We didn’t talk for the rest of the ride home and when we got off the bus at the corner we went separate ways without a word.
Great, Juliet. Make everybody hate you.
My shoes scuffed the gravel as I walked toward the house, and little plumes of gray dust billowed up. I gave a hard kick and sent a cascade of stones into the air. They dropped back to the ground like a hard burst of rain and I struck again with my other foot. My heel hammered the earth and the shock pounded through my calf. It hurt, but I didn’t care. Hurt felt right and I wanted to pummel and pound and launch into orbit every rock in the driveway. I kicked at the gravel again.
A gold glint flashed in the air and something shiny dropped with a clink. I waited for the dust to settle, then picked it up.
A key.
Its round head almost disappeared between my thumb and index finger and the bar of jagged teeth extended only about an inch. So tiny.
Tarnished and streaked with a thick black smudge of dried grease or oil, the key looked ancient. It could’ve been to a diary, but I’d never kept one. Where did it come from?
I tucked it into my pocket and kicked gravel the rest of the way up to the house.
When I walked in the front door the scent of warm chocolate chip cookies enveloped me.
“Juliet?” my mom sang from the kitchen.
I closed the door and slipped off my new loafers. “Yeah.”
“Come have a snack.”
Mom hadn’t baked anything in, like, forever. I dropped my bag and shoes on the bottom stair and went into the kitchen.
Cookies covered every horizontal surface and my mother, in her peach gingham apron, bent over the oven to pull out another tray. She’d pinned her hair up in back, and damp ringlets framed her face and neck.
“What are you doing?”
She put the cookie sheet on top of the range and pointed toward a barstool with her oven mitt. “Sit down. I’ll get you a plate and some milk.”
“What is going on?”
She stuck out her lower lip and blew a shot of air into her bangs. “What do you mean?”
“This.” I swept my hand around the kitchen.
I sat down and she pulled a glass of milk from the fridge. The inside of the glass had a crusty white line around the level of the milk.
“How was your day?” she asked.
Strange, weird, bizarre. “Fine.”
Mom pulled off the oven mitt and tossed it on top of the microwave, the only free spot in the kitchen.
I reached for a cookie and took a bite. “How was yours?” I asked slowly.
“Good.” She put a few cookies on a plate and sat down on the bar stool at the end of the counter. She pushed the plate in front of the empty stool between us. “Have some more.”
I took another bite. “Hey, I saw you drive past the school the other day.”
Mom scratched the insides of her palms with her fingernails. “Oh?”
“Who was in the car with you?”
I know I didn’t just imagine the color in her face. “That was my client. Ja—Mr. Pierson.”
“Your client?”
“I told you I had an account. He hired me to organize his new office space.” She smoothed her apron over her lap and smiled at me.
I ate another cookie.
“I wanted to talk to you,” she said.
Those words never meant anything good.
“I’m concerned about something.”
Neither did those.
“Your father and I both are.”
Damon.
She took a deep breath and drummed her bright red fingernails on the counter. “Are you seeing the Sheppard boy?”
My jaw clenched. “I see him every day.”
She glared at me between her thick, fake lashes. “You know very well what I mean.”
Heat flared behind my eyes. “Am I going with him? No.”
“What exactly does ‘going with’ someone mean?”
Oh, geez. I chewed and looked at the refrigerator. “It just means that you’re together. You’re, like, dating.”
“But, has he been forward toward you?”
“What exactly does ‘forward’ mean?”
Her fingernails drummed harder. “You’re not making this easy, Juliet.”
What would she say if I told her I’d ridden home in his arms, alone in the dark? And that I’d really, really liked it?
But now it would never happen again.
She put one hand over her mouth and sighed. “There are some things you should know about that family.”
I took a drink of milk and another cookie.
“They lived here a while ago. Before you were born, when they just had the older boy.”
“Adam? Really?”
It would’ve been better if I hadn’t said his name.
Mom scowled. “I knew Jessie, their mother. They went to our church. They seemed like nice enough people.” She stopped and rubbed her thumbnail against her front teeth.
I nodded. “And?”
She sighed.
Spit it out, Mom.
“Then they moved overseas.”
“Really? Where?”
“Africa. Jessie died while they were there.”
Damon’s mother died?
“Then they moved back here again. Those boys have been in and out of trouble ever since.”
I didn’t really want to talk to Mom about this, but she seemed to know more than anyone else. “Mark told me Adam and Damon both went to juvenile detention.”
“Yes.” She nodded and her jaw went out to one side as she bit her cheek. “They’re not good boys, Juliet. I don’t want you getting involved with them.”
I pictured Damon’s arm around Amica. “I don’t think you need to worry.”
She took another big breath and her shoulders relaxed. “I’m glad to hear it.”
Car tires crunched up the driveway and Mom looked toward the front door.
“What’s wrong?”
The engine cut out and a door squeaked. “It’s Mark.”
“Who did you think?”
She shrugged and slid off the barstool. “You’d better go do your homework.”
“It’s Friday.”
“Never too early to start.”
Whatever. I hopped off the stool, grabbed my stuff and headed to my room.
