I text back so there are no mixed signals: Fuck. Off.
No matter how many times I block her number or change my own, she still finds a way to get to me.
Please, Adam. It’s important.
I half expect her to claim she’s pregnant and it’s mine, even though we haven’t been together in nearly two years, and even when we were, we never had sex. Brittany is that kind of crazy. Anything for attention, I guess.
My phone rings in my hand before I can reply or block her number. It’s her, of course.
Sighing, I answer. I shouldn’t, but I do. “What.”
“Oh my god, don’t hang up. Just hear me out, okay?”
I don’t say anything. She takes my silence as a green light.
“I love you,” she blurts. “I always have and I just never got a chance to be the girlfriend you deserve. I was screwed up, you know?”
Was? She still is screwed up. But I keep my mouth shut and she continues.
“Seeing you the other night, I just… Can’t we just start over?”
I clench my jaw. “This is what’s so important? We’ve been over this. I’m not interested, Brittany.”
“But I’ve changed. I’m different than I was back then. I’m different than I was even last month.”
I smirk. “That’s a shame. I liked who you were last month.”
There’s confusion in her voice when she says, “But we didn’t talk last month.”
“I know.” And then I end the call, blocking her number immediately afterward. Hopefully she’ll be over this by the time school starts.
“Where are we going?” Alaina asks, buckling her seatbelt.
“It’s a surprise,” I say, backing out of the driveway. “How’d your visit with Ms. Jackson go?”
“Okay, I guess. I told Ms. Jackson about Mother following us.” She chews her lip.
Shifting into first, I start up the street.
“She told me I didn’t have to see Mother any more if I didn’t feel safe.”
I glance over at her. “What’d you tell her?”
Her fingers knot in her lap and she looks at me. “After the things she said at our last visit, and after talking with Beth, I told her I wouldn’t mind taking a break from visits.” She sighs and I focus on the road as she continues. “I feel awful about it, though. I can’t imagine how hurt Mother will be when Ms. Jackson tells her.”
“I’m sure she’ll be fine.” I check my speed as we drive past a city cop camped out on the side of the road. Please don’t let that be Patterson. I can’t deal with him twice in one month.
“It’s all so confusing,” she says after a while. “One second I’m living in Shiloh, obeying what I thought was a prophet of the Lord, or trying to, anyway. The next, I’m here and everything’s a lie and Mother… Well, Mother has always been concerned for my salvation, but out here it’s different. She’s different.” She sighs. “It’s hard.”
Maybe I shouldn’t have brought it up. “I didn’t mean to depress you.”
“You didn’t. I’m fine.” She relaxes in her seat. “So, where are we going?”
I smile. “I already told you. It’s a surprise.”
It takes nearly thirty minutes to get there, but when we arrive at Stone Mountain Park, Alaina’s eyes nearly fall out of her head.
“What is this place?” she asks, staring up at the mountain as I pull into a parking space.
“Stone Mountain. It’s like, the Mount Rushmore of the South.” I turn off the car.
“What’s Mount Rushmore?” she asks, unbuckling her seatbelt, her eyes still glued to the bare top of the mountain that’s visible beyond the entrance.
Duh, Adam. Why would she know that? “I’ll show you later. Come on.”
We walk across the parking lot hand in hand. “You’re not scared of heights, are you?” I ask, eyeing the line for Skyride tickets. We could walk up, but it’s hot as hell and neither of us is really dressed for hiking mountain trails. Besides, by the time we got up there, the laser show would be starting and we’d probably miss most of it trying to get back down in the dark.
“Can we go to the top?” She squeezes my hand excitedly.
I smile. “That’s the idea.”
During the ride up, I try to remember all the stuff we learned in school about Stone Mountain so I can fill her in. I don’t know how much she knows about the Civil War, if anything, so I try to keep it simple. “The guys on the mountain were important back in the eighteen-hundreds when the country split up for a while.”
She nods. “I read about that in my history book. Who is that on the mountain? Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis?”
