m not prepared to do that.” She holds out the car keys. “Here.” The single word echoes through the garage.

“I don’t want it.”

“Take it.”

“No.”

“You can’t skateboard to school all winter long.”

“Mo has a car!”

“Then take this,” she says, slipping her MasterCard out of her wallet.

I shake my head.

“For when the car breaks down.”

“Mo has money.”

“You mean Mo’s dad has money. Is either of you working?”

I cringe. “No.” I wouldn’t have wasted my week moping about Reed if I’d known I was going to have to admit that to her.

She thrusts it at me. “Take it so you don’t have to go begging to Mo’s dad the next time you want a new outfit. Do you know anything about how those people operate?”

I look into her eyes and see tears pooling, her lower lip quivering.

“Those people?”

She grits her teeth, pulling the tears back in. “Don’t get all high and mighty with the political correctness now. You don’t just marry a person. You marry a family and a religion and a culture—do you even know the first thing about any of it?”

My heart is racing now.

“Do you know how they treat their women?”

“I know how Mo treats me.”

“Do you realize that according to them you’re his property now?”

“It’s not li—”

“Or that your children will be Muslim, even if you aren’t? Although if you’ve already converted, that’s obviously not something that’s going to bother you. Have you?”

I stare into her eyes. Who said anything about converting to Islam? Her eyes really are brilliant when she’s angry. The sparkle reminds me of my new ring.

“But if you think that’s something that’s not going to bother me and your dad, you’re wrong. Sorry if it’s not politically correct, or if it makes me old-fashioned and small-minded in your eyes, but there’s something to be said for calling it like it is.”

I’m too blindingly angry to speak. I can’t even think with her eyes cutting into me like that. It’s the glare. I don’t even know which question to answer first. But silence sounds like stupidity to her, and I wish I weren’t too stunned to breathe.

“I just never thought you’d hurt us this way,” she says bitterly.

“That’s the problem!” I hear myself yell, but it doesn’t even feel like me. It’s some other girl, some other explosion. “There isn’t a maximum amount of pain you can feel. It’s not like you can use it all up on Lena and expect to be done. I can’t hide in my room the rest of my life because your heart is already too broken. It’s not my fault that you let what happened to her crush you.”

She pulls in her chin and lifts her shoulders like she’s bracing, but it’s too late. I’ve already said it. We’re both too shocked to do anything but stare at each other. Tears pool in her eyes. Finally she stretches out her arm again, pushing the card inches from my hand. “Take it.”

I slap it away.

It doesn’t feel like my hand, but now there’s a slight stinging in the center of my palm where it connected, and in the seconds that it takes for the card to cartwheel through the air, I hear her gasp like it’s her face that I’ve slapped. The card clatters as it hits the cement, the sound echoing like applause. Or gunfire.

I can’t look at her in the silence that follows. I stare at the card, lying facedown beneath the tailpipe of a minivan. We’re finished. I turn away.
Don’t run, don’t run, don’t run
, my brain tells my body, and my body obeys even though walking hurts. Still, I force myself to the stairwell, one deliberate step away from her at a time, and when the door clicks shut behind me and I’m finally free to run up to Mo without looking like a baby, I don’t. The adrenaline is gone. I do exactly what my mother thinks I’m going to do. I stumble forward and sink.

Chapter 24

Mo

I
stumble backward and sink.

It’s pretty lame. I always thought I’d be able to take a punch to the face like a man. Sure, it would hurt, but there would be that wholesome, ringing
crack
that you hear on TV, and of course I would see it coming, brace for it, and not drop like a ten-year-old girl.

But I don’t see it coming.

I thought if I was going to get punched in the face, it was going to be by Mr. Bernier, which is why I’m in a constant state of cringing when I so much as think his name. But we haven’t seen either of Annie’s parents since she spiked her mom’s credit card across the parking lot two weeks ago. It never occurred to me I would take my first honest, closed-fisted punch to the jaw from my friend, which is why I’m not bracing when I open the door and see Bryce.

