Magic Minutes

by Jennifer Millikin

  “Yeah.” I take my place on his right.

  “Kelsey?”

  “Uh, no.” My eyes flicker down to my plate. My first thought is that the dinner looks like Christmas, but the red sauce reminds me of all the red hair that was nestled against my chest an hour ago.

  “Not Kelsey?” His salt-and-pepper eyebrows are on his forehead. “Someone else?”

  I push the noodles around and shake my head. I don’t want to talk about Kelsey. “I went for a run after practice. I need to increase my cardiovascular stamina.”

  He nods slowly. “It’s getting pretty far along in the school year.” He steeples his fingers and rests his chin between the index and middle ones.

  My chest puffs out. Heat fills me.

  “It’s what I want, Dad.” It’s only ever been soccer for me. I live it, I breath it, I dream it. I have to play it in college, or else… I don’t know. The alternative is inconceivable.

  “I know, son, but it might be time for you to pick your gaze up from the ball and start looking around.” His face is fixed in a concerned stare, the skin between his eyebrows cinched together.

  I want to tell him if I kept my gaze on the ball I wouldn't score as many goals as I do, but I keep the comment to myself. Besides, I’ve heard him say it enough times that I could've said it myself the second he opened his mouth. He’s been saying the same thing since the fall when Tripp was picked up by Stanford. But how can I give up on my dream now? And how can he expect me to?

  I get where he’s coming from. His parents died in a freak boating accident when he was my age. There was no time for college, no time for him to goof off and go to frat parties. On the day they died, he became the owner of Sutton Vineyard, Sutton Wine, and the whole Sutton brand. My determination to play professional soccer doesn’t help my dad keep Sutton Wines in the family.

  He frowns and sits back in his seat, crossing one ankle over a knee. “I’m not saying anything we haven’t talked about before, but I think it bears repeating. The clock is ticking.”

  He’s saying one thing, but all I hear is that I’m not good enough to play on the college level. I know my left foot needs work. I can’t score from all angles.

  Sullenly I shove a bite of noodles into my mouth. They’re okay, a little soft, and they drip sauce, but they’re not awful. Honestly, I don’t know if I’d even recognize if it tasted bad. The taste in my mouth is already sour.

  “And Brody?” I ask because it’s my best defense. My brother is a loner, a guy who sometimes likes to go off the grid. He’s not following in Dad’s footsteps, he’s not a protégé. He’s so laid-back he might as well be lying down. He only went to college because my mother made it clear she would kill him if he didn’t go. If I believed in the whole birth-order-determines-personality idea, I’d say God switched us by accident.

  My father eyes me with the same shrewd attention he gives a withering grape on an otherwise healthy vine. “What about Brody?”

  “He’s the one half-assing his way through college.” Deflect. Always a good strategy when the heat is on me. Plus, Brody’s not here to defend himself. If he were, he’d spout some baloney about how he’s finding himself.

  “We’re talking about you. Not Brody.”

  I sigh around my next mouthful and lean back in my seat.

  “I want you to think about what could be next for you. Just in case.” He pushes his chair back from the table and uncrosses his ankle from his knee. “My job is to prepare you for outcomes you may not see yourself. Your job is to act surly and certain I don’t know what I’m talking about.” He tries to hide a smile. “You’re excelling right now.”

  In another part of the house my mom calls for my dad. He stands and claps me on my back. “Try not to put so much pressure on yourself, Noah. Everything has a way of working itself out.” He walks from the room, calling, “Coming, Johanna.”

  I look down at my plate. A majority of the fake noodles are still piled there, soaked in red sauce. All I can see is a spray of red hair, arms circling the air, and the face of a person who knows much more than I do. I can tell by looking at her that she’s not being suffocated by questions with no answers.

  If anybody’s drowning, it’s me.

  “Come on, Noah,” Coach Hutchinson yells, his irritation evident. He has a right to be annoyed. I wasn’t paying attention, and I missed the pass.

  “You gonna do that in the game?” Coach yells again.

