CHAPTER 27
EMILY
Let me count the ways this was awkward. I had been caught snooping by a security system that automatically called the LAPD. I was wearing sweaty dance clothes that were wet between the legs from a hot frisking that made me wish I had a weapon. Carter was mad at me for good reason, but I had no idea what his relationship with these people was so I had no idea what to say or not. And most important, my stomach growled loudly enough to wake the dead.
Carter’s mother kept her hand on my elbow and led me through the living room, with a leather couch and mission-era coffee table, skirting a TV room with a flat-screen and old fabric couches, to the kitchen, where a nook was set up for dinner. She clapped her hands once, the rings on her fingers clicking together.
“You’re not one of those vegans, are you?”
“No.”
“Because I can work around that.”
“I eat anything, actually.”
“Phin!” Carter’s mother called. The boy who had been looking out the window flopped in with the grace of the newly adolescent. He had freckles and big green eyes. “This is your father’s stalker,” she continued.
Phin put out his hand, and I shook it. “Nice to meet you. I’m kind of a stalker too.”
“I’m not . . . Wait. What?”
I didn’t like being called a stalker, but I’d earned the label. This kid, on the other hand, didn’t look like much of a danger to anyone.
Carter spoke from the doorway. “That’s not funny, Phinnaeus.”
Phin reached for a plate, and his grandmother laid silverware on it. He put out the setting with clicks and clatters while Carter leaned on the doorjamb with his arms crossed.
I mouthed an apology.
He shrugged. I got the uncomfortable feeling that eating with his family gained me zero points. It may have earned me negative points, actually. I was fully and illegally encroaching. Despite the warm hospitality of his family, I was unwanted in that house.
Well, no doubt I’d earned the discomfort by ripping a page from the book of Epic Stupid. Best to just take my licks.
Mom pulled Carter into the room. Phin slid into the nook, Carter opposite him. Mom next to Phin, and apparently I was to sit next to Carter.
It was tight, to say the least.
“Grandma says the dining room table is too far away,” Phin said as his grandmother dumped white rice onto his plate. “It’s a pain to clean off.”
“Call me Brenda.”
Carter pointed his fork at the kid. “Clearing the table is your job.”
“Not if he has homework. Do you like chicken, dear?”
“Please.”
I sat as far to the edge as I could, but my arm was a quarter inch from Carter’s. I could barely breathe without touching him. He had his own side for a reason. He took up most of the bench.
“So, what’s with the getup?” Phin indicated my little shorts and crop top. “You come right from the gym?”
“No. From work.”
“Got any pets?”
I opened my mouth to answer, but Carter interrupted.
“Don’t answer any personal questions.” Carter addressed me but stared pointedly at Phin. “The little hacker’s looking for open doors. Ways to figure out your passwords.”
Phin rolled his eyes. “I’m totally white hat, first of all.”
I didn’t want to interfere with this dinner and then close myself off, even if the little hacker was going to use every bit of intel to pry password clues out of me.
“The pet situation is in flux. I’m dressed like this because I’m a dancer and a choreographer.”
“Cool. What kind of dance?”
“Contemporary. Jazz. Whatever we need. I mostly work with a pop star on her acts.” I glanced at Carter to see if he wanted to add who we worked for or whether or not we worked together. He didn’t add a word.
“When did you start?”
I’d worked with kids his age before, and they were usually more interested in talking about themselves than asking questions.
“I was a gymnast first. Then I injured my knee.”
“Bummer. Was it bad?”
He shoveled rice and chicken into his mouth as if he hadn’t eaten in days.
“Yeah. I tore my right meniscus, which—”
Phin dropped his fork and held up his hands. “No, no. The empathy. Ah . . .”
Carter broke in. “Phin asks about injuries, then gets empathetic pain.”
“It’s not pain,” Phin said with a shudder. “It’s like whatever body part you’re talking about gets this weird feeling.” He shuddered again and picked up his fork.
“Well.” I smiled. “Medical school is out of the question.”
Carter and his mother laughed.
“Speaking of school,” Carter said, “how was it today?”
Phin told us about his day, from getting on the bus in the morning to an after-school White Hat Club meeting.
I felt Carter at my side, his shirt brushing against my bare arm when he moved his fork and knife across his chicken. I was painfully aware that I’d wronged him and that it wouldn’t be forgotten. This dinner could be the last together. I’d blown it, for sure. He’d made a choice to conceal his family, but in the end he had nothing to hide.
Phin had his knee on the seat while he ate, then he put it down, seesawed his fork, twiddled with the hot-sauce container, snapped and tapped, interjected jokes, and pointed fingers when he agreed.
“You’re cool for a stalker,” he said.
“She’s not a stalker.” Carter had a dad voice that made even me sit up straighter.
“What is she?”
“I’m more of a lurker.”
“Can I tell my friends we had a lurker over for dinner?” he asked Carter.
“No.”
“Cleanup time,” Brenda said. “Let’s get the show on the road.”
I picked up my plate, but Phin took it. “Me and Grandma clean up on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. It’s like a rule.”
“The rule is you clean up,” Carter interjected. “Your grandmother has a soft heart.”
“I want it done this year, is all. And please, say Brenda. Not ‘grandmother.’”
Phin rolled his eyes as he stacked the plates. While they were both at the dishwasher arguing about the best way to fill it, I turned to Carter and spoke softly.
“He’s a great kid.”
“Yeah.”
“You’re secretive because you want to protect him.”
He touched his nose with his fingertip.
“And when I came here, I put that in jeopardy.”
He touched my nose with his fingertip.
“I’m sorry.”
He finished his water and put it down deliberately.
“Do you like tomatoes?”
“Sure.”
“Come.”
I glanced over at Brenda. She gave me the shoo sign.
