by Linda Kage
Depressed and cold, I shiver, remembering my friends I left and my mother who seems to have left me. I feel so blue. Blue, like the deepest part of the sea with all those billions of water droplets pressing down on top of me or the highest stage in the sky where oxygen runs thin and I can no longer breathe. Honestly, who can survive in so much blue?
* * * *
The game had already started when I entered Southeast’s sports complex and paid my fee at the door before getting the back of my hand stamped. They were almost finished with their first quarter and beating the opposing team twenty-four to sixteen.
Popcorn and body odor permeated the air along with shouting from coaches and players, while the cheerleaders led fans in stomping their feet and clapping out a chant. I stood awkwardly in the doorway for a solid minute, watching the game, looking for Ryder.
He was currently benched, but I spotted his friend Todd on the floor just as he made a basket, nudging their score up to twenty-seven. When a family needed to enter behind me, forcing me to step fully into the arena, I had no idea where to go, so I dragged my feet toward my new pep club section, where Barney was whooping as he cheered for Todd’s basket.
It felt strange to approach the purple and white students. I was an outsider invading their home turf. I half-expected them to throw me out as soon as I breached their section.
I wished I had someone I knew with me, someone familiar by my side, holding my hand. But I marched alone. Clutching my dad’s lumber jacket tighter across my chest—though it was actually warm in the gymnasium—I neared my new classmates.
Southeast scored two more points by the time I reached the bleachers. The cheerleaders screamed and shook their pom-poms. I spotted Kiera twirling to grin at one of her co-cheer friends before saying something.
Okay, I finally admitted to myself as a lump of doom obstructed my windpipe; I couldn’t do this. Primed to whirl around and book it out of there, I heard someone call my name, making me pause.
“Grace! Hey, Grace. Up here.”
I blinked, lifted my face, and was shocked to see a girl waving. At me.
“Come sit by me,” she called and patted the free, two-foot section of bench beside her.
I remembered her face. One of the girls in Todd and Ryder’s group that Todd had introduced to me, she had a basketball player boyfriend. He’d been wearing a nice outfit at school, which told me he was a player. I guess they all dressed up on game days. Yeah, I could remember that, but for the life of me, I could not remember this girl’s name.
“I’m Mindy. Cory’s girlfriend. Remember?”
Cory? Had there been a Cory in the introductions? I had no idea. But Mindy was talking to me, so she became my new best friend.
I sat beside her. “Looks like we’re doing great,” I noted.
“We’re doing totally awesome. You just missed seeing Cory making a three-pointer right before Todd did.” She grinned at me, pride glittering in her eyes. “He can sink ’em like they’re layups.”
I nodded, mentally reminding myself to research and discover what a layup was.
“So Todd says you’re hanging out with us tonight after the game.”
Glancing up, I stared hopefully at my new best friend. “Are you going too?” I asked. If she said yes, I figured maybe I could get through the rest of the night after all. She grinned and nodded.
Whew. My relief bloomed.
Until she added, “But it’s not all that exciting. We usually just head over to Ryder’s house and hang out.”
“Ryder?” I echoed, my voice small as my chances of making it through the evening plummeted.
“Yeah, he’s number, umm…” Mindy trailed off, squinting as she scanned the floor for him. I almost muttered forty-two for her, but managed to hold my tongue another three seconds until she pointed and said, “He’s number forty-two. He’s dating Kiera, that cheerleader over there.”
Yes, that part I remembered.
But I acted clueless as Mindy rolled her eyes my way and explained, “He’s one of those rich kids whose parents couldn’t have more than one child, so they spoil him rotten. I swear his bedroom is bigger than my whole house. There are two different levels with a couch and entertainment center and fancy surround-sound speaker system with, like, fifty million game systems, private bath, and his closet… Oh, my God, Grace. His closet is bigger than my bedroom.”
As she spoke, I sought Ryder with my gaze. He looked intent on watching the game. It kind of hurt to stare at him. He looked just as he had that first night in Hillsburg, decked out in his purple and white number forty-two jersey. But so much had changed since then.
