“I dropped your change of clothes off with Luke before coming to get you,” Piper said. “I decided it would have been too much of a pain to drive all the way back to my place so you could change. Besides, we don’t want to eat into our fun time.”
“But you said I would get to meet Dr. Schiff,” I protested, in what I’m afraid might have sounded a bit like a whine.
Piper made a something-smells-bad face. “Believe me, you’re not missing anything. He’s a long-winded bore, and as far as I can tell, he has no sense of humor. Don’t worry—we’ll come up with something creative to tell your dad.”
Luke’s door opened and Piper darted in, pulling me in behind her. I seriously considered telling her I had a queasy stomach and would rather stay home after all. That lie had little to no chance of getting me in trouble—though my dad would be disappointed I didn’t get a chance to impress Dr. Schiff—and lying in bed feigning stomach woes would be more fun than watching Piper hang all over the boy I’d been too shy to make a play for.
Piper didn’t give me a chance to say anything before she flung herself into Luke’s arms, leaving me to close the door behind us. Luke laughed and hugged her back, hazel eyes dancing.
“Long time no see,” he said in that delicious baritone voice of his. He was wearing a faded T-shirt for some band I’d never heard of over comfortably lived-in blue jeans, and even though he was my neighbor and I saw him all the time, my voice froze in my throat when he met my eyes over Piper’s head.
“Hey, Becket,” he said. “Glad you can come with.”
I had no reason to believe he really meant that, but I wanted to. And though it was totally lame of me, I realized I couldn’t pass up the chance to spend time with him, even if it made me sad and jealous. So, no queasy stomach for me.
I hate my full-out smile because it shows too much gum, so I kept my lips a little tight as I smiled back at him. I probably looked like I was grimacing in pain. “Me too. But you know you’ll be caught in the Circle of Doom if my dad finds out about this.”
Luke shrugged casually. “It’s a chance I’m willing to take. Why don’t you go ahead and get changed so we can hit the road? Your clothes are in the bathroom.” He pointed down the hall.
“Okay,” I said, then hesitated a beat, feeling like I should say something else. Something sophisticated, or at least witty. But my mind went blank, as it had a tendency to do around Luke, and I hurried toward the bathroom before the silence could become awkward.
When I closed the bathroom door behind me, I let out a sigh of relief. How was I going to get through an entire night in Luke’s presence without making him think I was a gibbering idiot? I was always a little shy, but not like I was in Luke’s presence. I couldn’t say two words to him without second-guessing myself, and tonight was far from the first time I’d had my mind go completely blank while talking to him.
“Cheer up,” I muttered to my reflection in the mirror over the sink. “With Piper around, he won’t be paying any attention to you anyway.”
I changed into my jeans, folding my nice outfit carefully, worried that it would develop telltale wrinkles. Then I spent a couple of minutes in front of the mirror practicing my no-gums smile. It looked a little fake, but I’d rather look fake than flash half an inch of gums.
I took a steadying breath. It was already clear I was going to be way out of my comfort zone tonight, but maybe it would be good for me. My dad kept me too isolated, too sheltered, and I needed to get out into the world a little more or college was going to give me a bad case of culture shock.
Determined to have fun, I bravely rejoined Luke and Piper.
CHAPTER FOUR
It turned out Piper’s idea of a fun Saturday night was getting some friend of hers to sneak the three of us in through the back door of a nightclub on South Street. Which, I have to admit, seemed pretty exciting at first. No one under twenty-one was allowed into the club, and yet there we were, getting a sneak peek of what it would be like when we were legally old enough to drink. My dad would totally have a heart attack if he knew where I was, and there was no denying the glow of satisfaction that gave me.
The glow faded pretty fast once we got inside. The music was so loud it made my teeth vibrate, and it was some obnoxious techno crap with a relentless thumping beat and no melody. The club was packed to the gills, and although it might have been twenty degrees outside, it was probably around ninety inside.