“Hey, loser! I thought you weren’t back till next week!” I say, and that’s the last thing to leave my mouth before Bryce’s fist smashes into it. Pain explodes through my face, shooting up into my brain and down my neck, followed by the sensation of flying in reverse, like I’ve got a rubber band attached to my neck and I’m being snapped backward. And there’s a lot of noise—a high-pitched screaming like a train whistle—but I can’t tell where it’s coming from, and it stops when I hit the open door behind me and slide to the ground. Colors go streaky. Rainbow Twizzlers fading into dust . . .

“One girl!”
he shouts, but he’s blurry and his voice is fizzy and my face hurts so badly I’m afraid to touch it or to move. “My whole life, I’ve been in love with one girl!”

He’s leaning over me now, but I’m spinning too fast to be thinking defensively. I close my eyes. No good, still spinning. And the jaw ache is radiating into my skull now.

“What the hell is the matter with you?” he yells. “I would do anything for you! And you know what? If you’d have told me, I probably would have been okay with it. At least I would’ve tried. But you . . . How long have you . . . ?”

He can’t even finish it. And I can’t answer, not just because I don’t have any control over my jaw, or because my thoughts feel like they’re vibrating and are no longer in a language I speak, but because there is no allowable answer. I close my eyes and shake my head. I don’t want to look at his face anymore.

“How long?”

Guilt and vertigo swirl in my gut, pushing puke up into the back of my throat, but I swallow. It burns all the way down.

“Never mind,” he mutters.

I keep my eyes shut and listen as his footsteps retreat. Then nothing. I wish I could pass out for some temporary relief. Aren’t you supposed to get some unconscious recovery time when you get hit that hard? But no, I have to be wide awake to wallow in pain and guilt.

I was going to tell him. I was. But I didn’t think he was going to be back until next week, and I had no clue he’d take it so hard. Except now, even through muddy, concussive thoughts, it seems clear that he would. He’s always loved Annie—how did I forget that complicating and inconvenient piece of information? And unlike everyone else in E-town, he’s always believed we were just friends, because he was my friend, and friends believe each other.

I open my eyes to verify that yes, the entire world is still on Tilt-A-Whirl setting. Everything’s twisting together. I
was
lying to him or I
am
lying to him. It can only be one. I’m pretty sure it’s
am
, and it kind of makes me disgusted with myself and helpless at the same time. I stand up slowly, bracing my hand against the door. It takes a moment to make sure I’m steady, but when I’m sure, I make my way to the bathroom to inspect the damage.

My cheek is that vibrant pink of raw tuna. I touch it gingerly and then say every expletive I know to combat the pain.

“Mo?” I hear Annie’s voice call. “Where are you? Did you know the front door is wide open?”

Annie. Job interview. Good, I still know basics. “Yeah. Or no. I forgot to close it.”

“Do you want to hear how my inter . . .”

I glance at her reflection, then back at my own. I don’t know who looks scarier. Her eyes are actually trying to exit her cranium.

“What happened?”

Thank goodness she’s whispering. “Um, Bryce stopped by. These are his warm wishes to us for a lifetime of happiness together.”

“No.”

“Actually yes.”

“He did that to you?” She reaches out and, before I can stop her, puts her fingers on my cheek.

“Aaaaaah,”
I roar, and she jumps back.

“I’m so sorry!”

“Why would you try to touch it?” I ask, like I didn’t just do the same thing.

“I’m so sorry! Why haven’t you put any ice on it?”

“Because I pulled myself up off the floor and walked in here about five seconds before you got here.”

“Did you pass out, or did I just miss him?”

“I don’t think I passed out,” I say, trying to remember my thought train. “But I don’t remember what I thought about after the stars and before the spinning things.”

“Here, come with me,” she says, and pulls me by both arms to the couch. “Sit.”