For a moment, I wished I could go back in time so I could relive that moment and feel the charged thrill of a stranger—a very handsome stranger—acting interested in me. Who knew learning so much about him would ruin my magical memory?
Mindy prattled on beside me, trying to bring me up to speed on everyone, but she really only confused me more, throwing forth so many different names I tuned her out as I watched the game.
Ryder didn’t play much, only a handful of minutes here and there. But he didn’t seem to mind. When he was in the game, he participated one hundred and ten percent. His friend, Todd, on the other hand, was an excellent player, without even trying. Mindy mentioned something about how Todd wanted to get a basketball scholarship to some college, but I really didn’t listen to that either.
I copped a few peeks at Ryder’s cheerleader, wondering what he saw in her—well, besides her pretty face, her peppy attitude, her awesome ability to do a back flip, and—okay, okay, so I know what he saw in her. It was just depressing to admit the truth, so I amused myself by finding faults.
She played with her blond hair too much, always checking to make sure the ponytail was tight and smooth.
She plucked her eyebrows too thin.
She paid no attention to the game, only cheered when the other girls around her did.
Once the final buzzer went off, I jumped and ripped my gaze away from her. For the first time since I’d entered high school, I was able to clap for my team over a victory. It felt super strange sitting on the winning side for once. I sympathized with our opponents, knowing too well how crushing defeat could be.
But Mindy quickly sucked me into her enthusiasm as she led me outside to wait with her and a couple other girls for their boyfriends. Kiera showed up a few minutes later, surrounded by two of her cheerleader friends.
“Hi, again.” The one to her right waved at me. Her face, like Mindy’s, was familiar, but I had no idea what her name was, so I smiled and waved a friendly hi back.
When an outside door, opening straight from the guys’ locker room, emitted a somewhat familiar face, Mindy brightened and popped to her feet. She rushed to her boyfriend and threw her arms around him, kissing him and telling him what a good job he’d done.
I hung back, wishing she’d return to my side and emotionally hold my hand some more. But the door opened again, and this time Ryder exited, once more dressed in the nice clothes he’d worn to school.
He was so utterly beautiful.
I could tell he’d just gotten out of the showers because his hair was wet, the damp moisture making his locks darker so they finally matched the hue of his eyebrows. When he glanced over and saw me, he slowed to a stop, making his halt look really obvious because it caused his duffle bag hanging over his shoulder to bump against his hip and shuffle him a step off balance.
Our gazes held, but he wasn’t granted a long stare because Kiera appeared in front of him, hugging and kissing him and ripping his attention away from me.
Embarrassing as it is to admit, I was so busy watching them kiss I didn’t notice Todd until he stepped in my line of vision, beaming.
“Hey, you did make it.”
I managed a tight smile, not sure why I felt so uncomfortable around him. Since the moment I’d met him, Todd had been nothing but nice, polite, and welcoming.
“Good game,” I said.
<
br /> “Thanks.” His grin grew. “So you’re going to hang with us tonight, huh?”
I forced myself not to glance toward Ryder as I nodded. He didn’t want me around, and since everyone was going to his house, he had every right to refuse my presence. But would he? I kind of didn’t think so.
“My stepdad talked my mom into letting me stay out until midnight.”
“All right,” Todd whooped. “Do you want to ride with me or do you have your own set of wheels?”
My eyes flew open wide. Ride with him? No, no, no, everything inside me rebelled. I did not want to ride anywhere with anyone. But…
“How far away is it?” I hedged.
He shrugged. “Only a couple of blocks from here.”
I bit my lip, thinking I should just say I’d walk. But I didn’t know where I was going, I didn’t want to offend Todd, and it was really freaking cold outside.
“Okay,” I relented, bundling myself deeper into my red and black coat, silently telling him I had agreed only because of the weather. But honestly, this was going to be majorly weird, riding in a foreign car with some foreign boy I’d just met hours ago. My mother would totally not approve. Heck, I didn’t approve. But I felt sucked into something I couldn’t escape. The whole day felt like one big suction, dragging me deeper and deeper into actions that were growing irritatingly out of my control.
