Unchained Melody (3 page)

Callie collapsed back against her bed, saying a quick, thankful prayer that her reaction to his comment had gone unnoticed by him. Already, she was feeling close to normal again, just like the lyrics of Marcy Playground- surely she’d just dreamed that moment.

‘Okay cool well, I gotta go and finish getting ready...’ she rubbed her forehead with the heel of her hand, feeling strange when she added: ‘Pick me up soon?’

‘Sure,’ Hunter sounded as stiff. ‘Ten minutes?’

‘Cool.’

‘Check yah.’

Callie hung up the phone and then bent over, resting her head between her knees and groaning. While she was sitting like that, her bedroom door inched open.

‘Was there a crash in here?’

Callie looked up at her mother Lauryenne, trying to hide any evidence of her gooey moment. ‘Yeah, Hunter said something funny and I yo-yo’d the phone- sorry.’

‘Ahhh...’ her mum smiled. ‘What did he say?’

Callie got to her feet and yanked on the skirt of her black and white dress, turning to look at herself in the mirror and feeling pleasantly surprised with what was reflected back. The dress was the stretchy, tube kind with a low neckline, svelte cap sleeves and reached just above her knee. The fabric was black with tiny white polka-dots; very fifties, and very Gwen Stefani. Usually, Callie wouldn’t have been caught dead in it because it was entirely too girly for her. Yet, paired with her chunky black Doc Martens, it kind of worked. Callie reached for her favorite red and black flannelette shirt and tied it around her waist as she often did, but hitched the skirt of the dress up a few inches before securing the sleeves into a tight knot, low on her hips. Her smile became a full-fledged grin when she retrieved her hat from her dresser top and yanked it down over her hair, threading her ponytail through the loop at the back.

‘Oh… he might have himself a girlfriend. We’ll see. His recounts of flirting with her had me giggling.’ She turned to the side, assessing herself. ‘How does this look?’

‘Actually… pretty good. I guess it’s as close to Rockabilly as your generation is going to get.’ Her mother crossed the threshold to her room and ran her fingers through Callie’s ponytail. ‘Gosh, you’re getting so grown up. You look lovely. If you won’t lose the hat, will you at least let me stick a few velcro rollers in here before you go?’

Callie made a baboon face. ‘Curls? Won’t that be overkill?’

‘Nope- it’ll be perfect.’ Her mom tilted her head, meeting Callie’s eyes in the mirror. Auburn hair swung over Callie’s shoulder. Most people did that; stood close to her when they spoke and stooped, trying to see under the brim of her hat and into her eyes. ‘And how do you feel about Hunter having a girlfriend?’

Callie didn’t think over her response. ‘I guess it’s weird. But I sort of knew that it was inevitable.’ She shrugged. ‘Meredith seems nice… to him. So long as she doesn’t break his heart or anything…’

‘Break Hunter’s heart?’ Lauryenne smirked. The only wrinkles she bore were tiny lines around her eyes which creased when she smiled or stared at her computer, typing away on her latest masterpiece. She was a beautiful woman, and Callie often lamented the fact that they looked nothing alike. She never had to tell people she was adopted; One look at her olive skin and black hair compared to her Australian born mother, who was all autumn bronzes and peach, and her Canadian father, who was tall and as pale as Vlad with a shock of red hair made it clear that Callie had not inherited her features from either of them. ‘I don’t think that’s possible. I could reverse over that boy with my car and he’d probably leap up, laughing at my antics.’

Callie chuckled. Her mother was right; Hunter Marks was basically the happiest boy on the face of the planet. ‘I don’t know how he’s ever going to become a rock star,’ she agreed. ‘No one ever got famous by singing about how content they are to be upper middle class and anxiety free.’

Her mother smiled fondly. ‘Maybe that’ll be his hook- and Ryan can just glare on pensively from the side for effect.’

