“Are you really going to eat that?” Erin asked David the next afternoon at the mall as the clerk in the ice cream store handed him a cone heaped with three different flavors.
“Every bite,” David said, taking a mouthful from the top.
Jody pulled on his arm and signed him a message. Erin watched as David signed a reply. “My sister wants the same thing,” he told Erin.
“Make mine vanilla, and only one scoop,” Erin insisted.
“Boring,” David said, but placed the order anyway.
Erin observed David and Jody covertly, still wondering how she’d let him talk her into coming to the mall when he’d appeared on her doorstep that Saturday afternoon, uninvited. She supposed it was his little-boy charm. And his sister. Erin found the little girl adorable. Her big blue green eyes, curly blond hair, and infectious smile—so like David’s—were hard to resist. Erin was also intrigued by the child’s deafness. She’d never known a handicapped person, and the way Jody adapted to the regular world fascinated her.
After they’d sat down, Erin said, “Jody doesn’t miss much, does she?”
“She’s got a very high IQ. Once she figured out signing and broke through the communications barrier, she was off like a shot.”
Jody signed something to Erin. “I don’t understand,” Erin told David.
“You should learn to sign,” David said. “Then you can talk to Jody yourself.”
“Oh, I could never learn—”
“Sure you can! It’s easy. Watch.” He made slow, deliberate moves with his hands and fingers.
“That’s Jody’s name, isn’t it?”
“Very good. You remembered. Now here’s yours, and here’s mine.” She watched, then mimicked his movements. “You’re a natural,” David said.
“But it doesn’t seem like you spell out every word when you talk to Jody. I mean, that would take forever.”
“That’s the beauty of signing. Certain gestures stand for nouns and even complete phrases. For instance …” David drew his thumb along his cheek and down his jawbone. “This means ‘girl.’ ” He repeated the movement, addine a circular motion with his open palm in front of his face. ‘That means pretty girl.”
Jody tugged on Erin’s arm, made similar gestures, and added the letters of Erin’s name. “What do you guess she’s just said to you?” David asked.
“I think she just told me that I was a pretty girl.”
“You got it!” David smiled, and Erin dropped her eyes because it made her quivery inside. “Now try this,” David said. He held up his hand and tucked his two middle fingers against his palm so that only his thumb, forefinger and pinky were extended.
“I give up,” Erin said.
“He repeated the move while saying the words, I love you.”
His aqua-colored eyes were so bright that they seemed to glow. Erin’s stomach did a somersault, and she felt a tightness in her chest, as if her breath couldn’t find a way out. She jumped to her feet. “I’m going to get a drink of water. I saw a fountain near the entrance of the food court.”
“Hurry back,” David called. “There’s lots to learn.”
She didn’t want to learn anymore. David made her feel things she hadn’t felt in over a year. She didn’t want to care about David Devlin. She really didn’t.
“Erin!” Someone called her name, and she spun.
A tall boy with black hair and chocolate-colored eyes was coming toward her through the crowd. For a heart-stopping moment Erin stared as Travis Sinclair walked her way.
Chapter Twelve
For Erin time stood still, and she saw Travis, not in the mall, but in the moonlight on the sidewalk that surrounded Tampa Bay. She could almost hear the lapping water and smell the jasmine-scented night air.
Travis approached her tentatively, his thumbs hooked on the belt loops of his jeans. “Hi,” he said. “I was just coming in the door, and I thought I recognized you, so I hollered.”
Erin felt her mouth settle into a grim line. “I thought you were away at college.”
“It’s spring break. My roommates and I are down for the week. You know, the beach and all.”
She remembered last year at spring break she was supposed to go to the beach with Shara and some friends and flirt with the college guys. But Amy had been hooked to life support. “Have you seen Cindy?” She arched the words, like barbs.
Travis reddened and shifted from foot to foot. “I told you once before, Cindy’s nothing to me. I never went out with her again after the dance.”