So I rode with Todd in his beat up Jeep Cherokee to Ryder Yates’s house. Thankfully, the drive ended up being not as bad as I thought it would. Three others rode with us. Two cheerleaders and a boyfriend of one of the cheerleaders, though I couldn’t name any of them. Todd had me sit up front with him in the passenger seat while the other three packed into the back, complaining about their cramped ride the entire way.
“God, Todd,” one of the girls grumbled, tugging up an empty Gatorade bottle on which she’d been sitting. “Don’t you ever clean your car?”
He grinned into the rearview mirror. “Clean it for me and I’ll give you five bucks.”
She snorted. “I’ll pass. It’d take twenty just to run this heap of mud through a car wash.”
The boy passenger found a sheet of paper he’d wrinkled under his shoe. After squinting at it in the sparse lighting, he pulled back and lifted his eyebrows. “Dude, weren’t we supposed to hand this in, like, last week?”
“Hey, that’s where that paper went. I told the teacher I’d finished it.” Todd snatched the sheet and tucked it into the cubby between his seat and mine.
I bit my lip, worried about his grade for him. “Can you still turn it in?”
He shrugged, a bit too nonchalant for my taste. “I’m sure I can sweet-talk my way into getting the teacher to accept it.”
His confidence surprised me. He must be used to cajoling teachers. I was usually too intimidated and guilty to even try when I wanted more time. That’s probably why I never turned in anything late.
Todd slowed the Jeep and pulled into a driveway. As the headlights swept over Ryder’s home, I sat forward, scoping the place out. It was a large, split-level home. Todd parked behind a new model, extended cab truck and a rusted old car. I had to guess the truck was probably Ryder’s and the car belonged to one of their other friends.
Behind me, the still nameless cheerleaders and boyfriend piled out into the cold, dark night. Todd killed the engine and grinned over at me. He always seemed to be smiling at me. It made me wonder if he was truly that happy of an individual or if he was forcing his enthusiasm for some strange, nameless reason.
“Ready?” he asked.
Not really, but I followed him and the other three along the drive and right past the front door. I glanced back toward the entrance, and shrugged, figuring we’d probably go around to the back. But instead, the four in front of me paused on the shadowy east side at a brightly lit window that led into the bottom level of the house.
“Knock, knock,” Todd called as he ducked his head into the open space and started to climb inside. I watched, mystified, as the other three followed him, entering the house through a window.
Were we sneaking in? Did his parents not know he had so many friends over? I stood outside in the cold by myself for about two seconds before Todd popped his head out.
“Need some help in?” He held out his hand.
“Um, no thanks. I got it.” Shrugging, I crouched and shimmed my way into Ryder Yates’s bedroom.
The nerd herd was so not going to believe this.
I refused to stick my backside in first and climb inside with my spine to the window. So I sat on the ground outside, tucked my feet in first, then ducked my head and dropped about three feet to the floor. Once my shoes hit carpet, someone called, “Shut the window. You’re letting all the cold in.”
Todd appeared beside me and did the honors. I leaned toward him and quietly asked, “Why did we just come in through a window?” hoping my question didn’t have some kind of foolishly obvious answer that I should’ve already figured out.
He just shrugged. “’Cause it’s fun.”
I shrugged too. Well, okay, then. And finally, I looked about me.
Ryder’s room consisted of two levels. The main portion took up the bottom level. It contained his huge, king-sized bed, a giant entertainment center that held a forty-inch flat screen and the works in electronic gadgets. Then a full-size couch hogged one wall. After all that, he still had plenty of room to fit in dresser drawers and three doors, one that was open and led into his own private bathroom. The other two, I guessed, would lead into the rest of the house and the room-sized closet Mindy had spoken of earlier. A ladder ascended to the upper second level, where a huge oak desk sat with a personal computer and printer and a filing cabinet. Three people hovered around the computer, laughing at something on the screen.
