Chapter 10
The shower felt good. The clean clothes felt even better. Dressed in white shorts and a soft, flowing barely pink top with spaghetti straps and knitting at the top, Sage set about getting the sewing machine untangled from its current resting place. First to come out of the closet was a sack of fabric that was really tiny pieces that might only be used on some quilt some day because they weren’t big enough to be used for much else.
A small box of thread and notions followed. She set that on her bed, hoping there would be some thread that matched or at least complimented her imagined creation. Crazy how at one time she had enjoyed this outlet so much and how it had somehow gotten lost in the busyness of her life.
Finally she reached the sewing machine and carefully pulled it free. It was older than hers but looked roughly similar. Yes. This would be perfect for her project. Luke’s project. She smiled at that. It would be nice to do something for him after he had been so nice to her. Safe.
Funny how when she thought of him, that word kept coming back to her. Just as she was dragging the card table out from its hiding place to the side of the closet, she heard her cell phone chime. Abandoning the task, she hopped over to the desk and retrieved it, realizing there was a message in the text. However, the call took precedence. She answered it. “Hello?”
“’Bout time you answer that thing. Where have you been?”
The onslaught was so abrupt that Sage shook her head to fend it off. “Been?”
“I’ve called like three times in the last fifteen minutes.”
Finally her sanity kicked back in. Rory. “Oh, I’m sorry. I was taking a shower. I guess I didn’t check my phone when I got out.”
“Well,” he said, not sounding particularly happy, “I was wondering if you wanted to go with me. I just got invited to this party over in Greely. My cousin’s best friend’s something or other. Anyway, if you’re gonna go, I need to be picking you up in like 15.”
In panic, Sage looked down at herself. “Minutes?”
“Yes minutes.”
Fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes. Who could get ready for a party in 15 minutes? “Uh, well, I have to ask. I can’t just leave.”
Rory sighed as if she was killing the mood or his desire to even spend the energy on her. “Well, can you hurry it up? I need to know what I’m doing.”
“Uh, yeah. Sure. Uh. Just a minute.” When she pulled the phone from her ear, Sage debated about just shutting it off. However, he sounded angry enough with her as it was, she didn’t want to do anything to make him really mad. Gently she set the phone on the desk and went out to the kitchen.
There she found both her father and her stepmother. They were talking about stocks or some portfolio something. Dragging her courage to her, she breached the little opening from the dimness of the hallway into the kitchen light. “Uh,” she said by way of hoping to snag their attention. “Hm.”
They both looked her direction, and their conversation slammed to a stop.
She laughed softly at how quaking her insides felt. “Um, Rory is on the phone.” Nodding back to her room, she put her hands behind her back. “He wants to know if I can go to a party with him tonight.”
Her father looked to her stepmother, and she knew she’d better do some fast talking before they torpedoed the idea.
“It’s at his cousin’s place. Kind of a family thing, I think. He needs to know like now because he’s leaving in a few minutes.”
Another silent conversation passed between them.
Finally, her stepmother leaned against the counter and folded her arms. “And this is just coming up now?”
How to answer that? Sage shrugged. “He just called. I didn’t know anything about it until a few minutes ago.”
“I don’t know,” her stepmom said. “Greely? That’s not exactly close.”
“But I haven’t gotten to see him all week, and you said I was ungrounded today. Please!” She so hated whining, but it seemed inevitable in this quasi-parental situation.
A moment and her stepmother wavered, shook her head, and went back to her cooking.
“Okay,” her father said, “but curfew is midnight. No exceptions.”
Sage nodded. “No exceptions. Got it.” She raced back and grabbed up the phone. “I can be ready in ten minutes.”
“Make it eight. I’m nearly to your place.”
With that, he hung up, and Sage squealed, some out of excitement, some out of panic. Eight minutes. Eight minutes. She ran to her luggage, realizing that at this rate she might as well unpack it. She wasn’t going anywhere any time soon anyway. However, that would have to wait. Yanking out her white capris, she switched out her pants and decided the top would have to do.
Make-up! Oh, and shoes!
