Magic Minutes

by Jennifer Millikin

  Every day since, Noah and I have arrived at school together. We knew there was no way Tana would keep her mouth shut, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to let Noah drive me instead of riding my bike every day. The whispers started the minute I climbed out of Black Beauty, and they haven’t stopped.

  That was the first day Kelsey began staring at me through slitted eyes in English, her version of shooting electrical bolts at me, but today she’s stepped up her game.

  I glance down at the sheet of torn paper she dropped on my desk when she passed me on her way to her own seat.

  SLUT!

  I roll my eyes and crumple it into a ball, then flick it off my desk.

  Common. Kelsey’s response is common. Everything about her is common. None of this surprises me.

  After school, Kelsey and her top three best friends of the day corner me at my locker.

  “What makes you think you can date Noah?” Kelsey stands at the locker beside mine, her hand on her hip. Her head bobbles with the attitude in her voice.

  “Do you actually want an answer to that?” I ask without looking at her. I put my books in the locker and slam it, turning to face her.

  “Yes, that’s why I asked it.” She’s snarling. It’s not a good look.

  “Because it’s a free country. Because we were both single. Because I wanted to.”

  “You’re not the right girl for him.”

  “Neither were you. That’s probably why you cheated on him.”

  Fear creeps into her eyes. She wants her indiscretion to stay a secret, and that’s fine by me. I have no desire to watch her skeletons run around.

  I move, leaning close enough that I can see where her mascara is clumped. “Kelsey, you don’t have to be upset by me and Noah,” I say in a quiet voice. “Maybe you think you’re supposed to be, and so you are, but you don’t have to be.”

  “What are you talking about?” Her tone is snippy, but she looks confused.

  “Exactly what I just said.” Reaching down, I grab my book bag by its strap and sling it across my body. Sidestepping Kelsey and her crew, I leave the locker bay behind.

  Noah is standing next to his car, waiting for me. When he sees me, he runs his hand across the hair on the top of his head, where it’s the thickest. Today it’s unruly, sticking up all over the place, but in a way that looks like he meant for it to happen.

  “I thought maybe you’d ditched me,” he says when I reach him. His arms encircle me, and he plants a long kiss on my lips. “I missed you,” he says when he comes up for air.

  “You’ve been texting me all day,” I remind him, but I understand what he means. We haven’t seen each other since this morning.

  We climb into his car, and he turns it on. “Where to?” We usually have until four-thirty, when soccer practice starts. We get something to eat, a smoothie or a frozen yogurt, and make-out in his car in the parking lot of my apartment, milking the clock until he has to race to make it to practice on time.

  I groan at his question. It reminds me where I’m supposed to be headed. “I have to work. Gruff left me a voicemail, asking me to come in early. Edna doesn’t feel well. Something about her hip being sore.” Edna is the retired nurse who had to come out of retirement. She lectures me endlessly about saving money, so I don’t end up like her.

  Noah looks disappointed, but he grabs my hand and brings it to his lips. He kisses all my knuckles. “We have this weekend to look forward to,” he murmurs against them.

  “About that—”

  “No way.”

  “Noah.” I’m trying to sound stern.

  “Ember.” He’s doing it too. He starts driving, and I’d bet the money I put in my mom’s envelopes last weekend that he’s hoping I’ll drop it. No can do. Once this experience passes by, it’s gone. There won’t be a second chance.

  “It’s senior prom. Not that I care about that, but you do.” I shift in my seat as I try to reason with him. “You’re nominated, remember?” The announcement was made in homeroom two days ago. People stared at me when his name was called, because the girls’ names were called first, and I was obviously missing from the list. They were probably waiting for me to burst into tears or run from the room. “Isn’t it a requirement that you be there?”

  He coughs. “I have malaria.”

  “You do not, and I don’t think malaria makes you cough.”

  “Typhoid fever.”

  “Noah, be serious.”

  “Scurvy.”

  I laugh at the last one. I can’t help it.

