MoonRise

by David VanDyke & Drew VanDyke

  Chapter 6

  “Elle! You are not going to believe this!” Amber stood on the front lawn of the house, cell phone in one hand, talking while she watered the lawn with the other as we drove up. “It looks like Ash and Will are together again.” I could hear the sounds of exclamation coming from the other end as Will lifted me down from the tailgate.

  “Hi, Will!” Amber called and waved. “I’ll talk to you later,” she told the phone and hung up on Elle. “Fancy seeing you here.”

   “Yes, well I found this poor handicapped bag lady wandering the streets smoking a clove and had to stop and lend her a hand,” Will said to Amber as he walked me over.

  “Don’t let him lie to you like that,” I said quickly, trying to divert her from the smoking tipoff. “It was me who took pity on the poor schmuck, because he had to stop and ask for directions.”

  “Now I know you’re lying. Men never ask for directions. Besides, he’s lived here all his life.”

  “So sue me.”

  The diversion did not work. “Ashlee, I thought you’d given up that nasty habit,” Amber said, so I whacked Will in the back of the head with the palm of my hand.

  “Thanks for spilling the beans, loser.” I turned back to my sister. “Will’s staying for lunch,” I said, hoping to avoid a lecture and almost positive she wouldn’t pull rank and nix his invitation.

  “Oh no he’s not,” Amber said.

  “Oh no I’m not,” Will echoed.

  “C’mon. I bet you two haven’t talked in a while. It’ll be good for all of us,” I said. “Besides, I’m cooking.”

  My sister rolled her eyes. “Now this I’ve got to see.”

   

  “See, I told you I make a mean pot of spaghetti,” I teased as I cleared the dishes and set another helping of pasta before the man I realized I wanted to get to know better again.

  “Please, Ash. I really couldn’t eat another bite,” Will said.

  "Oh, come on. Just one more wafer-thin mint?"

  Will grinned, deliberately stuck his fork into the center of the bowl and started slurping anyway, much to my delight.

  “Actually, Ash, that wasn’t bad for spaghetti. It was pretty good in fact,” Amber added as an aside to her S.O., who had come home for lunch. Benefits of the small town: short commute. “Wasn’t it, Elle?”

  “It was very good, Ash.” Elle played her role as the grownup to the hilt. “If it wasn’t for Amber, I’d probably be having another helping myself.” Elle laughed as Amber tickled her, pinching the pudge that she never could seem to lose.

  “So, why don’t we go take that drive?” I suggested to Will, who perked up at the sound and put down his fork. I’d taken another pain pill by now, so I figured I could at least make it through a two-hour reunion tour of the hometown, and besides, I didn’t think I could stand the lovey-dovey around here anymore. “Catch up on the dish. Tell me who’s divorced who and who’s still having babies when they should have stopped years ago. And stuff.”

  “And stuff,” Will echoed solemnly.

  “You still have to clean up this mess,” Amber tossed over her shoulder.

  “I’ll handle the dishes.” Elle put a hand on Amber’s wrist and squeezed. “I think Ash could use the time out of the house for a while.”

  Amber got it, smiled and then gave me a quick wink. “Fine. Take your time. Keys still in the same place, and don’t forget to reset the alarm after you come in.”

  “Thanks guys!” I gave them a quick hug and limped enthusiastically out the door toward the pickup past Mervin and JR, who were just coming home from soccer practice.

  “Hi guys! Bye guys!” I sang.

  “Hey, isn’t that Will Stenfield?” I heard Mervin ask Amber as he handed her JR’s muddy cleats, which she took with two fingers and walked them into the garage.

  “I think he dated Denise once,” Mervin commented, referring to Amber’s replacement and JR’s new step-monster, then shrugged and walked away.

  “Amber,” Elle said in a warning tone as she poked her head into the garage.

  Amber turned and put her hands on her hips.

  “What?”

  “Love you,” Elle said.

  Hearing that, I was seriously tempted to toss my cookies, but with Will there I was already too far away, reminiscing.

   

  “So, where do you want to go?” Will asked as he revved the engine while I went through his CDs. I pulled out a scratched-up copy of the Cars’ first album, one that he’d inherited from his dad. I still remember it playing from the work truck as Stenfield Landscaping groomed the school grounds when I was a kid. We both ended up loving the eighties music of our parents, I guess.

  Or maybe it was because Will was frozen in the past and I had no time to figure out “what’s a Bieber?”

  “Can we go by my old house?” I asked. “I want to see how much it’s changed.”

  “Um. Sure.” He hesitated, looking at me funny.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.” Will laughed as he pulled out onto Walnut Avenue and over to the west side of town.

  “Tell me.”

  “Tell you what?”

  “Tell me.”

  “No.”

  “Weirdo.”

  “Freak.”

  “Fine.” I folded my arms and faked a sulk.

  When Amber and I were growing up, we lived on the good side of the bad side of town, a couple houses down from one of the retired mayors. His raised brick ranch-style sprawled out over a half-acre lot and held lemon trees we used to swipe fruit from during the summer. These weren’t the cute little things you get in grocery stores, the ones that look like they were made from plastic lemon molds. These lemons were frickin’ monsters, grapefruit-sized. I had no idea why. Anyway, we had this weird thing about sucking the juice from lemons after coating them with salt, kind of like our older brother Adam did with cold sliced potatoes and equally cold slabs of butter.