Her body was going six directions at once as she waved her magic wand and got herself together. In fact, by the time Rory honked out front, all she had to do was grab up the cell phone and run. Some things were worth hurrying for.
Luke considered calling her but decided not to. He didn’t want to push his luck, and he figured the text was already doing that. So after a little X-Box and supper, he grabbed the summer reading book de jour, figuring now was as good a time as any to get started on it.
Hopping into Rory’s truck was always something of a trick, and the fact that he didn’t move from the driver’s seat to help her in didn’t make it any easier. Still, it was nice to be sprung from solitary, and spending some time with a handsome guy couldn’t be all bad.
“’Bout time.” He gave her a once-over that didn’t look overly pleased.
Sage’s confidence plummeted as she looked down at herself. “Sorry. You kind of caught me off-guard.”
Rory shook his head and spun the wheel to exit the driveway. “It’s Saturday night. What? Did you think we wouldn’t have plans?”
Well, it would’ve been nice to know we had plans before ten minutes ago. “I don’t know. I guess I hadn’t really thought about it.”
“Yeah, well, whatever. You’re here. I’m here. Let’s make the best of it.”
Wow. That sounded so incredibly romantic. Then again, she hadn’t returned his calls, and she hadn’t even thought to contact him today. This probably was more her fault than his. Thinking she should check her cell in case someone else had called, she pulled it out and slid her finger around for the passcode. In seconds the welcome screen came up.
Rory.
Rory.
Rory.
And then her heart snagged. She opened the message and very nearly laughed out loud. Hollywood. She so liked it when he called her that. Quickly, she turned the phone and typed her reply. At least she wasn’t failing in every single relationship she had at the moment. Sliding the bells to vibrate, she put the thing back in her pocket. “So how far is Greely?”
The earth nearly spun out from underneath him when his phone buzzed. Luke grabbed for it, realizing after he did so that it was probably nothing that earth-shatteringly important. He swiped it on and had to force himself to breathe as he read the message, her message.
Maybe not in YOUR dictionary. Doesn’t mean I can’t be creative!
Creative? He’d give her creative.
In her pocket the phone buzzed, but in the past ten minutes Sage had realized that Rory’s anger was not a passing thing. It was clear she had some making up to do, and texting some other guy probably wasn’t going to help in that department.
“So what’ve you been up to all day?” She slid across the seat and buckled her belt right next to him.
Rory looked down at her as if he wasn’t sure why she had done that. “Helping out with my grandpa’s farm.”
“Oh, throwing hay?” Flirting came easy even when it was less than the thing she wanted to be doing. Carefully she wound her hands up and through his arm. “You must be good at that.”
A moment and he grinned at her. “You’ll have to come watch me sometime.”
“I’ll have to.”
After an hour of checking the phone every five minutes, Luke had to admit to himself that she wasn’t going to text back. Why he felt like such a failure over that, he wasn’t sure. It wasn’t like she was really into him. Jaycee Lawrence Part Deux. Why was he surprised?
Then he thought about that name and the fact that he was an absolutely horrible friend washed over him. Sliding up so he was sitting with his back against the headboard, he dialed the number and listened to it ring. Once. Twice.
“Uh, hello?” She sounded sleepy or actually asleep.
“Hey, Jayc? How’re you doing?”
“Ugh. What time is it?”
He glanced at the clock. “About 9:30. How’re you feeling? They said you were sick.”
“Ugh. That’s one word for it. I think I died and they just haven’t found my body yet.”
Worry and disappointment with himself drifted through him. “I should let you go, let you get some rest.”
“K. But if I’m not better by morning, have them send someone in to make sure I haven’t really died.”
“I will. Get some rest.”
“K. ‘Bye.” And she hung up.
Luke put the phone between his knees and his head back. Yes, he was going to get the crown for worst friend ever. “Lord, please be with Jaycee. Help her get better. Amen.”
Okay, it wasn’t a family party. That much Sage figured out the moment they drove up to the old farmhouse. There were cars and pickups parked in every direction on the long driveway, and not an adult to be seen. As they got out of the pickup and headed to the house, she was horrified to realize there were couples making out in nearly every vehicle they passed. Maybe she shouldn’t have been so eager to come here with him.