I raise my eyebrows in surprise. “Right. And the other guy is Stonewall Jackson,” I say. The only reason I remember his name is because I wished my name was Stonewall when I was a kid.
After riding to the top and back down in the cable car, we find a spot on the crowded lawn for the laser show.
“I hope you don’t mind sitting on the grass. I didn’t think to bring a towel or nothing,” I say, taking a seat between an Asian family and a couple of serious stoners.
“I don’t mind,” Alaina says, settling beside me. “So what’s a laser show?”
I smile. “You’ll see.”
When the music starts, she jumps, just like at the movie theater. Apparently they didn’t have a lot of music or loud noises in Shiloh. We watch the colored lights and lasers bring the side of the mountain to life to music. And when I think her eyes can’t get any wider, they start with the fireworks. She shrieks when the first one explodes above us and for a moment, I think she’s scared. But she’s grinning, her face turned up to the sky.
“This is amazing!” she shouts over the noise.
After the show, we stay on the grass while everyone else hurries toward the exit. I know from experience that it’s best to hang out for a while and let traffic thin out. Otherwise you’ll be bumper to bumper for a good hour.
“I think this is the greatest thing I’ve ever seen,” she says, falling back on the grass, staring up at the sky. There are too many lights around the edge of the lawn to be able to see any stars. “Who knew you could carve things into a mountain, or make pictures with lights, or blow up the sky!”
I ease back on my elbows, not wanting to freak her out by lying next to her. “I’m glad you liked it. I saw you toting that history book around earlier and thought you’d be interested in seeing some history.”
She turns her head to look at me. “I’ve been doing home study. Beth says I’m doing better and Ms. Jackson thinks I’ll be caught up enough to go to school with everyone else in a couple weeks.”
“What’ll you be? A junior like Holly?”
She shakes her head slightly. “No. Ms. Jackson said I’ll be in tenth grade. What grade will you be in?”
“Twelfth. Finally,” I breathe. “I can’t wait to graduate and get the hell out of here.”
Pulling a blade of grass, she twirls it between her fingers. “Where will you go?”
“College. It’s where a lot of people go after graduating.” My arms are getting tired of holding me up and I lay back.
Instead of freaking out at the closeness, Alaina turns her head and smiles at me. “But we’ll be at school together until then, right?”
“Yup. Every day,” I reach over and grab her hand, kissing the back of it.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
ALAINA
Shopping with Jacki, Serena, and Holly is easier than it was the first time, but it’s still overwhelming. Beth made me a list of things I’ll need for school, but half of it might as well be written in Hebrew.
“Holly?” I tap her shoulder while she flips through a rack of tops. “What is a flash drive?” I hold my list out to her when she turns around.
“Oh, it’s like a storage thing for computers so you can save your work. They don’t sell those here. Just find some clothes; we’ll get the other stuff later.”
Computers? For school? No one men
tioned that.
I fold up my list and tuck it into the waistband of my skirt.
“So,” Jacki says, holding up a small pink shirt to my chest. “Tell us about your date with Adam.”
“Yeah!” Serena’s eyes light up and she nudges Holly out of the way. “Didja kiss him?”
My mouth falls open. “Of course not,” I say, indignantly.
“No, right. You save kissing for your wedding night,” Holly says, smirking as she pulls a striped green shirt off the rack. “And sex is for the one year anniversary.”
Jacki elbows her hard in the ribs.
“Ow! Jesus! I was kidding!” Holly scowls and moves to the other side of the rack.
“Start from the beginning. No, start from when he took you to the movie.” Jacki grins and I can’t help smiling back.
“Okay, well we got our tickets and then his old girlfriend came over to talk to him, but he didn’t want to talk to her so he asked me to hold his hand.”
“Hold up,” Serena says. “His old girlfriend? You mean Brittany?”
I nod. “Yes. Do you know her?”
Serena rolls her eyes and exchanges a cryptic look with Jacki.
Jacki shakes her head. “That girl, I swear… Okay, so you held hands. Then what?”