  Had to be there, I guess.

  Will drove us down Golden Boulevard, which used to be part of the old highway before they put the bypass through, and pulled into the parking lot of the Boxcar, an abandoned set of railroad cars that had been turned into a nice restaurant. I had worked there the summer I came home.

  For some, Knightsbridge was a college town, for others it was a great place to raise kids, but for single people, it seriously sucked. Just one more reason why I had taken the travel writer’s apprenticeship, seldom went back, and didn’t look people up.

  I know, thin, right? Bad memories, I guess I’ll admit to.

  “Remember this place?” he asked as we stared at the outside.

  “God, yes!” I’d spent that whole summer as the hostess greeter, since I was too young to carry alcohol and too new to serve food and get tips. I did help bus tables. Minimum wage, go me. “I met Palmer Courtland here and he tried to put a hand up my dress. You know, the guy from one of those daytime soaps where no one ever ages? I think he was seventy. Looked forty if he didn’t move his face.”

  “Come on, can you blame him?” Will waggled his eyebrows, mock-lasciviously. Or actually lasciviously. Made me feel all tingly.

  “Guess not, but I’m worldly and wise now. Back then…ew.” I laughed.

  “And what about that Sid guy who used to be the chef?”

  “Omigod! That’s right. He had such a filthy mouth,” I remembered. “If the customers only knew the way he talked about them! They would have just died.”

  “I think he knew it offended you and if I remember correctly, you told me it got even filthier, that is, until I had a chat with him.”

  “That was you? I never knew. That was sweet.” I lay flat on the bench seat, put my head in his lap and stuck my feet out the window, taking the pressure off my ass. “Remember when we all dressed up in white and played croquet in the park?”

  “I wasn’t there for that one, but I remember driving by. You looked adorable in white.”

  He was right. I did. I do. I smi
led.

  “You’re still pretty adorable.”

  That made me sit up and look at him, searching his face.

  Will leaned over and put a peck on my forehead. I lifted my face and he kissed me for real this time. Very softly. My mouth parted involuntarily and his tongue flicked in and touched the tip of my own in an intimate caress.

  Was I really doing this?

  “Um. Is it hot in here, or is it me?” I asked as I moved away from him, opened the door and climbed out of the cab. Just down the road from the Boxcar was a place called the Nordic Chalet where they still sold winter sports equipment. I marveled how it seemed some things changed and some things never did.

  “Come on, let’s walk,” I said, just to clear my head, and proceeded to stroll down my hometown version of Main Street USA, Will trailing a bit behind.

  “I can’t believe the Frosty Freeze is still here.” I kept up a running commentary as we walked. “And there’s the studio where Amber and I took jazz class. Knightsbridge School of Ballet was just around the corner, up there in that window, see?” I pointed and Will sneaked up behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist.

  I folded myself into him and looked up into his smiling baby blues. “What are you doing?” I asked, my heart pounding in my ears.

  “Reminiscing,” he said as he leaned down and kissed me again. Long and slow, and soft, like a lover. My body melted into his. I whimpered as my heart threatened to crack and I knew that I had it bad.

  Where the hell did this all come from? Old flames rekindled from banked fires.

   “Um, that was nice.” I inhaled his scent as I hid my face in the crook of his arm.

  “You’re welcome.” Will laughed and kissed me again on the forehead. Lots of kissing going on here. I liked it.

  This was the last thing that I was expecting. But there’s something about the people in your hometown, something very familiar, the same familiarity that breeds contempt, but when the right strings are played, it makes you feel like they know you inside and out…even when you know they really don’t.

  But you can never go home again, though I thought I could right then.

   

  I slipped out of his arms and walked a few steps ahead of him again. “I know what you’re doing.”

  “What am I doing?” he asked, daring me to answer.

  “Don’t think you can come in here all hella wonderful and worm your way back into my life that easy.”

  “Hella wonderful?” Laughter from him.

  “I got out of this hick town years ago and I’m not going to be dragged back here in the lined bed of a Chevy with intertwined hearts on it,” I said, referring to the etching on his back window.

  “I never thought you would,” he told me, eyes glittering in the sunlight dappled through the maples. I hated it when men did that, with their eyes. Hated it.

  Okay, I’m lying.

  “Well. Good. So back off, ’cause this girl’s not ready to settle.” I crossed my arms and looked at him defiantly.

  “Since when have you settled for anything, Ash?” he asked and grabbed my elusive hand. “And if I was that kinda guy, I’d be insulted. Come on. I want to show you something.”

  I let him drag me a few paces, then decided that with his bulk it would be a losing battle anyway and matched his steps. Before we knew it, we were in front of Crave.

  Keith and Dawn Snyder had opened Crave Donuts when I was a kid when one of those horrible chain donut shops was the only game in town. Pretty soon the other place closed. How’s that for entrepreneurial? They made the best Bavarian crème I have ever tasted in my life, so when he pulled me in the door, I thought I was going to die.

  “Hey Ash!” came a voice from behind the counter. “I didn’t know you were in town.” Jill Snyder, now Jill Blumenthal, came around the corner and gave me a big hug. I was taken aback for a moment. We’d never been that close in high school, but it just goes to show you that people’s memories of the past are often more rosy than we expect.