“Juliet.” Mom called.
I stopped on the stair and spun on my heel to look back down at her.
She pointed up at me. “I meant what I said. No Damon Sheppard.”
This hot streak of completely-ticked-off shot up from my stomach.
Did I not just say that?
If I hadn’t already blown it with Damon, I might have tried to kiss him, right in front of the house—no, right in the house—just so Mom could see.
Mark walked in and she danced over to him with a plate of cookies.
Maybe I’d just go to Pam’s party after all.
* * * * *
Before bed I cleaned up the key with soap and the toothbrush Mom kept under the sink for scrubbing grout. It shined up really well. I turned it over in my hand and tried to make out the worn, embossed letters on the head.
WORD LOGOS?
I took off my heart pendant, slipped the key onto the chain and put it back around my neck. The glass heart lay against the head of the key, framed perfectly by the round disk.
I climbed into bed and they nestled in the hollow of my throat, thrumming against my vocal cords as I prayed.
Now I lay me down to sleep.
I pray the Lord my soul to keep.
If I should die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take.
With the comforter pulled up to my chin I rolled to one side and curled my knees up against my stomach. A tear slid across the bridge of my nose and dropped onto my pillow.
Why am I even crying? What’s wrong with me?
Downstairs the front door opened and closed again. Mom let Dad have it about
something, and I listened to them fight until I wrapped my pillow around my ears and fell asleep.
CHAPTER 15
“Chug! Chug! Chug!” Adam Sheppard and three of his friends surrounded another guy and pumped their fists in the air as the knot in the drinker’s throat bounced up and down. The bitter scent of alcohol mingled with strange wisps of yellow smoke coming out of the hall closet.
On the couch, where Pam and I had watched TV and played Atari thousands of times, a girl curled around a boy and chewed on his neck like a hungry python. Michael Jackson sang, “Don’t stop till you get enough,” and someone flicked the lights off and on. The dark pulses turned the room into a scene from a slasher movie.
Or a nightmare.
Pam stood in the corner with a red cup in one hand and a board game in the other. Her panicked gaze darted around the room like a trapped housefly, and her face looked as white as her shirt.
A voice next to my ear made me jump. “Who’d have thought we’d ever be at the same party?”
“Mark!” I grabbed my brother’s arm and yelled, “Why are all these high school kids here?”
“Are you kidding? Everybody heard about this.”
Someone handed me a plastic cup.
Mark grabbed it before I could even look inside. “You’re too young.”
“So are you!”
He took a drink. “Have you ever had beer before?”
I shook my head.
“You want to try it?”
A voice behind me answered. “No, she doesn’t.”
I tried to lean away, but even my hair stood on end to reach back for him. Despite everything, Damon’s presence drew me like some gravitational force, a magnet to iron.
“Maybe I do,” I said and looked over my shoulder.
He stared down into my face, with a look that shriveled me.
He’s Amica’s. Don’t let him get to you.
“I’m telling you, you don’t.”
“You’re not the boss of me.”
Really? Could I have said anything dumber?
Mark emptied the cup into his mouth and crushed it in his fist. “He’s right. You don’t need to start drinking.”
“Stop treating me like a kid.”
“You are a kid.” Then Mark threw his head back and let out a cowboy whoop. “Time to thank the lady of the house!” He pushed his way through the crowd toward Pam.
He wouldn’t. No way.
Damon tried to turn me around, but I brushed him off.
A kid ran through the room and knocked into me. I fell backwards and stepped right on Damon’s foot.
Mark stalked at Pam. She saw him coming and dropped the board game on the floor. Her back against the wall, she had no way to escape even if she wanted to. Which she probably didn’t.
“Madame Hostess!” Mark bellowed. “You throw one killer party!”
Huh-uh. I shook my head.
Mark grabbed Pam around the waist and twisted her off balance. He dipped her back in the crook of his left arm and planted one right on her mouth. Her cup dumped all over the carpet.
“Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh.”
Damon grabbed my arm. “Who is that?”
I put my hands over my face. The room tilted every which way. My stomach felt like a cave full of pterodactyls.
“Are you okay?”
I shook my head.
Damon turned me around and led me through the kitchen and out the front door. My legs shook and my head swirled.
“Sit down,” he said, and held the porch swing as I collapsed onto it.
“Oh my gosh.”
He leaned against the house.
I clamped a hand over my mouth, in case the acid on my tongue meant my stomach was about to heave. I looked up at Damon.
His eyes narrowed as he frowned at me. “Is that your boyfriend?”
“My boyfriend? Mark?”
“I wouldn’t have pictured you with a guy like that.”
“He’s my brother.”
Damon’s whole face changed. “Oh.”
I leaned back in the swing and closed my eyes.
“Then why are you so upset?”
I inhaled really deep, then blew it out. “Aside from all the obvious things, like Mark has an awesome girlfriend, and Pam is four years younger than him?”
“You seem way more torqued up than that.”
It happened just like my sketch. “It’s hard to explain.”
Inside the house screams and laughter followed the sound of a crash.