  I shake my head, embarrassed. “No, Sir.”

  To make up for it, I spend the next forty-five minutes giving this practice my all. I’m not the most accurate shot, but my footwork is better than everybody’s but Tripp’s. The guy has magic feet. Stanford claimed him as soon as they were allowed to.

  I follow Tripp to his house after practice. On Wednesday nights his mom makes fried chicken and mashed potatoes. I haven't eaten at home on a Wednesday since I got my driver’s license two years ago.

  I stand to help Tripp clear the table. “Thanks for dinner, Mrs. B.”

  Tripp mimics me in a high-pitched voice, and I slug him in the arm. We finish the kitchen and are almost to Tripp’s room when he asks where my head was at practice today.

  “Nowhere, man.” I take my physics homework from my backpack and set it on his desk. “Just a missed pass, that’s all.”

  Tripp falls back on his bed and winds his hands around the back of his head. He looks up at the ceiling, where an almost naked woman spraying herself with a hose stares back at him. Trash, my mother would announce with a curled lip if I ever tried to put a poster like that up in my room.

  “You were probably dreaming about the ass you get from Kelsey.” Tripp says it in a lazy way, like if he says it off-handedly, I’ll divulge. Baiting me for details about my sex life is his second-favorite pastime.

  I pick up the soccer ball on Tripp’s desk and throw it at him. It catches him in the stomach, and he grunts.

  “Relax, man,” he says, setting the ball on the nightstand. It rolls off, bounces twice on the floor, and comes to a stop against my foot. Reflexively, my toes extend toward it.

  “You know I don’t talk about Kelsey like that.” He doesn't need the reminder. I’ve never given even a morsel of information, despite his repeated attempts.

  It’s not like I don’t have anything to tell him. Six months of dating Kelsey made for more than enough stories. She has a bit of wild in her, hidden behind the cheer uniform and sweet smile.

  “One of these days you might.” Tripp laughs.

  “Why are you so interested?”

  He sits up and grabs his backpack from the floor beside his bed. “If she would’ve seen me first, she’d be dating me.” He takes his homework from his bag and sets it on the bed.

  Tripp’s said this enough times that I’m over letting it bother me. And, to be fair, he’s right. If Tripp had been tasked with showing her to class on her first day of school, she’d probably be my best friend’s girlfriend right now. Instead of my ex.

  I’m still waiting on Kelsey to break the news to everyone. She wasn’t at school today, and I know she doesn’t want me telling people why we broke up. Keeping quiet about the true state of my relationship, I raise my middle finger at the best friend I’ve had since I was seven. He laughs.

  We start on our homework, but just like at practice this afternoon, I’m only partially present.

  The same face scatters my thoughts again, her gaze strong and mysterious, daring me to be attracted to her. The memory is so vivid, I can nearly feel the thin fabric of her dress, her body heat seeping through. My fingers curl into fists, the pencil gripped awkwardly in my right hand, until I’ve generated enough warmth to make the memory even more real.

  2

  Ember

  I hate these stairs.

  All sixty of them.

  And not because there are sixty, but because they’re the narrow kind. With their very presence, they dare a person to fall. I’m embarrassed to admit the number of nightmares I’ve had ab
out them. Realistic ones. With grotesque, limb-cracking endings.

  After climbing the obscene number of steps, I stay rooted in front of the door to our small apartment and listen to my mother and sister’s argument seep through. This makes tonight their forty-seventh argument about college and my sister’s refusal to go. I sigh quietly, count to fifteen, and make my grand entrance just in time to hear my mother inform my sister she’s allowing her condition to stunt her growth. My sister responds by slamming our door. I say our because my sister and I share a room. Not that I’ll be getting in there anytime soon.

  My guess is that Sky is now hiding in the dark, trying to breathe through the tightening of her chest. My sister’s panic attacks can occur at any time, but they often happen following a fight with my mother. They also happen in crowded places, and when she thinks people are looking at her.

  My sister is named Sky because her eyes are blue. I’m named Ember for the most obvious reason ever.

