by Cheree Alsop
Madelyn laughed at the image. Aunt Lauren’s rooster had a crow that sounded more like a strangled sheep than cock-a-doodle-doo. Aunt Lauren called it “eccentric.” She was fond of all the animals on her farm, especially if they took such an effort to stand out.
“Sorry to disappoint you,” she said.
I gave a dramatic sigh. “I suppose I’ll get used to it. I should have guessed you would be the complete package—bookish but mysterious, not a mean bone in your body.” I looked down at her. “Beautiful without realizing it, and now you sing like you belong on a stage.” I gave her a searching look. “Why are you with me, Madelyn West?”
She gave me her special smile as I pulled into the parking lot of the town’s pizza house. I would have preferred to take her for anything but pizza, except that there were only two other dining options in Sparrow. The first was Chaser’s burger joint, which was always flooded with students and therefore not the best place for a conversation. The other was a Chinese restaurant Aunt Lauren told me I should visit if I wanted to experience dysentery. Since that wasn’t my idea of a good date, I chose pizza.
“Two mediums, please.”
“To stay or to go?” asked a teeny bopper with short brown hair and green glasses.
“To go,” I said without giving Madelyn a choice.
“I thought this was a real date,” she said.
I nodded. “It is. I just want to give you a better view to eat by.”
The girl at the cash register batted her eyelashes at me. I smiled and ordered one Hawaiian and the other pepperoni and olive.
“Don’t forget cheesy bread,” Madelyn said. At my surprised look, she also batted her eyelashes. “It’s my favorite.”
I grinned and motioned for the cashier to ring it up. I paid and we settled down on red bar stools to wait.
“Come here often?” Madelyn asked.
I laughed. “Actually, no. I’ve never been here before, but I was reassured this is the best date food one can get in Sparrow.”
She leaned back on her stool too far. I grabbed her arm before she could lose her balance. She gave me a searching look as she straightened back up.
“What?” I asked, suddenly self-conscious.
“I’ve never had anyone watch me close enough to catch me before I fell,” she replied with an unsure smile.
Her tone made my heart stutter, as if she was on the verge of kissing me but didn’t want to be too forward. I took a chance and lowered my head. She covered my lips with hers in a soft kiss that told of her gratitude better than any words.
When she sat back, it took me a minute to remember where we were. I pushed the hair back from my forehead. “You have a great way of saying thank you.”
She blushed and was about to reply when the cashier called out, “Kelson, order’s ready.”
I picked Madelyn up before she could move, then spun around and set her on the ground. The action surprised us both. I had never acted that way with a girl—or with anyone, for that matter. The light sensation that filled me when I was around her made me invincible. I felt like I was in one of the movies Zoey used to watch where the guy falls over his own feet and would cross lava to bring whatever his girl requested. Madelyn hadn’t asked for anything, but somehow she had possession of my heart.
Her hand slipped in mine, jarring me back to reality and pizza that needed to be carried. I breathed not quite evenly as she walked at my side to the car. The sound the door made didn’t even bother me. I stood beside it and watched Madelyn lower herself into the seat with all the grace of her white geese gliding across the mirror-faced pond.
“Are we going somewhere?” she asked with a cute little smile that looked as though it held in a laugh.
I realized I had been standing with the door open gawking at her for far longer than was appropriate. I shut the door with a stupid grin and hurried around to the other side. If this date was going to go well, I had to get it together.
“Normally, I would take a date to a lookout over the ocean or high in the mountains so we could eat beneath the trees, but both are severely lacking in Sparrow,” I explained as I pulled up to the city’s park, a little tree-lined flat of grass with a man-made stream on one side.
Madelyn’s tone was carefully expressionless. “Did you date many girls in California?”
I nodded, but I couldn’t keep in a laugh. “No. I never went on a single date. We usually just hung out in a big group.”
Her smile touched her eyes. “But you’re so good at this.”
I grinned. “Zoey made me watch lots of romantic comedies. They were her favorite.” I paused, wondering why that had come rushing out.
