keys to the Honda and shouting to Mom that I’d be back by curfew and pushing Polka back in the front door with my foot because he wanted to go out so bad and there was no way I was taking him. Then I was in the car driving to Madrona in the chilly night.
The lights were on in Noel’s kitchen. Through the windows I could see his mom and stepdad doing dishes and wiping down the countertops. The little girls’ rooms in the front of the upstairs were dark, though, and Noel’s lights were out as well, except for the glow from his computer monitor.
I couldn’t ring the bell. Couldn’t just make small talk with his parents and ask if I could come in after all this time without seeing them.
And I couldn’t call. No cell.
So I scootched my bag underneath the porch and climbed the rose trellis on the side of the house up to the porch roof. I edged along it until Noel’s window was in front of me, and then, feeling kind of stalkerish and dumb but also like a girl in a movie about love, I felt around for a pebble to toss at the glass.
No pebbles. I was on the roof.
I felt in the rain gutter.
Nothing but some truly disgusting sludge.
What was I thinking? Of course there were no pebbles on the roof.
I picked at the shingles, hoping a bit of one would come off in my hand.
No luck.
Aha! Tums.
I had a small roll of antacid tablets in the front pocket of my jeans, left over from the misguided ingestion of two cappuccinos in a fifteen-minute period.
I took out a Tum and threw it at Noel’s window.
He didn’t answer.
I threw another Tum.
And another.
And another.
Tum. Tum. Tum. Tum.
Ag. I suddenly got worried that maybe Tums were toxic to birds or squirrels and I was inadvertently poisoning the small-animal population of Madrona.
I collected as many as Tums as I could find from where they’d fallen on the roof, then knocked on Noel’s window.
Looking in, I saw he wasn’t answering because he had headphones on. He was clicking back and forth between his e-mail and iTunes, tapping his fingers on the edge of his keyboard now and then.
He was wearing pajamas.
I had never seen Noel in pajamas.
Actually, they were blue and white striped pajama pants and a white T-shirt so thin and faded you could practically see through it.
I knocked harder, and he turned around.
He stared at me.
I stared at him.
He bolted out of his room.
Where had he gone?
Was he going to tell his parents I was on the roof?
No, he would never do that.
Was he angry I had come?
Was I being a stalker?
Had he left because he couldn’t deal with seeing me?
Should I just go home?
Would I die trying to climb down the rose trellis?
I was turning to attempt it when Noel came back.
He was wearing jeans and waving something at me.
A toothbrush.
He opened the window, leaned out, and before I could even speak—he kissed me. His mouth was cold and minty. I kissed him back and felt dizzy and clutched the edge of the windowsill. He kept kissing me, and I kept kissing him and I was so happy. Then he climbed out the window and we sat on the porch roof with our backs against the house and he waved his toothbrush again.
“You went to brush your teeth,” I said. “You kept me waiting on your roof in the cold so you could brush your teeth.”
