PANDORA

by Rebecca Hamilton

  “Thank you, thank you!” Tonya did a little happy dance out of Lily’s room, and we went down the hall to mine. Tonya sprawled across my bed, while I sat down at my desk. I fiddled with my iPod, then plugged it into my desktop computer to charge. The computer was a relic, but unlike Lily and Chloe I wasn’t going to save up for months just to buy a laptop that I wouldn’t know how to use anyways. I was only marginally better at typing on a keyboard than texting with my cell.

  “So, when is everyone coming over?” Tonya asked, grabbing a magazine from my nightstand.

  “Pretty soon, I guess. We all agreed on five-thirty. God, it’s gonna be a tight fit with all of us in the truck. When is Trevor getting here?”

  “Oh, he’s going to meet us there. That way we can have our own space.” She tried for a sly, sexy look, but failed miserably when we both started laughing.

  “You better not have sex in there, ’cause if Karin finds out, you know she’ll rat you out.”

  “God no! I don’t even really like it.”

  “What? Then why are you doing it with him?” I tried to imagine not liking sex with Nathan, but it was hard when I couldn’t even say that I liked it, which kinda sucked.

  “He’s a good kisser and I like, you know...” She gestured around her chest with her hands. “But I don’t know... I thought after the first time it would get better, or at least last a bit longer.”

  “Oh my God, Tonya, you’re dating a minute man!” I burst out laughing and tried to avoid the playful whacks Tonya was aiming at me.

  “Shut up. You and Nathan aren’t even doing it yet.” Failing to reach me with her swinging arms, she threw a pillow at me. I caught the pillow and tossed it back at her. My distraction plan had succeeded, now I just had to hold her off until the others arrived.

  “Who said we weren’t?”

  “Chloe. She also told Bianca you’re gonna be waiting a while.” This time she laughed louder. It sucked having a friend who was also friends with your sister. Not that Bianca and Chloe hung out a lot, but apparently it was enough that Chloe was spilling about my love life to her, and Bianca in turn was sharing with Tonya.

  “Whatever.” Not my smoothest come back, but anything lamer was interrupted by the doorbell. Hoping it was Nathan, I leapt out of the chair and ran up the steps, with Tonya following at a much slower pace.

  My luck with answering the door hadn’t changed. Instead of Nathan, I found Dylan. I opened the door for him to come in and tried to put on my polite face. Not the easiest task since Dylan ranked pretty low in my books, just above Vivian and Trevor, but he had gotten us the tickets half price and he’d agreed to let me turn his date with Lily into a group event, so I figured I needed to at least be polite. For a while.

  “Hey, Lily’s downstairs,” I said and he nodded. I went to the top of the stairs and yelled down to let her know it was Dylan. She made some kind of response that I took for ‘be right up’ and I went back into the living room to find Dylan making himself at home, sitting in my dad’s recliner, his feet propped up on the coffee table and flipping around the channels on the TV.

  “So...thanks for the tickets.” Awkward, but what else could I say? Dylan and I had had little to talk about when he was a nice guy, now that he’d turned into an ass there was even less.

  “Yeah, well Lily told me your dad wouldn’t let either of you go unless it was a group thing, so it’s not like I had a choice.” He shot me a dirty look before focusing back on the television screen.

  Interesting. Lily lying to Dylan. My lips tipped into a small smile. My angelic little sister was being a bad girl telling fibs to her boyfriend.

  “Where is everyone?” Tonya pulled out her cell phone to check the time. “Trevor’s going to get there before us and start worrying. Especially after the whole turning off the cell thing you did earlier.”

  A groan of disgust escaped before I could control it and I avoided the sharp look she sent my way. I’d been doing such a good job of distracting her, and now Dylan had broken my flow and she was right back at it.

  “That creep isn’t coming, is he?” Dylan said, sitting forward and glaring at me then Tonya. Dylan got a little less jerk-ish. If he didn’t like Trevor, then how could I be wrong?

  “He’s not a creep,” Tonya spit out. “He’s my boyfriend and yes he’s coming. He’s going to meet us there so he doesn’t have to look at your ugly face.”

  “Really?” Lily asked softly from the entry to the living room. “Can we please not fight tonight? I seriously don’t have the energy to pick up the pieces.”

  “They’re not gonna fight, Lils. And if they do they can deal with it on their own.” I sank onto the couch.

  Then Dylan completely floored me. He tossed the remote onto the coffee table and stood up to look at Lily.

  “You look real pretty, Lils,” he said and gave her such a sweet smile I could almost see the Dylan she must love. “I’ll be good. Promise.”

  She smiled back at him, but it faded as he stepped closer to her and by the time he took hold of her hand, it was gone, replaced by a sad look that only lasted a moment before she was yawning.

  “Sorry,” she said, covering her mouth. “I haven’t been sleeping very well.”

  Liar. She’d been sleeping almost twelve hours a day, sometimes more, for the past couple of months.

  She pulled away from him and went to the couch, sitting between Tonya and the armrest, leaving no room for Dylan to sit beside her.

  The bell rang again and I went to open it. Bianca leaned on the button even after I opened the door, while Owen seemed to be trying to put as much space between him and Karin.

  “Girl, took you long enough,” Bianca said, finally removing her finger from the bell and letting the constant chime echo itself to silence. “Please tell me you’re all ready.”

