Alicia burst into laughter, and the warmth of it hit him in the hollow of his throat and someplace lower, between his ribs. “God, Nikolai. What the hell? Don’t tell me you’ve turned into some kind of . . . I don’t know. Health nut?”
“I wouldn’t say that. Just that when I’m traveling, it’s too easy to fill up on junk food, and you get to craving it. Then a lot of times when I’m out in places where you can’t find it . . . I didn’t want to miss it, that’s all. Easier to just give it up.” He gave her a small smile.
There’d been a lot of things like that in his life. Better to abandon than risk longing for them. He shrugged.
Her laughter faded, her eyes still glistening with tears. “Easier to give up something so you don’t have to miss it? That’s pretty deep.”
He hadn’t meant it to be, but he supposed it was, if you wanted to analyze it. He didn’t. He spent a lot of time trying to do the opposite of that sort of navel-gazing. It never did much good.
“Ilya never mentioned she was sick,” he said, to turn the conversation. “If I’d known . . .”
He trailed off, not sure what he’d meant to say. If he’d known—what? He wouldn’t have come home any sooner. He didn’t plan to stay long, either.
Alicia shook her head and bit into the soft cake. She chewed solemnly, then tossed it into the nearby garbage can with a grimace. “Gross. Stuff like that always looks so good until you get it, but it’s never as good as it looks.”
“Talk about being pretty deep,” Nikolai said.
She didn’t answer, and he regarded her a moment. Sad eyes. Curved-down mouth. The last time he’d seen her had been a few months after she and Ilya divorced. Niko had run into her at the grocery store while on a brief visit home. Their exchange had been downright arctic. He hadn’t been home for more than a day or two since then, and he hadn’t seen her on any of those visits, not for years.
It might as well have been seconds; that’s how different he felt when he looked at her.
“Sorry,” Niko said quietly. “Trying to lighten the mood.”
Allie’s frown didn’t smooth. “She wasn’t sick for long. I try to see her at least once a week, and last week she was still doing great. Up and about, moving around. She’d complained about being tired, but she’s ninety-three. That’s to be expected. The staff said she took a downturn early Tuesday morning.”
The call hadn’t been a surprise, and he was grateful it hadn’t been someone telling him his grandmother had passed. He’d had time to see her again; at least there was that. He’d applied for leave from the kibbutz board and had been approved at once. Booking the flight to Newark International, making the trip, and figuring out a way to get from New Jersey to Quarrytown had been a little more complicated. He’d arrived exhausted and jet-lagged. He still hadn’t slept. He was sure he wouldn’t for another few hours.
“I got here as soon as I could,” Niko said, although she hadn’t said a word about how long it had taken him.
“I didn’t know they had your number. But it’s good they did,” Allie said with a pause that told him she knew as well as he did that she wouldn’t have called him. “It’s good for you to be here. Ilya’s happy about it, I’m sure.”
Niko noticed very particularly that she hadn’t said she was happy he was there. It shouldn’t have mattered, but it bothered him more than he wanted to admit.
He nodded. “Yeah. Me, too.”
“I don’t want to go back in there,” she blurted, like a confession. She lifted her chin, meeting his gaze steadfastly. “I know I should, but I just . . . I can’t. I don’t want to see her like that. And I really don’t want to hold Ilya’s hand through this.”
The last had been spoken with an undertone of biting venom that surprised him. He knew his brother’s faults as well as she did, although maybe no longer better. She’d been married to the guy, after all, while Niko had left home at age eighteen and had spent very little time there since.
“He hasn’t been here to see her in a couple months,” Alicia continued, her voice low and bitter. “She asked about him all the time, but he was always too busy to show up. He had a million excuses, when the truth was he just didn’t want to see her failing. Now he’s in there moaning and mourning. He’s going to let everything else fall to the side while he does this, Nikolai. I know him. He’s going to focus entirely on himself, and I’m going to pick up the slack, and . . . I don’t want to do it anymore.”