  “Yeah. I’m holed up at Amber’s for a few weeks recovering from a surgery. Bullet wound on assignment. I see you’re still in the doughnut biz.”

  “Bullet wound?” she said, her mouth a big O.

  “Just a ricochet. Nothing serious. Forget I said anything. You look great by the way.” And she did. Married life looked really good on her.

  Jill’s face lit up. “Oh, you’re so sweet.”

  That was the difference between her and a city girl, who would have taken my comment as one-upmanship. She was married to a tall, blonde and dishy silent type I knew from school but not very well, and now they had a few kids. I fought back a pang of annoyance. I was so not going to settle, down or otherwise.

  You know, God laughs at people’s plans, my brother always said, and if you swear you’ll never do something, guess what? That’s what will happen.

  “Hey, Jill.” Will gave her a smile. “Can we get some of your custard-filled chocolate bars?”

  Jill smiled back and went behind the counter.

  “I just made up a fresh batch,” she said and I had a sudden déjà vu as I remembered that her mother Dawn used to tell me the same thing. I watched with anticipation as she took the oozingly creamy custard and filled the warm doughy chocolate-covered orgasm before my very eyes.

  Will paid her for the donuts and a couple of milks and we sat over at a table by the window. When I bit into it, I thought I was going to die and go to heaven right there. One thing I never had to worry about was getting fat, by the way. Yes, all you girls can envy the hell out of me, but it has something to do with my monthly romp in the woods.

  Silver linings? Frankly, I don’t think it was a good trade. You try waking up with your face covered in blood. You’ll see.

  “So, are they as good as you remembered?” Will leaned his forehead into mine across the table in an intimate gesture and I sighed.

  “Better,” I said, savoring every bite in silence as I watched him demolish his own donut in two seconds flat. I took a napkin and wiped his chin.

  Jill was looking at us with interest from behind the counter and I knew that the social media gossip line was going to be hard at work this evening. Local Girl Returns, Reignites Old Passions!

  “Let’s get out of here,” I said under my breath as we downed our milks and headed for the door.

  “Bye guys!” Jill called after us. “Don’t forget Homecoming’s next month! Alumni games are first and then Trojans versus Spartans!” Her voice drifted out. “Everybody would LOVE to see you!”

  “Trojans versus Spartans?” I asked. “Since when are Knightsbridge and K-Christian even in the same league?”

  “Boy, you have been gone a while, haven’t you?” Will teased. “KCHS even has a football team now. It’s grown a lot.”

  “You’re kidding,” I said as we headed past the Shell station and back to the truck. “Where are they getting the money? We had to buy our own cheerleading outfits when I was in school.”

  “Yeah, well times change, Ash.” He held the door of the truck open for me. “And so do people. The town’s not so small, and it got a lot richer with the influx of wealthy conservatives fleeing the Bay Area. K-Christian went from being That Other School to the place the elite all send their kids, at the same time the public schools were cutting their budgets.”

  “Wow. Weird.”

  “Yeah, never mind. Back on topic: believe it or not, lots of people remember you with fondness,” he said, and I could see he meant it.

  I felt bad. I had been a pretty mixed-up kid, and after Mom died and the date-getting-killed thing, which nobody ever talked about – don’t worry, I’ll tell you about it soon – I had a tendency to see the glass half empty rather than half full. It made me feel small, and I thought that perhaps I needed some new glasses. Half-sized ones, maybe, that would be full, with half the…

  Sorry, my metaphor just broke down. Not so good for a writer, but I always swore not to revise my diary, so I’ll just keep
on telling the tale.

  I sighed as he drove me down past the boutique where I’d worked in the basement the summer in middle school, putting price tags on bras before I even had a need for one. He pointed out the old Woolworth’s I swiped fingernail polish from and the Safeway turned into a Von’s on the corner where we shopped for groceries back in the day. The small-town mansions that fronted the west end of town didn’t look so large anymore, and as we turned right onto Broadway and then onto Floral, the street where I grew up, I was floored.

  “Wow. This place has really gone to seed,” I said. Maybe it was just childhood, but I could have sworn most families in this neighborhood never had more than two cars, and none of them ever on blocks in the middle of the lawn.

  Will laughed. “It’s not the good side of the bad side of town anymore. All the money went up to the outskirts. New houses nearer the freeway for all the Bay Area commuters.” He looked apologetic.

  “You know, I’ve had dreams of coming back here and buying the old house. Dad sold it when he remarried and we had to move into the house on Devonshire. After that, it wasn’t really home-home, you know? Now, I think if I wanted to buy this place, I’d have to move it somewhere else just to feel safe.”

  We parked outside. It actually didn’t look too bad from here. Clearly it was the best-kept house on the block, if the neatly trimmed lawn and new paint job were any indication.

  “Let’s go in,” he said.

  I looked at him aghast.

  “What?” I shrugged. “Just walk up to the front door, ring the bell and say ‘Hey! You know I used to live here. Can I look around your house for a while?’”

  “Why not?” He smiled as he got out of the cab. “People are still people. They’ll understand.”

  “No way!” I refused to budge, but I watched as his cocky self walked right up to the painted concrete steps and then he turned to me.

