period and made it to the front of the school. Johnny was leaning against his Jetta, utterly disregarding the signs screaming NO PARKING! in the fire lane. He bought me a cheeseburger this time, more curly fries, and a Coke. He sucked on a strawberry milkshake, and said he wasn’t hungry.
We sat on the hood of his car again, in the same spot overlooking the valley, and talked about nothing all afternoon. It was nice to talk to someone who actually
The sun tended westward, and the wind’s rasping moan settling drifts of hot dust over the valley wasn’t nearly as creepy when there was someone’s voice to shut it out. We lay back on the hood and looked up at the liquid movement of light through the branches, and when he kissed me he didn’t take his shades off. But I didn’t mind. I didn’t even mind that I probably reeked of cheeseburger.
He even listened while he kissed. I can’t describe it better than that. He braced himself on his elbow and his other hand didn’t roam, just resting fingertips lightly along my jawline and occasionally dipping down to the curve of my throat where my pulse spiked frantically toward him. I bonked my cheekbone on his shades and laughed with a mouth full of him, and he laughed too. He tasted like strawberry milkshake, and he smelled like peppermints and desire and hot sun and clean clothes. He bit my bottom lip very gently, then kissed me harder.
It was so different from making out with the ugly friend of Gwyn’s current conquest in the front seat while the golden people heavy-petted in the roomy back seat.
We separated, and I still couldn’t see his eyes. “You wear those all the time?” I reached up, as if I was going to take his shades off, but he moved subtly back and I got the hint.
“Not all the time. Listen, I have some work that needs to be done. How about I take you out tonight? I’ll wait at the end of your road.”
My heart was pounding. I probably should have asked some questions, but I was tired of asking questions. I was tired of waiting. The air was bright and golden with pollen and dust, and I wanted to kiss the corner of his mouth again. His skin was smooth, a different texture. Like heavy silk, or something else matte and perfect.
He wasn’t too perfect, though. He wasn’t one of
“Okay.” Getting out of the house wasn’t going to be a problem, not with Dad working. I could be gone after dinner, and he’d never know. He’d probably think I was out with Gwyneth, unless she was calling again. “Where are we going?”
“Does it matter?” He laughed, and touched my cheek. The gentle flutter of fingertips spilled all the way through me, a tide of heat.
I should have cared. But I didn’t. I let Johnny take me home, and I even kissed him goodbye. We didn’t say we were together or anything. I didn’t think we needed to.
If I’d known, I probably would have made something nicer for dinner. But I was in a hurry, so it was Hamburger Helper. Dad chowed down silently. I’d even ironed his workshirts, and he had one on. “Late tonight,” he grunted as he stamped out the door.
“Yes, Daddy.”
The thought of being seen with Johnny, maybe by Gwyn and Mitzi if they didn’t have another party to go to, made me laugh out loud while I cleaned up the kitchen. I even put on Gwyn’s black silk shirt again. He probably wouldn’t care what I wore. And dammit, she probably owed me the shirt. She could always buy another twenty of them.
The good mood lasted until I tried to shave my legs and cut a gash in my leg with the cheap-ass razor. I bled all over the bathtub while the sun went down, and all of a sudden I was sure he wouldn’t show up. I’d wait out there in Gwyneth’s shirt and my school skirt and feel like an idiot.
I stopped and put my sweating forehead on my knees. In summer, the tepid water that squeezed out of our ancient plumbing was pretty much a blessing. Right now I was thinking it would do me good. The wind licked the sides of our trailer, and I surprised myself by laughing again, a hard jagged sound.
If he didn’t show up, I would know. And I’d call Gwyneth. And forgive her.
But if he did, I’d be ready.
It was a tinderbox night, the kind that usually starts with heat lightning and ends with a fire out in the hills and everyone jumpy. The Bleu was packed. It always was, even on school nights. I didn’t mind, and Johnny didn’t seem to either. We were glued to each other in the middle of the crowded dance floor. It was dripping hot, everyone breathing on everyone else, glowsticks flashing and the lights smearing over blank young faces.
The music hit a thumping groove and stayed there for a long time. It was like swimming next to someone else’s body. Johnny held me, and I got flashes of peppermint and clean heat whenever he leaned in.
Losing yourself in the middle of a mass of kids is easy. Losing yourself with someone else, that’s hard. We made up a little private universe in the middle of the dance floor. When the lights went out, the only illumination was from the glowsticks and the sheen of sweat, and Johnny nuzzled along my neck. He had swept my hair aside and his chest was against my back. I tilted my chin up when his fingertips pressed gently, and his other arm turned hard across my waist.
His breath was hot on my skin, and I melted into him. I thought he was just giving me a hickey, but a weird thing happened.
Johnny tensed behind me. The music thundered, some singer wailing over the top about a missionary man, and a spot of heat began in my throat. It flushed down my entire body like lava running down a hillside, working inward from my skin and settling in the pit of my belly. Pounding bass drew it deeper and deeper, through my bones and down into the core of me, and the entire club went dark red. Like how you close your eyes against a searchlight and your eyelids turn everything into a crimson haze. The throbbing of my heart melted into the bass and slowed down, my hips jerked forward, and everything inside me exploded.
In the Bleu with the music going full-bore, nobody can hear you scream. Nobody can hear when everything inside you gets smashed. And nobody sees if you’re dragged outside by a boy in a white shirt, darkness smeared on his lips and his shades on even in the middle of the night.
I huddled against the car door. He turned the engine off and sudden silence filled the interior. We sat there for a little while, the wind scouring at the respectable paint job.
“It’s not like you’ve been told,” he repeated. “Forget all that. Just think about it this way: I’m Fate. And I’m choosing you.
My throat hurt. I clutched the rough paper towel to the side of my neck. It was damp, but I couldn’t tell if it was with sweat or … something else. I had to swallow twice before I could talk.
“Why me?” The words were husks of themselves.
“You said it yourself. You’re not one of them. And we get lonely, those of us out in the cold.” He measured off spaces on the steering wheel with his fingers. Measured them again, like he expected them to change. “You can
I swallowed again. It felt like I had strep or something. My fingers were numb, even though the air pressed, crackling and electric-hot against my sweat-wet skin.
Then I asked the million-dollar question. “How?”
He smiled at me, and took his shades off. The red glow was vanishing, drawn back into the whites of his eyes in thin threads. His irises were dark now, like the first night I met him. “Are you sure you want to?”
I set my chin stubbornly. “First tell me how.”
“All you have to do is give me a present, sweetheart. It’s not so hard.”
“It’s not money.” He reached over and took my hand, and I didn’t pull away. His skin was dry and warm, normal against mine.
Then he told me. I went cold all over. Ice crackled and settled over me, ground itself together in my heart.
“I do that, and then what?”
“Then you come with me. And there’s a whole world out there for us. I won’t be lonely, and you won’t ever have to worry again.”
