“Yeah. It’s all yours.” He brushes past me, and when I catch a whiff of him, my stomach drops as if I’m free-falling without a parachute.
My shower doesn’t relax me like I hoped it would. When I rinse the suds from my body and wash the shampoo from my hair, my heart races with the thought that Dylan was just doing the same thing right here, in this same tub, not too long ago.
“Can somebody tell me what time it is?” I yell through the bathroom door as I towel-dry my hair in front of the mirror.
“Seven nineteen,” Dylan replies, his voice floating through my ears. I kick things into high gear upon hearing the time, and once my hair is dry enough not to drip all over the carpet, I exit the bathroom, hoping to get one more glance at Dylan before making the journey back to the pool house.
“All finished?” he asks, fiddling with some of the buttons on his shirt. “I gotta brush my teeth.”
“I’m all done.” Good job, Emma. You’re back to speaking in actual complete sentences.
“Great.” He bends over to tie his shoes, and I take a moment to admire his outfit. As on any other day, he’s wearing jeans, but instead of a graphic T-shirt, he has on a blue-and-black plaid polo with the sleeves pushed up to expose his strong forearms. Thanks to the moisture from his shower, the tiny hairs around the edges of his face twist and curl around each other, screaming for the attention of a brush. And even with his hair out of place, he’s still so irresistible to me.
“Is that a new shirt?” I smile, small but genuine.
“Yeah. Your mom bought it for me.”
“Looks good.”
“Thanks.” The awkward tension between us returns, and it’s so tangible that it feels like a slap in the face as he dismisses me without another word.
You really messed up, Emma. I pout, descending the stairs. The thought that he’s probably never going to talk to me again crosses my mind, and that’s when the panic sets in. I have to fix things between us.
* * *
Dylan continues to avoid me for the remaining week of September, and it isn’t until our family takes a trip to the mall to see a movie (per Matthew’s special request) that he makes an effort to say anything to me.
“How’s your weekend been? Anything new?” At first I’m confused, but I have to stay as cool as he is, so I brush over it.
“It’s been okay. I’ve had a boatload of schoolwork to do, so that’s kept me busy most of the time.” I know he’s just forcing conversation to make me feel better about him being so distant lately, but I can’t help feeling like a pity project. He’s probably sorry for me and is just hoping that this attempt at small talk will bring us back to where we were before the kiss.
We’re supposed to be on our way to the movie theater, but Dad has gotten distracted by a power drill that caught his eye in a display window. He’s now in a deep conversation with a salesman, and I fear Mom’s foot might catch fire if she taps any faster on the wooden floor panel of the shop.
“Emma and Dylan, can you guys go buy the tickets and find seats for us? There’s no telling how long it’s gonna take me to pull your father away from that power drill.” She uncrosses her arms, digs in her purse, and hands us a fifty-dollar bill. Great, I think to myself, flashing back to the moment Dylan turned his cheek on my kiss. More privacy. Because this ended so well the last time.
I let Dylan lead the way, attempting to keep my eyes on the ground. But that doesn’t work; I find myself admiring him from behind as we walk. He has a patch of hair that sticks up in the back of his head, and no matter how many times he runs his hands over it, it doesn’t lie down. I have to place my hands in my jacket pockets to fight the urge to smooth it down myself, but the thought of running my fingers through his brown hair keeps trying to push its way to the forefront of my mind.
“Damn,” I hear him say before he ducks behind a pillar and, to my surprise, pulls me with him. “Play along, okay?”
“What?”
“Just play along.” He reaches down for my hand and laces his fingers with mine before coming from behind the column. What is going on? What are you doing? “I’ll explain later,” he says as if he can read my mind.
“Dylan! Hey!” I see a girl prance up to us, her eyes wide with excitement.
“Chelsea, right?” Dylan asks, his voice deep and alluring. When I notice that he hasn’t dropped my hand yet, the butterflies in my stomach emerge from their cocoons, fluttering their wings and tickling my insides.