Defensively because her instinct questioned her safety, she slid closer to him, which he apparently liked. He put his arm around her and grinned down at her, and nothing in her liked that smile.
“Come on. This is going to be fun.”
The book was boring. Sage hadn’t texted back, and calling Jaycee was out too. Luke slid off the bed, hating living out in the middle of nowhere. A trip to fun would take at least an hour one-way and at nearly 10:30, he wouldn’t even make it there and back much less do anything fun in between.
In the kitchen, he grabbed a Dr. Pepper, sure his mother would have a fit if she caught him. On quiet sock feet, he went through the mudroom and out the back door where he sat down on the porch, just him, the Dr. Pepper and the night. A drink and he looked far, far out, as far as his gaze could stretch across the fields.
It was that hazy gray time of night when the glowing beige moon had just started its trek into the night sky beyond. He sighed and took another drink. “You know, God, it sure would be nice if You gave me some direction here. I’m not asking to be driven like Jayc, but a few clues might be helpful. I just feel like I’m drifting, like I could get to the end of my story and not have anything real to show for it.”
Shaking his head, he took another drink. “Is it like this for everybody? Does everybody feel like they have no idea what to do with their lives?”
He thought about other kids in his class, and some of them, he was pretty sure felt like he did. Others were on the warpath to their dreams. What separated one from the other? What was the difference?
All he knew was he would get up in the morning and go to church because he was supposed to. Did he want to? Good question. He couldn’t imagine being anywhere else, and he would never think of not going without a really good reason. However, did he really want to, or was he just doing it because that’s what was expected of him? He didn’t have an answer for that, and as he crushed the can and stood to go back inside, he wasn’t sure he ever would.
“Ror! You made it, dude.” The skinny young guy with the bottle of beer in hand called to them through the crowd and then approached. Upon getting to them, he put his fist in the air for Rory to bump, and then his gaze fell to Sage. “And who is this pretty little thing?”
Rory put his arm around her and grinned. “Hey, Evan, this is my girlfriend, Sage Wentworth. She’s here this summer from Hollywood.”
The way he said that word had her skin crawling, but she smiled at Evan, knowing anything less wouldn’t be acceptable.
“Well, Sage from Hollywood, it’s nice of you to join us.” Evan was trying, but suave just wasn’t working very well. “The drinks are in the kitchen. Help yourself.”
“Ev!” someone called from the other side of the room, and Evan detached himself from their company.
“Let’s go get something,” Rory said, and Sage had the awful feeling that kids here weren’t any saner than those in California.
This book was going to kill him. It would be nice if he could figure out who was actually narrating the story, but so far, 50 pages in, Luke was as lost as when he had started. Finally giving up, he put the book on the desk, checked his phone, and decided some early sleep wouldn’t kill him. Again, he wished he lived closer to the action. In a year, he told himself. In a year everything would be different.
At 11:15 Sage was beginning to panic more than a little. It had taken a good 40 minutes to get here, and they needed to be heading out. However, she had personally witnessed the five beers Rory had already knocked back, and her options for getting home were dwindling quickly.
Moreover, she had been called a pretty little thing so many times, she was starting to get a real headache from the leering eyes. She wished again she hadn’t come, but she was here now, and now she had to figure out how not to be. Excusing herself to the restroom and out from under Rory’s ever-heavier arm, she made her escape, and once on the other side of the locked door went through her options. There weren’t many.
Hoping that maybe if she took her phone out she would get the courage to call her parents, she pulled it from her pocket and slipped her finger around it. The message on top made her heart grab. Luke.
I didn’t realize your name was Webster. Webster Hollywood. You’re right! That is creative!
Although Sage wanted to laugh at the text, she didn’t have time. It wasn’t a great option, but it was better than the others.
Luke. Are you still there? SEND
The sound very easily could have come from his dreams, and at first, Luke was pretty sure that it had. However, the glowing of the phone screen on the ceiling of his room said otherwise. Surprised, he sat up, rubbed his eyes, wondering how long he’d been asleep even as he grabbed for the thing.