  “Are you coming?” He threw his arms wide, like he was in a movie or something. I shook my head, scrunched up my face, then jumped out of the truck. I had to see this.

  He rang the bell.

  Nothing. I was so relieved.

  “See. They’re not even home,” I said.

  “No kidding. Come on, let’s sneak a peek inside.”

  If I really wanted to, I could come back the next full moon in wolf form and check the place out and no one would be any wiser. It would be safer. I wasn’t a scaredy-cat when I was in wolf form. In fact, when I was shifted, I wasn’t afraid of anything. But now…now I was just petrified.

  Will reached out his hand and tried the handle. It turned and he pushed the door open. I was in shock.

  “Come on,” he said. “Aren’t you curious?” He took a step inside the door.

  “What? Will. Stop!” I yelped and grabbed his arm, trying to pull him back and away from breaking and entering. Well, entering anyway.

  “Hello?” he called as I tried to shush him. “Anyone home?” And then, “Mom?”

  Mom? And then it all came crashing into my head and I shoved him.

  “You slimy shitbird,” I yelled as he turned and I beat on his chest. He grabbed me and pulled me down to the tan-carpeted floor. I was so surprised I didn’t even notice my butt pain. “YOU OWN THIS PLACE?”

  “I own this place.” He grinned and I wanted to wipe that bird-eating kitty grin off his face once and for all. All the feelings that I ever had about this home washed through me and I began to beat on him, slapping him for making me feel stupid and scared, and then I began to cry.

  “Well, that wasn’t the reaction that I was expecting.” Will kissed my forehead, held me and stroked my hair. I heard a sound and turned to see a woman’s shoes and stockings out of the corner of my eye.

  “Hi Mom,” Will said.

  I looked up bleary-eyed as his mother bent down to greet me.

  “Hello dear. And who have we here?” I buried my face in Will’s chest. “Well, Ashlee Scott, as I live and breathe.”

  “Hi, Mrs. Stenfield,” I muttered, as I turned my tear-stained face to her.

  Will’s mother gently touched my chin. “Now, what’s a nice girl like you doing with a rough boy like mine?” she said with a chuckle. “Get up off that floor, young man, and let me greet this girl properly.” She stepped back and allowed us to rise.

  I smoothed the velvet crush of the fancy sweats I’d borrowed from my sister and ran my hands through my hair, pulling my locks away from my face.

  “Come here and give us a hug.” She pulled me into her and wrapped her small thin frame around me and I sighed contentedly. Mrs. Stenfield always knew how to make you feel at home. “Why don’t you sit down? I’ll make us some tea and we can catch up,” she said and then disappeared through the dining room and into the kitchen.

  “How could you buy this place and not tell me?” I turned on him. “If your mother wasn’t here, I’d kick your ass to hell and back.”

  “Well, then I’m glad she’s here. And when was I going to tell you, anyway? You took off so fast after that one summer, and we weren’t dating anymore, and the few times you did come back home I hardly saw you, so when was I going to tell you?”

  “You could have emailed me. The address is on every article.”

  “I’m not an email kind of guy.”

  I knew that. He didn’t even have a smart phone, just a beat-up old Nokia that could barely text, and he probably only carried that because his work required it. I always felt Will was born too late, and would have been more comfortable in Mom and Dad’s world.

  “You could have told Amber. She would have told me.”

  “I asked her not to,” he said. “I wanted to surprise you, if ever…”

  “If ever what?”

  “Nothing. You know.”

  Will’s mother came back with a serving tray and a tea cozy as I slid into the soft lining of the brown suede sofa. I took the cup she offered, almost overwhelmed with the memories.

  “So, what brings you back to town, Ashlee? Last I heard you were doing some articles for Contemporary Cruising.”

  I forced myself to focus on talking to her rather than reminiscing. “Really? Where’d you hear that?” I avoided the first question. I so did not want to talk to her about my bullet wound. Once I started that I’d be sounding like everyone’s grandparents talking about their medical conditions. Why is it that the older people get, the more readily they pull out their aches and pains? Probably because there are more of them. I guess I could relate, or at least, my butt could.

  “I think you told me, didn’t you, Will?” She turned and I looked at him out of the corner of my eye.

  “Huh?” He was blushing. “Um, yeah. I guess so.”

  Mrs. Stenfield turned back to me. “Will has everything you’ve ever written. Asks Amber to call him when you’ve got a new article and buys it up before it hits the stand.”

  “Oh, really?” I looked at him with pursed lips. I wondered what other secrets my dear identical twin had been keeping. I made a mental note to interrogate her when I got home.

  “Oh yes,” Mrs. Stenfield went on with enthusiasm. “I think my son just might be your biggest fan.”

  I could not believe it. Will Stenfield? He’d never be comfortable in a five-star hotel and spa. Then again… “Well, then. I guess I’ll just have to hit you up when I finally organize my fan club.” I laughed.

  How natural this all seemed. Smooth. Easy. Not like any of the other conversations I’ve had with the parents of the guys I’ve dated. Actually, scratch that. I rarely got around to meeting the parents of the guys I dated, because I normally didn’t go longer than three dates with any of them. Sound familiar?

  Will settled back and popped the leg rest up from where he sat at the end of the sofa sectional. He looked really comfortable and at home here. In my old home. Who would believe it?