“How are you?” She smiles. She’s really pretty. The juxtaposition of her long dark hair against her pale skin makes her green eyes look as penetrating and intense as a lioness in the dark of night. If I were into girls, I’d probably be attracted to her, too.
“I’ve been okay.” He’s such a guy. Keeping it short and to the point.
I see her eyes drop to where our hands are. “Who is this?”
“This is Emma, my girlfriend.” He raises our intertwined hands and kisses the back of mine. “We’re trying to catch a movie before it starts to get busy.”
Girlfriend. At first, I think I’m hearing things, so I repeat his words again in my head. My mom used to say that sometimes we hear what we want to hear because it satisfies a need deep down inside of us. I fear that this is one of those instances, and so I replay his words a few more times to make sure that I’ve heard him correctly. Nope, he said it. He definitely said “girlfriend.”
She looks me up and down as if I’m not worthy to cling to Dylan’s arm, and then she giggles. I shudder; even her laugh is attractive.
“This is going to sound embarrassing,” she says, “but I thought you were playing the girlfriend card to let me down easy.”
“Well, as you can see, my girlfriend does indeed exist.” I raise my eyebrows in contentment, and squeeze Dylan’s hand a little harder. I expect him to end their conversation and pull me toward the theater, but he continues to stand there, staring Chelsea down. “We’re gonna be late for our movie.” After a moment of uncomfortable silence between them, I feel his fingers graze the bottom of my chin and lift my face toward his. Before I can register what’s happening, his soft lips are on mine.
A million questions pulse through my mind as he grabs hold of my waist to pull me closer. Am I doing this right? Do I breathe through my nose or my mouth? Or am I not supposed to breathe at all? As his lips continue to wrestle with mine, I push the questions out of my brain. I don’t want them to ruin the moment I’ve waited my entire life for: my first kiss.
When he finally pulls away and I open my eyes, I realize that I’m out of breath. I search his face for some kind of clue to what just happened between us, but get nothing except a side-smile that says, Wow, and a look in his eyes that reads, Did I really just do that?
“Well, I’ll see you two later,” Chelsea says before walking away. There’s a sodden look in her eyes, and her already pale face seems to fade into a lighter shade of white. But her pain is no concern of mine. I got my first kiss, and nothing can bring me down from this high.
“Dylan—” I start before he cuts in.
“Thanks for that,” he says, letting go of my hand and putting more distance between us. He’s still smiling, but this time it’s mischievous, like he just got away with murder or some other heinous crime.
“For what?”
“When I saw her at an art exhibit downtown yesterday, I told her that I was taking my blond bombshell of a girlfriend to a movie, so I couldn’t go on a coffee date with her,” he says, shoving his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. “If you hadn’t been here today, I would have been exposed as a liar, and Chelsea would have continued to pursue me.”
“So that was all—”
“An act? Well, yeah. What did you think I was doing? You’re my foster sister. We can’t date.”
“But,” I begin as my eyes well up. I don’t want him to see me cry, so I try to blink the tears away. “You knew I liked you, though.”
“Yeah, I did,” he says after a momen
t. “Honestly, it wasn’t that hard to figure out, especially after you tried to kiss me after our meet-up with the social worker.” The suffocating pain of my heart breaking is all I can focus on as I watch a smug grin settle onto his face. “But you should be happy, Emma. I gave you what you wanted, didn’t I? Now, can we forget this ever happened and go buy the tickets like we were supposed to?”
“‘Gave me what I wanted’? You mean, made a fool of me?” I can’t hold back now; the tears start streaming down my face, burning my skin as if they are laced with hydrochloric acid.
“That’s not fair, Emma. You know I won’t be able to stay if they even think that we’re romantically involved.” He turns away from me, I guess in disbelief. “Are you really that selfish that you’re willing to risk my future in this family to get what you want? Everything isn’t always about you.”