  “Ember, I’m serious. I’m not going to prom. It’s not important to me. They can crown the squirrels who live in my backyard for all I care.”

  “You’re crazy,” I say through my laughter.

  “Yes, I am. And this weekend, it’s just going to be us.”

  We’re almost to my work, and I wish we weren’t. I don’t want to be apart from him.

  “Are you going to tell me where we’re going?”

  “Are you going to tell me what ‘shmily’ means?”

  “No.”

  “Then, no.” He draws pinched fingers across his lips, zipping them.

  I throw up my hands. I want to know where we’re going. How am I supposed to know what to take?

  Noah answers the question I haven’t asked. “Just bring couple changes of clothes, a bathing suit, maybe a sweatshirt, and whatever girly stuff you need.” His eyebrows draw together, and he motions at my hair and face, as if I’m a life-form he knows nothing of.

  He parks as close to the entrance of my work as he can, undoes his seatbelt, and leans toward me, resting his forehead against mine. “See you at nine?”

  “Like always,” I say. I work four nights a week, and each night, Noah insists on picking me up. He doesn’t want me riding my bike at night, despite the fact that I did it for two years before meeting him.

  “Good luck at practice.” I retrieve my bag from the backseat and kiss him lightly.

  His smile is uneasy. “Thanks.” The word is filled with melancholy. Of all days, I wish I could be with him until the clock demands he leave me. Two more practices, three more soccer matches, and the season will be over.

  He looks sad and lost. Wistful. As if he’s preparing to say goodbye.

  I squeeze his hand. “Try not to anticipate the end. It’ll take away from the experience you’re having now.”

  “How did you get so wise?” he asks, his head cocked to the side.

  “I read that on a fortune cookie.”

  His eyebrows lift. “Really?”

  “No.”

  He chuckles. “Ember, I…” His mouth clamps shut, he pauses, then he opens it again. “This weekend will be fun.”

  Quickly I kiss him and open the door. I climb out and close it, and through the window Noah has rolled down, I say, “It should be great. I’m going to have a great time during my sleepover at my new best friend Kelsey’s house.”

  Smiling at Noah’s laughing face, I walk into the building to find sweet old Edna.

  I went to football games with Sky before she graduated from Northmount. She loved them, but not me. I didn’t understand why anybody would want to ram their heads into one another, or chase a ball, but I liked the energy of the crowd. All those people, rooting for a common cause. It was inspiring to be around.

  This is different. Noah’s soccer match makes those football games look like they were Pop Warner.

  Pandemonium surrounds me as screaming, bleacher-stomping fans hold posters to support their favorite players. I tried to be surreptitious about it, but I’ve since given up and started blatantly craning my neck to read all the signs.

  We flip for Tripp. The cheerleaders hold these signs. They’re down near the front, a few rows away from me, and ten feet over. Through observation, I learned soccer doesn’t have cheerleaders, and my confusion about why they’re in the stands has been cleared up.

  Looking behind me, I spot a group of girls holding a giant sign that reads Sutton can press
my button. My eyes go wide and I try not to show my unease. I keep looking around, and the feeling passes. Signs with his last name are everywhere. One is in the hands of two girls who look like they’re twelve, but are probably older. Others are held up by girls I recognize from classes. Even Elsie Sweetzer, class president, hoists a sign above her head.

  Memories of lying in Noah’s bed run through my mind. Sutton was certainly pressing some buttons, until his dad spoke through the door and I nearly had a heart attack. Before that happened, other things were taking place. Good things. Things I didn’t want to stop.

  Suddenly my chest feels hot, and the tops of my thighs start the now-familiar ache. To distract myself I run a palm over my face and pinch my lower lip. It works.

  “Hey, Ember.”

  I look up. The too-bright stadium lights blind me momentarily, and I blink until my eyes adjust and I see Noah’s dad standing above me.

  “Hi,” my voice squeaks.

  “Mind if I join you?” Derek points to the empty space beside me. “Noah’s mother and Brody are on their way, and I was going to sit alone until I saw you over here.”

  “Of course.” I scoot over. “Nobody likes to sit alone.”

