CHAPTER 28

Lucy

––––––––

THIS HAS TO STOP. I don’t know how she’s doing it, but Mom is dropping me at school and picking me up every day.

“Don’t you have class or work or something?” I ask, trying to sound genuinely concerned.

“I talked to my teachers. They’re being flexible. Don’t worry about it.” She smiles at me as I unbuckle my seatbelt. “See you at three. I’ll be in front.”

I smile back at her with a sarcastic grin that says oh joy! “See you then,” I beam, faking my enthusiasm. “Can’t wait.”

“Love you,” she yells through the open window.

I love her, too, but I keep walking.

I’ve had to attend cosmetology for more than a week, and Dani is right. It’s a huge waste of time. The girls in there are superficial and annoying.

Dani doesn’t stay. I see her at lunch, and the two of us smoke weed out of her little pipe underneath the shaded stairwell. It’s something, but I haven’t been able to hang out with her or Gabe and Paco this whole time. I haven’t seen them since I was arrested. None of them got caught. Only me.

“You have to get faster,” Dani teases me as we recount the night, reliving the excitement and craziness.

There’s nothing to the story really. We were tagging FTC on a brick wall behind the grocery store, but I’ve never been arrested before, and Dani still laughs whenever she remembers my blank-face holy shit look.

“You just stood there,” she laughs through a hit, smoke forced from her lips. “I remember running like fucking crazy and looking back at you, stuck like a fucking scarecrow.”

I laugh too, because it’s funny now. But it wasn’t funny then. My stomach cinched into a thick knot when I saw those lights.

Anyway, tonight I’m going to see them. I’m sneaking out or whatever I have to do. I can’t stand it anymore.

* * *

I let the evening play out as mom expects. We eat take-out Chinese food. I act happy and clean up. But the whole time I’m tense. I eye the keys to her car lying on the entry table by our front door. Either way, I’m leaving tonight, but taking the car would be so much easier.

I make sure she’s not looking and casually slide them into the pocket of my hoodie, holding them tight so they don’t jingle.

“Okay, I’m going to bed,” I say an hour too early.

“It’s only 8 o’clock,” Mom chimes without looking away from the TV.

I’m already headed down the hall. Ruth is in Mom’s room on the computer. “I know,” I say. “I’m really tired, though. I didn’t sleep well last night. Love you, Mom.”

“Night.” Her voice muffles through my closed door.

I take a deep breath, fix my bed with pillows so it looks like I’m buried in the covers and open the window. Luckily it’s on the courtyard side of our apartment complex. All I have to do is step over my windowsill, and I’m two feet away from the stairs that lead to the parking garage.

I close the window behind me, leaving enough room for my fingers to squeeze under when I need to re-open it. Then I sneak into the garage and find the car.

I’ve driven before. A lot actually. Back home in our small town nobody cared if I took the car to the tiny market/ butcher shop. Everyone did it. But I’ve never driven in the city.

I’ll just go slow, I tell myself.

I start it up and drive the familiar Toyota onto the street.

Nothing happens. I don’t die. I don’t crash. I just park right in front of Dani’s and call her on my cell. I see her head peek through the curtains of her apartment.

“Shit!” she says to me over the phone. “You’re fucking crazy, Luce. I’m coming down right now.”

The excitement in her voice makes me smile to myself, even as I hang up. The heater blows warm air into my face, and I feel like an adult. The confidence puts me in a good mood, and I turn on some music as Dani gets in.

“Did you have to sneak out?” I ask.

“What? No. My mom doesn’t give a shit.” She shrugs. “Come on. Let’s go get the guys. It’s been forever since we all hung out.”

I drive to Gabe’s, stopping at all the red lights, pretending I’ve done it a thousand times, but there aren’t any streetlights in Massack. I’m trying to focus, but suddenly I realize Dani is telling me she had sex with Paco last night for the first time.

“Wait. What?” I ask, staring at her with a shocked smile.