I slid out of the booth, and Carter led me to the back door. He punched some numbers into a little panel by the door and joined me on the back deck. The yard was bigger than mine but not immense. A garage to the left. A soccer pitch to the right. A thick sycamore tree and a tire at the end of a rope. He led me deep into the shadows in the back of the yard.
“I can smell the garden,” I said. He pulled me into him and kissed me in the dark. Caught off guard, I stiffened, but he persisted. I melted for him again. My muscles worked with his movement, going pliable against him. In the silence and passion of that kiss, he forgave me. Accepted me. Drew me inside his world.
When I opened my eyes, I’d adjusted to the light.
“Now I want to tell you everything,” he whispered.
“I’ll listen.”
“You’ve got to be freezing.” He ran his fingers over my bare arms, and they broke out in tingling bumps. “You’re half-naked.”
“I’m completely covered. And it’s May.”
“Speaking of the season, my mother grows these like nobody’s business.”
Against the fence stood a raised bed with lush tomato plants. Even in the dimming light, the colored dots of fruit were visible.
“Do you have a preference?” he asked, bending down and moving leaves away. “We have orange, yellow, plum, beefsteak I think. I don’t know what the hell else she has back here.”
He plucked a huge red and orange tomato from the vine. It was as big as his palm, and when I took it, my arm dropped. It had to weigh two pounds.
“This is going to last me a week.”
“It’s a gift so you don’t get insulted when I walk you around the side.”
“I’m not insulted.”
“Phin needs routines. We try to disrupt them as little as possible.”
“It’s okay.”
“If you go back in, he’ll find a way to engage you, and he’ll break his routine.”
“I have my car key.” I wiggled my little coil bracelet with the key on the end. “I can just go.”
“Where’s the car?”
“Down the block. I was trying to be stealthy.”
He kissed me tenderly, letting his lips linger on mine.
“I’ll walk you.”
He laced his fingers in mine and took me around the side of the house, past hockey sticks and a folded goal and a skateboard.
“He’s really into sports.” I pointed to a basketball hoop on wheels.
“Not really. That was me trying to get him to play something. The only things he wants to do are code video games and make computer art.”
He let me through the side gate, and we joined hands again at the sidewalk.
“Hey, Emily!” Phin called from the porch.
“Good night,” I called back.
The kid ran down the steps and held up a little blue thumb drive. “I made this. It’s fun.”
He tossed it and I caught it.
“Thanks.”
He suddenly looked timid, as if he’d stepped over a line.
“Size of my heart.” Carter held up a fist.
Phin relaxed and held up his fist. “Size of mine.” They bumped. He bounded up the steps and closed the door behind him.
“What was that?” I asked. “The fist thing?”
“It’s a stupid way of measuring things that can’t be measured.”
I rolled the USB drive between two fingers.
“Love?”
“Yeah.” He cleared his throat and looked at the sidewalk.
“Are you embarrassed to talk about it?”
He shrugged. “It’s love. It’s, you know, girlie and squishy. He and I eat bark. We’re ultramen.”
I laughed.
“Should I be afraid of this?” I held up the little USB drive before tucking it between my thumb and the tomato as we walked.
“Probably blow a hole right through your system.”
“Can I ask about his mother?”
I didn’t expect him to answer right away, but I didn’t expect him to stay silent all the way back to the car. I unlocked it with a chirp, and he opened the driver’s side door for me. I put the tomato and Phin’s gift on the dash. He closed the door without saying good-bye.
Wow. I’d really screwed that up. I even asked if I could ask, yet . . .
He rapped his knuckle on the passenger window, and I let myself breathe in relief before I unlocked the doors.
He slid in. “You asked about his mother.”
“You don’t have to answer.”
He started talking before I even finished.
“His mother was a fuckup. First-class. I shouldn’t say that, you know? What happened to her wasn’t her fault, and I should keep it civil. But that was how I felt, and I can’t pretend otherwise. Some days I get really pissed off, but there’s no point, because I love him. He’s mine . . . my responsibility . . . and I’m not going to blame a dead woman for giving him to me. I should thank her.”
He was so conflicted and raw that all my questions seemed trivial. Were they married? Were they even together? How did she die? And when?
“He seems like a great kid.”
“He is. He’s like her in a lot of ways.”
“Did you love her?” The question came out before I thought about it, and I regretted it before it was even out of my mouth.
“Very much.”
He’d loved a fuckup. I couldn’t imagine the Carter I knew loving anything but clear-cut responsibility and accountability, but long ago, over lunch, he’d admitted to being a troublemaker. Maybe she belonged to that part of his life.
“I’m being a buzzkill.” He took my hand and squeezed it. “I should be feeling you up right now.”
“You can feel me up on our date if you still want.”
“Saturday.”
“Saturday.”
“I should go back inside. I’m sorry I dumped all that on you.”
“You can dump anytime.”
The dome light went on when he opened the door. He didn’t get out. He looked at our clasped hands and brushed my finger with his thumb.
“I don’t know what it is about you. You made me dance. You stalked my house. I would have killed Vince over what he did to you. I haven’t done that in a long time. Haven’t talked about Phin’s mother like that to anyone. I feel stupid, but at the same time . . . I’m kind of relieved.”
“You’re a basket of contradictions.”
He smiled and kissed me, putting his hands on my face as if memorizing the shape.
“Promise me you’ll go right home and lock the gate behind you.”
“I promise.”
“And call me when you’re on your street.”
“All right.”
“I’m calling Fabian to lock you in.”
He got out, and when he closed the door, he knocked on my window. I rolled it down.
“Fabian doesn’t have to lock me in,” I said.
“I know. But he’s there already.” He reached in and locked my door, then stepped back and pivoted his wrist in a circle, meaning “Roll up the window.”
I did and he waved, watching me drive away.