Since we hadn’t come in the front entrance, we didn’t get to check our coats. Which meant someone would have to keep an eye on them all night or they might walk off. Why anyone would bother to steal a coat from inside a nightclub I don’t know, but it was just a fact of city life that you couldn’t put anything down anywhere and expect it to still be there when you got back.
There wasn’t anywhere to sit down, but there was a cluster of standing-room-only tables off to one side of the dance floor, and we hovered until one of them opened up, then piled all our coats on it. Luke fought his way to the bar and got us each a beer, but before anyone had taken more than two sips, Piper was tugging him toward the dance floor. He looked over his shoulder at me, obviously uncomfortable with the idea of leaving me alone at the table. I wasn’t exactly comfortable with it myself, but I gave him a smile and a thumbs-up anyway.
Left with no company save three empty coats, I felt the faint prickle of tears in my eyes. I blinked rapidly in an effort to stave them off. Piper was out on that dance floor, dancing with abandon, her body gyrating to the beat as she steadily sipped from her bottle of beer. She leaned toward Luke and said something that made them both laugh. With nothing to do but people-watch, I let my eyes drift around the room and saw that Luke wasn’t the only guy in the place who appreciated Piper’s dancing. If Luke got tired, there would be a stampede of volunteers eager to take his place.
I took a sip from my beer and tried not to make a face. Disgusting stuff, though I fully intended to try to develop a taste for it in preparation for college. I’d never be the wild party animal type, but I hoped to at least blend in.
There were plenty of people out there dancing without partners, mostly groups of girls who seemed to be having a good time without the help of any guys, but I would have been way too self-conscious to just go out there and dance by myself, even if I didn’t have to keep an eye on the coats. I felt like the world’s biggest loser.
I spent about five minutes throwing myself a pity party, but then Piper returned to the table and pushed me out toward Luke on the dance floor.
“Your turn!” she shouted in my ear.
Lucky for me it was kinda dark in there, so Piper couldn’t see how red my face turned. Me, dance with Luke? I could barely remember how to breathe in his presence.
Piper gave me a bright smile and another push. “He doesn’t bite unless invited to,” she said with a laugh. “Now get out there.”
Luke was beckoning to me, so I plastered on what I felt sure was a frozen smile and forced myself out onto the crowded floor.
It’s not like it’s some romantic slow dance, I told myself. Piper would never have sent me out if it were.
The good news was that the music was too loud for conversation, so I didn’t have to make a fool of myself stumbling over words. The bad news was that, well, I had to dance. The floor was so jam-packed the only dance move I could do without bumping into someone was a vaguely rhythmic shuffle. Luke was about ten times as coordinated as me, but he didn’t seem to mind my pathetic dancing, and I tried to have fun. Sweat trickled down my back and glued my hair to my neck. Eventually Piper cut in, and I was more relieved than disappointed.
Luke and Piper made every attempt to include me, and we all took turns sitting out and keeping watch over the coats. But despite their best efforts, every time it was my turn to sit out I felt a little lower, a little more like a third wheel who just didn’t belong. Maybe it was because I couldn’t get enough beer into me to make much of a dent in my inhibitions.
That was one problem Piper most definit
ely did not have. I didn’t keep track of how many beers she drank, except it was a lot, and her dancing got progressively wilder and more sexual. Sweat plastered her already clingy shirt to her body and shone on her skin, and her movements became less coordinated. Already, I was dreading what would happen when it was time to go home. There was no way I was letting her get behind the wheel of a car in her condition, but I wouldn’t be at all surprised if she put up a fight.
The alcohol seemed to give Piper a limitless supply of energy, and after a while she stopped taking her turn watching the coats. Once she was drunk enough, even Luke seemed to have become optional to her, and eventually he and I were left standing at the table together while Piper danced on in a little all-girl cluster toward the edge of the floor. I noticed with some relief that Luke was drinking a Coke rather than a beer.
“We’re not letting her drive,” I shouted at him, hoping like hell he would be on my side.
