The Color of Grace

by Linda Kage

  Not sure why my opinion of a stupid glove would send him into a tailspin of remorse, I opened my mouth to come right out and demand to know his thoughts.

  But before I could, he whirled away from me and strode off, fleeing down the sidewalk, back toward the school. “I have to go,” he said over his shoulder.

  I watched the back of his head—bent down as he stared at the ground—and the stiff straight line of his spine as he hurried away in a rigid, almost angry, march.

  “Wait,” I called. Rattled I even possessed the nerve to call after him, I slapped my hand over my mouth for shouting at him. But honestly. I had to know what just happened.

  For a moment, I thought he was going to ignore me. But after another three steps, he slowed and swiveled around.

  Lifting my hands, I demanded, “What’s the deal?”

  Frowning, he shook his head as if my question was the most puzzling part of the last thirty seconds.

  “Why’re you taking off like that?” I clarified.

  Again, he shook his head, but this was more of an I-don’t-want-to-talk-about-it motion. Swinging away as if to stalk off again, he paused at the last second before rotating back.

  “You don’t have to go tonight,” he said, his voice serious, letting me know this was the whole reason he’d sought me out after school. “You don’t have to meet Todd and the rest of us after the game.”

  Mind whirling, I tried to make sense of what he was really saying. Did he know I had reservations? Did he know I’d only said yes to irritate him or that I planned to no-show after hearing he was the most sexually active boy in school?

  Or did he just not want to be around me?

  Gnawing on my lip, I stalled. “I already said I would.”

  “So back out,” he insisted, looking desperate as if he needed me not to go tonight more than he needed his next breath.

  “Why?” What did he know that I should?

  For a moment, he didn’t answer, didn’t look like he even wanted to answer. Then he sucked in a breath and speared me with a heavy look. “I don’t want you to go, okay? You don’t belong with this group.”

  Before I could respond, he spun away and jogged back toward the school.

  As I stared after him, his words soaked into my soul until I believed them as strongly as he obviously did.

  I didn’t belong.

  Blinking against the sudden rush of tears, I could only watch him retreat, his form turning blurry in my moist vision.

  Confused, devastated, and forlorn, I closed off my phone and turned in the opposite direction only to catch sight of the desolate glove in the snow. It looked too miserable and cold to be left by itself.

  After bending to snap up the poor, lonely thing and stuff it into my pocket, I carefully tread the rest of the way to Barry’s house, unable to stop thinking about the cruel words Ryder Yates had slung at me.

  Chapter 9

  I feel like I should be beige. Neutral and as dull as oatmeal. No flavor, no exciting color. Just one big nonentity. Ryder was right. I don’t belong, especially to anything as exciting as color. I’m just a deep bottomless pit of nothing.

  * * * *

  “So, how was your first day?”

  I paused inside Barry’s foyer as the question traveled across the living room. I lifted my face to find him and my mom camped out on the couch, their legs intertwined and sock-covered toes playing footsie on the coffee table.

  A week ago, I would’ve dropped my bag, dashed over there and crawled up next to Mom, burying my face in her shoulder, and sobbed out the entire, sordid day. A part of me ached with regret because I didn’t feel like I could do that today. Not only did I still feel bitter toward her, but she looked all comfortable and happy with her new husband. No room for third-wheel Grace.

  So I speared her a glare and hissed, “Like you care,” as I passed through the room and rushed to my lair.

  “Hey,” she called after me, her voice surprised and indignant. “Get back here, young lady. Grace!”

  Barry must’ve contained her. I heard his low voice murmuring something and then there was nothing else. I was free to escape. I had barely closed the door, pressed my back to it and clamped my eyes shut when my bag rang, or rather my phone inside my bag rang.

  Who in the world could be calling me?

  I dropped my bag off my shoulder and rummaged until I discovered it was Bridget.

  “Oh, thank God,” I moaned, answering immediately. I needed to hear my best friend’s voice right then. My sanity depended on it.

  “You will not believe the day I had,” I gushed instead of my usual greeting.