Callie’s smile faltered as she thought of her other best friend, who was also an aspiring musician. Ryan was beautiful to look at, his singing voice was incredible, and he had an intensity about him that Hunter didn’t; a sort of darkness that was as appealing as it was subtle and idyllically ‘Heavy Metal’. Callie often worried about their friendship, and what would happen when a name was called to walk to the front of the stage and the other was left in their shadow.

Brick came on and Callie wasn’t in the mood to be brought down. Knowing that Next’s Too Close was the next track on her SmashHits disc, she hit the button on her C. D player and skipped Ben Fold’s, needing a dose of Hip-Hop to suit her strange mood.

‘What about you hon?’ Her mother asked. ‘Do you have a date? Or are you and Ryan going together…?’

Callie scowled at her mother. ‘No. We’re all going together. Try not to look too disappointed.’

Her mother huffed. A few golden brown hairs lifted from her bangs. ‘Well I’m sorry but you’ll be eighteen in a few months. It’s strange that you spend all of your time with those two boys and yet don’t ever gush over either.’

‘Dad seems happy about it,’ Callie joked.

‘One day your father will want grandchildren as much as I do.’ Her mother muttered. ‘And he’ll regret not backing me up on this.’

‘Maybe I won’t have grand-children.’ Callie pointed out. ‘What if I focus on a career instead?’

Her mother didn’t flinch. ‘Sure...’ she said smoothly. ‘And considering that most dancer’s career are over by the age of thirty, what then?’

Callie closed her mouth and looked down at the shirt tied around her waist, feeling lost. ‘I dunno. Do I have to decide right now? I’m in a skirt- so it’s throwing me off.’

‘No, but you’ll have to decide soon.’

Callie sighed. She was a good dancer. Better than good. And she could sing too, and had taken to basically every instrument she had ever touched. Who said her career had to end at thirty? Who said she couldn’t find a way to dance and sing for the rest of her life?

‘Maybe I’ll teach, or choreograph or…’ Callie shrugged at her mother’s reflection. ‘Can’t I just promise that I won’t end up sniffing paint cans behind the seven eleven? I’ll be fine.’

Lauryenne rolled her eyes. ‘I know that Callie.’ She stroked her ponytail again and rested her chin on top of Callie’s hat. ‘I just want to know that I’ve done my job right by you.’

‘To prove that being adopted hasn’t horribly scarred me?’ Callie quipped. She always tried to make light of her adoption, for she knew it bothered her mother constantly. But deep down, it bothered Callie too because her parents had decided not to tell her any details about it, or her biological parents until she was twenty-one.

Her mother smirked. ‘I know I haven’t scarred you. By all counts, you’re an over-indulged brat. I just want to know that you’re passionate about your life, even though you had a slightly strange start.’

Callie knew that her mother was referring to the lack of dreams, the fear of thunderstorms, the adoption and whatever else. ‘I have passion mum.’ She turned to face her mum and held her narrow shoulders. ‘I love you. I have loved being spoiled rotten. I am certain that I will find a man who looks like Skeet Ulrich and intends to spoil me even more, and if I don’t, I will get a six figure job and spoil myself, I promise.’ She rubbed her nose against her mother’s. ‘Happy?’

Her mother smiled. ‘I might be, after I’ve gotten the rollers.’ She grinned. ‘You; red lipstick. Top drawer bathroom cabinet. Nothing says ‘passion’ quite like red lipstick.’

Callie rolled her eyes. ‘And nothing says Sociopath quite like a mother who is a romance writer.’ she muttered, but she followed her mother down the hall.

2.

Hunter collapsed into a plastic folding chair next to Ryan and crossed his ankles on the edge of the table in front of them, bringing his punch cup to his mouth to hide his lips before asking: ‘Ryan…’ he cleared his throat. ‘When Callie walked down her steps to the car earlier, did you hear Cherry Pie in your head, or was it just me?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous,’ Ryan scoffed leaving Hunter alone in his humiliation for a moment before muttering: ‘It was Nine Inch Nails, Closer.’

Hunter threw back his head and laughed. ‘Thank the lord!’ Then he shook his head woefully. ‘What’s up with the cleavage and stuff?’

