“I talked to Jon-Paul last night. Emma’s finally home. She was asleep when I called.” Raina closed her eyes, conjuring up the faces of her sister and her husband, a sister she had never known existed until February.
“But she’s doing all right?”
“She is now.” It had been touch and go as Emma’s doctors fought to stave off infections that threatened her new bone marrow, but after a hundred and ten days, she had been sent home to complete her recovery and begin her married life, cancer free.
“And you?” Hunter touched her hip in the area where bone marrow had been extracted to save Emma’s life.
“You asked me the same thing yesterday. The answer’s the same today. I’m fine. Just a small scar.”
“Can I see?” He nuzzled her neck.
“I’m shocked you would ask. I mean with all these people looking on.”
He laughed. One thing she could trust about Hunter was that he wouldn’t look even if she stripped on the spot. “I’m not a prude.”
“Yes you are.” She twisted around and kissed him lightly. “That’s what makes it work between us. I keep trying to jump your bones and you keep pushing me away.”
“This will change when we get married.”
Her heart did its usual stutter step. They talked about sex and marriage, but truthfully, huge hurdles lay in front of them. For starters, Hunter wanted to be a minister and had taken early admission to a small Christian college in Indiana the previous winter. She wasn’t sure she even believed in God. Only Holly, Hunter’s sister, realized the depth of their dilemma. Raina was worried about their having a future when they were such polar opposites in this area. Yet whenever she was with him, all she thought about was how much she loved him and about being with him forever.
“What if I get a better offer?” she asked playfully.
“Then I’ll just have to take the guy out.”
“That sounds pretty hostile—for a minister.”
“Think of Samson. Hey, I’m tough. I’m the guy who got into a fistfight over you, remember?”
How could she forget? Tony Stoddard’s bad mouth had almost destroyed her relationship with Hunter. “Don’t joke about that, Hunter,” she said quietly. “I don’t think I’ll ever be able to joke about it.”
His arms tightened around her. “I was the idiot, not you.”
She knew he wanted to make it up to her for the way he’d treated her after Tony’s “revelation,” but he didn’t need to. She loved him and wanted to be with him forever—yet the hurdles remained.
Carson hoisted himself out of the pool. “I’d better turn the burgers.” He padded over to the grill, raised the lid and stared down. “Um—I think they’re burned.”
Holly went over and confirmed his suspicion. “Hopelessly burned.”
“Dad’s never burn.”
“He stands over them full-time,” Kathleen called. She had straddled the float and paddled to the shallow end of the water, where she used the steps to exit the pool. She walked over to the grill.
The three of them stared in dismay at the charred remains of their lunch.
“Too bad. I’m starved,” Kathleen said.
Carson turned off the grill. “So how does everybody feel about pizza?” The agreement was unanimous, so he picked up his cell phone and hit a single button.
Incredulous, Kathleen asked, “You have the pizza parlor on speed dial?”
Carson grinned. “A guy’s got to eat.” He slipped his arm around her.
Holly hung back, feeling as left out as she always did. She’d turned sixteen in May and now had her driver’s license, not that it did her a whole lot of good. Her parents only allowed her to drive Hunter’s beat-up car solo and only if and when he wasn’t using it, which wasn’t often. Her emancipation wouldn’t go into full effect until he returned to college in September—if then. But it wasn’t the car issue that bothered her the most. It was the lack of a boyfriend, a guy of her own, a boy who took her out on dates or came with her when she hung out with Raina and Hunter, Kathleen and Carson.
In mid-May, the e-mails from Shy Boy had stopped as suddenly and mysteriously as they had begun. Her e-mails to him bounced back to her mailbox, so she was no closer to knowing who he was than when he’d first contacted her in February. She’d printed out all their communications and kept them in a notebook stuffed between her mattress and box spring, because, of course, her parents knew nothing about Shy Boy. They would never have approved, so she’d printed and then deleted the messages as soon as they’d arrived. She’d read them so many times that she could quote them.
HOLLY: Are you some 35-year-old
pervert, pretending to be sixteen?
SHY BOY: I’m seventeen, and not a
pervert… well, I’m not most of the time.
HOLLY: Why don’t you want to meet me
face to face?
SHY BOY: I know what your face looks
like. It’s the face of an angel.
HOLLY: But I don’t know what YOU look
like!
SHY BOY: My mother thinks I’m
handsome.
HOLLY: I should believe her because… ?
SHY BOY: Because mothers don’t lie.
And because it’s what’s inside a person
that counts, not what’s on the outside.
HOLLY: So … are you saying that you
have a face only a mother can love?
SHY BOY: My face is decent. Honest. And
I only have eyes for YOU.
Then the e-mails had stopped. She felt irritated and impatient with him. And she felt sorry for herself. She finally had a boy interested in her, and he was like a phantom. She couldn’t see him or touch him. Raina had said, “Savor the moments. If he got hold of you once, he’ll do it again.”
And Kathleen had said, “Remember how long it took me to get it together with Carson. Be patient.”
Easy for them to say. They had their guys locked in their arms and their hearts. The only bright spot in Holly’s life this summer was the Pink Angels program. Volunteering at the hospital was what got her out of bed these bright summer mornings. That and the remote possibility that one day soon, she’d turn on her computer and Shy Boy would have sent her another e-mail, this time setting up a time and place for them to meet.
Published by Laurel-Leaf
an imprint of Random House Children’s Books
a division of Random House, Inc.
New York
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either
are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events,
or locales is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2005 by Lurlene McDaniel
All rights reserved.
Laurel-Leaf and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
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visit us at www.randomhouse.com/teachers
RL: 5.3
eISBN: 978-0-307-43313-8
v3.0_r1
Lurlene McDaniel, Kathleen's Story
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