His eyes study my face, and a new light seems to burn in them. “You sure? You know I can’t cook, and half the time I’m in my own world… What about your friends in New Jersey? Prom and all that.”
I shrug. “I don’t care about proms. New Jersey isn’t right for me anymore—I think you get that. I want to help you finish restoring the ruins.” I give him my best smile. “Will you let me live with you?”
“I’ll have to talk to your mother,” he says, but then his face softens. “But if it’s up to me, it’s a yes.” He smiles, opens his arms, and pulls me into a hug.
It takes my parents a full day to work out a new plan for me. Even then, it’s full of disclaimers—the judge has to amend the custody arrangement, I have to do well in school, I have to spend Christmas and half the summer with my mother. I think I would agree to just about anything, though, to be able to stay.
I can’t wait to tell Jalen, and when he calls to invite me to have dinner with his family, I have to bite my tongue to keep from blurting it out.
He picks me up in that battered old pickup that idles like we’re sitting on an earthquake. It smells of men and tools and summer, and the wind whooshes in my face as we drive down the road, ending any hope I have of arriving at his parents’ house with neat, smooth hair. But it doesn’t matter. I’m sitting on top of a secret so exciting I feel like I’m going to explode, and yet it’s so big I don’t know how to tell him.
“How are you doing?” Jalen asks as we exit my father’s neighborhood and head for the highway. It’s still bright, but the sun is beginning to lose the worst of the heat and the air feels like satin. I shoot him a sideways look. Today he’s wearing a pair of khaki-colored shorts and a black Jimmy Eat World T-shirt.
“A little nervous,” I admit. “Can we stop somewhere? I want to buy some flowers for your mother.”
Jalen shoots me a sideways look. “You don’t need to bring her flowers. And you don’t need to worry. Everyone is going to love you.”
I pick at the nubs of the worn fabric seat. “Thanks, but right now I’m the girl who almost got their son killed. I’d kind of like to change their impression of me.”
“You’re the girl who stopped a monster,” Jalen says. “That’s how they think of you.”
I try to read his profile to see if he’s just saying that to try to make me feel better or if he really means it. Even he doesn’t, I’m glad he said it. “All the same, I’d like to bring your mom some flowers.”
He smiles. “Okay.”
We drive a few miles and then take an exit that turns us in the direction of the mountains. We follow a two-lane road that splits farmland on either side of us. Jalen drives a little farther, and the road narrows, becomes more rutted, and he slows down. Just as I’m about to ask where he’s going, he pulls the truck to the side of the road and turns off the engine.
For a long moment, we stare out the window at clusters of orange wildflowers growing along the fence line, stretching as far as my eye can see. They look a little like marigolds, but more delicate, which seems strange considering they have to be a lot more hardy to bloom in such dry soil.
“Beautiful,” Jalen says, and his eyes say that I am, too.
We turn and look at each other for a long moment. He is also beautiful, with his long dark hair framing his oval face, his skin smooth and dark, his lips so perfectly sculpted that all I think about is how much I want to kiss him.
We lean toward each other, but between the truck’s gears, my broken arm, and his broken collarbone, we have to turn and shift and strain. We both laugh at the failed attempts to reach each other, how careful we have to be to line our bodies up without hurting each other. But then, his face is close to mine and his warm mouth closes over my own. We’re kissing, and even though I can’t hold him the way I want to, can’t be as close as my body wants to be, it is amazing. I close my eyes. I belong to him and he belongs to me in a way that we can never belong to anyone else.
We pull apart for a few seconds and then start kissing again. I don’t think it’s ever going to be enough—I think I could kiss him forever. But then we pull back, catching our breath and grinning at each other. I love him, and I think he loves me.
“I’m staying,” I say, holding his gaze. “I’m not going back to New Jersey. I’m going to live with my dad.”
“Are you serious?” Jalen grabs me before I even have time to answer and hugs me so hard that I think he may have re-fractured his collarbone. “This is fantastic. Are you sure? When did you find out?”
“Today, right before you picked me up.” His grin tells me he’s happy, but I need to hear him say it anyway. “I don’t want you to feel pressure or anything about us. If it works out with us, that’s great. But if it doesn’t…” I give him a small shrug.
“It’s going to work out.” His eyes tell me he’s serious, and something inside me relaxes. We’re going to be together; we’re meant to be together. It feels scary, like I’m glimpsing something I shouldn’t, but it also feels exciting and right. I know if Emily were alive, she’d be cheering me on, telling me to go for it.
They’re all waiting for me when Jalen and I step through the front door to his house. I smell something delicious and glimpse an oak dining room table already set for dinner, and then a dark-haired woman with Jalen’s brown eyes and smile steps forward to greet me.
She accepts the flowers as if nothing I could give her could please her more and then takes my arm, leading me into a spacious family room decorated with brown leather couches, Western artwork, and shelves of family pictures.
“Everyone,” she says, “this is Paige.” She smiles at a boy seated on the couch with a gaming controller in his hands. “Turn that off, Harold,” she says, “and say hello to Paige.”
Harold is a younger-looking version of Jalen. They have the same strong cheekbones and deep-set dark eyes, but Harold is finer-boned and the expression in his eyes is more mischievous, where Jalen’s is almost always serious. “Do you want to play Ambush IV with me?”
“Jalen warned me not to,” I admit and he laughs.
“You already know John,” Jalen’s mother continues, gesturing to her husband, who welcomes me with a smile.
“And my brother-in-law, Billy Yazzi.”
It’s the first time I’ve seen him since the moment he appeared framed by the moonlight in the doorway to the ruins, and I feel my palms go damp at the memory. That night he was a warrior, but right now he looks like a kindly, middle-aged man dressed in Wrangler jeans and a red button-down shirt. He’s holding a plain brown bag in his lap, and as I greet him, he says, “I have something for you.”
I feel myself blush with pleasure and then cross the room. Pushing aside some white tissue paper, I pull out an intricately carved wooden doll—a girl, painted yellow, with corn, seeds, and other symbols running the length of her body. I recognize her immediately—the yellow corn maiden. It reminds me of Emily—not how she died, but as she lived, holding nothing back, running fearlessly, gracefully through the corn field.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This idea for this story came from a family vacation to Arizona. Among our many adventures, we visited the cliffside ruins of ancient Native Americans. The high-rise mansions were beautiful and haunting and the perfect place to set a story. It took me many drafts, and I’d like to thank my critique group–Joy Preble, Suzanne Bazemore, Bob Lamb and Dede Fox–for reading all of them. All their feedback, support, and friendship helped make the journey fun. I’d also like to thank Senior Editor Vikki Ciaffone for being the kind of editor every writer dreams about having. Thank you, Vikki, for your great editing job and for your emails that always made me smile and get excited all over again about the story. You are brilliant and kind! I’d also like to thank all the creative, talented, and totally amazing people at Spencer Hill Press who have worked on this book. Finally, I’d like to express my appreciation to Joyce Carol Oates for allowing me to use a passage from her absolutely riveting book, The Corn Maiden.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kim O’Brien grew up in Bronxville, New York, in a very old Victorian house. Nightly, her mother’s stories about the ghost who lived in their attic both terrified her and inspired in her a deep love of books and storytelling. She holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Emory University, and a Master’s in Fine Arts in Writing from Sarah Lawrence College. She worked for many years as a writer, editor, and speechwriter for IBM. Currently she is an adjunct professor at Lone Star College. She lives in The Woodlands, Texas, with her husband, two daughters, and four-legged friend Daisy. Kim loves to hear from readers and can be reached through her website: www.kimobrienbooks.com; Twitter: @kimobri; or her Facebook author’s page.
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