The roller-skating rink had been closed to people on wheels and opened to the populace of Horizon High and Shale Creek College for the disco. Those were the only two high schools for fifty kilometers and even with the hundred odd students present, the venue seemed to yawn with excess space. But the D. J knew what he was doing, and his beats were whipping up some decent atmosphere.

But for once, the music was the second to last thing on Hunter’s mind: Callie had his complete attention. She looked incredible. Her figure-hugging black dress was skimming over curves Hunter hadn’t even known that she had. When she’d walked out of her front door, she’d looked like a film clip in motion.

Ryan dropped his chin into his hands on the edge of the table, and the cheap white tablecloth slid a little. ‘Do you know how many times tonight I’ve thought about going over there and making her put her flannie on over that damn dress?’ He sat up and looked at Hunter, the picture of misery. ‘The only reason I haven’t is because, well… I’d probably tear it back off a second later.’

Hunter laughed and high-fived him, thinking of how he’d had to stare straight ahead on the road when Callie had climbed into his Torana and her skirt had hiked up a few inches along her olive thigh. ‘My sentiments exactly man. What are we supposed to do?’ Even as he asked the question, he risked another peek down to the opposite end of the table, where Callie was talking to Marnie Winters, gesticulating about something. Marnie was the only girl in school who Callie had ever been friendly with; sometimes they went into town shopping together (album shopping of course, never shoes like all the other chicks) and sometimes they went to the gorge as a foursome. They weren’t best friends in any traditional sense, but it was as close to having a best girl friend that Callie was ever apparently going to get.

‘We should go find Mr Falcon, remember him? He taught us Sex-Ed in grade seven and gave out those pamphlets on what to do when you start noticing changes in your girl friend’s bodies?’ Ryan joked. During that sentence, his eyes slid to Callie and then guiltily away three times.

Hunter snorted. ‘You mean, the ones about growing hair, down there and how to handle a wet dream?’

Ryan’s eyes flickered to Callie again. ‘Yep. Think I’m definitely gonna need some help with the second part after tonight.’ He glanced at Hunter. ‘But you’re still pre-occupied with trying to grow hairs, right?’

Hunter smacked him over the back of the head. ‘Asshole. Puberty or not, this isn’t right man. We can’t sit here ogling her and I do not want to dream about her that way. Which I will if it’s on my mind when I go to sleep later!’

Ryan glanced at him. ‘You mean, you’ve never…?’

Hunter felt his face grow even hotter. He and Ryan shared everything. He was certain that they didn’t have two ends of a secret between them. They’d discussed it all; porn, dreams, ambitions, crushes, fears… but they’d never discussed Callie. Never ever. ‘She might have made a cameo appearance once or twice…’ he hedged, sitting back down and turning his body towards Ryan’s. ‘But I’ve never lusted after her. I knew she was pretty but tonight, she looks-’

‘Beautiful,’ There was a distinct note of veneration within Ryan’s eyes- the blue seemed to flash more brightly yet more softly. ‘That was the first word that came to mind when I first saw her at the gorge that day; Beautiful. In that red swimsuit, with that black hair, she reminded me of Snow White- okay a Mediterannean Snow White but still…’

Hunter was caught off-guard by that admission. ‘Damn, you look like you’re talking up a balcony. You’re not in love with her or anything, are you? Because if she found out-’

But Ryan rolled his eyes. ‘Look Callie’s my best friend and I am perfectly happy to keep it that way.’ He gestured across the room. ‘But a guy can dream, and she does not have to know about it.’

‘Agreed.’ Hunter leaned back, scoping out Callie again. She and Marnie were moving towards the dance floor, and Callie was tapping the heel of her hand against her upper thigh as she walked, in time to the music. There was something about her that night, boobs and legs aside that was pulling every set of eyes in the room in her direction. Her eyes were sparkling, and her laugh was carrying across the floor between songs. Her sleek black hair had been twisted into a perky, sock-hop ponytail under her hat and it bounced every time she took a step.

