She knew he loved her. He sent her the MP3. He wouldn’t have done that if he wasn’t planning to meet her.
Of course her dad found out and took the MP3 player. He even read their e-mails!
Her face flamed as she thought of that.
“Summer?”
She looked in the direction of the voice. A middle-aged guy was making his way through the restaurant toward her.
“Are you Summer?” he asked.
“Uh-huh.” She waited for him to come up to her. He was breathing through his mouth and sweating from the heat. He wasn’t much taller than she was and looked a little like Mr. Murray, who taught fifth-period math.
“I’m a friend of James. He got tied up and couldn’t make it, so he asked me to pick you up.” The man added, “I bet you’re thinking you shouldn’t go with me, but really, it’s all right. James is staying with me while he’s here.”
“You’re Dale?”
He looked surprised. “He mentioned me? Well, that’s cool. All he’s been talking about is Summer Summer Summer. I didn’t think he’d even mention me.” He smiled. His smile was so homely, it made her feel good. “Let’s go rustle up old Jamie.”
She followed him through the parking lot to a white GEO Prizm—not exactly what she’d been dreaming of.
He held the car door open for her, and for a moment she almost balked. Technically, he was a stranger. But if she didn’t go with him, it would all be for nothing. She wouldn’t get to go on her date.
Plus, James had mentioned Dale.
Dale was looking at her, frowning a little. As if he thought she didn’t trust him, and this disappointed him.
She got in.
They pulled out of the parking lot and drove south on Swan. She was aware that he kept sneaking peeks at her. She knew she looked good in her denim skirt and her pink peasant top; getting looked at was nothing unusual. “Why couldn’t James come?” she asked him.
“He’s working on his folks’ motor home. The air conditioner is on the fritz.”
“His parents are here too?”
“Yeah. They’re good friends of mine. That’s how I got to know Jamie. He was the one who got me into dirt bikes.”
James had told her that he raced dirt bikes. He also loved to hike and camp. They had that in common; when her parents were still together, they had a camper and would go all over the place.
But now she had another worry. James’s parents. What if they thought she was too young? What if they called her mom? Worse, her dad? She thought about this as they drove. Pretty soon she noticed they were driving through an ugly area, past a big electric plant. Dale glanced at her. “Almost there.”
He turned onto the Old Benson Highway. This was a scrubby part of town—desert, old motels, and mobile home sales. She wondered why James would stay way out here.
They drove past motels with western names, crummy old places with peeling walls and rusty signs. Past a vacant lot that seemed to go on forever. The headlights picked out the desert broom that grew alongside the road. Her mom had a constant battle with the stuff in their little yard of the new townhouse.
“Here we are,” Dale said.
A weathered sign under a light on a tall pole said, EL RANCHO TRAILER COURT. Dale turned onto a narrow lane between two rows of trailers jam-packed together.
“He’s staying
“It’s close to the airport.”
Gravel popped off the GEO’s tires as they drove slowly up the lane. The trailers looked dented and ancient—one of them had painted-over windows and was the color of dried blood.
That carnival ride thrill again, only this time it didn’t feel so good.
She glanced at Dale. He was humming a tune under his breath, like he was the happiest man in the world.
The window shades of the trailers they passed were all pulled down, dim light seeping out from underneath, flickering blue. She pictured hillbillies in their underwear watching TV and drinking beer in front of an electric fan. They drove by a dead palm that looked like a witch’s broomstick, and stopped behind a motor home parked at the end of the lane.
“Here we are,” Dale said.
Suddenly she felt queasy. James was going to college in the fall. He owned an expensive sports car. His father was a surgeon. What were James’s parents doing in a place like this, when they could have stayed at one of the inns by the airport?
“Come on,” Dale said, getting out. He came around to her side and opened the door.
At least the motor home looked good. Clean-looking. New tires. That dispelled some of her worries. The other thing that made her feel better was, for some reason, THE ROPERS wheel cover under the back window. It had to be James’s last name. She tried it on for size. James Roper.
And she liked the curtains in the window. Not blinds, but lace curtains. Something a mom might make. James’s mom?
