“Holy crap, calm down,” Joe said. “Sorry.”
“Sorry? Sorry ?” Allie glared at him. “Don’t be sorry to me. They’re your lungs. And, while I’m at it, what’s with this holy crap bullshit? Why don’t you swear and get it over with? Too holy or something to swear, but not too holy to wreck your own body?” And she was on her bike and starting to pedal.
“How do you really feel?” Joe said to her disappearing backside. She flipped up her middle finger behind her back and accelerated away.
“Holy crap,” Joe said. He looked so deflated, I felt my own heart sinking a little. He sure wasn’t the Hollywood-cool tough guy he’d appeared to be at the Blue Ox. He was just a guy. Still sexy as all get-out, but just an ordinary guy. I ached for him. And for some crazy reason, the more I got to know him, the more I wanted to kiss those lips. But now I couldn’t stop thinking about what Allie had said, and it made me sad and mad.
“I think she likes you,” I said.
“I don’t think so,” Joe said. “I think she likes you. Maybe that means she hates me a little bit ’cause she’s jealous. And she sort of hates the world and is taking it out on me. And smoking is just her excuse.”
“Hates the world? Jealous? She said she likes you. My impression is,” I said, “that Allie says exactly what she means. She thinks you can be good. If she says she likes you, she does. I don’t think she bullshits anybody. She doesn’t want you to screw up your chances on the bike. Or maybe screw up your life.”
Joe just looked at me.
“Wait.” I chewed my lip. “What did you mean? When you said maybe she’s jealous? Jealous?”
“Maybe she likes you and she’s jealous of me, doesn’t want to share you with me.”
“Share me?” I stared at him and my heart thumped. “What are you talkin’ about?”
“She had you all to herself before I showed up.”
“So?” My heart hammered with a little bit of hope that Joe might be feeling what I was feeling. That maybe he meant Allie was jealous that Joe liked me.
“Don’t you think she’s a dyke?” he asked. “I think she likes you. Didn’t you see how she jerked away that day at the Last Chance when Thomas just touched her?”
“Well, we’d just gotten creeped out. That was really scary. I was jumpy, too.”
Joe shrugged. “Not like that. She doesn’t like to be touched, at least by a guy, that’s for sure.”
“We were both freaked out. That doesn’t mean she’s a—shouldn’t you say ‘lesbian’ ?”
“Maybe not,” Joe said. “But I still say she likes you. And she doesn’t want to share you with me.”
I jumped to my feet. “I can’t believe you said that.”
“Don’t get all defensive. What? Are you sayin’ that you like her that way, too? And I walked into the middle of it? Sorry.”
“Joe, I like her a lot, too, but it doesn’t mean I want her. Or that she wants me.” I grabbed my bike. “I really don’t believe you said that. What makes you think—?” I stared at him, wondering if I’d misinterpreted every little sign that maybe he liked me. “I thought you were a decent guy. That’s sort of twisted. We’re just friends.”
Before he got up from the curb, I was riding away, leaving him sitting with his stupid slushie.
That night at supper, I didn’t talk to Joe. I caught him looking at me a couple times, but after we ate, he took his saxophone out to the edge of the woods and played for the first time. He was good. Really good. The notes were sweet and lingered on the evening air. The music was sad, like the sadness I saw behind his eyes sometimes. It made me want to cry. For him, for me, for Allie. I also didn’t see him go out for his last cigarette before bed.
I went into my CCC closet and found the blues on my iPod that I downloaded at Dad’s last Christmas.
What the heck. Why did this have to be complicated? Allie a lesbian? It hadn’t crossed my mind. I just liked her. She was the most interesting friend I’d ever had. When we rode, I wanted to be her.
If she was lesbian, so what? And Allie jealous? That was the stupidest thing I’d ever heard. But why would Joe even think about that? Did it mean maybe he liked me? Could it? That he thought Allie was jealous of him and me? Impossible. He was … sexy, in spite of not being the tough guy I thought he was. He was … beautiful. I was plain ol’ me with a stupid brown ponytail. A chicken. Who couldn’t ever think of the right thing to say. Who sat by listening while they fought. And now I’d blown up at him, too, and probably ruined my chances forever. Stupid, stupid, stupid me.