‘Okay so I need a cold drink and possibly a cold shower…’ Ryan said then, sitting up. ‘And maybe a girlfriend who’s not just a friend- just to take the edge off.’

‘Completely agreed.’ Hunter said, moving his head to the beat when Tupac’s California Love started blaring over the speakers, its intro beat breaking away from P. Diddy’s Come with me.

At that moment, Meredith Leed’s walked onto the dance floor and the focus of the room shifted from Callie to the popular blonde, whose sparkling silver mini skirt and matching halter top were lethally hot- and short.

‘Oh shit.’ Hunter sat up, then slouched again self-consciously. His heart was thudding with excitement. ‘Dude check out Meredith! I think she wore that for my benefit!’

Ryan’s gaze swung to Meredith, and his brows rose. ‘Bloody hell. How does Meredith always manage to dress like a slut and a princess at the same time?’

‘Who cares? It works.’

‘Well… what are you waiting for? Go pounce it.’

‘Right. Pouncing. In three, two…’ he rose to his feet and ambled around the back of Ryan’s chair. Meredith had been scanning the room, and when she saw him, she smiled cunningly. He supposed that his appreciation for her ensemble was clear on his face. He wasn’t surprised- he already had a semi.

And then someone went: ‘Woo!’ And Hunter turned to see where it had come from. He looked, and then did a double take to see that Callie was dancing; hard. He’d seen her dance before; his mother had forced him to several recitals of Callie’s growing up, just as Callie had shown up to his and Ryan’s football games and debate clashes and whatever else they’d been tortured into doing that didn’t involve a guitar. But the moves Callie was throwing down were not the tip-toe sugar-plum sort. They were the ass-swinging, ophidian, belly dancer come Let’s-Talk-About-Sex type and she looked incredible as she stretched her arms above her head and circled her wrists perfectly to the hard hip-hop bass line. She was not Callie anymore- she was someone else, someone wild and sexy. Her eyes were closed the way they always were when she was lost in music, and a small circle had assembled around her, envious girls and salivating boys.

‘Oh yeah oh YEAH!’ Hollered the D. J. ‘Ladies and gents we have a mover. But let’s not stand there looking daft, I don’t play one-man parties!’

Callie’s eyes didn’t open because she had no idea that she was the subject of the room’s interest. She turned slowly, resting her hands on her hips and then sliding them down her thighs as she rotated in a pulsing motion.

‘Shake it, shake it Cali...’ The lyrics were ridiculously relevant as Callie was indeed, shaking it. Hunter felt something inside his very soul burst to life and then flicker out then burst again as different lyrics flitted behind his frontal lobe.

Curls and boots, my girl gone wild/ Blossom to the beat/ woman from child. My pointe dancing angel/ cries to be defiled.

‘Hunter?’ There was a questioning note in Meredith’s voice. A soft hand grazed his jaw, rotated his face. She was silver and blonde, like a snow-capped Christmas tree in pictures from countries Hunter had never been to. She was beautiful. She faded the lyrics in his mind. The world was shaking it again, and nothing more.

‘Hey…’ he swallowed again and forced a wider smile then he felt. He glanced down at her bare torso, then back up to her pretty face. ‘You look… there are no song lyrics for that outfit.’ He glanced over at Callie again, frowning to see that Reece had made his way over to the circle, and was breaking through it, his hands coming down on Callie’s hips with the self-assuredness of a guy who knew he would get away with it. And to Hunter’s dismay, he did. Callie looked shocked at first, but then she smiled and turned in Reece’s arms and Hunter wanted to retch because they looked good together, Reece with his spiky black hair, Callie’s blacker still.

‘Hunter…’ Meredith said his name again, and he looked back at her. She ducked her head. ‘I hate to have to actually say it, but I’m trying to get you to ask me out here...’

‘You are?’ Hunter was surprised, even though she’d been pretty blatant about her intentions earlier that day. ‘That’s kind of awesome.’

