'Sure. Summer place?'
'Uh-huh.'
'You don't sound too happy.'
'I'm not. They call me at school and tell me they've got this
wonderful place lined up for the summer. I drive up and here it is.
On the way up everything has been shrinking--trees, houses, shrubs. So
I wonder if I'm not shrinking too. This town's a little dull.'
'Tell me about it.'
pulled the car out into the road. I'd never felt the least bit guilty
about not going to college. I still didn't, not exactly, but it was
getting close to that.
'You do, though, right?'
I am fabulous at conversation.
'Pine Manor over in Chestnut Hill. My last year. Steven goes to
Harvard, and Kimberley's with me only a year behind, and her major's
French. Mine's Physical Anthropology. I'll do field work in another
year if I want to bother.'
'Do you?'
'So far. Sure. Why not. Don't you get bored?'
'Huh?'
'Don't you get bored around here?'
'Often.'
'What do you do?'
'For a living?'
'I mean to kill the tedium.'
'Oh, this and that. I see the beach a lot.'
'I bet you do.'
The road was narrow and twisting but I knew it blind by now, sc it was
easy to keep an eye on her. There was a small patch of sane on her
shoulder. I wanted to brush it off, just for the excuse to toucf her.
She sat very low in the seat. She really was in terrific physical
condition. Just one thin line where the flesh had to buckle at the
stomach. She smelled lightly of dampness. Sweat and seawater.
'Your car?' I asked her. 'It runs pretty good.'
'No.'
'Your dad's?'
'No.'
'Whose, then?'
She shrugged, telling me it didn't matter. 'Is this your town? You've
lived here all your life and all?'
'Me and my father both.'
'You like it?'
'Not much.'
'Then why stick around?'
'Inertia, I guess. Nothing ever came along to move me out.'
'Would you like to have something come along and move you out?'
'Never thought about it. I don't know.'
'So think about it. What if something did? Would you want that?'
'You want me to think about it right now?'
'You going anywhere?'
'No.'
So I did. It was a hell of an odd question right off the bat like that
but I gave it some thought. And while I was doing that I was wondering
why she'd asked.
'I guess I might. Yeah.'
'Good.'
'Why good?'
'You're cute.'
'So?'
'So I couldn't be bothered if you were stupid.'
There wasn't much to say to that. The road wound by. I watched her
staring out the window. The sun was going down. There were bright
streaks of red in her hair. The line of neck to shoulder was very soft
and graceful.
We were coming into town. Willoughby was just on the outskirts, the
closest thing we could claim to a grouping of 'better' houses.
'You'd better pull up here.'
'You're not going home?'
She laughed. 'Not in this. Pull up here.'
I thought she meant the bathingsuit, that her parents were strict about
that. It was pretty skimpy. I pulled the car off to the shoulder and
cut the engine. I reached for the keys.
'Leave them.'
She opened the door and stepped out.
'I don't get it. What are you going to do about the car?'
She was already walking away. I slammed the door and caught up with
her.
'I'm going to leave it here.'
'With keys in the ignition?'
'Sure.'
Suddenly it dawned on me.
'I think you'd better tell me your name. So I know where to send them
when they come for me.'
She laughed again. 'Casey Simpson White. Seven Willoughb, Lane. And
it will be my first offense. How about you?'
'Clan Thomas. I've been up against it before, I guess.'
'What for?'
'They got me once when I was five. Me and another kid set fin to his
backyard with a can of lighter fluid. That was one thing.'
'There's more?'
'A little later, yeah. Nothing glamorous as auto theft, though You
wouldn't be interested.'
I grabbed her arm. I could still feel the adrenaline churning. I