  We chatted a bit more, small talk and things.

  “You know, you really should go visit Sam and Muriel next door. I bet they’d love seeing you agai
n,” Mrs. Stenfield continued. “Darcy’s over there a lot, with her husband and the kids. After Oliver died, they needed the grandkids around to fill the place with gladness.”

  Darcy and Oliver were our neighbor playmates growing up. Ollie died of diabetes complications years before and I didn’t get back very often. I sometimes felt guilty about that, but dammit, my life wasn’t easy and coming home always intimidated me. I was a moody bitch growing up and still am sometimes, and didn’t like being reminded of that fact, which is why I usually avoid things like Homecoming and class reunions.

  Forgive yourself, the little voice in my head said. I promised to try.

  “Yeah. Maybe I will,” I replied to her and myself both.           

  Will threw the kickstand back on the recliner and pounced out of the chair. “Hey Mom. I’m gonna show Ashlee the rest of the house. Let her see what we’ve done with the place.”

  “Of course, dear.”

  Omigod! Why did he have to be so cute with his mother? And me without mine, since I was eleven. At least corporeally.

  But he was, and he pulled me up off the couch and motioned me over. “As you can see, I stripped the paint off the mantel and off all the floor and sideboards, leaving the natural walnut to breathe. This place was made simple, but they used really good techniques in the joins.” He rambled on about renovation as I ran my hand over the polished grain. It looked like he’d put a lot of love into the job and I said so.

  Will smiled shyly and my heart went pitter-pat. I was such a goner! Inwardly I groaned. What the hell was I doing? This wasn’t going to work, me the world traveler and him the small-town guy.

  Will showed me how he’d done the same refinishing with the French doors that slid into the wall, and talked about hand-beveling and then showed me the wall with the china cabinet where we used to keep only the best dishes for when guests were over. We usually ate in the kitchen otherwise. The etched panes of crystal seemed to glitter and the light from the chandelier over the dining room table refracted rainbows along the wall as he opened and closed the cupboards, showing me the gleaming burnished solid brass hinges. God, I loved this place, though I really didn’t understand as a child how nice it all was.

  We hardly ever do.

  They’d cleaned up the sun porch that opened off the dining room and added a settee and a breakfast nook and I smiled as I remember how often I’d retreated to this room as a child to read about the Patchwork Girl in Oz, and Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys. Will then let me out the side door of the house and showed me the well-tended gardens where my father and I had pulled weeds and the now-huge chrysanthemums we’d planted years ago. He walked me around the back and showed me how he’d turned the tomato garden where we used to have mud-fights in the late summer into a small rock garden and how he’d resurfaced the patio and rebuilt the sandstone outdoor barbecue that was still shaded by a couple of plum trees. Sliding open the garage, I caught the whiff of gasoline and the same smell of freshly mown grass that clung to his well-oiled tools occupying the back wall. And he showed me the motorcycle he was building from scratch that looked like he hadn’t worked on it for a while, but would get back to, once the landscaping season slowed down in winter.

  “Hey! Is that crawlspace still up here?” I asked and climbed up the slatted wall on the left side of the garage to peek my head into a small storage area. On a sleeping bag up there we’d felt each other up for the first time, hiding from the world and discovering clumsy teenage lust.

  “Don’t go up there!” he said, but I already had.

  “Looks like you haven’t been up here in a while.” I saw it clean and empty. I climbed down, snickering.

  “Yeah, well, there’s this thing called the internet now,” he replied, sheepish.

  “What, no girlfriend to take care of your base carnal needs?” I asked with false lightness.

  “No, Ash. Not since you.”

  Wow. I felt honored, and more than a bit pressured. He really had waited. I gave him a peck on the cheek.

  “What was that for?”

  “Because you’re so cute when you turn red.” I hugged him again and then stepped away.

  “Let me see the rest of the house.” I ran toward the garage door, pulled it shut behind me and latched it.

  “Don’t you dare lock me in here!” he called, but I already had. He pounded on the door and I giggled.

  “Ash. It’s not funny.” He pushed hard against it and I thought the lock was going to snap.

  “Okay. Okay. Step back and wait a second.” I unlatched it. When I slid the garage door open, I saw anger in his eyes.

  “What?” I remarked. Boy, he was actually pissed.

  “You of all people should know that that’s not cool.”

  And all of a sudden, it dawned on me how right he was. I’d gotten locked in the garage more than once back when I was a little kid, and the last time I did, it took a couple of hours for someone to find me. It happened to be Will. By that time I was so distraught, I thought the Rapture had occurred and I’d got left behind. I shivered at the memory.

  See, there were these movies some friends of ours had been into when I was little, about getting left behind after the Second Coming, and then the Antichrist showed up and everything went to hell, Christopher Walken style. Freaked me out so bad I had nightmares for days and prayed the sinner’s prayer every night for the next two years. So, when I got locked in the garage after falling asleep there one day, I was understandably distraught. My brother and Amber had just laughed at me.

  “You’re right,” I said and hugged him. “I should know better.” I looked into his eyes and apologized. “Forgive me?”

  He nodded. “Of course I forgive you.”

  People don’t apologize enough anymore. Instead, they say something like “I’m sorry,” or even worse, “my bad.” But forgiveness? Only seemed to happen in certain circles and I’m sorry can mean so many different things including sucks to be you.