I fell asleep to sad muted trumpet on my iPod.
Fourteen
Fear Factor
June 29
After Joe moved in, there were simply too many people in too small a space. The tension in the house grew, then settled like dust. Too many of us moving all at once stirred it up, but most of the time we could ignore it. I chose to stay outside—on my bike, walking Peapod—or in my CCC closet whenever I didn’t have to work, either at the Blue Ox or for Aunt Susan. Joe smoked outside, and went who knows where. He had a car, after all. After Allie blew up at him, he played his sax sometimes and avoided me. He didn’t ride with us anymore and quit talking to me at all. He seemed exempt from all the household tasks Aunt Susan gave me. I didn’t know if she let him off easy because he was a boy, or her own nephew, or in mourning for his brother, or working full-time. No matter what her reason was, it pissed me off. But of course I couldn’t complain about it.
Timmy was oblivious. The highlight of his life was living with his cousin Stevie for the summer. Allie was the only one I could talk to, and somehow it seemed wrong to complain to her about Joe and make that whole scene any worse. So I said nothing.
I felt like Cedar Claustrophobia Central was the perfect name for my summer, except for riding with Allie.
When I got home from work one day, I stopped in the Last Chance before going to the house. Peapod was all wags and giant happy tongue to greet me. He weighed over a hundred pounds, which was huge even for a lab mix, so a hundred pounds of wag could be lethal. He flopped back on the cement when I ducked into the bar.
“Hi, Scout.”
“Sadie. What’s up?”
“What happened to Joe’s brother hiking? How did he die?”
Scout chewed his unlit cigar. He handed me a root beer. Root beer was his ambrosia, the healing potion for all ills. “I think Joe should be the one to tell you that. It’s his story, not mine.”
“If I’d been paying attention when I heard that you and Aunt Susan went to a funeral in Arizona, I’d have found out then. But I wasn’t paying attention.”
“I’m not gonna tell you because I think Joe might need to do that, even if he hasn’t yet. You’ll pay attention now, I bet. When he’s ready to talk.”
I drained my mug. “Thanks for the root beer, Scout,” I said, heading for the door. “Peapod, want to go for a walk?”
Peapod leaped to his feet with full-body wags.
Megan was watching Beauty and the Beast for the millionth time, so I snuck past her. Peapod waited for me in the kitchen while I changed into shorts and then bounded ahead of me down the trail toward the river, looking more like a sleek lion than a peapod, only slowing to jump higher than the grass to see me, to make sure I was following him.
Near the bottom, where the trail fanned out into clay and sand, he stopped, mid-stride, skidding, and the fur on his scruff bristled. He froze in a point position.
“What is it, Peapod?” I said, barely louder than a whisper. I could hear the approaching hum of four-wheeler ATVs on the path. Peapod bolted back to me and leaned against me, growling toward the motor. I grabbed his collar and pulled him off the path, into the woods about ten feet.
Three four-wheelers, the recreational vehicle of choice in this neck of the woods, came ba
rreling closer, going way too fast, spraying dirt, and Peapod kept growling. The dirt came raining down on us, even from ten feet away.
I couldn’t figure out the growling, since Peapod always hung out on the front sidewalk of Scout’s Last Chance, greeting customers. Too lazy to get up most of the time, he’d just lie there on his side and wag, even when the local riffraff came and went. The only time I’d ever heard him growl was at the two rednecks from the blue pickup.
I hung onto Peapod and watched. The four-wheelers came zipping past, and I felt my breath suck in like a punch. The guy in front was wearing a helmet, but a familiar long greasy ponytail flopped out behind. The reptile guy. I was surprised the ponytail didn’t leave a grease streak down his back. The second guy, without a helmet, was the driver of the pickup, wearing his black Schlitz cap backwards.
Peapod had been running a low-grade growl, but when the third four-wheeler zipped even with us, he let out a full-fledged snarl and almost yanked his collar out of my hand.
