Our neighbor stands maybe twenty feet away at the screen door.
Danny rolls off the couch. “Tell him to go.”
I sit up slowly. “What do you want, Nathan?”
He holds out a bag of tomatoes. “Grandma sent these.”
I smooth my hair. My ball cap is gone. “Leave them on the porch.”
“What were you guys doing?” Nathan asks.
“Nothing,” Danny says.
“Just go,” I say.
He stands there. “Angelyn?”
“What?”
Nathan’s face is as red as the tomatoes. “I can see your underwear.”
“Oh.” My sleep shirt is ridden to my waist. I tug at it, hating him.
Danny passes me. “I’ll take the tomatoes.”
Nathan peeks around when he opens the door. “Angelyn, you okay?”
“Yes,” I say, like, DUH!
Danny reaches for the bag and latches the screen door shut. He pushes the front door closed. He sets the tomatoes on an end table.
“That kid’s not right.”
I check Mom’s room. Her door is shut, still.
Danny comes to the couch. “Scoot.”
I sit at one end, him at the other.
“What was that about?” he asks.
“Nathan’s real dumb at school.”
“He likes you, huh?”
“Yuck! No.”
“Well, he’s seen you like that,” Danny says.
I curl my legs under. Hide my face.
“You didn’t do anything wrong,” he says.
“Nathan acted like I did.”
“So what on him, and, no, you didn’t.”
I peek at Danny. He’s looking over real serious.
“Kiddo, I don’t want you to feel funny, or bad, or—”
“I feel good with you.”
“Yeah?” He smiles. “Me too.”
“I guess Nathan will tell everyone he saw my pants.” I try to laugh.
“That’s all, if we’re lucky.”
“Huh?”
“Maybe we’re in trouble,” Danny says. “He could tell any lie.”
“What lie? I won’t let him.”
He rubs a thumb over his lips. “We’re friends, right?”
“Yeah, we’re friends.” I’m scared.
“Friends back each other up,” he says.
Mom’s door creaks open. “Was someone here?” she says, yawning.
I’ve still got the remote. I slide it to Danny across the cushions.
“Just now.” She steps into the room. “I thought I heard—”
Danny looks at me, and me at him.
“Nothing,” he says.
“Nobody,” I say.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Next Morning,
Sidewalk in Front of Ag
Steve doesn’t believe me. “Rossi was okay about the beer?”
I sway with him, my hands on his on my hips.
“Don’t bring it to school was all he said.”
Steve says, “Not a problem.”
“That’s what I told Mr. Rossi.”
He pulls me to him. “Sweet.”
Nearby, Jacey is wound around JT. Other couples hold each other along the walk, the unattached ones teasing across from boy/girl groups. This is our place before school. My place with Steve. Thirtysome of us gather. Hicks, the others call us. The prep kids, the rich kids, the jocks. Or, cowboys. The words don’t fit everyone. They sure don’t fit me. Steve’s family runs cattle. So does JT’s. Jacey and Charity live on ranch land—neighbors—but their dads are in real estate.
Me, I’m here because I’m friends with them and because last year Steve decided that he liked me.
Fine, hot girl, he called me then.
Cowboy Steve, I called him.
“Mom grounded me,” I say against his lips.
Steve stands back. “Because of the beer?”
On tiptoe, in his ear: “Mr. Rossi didn’t tell. She’s just being a bitch.”
He curves his hands around my butt. “Reservoir today then for sure.”
I wiggle so I face front. “I don’t know.”
He presses against me. “You can’t get any more grounded than you are.”
I stare at the ball field across the street, empty but for birds hunting breakfast.
“I can’t get any more grounded,” I say.
“Ms. Stark,” Mr. Rossi says as I walk into World Cultures with the girls.
“Hey.” I stop smiling when I see yesterday’s homework on the board.
Jacey stops at his desk. “Say hi to us, Mr. Rossi.”
Charity crowds next to her. “Yeah. You see us too.”
“I do,” he says. “Hello, girls.”
I push them on.
When we’re in our desks: “Did you do the homework?” I ask.
Charity says, “No.” Jacey shakes her head.
“I didn’t either. I said I would. I’m screwed.”
“Yeah, by him,” Charity says.
Mr. Rossi stops me when class is over.
“No homework?” he asks, pointing to the pile on his desk.
“Sorry, Mr. Rossi. I was fighting with my mom.”
“Bad excuse, Angelyn. Take your own responsibility.”
In the doorway the girls laugh. I send them a death stare.
“Keep your focus,” Mr. Rossi says.
“I’ll get you the work. I promise.”
“You said that before, and it didn’t happen.”
I flinch. “I’ll give you yesterday’s homework and today’s. Tomorrow.”
Mr. Rossi leans back in his chair.
“I will! I wrote the assignments down.”
“Fool me once,” he says.
“You have to believe me.” My voice shakes.
At the Reservoir
“People think I suck,” I say on Steve’s lap. “Everybody’s pissed.”
“I’m not. Gelly.” Hands in my hair, he pulls my face to his.
A blast of wind rattles the truck, breaking our kiss. We’re ten miles from school, alone in the stadium-sized parking lot overlooking the water.