Damon looked in the kitchen window, then down the street. “Come on,” he said and reached for my hand. “This isn’t where you want to be.”
He pulled me off the porch swing before I could say anything else. I followed him into the dark, aware of little but the solid, delicious warmth of his hand wrapped around mine.
We turned past the corner of the house and he let go.
A bike that looked like it had been around the block more than a few times leaned against the siding. A deep scrape ran the length of the silver exhaust pipe.
“That’s a motorcycle.”
Damon climbed on and stuck a key into the ignition. “Well, a dirt bike.”
“You said you’re not legal on these.”
The bike roared to life. “Technically, no. Not on roads.” He pulled a helmet off one of the handlebars and passed it to me, then nodded to the back. “Get on.”
“Do you even know how to drive this?”
He laughed and took a second helmet off the other handlebar and gave it to me. “I’m actually really good at driving these. I have trophies.”
Before I could even ask why he had two helmets, I knew.
Amica.
“No, thanks,” I said, and handed it back.
But he didn’t take it. “What’s wrong?”
“What do you think?”
He sighed and his shoulders slumped. “I know. Adam drove tonight, but he’s not going to be in any shape to drive it home. He lost his license anyway. And I sure don’t want to stay here.”
Okay, so the extra helmet didn’t belong to Amica. But an illegal motorcycle ride didn’t make me feel good, either. “If you get caught you’re going to be in so much trouble.”
He nodded and looked at the handlebars.
“Why didn’t you ride your mountain bike?”
“Adam wouldn’t. Too far.”
“You could’ve ridden separately.”
He just stared. I couldn’t tell if he hadn’t thought of that, or if it just sounded stupid. “It’s hard to explain.”
A siren wailed in the distance.
“Please get on the bike,” Damon asked. “Or go home. Now.”
Home, where no one had spoken to anyone else all day.
Right.
I lifted the helmet up and pulled it over my head. I fumbled to figure out the straps and Damon reached over. His fingers brushed mine as he tugged on the clips and fastened them under my chin. I stepped behind him and swung my leg over the bike. The seat felt enormous, like a gymnastics vault.
He revved the engine and the back tire slipped in the grass as we pulled away from the house. The bike dipped to the left and I grabbed onto Damon’s sides to brace myself as we pulled onto the road. Then, too aware of my hands, and his rib cage beneath them, I let go and put my palms on my knees. But that left me wobbly, so I clutched the loose tail of his T-shirt in both fists.
He reached back, found my hand and pulled it around his waist. Then he did the same with the other one. His fingers lingered on mine before he reached up to the handlebar again.
My heart thundered against his back.
We veered off the main road onto the gravel track that led further out to farmland. He slowed down, turned back toward me and lifted the visor on his helmet. “Where do you want to go?”
“I don’t know,” I yelled.
He rested one hand on his thigh as he twisted around to talk to me. I wondered how he kept the bike going straight.
> “I don’t know this area very well,” he said.
I could only think of one place.
“Go down this road about a mile and a half and there’ll be a path into the woods on the right.”
* * * * *
“In Benin, everybody rides motorbikes. Even children. That’s just how you get around.” Damon stretched his legs out and leaned back on his elbows. “I saw a little kid once, about eight or nine, riding his velo home from the market with a live goat hanging across the seat behind him and a dog in his handlebar basket.”
I laughed and the raft bobbed up and down beneath us. “How old were you when you learned to ride?”
A chill breeze carried the promise of a cold night across the lake. The quarter moon hung in the sky like a tipped bowl and poured silvery light over Damon’s face. “Probably five or six. I remember we had this tiny bike that Adam and I learned on. We rode that thing all over the quartier.”
“All over the what?”
“Sorry. Quartier. The neighborhood.” He sat up and put his elbows on his knees. “Why were you at that party tonight? Did your brother bring you?”
“No.” I wrapped my arms around my knees and rested my cheek on my wrist. “I wasn’t going to go. I told Pam it was a stupid idea.”
“I think you were right.”
“Sometimes my mom just makes me so mad.” I stopped then, when it clicked that I now sat under the stars, alone in the dark, with the boy I wasn’t supposed to be with. And that the forbidden boy had taken me away from a forbidden party on a forbidden motorcycle.
I also remembered that Damon’s mom was dead.
“I’m sorry.”
“What for?”
“Talking about my mom.”
“That’s okay.”
I swallowed a lump. “I heard that your mom…”
“She died.”
“I’m really sorry.”
He nodded and looked out over the water.
“Was it a long time ago?”
“Three years next week.”
Neither of us said anything for a long time. Pretty soon he lay back on the raft and put his hands behind his head. I did the same and we watched bats crisscross the sky and dive for bugs.
Damon whistled once and the bats scattered. “You know, I’ve never talked to anybody except Adam about Mom.”
“What about your dad?”
He blew air out his nose. “Dad doesn’t talk. Not about stuff like that.”
I lay still as a statue, afraid to even blink and shatter the fragile harmony between us.
“She died two months after being diagnosed.”
Two months.
Damon swallowed hard. “Dad took her back to the states for treatment, and said they’d be home right after her chemo. But she didn’t make it.”