I try easing myself down, but my legs give out once I’m about halfway, and I fall back into the couch. I’m probably not ever getting out, and I don’t care. Annie’s back with Advil, chocolate milk, a wet washcloth, and a Ziploc bag of ice.

“Take the Advil, then tip your head back,” she says. I obey. She wraps the washcloth around the bag and brings it close to my face. “And no screaming.”

“I didn’t scream,” I say, grimacing as the ice makes contact with my throbbing face. “I shouted and it was manly.”

She doesn’t correct me. She holds the ice with one hand and the back of my neck with the other. “You could have a concussion. How would I check for that, by the way? Maybe we should go to the ER.”

“I don’t need to go to the ER. And I think you’re supposed to ask me questions to see how confused I am.”

“Like what’s your name?”

“Mo. But I think trickier questions, like who’s the vice president.”

She pauses, then mutters, “So now I’m the one with the concussion?”

“I don’t think I have a concussion. I think this is just how you feel when you get punched by one hundred and eighty pounds of muscle and anger. At least I know how that idiot from Taylorsville felt now.”

“Which idiot from Taylorsville?”

“The one who called me a towelhead last year. Bryce punched him in the face.” I try to smile at the memory, but that proves to be a painful error. And thinking about Bryce sticking up for me tightens the guilty knot in my stomach.

We sit in silence for a minute before she asks, “So, are you going to tell me what happened?”

“Yeah. He punched me.”

“I got that part. Anything else?”

“He feels bad.”

“You don’t say. He’s been trying to get me to go out with him for five years. I didn’t realize you hadn’t told him yet.”

“I was going to email him, but I thought it’d be better in person, and I thought he wasn’t coming back until next week.”

“So what, he found out on Facebook?”

I shrug. I hadn’t thought of it, but there hadn’t been much post-punch thinking time. Facebook was a likely source.

I think of his face hovering over me. His eyes. It wasn’t just rage. Even with the swirling, I could see confusion. “Maybe we could tell him the truth.”

Annie’s grip tightens on the back of my neck and she takes the ice away.
“What?”

“At least then he’ll understand and he won’t have to hate us.”

“What are you talking about? I lied to
everybody
. My family isn’t even speaking to me! You can’t decide to tell people because you don’t like getting punched!”

“That has nothing to do with it. Although, wow. Getting punched. Who knew?”

“I’m not kidding around, Mo!”

“Neither am I. You know he’s always had a thing for you. Now he thinks I stood by and watched him make an idiot of himself and that something’s been going on with us for years.”

“So. The hell. What?” There’s more than a hint of panic in her voice. “And what about what Sam said? If we get caught, you’d get deported and I’d go to jail!”

“She said jail time pretty much never happens. You’d get a fine, but it’s not like Bryce would tell anyone.”

“Bryce is never going to know!”
At some point during the conversation she got up into my face, and now she’s so close I can see the hair inside her nostrils. It’s weird. I don’t think I’ve ever noticed that before.

“You’re scaring me,” I say.

“Good.” She sits back on her heels and shakes her head at me. “Because I will do something so evil to you in your sleep if you tell Bryce or anyone. You can’t even imagine it.”

“I was just assaulted by a primate with a fist the size of a cantaloupe.”

She narrows her eyes. “You’re saying I’m not as scary as Bryce’s fist?”

“I’m saying I’ve never been more terrified of anything in my whole life than of you at this moment. How’d the job interview go?”

She brings the ice back to my jaw. “Welcome to Myrna’s Country Craft, how can I help you?”

I grin and pain shoots into my cranium. “Congrats. You know what this means?”

“Employee discount.”

“It means I have a sugar momma. Hey, and you’re older than me too. How’s it feel being a cougar?”

“Not bad. How does it feel being a punching bag?”

“Not good.”

“Hey, if I’m your sugar momma, I get to revise the job chart. Here, hold this.” She takes my hand and puts it over the ice.

I don’t argue as she reassigns chores. I’m too sore, too grateful. At first, anyway. “Wait, I have to do the toilet and the dishes? Seems like it should be one or the other.”