  My mother must have a thing for colors. When Sky laments her name, I remind her she could have been Sapphire or Cerulean. Then again, I could have been Terra cotta or Maroon, so we should really just find peace with where we landed.

  “Hi, Mom.” I walk into the kitchen.

  Her back is to me, and she’s digging through her collection of plastic cups until she finds the one she wants. Surf City Bar. On it is a picture of a shark in shorts carrying a surfboard. It’s her favorite. I think it’s cute she collects these little souvenir cups from random places.

  “Hey, hon,” she says, turning on the tap and filling her glass. “Sorry you had to come home to that.”

  I shrug. It’s typical. My mom and Sky don’t get along much these days. Mom has been pushing Sky to work through her anxiety and go to college. Sky doesn’t want to. That’s the gist of it.

  My mom is right. It has been two years since Sky graduated high school.

  This year, I’m the one graduating. I have only two months left, and there has been almost no talk of my college aspirations. No anxiety, no racing heart, no fear of public situations, and I’m left to figure things out on my own. Which I have. Unbeknownst to everyone, I applied to six high-ranking colleges. I’ve been saving money for years, starting with my first baby-sitting job at twelve. College applications don’t come cheap. I’ve never told my mom, but to be fair, she hasn’t asked. Her focus is on Sky, on getting her well, on helping her create a happy life for herself.

  It’s always the squeaky wheel that gets the grease.

  Mom turns around, resting her backside against the sink. She sips from her cup and looks at me with defeat. “Do you want to try talking to her?”

  “Sure, Mom.” I would rather not, but I feel bad for my mom. Coming home from work and walking in to fight with Sky is probably the last thing she wants.

  Together we walk from the kitchen. She goes to the couch and reaches for the remote, while I make the short walk down the hall.

  “Sky?” I say with a cautious knock on our bedroom door. Behind me I hear the TV turn on, the sounds of the evening news filtering through our apartment.

  The door opens six inches, and Sky peers out. She spends less than a second looking at me, then cranes her neck out to make sure our mom isn't close by, using me as bait to lure her out.

  “Why can’t she turn that junk down?” Sky mutters, ushering me in and quickly closing the door.

  My mother loves the news. Turning it on is the first thing she does when she walks in from work. Actually, no, that’s not true. First she washes her hands, and when I say wash, I mean she scrubs them. She even uses a little brush to get under her nails. I’m not sure if she’s washing off the germs she has picked up being in other peoples’ homes all day, or if she’s trying to wash off the fact that she’s a cleaning lady.

  I don’t think there’s anything disgraceful about her job. But she does.

  To me, she’s a contributing member of society.

  To her, it’s embarrassing.

  I found a book once, its unlined pages filled with her flowy script, and a second—sometimes illegible—chunky text. Some pages were poems, some were letters, but both people wrote flowery words of love. My mom and this person were going to spend their lives together, they were both certain of it.

  Whoever the man was who wrote those things to my mother, he wasn’t my father. My dad left soon after I was born, and from what my mother says, it was the nicest thing he ever could’ve done for us. She doesn’t talk much about him, only to say he had a penchant for making bad choices.

  The words in that book, the larger-than-life promises, came from a man my mother refuses to talk about. A few months ago our building’s fire alarm went off in the middle of the night, and as we hurried from the apartment, my mother had the book clutched to her chest.

  When the tenants trudged back to their apartments after the false alarm, I watched my mother lift the cover to her face and briefly hold it against her cheek.

  I don’t think I ever want that for myself. To be so hung up on someone I can’t move on. To let the past keep me in its clutches. I also don’t want to be in the clutches of what’s gripping Sky right now. With her hand over her heart, she draws in a gulp of air. Her slow exhale rattles out of her.

  “Are you okay?” I flip on the light and go sit beside her on my bed. I don’t know why she chooses my bed whenever this happens, but she does it without fail.

  “Getting there,” she says, placing her free hand on mine.