  “Tell us everything.”

  I paused, a small frown marring my eyebrows. “Us?”

  “Hi,” the voices of Schy and Adam chorused from Bridget’s line.

  Hearing all of them together deflated my relief. I know it was selfish, but the idea of them being with each other, without me, hurt. Reasonably, I understood it’d be silly for the nerd herd to disband and float off in lonely, separate directions once I had to leave. But irrationally, I felt betrayed. It was as if my absence hadn’t even left a smudge. They were still as tight as ever.

  “So did you see him?” at least two voices asked.

  Slumping toward my bed, I sat on the edge of the mattress, my enthusiasm to tell all deflating. “See who?” I closed my eyes even as I answered. The innocent, whatever-are-you-talking-about tone in my voice was a bit too obvious.

  “Number forty-two,” Bridget nearly shouted, just as Schy did shout, “Ryder Yates. Duh.”

  “Oh.” Him. As of five minutes ago, I did not want to talk about that guy. Or even think about him. “Mmm hmm, I saw him. I, uh, talked to his friend who was sitting directly in front of him during second hour. The friend introduced us.” For some reason, I couldn’t tell them about the encounter I’d had with him after school. Still stung too much.

  “Holy Hosanna. You have a class with him?”

  “Chemistry,” I answered then bit my lip as soon as the word crossed my lips.

  Schy had to be the one to catch the irony. “Grace and Ryder have chemistry together.” She snorted.

  I cleared my throat. “Yeah. His girlfriend doesn’t have the class with us, though.”

  “This is going to make Adam’s song for you two so much—wait. Did you just say girlfriend?”

  I gave a decisive nod, though no one could see me. “She’s a sophomore and is already, like, the most popular cheerleader to ever attend Southeast. Oh, and the two of them are known as the most sexually active couple in school.”

  After dropping that little information bomb, I held my breath, waiting for the fallout. Silence breezed through the connection.

  Finally, Adam of all people was the one to speak. “They’re what?”

  “Well, dang,” Bridget muttered. “Guess that’s a dead end.”

  “Grace,” Schy groaned, putting two syllables in my name. “That’s so not right. He was supposed to be all single and…and perfect, just waiting for you so you guys could run off into the sunset together and have a romantic happily ever after.”

  “Yeah, well… Sorry.”

  “This sucks,” Bridget exploded, her tone of voice telling me exactly what her facial expression looked like at that moment.

  A hot needle of loneliness pierced the center of my chest. I didn’t want to sit on my bed alone and simply listen to them. I wanted to be with them, relaxing on the floor with my knees bent and my face down as Schy drew designs on the back of my neck and Adam fiddled on his guitar and Bridge commandeered her computer, looking up odd facts.

  “Want us to come over?” Schy offered.

  “Yeah,” Bridget chipped in. “We can be there in twenty minutes if Adam drives fast.”

  “Grace,” my mother called, rapping on my door hard enough to open it with her knock. Then she butted her big head into the wedge of space. “Five minutes,” she said with a severe, dictating arch of her eyebrows. “Then it’s time to ge
t ready for supper. Your night to cook, remember?”

  I turned my back to her. And kept talking. “Yeah. So that’s all there is to say about that,” I told my friends.

  “Was that your mom?” Bridget said. I guess she’d heard my mother’s declaration.

  “Yes.” I rolled my eyes.

  “You two are still fighting, huh?”

  I sniffed. “You could say that.”

  “What is her problem lately?” Schy demanded to know. “I used to be so jealous of the relationship you two had. My mom and I have never been so close. But in the past few days…I don’t know. It’s just strange.”

  It flattered me to know she’d been jealous. But it also depressed me too. Mom and I had been close. What was changing? Well, besides everything.

  “What about the rest of your day?” Bridget broke in, unknowingly pulling me off my track toward depression. “At least tell us you made a friend.”

  I bit my lip and told them about Laina.

  “Yeah, she sounds okay,” they agreed.

  I nodded before rushing out the words, “Then Ryder’s friend Todd asked me to hang out with a bunch of them after their basketball game tonight.”

