“I hate those things,” Peter said. He took out a cigarette and lit it.
Pete wasn’t like any of the other kids in Greendale, and the boy knew it. His mother was a librarian up in Argyle, and his father was an assistant professor at Adirondack Community College, the Wilton branch. He was smart, compassionate, and above all else, not the sort of kid you might see in a town like Greendale. His parents were both doctorate holders, while Danni’s own had been nothing more than farmers. Still, though, the boy had made the stupid decision to smoke.
“Those things are going to kill you,” Danni said.
Pete smiled. His white teeth that would turn yellow if he kept smoking shined in the pale moonlight.
“If anything, I think you’re going to kill me.”
“That so?” Danni said. She walked around the car and stood next to Peter. Danni thought about grabbing Pete’s cigarette, and either throwing it into the woods or taking a whiff of it herself. He had never smoked in his life, but she knew it was a destination he would eventually reach. Everyone in Greendale smoked, and the only ones who didn’t had either lung cancer or they chewed their tobacco. Danni’s own grandmother had died of cancer. Even after having both breasts removed and part of her liver, the woman couldn’t quit. She didn’t like it when Danni pestered her about it. When you’re on death’s door and so mangled like that, well, who was Danni to deny the woman her pleasure?
“What’s going to happen to him?” Peter said, looking straight out into the woods in front of them.
Peter always liked to play the hero, always wanting to be the good guy, the kind of guy who would build a campfire and have everyone make s’mores and talk about their feelings. It was charming, but also infuriating. Matt wasn’t going to get better by people feeling sorry for him. If anything, it would do the reverse of what people wanted, and then they would pat themselves on the back while the person they “helped” was either in the same shape or worse for wear then before.
“He’ll be fine,” Danni said, hoping her voice sounded a tad bit more assertive then she felt.
A truck drove by. Danni didn’t recognize who it was, but it was from out of the county. Most of the people driving through Greendale were driving through.
Like Peter.
She wanted to ask him then. How could anyone want to ask that, to have the future crystallized and outlined before them, all of it already cased in stone?
Peter seemed to read Danni’s mind, though. He took his cigarette and threw it on the ground. Then he turned and looked at Danni, his gray eyes bright in the night.
“Last year,” he said.
High school seemed to fly right by, and it was only yesterday that the two of them started ninth grade together. Of course, back then, they had been friends, and most of the people at school still thought of them as such. They had been younger then, with hopes and dreams that seemed as boundless and free as anything that had ever existed.
But that time was coming to a close.
After this year, everything was going to change. High school was easy in retrospect compared to what came after. Danni wished it were darker out, that a cloud could cover Peter’s face when the two of them talked. Maybe then the conversation wouldn’t be real.
“You’re leaving,” Danni said.
“Greendale isn’t my town,” Peter said. “It never was.”
“Then what does that make me?” she said.
Something flashed across Peter’s face, and Danni immediately had thought to hit him right then and there. It wasn’t fair! None of it was fair. Who the hell did he think he was? Just because his parents weren’t farmers didn’t mean that he could come into someone’s life and then leave them when the time became opportunistic!
“Hey, lovebirds.”
Danni turned.
“Isn’t it past your bedtime?” she said.
Becca walked over to them. She must’ve come out of her fire escape.
Her conversation with Peter could go on hold. Hell, it might be able to go on hold for the whole senior year, and who knew how much longer after. Danni had a year to convince the boy to stay in Greendale, and Peter had a year to convince her to leave.
“How was he tonight?” she said.
It was never good to lie, in Danni’s mind, at least.
“He was fine,” Peter said.
Danni rolled her eyes.
“He had an attack,” Danni said. “I’m sure you’ll hear about it at church this weekend.”
Becca had expected as much. Danni could feel Peter’s eyes in the back of her head, but it didn’t bother her. If she couldn’t see him, then was he really mad? And for what? Telling the truth?
“How’s your mother?” Danni said, knowing full well that Peter was freaking out behind her.
“The same,” Becca said, in the nonchalant way that only people who have their own people dying near them could speak. “My dad’s getting antsy, though.”
Anything would have been a step up from Nigel.
But Dr. McCarthy seemed to have been bitten by the same bug of compassion that had gone up and infected Peter. Sure, Robbie had a bit more vested interest in wanting to save people, considering who his wife and his wife’s son were. But it was all that same bird of the same feather. Danni felt bad for all parties involved, but there wasn’t any way for her to make it better, so she kept quiet on the issues.
Peter didn’t.
“Well, I’m sure he’ll come up with something,” Peter said. “He seems like a resourceful guy.”
“Were you guys smoking?” she asked.
“Nope,” Danni said. “And even if we were, we wouldn’t give you any. You’re too young for that.”
She was too young for a lot of this.
“Fine,” she said. “How was the fair, at least?”
“Same as it is every year,” Peter said.
“So it was great,”