Erin was angry. She wanted to hurt him; she wanted to run away. “Well, I’d like to say it was good to see you again, Travis, but why lie?”
“I was hoping you weren’t still mad at me, Erin. I was hoping that you might have figured out how hard it was for me to see Amy that way—”
“Save it!” She might have said more, but David appeared and stepped between her and Travis.
“I’m David Devlin,” he said. “Weren’t you a senior last year at Berkshire?”
Travis nodded at David. “Yeah. I remember you. How is the old place? Is Mr. Wells still there?”
“Yep. He’ll never retire. I think we’re gonna cast him in bronze and set him out for the pigeons.”
Erin listened while David and Travis traded school memories, and when Travis turned to leave, she refused to say good-bye. “What was that all about?” he asked.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“I looked out and saw the two of you standing in the middle of the food court, and it looked like you were arguing. So don’t pretend nothing was going on.”
“It’s not important.”
He took her arm and pulled her closer. “I want to know what’s between you and Travis Sinclair. Were you seeing him? I know he had plenty of girlfriends.”
“Hardly,” Erin said. “I hate his guts.” David looked surprised. “What’s wrong?” she asked. “Is it so hard to believe that every girl doesn’t fall at his feet?” She played up the sarcasm because she knew deep down how much she had once cared about him, and she didn’t want anyone ever to know. She’d told Amy, but the truth had been buried with her.
“Talk to me. Tell me what’s wrong.”
Erin felt a tightness in her head as if a band had been clamped around it. “I need to go home. Where’s Jody?”
David let go of her arm and stared at her hard. “Jodys waiting in the ice cream shop.”
She felt sorry for him suddenly. David hadn’t done anything wrong, and neither had Jody. They both must think she had flipped, but there was too much to tell, too much she didn’t want to tell. “David, I’m not trying to hide anything from you. It’s just that I’m getting this little headache, and if it gets out of control …”
“You do look sort of pale.”
They left the mall, and Erin rested her head against the back of the seat during the drive home. By the time they arrived, she was almost blind from the pain. Her parents weren’t there, so David took her to her room while Jody waited in the living room. He pulled back the covers, and she slid beneath the sheets, fully clothed. “I don’t want to leave you,” he said.
“Go. Please.” Erin’s voice was barely a whisper. She was afraid she was going to throw up, and she didn’t want him to see that.
He tucked the covers around her chin and touched her cheek. “I’m gonna call and check on you later.”
“Much later,” she told him and groaned. After he’d gone and she was alone. Erin began to cry. The tears trickled down, and inexplicably they washed away some of the pain. “No need to wonder what set this one into motion, Dr. Richardson,” Erin said aloud as if the shadows in her room would answer. Seeing Travis had triggered this headache. But knowing the cause didn’t mean a cure. She longed to go to Gilead and find some magic balm. Instead, she cried herself to sleep.
“I thought you gave up cigarettes, Mom.” Mrs. Bennett’s back was to Erin, but she could see the thin trail of blue smoke curling upward from where
her mother was sitting in the office she’d converted from Amy’s old bedroom. The computer terminal on her desk blinked amber with a spreadsheet.
Mrs. Bennett stabbed out the cigarette and spun toward the doorway. “Don’t sneak up on me, Erin. And I only smoke when I’m under a lot of stress. Summer’s not even here, and already I’ve got to start buying for the store’s fall line. Where have you been all afternoon anyway?”
“Tonight’s Spring Fling, remember? Shara and I went to have our nails done.” She held them out for her mother’s inspection.
“Well, come closer. I can’t see them from here.”
Erin hesitated, then walked across the sun-filled room. It still made her uncomfortable, even though it looked nothing like Amy’s old room. Bookshelves stood in the place of Amy’s dresser, and her mother’s desk took up the space where the bed once stood. The walls had been repainted a soft
yellow, and the red gingham curtains replaced with decorative wooden blinds. At least the beige-colored carpet was the same. “I think the pink will go well with the blue of my dress, don’t you?”