The snarl was so loud, the driver guy and the third guy heard it over the roar of their motors. The Schlitz-cap guy slowed way down and leered a half-grin at me. Recognition spread over his skinny, bristly face, and then the grin slid off his face and his eyes narrowed.
I’d never seen the third guy before. He wore pale green sunglasses and a short haircut under a Polaris Snowmobile cap. His face was handsome in a worn sort of way, full of chiseled lines, like wrinkled leather. His body looked hard and his arms were tight as thick rope.
Peapod lunged right at him and almost ripped my arm out of its socket. He jerked me forward and went crazy, snarling and snapping. Way worse than he’d growled at the two rednecks from the pickup.
The man looked unperturbed. He saw us, all right. He barely turned his head as he slowed down to stare at us. Even through his sunglasses, his gaze was hard as cold steel, boring holes into me. He looked as if he’d as soon squash Peapod as veer from his course. A steel, leather, and ice man. He gave me the chills. And Peapod hated him.
The driver guy, putting along really slow now, looked over his shoulder at the Polaris guy and indicated me with a tilt of his head. Then he gunned his motor, and took off after the reptile guy in a dirt-flinging wheelie.
After the noise died away in the woods, Peapod calmed down and I let him go. He trotted in the direction where the four-wheelers had disappeared, sniffed their tracks, and rumbled one more low growl. Then he charged down the rest of the hill and jumped in the river, but he only splashed around for about a minute before bounding out again to check on me.
Motors approached again, and Peapod had heard them before I did. No growl this time, but Peapod stepped between me and the trail. I hung onto his collar and watched. Two boys, maybe twelve years old, maybe fourteen, roared toward us and slowed when they saw us. They both nodded at me, and each one stood his machine on two wheels to spin out, accelerating a wheelie away from me.
I couldn’t help laughing. “Oh yeah,” I said aloud to their disappearing backs, “I’m really impressed.” I rubbed Peapod’s head and he jumped back into the river.
“Wanna go home?” I asked when I had walked far enough along the river to see the chain-saw sign hanging on its tree, starting to sag. Peapod wagged and started up the path. Sometimes I had to coax him out of the water, but today he didn’t need coaxing.
Sure enough, we were almost at the top of the hill, when I could hear ATVs coming back toward us. “Peapod,” I said, “come here.” He came, and we hightailed it deeper into the woods. For once, the junk was a good thing. I squatted down behind an old refrigerator lying on its side and pulled Peapod after me. I made him sit so his tail wouldn’t give us away. The noise came kiting down the hill. I was sure it was the same rednecks and their buddy, and that they would be watching for me. I ducked low.
Peapod’s growl turned to a snarl before the motors even got close, so I pulled him closer and put my hands around his nose to shush him. I leaned out to look.
Sure enough, they were motoring back the way they’d come, and they were scouring the woods for the sight of me. My heart was hammering and Peapod strained against my hands, growling, but he let me hold him. Finally they gave up, revved their engines, and took off, bouncing away down the hill.
When they were out of sight, Peapod’s hackles were still standing up more than I’d ever seen them. We ran as fast as we could back to the house. I hosed Peapod down to get the river water out of his coat. “Good boy,” I said, rubbing his wet head. “Good boy.” I couldn’t imagine how creepy the third guy must be if he got such a rise out of Peapod. I took off my shoes and rinsed off my legs, too, using Scout’s shop soap, in case there was poison ivy where we’d hidden.
Aunt Susan saw us from the garden where she had Josie “helping” her weed between tomato plants. Stevie and Timmy were picking peas. “Sadie! Will you go check on Stacie? She’s sleeping in her crib. Then would you get Megan and both come help us pick peas?”
“Okay,” I said. My heart still hadn’t calmed down to normal speed, but I was hoping she didn’t notice.
“Please,” Aunt Susan added to my back, as if she’d just remembered. Of course she wouldn’t notice. She could barely keep her nose above water.