Selfish? I replay inside my head. His words are cold and harsh, and I have to turn away before my face starts to crumple. “You’re such an ass,” I spit at him, feeling around for the money in my pocket. When my fingers find it, I start toward the theater to buy the movie tickets. I refuse to let him have the satisfaction of getting the last word.
chapter 8
“YOU’RE LIVING WITH the Ellenburgs now, right, McAndrews?” I hear two students grilling him across the hall. As much as I look forward to my English class, it’s excruciating today; for an entire hour, I have to share the same space as Dylan, and ever since our falling-out at the mall, it’s been hard to face him. I feel my cheeks grow hot with embarrassment and anger when he approaches the group waiting to get inside the classroom. But even the memory of his betrayal can’t stop me from thinking about the passion that lit up inside of me when his lips touched mine.
Most days, it’s a quiet wait in the hallway, but thanks to the two oaf-looking boys—one tall and gangly, and the other short and plump—poking fingers into Dylan’s chest, there’s a scene for everyone to watch while we wait. “I saw you pulling into the parking lot this morning. That’s a nice car that you have there. Did your new mommy and daddy buy that for you, too?”
“Actually, yes. It was a gift, and I was always taught that it’s rude not to accept gifts.” Dylan’s calmness turns the entire scene into a farce. It seems as if the calmer he stays, the madder the two boys get. “By now, you should know that, but good manners don’t seem to be a priority for either of you.”
“You think you’re funny, huh?” the tall one says, grabbing a fistful of Dylan’s button-down shirt. I try hard to ignore the conversation across the hall, but even the anticipation of presenting our close readings of Wuthering Heights next period can’t pull my attention away.
“So how does it feel, huh?” the shorter one sneers. “You waltz into their lives, and they just supply you with everything you want. How does it feel to be their own little charity case?”
“Yeah, you gonna freeload off of them for the rest of your life?” Freeloading? I’m sure that thought has never crossed any of our minds. Being an ass? Yes, that’s definitely crossed mine, but not freeloading. I see Dylan open his mouth to respond, but before he can muster up a smart-ass comeback, the bell rings, bringing Mr. Lawrence to the hall.
“Is there a problem, gentlemen?”
“No problem here, sir,” the two boys say in unison, walking away as we begin to file inside the classroom.
“Coming in or staying out, Miss Ellenburg?” Mr. Lawrence says, raising an eyebrow in my direction.
“Coming in.” I adjust the strap on my bag and make my way toward the door, but not before stealing a glance in Dylan’s direction to see his bronze eyes piercing mine through my glasses, pleading for me to stay out of it. We’re not on speaking terms anyway, so it’s not like I have much of a choice, I answer back in my head.
The first thing that Dylan does when he enters the room is march up to Mr. Lawrence’s desk and ask to switch seats. Not entirely unexpected—his seat is right next to mine.
“Give me a good reason, and I’ll let you move,” the teacher bargains, but Dylan doesn’t take the bait. He’s cornered, and no one can find out what’s going on with us. Without another word, he bolts to his seat and angles away from me, mad at the world.
“I love Mondays,” Mr. Lawrence sighs, uncapping a whiteboard marker. “Don’t you guys just love Mondays?” I hear the students around me grumble and groan as he scribbles two words on the board: Metaphysical Monday. At the start of every week, Mr. Lawrence blocks out the entire class period to have a “creative discussion,” as he calls it. This is really just a debate. “But before we get to this, you guys owe me a journal entry.” He raises his wrist to expose a fancy pedometer watch, and we all rush to pull our journals and something to write with from our backpacks. “You have ten minutes to write. Get started.”
Dear Catherine,
Some say that the worst type of love is a dying one. One that started with a small bud of a crush and blossomed into a beautiful, breathtaking tree. One that stood its ground in the face of every hurricane and flood that crossed its path. One that didn’t even know it was dying until it was too late to remedy the broken pieces. But that’s not it. The worst type of love is unrequited. A love that never even had the chance to see an end because it never got off the ground to begin with.