Madelyn smoothed my emotions by covering my hand with hers and giving me a kiss on the cheek. “I’m happy we’re on a date.”
I smiled at her. “Me too.”
I opened her door and led the way to a shady patch of grass near the stream. The rocks had been stacked so the water trickled pleasantly with much the same sound as Madelyn’s laughter.
The sound reminded me of the camping spot where Dad used to take Zoey and me. That was way before Mom and Dad’s financial struggles, back before he walked out of our lives without looking back. He always staked the tents by the stream, saying the sound was better than a mother’s lullaby. Mom disagreed with that, but her smile chased away any argument. I wanted to see her smile again, like she used to before I lost Zoey in the fire. I owed that much to her.
“What are you thinking about?”
Startled, I looked at Madelyn. “I’m sorry. I must be the worst date ever.”
She held up her pizza with a teasing smile. “You brought food. What more could a girl ask for?”
“More than someone staring off into space, I’m sure,” I said, feeling a little lost.
She touched my arm. “You looked sad, Kel. What was it?”
I glanced at the stream, then let out a breath. “Regrets, I guess. I feel like if I had known then what I do now, I could have prevented a lot of the bad stuff from happening.”
Her eyes lowered thoughtfully and she nodded. She looked at the water and slipped her hand into mine. “I’ve always wondered if I could have prevented Mom’s accident.”
I stared down at her, my heart constricting. “It wasn’t your fault, Maddy.”
She gave a little shrug, her eyes not meeting mine. “I begged Dad for that horse. It was all I wanted, and the Stevensons offered her to us because she was gentle and they knew how much I wanted to ride.” Her hand tightened convulsively and even as a small smile touched her mouth, tears filled her eyes. “He said no and I went to bed heartbroken. Mom came in and promised she would talk him into it.”
Her voice caught and she took a shuddering breath. “She smoothed my hair and kissed me on the cheek like she used to every night before bed, tucking the covers in snug even though I wasn’t a child anymore. ‘I’ll tell him I want it,’ she whispered, and we both smiled at each other because we knew Dad would never deny Mom anything she wanted. He loved her that much.”
I wrapped an arm around Maddy’s shoulder and she leaned against me, turning her head toward my chest, her pizza forgotten on the napkin that balanced on her knee. “Mom rode her everywhere. I think she loved the horse even more than I did. Nessi was spirited, but Mom loved that about her, and I didn’t mind because she always calmed down when Mom rode her.”
She lifted our entwined hands, studying our fingers as she spoke. “Then Mom took her out and didn’t come back. We waited until evening and then Dad called everyone he knew, which was half the town. They combed the fields where Mom liked to ride.” She sniffed and I could feel the dampness of my shirt where it absorbed her tears. “Mark Stevenson was the one who found her. They had jumped a ditch, but Nessi landed wrong on the other side and broke her leg. She rolled over Mom in the fall, crushing her. I heard the shot when they put Nessi down, and I knew something was terribly wrong.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” I whispered, smoothing her hair
. “You couldn’t have known.”
“If I didn’t want the horse . . .” Her voice choked off with guilt.
“If I hadn’t thrown that stupid party in the warehouse,” I answered, holding her tight.
Her arms wrapped around me and I closed my eyes, feeling a strange release as though everything suddenly made sense, everything I had been fighting about the night Zoey died. “Say it’s not your fault,” I told Madelyn.
She sat back and looked at me. “What?” she asked with tears in her eyes.
“Say it,” I repeated. “Say your mother’s accident was not your fault.”
She shook her head. I took her hands in mine. “I have carried the guilt of Zoey’s death on my shoulders because I planned the party and I invited our friends.” I blinked, refusing to let tears fall. “I didn’t know how out of hand everything would get, and I didn’t know Zoey and Jeff would die in the fire.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” Madelyn said.