  Coming home was hard. It reminded me of all the things I’d done that I was ashamed of. So why was I back here?

  Will said, “C’mon. Let’s see the rest of the house.” He pulled me close and sniffed my hair as we walked toward the back door past the fruitless Mulberry tree that our family had to trim as a ritual every Thanksgiving. I looked up into the newly sprouting branches.

  “You know, when I was younger, we had to cut this damn thing back every Turkey-Day. I spent hours here on the ground, waiting for the branches that fell. Amber would drag them over and I would cut them up into manageable pieces that we’d tie with string and when the bundle got large enough, we’d tie it all up and drag it out back to be hauled away on trash day. I always envied my brother Adam, who got to be up in the tree running the chainsaw.”

  Will laughed. “Well, then. Next Thanksgiving, you can be chainsaw-girl and I’ll handle the ground work.”

  “Aren’t you ever afraid you’re going to fall?”

  “Naw. We strap ourselves in with harnesses nowadays. Too much liability with insurance if we didn’t.” He opened the swinging door to the back porch where the washer and dryer still sat.

  I ran my hands over the cream-colored appliances and experienced a sense of déjà vu all over again.

  “I think that’s the same washer and dryer your mom used when you guys lived here,” Will said.

  “How do you know?”

  “They came with the house.”

  I looked closer at them.

  “I’ve replaced a lot of the parts over the years, but they’re still the same housings.”

  “You’re so – handy!”

  He laughed. “That’s me. Jack of all trades, master of none.”

  “One or two, I bet.”

  He blushed. I liked that.

  Mrs. Stenfield puttered in the kitchen like my mom used to do, rinsing dishes and putting them in the dishwasher as we entered the house. The squared white linoleum floor and the sunny-yellow kitchen were almost like I remembered. O
nly the trim was different and the countertops had been updated with colored tile and the stove was a new glass-top electric instead of the gas that we’d had years before. Nothing fancy, but I didn’t care.

  My old house. My old home, now Will’s and his mother’s. Wow. I remembered his dad and mom had gotten divorced, and that made it seem a little less idyllic, but still, there was this…glow.

  A tray with a pitcher of lemonade sat on the sunny kitchen table and Will poured us each a glass.

  “Wow. I haven’t had real lemonade in forever.”

  “It’s just from frozen, Ash.” Will laughed. “Not like your mom used to make off those lemons you and Amber brought home.”

  “Oh, you remember that?”

  “Like it was yesterday.”

  “I’m glad you like it,” Mrs. Stenfield said. “Well, I’ll just leave you two alone for a bit. I’m headed downtown to meet Joanne at the White Rabbit. Do you need anything while I’m out?”

  “No thanks, Mom.” He rose and gave her a quick hug. “I’ve got everything I need right here.”

  I thought I was going to die. Alone with Will Stenfield, and with his mother’s blessing! In high school, I was always considered the wild one of the “terrible twins” and now I was being left all alone with a man, unchaperoned! What was this world coming to? Of course, objectively I knew we were both in our twenties now, but parents always seem frozen in time, at least in their kids’ minds.

  “See you later, Ashlee?” Mrs. Stenfield said.

  “Um, yeah, sure,” I stammered.

  “Stay out of the cookie jar, Will.” She slapped his hand as he reached for the lid of the Winnie-the-Pooh honeypot on the counter. He cradled his hand in mock injury, but she had looked at me when she said it.

  Now I really thought I was going to die. What did she think, I’d jump her baby boy’s bones on the sofa while she ate dinner with a friend?

  Hm. Not a completely unattractive idea. She breezed out of the house without a word. Will held out the honeypot to me and I grinned.

  “No thanks,” I said. “I’m watching my figure.”

  “So am I.” His eyes roved me up and down. It felt good, and I loved his laugh.

  On impulse I got up and opened the door to the basement and went down. It seemed they’d turned it into some kind of artsy rumpus room.

  “Well, this is cozy,” I said, as he came up behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist. That was getting to be a habit.

  “Yeah it is,” Will said, and I elbowed him gently in the gut.

  “I was talking about the basement, nerdling.” The tiny space contained a La-Z-Boy, a reading lamp, a few shelves of model cars and airplanes and a mysterious work in progress. I walked over to the easel and lifted the tarp from off the canvas that was sitting there.

  “Your mom’s?” I asked, as I viewed the Italian landscape on it.

  “Actually, it’s mine,” he said, and he blushed.

  I turned back to the picture. “It’s good. Your perspective is off a bit, here and here. But overall, it has nice composition and your color palette is very Tuscany.”

  “I didn’t ask for a review, but thanks anyway.”

  Now it was my turn to blush. “Sorry. Force of habit. Travel writer, critic. Goes with the territory.” I bit my lip. In my job I was used to being free with my judgments and opinions of the world and sometimes it was hard to turn it off.

  “That’s okay. I may not always like it, Ash. Like what you have to say. But at least I know where you stand.”

  “That’s rare.” I blew a strand of hair out of my eyes. “Most people aren’t so appreciative and just think I’m a bitch.”

  “I’m not most people.”

  I turned to look at him. Really look at him. He’d grown up since I’d been away and I said so.