Dylan doesn’t like me in the same way I like him … I found that out the hard way. But knowing that doesn’t stunt the feelings I am developing for him. Knowing that doesn’t stop him from being the first person I think about when I wake up in the morning and the last thing I long for before I close my eyes at night. It doesn’t stop my heart from racing at the mere mention of his name.
I should hate him with every fiber of my being. But I don’t.
And I thought things were weird between us before, but now…? He’s been dodging me since the mall incident, which sucks because now he’s treating me the same way that every other guy does around here: as if I don’t exist. As if I’m invisible. That’s what hurts most of all. I thought he was different.
I don’t know what kind of trouble I caused in my past lives, but I’m sure that whatever I did didn’t merit this kind of karmic retribution. Crap … my ten minutes are up. Catch you later.
Emma
“Now, where were we? Oh, yeah,” Mr. Lawrence says, clapping his hands—he does that a lot. “Here’s your Metaphysical Monday question: Catherine loves Heathcliff, but she decides that they can’t be together because of the differences in their social classes.” He pauses here for dramatic effect, but I fear that no one but me is truly interested. “But what if they were of the same caste? Do you think their love would be more socially acceptable if they belonged to the same class?”
I have to shake my head at Mr. Lawrence’s suggestion. It’s not explicitly said in the book, but the real reason Catherine and Heathcliff can’t be together is not because of their statuses; it’s because they are foster siblings and, as Dylan can vouch for, that’s not okay. When Mr. Lawrence told us that this book would relate to our lives in ways we would never imagine, I tried to write that off as melodramatic. But now I’m beginning to see a few problematic connections.
Mr. Lawrence starts rattling off the names of our partners, and I cringe when I hear my partner’s name. “Emma, I’m partnering you with Dylan for today’s discussion. That okay?”
Is he kidding? Mr. Lawrence must have no idea that my family is fostering Dylan. He’s not so maniacal as to pair up real foster siblings to discuss literature’s most famous lusty foster siblings. I dismiss the thought and nod approvingly, scoot my desk a little closer to Dylan’s, and dive right into the task at hand. “Hypothetically speaking, they should be able to date … I mean, if they are no longer in different classes, right?” No response. He just sits there balancing his mechanical pencil on the tip of his index finger. “So, what do you think about this?” I probe again, thinking that maybe he hadn’t heard me the first time. But still, nothing.
“Well, this is a conundrum,” I whisper, half t
o myself and half to Dylan. Unblinking, he glares in my direction, sending chills down my spine, until it’s so uncomfortable that I have to focus solely on my own response just to distract myself from it all. And when Mr. Lawrence opens up the floor for us to share our opinions, Dylan slides his desk away from mine. Clearly, he wants nothing to do with me inside and outside the classroom.
“I say yes,” one girl articulates without raising her hand. “It should definitely be okay for Heathcliff to pursue Catherine. She’s not his real sister, so it wouldn’t be incest or anything like that. If they’re in the same class, then there is nothing standing in the way of them falling in love with each other. I don’t see a problem with it.”
“I disagree,” another boy interjects. “Heathcliff was brought into their family as an orphan, and it’s pretty obvious that he will probably become a real part of the family at some point. Adopted sibling, half sibling, foster sibling … whatever. It’s all the same. If you live under the same roof and refer to each other as family, then you should act accordingly.” I feel my heart shrink when I see some students nod their heads in agreement with him.
“But that’s not fair,” a different girl—Diem—contests from across the classroom. “Think about how you would feel if you were in their position. I mean, yes, Heathcliff is technically her brother, but he shouldn’t have to give up the love of his life just because society thinks that it’s wrong for adopted siblings to be together. Society can’t dictate the terms of these artificially constructed relationships. There is absolutely nothing wrong with them falling in love with each other.”
“Anyone willing to take her on?” Mr. Lawrence asks, looking for more raised hands. Diem is the captain of the debate team, and everyone is always afraid to disagree with her in class. When no one steps up to the plate, Mr. Lawrence doesn’t waste any time calling on someone else. “Dylan. I’d like to hear what you have to say.”
Wrong in All the Right Ways Page 8