  “Except you,” Derek points out with a playful chortle.

  My laugh sounds nervous. “Oh, well. Yes, I guess so.”

  “Excited for the game?” Derek reaches into the pocket of his jacket and pulls out a bag of candy. He offers some to me, and I accept. We’re chewing the sweet, fruity candy when he asks about my parents.

  I give him the short version. Not that there’s really a long one. I just skip the editorializing.

  “And your mom’s name is…?”

  “Maddie.”

  “Got it,” he says, looking off into the distance. He stares for so long that I wonder if maybe he’s forgotten I’m here.

  “Well, anyway,” he finally says, snapping back from wherever he just went, “you ready to cheer on Noah?”

  Glancing around at all the signage and clothing bearing Northmount’s name, I confess that I feel ill-prepared.

  “You’re in luck.” He winks at me. Reaching into a bag he brought in with him, he produces a large, rolled-up piece of paper. “You’ll have to help me hold it, because it keeps rolling in on itself. You up for the task?”

  I nod, helping him unroll it. #1 Go Sutton! #1

  When the team takes the field, the stands erupt in ear-splitting screams. How did I not know soccer was this big of a deal?

  Noah runs out, his eyes on the crowd. He sees his dad first, and then me. He smiles at the sign held above our heads, and I can only shrug, but I’m smiling. I love cheering on Noah.

  When I get home that night, my mom is already asleep. Sky is not. She’s lying on her bed, listening to music on her iPod. She sits up when I come in and pulls out her earbuds.

  “How was it?” she asks, swinging her legs beneath her and settling down on them.

  “Fun.” It’s hard to admit it, but I had a good time.

  Even afterward, when Noah’s parents asked me to get a bite to eat with them, it was enjoyable. Derek was friendly and never mentioned catching Noah and me together, and Brody was nice too. Affable and funny. He even suggested Noah and I double-date with him and his girlfriend, Alyssa. Mrs. Sutton was still stiff, but she tried. She asked me how my week was. The question felt odd, but I answered it. I told her about Edna, which in retrospect was probably as boring as getting a play-by-play about the hardening of concrete. I was flustered and couldn’t stop thinking about what had almost gone down under her roof, so I rambled.

  “Just fun?” Sky says. “That’s it?”

  “Pretty much.” I pull my shirt over my head and toss it into the corner where we throw our clothes. “How was your day?” I reach for an oversize T-shirt and pull it on. When I look back at Sky, she’s toying with a loose string on her nightshirt.

  “What?” I ask, plopping down on her bed and scooting until my back is against the wall.

  She meets my eyes, and her cheeks are scarlet. “There was a new person at work today. Ryder. Isn’t that such a cute name for a guy? Ryder. He was nice, too, and they asked me to train him.”

  “That sounds like it could be interesting,” I say, careful to keep my voice happy but not too happy. Too much, and she’ll become anxious that she came off wrong and embarrassed herself. Too little, and she’ll think she’s not good enough.

  “He has blondish-brown hair, and a crooked smile. There’s a scar next to his left ear. I didn’t ask how he got it.” Sky runs her fingers over her bent knees.

  “I’m glad you met someone you like. Maybe soon you can all go to a work happy hour and get to know him better.” Careful, careful.

  “Ember, please.” Sky’s voice has changed from excited to disdainful. “I live with my mother. In a room I share with my high-school-age sister.” Her worried eyes lift. “No offense.”

  “None taken.”

  “Ryder’s not going to be interested in me.” Her voice is tiny. I wish I could take it away from her, and make her feel big and strong.

  “Have you thought any more about those college scholarships I found for you?” I ask, thinking maybe this is my chance to help her.

  “Yes,” she whispers. She swings her legs out from under her and scoots until she’s beside me with her back against the wall. “I’m scared though. What if I have a”—she looks around anxiously, as if the walls have ears—“you know what?”

  “Period stain on the day you wear white?”

  Sky rolls her eyes. “No.”

  “Montezuma’s Revenge?”