“The guy knows what he’s doing, let me just say—”

“Shit!” I look up just in time to catch the gleam of red. My heart rockets into a frantic rhythm after the first sharp thrust of fear. I swerve, avoiding impact, as a black Jeep screeches and peels out feet away from my driver’s side door.

My body whips right, then left. I knock my head against the window, but I clutch the wheel in time to avoid the metal pole of the light. The car responds with a sharp zig zag that tosses me around in a rough jolting way, testing the strength of my seatbelt, but I even us out, and then I just keep driving.

Dani and I look at each other with wide wondering eyes, because we should be dead. It could have played out a thousand ways, but here we are, driving along like it never happened.

She dissolves the eerie moment with a laugh. And then I laugh. And that’s it.

When we get there Dani goes to Gabe’s door. His mother answers, and I watch through the windshield in silent curiosity. She smiles and they hug. Gabe slips through the door putting both hands on his mother’s shoulders as he passes. He heads to the car, squinting through the glare of my headlights.

I roll the window down as he approaches the driver’s side and he lowers to my level.

“Breaking more laws I see,” he says, toying with the stud below his lip as he smiles.

“I could have my license.”

“Yeah, when you’re sixteen. Isn’t your birthday in June?”

“Okay, so I could have my permit.”

“But you don’t.”

“And you do?”

“I’m eighteen. What do you think?”

I glance at Dani, who is now hanging on Paco, her arms around his neck.

“When did Paco get here?” I ask.

Gabe shrugs. “He’s always here.”

“Well, tell them to get in. Let’s go.”

“You think I’m tryin’ to get killed by some delinquent underage driver?” He slaps the door with a double tap. “Park it. Paco’s gonna want to get faded. Let’s take the bus.”

I roll my eyes but do it, secretly liking the idea. My heart still hasn’t settled after my almost-death.

Gabe’s plan is much better. We end up walking by a liquor store and Paco convinces a bum to buy us King Cobra 40s. We shove them in Gabe’s backpack until we’re on the bus, then he passes them out and we drink.

I have no idea where we’re going, but we’re on the bus for an hour and a half. Its purple seats are filthy and stained. There is clearly vomit in the back row. But the entire bus is ours, and the driver is a robot, completely ignoring our underage drinking and riotous laughter.

“I like this girl,” Paco says to Gabe, loud enough we can all hear. “She’s fucking crazy. Stealing her mom’s car and shit.”

“You like everyone when you’re drunk,” Dani laughs.

“No, I’m serious.” He straightens up, trying to look sober. “We like to do some crazy shit sometimes. If you’re going to roll with us, you can’t be a pussy.”

Gabe raises his eyebrows, warning his friend to shut it.

“Oh, what?” Paco’s belligerent tone challenges Gabe. “You can’t act like Mr. Good Boy forever Gabe. Fucking own up.”

Gabe stands and tugs on the bell string to stop the bus. I follow him off and look over my shoulder to see Paco and Dani not far behind.

I can feel the subtle tension between them, but Gabe doesn’t look or act mad.

“I think it’s this way,” he says.

We end up on a beach. Shoes and socks immediately come off. The sand is cold between my toes as we walk, and the rush of freedom gives every detail a magical quality. The black cloak of night sky, the cold misty air, the lacquered shine of the sea.

Paco and Dani get lost up ahead in the veil of the lightless shore, but I can hear her shrieking laughter like a shrill bird.

Gabe searches for them, standing on tiptoes and craning his neck as if that will give him some sort of advantage against the night. I sit on the chilled sand, forgetting the others and dig my fingers into the tiny dunes as Gabe sits next to me. Not too close but within reach.

“Paco is right about me you know,” he says as we listen to the crash and shatter of waves. “You should stay away, Luz. I have a bad habit of chasing my brother’s ghost. It gets me into trouble.”

He stares straight ahead as if considering the beckoning rhythm of the ocean, but I look right at him. He rests his forearms on his bent knees, hands loosely clasped. Maybe it’s the buzz of the beer or how comfortable I’ve grown around him, but it’s like I can feel his kindness. Call it a vibe, his aura, whatever, but he puts me at ease. Something I never thought I’d feel around a boy ever again.