  I stay with her, listening to her draw in a breath. I hold her hand, breathe with her, and do the only thing I know to do to help her.

  “I met someone.” Met? Such a passive word for what happened when he dragged me from the lake. He demolished my senses. Fractured my sanity. I was shattered by his stoicism, and the desire for excitement that run through him like an undercurrent.

  Her head snaps up. Surprised eyes search my face for the possibility of a joke.

  “For real?”

  “Um hmm.” I dig my big toe into the purple cloud-shaped rug that lies between our twin beds.

  “Well, come on. Tell me more.” She turns so she’s facing me, one leg up on the bed. Her face doesn’t look stricken anymore, the way it did when she let me in.

  “He was nice. Really nice.” Another lame word. Hypnotizing. Soul-infiltrating. Agonizingly beautiful. We’ve gone to school together for almost four years, so I already knew he was gorgeous. He became beautiful when he thought he was rescuing me. When I saw his need to understand my swim, subsequent dance, and his curiosity and desire to experience it too. When he shed the skin of unflappable soccer god, and looked at me like I held the key to his whole life, he stopped being merely gorgeous.

  His face when he thought I needed saving… Determined, persistent. In that moment, I was the most important thing in the world to him. A stranger mattered enough to dive into a lake fully dressed.

  It’s hard to explain why I got in the lake. Mostly just to do it. To experience the chilly water, my limbs dancing despite the temperature. I heard that cold water is invigorating, so I thought, why not?

  Turns out, the person who made that claim about cold water is right. I was full of energy after being in the lake. Full enough that I asked Noah Sutton to dance with me. Even knowing he has a girlfriend. It didn’t mean anything. Yet in that moment, the way he was looking at me as if he didn’t believe a person could move their body without hearing music, it seemed like I owed it to him to show him how unimportant real music could be. After all, he did think he was saving me from drowning. The least I could do was remove some of his blinders.

  “I need more than nice,” Sky complains. “Flannel socks are nice. So is the check grandma sends on my birthday. Give me more.” She’s animated now, no longer frightened of the feeling in her chest.

  “He was at the lake. I went there to…”

  I don’t want to lie, but I also don’t want to anger Sky. She hates it when I follow through on my wild ideas. Just like Mom, she says, wit
h disapproval she doesn't attempt to conceal. Sky see’s Mom’s sense of adventure as irresponsible. She doesn't like it when Mom brings home cake for dinner, or saves boxes because maybe we could cover them with washi tape and make a magazine holder. Sky believes in roles, and to her, our mother is not fulfilling hers.

  “I went there to be alone for a while. Meditate. Be one with nature. That crunchy stuff.” I smile when I say it. Crunchy is her favorite word when it comes to describing me, even though I tell her she’s wrong. I wash my hair, and I don’t make my own shoes out of cardboard and rope.

  She barks a laugh, and tells me to stop stalling.

  I settle back, my palms on the bed behind me. “There was a guy there jogging. I recognized him, of course.” I say of course because who wouldn't know who Noah Sutton is?

  He’s a legend at Northmount. With thick hair the color of straw, and wide shoulders that seem to stretch into forever, he walks the halls of our high school as if they were made for him to step foot there. The girls whisper about him, the guys boast about his abilities on the soccer field. The only person people talk more about is Tripp Benson. He’s a carbon copy of Noah, except he has white-blond hair and no desire to do well in school. The girls fall all over him, too, and he rules the soccer field.

  None of this is information I’ve learned firsthand. It’s amazing what you can glean when you don’t talk to anybody.

  “It was Noah Sutton. He didn’t know who I was, of course.” This of course is because I go out of my way to stay hidden. Paired with the fact that we've never had a class together, this means I’ve pretty much been transparent to him.

  Sky groans, her hands on her eyes. She shakes her head. “Why him, Ember?”

  “What are you talking about?” The image of Noah standing on the shore, water droplets from the bottom of his soaked shorts making polka-dots in the sand, sticks to my mind. I want to protect it from my sister’s dubiousness, from whatever she thinks she has to be skeptical about.