by Sarah Dessen
I thought back to what she’d said when she arrived at the Washroom. “Feeling differently” was clearly an understatement. “So she threw you out?”
“Not initially,” he replied. “When I first told her I wanted to go ahead and give my month’s notice to pursue other opportunities, she was just really pissed. Said I was screwing her over, abandoning her. You know, her typical rant. But then when it came out those opportunities involved Clyde … that’s when she went ballistic.”
I watched him help himself to another olive. Drinks and snacks, so civilized, even in this most uncivilized of places. “Why, though?”
He shrugged. “Oh, she thinks I used her to get access to him. That I always intended the job with her to be a conduit to something bigger.”
I couldn’t help but notice how casual he was about all this. The one time I’d gotten fired—from a retail job at a dollar store in a now-defunct strip mall—I’d been totally freaked. “But that’s not true. I mean, how could you have even have known Clyde would come around?”
He smiled. “I didn’t. It was just a good hunch.”
I looked at him, confused. “Wait. So you—you did sort of plan on this?”
“This?” He looked around the camper. “No. In my mind, it did not end like this. But I told you, Emaline: I’m driven. I don’t settle. If I see something better within reach, I go for it.”
“Even if it gets you fired?”
“Risk is part of ambition,” he replied. “If living here is what I have to do, I’ll take it, if the next step is my working for, and with, Clyde. I don’t need a mansion, or Ivy for that matter, to make my play for the Best Job Ever. In fact, this might turn out to be the best thing that could have happened to me.”
Now, I was really lost. “How do you figure?”
“You said it yourself,” he replied. “He’s Clyde Conaway. Which do you think he’d respect more: me living in that house, or this one?”
Something wasn’t right here. It was like the smell of the bleach, obvious and nebulous at the same time, one thing covering another. “I think Clyde would see if you were trying to be something you’re not.”
“Maybe. Or maybe not.” He smiled, then picked up the bottle, refilling both our glasses. “Regardless, the Best Summer Ever is about to become Better Than Ever. No more Ivy to deal with. We have to drink to that.”
He held out his cup, and, slowly, I did the same. But as we pressed them together, I felt that same hesitancy, a bad feeling I could not name or shake. It stayed with me even after we left Lucky Number Seven (as I knew it would now forever be called) to return the bikes and get my car. Theo locked the camper, put his backpack on, then began pedaling back toward the pier, and I followed. Maybe it was the wine, or the freedom, but this time he was moving fast, as if lighter, and within very little time he’d sped out pretty far ahead of me. I waited for him to notice this and slow down, maybe even turn back. When it became clear he wasn’t going to, I just pedaled faster, suddenly aware that the last thing I wanted was to be left behind.
17
IN THE DREAM, I was back in Theo’s camper. Now, though, it was vast, huge, and I was looking for the door and unable to find it. As I searched, growing ever more frantic, the smell of bleach grew stronger and stronger, until I was coughing too hard to even see. When I woke up, I was gasping for air.
“Emaline?” Still fuzzy from sleep, I could barely make out my bedroom door opening in the morning light. Then my dad, a mask covering his own mouth, was beside my bed, pulling the covers back. “You’re not supposed to be here.”
“It’s the middle of the night,” I said, still coughing. “Where else would I be?”
“It’s seven a.m.” He eased me into a sitting position, then off the bed. “And when I checked around five thirty, you weren’t here. Come on.”
It was a good thing I was still half-asleep, not to mention coughing too hard to be expected to explain, because I was busted. I’d planned to make it home by curfew, only to fall asleep listening to music in the camper with Theo. Too much wine and olives, not enough of anything else. At any rate, when I’d finally woken up, I didn’t want to leave the campground alone, waiting instead until it was light. Which had been, well, about an hour earlier. Whoops.
Luckily, my dad was too focused on getting me out of whatever toxic cloud he’d created to start in on me yet. Still, as he guided me over my threshold and down the hallway, I could hear him muttering.