“When’s the last time you did any cooking?”

“Good point.”

She turns on the TV. “How about you just watch basketball and agree to do whatever I tell you to do.”

“You’re mean. But okay. Wait, can the new order begin tomorrow, once I can feel my face again?”

“Fine.”

I spend the rest of the day acting like a baby and Annie spends the rest of the day treating me like one. It’s kind of awesome.

* * *

I
n a lot of ways, living with Annie is like living with Sarina. A girl is a girl. There are boxes of feminine hygiene products under my sink that I absolutely will not touch or even stare directly at, just in case I accidentally internalize information that makes me want to vomit and/or kill myself. And there are ridiculously long showers, but I can handle it. Besides, the bathroom smells like berries and vanilla after she leaves wrapped in about five towels, so what do I care? And there’s a row of bath products in the shower for practically every body part. Seems excessive. But apparently she needs a different bottle of soap or gel or foam or whatever for heels, forehead, and stomach.

Annie’s stomach. It’s kind of an interesting idea.

It’s not like I’ve never pictured her naked before—just nothing more than your typical
I wonder what she actually looks like without her clothes
curiosity. Except living in the same house, waiting for my turn in the shower with her all of ten feet away, naked and dripping wet, I find my mind wandering around a little more. That’s probably not abnormal though, what with the proximity thing messing with my brain. I don’t think it is.

I need school to start up again so I can go back to imaginatively admiring Maya. That’s an idea I can wrap my mind around. If I was at basketball camp right now, I’d at least have something real to focus on. Summer, however, is another six weeks of SAT prep (
Study like it’s your full-time job
, according to Dad), so I will continue trying to avoid making up analogies like
Maya is to grapefruits, what Annie is to: a. mandarin oranges b. lemons c. key limes
d. NONE
OF YOUR DAMN BUSINESS, MO.

“What are you thinking about?”

“Huh?” My head jerks up. Annie’s digging through the key jar.

“What are you thinking about? You look like your brain is hurting.”

I point to the Kaplan text, which isn’t even open.

“That makes sense then. I’m going to work, and I’m stopping by the grocery store on the way home. Any requests?”

“No.” I stretch my arms above my head. Unless Kroger is selling sanity, I can’t be helped. “Wait, can you get more of those chicken nuggets in the shapes of dinosaurs?”

“Dino-Nuggets? You know they taste the same as the regular-shaped ones, right?”

“Supposedly.” Should I bother explaining? I used to tease Sarina about begging Mom to buy them, and now they remind me of her. Annie would understand, but I’m still too weirded out by my own weird thoughts and just want her to leave.

“Oh, and don’t forget we’re doing bridal portraits tonight,” she adds.

“What?”

She rolls her eyes. “We talked about this after Sam called the other day. That girl I told you about at work, Kristen, is bringing her dress for me to borrow. I told her my cousin is getting married and I want to show my mom the beading to see if she can do it, but I have to take it back to her tomorrow.”

“Holy elaborate lie,” I say.

“I know, but it’s not easy to steal someone’s wedding dress for a day when you’re already married.”

“And bridal portraits?” I know enough to know I shouldn’t admit to only vaguely recalling the conversation with the ever-demanding Sam about them. She brings out the “tune out” side of me. But I’m remembering now. We need pictures for our interview. That’s right. “Wait, why are we taking wedding pictures when our official story is we eloped?”

She sighs. “Not wedding pictures. Bridal portraits. It’s not like we’re hiring fake guests or anything. We’ll just go outside and use the timer to take a few shots. Sam said it would be smart to have something sentimental that makes us look like we’re actually happy to be married, you know, since we didn’t have a big wedding. Even elopers might do that. Elopers—is that a word?”

“Yeah. But the whole concept seems lame. Wedding glamour shots? Really? People do that?”

“Of course people do that. And Sam said good pictures go a long way in showing a couple is really in love.”