I shrug. “We watched the movie and then went to his house to eat pizza. I met his stepmother.”
Serena snorts. “Did she glare at you the whole time? She always gives me the weirdest looks, like she’s sizing me up for a fight.”
Nodding, I say, “I thought she was going to hit me. And I flinched and she laughed and Adam said something unkind to her and she left.”
Jacki nods. “Yeah, he’s good at that. Okay, so then…?”
Here’s the part I want to keep to myself. Adam kissing my cheek is private. I told Holly, but only because she’s my cousin. “He took me home and that’s it.” I shrug again and smile.
“Um, you forgot something,” Holly calls from the other side of the rack.
I shake my head. “No. I told all there is to tell.” I widen my eyes at her, willing her to keep her mouth shut.
“What about the part where he kissed you?” she blurts.
Jacki and Serena’s faces light up and they both gasp and squeal at the same time.
“Relax,” Holly says. “It was just on the cheek. Like I said, she’s saving all the good stuff for their wedding.”
It’s then that I realize Holly is mocking me. I scowl at her over the rack of clothes. “I’ll kiss him when I’m ready,” I snap.
She glares back at me. “I bet you won’t. I bet you’re too scared of getting pregnant or something stupid like that.”
My blood boils under my skin and my fists clench at my sides. “I don’t judge you for the things you do with Drew! Don’t you dare judge me for what I don’t do with Adam!”
Jacki holds her hands up. “Whoa. Holly, what’s your problem?”
Holly lifts one shoulder and goes back to searching the rack for clothes. “Look, all I’m saying is that you’re not in happy crappy cult land any more. You like a guy, you need to show him or he’ll find a girl that will. That hand-holding, cheek-kissing bullshit will only last so long. Then he’ll expect more.”
“Not true,” Serena says to me, shaking her head. “Adam’s not like that. I mean, he’s no virgin, but I really doubt he’ll expect anything.”
The noise of the store dies away for a moment. “What do you mean he’s not a virgin?”
The corner of Serena’s mouth lifts. “He’s… I mean, you know.”
I shake my head. “No, I don’t know.”
She sighs and looks to Jacki.
“I’m not a virgin,” Jacki says.
“Me either,” Serena adds.
Holly grins at me over the top of the rack. “Lost my V-card in eighth grade.”
The air goes out of my lungs. Not a virgin. None of them. They’re all fornicators, even Adam. 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 echoes in my head. Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers…shall inherit the kingdom of God.
I know the scripture like I know my own name, but there’s a tiny part of me that wonders if that’s one of the scriptures that Elder Berman twisted to control us. Should I be upset that I’ve become friends with ungodly fornicators and stop associating with them? Or should I not pass judgment on them, as John 8:7 says: …He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone... I’ve sinned plenty since leaving Shiloh.
“Alaina? Are you okay?” Jacki touches my shoulder, her forehead wrinkled with concern.
“I’m…” Am I okay? I’m not sure. “I think I need some air. This store is…” I don’t finish my sentence. I just turn and walk out.
Once in the corridor, I spot an open bench and take a seat.
I don’t know why it’s so shocking. I kind of figured Holly had done some immoral things. The idea of Adam being with someone else is heartbreaking, though. Images of him kissing Brittany the way Avryn and Hayze kissed in the movie flood my mind.
“Yuck,” I breathe, pressing the heels of my palms into my eyes. I guess it was stupid of me to assume anything about him after he told me he’d kissed someone like that before. It makes me wonder what else I don’t know that apparently everyone else does.
Someone brushes against my arm as they sit beside me on the bench. Lifting one hand, I glance over with one eye. It’s Jacki.
“Don’t listen to Holly. She’s jealous, I think.”
“Of what?” I say, letting both hands drop into my lap.
“You. You and Adam but mostly just you.”
I squint at her. “Me? But why? I’m…I’m…” I shrug, unable to find an adequate word for how insignificant I am.