With one breath and a glance at the words, his heart snagged. Worry, pure and unadulterated, splashed into him at the message. Quickly he typed back, Yeah. I’m here. What’s up?
He hit send realizing she was probably going to tell him they hadn’t gotten enough lace or something. How much lace does one need for a small jacket anyway? It was a question he had never really contemplated.
Sage’s fingers flew over the keys, and she hit SEND, praying he would know what to do.
Help. I’m in Greely with Rory, and he’s been drinking. I’ve got to get home by midnight or I’ll be grounded for life!
With that, the lace was forgotten. Luke swung out of bed, his feet hitting the floor as his brain spun into gear.
Her phone jingled.
Can you drive?
Panic flooded his being as he waited the ten seconds.
He has the keys.
Realizing this was going to take too long to do as texts, Luke hit Contact and Call. If he could go get her himself, he would, but that was out of the question. She probably didn’t know how to get him there anyway.
When her phone rang, Sage nearly dropped the thing. Then she saw the call log and breathed a sigh of relief. “Hello?”
“Sage?”
“Yeah.” With that her whole body simultaneously relaxed and went into meltdown mode. “Luke? What am I going to do?”
“Where are you?”
She looked around, wondering if she should tell him. “In the bathroom at some guy’s house.”
“Where’s Rory?”
“Outside somewhere.”
“He’s been drinking?”
“Yeah, and they’re smoking something too. I don’t know what it is though.”
Luke let out a hard breath. “Can you talk him into giving you his keys?”
“His keys?” Her eyes went wide. “To his truck?”
“I would totally come get you, but I don’t know where you are, and I couldn’t get you home in time even if I did.”
Sage wasn’t a huge fan of this plan, but if it was her best option, she was going to have to take it. “I think I can get them.”
“Okay. Then do it. You drive. If he won’t let you, call me back.”
“K.” The syllable was shaky and weak.
“And Sage?”
“Yeah?”
“I’ll be praying for you.”
“Thanks.” When she hung up, she was pretty sure she was going to need every prayer he could offer.
“Dear Lord,” Luke breathed into the darkness, and somehow this prayer didn’t feel ambling or meandering at all. It felt deathly serious. “Please give Sage the courage to get those keys. Keep her safe. Please, dear God, help her…”
“Hey,” Sage said, doing her best sweet, loving girlfriend act. She slid herself under Rory’s arm and put her arms around him. The stench on him was horrible, but she willed herself not to notice it. “I guess we’re going to have to be going.”
His smile disintegrated. “Going?”
“You know, home.”
He backed up even further from her. “Home? We just got here.”
It was harder than impossible, but she smiled at him with even more syrup. “I turn into a pumpkin if I’m out past midnight. You know that.” She let her eyes fall almost closed, flirting like she never had in her life.
“Wouldn’t want that,” the guy Rory was talking to said, tipping his beer toward her.
Miss America couldn’t have smiled brighter.
After a moment Rory sighed dramatically. “I guess.”
One hurdle down. One to go.
“Please, God. Please. Get her out of there. Please help her.” Luke was sitting on the edge of his bed feeling more helpless than he ever had in his life. He wanted to call her, to find out if she had gotten the keys, but he didn’t dare. If Rory found out she was talking with him, there was no telling what he would do.
The guy was an apple short of a bushel the way it was. Making him mad with her at his mercy was not a good idea. “Please, dear Lord. Please.”
Sounds of the make-out sessions in progress followed them every stumbling step out to the pickup. Luke was right, Sage decided. She had to get those keys.
“You know,” she said, hating that sweet sound in her voice but knowing it was her best bet. “I’d hate for you to get into trouble over having a little fun.”
Rory’s foot betrayed him, and she barely kept him upright. “We could have some more fun.” He angled his mouth down near her neck, and the stench about took her knees from under her.
“That’s gonna have to wait until next time.”
They were at the pickup now, and it loomed in the night above them.
He pulled the keys out and fumbled with them to get the fob to work. Instead of hitting the unlock button, he managed to hit the little red panic one and the pickup came alive.