  “Naw.” He stuck his tongue out at me. “I’m still the same old guy. Lucky in life, unlucky in love.”

  “Well, at least you’ve got part of the equation.” I touched a finger to the painting. It came away tacky, leaving a fingerprint.

  “Oh no, Will. I thought it was dry.”

  He laughed and dragged me over to the sink.

  “Don’t worry about it.” He took a rag, dabbed a little thinner on it and proceeded to wash my finger.

  Something inside me stirred and I felt lightheaded again. “Must be the fumes,” I whispered. But when he turned me in his arms, my knees wobbled as he pressed his body up against mine.

  “I’ve missed you, Ash.” His voice came out low and purr-fect and he leaned his mouth over mine and caught my lips with his own. Warm. Wet. Probing. The tip of his tongue flicked against mine and my breath came out panting. There was a stirring in my belly as I felt him press against my hips.

  “Too fast,” I said and pushed him away. “Sorry.” My head swam and I forced myself up the stairs and out of his reach.

  Yeah, I know I wanted him, but thinking about something and then actually doing it are two different things.

  Once I was back in the kitchen I relaxed. “You know, when we were kids, we used to have Halloween parties down there. Used blankets to create walkways and strung stringy stuff up for cobwebs, and made things that jumped out to scare each other.” I laughed as I ran water into the kitchen sink and splashed my face with it.

  Will handed me a towel. “I know. I was one of your victims, remember?” He shut the basement door behind him.

  “I remember. We used to blindfold you guys, then make you put your hands into bowls of cold spaghetti and gelatin mixed with fake fur. It was disgusting, but hilarious.”

  “To you, maybe.” He smiled.

  “And this was my brother’s room,” I said as I pushed open the east side door off the kitchen. Apparently Will had turned this into a widescreen TV room. “Adam used to lie on the floor below the turntable with his head between two speakers and blast Coldplay into his ears.”

  “You know I love you so, you know I love you so.” Will sang and strummed an air guitar as we both sounded out the bass line. “Duhdahduhdahduhdah. Duhdahduhdahduhdah. DUN. Dunt DUN. DUn. Dunt DUN!”

  We just looked at each other and laughed.

  “We are such geeks,” I said. “Now, let me see my room.” I turned and lurched out the other door, through the sun-porch, across the dining room, back into the kitchen and flung open the door off the west wall.

  “You mean my room now,” he said in my ear as he came up behind me.

  I don’t know why I did it, but all resistance crumbled and I turned and kissed him.

  The next thing I knew we were on his bed and groping each other like two kids drowning. Will had his hand up my shirt and I grabbed his jean-clad buttocks as we kissed like starving children. When the phone began to ring, my addled mind suddenly hit clarity and I laughed.

  “Aren’t you going to get that?” I asked as he nibbled on my ear.

  “Ignore it,” he mumbled as he nipped my lobe and sent spasms of pleasure through me. His right hand had found the underwire to my bra and his thumb slid over my breast and I gasped.

  “You like that?”

  “Maybe too much.” I was a good girl, after all. Oh, yeah. Aren’t we all, in our own minds.

  The phone continued to ring, then the machine picked up.

  “You still have an answering machine?” I laughed. He kissed me stupid and I shut up.

  “You have reached…” The rest of the message fuzzed in my brain as he pulled off my shirt and unsnapped my B-cup, his tongue taking the place of his fingers.

  “God, Ashlee. I love you,” he whispered into my navel as he slid down my body.

  Shock woke me right up out of my lust-filled delirium. “WHAT?” I grabbed his shoulders and pushed back. “What did you say?” My left eyebrow went up and I stared him down like a wombat in a cage, whatever that means.

  “Umm…Ashlee, I love you?” He said it as if I hadn’t heard it the first time.

  “Well, that’s just great.” I snapped my bra back together
and threw my shirt on over my head. “Here we are getting along all fine and dandy and you have to go and drop the L-bomb.”

  “Ashlee, I’ve loved you since high school. I’ve never stopped loving you. I thought you knew that.” He looked so forlorn, on his knees, on his bed, in my old room.

  So, do you really wonder why I’m a mess?

  “And how, pray tell, was I supposed to know that?” I asked. “I mean, animalistic teenage lust revisited, I get that! But love? Will, you don’t even know me anymore.”

  “I know you.”

  “Well, maybe I don’t.”

  “You know me.”

  “I didn’t mean – never mind.” I growled, “Men are so exasperating!”

  “What?”

  “You all just think you can cat around until the day you decide it’s time to grow up and settle down. Well, I don’t want to!”

  “I didn’t cat around, and I’ve always wanted to settle down. Ashlee, I’m the same guy.”

  “Yeah, maybe too damned much the same. Look at it from my perspective. You’re a guy who lives with his mom and sleeps in my old room!”

  “I thought it would be romantic.”

  “Argh!” I screamed and I marched out of the house with my buttons all askew.

  “Ashlee, where are you going?” he called from the porch as I headed down the dilapidated block into the evening’s slanting light.

  “Anywhere but here!”

  “You know this isn’t the best neighborhood to be walking around in,” he yelled. “Let me at least take you home.”