  I swear all three of my friends chorused, “Really?” in unison.

  Ugh, maybe I shouldn’t have told them about that. “But I’m not going,” I pledged.

  I’d had reservations to begin with, but after hearing about Ryder and Kiera’s status, I really didn’t feel like attending. Then Ryder had gone and solidified my decision with his whole you don’t belong spiel. I still didn’t want to think about that. Every time I even started, tears began to work their way to my eyes.

  “You should go,” Schy insisted.

  “Yeah,” Bridget seconded.

  “But they’re really not my kind of people,” I hedged and winced. And Ryder Yates would be there.

  “How do you know they’re not your kind of people if you refuse to hang out with them?” Bridget asked.

  I wasn’t sure how to explain it. I just knew. If any of those three had been around this group for the thirty seconds I had, they’d feel it too. Ryder Yates had been right. I wouldn’t fit in. They were too—what was the word—fast, maybe. Yeah, they were too fast for me.

  What if they wanted to drink alcohol? Or take drugs? I’d probably expire on the spot. My type of people did not do that kind of thing. This new group…well, I didn’t know, but I didn’t want to find out either.

  “You have to make friends, Grace. You just have to.” Bridget sounded desperate, as if her entire happiness relied on me fitting in at Southeast.

  My resistance failed. “Okay,” I muttered. “I’ll go.”

  “Grace!” the muffled voice of my mother bellowed through the house.

  Instead of answering, I kept my back to the door and tried to think up something to say to keep me on the phone with my friends longer. “What color am I?” I asked.

  There was a long pause before Adam said, “Um…Caucasian?”

  “A very pale Caucasian,” Schy added. “In fact, you could use a good tan.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Not the color of my skin. What color is my…my soul?”

  Another long drawn out space of silence followed. Then Bridget hesitantly asked, “Why do you ask?”

  “I have to write a paper for literature class.”

  “You’re thinking this hard over a school paper?” Adam blurted out, sounding disgusted.

  Schy groaned. “Good Lord, Gracie. I can’t believe this. You moved to Southeast only to turn into Bridget?”

  “Oh, honey,” Bridget cheered. “Welcome to the dark side. Isn’t philosophizing everything addictive?”

  I winced. Did I really sound like Bridget when she fell into thinker-mode? “Okay, maybe I worded that wrong. I meant my personality. What color of a person am I?”

  “Grace, if you don’t get off that phone right now, I’m taking it away from you for good.” My mother bulldozed her way into my room, her eyes flashing with anger.

  “You better go,” Bridget said.

  “Yeah,” Schy echoed. “She sounds mad.”

  “Bye,” Adam called just as their line disconnected.

  “Bye,” I mumbled back, and tossed my phone onto the mattress beside me. My stare frosted over as I met my mother’s gaze. “I’m off,” I announced in a snide voice.

  She folded her arms over her chest and glared back. “Good. So go start supper.”

  I huffed out a reluctant sigh and pushed to my feet, leaving my phone on the bed before brushing past her on my way out of the room.

  It wasn't as if I’d never made supper before. When it had only been the two of us, Mom and I switched off every other night. Her marrying Barry hadn’t stopped that except now he took his turn as well. He wasn’t much of a chef and usually ordered some kind of delivery, but it was nice that I only had to put up with kitchen duty once every three nights instead of every other night.

  I whipped up a quick batch of spaghetti. Wasn’t hard. Boil noodles, brown some ground beef, open a can of spaghetti sauce, and mix the three together. It came out better than anything Barry had ever cooked, though I felt bad thinking that. He really did try.

  Once I had the table set and added some garlic bread—which was simply sandwich bread slices cut diagonally with butter and garlic powder on top, cooked a few minutes in the toaster oven—I called Mom and Barry in to eat.