The sound reverberated around them, and Sage lunged for the keys to turn the thing off.
When it stopped, she heard someone in one of the vehicles hurl obscenities at them, but at the moment, that wasn’t really the most pressing problem. “Tell you what, why don’t I drive?”
“You?” Rory swayed, and Sage vowed she was not getting in that vehicle with him behind the wheel. “You can’t drive this thing.”
She saw her opening, and she took it. Running her hands up his chest, she pushed him next to the pickup. “Oh, you’d be surprised what I can do.” With a push, she leaned toward him and kissed him, hard and wanting.
That seemed to knock him out of the protests into another realm entirely.
“What?” she asked, letting her voice fall into seductive. “You don’t trust me with big, hulking machines?” The act was all she could feel as she ran her hands down his arms and back up again. His objection to the plan was weakening by the second. “I’m pretty good at it, you know?”
“Oh, I can imagine.” And he came back at her, wrapping her in a tight grip as he planted a slathering kiss all over her face.
She let him think he was going to get somewhere for a moment and then pushed him back. “You bad boy. You’d better play nice, or you won’t get anything.”
His eyes in the moonlight, dim, desirous and hopeful took her all in. “I can be good, and I can be bad.”
“Then you’ll let me drive.”
A second and he nodded. “If you think you have what it takes.”
“Oh, Lord, please.” Luke hadn’t quit pacing since he couldn’t stay seated any longer. He grabbed up his phone again and checked it in case he hadn’t heard it. He hadn’t.
Collapsing onto the bed in a heap, he closed his eyes and prayed like he never had before.
Sage could hardly breathe for the fear racing through her veins. Some was the truck. Some was Rory, still pawing at her. Some was that she had no idea how to get back to the main road.
“Hey,” she said, elbowing him away from her body. “Is it right or left at this turn?”
“Uh.” Rory looked out the windshield and swayed again. “Left.”
She had no other option than to go with left. “Oh, God,” she whispered in her spirit as she fought the tears, “please help me.”
At 11:45 Luke seriously considered getting in his car and going over to her house. Maybe he could alert her parents to the situation. Maybe they could call her. Maybe he should have done that right away. He didn’t know. The last thing he wanted to do was to get her into more trouble, and it was possible that she would get home and they would never know the difference.
It was also possible that she wouldn’t get home at all. Tears burned his eyes at that thought. “Dear Lord, please…”
With every minute that passed, Sage prayed harder. The pawing had thankfully decreased, owing mostly to the fact that Rory started nodding off halfway home. Some things in life were more mercy than one deserved. That was one of them.
At 11:52, they went through the little town, and Sage was grateful for the trek from the hall home that afternoon. For the first time she had paid some attention to the turns, and working in her mind she tried to figure out just how long that drive had lasted. Five minutes? Eight? Could they make it by midnight?
Then her mind really went into overdrive. What if their clocks were just enough off to make the whole question moot? What if, after all of this, she still made it home a minute or two late? Her heart thumped hard in her chest as her prayers slid through the tears she didn’t dare let herself shed. This whole night had been a nightmare. Her life was a nightmare. Yes, that was it. She was physically, literally, living in the middle of a nightmare she sensed at the moment she might never wake up from.
Finally, blessedly the last turn came into view, and her prayers shifted even further into overdrive. “Just get me home. Please. Just get me home.”
The hulking truck made it into the driveway, and Sage’s first sensation was that the lights were on in the kitchen. They were waiting. She knew it.
Her gaze tripped to the little green numbers on the dash. 11:58.
Truly not caring about anything other than getting in that house, she put the pickup in park. “Rory. We’re here.”
“Here?” He picked himself off the back of the seat.
“I’ve got to go.” Suddenly that he was going to drive now knocked into her consciousness. “You could sleep it off out here.” Frantically, she looked back at that kitchen light. I have to get in there! “Why don’t you? Just crash out here. Couple hours. You’d be okay to drive then.” She opened the door and slid out even as she talked.
“Nah. I’d better get on home.”