“Gelly.” I make a lemon face. “That is so … yuck.”
“Don’t tell anyone I call you that.”
“I won’t.” I shift against him. “Cowboy Steve.”
He runs a finger along my cheek. “Let’s get in back.”
I sit up, the steering wheel against me. “No. It’s too windy outside.”
Steve slides me off his lap. “So, we’ll keep our heads down.”
Scrambling to my knees, I lean in for a kiss, my hands braced on his thighs.
“You’re trying to change the subject,” he says, though I haven’t said a thing.
My hands drift downward. “We can do enough in the cab.”
“I want to stretch out.” He sounds about six years old.
I run my nails along his fly. “I’ll do better in here.”
“You want to get out of doing stuff.” His voice fades as I undo the buttons.
“I am doing stuff.” I look up. “Want me to stop?” Gently, I work him free.
Steve says nothing. He groans.
Afterward he thanks me like a little boy.
“Kiss me, then,” I tell him, playing tough. He does it.
Neither of us has much to say after that. It’s hot in the truck. Close.
“I’m getting out,” I say, opening my side.
Steve opens his. “See, now it’s not too windy for you.”
Outside he buttons up. I walk to the edge of the lot overlooking the water. It’s gray and rocking today, more ocean than lake.
He joins me. Puts his arm around me. It feels good underneath.
“You know something?” Steve says. “I am pissed with you.”
I check him. “What’d I do?”
“It’s what you don’t do. And you know what I mean.”
“I have.” I walk away, elbows clasped.
He follows. “Twice we’ve done it. I hardly remember the last time.”
“Lie number one.” The wind whips my hair in my face, my eyes.
Steve grins. “Okay. May 28. Here. Four months ago, Angelyn.”
I shrug. “I didn’t see you over the summer.”
“You told me not to come around.”
I hold my hair back with both hands. “My mom doesn’t trust me.”
“As much as everyone thinks you party—”
“Oh, everyone who? What does that mean?”
He looks off. “Forget it.”
In the truck I sit, arms folded, staring out the side.
“Don’t be like that,” Steve shouts as we tear across the lot.
“Who’s been talking about me? You?”
“JT and Jacey are doing it. You don’t talk to her about me?”
“No.” It’s true. I don’t.
“I guess you’re better than me, then.”
He swings onto the road out.
“It’s great how you save this for after I do my thing.”
“You were acting so pure,” Steve says. “I get tired of it.”
“Pure?” I look at his crotch. “Didn’t taste that way to me.”
He snorts. “Okay, so you’re talented. You know I want more.”
“Most guys would be glad for what you get.”
“Conceited, much?” He downshifts for the climb to the highway.
I touch his arm. “Let’s not do this again.”
Steve twitches me off. “You think I don’t know it’s how you keep me away?”
“I don’t keep you away. I’m here. Doesn’t that count?”
He’s frowning. “You’re not on it like a girlfriend should be.”
The reservoir disappears as we round a curve into thick brush.
“I’m sick of it, Angelyn.”
I watch him. “Another time, I will. I promise.”
“Your hand,” he says. “Your mouth—”
“Stop it.”
“Could be anybody’s hand, or mouth.”
“Right.” I’m squirming.
Steve looks over. “I want you, Angelyn. I want us to want each other.”
“We do,” I say. No color to it.
“Look. Whatever you’re afraid of, or think you are—”
“I’m not afraid of anything.” It comes out vicious.
He lifts his hands and slams them on the wheel. The truck fishtails, and for a scary second he fights for control.
“Watch it,” I say, wishing I didn’t after.
“We are never getting together again. Is that what you’re saying?”
“Another time, I said.”
Steve jerks the truck to a stop.
“What?” I ask, hands against the dashboard.
“I’ll call your bluff right here. We skip the afternoon. Circle back to the lot. We’d have two hours before school’s out.”
“No,” I say. He hisses something. “They’d get us both for cutting. Mom grounded me last night. I can’t get into trouble again that fast.”
“All excuses.”
I check the dashboard clock. “Lunch’ll be over. We should go.”
“You act so pure. And I know you’re not.”
“Okay, you said that before. What does it mean?”
Steve stares ahead.
“If I’m dirty like that, maybe you don’t want me in your truck.”
“Maybe I don’t.”
I catch my breath. “Are we supposed to sit here until I give in?”
No answer from him.
“Not today, Steve. I didn’t mean today. It doesn’t make sense, today.”
He flexes his fingers. “Uh-huh.”
We sit unmoving. I watch the clock and wrench from it.
“What do you care as long as you get off? It’s all the same, isn’t it? Once it’s done.”
Steve clears his throat. “It’s not the same. One kind is, you’re with me.”
“It’s a damn chore,” I say. Mostly to myself.
“Get out.” He’s quiet.
“What?”
Steve says it again—shouts it: “GET OUT.”
I get out.
He drives away.
CHAPTER EIGHT
I watch the truck blast around a corner.
Gone.
“I can’t believe this,” I say. To no one. I don’t like the way I sound. Weak.
“Bastard,” I add, with a kick to the pavement.