“You’re not a bad guy, Gabe. Trust me. I can tell.”

“I try not to be.”

I wait for him to move the conversation forward. We’re alone. He’s got things he wants to tell me. I know it.

He doesn’t, though. We just sit and watch the water roll in and out like sheets of obsidian. The peacefulness between us stirs up my crush on him as I sit and think about the two of us together. I wonder if I really do like him or if I’m just desperate to prove myself wrong about men. Maybe this one won’t hurt me or disappoint me or abandon me. I think about Angel and my dad, who hasn’t called to talk to me. Not even once.

The alcohol makes me brazen. “Why haven’t you told me you like me?”

I hear him sigh, and immediately know it’s true.

“Like I said, I’m not good for you. I’ve got things I need to do. I can’t let it go.”

“What, like Mendoza?”

He looks at me through the moonlight, eyebrows turned down with a regretful sadness.

“My family is close,” he says. “I don’t know if yours is the same, but imagine if someone killed your sister. Could you just let it go? Could you just let them get away with it?”

Ruth and I fight, but she’s closer to me than anyone, in a secret, silent way that comes from sharing dark moments. She’s the person I cling to when things in our life begin to shift and break around us. She was the only one there for me on Daddy’s drunken nights, when voices and cackling laughter floated down the hallway to our rooms with a cloud of cigarette smoke. Or when Mom forgot to call to tell us she wasn’t coming home until 4 a.m. because she’d lost herself to the hypnotic lure of the casino. But Ruth was there. Always Ruth, to whisper promises that it would be okay in the morning, to take me into her warm bed, and hush away the fear until I could sleep.

“No,” I answer, understanding him completely. “I couldn’t let it go.”

The air changes between us, becoming charged with the truth of his feelings for me. And mine for him.

He turns toward me, leaning in a little, so I can see the soft searching gaze in his eyes. “It doesn’t mean I don’t think about it. About you.”

I let go of a trapped breath, held completely still as he moves closer. My buzz is making me flushed and nervous, but brave. I wait for the kiss, wanting so badly to not feel the panic rising. I wish away Angel’s eyes and the feel of his harsh mouth pushing too hard against mine.

But Gabe is gentle, our lips hardly touch at first. He waits until I kiss him back. Then he presses closer but just enough, and every movement feels choreographed and smooth, like bare skin and silk sheets.

I enjoy it, but the beer on our breath reminds me of a different moment and I gasp away. It’s not what I want to do or how I want to feel, but the damage done to me is haunting and always fresh in my mind.

He pulls away confused and somewhat wounded.

“I shouldn’t have—”

“It’s not you,” I interrupt, desperate for him to understand. “I want to like you. I do like you. I’m just fucked up. I’ve got issues.”

“Like Angel?”

My head whips to the side so I’m staring him down again, suspicious and defensive.

“How do you know about that?”

“I heard every word you said that night. Dani thought you just went nuts, but I listened. I don’t know who the fuck he is or what he did to you, but if you want me to, I’ll kill him.”

I laugh at first, not knowing if he’s trying to diffuse tension or if he’s completely serious.

“I know people,” he says, and I stop laughing. “My brother was in Crazy Eights.”

“What’s that? A gang?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you in it?”

“Fuck no. There’s a reason they’re called Crazy Eights. They’re fucking crazy.”

“Well I don’t want you to kill Angel. I want to forget him,” I say, thinking I should stop talking about it, but the beer makes me too honest. Too open. “I see him all the time. Every time anyone gets close to me. Every time someone touches my arm or brushes past me. Even when Dani tries to play with my hair I cringe inside.”

“I won’t touch you if you don’t want me to,” he whispers, slowly leaning back.

I can’t let my past ruin me, I tell myself as I push past my comfort zone and move to sit on his lap. I straddle him with my legs wrapped around his waist so we’re facing each other.

“I do want you to,” I say, breathing hard as nerves and the rush of our bodies touching test my urge to pull away. “I want to like it. Help me like it.”