Serious terror ripped her both directions. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah. No worries. I’ve done it before.” He slid over into the driver’s seat. “I’ll see you soon?”
She was on the ground, looking up at him. “Yeah, soon.”
With a nod but no wave, he slammed the door closed between them, and knowing she should stop him, she backed up. A moment and she closed her eyes to the tears assaulting her. How could she let him drive away? She knew better, but what could she do—jump in front of the truck and stop him? Suddenly 11:58 flashed through her mind, and she squeaked out the concern jumping through her spirit. Turning she fled into the house as the pickup turned at the corner and headed off into the darkness.
The clock on his desk glowed 12:00 as the colon in the middle kept blinking the seconds away. Luke wondered as he watched it, counted, and prayed if he would hear from her tonight. Or ever again flitted through his mind.
No! He wouldn’t think like that. He wouldn’t. He was going to believe she had gotten home safely, and everything was all right. Because if she hadn’t and it wasn’t, he would never forgive himself.
The second her foot hit the kitchen threshold, Sage pulled up short from her headlong dash into oblivion. Sure enough. They were both there. Waiting.
Her father looked at her, shook his head, and dropped his gaze. Sage just stood there, knowing the end was near.
The moment slid into the next, and then Mrs. Lawrence stepped from her leaning post on the cabinet and came toward Sage. Only verifying that her stepmother had no knife in hand kept her feet planted there.
“I… made it,” Sage said and added a soft, hopeful laugh.
“That you did.” Her stepmother came right up to her, stood for a second, and then leaned in and sniffed. “Fun party?”
“Heh. Heh.” The laugh was decidedly less hopeful. “Yeah. It was all right.”
Spinning on her toe, her stepmother walked away from her, and even from behind her, Sage could hear the silent conversation that passed between them.
“We called Rory’s parents,” her father said. “There was no ‘family party.’”
Panic and tears seeped over her. “He said it was his cousin. I didn’t know until we got there. I swear I didn’t.”
This nod from her father dragged his gaze off of her again. “Sage, we’ve made it very clear that there are rules in this house.”
Her arms flailed out. “But I didn’t know! I didn’t!”
When her stepmother swiveled, she knew the jig was up. “Have you been drinking?”
Horror swept through her. “No!” The revulsion reached up and grabbed her throat. “No. I wasn’t drinking. I wasn’t.”
“Was anyone else drinking?” And now her stepmother unfurled her arms like a prosecutor.
“Anyone… else?”
“At the party, Sage. Was anyone else drinking at the party?”
Physically, she felt the color drain from her face. They knew. She knew they knew. “I didn’t…”
“Was Rory drinking?” Her father’s question sounded like it was strangling him to get out.
“I…” But she couldn’t answer that one truthfully either.
At that and with a hard shake of his head, her father stood and walked out of the room.
Tears sprang into her eyes, and she mashed them back with her mouth. “I didn’t know. I promise. I didn’t.”
One, small nod and her stepmother came back to where she stood. “Two weeks.” She put her hand out. “We’ll start with that, and see if your father’s calmed down by then.”
“Two… but I didn’t do anything! I didn’t know!”
“If you think I’m going to let you come in here and ruin this family’s reputation, you have another think coming.” Her hand was out between them. “The phone, Sage. Now!”
Sage jumped a foot at the short burst of anger, and sheer terror gripped her. She hadn’t done anything. She hadn’t. And now she was being punished anyway. Not knowing what else to do, she pulled the phone out of her pocket and placed it into the hand.
“Don’t plan on going anywhere for the next two weeks. Church and home, and that is it. Got it?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“And figure on doing the vacuuming and the dishes as well.”
Deeper and deeper the cut went as helplessness drained into it. “Yes, Ma’am.”
“Now go to your room.” Her stepmother pointed the phone that direction.
“Yes, Ma’am.” Without another protest, she headed that direction.
When she was at the door, her stepmother said, “And take a shower. You stink.”
And with that the tears overwhelmed her and Sage fled.
“Please, Lord. Please. Please let her be all right.” Luke’s prayers continued unabated into the darkness of the night. “Please…”