She cut herself off, her lips pressed together. She shrugged, shaking her head as though words had failed her. Then she tossed the soda bottle into the trash and crossed her arms over her belly, hands cupping the opposite elbows. She scuffed her shoe on the tile floor.
“He can be kind of a dick,” Niko agreed.
Alicia tilted her head to give him a sideways glance. “Yeah. Sorry. I shouldn’t have said anything about it. It’s not your problem.”
“It’s not like we don’t all know it. Hell, Ilya would probably say the same thing about himself. I’m sorry he hasn’t been better to you, Allie. You deserve better. You always have.” Niko didn’t mean to pull her close again, but there she was in his arms.
She felt good there.
She felt . . . right.
Nestled just beneath his chin, the soft fall of her strawberry-blonde hair against his cheek, Alicia sighed. One hand went flat to his chest, over his heart, which to Niko’s embarrassment had started beating faster. Thump thump thump—no hiding his reaction to the way she felt against him.
She noticed. Of course she did. Alicia had always been the “smart” one of the two Harrison sisters, although Niko secretly had always thought she was just as pretty as Jennilynn. You couldn’t put much over on Alicia.
He waited for her to pull away. Both of them would laugh a little nervously, not looking at each other. She’d make a caustic comment, or he’d try to joke, and they’d pretend there’d been no small but rising heat between them. She’d pull away and go back to ignoring him, and he would tell himself it was better that way.
She didn’t pull away.
CHAPTER FIVE
Then
They were going to get caught; Alicia knew it.
“Did you get the beer?” Alicia paced nervously, repeatedly tucking her straight reddish hair behind her ears. She clamped the tip of her tongue between her teeth to keep them from chattering with anxiety.
Jennilynn tossed her blonde curls over her shoulders and gave Alicia a long, smug look. “Of course. I told you I would. A whole case.”
“How did you get a whole case of beer?”
A six-pack—that’s all they were supposed to get. Everyone was supposed to bring one. Alicia had also picked up some chips and dip, because you couldn’t have a party without snacks, right? And the boys from across the street weren’t going to think about it; maybe they’d grab some money from everyone later for a pizza or something, but they sure weren’t thinking about party snacks . . .
“Allie!” Jennilynn snapped her fingers in front of Alicia’s face. “Chill. You’re making me nervous.”
“How did you get a case of beer?” Alicia lowered her voice to a hissing whisper.
Mom and Dad were still here, getting ready in their room down the hall. They were going away for the weekend, leaving Jennilynn in charge for the first time. At seventeen, she was supposed to be old enough to handle things. She was supposed to be trustworthy, and what was the very first thing she did? Throw a party.
It’s going to end up bad for everyone, and there’s nothing I can do about it, because my sister is going to do whatever she wants. The way she always does. Jenni’s going to get us all in so much trouble.
Jennilynn smiled. Mysterious and beautiful: that was Alicia’s older sister. Jennilynn shrugged, her bare shoulders lifting and falling. It was October, but still warm. Jennilynn wore a halter dress, her collarbones exposed, and in the hollow of her throat rested the heart-shaped pendant Alicia had asked for, but had not received, for Christmas.
>
Two years apart in age, universes apart in coolness. It’s not fair. And she doesn’t even notice it.
“I know a guy.” Jennilynn shrugged again as she looked in the mirror.
Black flecks speckled the glass where the silvering had come off on the back. This mirror was an antique, attached to an old dresser that had been their grandma’s when she got married. When she died, their mom got it. It had been in their room forever, so both of them had gotten used to standing in weird poses in order to see all of themselves. Still, the way Jennilynn stood now, a hip cocked, her head tilting as she let her hands run up her sides until her fingertips rested on her chin, thumbs pressing downward on her throat . . .
Weird. And who’s this random beer-buying guy? Something’s going on with her, and she won’t tell me what it is.
“Where did you meet a guy that old? The diner?”
Jennilynn had been working there since she got her driver’s license, which was about the same time she started growing distant and irritable about things that never used to bother her. Now her dreamy, vacant expression went tight. She turned with another toss of her hair.