Jacki leans back, watching people stream past us. “She just is. She’s jealous of the attention you get. She’s always been like that. Even with me. She had a fit at her birthday party in fifth grade when I showed up with glow-in-the-dark beads in my hair and everyone told me how cool they were.” She laughs. “She literally told on me. Like, ran and tattled and said I was ruining her birthday.”
I shake my head, confused. “Why are you friends?”
“Because when she’s not being a bitch, she’s really cool and a lot of fun. The good outweighs the bad, you know?”
Nodding, I watch a group of people close to my age walk past. Most of them are holding hands with someone and it brings back those uncomfortable feelings about Adam. “Did Adam…Was it with Brittany?” I hope she understands what I’m asking. I don’t think I can say it aloud.
Jacki scowls, curling her lip. “Oh, God no!”
I stare at my shoes. “How do you know?”
“Because Adam told Drew and Drew has the biggest mouth on the planet.” She nudges my arm and I look up. “Remember that. Never tell Drew something you don’t want the world to know.”
“The same can be said for Holly, I think,” I say.
She laughs. “Yeah, that’s true. They make a good pair!”
“So,” I say slowly. “If it wasn’t Brittany, then…?”
She shakes her head. “You don’t know them.”
Them?! “How many girls has he…?”
Jacki laughs. “You should see your face right now.” She puts her hand on my shoulder and shakes me. “Relax, Alaina. Serena’s right. Adam doesn’t expect anything from you. He’s not like that at all.” She nudges me again. “I don’t need to tell you that, though.”
Serena and Holly walk out of the store empty-handed. “Ready?” Serena asks.
Jacki glances at me, raising an eyebrow. I nod. “Ready.”
I’m not sure I feel any better about any of this, and I still don’t know the right way to handle being friends with blatant fornicators, but right now they’re all I have. And they’re not asking me to fornicate. That counts for something, I think.
After shopping in a few more stores, we take a break in the food cou
rt. Holly insists on buying a cinnamon roll for me to try, even though I’ve told her repeatedly that we made them all the time in Shiloh.
“You haven’t had one from Cinnabon, though,” she says.
When she takes off toward the Cinnabon stand, Jacki leans over and says, “She’ll never apologize for being a bitch, but she will make it up to you in her own way. Like, with cinnamon rolls.” Then she slips away to get in line with Serena at Great Wraps.
I find an open table and sit down. As soon as I do, my hip buzzes, making me jump and I realize it’s my phone. I forgot I had it tucked in my waistband with my shopping list.
There’s a message from Adam on the screen: Already got our next trip planned out. When do you want to go?
My stomach knots. My thumbs hover over the screen as I try to decide whether to write Now, Later, or Never. I can’t stop imagining him kissing other girls. Faceless girls that dress provocatively and wear makeup. Girls that are nothing like me.
I type: Now
I’d be lying to myself if I said I truly didn’t want to see him anymore. Besides, he’s not still kissing those faceless girls. I shouldn’t hold it against him. I should just push it out of my mind.
Is tomorrow okay? It’s kind of an all-day thing.
Smiling at my phone, I type: Ok. Tomorrow. Where are we going? What time?
Pick you up at 10. Here’s a clue.
He sends a picture of a black and white bear. A panda, I think. We didn’t spend much time learning about animals in Shiloh unless they were animals we had to care for, like chickens and horses and cows.
I type: Can’t wait!
“Who you texting?” Jacki asks, sliding into the chair beside me with a tray of food. Serena sits across from me with her tray.
Shoving my phone back in my waistband, I say, “Adam. We’re going somewhere tomorrow.”
She smiles and pops a piece of tomato from her sandwich into her mouth. “Y’all two are so cute.”
Holly appears in front of me and sets the biggest cinnamon roll I’ve ever seen on the table. “Bet they didn’t make ‘em like this in Shiloh!”
My eyes widen and I reach out, dragging one finger through the icing dripping down the side of the roll. “No, they certainly did not.” Sticking my finger in my mouth, savoring the buttery-sweet flavor, the disturbing images of Adam kissing other girls fade away.
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