Another three people sat on the couch, discussing the game. Todd paused at the entertainment system and started shuffling through DVD-looking cases, while Ryder lay stretched out on his bed, his back to the headboard and legs sticking out across the mattress with his girlfriend planted on his lap, facing him as she tried to extract out his tonsils. With her tongue.
I was pretty much ready to go home.
Loitering by the window, I hunched inside my Dad’s oversized coat, debating how easy it would be to push up the window and escape without anyone noticing and stirring up a bunch of questions I didn’t want to answer.
I wasn’t so sure if I really wanted to hang with this crowd. Okay, honestly, I was absolutely certain I did not want to hang with them. They seemed superficial. I liked Mindy, and Todd was nice to me, but...
“Grace!” Mindy called, noticing me for the first time. She smiled and waved. “Come sit by me.” She patted the last available cushion on the couch next to her.
As I reluctantly left the window and moved toward her, I noticed Ryder from the corner of my eye grasping Kiera’s arms to physically break their kiss and set her away from him. He ran the back of his hand over his mouth as if he wanted to rub off the feel of her lips. Or maybe that’s how I wanted it to look. A petty and spiteful wish on my part, but I didn’t really care.
Behind me, the window opened again. I glanced back to see two more guys joining the party.
One boy waved a six-pack of beer over his head. “Anyone thirsty?”
My stomach dropped into my knees. This was exactly what I’d feared most. If someone pulled out drugs next, I was going to be so out of there…and look like a total moron in the process.
I was out of my league.
But Ryder snapped, “Put that away!” He surged off the bed in order to corral the beer-waver back toward the window. “Don’t ever bring that crap into my house again. Do you know how dead I’d be if my parents saw alcohol in my bedroom?”
“Yo, man, sorry. I didn’t know.”
“Just…take it back to your car,” Ryder ordered, ushering his friend outside.
After the beer disappeared, I could breathe easier, but no way could I sit down now. My feet felt too antsy, wanti
ng to flee. I lingered next to the couch beside Mindy, not that she noticed my presence as her boyfriend put his arm around her and pulled her close for one of those long, why-in-the-world-are-you-doing-that-in-public kisses.
I began to hum “Amazing Grace” in my head, trying to mind my own business and not look like a dork in the process. Lifting my face, I glanced at the pictures on the wall. Poster-sized but framed with nice oak wood, they weren’t prints of what I’d guess a teenage boy would put on his wall. No wet, tanned models in skimpy bathing suits. No sports heroes. No movie actresses. Ryder put tasteful pictures on his wall. The Eiffel Tower at night lit up with lights. The San Francisco Bridge at sunrise, vivid red framework against vivid blue sky and sea. A looming skyscraper taken from a diagonal angle, rising from a nest of fog. The Hoover Dam. A Ferris wheel.
“So what do you think?” that spine-tingling voice said next to me.
I held my breath a moment before glancing over and looking up into Ryder’s beautiful green eyes.
He grinned before nodding his chin toward the Ferris wheel poster. “You can’t tell me that picture makes you feel sad and lonely.”
Chapter 11
Pink is love and purity. A pink carnation for a new baby or a pink rose for the beau you just discovered. Every time Ryder draws near, I turn pink. Why? Why can’t I forget that fresh blush of interest I felt when I first looked up and drowned in his perfect, pink smile?
* * * *
A little spot in my chest ached because Ryder had to go and remind me of our glove conversation. He thought I’d been analyzing the pictures on the wall and reading the meaning behind them. I liked that, yet it irritated me that I still found myself liking anything about him.
Instead of answering and being forced to admit I hadn’t been dissecting the picture—I’d been dissecting him—I cleared my throat and studied the Ferris wheel.
“You like photography?” I guessed. A strange warmth worked through me as I asked. Could it be possible I had the same passion as Ryder Yates?
But he shook his head and corrected, “Architecture.”