Mrs. Bennett inspected Erin’s hands. “Yes, but I still wish you’d picked out your dress from stock at the boutique. You would have only paid cost for it.”
“Don’t you like my dress?”
“It’s pretty, but it was so expensive.”
Erin held her tongue and sauntered over to the bookshelves. Instead of Amy’s collection of teen romances, Erin studied the bindings of books on computer software, accounting, and fashion. “Did you always want to do this, Mom? Be in fashion and own your own business?”
Mrs. Bennett leaned back in her swivel chair. “I was always interested in clothes, but I bought the store with the money your grandmother left me in her will. You and Amy were growing up, and I needed to work so that we could afford to send you both to college. It seemed like a good investment at the time.”
Just one to send now, Erin thought. “Florida State shouldn’t be too expensive,” she said, half holding her breath because the topic usually brought on a negative comment from her mother. “I mean with in-state tuition and all. Then what will you do with the money? Dad told me he once wanted to travel—to Paris.”
“Paris.” Mrs. Bennett laughed. “Isn’t that typical of him? I’ve always been the more practical of the two of us. I’ll save the money. of course. It takes years of hard work to build up a nest egg. I don’t imagine you’ll want to take care of us in our old age.”
Erin hadn’t ever thought about it. When she was nine, her grandmother had lived with them until she died. She figured that she and Amy would simply help each other out with family problems after they grew up. “I’d work it out. Taking care of you and Daddy, that is.”
“If my business continues to do well, you won’t have to.”
In other words, Erin thought, she wouldn’t be needed. She wondered if her mother would still need her father if her business continued to grow. Erin retreated to the farthest corner of the room. A desktop copier stood on a short file cabinet. Once Amy’s vanity table had lined the wall, and a poster of Tom Cruise had hung to one side. “I guess I should start getting ready. I wanted to take a long bath this afternoon.”
“Just a minute,” Mrs. Bennett said. “Have you written down exactly where you’ll be tonight like I asked you to?”
Erin counted to ten under her breath. “Yes. The Columbia restaurant, the dance at the downtown Hilton, and then to Shara’s parents’ beach house.”
“David is a good driver, isn’t he? I wish I’d met his family. And absolutely no alcohol. Is that clear?”
“Don’t you trust me?”
“I know what prom night is all about, Erin. Kids can get into a lot of trouble.”
“Well, I’m not like other kids. I didn’t even want to go at first, but Shara talked me into it.”
“I’m just concerned about you. It’s not like there’ll be another prom night around here, you know.”
Erin dropped her gaze to the carpet. A round, colorless spot stared up at her. She remembered the time when Amy had spilled nail polish and tried to take it off with acetone and had removed the color from the carpet instead. “Why are you always griping at me?” she asked her mother.
“That’s ridiculous. I just want you to be extra careful tonight. You never used to care if I reminded you of things. Why can’t it be like it used to between us?”
“Nothing’s the same anymore.” Erin’s palms began to sweat.
“Are you saying that it’s my fault things are different? I’ve done all I can to keep the lines of communication open between us.”
Erin felt that Jody was better at communicating than her mother. “I need to start getting ready,” she said, and started toward the doorway.
“You’re all I have, Erin,” her mother blurted. “I can’t help but worry about you. In time I know you’ll go away, and then …” Her sentence trailed, and Erin saw tears fill her eyes.
She wanted to cry too. “You’ve still got Daddy,” she ventured.
Her mother looked away. “And he wants to go to Paris.”
They’d come full circle in their argument, and for an instant Erin felt as if she were on a merry-go-round. “I’ll be in my room getting ready,” she said. “David’s supposed to be here at six, and then we’re picking up Seth and Shara.”
“I’ll make sure there’s film in the camera.”
She felt like asking, “What for?” Mrs. Bennett no longer kept up the photo albums. The prints of Amy’s sixteenth birthday were still in a drawer. At the doorway Erin paused. “Oh, David’s sort of unconventional, so there’s no telling what he’ll show up wearing.”