She peeked up at him. ‘It is? Because every time I come to talk to you, you end up talking to, or looking at- Callie instead.’

Hunter frowned. And then he shrugged. ‘Meredith I would love to ask you out. But Callie… she’s like a sister to me. If you’re going to have a complex about her then this-’ he gestured to the space between them, ‘-won’t happen.’

Meredith tilted her head, as though thinking it over. ‘You’re really not into her?’

‘She’s my best friend.’

‘A beautiful best friend.’

He shrugged. ‘Maybe. But her being beautiful doesn’t make you less beautiful, does it?’

Meredith’s smile broadened. ‘You think I’m beautiful?’

He rolled his eyes. ‘Oh please- you’re just fishing now. Everyone thinks you’re beautiful.’

Meredith slung her arms around his neck. ‘So if you’ve already got a girl best friend… does that mean that the position of girlfriend is still open?’

Hunter’s insides sizzled. Meredith was sexy under normal circumstances, but now that she was turning it up to get his interest, she was smokin hot. So hot that he couldn’t think up a clever response. Not that it mattered, because a beat later, she was kissing him. And Hunter was kissing her back.

*

‘Oh my gawd!’ Marnie tugged on Callie’s arm, pointing across the room with her other hand. ‘Check that out! Hunter’s getting with Meredith!’

Callie whirled around, touching her fingertips to her lower lip, equal measures surprised and weirded out when she saw it was true. She’d never seen Hunter kiss a girl before- and she didn’t know how he knew what he was doing. So seeing Meredith wrapped around him so eagerly made Callie feel… displaced. Not exactly jealous, but definitely possessive. The kiss looked so passionate and grown-up, and she touched her Red Sox hat on reflex, as though reminding herself that him being linked to another girl hadn’t severed their bond.

‘I can’t look,’ Callie confessed, and turned back to the D. J booth, her ear twitching to hear what he was going to throw down next, then grinning when Five’s When The Lights Go Out started; she was definitely in a hip-hop state of mind and it looked like Hunter was too. ‘It’s so alien; like walking in on your parents or something.’ She pressed a hand to her collarbone, aware of a sort of fuzziness lurking over her heart. She’d felt alien all evening... walking around with bare legs, letting loose on the dance floor only to find herself surrounded by spectators and then, Reece… now Hunter was going for it with the queen Bee of Horizon High! None of it computed. It would have felt strange for the simple fact that she, Ryan and Hunter had separated when they’d first arrived because usually at any sort of social function, they sat in a corner together, away from everyone. But the boys had been weird since the drive there, and when Marnie had beckoned her over to the edge of the dance floor to catch up, Callie had almost been relieved to walk away from her mates.

‘Which is probably how Hunter and Ryan felt, seeing you dance with Reece.’ Marnie pointed out, adjusting the hem of her short blue skirt. She was wearing it with a lime green halter- an outfit so trendy that it might have looked ridiculous on anyone else, but Marnie’s athletic frame was just tall enough to pull off the color, and her chunky black spectacles gave her the ‘Hipster’ edge to own the look.

Marnie Winters was the same, outspoken girl Callie had met at the gorge, but now even Hunter wouldn’t dream of trying to push Marnie around! She still told every bully in Horizon to shut it, but now she had the athletic prowess to make them shut it, and the grades and shelves full of trophies to make teachers look the other way when she was forced to physically ‘shut it’ on someone’s behalf. And because of that natural strength and confidence, Marnie was the only girl in Horizon who was overtly friendly to Callie. They were both Mavericks, consumed by their extracurriculars rather than their social status, which kept them both (happily) relegated to the fringes of society; not bullied, but avoided. Callie knew they could have been great friends, if either of them had the time to actually get together more often!

‘Nah. They don’t see me that way.’

‘Yeah whatever... keep the hottest guys in school to yourself and pretend like they’re not in love with you.’ Marnie winked. ‘If that helps you sleep at night.’

Callie rolled her eyes. ‘I sleep like a rock, actually. So it must be true.’