“—specific point to make sure everyone was out of the house when the sealant was being applied,” he was saying as I finally hit the fresh air and sucked in a deep breath. With the mask on, he looked like a surgeon delivering bad news. “Did you not get your mother’s multiple messages?”
Now that I thought of it, I had seen a few texts on my phone. But then, the battery conked out. Theo’s camper, among its many charms, had exactly one working—albeit ancient—outlet, which he needed for his computer, so I’d been out of luck. And incommunicado. “Sorry,” I mumbled. “My battery died.”
He sighed, annoyed with both me and this excuse: my phone was a common scapegoat. “You might have, too, if I hadn’t heard you coughing.”
“Is it seriously that dangerous?” I said. I mean, I got his whole renovation obsession thing, but there had to be limits.
“No,” he grumbled. “But you don’t want to be breathing it in for hours on end. Here, drink something.”
He glanced around, then spotted a fountain drink, a straw sticking out, in my car console. As he opened the door to get it, it was like I could just see the next minute unfolding in front of me, and it was not going to be pretty. Quickly, I took it from him.
“Thanks,” I said, sucking down a big, watery gulp of what had once been soda. “Whew. Much better.”
And that was the exact moment that, despite my attempts to cover it with my hand, he saw the words on the side of the cup: CONROY PIER FISH/TACKLE. I’d told Theo this was not a safe place to go after dark—or really ever, as it was housed basically in a metal box beside the Sea View motel—but he’d insisted he was street smart and went for provisions anyway. “What could happen in Colby, really?” he’d asked, before disappearing into the dark. Now, I was pretty sure I was about to find out.
“Conroy,” my dad said, looking at the cup, then at me. He still had on the mask, but now looked like an angry surgeon, one you definitely didn’t want anywhere near you with a scalpel. “You were at the campground?”
I’d been hoping he’d ask if I’d been at the store itself. That way, I could answer honestly and say no. Just my luck. “Well,” I said. “Sort of.”
“Sort of,” he repeated. I heard a car engine, and we both looked over to see my mom pulling into the driveway. She waved cheerfully. Neither of us waved back. “Which means yes.”
“I was with Theo,” I said, like this was going to win me any arguments.
“Why was he there? I thought he lived in a mansion out on the Tip.”
“He did, with his boss. But his work and, um, living situation has changed.” My mom was getting out of the car now, carrying bags from my dad’s favorite breakfast place. Called Roy’s, it was known mostly for its sausage biscuit, which was so huge and greasy you needed a shower after eating one. “He’s just renting a place for the rest of the summer.”
“At the campground,” he said, as my mom approached. “And you were there, all last night.”
I nodded. He looked furious. On an unrelated note, now I could smell sausage.
“Good morning!” my mom said to me. “I didn’t expect to see you here for breakfast. I figured you were still asleep at Daisy’s.”
“Nope,” my dad said.
Just this single word, in this specific tone, clued her in that something was up. She looked at him, then at me. “What’s going on?”
Neither of us replied. My dad was still glaring at me. Finally, he said, “Emaline spent the night at the campground. Apparently.”
“What?” she demanded. M
y mom was a reactor: she could go from zero to seriously pissed in seconds. “Are you crazy?”
“Mom—”
“Do you even know what goes on there? It’s basically lawless!” She thrust the bag at my dad, then focused again on me. “Now, I know you’re about to leave for college and basically an adult. But I didn’t raise you to be stupid, no matter how old you are.”
Ouch. I knew better than to protest or defend myself, though. Like a storm, the best bet was to take whatever cover possible and wait for it to pass.
“She didn’t get your messages,” my dad added, taking out a biscuit, the paper covering it wet with grease. “I just found her in her bed, breathing in fumes.”
“I was coughing,” I pointed out, as if this, again, was going to somehow win me points.
“You were in the house?” Then she turned to face Dad. “I thought you double-checked everyone was out before you started.”