  “Gross!”

  “Spontaneous and foul-smelling—”

  Sky screeches in protest. “Can we please stop playing this game?” But she’s laughing. That was my goal.

  I turn to her, sister to sister, my soul link. “Will you please consider it?”

  “I will if you will,” she challenges, huffing. “Where are all those acceptance letters of yours? Shouldn’t they be pouring in? You applied to enough places.”

  I know exactly where they are. In a place nobody will find them.

  “You know how colleges like to drag it out,” I say. “Like announcing the winners on those cooking contests on TV.”

  “Want to watch one? You know they’re always on late at night.”

  I should tell her no. I have to get my overnight bag ready for tomorrow. Noah is picking me up around the corner from the apartment complex at ten, and Wyatt’s mom found a different baby-sitter for the afternoon. Everything is set and ready to go.

  Based on the nerves in my stomach, I’m not likely to sleep tonight.

  “Sure,” I say, knowing I shouldn’t. I can’t help it though, I want to be with my sister.

  Leaving our room, we cuddle up on the couch until we notice Mom walk out for a glass of water. Her eyes settle on us and she smiles, joining us instead of going back to bed. Instantly, the guilt of the lie I haven’t told yet begins to sink in.

  Just not enough for me to change my mind.

  Whatever Noah has planned for us this weekend, I’m game.

  11

  Noah

  Last night, when I was certain everyone in my house was asleep, I snuck into my dad’s office. Quietly, I opened the center desk drawer and slipped the key I found there into my pocket. Then I crept out to my car and put my overnight bag in the trunk of Black Beauty.

  I’m ready for this.

  Time alone with Ember.

  No practice for me, no work for her, no parents expecting us. Twenty-four uninterrupted hours with Ember.

  “Hey, Mom.” I walk into the kitchen where she’s sitting at the breakfast nook, coffee cup in hand. The smile on my face is sure to tip her off to something, so I stick my head in the fridge and try to stop grinning. After grabbing an apple and stuffing it in my mouth like a pig at a luau, I back out of the fridge.

  “Do you have plans today?” She tears her eyes from the iPad lying on the table in
front of her. This is her Saturday morning ritual. Maybe one day I’ll drink coffee and read the news, too. It sounds very adult. For now, I’ll pass.

  I munch the rest of my bite and swallow. “Going to Tripp’s.”

  “What are you two doing today? Certainly not pampering for prom.” She sits back in her chair and pulls one bent leg into herself. “Guys have it so easy. Just a haircut and formal clothes.”

  “Yeah, so easy,” I echo. I completely forgot prom is today. To make this charade look believable, I’m going to have to bring my suit with me when I leave.

  “I’m assuming you’re taking Ember tonight?”

  “Ember’s not going. She’s not interested.”

  My mom frowns, then tries to fix her face. “That’s…atypical.”

  I nearly laugh. Atypical. I have a strong feeling she was about to say weird.

  “Laurel said Kelsey told her you were dating someone. She was asking me about the new girl in your life.”

  Leaning back against the sink, I sigh with annoyance. “So?”

  “Why are you on the defense when it comes to Ember?”

  “Why are you on the offense when it comes to Ember?”

  “I’m not,” she says, her voice hard. “It’s just…” She shakes her head. “Never mind.”

  I turn around and leave the kitchen. My anger at my mom leaves me like a slow leak while I get my stuff ready to look like I’m going to Tripp’s. By the time I’m walking out the door, I’ve forgotten about our hostility.

  “Tripp,” I say into the phone as I pull out of the long driveway and onto a bigger street.

  “Why are you calling so early?” His voice sounds like gravel.

  “What time did you get home last night?”

  “This morning,” he corrects, “and I don’t know. There was sun when I went to sleep. Just be happy you didn’t go out. Be happy you have sweet little Ember to keep your ass in line.”

  Oh, I am. Happier than Tripp could ever know.

  “Listen, I’m not going to prom tonight, and I need—”

  “What? Why not? This is senior prom, man, and you’re nominated.”