I nodded, feeling as though I could breathe easier. “I know that. You helped me know that. I didn’t know there would be a fire. I didn’t know Zoey and Jeff would go upstairs and I wouldn’t be able to reach them in time.” I swallowed and concluded softly, “I didn’t know she would die.”
She nodded and I caught her chin in my hand, gently forcing her to look at me. “And you didn’t know your mother would jump that ditch and Nessi’s leg would break. You didn’t know, and so it wasn’t your fault.”
Tears spilled down her cheeks, but she didn’t look away. Her eyes held mine as if she needed to hear what I was saying. The disbelief in her gaze warred with the want to believe. I pressed on, “You were a little girl who wanted a horse. That’s all,” I said.
She watched me for a second longer and then she nodded. At first it was a slow nod as though she was thinking everything through. Then she nodded quickly, her tears falling in a soft patter. “It was an accident,” she said softly.
“Of course it was,” I replied, pulling her close. “A horrible, painful accident that you couldn’t have prevented. Your mother would never want you to carry that guilt with you because you don’t deserve it.”
She cried harder, the sobs of someone who carried such a heavy burden but feared no one else would understand. Deep down, she felt that they blamed her, but they didn’t. For the first time, she allowed herself to accept that she was that little girl who wanted a horse, not the one responsible for her mother’s quadriplegia. The sobs broke and turned into sounds of relief, of loss and gain, of finding one’s self again.
I held her and blinked past the tears that had broken free at her heartache. I wouldn’t cry for myself, but I couldn’t stop myself at her pain. “You’re amazing,” I said softly, running a hand along her hair. “You carry so much by yourself, and you are the most wonderful person I’ve ever met.” Her crying slowed and she listened as I continued, “You are so beautiful, inside and out. I can’t even begin to describe how grateful I am to have found you.” My voice dropped to a whisper. “You give me something to live for.”
She tipped her head up and pressed her lips against mine. Our tears mingled with a taste of self-forgiveness. Afterwards, I tipped my forehead against hers, staring into her eyes and wondering again at the fact that she trusted me and wanted to be with me.
“You are amazing, Madelyn West,” I said, lost in her gaze.
Her eyes searched mine. “How is it that you’re everything I need fifty times over? I don’t deserve you.”
“You’ve trapped me in your spell,” I answered with a grin, feeling such relief after our conversation that I couldn’t stop smiling.
She took my hand and smiled a sweet smile at me before she dipped my fingers in ranch dressing. Before I could process what had happened, she took off running. I ran after her, laughing so hard I could barely keep up. I finally caught her by a stand of little trees and wiped ranch on her nose. She gave me an Eskimo kiss, smearing the sauce on my nose as well. We were both laughing so hard by the time we reached the pizza boxes again that we could barely walk.
We fought over who got the last piece of cheesy bread, and when I gave in, Madelyn tore it in half, so we shared it. I threw away the boxes and escorted her back to the car. I felt proud to have such a beautiful woman at my side with her hand resting on my elbow.
“Thank you for the lovely date, Kelson Brady,” she said after I shut her door and hurried to the driver’s side.
I shook my head. “We’re not done yet. Not by a long shot.”
Her eyebrows rose. “What are we going to do next?”
I grinned, but didn’t explain. She waited patiently until I pulled into the parking lot of the town’s only true entertainment facility, a place called At Shairo’s that housed pool, laser tag, and miniature golf all under one metal roof that looked very much like Uncle Rick’s Quonset hut.
“Whaddya wanna do?” asked a boy with short black hair and freckles.
“Your pick, my lady,” I told Madelyn.
I thought she would go for miniature golf, but she surprised me. “Laser tag.”
At my look, she smiled, showing all her pretty white teeth. “I’ve always wanted to try it.”
I nodded. “Then a duel it is.” I gave the attendant a ten-dollar bill and we followed him into a little room that was more of a closet lined with tattered vests, banged-up guns, golf clubs with broken shafts, sun-faded colored balls in a row of buckets, and broken pool sticks.