Stacie was still sound asleep, and Megan, in the middle of Beauty and the Beast for the ten-thousandth time, complained about leaving Belle still in the grips of the Beast who hadn’t turned nice yet, but she and I went out and helped with the pea-picking. I looked at Aunt Susan’s tired face, and I knew I would never say anything to her about the guys in the woods.
We six pea-pickers ate about as many raw peas as we put in the bowl, and then I helped Susan weed carrots. My heart rate seemed back to normal now, but I couldn’t get rid of the creeps.
Josie, who was playing in the grass beside the garden, started to whine. “Mommy, I want juice.”
Susan let out a big sigh.
“Go ahead,” I said. “I can finish these.”
“Thanks.” It was the first time I’d seen gratitude on her face, instead of frustration, all summer. She picked up Josie in one arm and the bowl of peas in the other. The boys took off for the fort they were building behind Scout’s shop. Peapod lay down near the tomatoes and kept an eye on me while I finished.
We heard another ATV motor on the trail in the woods. Peapod looked at me and I looked at him. But he lay there, calmly, and I kept pulling weeds.
When I was done, I went to find Scout again. I let Peapod, who was almost dry now, in the back door of the Last Chance with me. “Scout?” I called. “Uncle Scout?” No answer. Peapod’s claws clicked and my flip-flops padded over the tile floor. When we went into the bar itself, Peapod lay down in the doorway. The only light in the dark room was the glowing end of Scout’s huge cigar. He was at a booth, sitting alone, staring out the tinted window.
“Scout?”
He jumped, so the ash fell off his cigar onto the table. He chomped down, brushed the ashes from the table into one palm, and grinned at me around the cigar.
“Caught me thinkin’,” he said. “And smokin’ in a public establishment.”
“What are you thinking about?” I slid into the booth across from him.
He held his cigar with two fingers of the hand that wasn’t holding the ashes. “Those two scumbags who chased you on your bikes. They rode by here today on ATVs. With some other scumbag. I’m not likin’ that. They made a big circle around the whole place. I went out to tell ’em to get lost before I called the cops, but they took off like bats out of hell as soon as I opened the door.”
“I saw them. Peapod and I were in the woods. Peapod growled like crazy. But the third guy? The one with them? I’ve never heard Peapod growl like that. And snarl. And snap. He would have ripped that guy’s legs off if I’d let him go. Almost jerked my arm off.”
Peapod, hearing his name, whined from the
door.
“Come here, you big oaf,” Scout said. Peapod wagged into the bar and Scout rubbed his ears.
“Then some kids went by, and Peapod didn’t even care.”
Uncle Scout studied my face while he rubbed the big golden head beside him. “Old gentle, ever-loving Peapod, you got more sense than I give you credit for.”
“They heard Peapod, and they saw me. That last guy—it felt like he looked right through me. Scared the crap out of me. Peapod really hated him.”
Scout pulled the cigar from his mouth and studied it. “No idea who that one was?”
I shook my head. “I was hoping you knew. Since Peapod hates him so much.”
“No idea,” Scout said, slowly turning his root beer mug in its sweat ring on the table. “Sure you’ve never seen him?”
I shook my head again. “Did you call the cops?”
“Yup, I did. I was hoping they’d mind their own business so we wouldn’t have to. But I guess they aren’t smart enough for that.”
He paused.
“Sadie.” Scout pointed the two fingers holding the cigar at me. “For now, don’t go in the woods alone. Not even with Peapod, okay?”
I nodded.
The policeman—a detective—showed up fifteen minutes later. Scout had given him instructions to pull up to the front of the bar and grill without lights or siren. He wanted to prevent Susan from seeing the cop car if possible.
The officer’s name was Rankin. Scout asked him if that made him a rankin’ officer. Rankin didn’t crack a smile, just shook his head and started asking questions. No nonsense. I had to tell Officer Rankin the story about getting chased, and describe where it happened, including hitting the ditch, the pickup half off the road trying to hit us, the beer bottle hitting Allie, and seeing the guys today.
“You say you don’t know the guys?” he asked.
Chasing AllieCat Page 7