He shook his head, then reached into his pocket and pulled out a set of keys on a Hello Kitty key chain. They definitely weren’t his, and I breathed a sigh of relief as he flashed me a wry grin.
“Not my first time around the block,” he yelled back. I could barely hear him over the music, which was so monotonously repetitive I longed for my iPod and some earbuds. I hoped my top wasn’t showing sweat stains and that my makeup hadn’t melted off. How Piper could keep dancing with such energy in this heat was a mystery.
I glanced at my watch and saw it was almost midnight. So much for my eleven o’clock curfew. I fished my cell phone out of my pocket and saw I had three missed calls from my dad. Great. I hoped Dad hadn’t called Piper’s house looking for me when I didn’t answer. Luke caught me checking and leaned in closer so he wouldn’t have to shout quite as loud.
“What time did you tell your dad you’d be home?” he asked.
“Eleven,” I replied glumly. Piper was obviously having a blast, drinking and dancing, even flirting a little, which I didn’t think Luke much appreciated. Prying her away was going to take a major effort.
Luke winced in sympathy. He knew my dad. “We’d better get out of here, then,” he said.
I wasn’t exactly having fun, but I might have felt compelled to argue anyway—if Luke had waited for a response. Instead, he immediately waded out onto the crowded dance floor and shouted something into Piper’s ear. Still dancing, she made a pouty face at him. I didn’t need to hear them to know she was telling him she wasn’t ready to leave yet.
I don’t know what Luke said to her—he appeared to try several different tactics—but eventually she gave in. I noticed she had to cling to his arm to keep herself upright, and when she got back to the table, it took both Luke and me to get her into her coat.
We left the same way we came in, through the back door. Piper puked into the gutter before we were halfway back to her car. I hoped getting some of the alcohol out of her would sober her up just a little, but no such luck. She was so unsteady on her feet that I thought Luke was going to have to carry her, and when she spoke her words were so slurred I couldn’t understand her. I had the feeling I wasn’t missing much.
When we got to the car, Luke handed me the keys, and I opened the door. Luke then guided Piper in so she could lie down on the backseat, where she passed out immediately. Luke shook his head at her as he closed the door. I wondered how many times she’d ended up passed out when one of their dates was over.
“I thought maybe with you here she wouldn’t get so drunk,” he said, giving Piper a rueful look as he reclaimed the car keys.
I didn’t say so, but that seemed a little idealistic of him. Piper was who she was, and you either accepted the whole package or you didn’t. There were things about her I didn’t like—and she’d added a few entries to the list tonight—but I knew I had to take the bad with the good. Tonight had been nothing like I’d planned or hoped for, but I’d still had plenty of good times with her in the past. It was worth putting up with moments like this. “Moderation just isn’t her thing.”
Luke laughed. “Yeah. Guess you could say that.”
He got into the car, and I did too, though I was super conscious that I was sitting in the front seat next to him, where Piper ought to be. A hint of panic fluttered in my belly. When Piper was around, I never had to worry much about what to talk about, because she was never at a loss for words. If a moment of silence threatened, she jumped smoothly and easily into the breach. But Piper was passed out, and I was tongue-tied around Luke in the best of times. What was I supposed to say to him after a night like tonight? Would he think I was totally standoffish and rude if I just savored the silence after the cacophony of the club?
“Sorry tonight wasn’t much fun for you,” Luke said as he started the car and pulled out into traffic.
“What? Oh. No. It was great.” I felt my face heating with a blush at my spastic response.
He gave me a knowing look. “What could be better than standing at a table watching the coats?”
My blush deepened, and I hoped it was dark enough that he couldn’t see. “I danced!” I said, but even I could hear how defensive I sounded.
“There’s nothing wrong with not being into the nightclub scene.”
My hackles rose, though I knew he was just trying to be nice. I’d tried to act like I was having a great time, tried to lose myself in the music—which was hard when I actually hated it. Why couldn’t he just pretend he hadn’t noticed I was miserable?
“It’s not really my thing, either,” Luke continued, surprising me. “But Piper loves to dance, so I go with her.”