  They poured their own drinks—water for Barry, milk for Mom—and we sat together in silence. As the meal began, the occasional tinkle of silverware against a plate was the only sound filling the room. I glanced at the newlyweds, wondering if they’d be more comfortable with me absent. Yet another place I didn’t belong. I hadn’t thought about stuff like this when my mom had told me she was getting married. But now that it was here, and the three of us were actually living together, I couldn’t help but feel like the odd girl out. The extra wheel. The party crasher.

  They’d probably be more relaxed the rest of the night if I went to the game. That’s what made up my mind to actually go more than anything.

  After taking a quick drink of iced tea, I cleared my throat. “There’s a home game at Southeast tonight,” I hedged. “I’d like go if I could.”

  Mom jerked her head up as if surprised I wanted to talk. After picking her napkin off her lap to dab at her mouth, she said, “Oh? What kind of game?”

  I nearly rolled my eyes. What kind of game? Was she serious? I almost sneered something sarcastic like, “Baseball, because all high schools play baseball in the winter,” but I managed to refrain myself and politely said, “Basketball.”

  She wrinkled her nose. “Since when have you liked basketball?”

  Since never. But how was that the point? So here came the tricky part. “Actually, a group of people get together after the game and hang out. They invited me to join them tonight.”

  She smiled. “Really? See, you’re making friends already.”

  I smiled too, a forced, stiff smile. “Yeah. And I really need my curfew to be extended to midnight if you don’t mind.” I rushed my last request so it all sounded like one, big jumbled word.

  Mom’s smile died flat. “Absolutely not.”

  “Mom,” I cried. “They all get to stay out that late. I’ll look like a total dork if I have to go home at ten. Do you want me to be a dork? Do you want me to be friendless for the rest of my high school career?”

  She closed her eyes and rubbed at her forehead with a sigh. “Dear Lord. Why do high school girls have to act so dramatic?”

  If she wanted drama, I could easily deliver, but I held my patience and said, “If I can’t go to Hillsburg, fine. But if you’re going to force me to continue attending Southeast, then I’m going to have to somehow make friends or I’ll be a social pariah. You don’t want your only child to be a lonely outcast, do you?”

  Rolling her eyes as if she still considered me to be overly dramatic, which, okay, I might’ve been a little, she muttered, “What in Go
d’s name do you plan on doing until midnight?”

  “Honestly, Mom. What’re you so worried about? There’s nothing I couldn’t do after ten that I can’t do before it.”

  Across the table from me, Barry laughed. “The girl’s got you there, Kate.”

  Mom shot her new husband a glare. “Do you mind?”

  He lifted his hands and eyebrows in surrender. “I’m just saying. Maybe if you give her a little space, she won’t feel so constrained.”

  Eyes narrowing, Mom charged, “You think I’m constraining her?”

  Barry shrank back in his chair, his throat working as he gulped down a nervous swallow. “I just meant— Geez, darling. Grace is a good girl. I think she can be trusted to remain a good girl.”

  “Fine,” Mom muttered, shoving back her chair and jerking to her feet. Focusing her glare on me, she hissed, “Stay out as late as you want. Far be it from me to worry about my only child.” Then she stomped from the room.

  Humph. And she’d just called me dramatic.

  As soon as she cleared the exit, Barry turned to me and grimaced. “I stuck my foot in my mouth again, didn’t I?”

  My shoulders slumped. Great, I just caused trouble in paradise to add to my list of mistakes for the day. Giving my new stepdad a grateful wince, I answered, “Thanks for sticking up for me though.”

  “No problem. You really are a sweet girl, Grace. You deserve a little more freedom and trust. I’m not blind; I see how much Kate limits you.”

  For some reason, I wanted to defend Mom. She’d been a single parent for so long, so many responsibilities heaped onto her shoulders with no help from a husband for thirteen years. Could anyone blame her for setting stricter rules on me to avoid as many complications as possible?

  I didn’t think so, but I held my tongue.

  “Do you need to borrow my car?” Barry asked.

  The question perked me to attention, but he’d already stuck his neck out far enough for me for one night. So I smiled gratefully as I answered, “Thanks, but I can walk.” Through the freezing ice and snow. Ugh.

  Chapter 10