“What do you care? Ilya said bring beer. I’m bringing beer. What difference does it make to you what I had to do to get it?”
Asking how she got the beer and where she met the guy who was bringing it was totally different from asking what Jenni had to do to get it. “Jennilynn! What did you have to do?”
“Jesus, Alicia. Enough with the Spanish Inquisition. I met a guy, he’s old enough to get beer, and he likes me enough to bring it to the party. Quit acting like this is some kind of big deal, because it’s not.” Jennilynn turned to the mirror again, pursing her lips and turning her face from side to side as though she was looking at something only she could see.
“What’s going on with you lately?” Alicia demanded.
Jennilynn looked at her sister in the reflection, then once again turned to face her. Slowly, this time. Without the flounce. For a second or so, Alicia was sure her sister was going to come clean about all the secrets she’d been keeping lately, but then she shrugged and gave Alicia another vacant smile.
“Nothing.” It was a lie, and Alicia knew it. Worse, her sister knew that Alicia didn’t believe her, but she didn’t seem to care. “It’s going to be a slammin’ party. Don’t be such a loser.”
Alicia ignored the L her sister made with her thumb and first finger pressed to her forehead. “We’re going to get in trouble.”
“Not unless someone narcs on us. Mom and Dad won’t be back until late Sunday. Galina’s working a double, or something. Ilya said she won’t be home until morning. Barry went fishing for the weekend. And Babulya’s staying with some friends in Camp Hill, some kind of quilting thing.”
Galina worked a lot of nights and weekends. Her still-newish husband was also often away during the same times. Alicia’s parents, however, went away for the weekend occasionally, and never before without having someone come to stay with them. Babulya was almost never gone. If there was ever a time to have a party, this weekend was it.
Alicia wasn’t satisfied. This had all the makings of disaster. “What if someone calls the cops?”
“Who’s going to call the cops?” Jennilynn rolled her eyes. “We’re the only houses on this dead-end street.”
Four hours later, their parents barely two hours on the road, Jennilynn was wasted and dancing so hard in the center of the Sterns’ living room that her halter dress could barely stay up. The guy who’d bought her the case of beer showed up to the party with a couple of bottles of rum. He was at least in his thirties, way too old to be at a high school party, but nobody seemed to care. Especially not Jennilynn. The Stern brothers pulled out a stash of vodka. Ilya was mixing some with red punch. Someone else spilled the chips all over the living-room floor, and kids danced on them, crushing them into the carpet.
“Of course it’s vodka. Like water for Russians.” Imitating his grandmother’s thick accent, Nikolai lifted the bottle toward Alicia’s nose until she recoiled from the stinging scent. “Water of life, come on, have a drink. It’s Galina’s.”
“Won’t she notice it’s gone?” Alicia had to shout over the sound of the music getting louder, louder, louder, the bass thump pressing her in every place her heart beat.
Nikolai didn’t hear her. He swigged right from the bottle, but she turned her head at his offer to drink. She already had a beer and didn’t like the taste or how it made her feel. She needed to get outside, get some air, away from the now-hovering haze of marijuana. This party was getting out of control, just as she’d predicted.
The Sterns’ backyard was rarely mowed. The flower beds went unweeded, unmulched, untended, and the flowers there grew wild and lush. Like a meadow. Alicia’s mother tut-tutted about it under her breath, about how a woman alone raising two boys shouldn’t need to hire a gardener to keep her yard in shape. That was what boys were for, Alicia’s mother had said to her father in the kitchen after dinner one night. Or that new husband. To mow the lawn and take out the garbage. To fix the sagging shutters and the screen door that blew open every time there was a storm.
But what difference did it make? Out here at the very end of Quarry Street, with only two houses and nobody to even see the Sterns’ backyard except them? It wasn’t like they lived in one of those cookie-cutter neighborhoods, where all the houses looked the same, one on top of the other, every yard nudging up against the next so you couldn’t be sure where one stopped or started except by the placement of the swing sets.