I glanced over my shoulder at Piper, who was still dead to the world. “That isn’t all she loves to do,” I mumbled. How did she get away with coming home drunk like this? Were her parents okay with her drinking? Or did they just not care?
“I tried to get her to slow down,” Luke said, and this time he was the one who sounded a little defensive. “But once she gets started…” He shrugged instead of finishing the sentence. “I’m just glad she doesn’t give me a hard time about taking the keys away.”
Yeah, me too. If it had been just me and Piper tonight, the way I’d expected, would she have given me her keys?
I knew the answer to my own question. She would have fought me on it. There was no way I would have gotten into the car with her behind the wheel in the shape she was in, but would I have been assertive enough to stop her from getting in? I don’t think of myself as being particularly weak willed, but sometimes Piper felt like a force of nature, and I’d let her have her way so many times.
I didn’t like where my thoughts were taking me, so I yanked my mind away—and immediately saw the flaw with having Luke drive Piper’s car.
“How are you going to get home?” I asked. Piper’s house was out near the Main Line, so it wasn’t like he could hop on a bus or subway to get home once he’d dropped her and her car off.
“Piper’s folks will call a cab for me, or one of them will give me a ride. They’re just thankful I don’t let her drive.”
Clearly this wasn’t the first time he’d ended up in this situation. If so, it seemed like kind of a shitty way to treat your boyfriend. Piper was the only one of the three of us who’d really been free to have fun tonight, and it was only because she knew I’d stand there and guard the coats and Luke would stay sober so he could drive her home.
I can’t say it was the first time I’d ever allowed myself to think that my dad’s view of Piper was more accurate than mine, but I found his voice in my head harder than usual to dismiss.
“She’s a handful,” Luke said, though he looked at her in the rearview mirror with a smile that said it wasn’t so much a complaint as an observation. “But she’s worth the trouble.”
Maybe he and I both needed to stop drinking the Kool-Aid.
CHAPTER FIVE
Remember how I said there wasn’t much my dad could do to me in punishment if he found out the truth? Well, I was wrong.
He was waiting up for me w
hen I got home, and just as I’d feared, he’d called Piper’s house to check on me when I didn’t answer my cell. Piper’s mom ratted me out, of course, and to say my dad was furious is an understatement. The fight we had was truly epic, and I ended up not just grounded but confined to my room. He made sure I had nothing to do other than homework and college applications, stripping all the books from my shelves and blocking the Internet on my computer.
I said some awful, hurtful things while we were yelling at each other, and it wasn’t until afterward that I realized how much I’d sounded like my mom, in those final, miserable months before she moved out. I don’t know how long she and Dad had been fighting in private, but they’d gone totally public with it in the year or so before their divorce, the fights getting louder, more frequent, and nastier as time wore on. Having been an unwilling witness—or at least listener—to many of those fights, I knew where Dad’s weak spots were. Poking a wounded bear rarely turns out well, but after the disappointment and discomfort of my night on the town, I couldn’t seem to help myself.
It wasn’t until I woke up on Sunday morning that I started to feel really bad about it. After all, I had lied to him, and in a big way. I’d known exactly what I was getting into when I decided to go out with Piper, and I’d done it anyway. A parent who wouldn’t get pissed off about what I’d done was probably a parent not worth having.
I was allowed out of my room for meals and bathroom breaks only, and I slept so late it was lunchtime by the time I made it downstairs. Dad was in the kitchen scrambling eggs when I dragged in, still in my pj’s. There was a full pot of coffee waiting, and I helped myself. Dad’s face was tight and unhappy, and he didn’t say good morning. The silence between us felt like a physical force, daring us to break it.
He was still royally pissed at me, and I could hardly blame him. My own anger had faded into resignation and a heavy dose of shame, not so much for disobeying him but for the things I’d said. Once upon a time, we’d been really close, and I’d thought having this time with just him and me living together would make us even closer. So far, it had turned out just the opposite.