“I did. She came in after that.”
I just looked at him. It wasn’t like I’d expected him to break rank here—mostly because it had never happened that I could remember—but he was really not helping me. Unfazed, he pushed up his mask, meeting my gaze, then took a bite of his breakfast.
“Emaline,” my mom was saying now, “I sent you several messages about the sealant. You knew not to be here this morning.”
I waited for my dad to say I’d ignored her texts. Now, though, he was silent, leaving me to offer a lame, “My phone died.”
“At the campground. In the middle of the night,” my mom finished for me, not missing a beat. “What, do you have a death wish now, too?”
I was prepared to be berated about the phone and being out overnight. And if I’d been smart—or maybe just more awake—I would have just stood there and taken this with the rest of it. But stupidly, I said instead, “What’s that supposed to mean?”
My mom took off her sunglasses, narrowing her eyes at me. “What did you just say?”
“You asked if I had a death wish now, too,” I told her. “In addition to what else, exactly?”
My dad, having consumed an entire biscuit during this short exchange, crumpled up the paper in one hand and pulled the mask back down with the other. “I’m going in,” he said to us. “Everyone else stays out here. Understood?”
“Yes,” I told him. My mom said nothing. Then he walked away, leaving the Roy’s bag on the hood of my car and us to it.
I knew she was waiting for me to speak first, backtrack somehow. Which was exactly why I didn’t. Finally, she said, “God, Emaline. I just … I feel like I don’t even know you anymore.”
I had been expecting something harsh. But this went deeper than just anger or lashing out, and just like that, I felt small again.
“How can you say that?” I asked her. “Nothing’s even changed yet.”
“Are you kidding?” She held up a finger, counting off. “You broke up with Luke. You’re out all hours. You don’t return my calls or texts. You’re going places you know much better than to be at any hour, much less late at night …”
“I’m eighteen,” I said. “In a few weeks I’m leaving for college.”
“But not yet,” she shot back, now pointing the same finger at me. “And while you’re here, you must follow our rules. I don’t care if you have a new boyfriend, we’re the same parents. And this is going to stop, right now.”
“This isn’t Theo’s fault,” I told her. “Just because you don’t like him—”
“I don’t know him!” she said. “You’ve never brought him home to meet us. We have no idea where he’s from—”
“Unlike Luke, who you knew preconception,” I finished for her.
“Stop it,” she said, shaking her head.
“Seriously. If I’m only allowed to date people whose parents you went to high school with, I need to know that. It narrows the pool a bit.”
“That is not what I’m saying.”
“I hope not, because it was you, if I remember correctly, who was so adamant that I not end up tied down so young with someone from here. I mean, make up your mind. Do you want me to be like you, or not?”
I regretted these words the minute I said them. It was like I’d launched a missile, only to look down at the red button, scrambling for a way to unpress it. Her hurt expression, instant, was worse than anything she could have said. But she spoke anyway.
“What I did,” she said, her voice strangely calm, even, “was give up everything for the wrong person. It was a mistake. I can’t undo it. The closest I get, every day, is making sure you don’t do the same thing.”
“Mom,” I said.
“But you’re right. You’re a big girl now. I can’t protect you anymore from everything. Especially yourself.” She looked away, then back at me, taking a step forward. “But know this, Emaline. The mistakes you make now count. Not for everything, and not forever. But they do matter, and they shape you. If you take nothing else from what I’ve been through, at least remember this: make your choices well. Because you’ll always be accountable for them. That’s what being an adult is all about.”
And with that, she grabbed the bag off the car hood, turned, and walked away. I stood there, in my pajamas, watching her as she got in her car and drove off, not looking at me once. When she was gone, I glanced at my watch. Sure enough, now I was late for work. I went over to the front door, slightly ajar, and stuck my head in, looking for my dad.
“Hello?” I called out.
No answer.
“Is it safe for me to run in superfast and get dressed?”
Nothing.
“Dad?”