Sometimes she wished they lived closer to town, so she could walk to places the way her friends did, or so she didn’t have to get up so early to catch the school bus, but most of the time, Alicia loved living out here on the end of Quarry Street with nobody but the Sterns. It was quiet, at least on nights when her sister and Ilya weren’t throwing a party, and because there were no streetlights, there was never any problem seeing the stars.
Her feet whispered through the too-long grass, damp with night dew. There was a bench out near the dilapidated garden shed, and she sat on it to stare at the dark sky. The Quarrytown iron quarry was operated at one point in its history by a pair of brothers who preferred to live close to the site, so they’d built their houses directly across from each other outside the quarry’s original entrance. The Sterns lived in what used to be the older brother’s house, which was bigger and fancier because the older brother had never married and spent all his money on his property. The Harrison house across the street was smaller but kept in far better shape. Both houses were built from the same local limestone, but the Harrisons didn’t have a shed. Their backyard edged up to a farmer’s field that was usually planted with corn. The Sterns’ backyard eased into the woods surrounding the quarry, which was abandoned in the early seventies after a hurricane flooded it. It had become a vast, clear lake fed by spring water that never got warm, not even in August.
When they were much smaller, the four of them used to build forts out of tree branches and the cast-off bits and pieces of machinery or other things the quarry workers had left behind. They used to hide junk food in the old equipment shed. Now, she’d be more likely to find a stash of weed and some empty beer cans and maybe even a used rubber or two rather than a box of Little Debbie Snack Cakes. They all still swam in the quarry, but Alicia couldn’t remember the last time they’d hung out together in the woods. They were all growing up. Jennilynn and Ilya were high school seniors. Nikolai was a junior. Alicia and the Stern brothers’ new stepsister, Theresa, were both sophomores. They all waited for the bus together at the end of their street, but that was about it.
Except for now, at this party. Cars lined the street. The music was way too loud. There wasn’t anyone around to call the cops—Jennilynn was right about that—but in some way or another, by the end of the night, the cops were going to show up. The only time kids got away with mega parties like this without getting busted was in the movies.
For now, she sat o
n the old park bench nestled into the knee-high grass. The wood was splintered, so she was careful when she shifted. She looked up at the night sky. No moon. The stars were like bright pinpricks, diamonds on black velvet . . .
Shit. I’m actually drunk.
Or maybe she got a little contact high. Either way, her head buzzed, and the universe seemed vast and wild, but still so close she could reach up and grab it, if only she held out her hand.
“Hey.”
Startled, she let out a small “meep.”
“Nikolai.”
He still had the bottle, though the amount of liquid sloshing in the bottom was a lot less than it had been inside the house. He sat next to her on the creaking bench and stretched out his legs. He’d grown taller over the summer.
Their shoulders touched. This time, when he passed her the bottle, Alicia took it. She sipped, choking, eyes burning. The vodka warmed her throat and belly. She hadn’t noticed she was shivering.
“Got cold out here.” Nikolai slung a companionable arm around her shoulders. “Trees will be changing soon.”
From the house came a sudden flare of light and music and laughter. Dark silhouettes appeared in the doorway, then disappeared into the shadows. Nikolai laughed under his breath.
“Your sister,” he said. “That guy.”
Alicia tried to catch a glimpse of Jennilynn but could see nothing. “He’s too old for her.”
“Girls like older guys.”
She looked at him. “He’s way too old.”
Nikolai shrugged. His eyes flashed, then his smile. “Great party, huh?”
“Your mom is going to kill you when she gets home.” Alicia relaxed against the back of the bench and his arm.
“She’ll blame Ilya.” Nikolai drained the bottle and tossed it into the grass with a clink.
That was true. Galina and Ilya clashed all the time. Nikolai was Galina’s favorite, but this was the first time Alicia ever heard him admit knowing that. She retrieved the bottle, setting it close to her side of the bench. “It will break and someone will step on it.”