“Yes, I remember the time he came here in his clown outfit. I hope he uses better sense tonight.” Her mother swiveled toward the desk and her computer terminal. “I’ll be here if you need any help getting ready.”
Erin realized that she couldn’t begin to tell her mother what she needed from her. “What’s Dad doing this afternoon?”
Mrs. Bennett shrugged. “He’s at the library, I think. Safe and sound in his world of books,” she added under her breath.
“Maybe he’ll write one someday,” Erin said.
“Don’t bank on it. He talks a lot but does very little.”
Erin wanted to say something to defend him but didn’t know what. Wistfully she watched her mother begin to type on the computer keyboard and tune Erin out, as if she’d already left the room. Sunlight fell across her mother’s shoulders and caught in her hair, which was dark, like Amy’s.
Chapter Thirteen
Erin fidgeted with her hair and looked at her alarm-clock radio for the umpteenth time. She’d been ready for half an hour, and she still had time to kill before David was due to arrive. Her parents were waiting in the living room; she heard the TV playing, yet she knew that her father was reading and her mother was compiling lists of new designs and fabrics for the store. She wished they would talk to each other, like they used to do. Erin sighed, not wanting the tension in her home to spoil the excitement she felt about the night ahead of her.
She rechecked her evening bag for all the essentials, including her headache medicine. Her stomach growled, reminding her that she’d skipped dinner in anticipation of the meal at the Columbia. She went to her dresser, to the drawer where she kept an emergency cache of candy bars, and poked through her lingerie and dance leotards. At the back of the drawer, she felt a piece of paper caught between the side and a groove, buried under stuff she hadn’t worn in ages. She jiggled the drawer and pulled out the paper. It was the program from the night she’d gone to a rock concert with Travis. He was supposed to take Amy, but when Amy was grounded for not finishing a history paper on time, she begged Erin to go in her place so Travis wouldn’t take Cindy Pitzer. Erin opened the program. Inside was scrawled,
Surprise, sis! Hope this doesn’t ruin your souvenir, but I couldn’t pass up the temptation to sign an autograph. Someday this will be a program with MY n
ame on it!
Love and stuff,
Your tragic Russian princess from the night of her term paper on the Crimean War—aka AMY!
Erin remembered the night as if it had been last week. It had been a washout, because all Travis talked about was Amy, and Erin finally understood how hopeless her crush was. Later, on that last night with Amy in the hospital, Erin had confessed to her sister: “And I’ve decided that it wasn’t that I really loved Travis. I just wanted somebody to love and somebody who loved me the way it is in the books and movies.”
Well, she didn’t want that anymore. In real life, people who swore to “love, honor, and cherish” each other turned into strangers who argued and shouted and spent more time apart than together. In the real world daddies went away and didn’t call home. So much for commitment.
Erin traced her finger over Amy’s hastily scribbled words, imagining her sister sneaking the program into the drawer as a special surprise. Amy should be here tonight, Erin thought. They should be getting ready together. Amy would be clowning around, and Erin would be trying to keep a straight face and ignore her antics. And then their dates would come, and Amy would do something outrageous, like pin her corsage to her hair and—
“Erin, David’s here.” Erin jumped at the sound of her mothers voice.
“Coming,” she said, stuffing the program into the drawer.
In the hall her mother said, “If you weren’t going with Shara, I’d never let you go out with this boy, Erin.”
“What’s the matter?”
“See for yourself.”
Erin hurried into the living room. David stood facing her father but turned and flashed his high-voltage grin. He was wearing a tuxedo jacket, ruffled white shirt, paisley blue cummerbund and bow tie, and faded jeans. Down the side seams he’d sewn a blue satin ribbon. He wore red high-top sneakers and a black top hat, and a vivid red scarf poked from the upper outside pocket of his jacket. His bright red clown nose covered his real one.
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