  “I’d rather have a gang-bang with a bunch of Cholos,” I yelled back, then looked around as a few faces peered out the windows at me. “Ha ha! Just kidding!” I singsonged, but I decided that now was as good a time as any to get back to the jogging I’d missed while my ass was healing.

  I ran.

  I knew it was a mistake, but after the first stabbing pain and the endorphins kicked in I found myself reaching a good steady stride and forgetting about my injury. All I could think about was my breathing and keeping my bag from hitting me right on the wound as I slung it across my back. I cut through a couple of alleys and back onto the Boulevard and then slowed when I hit the tracks and passed into what I felt would be a safer neighborhood.

  Night began to fall and soon I found myself walking alone with a designer handbag and a serious ache in my behind, in the dark next to Piccadilly Park. Don’t ask me why they called it that. If you ask me, if they wanted a classic London reference they should have called it Hyde Park for its high crime rate.

  “Hey! I like your bag,” a voice called out behind me.

  “Why don’t you hand it over,” another voice beside me said.

  “If you do, maybe we’ll let you walk away and keep that pretty face of yours.”

  My heart skipped a beat and I looked up and around, realizing that in my self-righteous anger, I’d walked right into a herd of biker chicks or something. At least, they had a lot of leather and piercings and ink.

  “You know, my twin sister’s a lesbian,” I said, trying to distract them as I slid away from the phalanx they were creating around me.

  “Hey, Arnott. I think she just called you a lesbian,” one of the hard-faced girls spoke up.

  “No, she didn’t. She said your sister is a lesbian,” said another.

  “I already know that. Although what that has to do with giving me her bag, I got no clue,” the more well-spoken leader said. “So, why don’t you just hand me that purse and we can all go on our merry way?” The circle began to close.

  Oh no, this was not going to happen. I looked at the sky and thought about trying to shift. If the moon was up at all I might be able to induce the change, though most times I no more wanted it than the average girl craved a visit from Aunt Rosie Flow.

  “And why don’t you take your big old ass…” I began, but didn’t get any further, as suddenly the sound of a Chevy V-8 roared up behind me and Will threw open the door, scattering the crowd.

  “Get in, Ash,” Will yelled and he grabbed for me as I leaped into the truck.

  “Ow. Ow. Ow.” I yelped as my butt slid across the seat and I could feel skin and stitches tear. “Get me to a hospital.” 

  “I’ll do better than that.” He said something vulgar. “I’m taking you to my sister.” His hands gripped the wheel and he put the pedal to the metal.

   

  Will’s big sister Samantha “Sam” Stenfield was a nurse practitioner at Knightsbridge Hospital and worked the swing shift. Used to work graveyard, but when she got the chance she changed to evenings. Too many crazies on nights, she’d said. About ten years older than Will and me, but she looked at least a decade beyond that. I guess that’s what the ER will do to you, but she had a good bedside manner and didn’t even blink when Will rushed me over.

  “Oh, hi, Ashlee. Nice to see you again,” she said matter-of-factly. “Strip and let’s see what we’ve got.”

  “Get him out of here first,” I told her.

  “Will.” She gave him that older-sister-to-younger-brother look and he retreated behind the curtain she’d pulled in front of his face.

  I dropped trou and laid face down on the examination bed. I was so humiliated.

  “So, you want to tell me what happened?”

  “Not really,” I said. “Oh, you mean with my bullet wound. I mean, it was a staph infection. Hunting. A ricochet. The bullet wound got infected,” I amended.

  She scowled. “Doctors these days. Better safe than sorry, they say. So let’s just get a surgeon in for a consult, they say. And surgeons love to cut stuff anyway. When you got a hammer, everything looks like a goddamn nail.”

  I winced and then bit my lip as Will’s sister went on her rant. I was so not going to complain. It was my fault anyway I was in this predicament, I figured. I may be from here, but it wasn’t my Knightsbridge anymore.

  “Well, you may have set yourself back a few days, but I’ve cleaned the wound and used a little skin seal instead of stitches. What do they got you doin’ for wound care?”

  “Oh, you know. Bleach baths and fresh dressing.”

  “Well. Keep it up. Looks like you’ve got a week or so to go, then you’re out of the woods, but I’d continue the bleach baths until the wound is totally closed. Make sure that all the bacteria stays dead.”

  “Can I come in now?” Will asked.

  “No,” I warned him.

  “Hey Will. Give me your sweatshirt,” Sam called, and he handed it to her through the gap. She turned it inside out as it still had a few grass stains.

  “Here. Step into this and wrap it around your waist. I’ll put your sweat pants in a bag. There’s bloodstains on them,” she said. “And Will, you take her straight home, you hear? Are you good on pain medication?”

  I nodded. “I’m good.”

  “Cool.” She let me get quasi-presentable before she pulled the curtain open and let in her brother.

  “Good seeing you again, Ash. Take care of yourself,” she said, as if I came in every Friday. Hadn’t seen me in years.

  Nurses. Can’t faze ’em.

  I let Will bundle me off to the truck and back to Amber’s doorstep. “I’ll call you tomorrow. See how you’re doing,” he promised. Then he drove away.

  I kind of hoped he would and I kind of hoped he wouldn’t. I sighed as I let myself in the door and slipped upstairs while the rest of the house slept. I was not going to tell this to my sister. No way, no how, I thought as I brushed my teeth and went straight to bed.