It’s a mile or more to the highway, uphill in winding turns through thick brush. A mile back to the parking lot and the cool breeze off the water. Here the air doesn’t move. I swirl my hair in a topknot and let it drop, heavy on my shoulders. I am already sweating.
I start the climb, hobbling on asphalt in boots meant for show. My shirt clings like a second skin. By the time I reach the curve where the truck disappeared, it’s sweated through.
“Hate you,” I say, coming out of the turn to the next identical stretch of road.
Around another curve I follow a break in the brush to a picnic area I’ve never noticed. There’s a restroom, a pay phone bolted to its side. A few tables. A barbecue pit. A hip-high faucet in a circle of gravel. I head for it.
The water is rusty. Lukewarm. I let it run cool and duck my head under, the water sluicing my face as I drink. As I stand, weeds move in the woods beyond the restroom. It’s like someone’s grabbed my throat.
“Who’s there?”
A yip comes back, choked as my question, and a medium-sized dog after it, bursting through the brush, curved tail wagging, covered with burrs.
I exhale hard. I have to pee.
The dog is at the bathroom door when I come out.
“Go home,” I say, without much heat, taking a closer look.
It’s black with brown spots, its body as matted as its tail. A spaniel mix, maybe, with floppy ears. It watches with bright brown eyes.
“I guess you won’t kill me. I hope you’re not contagious.”
Its tail wags harder.
I kneel on the concrete. “Come here.” The dog does. I pet it—her—the rough fur scraping my skin. So many burrs.
“Somebody dumped you.” And then I start to cry.
The dog drinks from the faucet while I sit at a table thinking what to do next. The pay phone juts like an ear off the restroom structure. I can’t call my mom. Would not call Danny. I have no money for a cab, and it’s not like they’d come here anyway.
Steve is the only one I could call.
The dog trots over and sits at my feet.
I lift her to the bench. “Who left you here?”
Campers, I’m guessing. Late-summer campers with less room leaving the reservoir than they had coming in.
“People suck.” I work a sticker from the tangled fur behind her ear.
In the distance, a honk. More honks, coming in.
“I will kill him,” I say. Pissed that I’m happy.
The dog strains against my hands, wanting DOWN. I let her go.
Between honks Steve is shouting my name. The dog takes off like he’s calling her. I follow, thinking what I’ll say to him.
The truck slides around the corner as I step out of the clearing. The dog is down the road, safe in a patch of weeds. I fold my arms and wait for Steve to see me.
He skids past, jams on the brakes, and reverses to where I stand.
“Get in,” he says. No eye contact.
The dog tears for the truck, barking nonstop.
“Asshole,” I say over her.
Steve waves an arm. “Let’s go.”
The dog crouches at his door. Gathering herself, she jumps, falling in a scrape of nails.
“Hey,” Steve shouts. “Dolly, back!”
I stare at him. “What did you call her?”
The dog jumps again. Falls again, whimpering.
Steve revs the engine. “Angelyn, come on!”
“Dolly?” I say to him. To her: “Dolly?”
The dog is watching me. I walk to her, fingers outstretched. She skitters off.
“Steve,” I say, “do you know this dog?”
“No,” he says. “Now hurry.”
I smooth my shirt. “I think you do.” My stomach trembles.
Steve does a half-assed finger snap. “We can make it if we leave now.”
“You dumped her. Didn’t you? Whose is she?”
His jaw works. “Forget the dog and come with me.”
I look at Dolly. “What will happen to her?”
Steve says, “It’s just a dog.”
Head tilted, Dolly treads beside the truck.
“How could you do that?” I ask.
“Do you want to get back to school or don’t you?”
“It’s not right,” I say slowly.
Steve turns. “Angelyn, I will leave without you. Think I won’t? You can find your own way back and I won’t know a thing about it. I was never here.”
I believe him. I get in.
“It’s my sister’s dog,” Steve says on our way back. “Some mutt she found at college. She left it with us, and my folks said, Get rid of it. What was I supposed to do?”
“Don’t know,” I say, tracing a pattern in the circle I’ve breathed on the window.
“A ranch isn’t some playground for animals. It’s a business.”
“Nice quote. Who said it first, your mom or your dad?”
“I left food.” Steve is whining. “It’s better than the Pound, yeah?”
“Yeah. You’re a real great guy.”
“Stop giving me crap. I didn’t have a choice!”
I look at him. “You dumped me like you dumped that dog.”
Steve wags a finger. “I came back for you.”
“Thanks!” I say with a fake sweet smile.
“All right, I’ll say it: Sorry. I shouldn’t have left you.”
Close to campus, we pass the bus yard where my mom works. I duck. Steve grabs my neck and squeezes.
“While you’re down there …,” he says in his Sex voice.
I twist from him and slide across the vinyl.
“Hey!” Steve says. “I’m only playing.”
I hug the door. “Well, I’m not.”
“Ange, I said I was sorry. What more do you want?”
I feel like crying. “Go back for her.”
“The dog?” He shakes his head. “And do what?”
“Stand up for her. Tell your parents how it’s going to be.”
“Yeah, that’ll happen.”
The File on Angelyn Stark Page 3