Madelyn slipped on the vest he handed her, then laughed at the name on the gun. “The Lady Killer,” she read. “I think it’s calling you a girl!”
I pretended to be offended, but when I checked the name on my gun, I couldn’t hold in the laughter. “War of the Roses—really? Who names these guns?”
The black-haired kid shrugged, obviously not as enchanted by our situation as we were. He ran through a monotone list of rules as though there were no spaces between the words or sentences, then he gestured at the opposite side of the closet and disappeared back through the door where we had entered.
Madelyn gave me a confused look. “Are we supposed to go through there?”
I lifted my gun. “From what I could catch of his rundown, we’ll either find the ultimate laser lair or a nest of poisonous neon spiders. Either way, I’m ready.”
She laughed and pulled the door open. Both of us stared at the black room lit by florescent painted walls.
“This. Is. Awesome,” Madelyn breathed. She looked back at me. “Save yourself,” she said before ducking in.
I was laughing so hard, I got shot by three different people the second I set foot in the room.
I had never had so much fun playing laser tag. Madelyn turned into a whole different creature when she was wearing a vest and had a gun in her hands. She dove, rolled, dodged, and spun around corners to take down our opponents from the red team. Before long, everyone on that side was gunning for her.
I backed into a corner in an attempt to catch my breath and found myself shoulder-to-shoulder with Martin, the writer of the school’s Bulldog Bulletin. I didn’t have anything against him, but his uncanny ability of uncovering every photograph of the Black Rider to post on his bulletin left me wary. It didn’t help that his brother was also my personal repairman when it came to patching up my myriad scuffs and scrapes from my life as a vigilante.
“Hey, Kelson,” he said, pushing his glasses back up on his nose. His blond hair stuck out in all directions despite the amount of gel he used on it.
“Hi, Martin. How’s it going?”
He shrugged. “Your girlfriend’s making us all look bad. She’s killer with that gun!”
I grinned despite my reservations. “Who knew?”
He tipped his head. “We’d better get back out there. She can’t hold it on her own.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” I replied, but I followed him anyway.
Three members of the red team had been lying in wait. Martin and I dove to each side. I shot as I slid, feeling as
though I were in an action sequence straight out of the movies. The vests of two of the members buzzed, signaling that they had been hit and needed to back away in order to reset. The third dropped to his knees and attempted to shoot Martin. I scrambled to my right and shot from the hip; the boy’s vest buzzed.
“Geesh, it’s just a game,” he said. He shook his head as he retreated from our little corner.
Martin and I laughed. I leaned against the black carpet-covered wall, wishing Madelyn had seen it.
“You saved my butt,” Martin said, crawling over on his knees. He paused and his expression changed. “Where’d you get those?”
I looked down and realized that the last move had forced my shirt to slide up, revealing the bullet bruises across my lower ribs. We sat underneath a yellow light that made the bruises look angry and purple. I shoved the shirt back down and stood. “Cow kicked me.”
His eyebrows rose suspiciously. “More than once? What, you didn’t think to move?”
“She had me pinned between the milking bar and the barn door,” I said quickly. The story came to mind because the exact same thing had happened to Cassidy’s younger brother Cole a week before. After making sure he was all right, we had laughed all through breakfast. I only hoped it was realistic enough to fool Martin.
He studied me for a minute. “Okay, Kelson, but I’m watching you.” He disappeared around the corner, where an unmanly scream heralded the red trio’s victory.
I hit my head against the carpeted wall and let out a frustrated breath.
“YOU TOOK HER TO play laser tag?” Magnum asked.
I grinned at the surprise in his voice. “You should have seen her. She beat us by more than all of our scores added together. It was amazing!” We were sitting in the junkyard in the dark, throwing rocks at a tin can lit by one of Jagger’s porch lamps. I hoped the sheriff would call with something for us to do soon because any peace I had found organizing junk had been taken away with the realization that I had really only been doing it to help Jagger find his lost door.
“Maybe she should be a Black Rider,” Magnum mused.