I stepped in, listening. I could hear him moving around upstairs and waited another beat for a response. When none came, I took a last deep breath of fresh air, then ventured in, hoping for the best. Clearly, now, I was on my own.
* * *
Fifteen minutes later, feeling light-headed but now appropriately attired, I headed to work. When I approached the lot, however, the first thing I saw was my mom’s car, flanked by both Amber’s and Margo’s. Which meant they were already gathered at the conference table, eating biscuits and discussing me. No thanks. I kept driving.
And driving. Since it was early, the road to North Reddemane was clear, with most of the traffic going in the other direction. I wasn’t even sure where I was going until I saw Gert’s rising up in the distance. I put on my blinker and turned in.
Mr. Gertmann wasn’t behind the counter, although he was clearly not far. The TV was on, a newspaper open by the register, one of those packaged sticky honey buns, half-eaten, beside it. I went to the cooler and got a soda, grabbed some crackers more from habit than anything else, then walked over to the back door and looked out at the house just behind the store. Like always, Rachel was at the table by the window, head bent, working on her bracelets. It was like she hadn’t moved, or changed, since the night all those weeks ago I’d come here with Theo and found the milk crates. That made one of us.
I’d only been a kid when her accident had happened, but it was still an event that loomed large in my memory. I clearly recalled the bake sales and car washes that were held to raise money for her hospital expenses, as well as seeing her parents push her in a wheelchair into Da Vinci’s for pizza. Even after the hospital and rehab, Rachel had looked the same, for the most part, a pretty, normal girl. At least on the outside. Within her mind, though, she’d remained sixteen, even as her body, friends, and family grew older. How weird that must be, to stay the same as everyone else changes. Even if you weren’t able to understand, you had to notice.
For some reason, right then, I thought of my mom, seeing again her hurt face looking at me, once that missile was launched. She, too, had hit the pause button on her life, albeit in a different way, when she got pregnant with me. Left behind while everyone else grew up, moved away, moved on. Talk about accountability.
I sucked in a breath, putting my hand to my chest. I knew the sound could not have carried far, but across the ba
ckyard, Rachel suddenly looked up, seeing me. A half-finished Gert bracelet hung from one hand, a bead poised in the fingers of the other. After a moment, she looked away.
I turned, walking quickly to the front of the store. The TV was showing a clip of a guy holding up a huge marlin: RECORD BREAKER! the text below read. I pulled out a couple of bills, put them on the counter, and left.
Make your choices well, my mom had said. It was what she thought she hadn’t done, what she hoped above everything I’d do differently. On the flip side, though, there was Clyde, telling me that there were second chances, even—and especially—when you’ve given up all hope of them. But maybe, when a life and summer was going so fast, you couldn’t wait for fate to punch the time card. You had to do it yourself.
My father’s house was only a few blocks from Gert’s. When I turned in the driveway, the paper was still there, but the front door was open. Someone was already up.
Up on the porch, I peered through the screen, expecting to find Benji at the table with his laptop and other distractions. Instead, I saw only my father, a coffee mug in hand. He had his back to me and was sitting alone in the only chair remaining in the otherwise empty living room.
“Hello?” I called out.
He turned, squinting to make me out through the screen. “Who’s there?”
“It’s me,” I replied. Then, to clarify: “Emaline.”
“Oh.” I saw him check his watch. “Come in.”
I did, noting the loud creak of the screen door as I eased it open. I would have to tell Margo to grease that before she showed the house, although I was sure she’d already made a note of it, somewhere. “You’re up early,” I said.
“As are you,” he replied, as I came into the living room. He glanced around. “I’d offer you a seat, but …”
“It’s fine,” I said, sitting down on the bare floor. “You weren’t kidding when you said you were only keeping the minimum, were you?”
“I hadn’t expected to go quite this sparse,” he replied, looking around again. “Your sister, however, made a strong argument for having a ‘blank slate’ so possible buyers could ‘create their own vision.’”