  “Yes, I guess we’re just waiting on Nathan.”

  “He’ll be here any minute. I caught a glimpse of him getting in his dad’s truck as we passed his place.”

  Nathan was our designated driver, since he was the only one who could get a truck. It would be a squish fitting in for the ride to the theater, but once there, he’d be able to reverse into the spot and we’d all pile into the back of the truck.

  “Hey guys, Nathan’s almost here,” I called into the living room, then got my shoes from the closet and sat on the small stool beside the door to slip them on. Dylan, Lily, and Tonya joined us at the door just as two vehicles pulled up. The first was Dad’s silver minivan, which he parked in the driveway. Nathan’s was the second and he pulled his dad’s truck up behind my Sunfire in front of the house.

  “Hey, Mr. Matlin,” Bianca said as Dad made his way up the porch.

  He smiled and greeted everyone as they parted to let him through. Once inside he dropped his briefcase on the floor beside me.

  “What time are you expecting to be home?” he asked, looking at Lily.

  I rolled my eyes at his back. God forbid I give him an honest answer.

  “The last show should be done by two, so probably around two-thirty. I’ll call if it’s going to be later,” Lily answered.

  “I know you will,” he said and this time he caught my rolling eyes when he turned to me suddenly and said, “No more fighting.”

  “Sure, whatever.”

  I wasn’t sure what I’d done to earn his distrust, but so far he’d refused to allow me on a solo date with Nathan after curfew, even after giving Lily permission, and now he was expecting me to lie about how late we’d be out. Deep inside I knew it wasn’t me he didn’t trust but Nathan. Dylan had been around for years and had proven himself over and over, even if I thought that trust was sorely misplaced. And well, there was the fact that Lily was an angel.

  “I’m serious, Phoebe.” He glanced over at my friends who all seemed to be finding something interesting on their shoes or in the sky. “I’m trusting you.”

  I nearly rolled my eyes again, but knew if I did, I probably wouldn’t make it out of the house f
or at least a month, so I gave a tight smile instead and followed Lily and the others out to Nathan’s truck.

  “You look nice,” Nathan said as he got out from behind the wheel and came around to me. He grasped my hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. I figured he didn’t try for a kiss because Dad still watched us.

  Everyone piled into the truck, making it was a tight squeeze. Good thing Trevor was meeting us there, because even with Dylan and Lily going in his car, and the extra large cab, we were sandwiched in. Owen had managed to maneuver his way into sitting between Tonya and Bianca, while Karin sat up front with Nathan and me.

  Bianca kept us entertained during the twenty-minute drive with comments about the mall and Dylan’s out-of-date Bieber hair. I even managed to relax a bit, because Tonya seemed to have let the whole cell phone thing go.

  When we pulled up to the theater, Trevor’s new truck was idling just outside the ticket plaza and he followed us through the gate. Nathan handed over our tickets and then reversed into a spot beside Dylan’s car. We poured out of the vehicle and I took a deep breath, stretching my arms, glad that I had opted to bring my, well, Lily’s black cardigan.

  Nathan and Owen hopped into the truck back to spread out a blanket and arrange the few pillows Lily pulled from Dylan’s trunk. I turned to talk to Tonya, but she was already standing over by Trevor. She grasped his hand and dragged him over to me. Both were smiling. There was no way either of them could be truly mad at me. I felt a bit smug, knowing my quest to have a Trevor-free shopping day and then my distraction technique had worked so well.

  The drive-in theater was one of the few old relics left in town. It had been built over forty years ago and still featured the plug in radio set that hung on the window. Nathan propped it up on the side of the truck and cranked the volume up, filling the space around us with the sound of Elvis. Every time I went to the theater, the same songs played, and probably had since they’d opened.

  Nathan reached out a hand to me, and I grasped it, letting him pull me up and onto the truck bed. It was already six and, despite the lack of complete darkness, the first movie would be starting soon. We snuggled down on a pillow together in the middle of the truck bed, our backs pressed against the cab, and covered our legs with a blanket. It wasn’t cold out, but I wasn’t going to pass up a chance to cuddle with him.

  Owen and Bianca spread out on their stomachs in front of us, propping their chins up on their hands. Tonya and Trevor sat inside his truck, hopefully behaving, because Karin kept glancing their way from her position beside me. Lily and Dylan were still inside his car. I glanced around Nathan and could see Lily pressed against her door, with Dylan hidden on his side by the angle I looked from.

  Seeing that distance between them reminded me of the assumption Dylan had made that our dad had been objecting to both Lily and I going on single dates to the Triple Feature, not just me. Something was definitely going on with Lily, but I had no clue how to ask her about it. She was so quiet, and even though she was my favorite sister, I always found it easier to talk to Chloe. Maybe because she never shut up and I got some major satisfaction by interrupting her.

  “You okay?” Nathan asked, tightening his arm around me.

  “Yeah,” I said and smiled up at him. “Perfect.”

  He titled his head down and lightly pressed his lips to mine. I leaned into him and increased the pressure.

  “Hey,” Bianca said, causing us to break apart and look at her. She’d twisted around to glare at us. “No macking on each other in front of the unattached.”

  “Unattached?” Nathan asked.

  “Yeah, us without a life mate. Us singles,” she clarified when he continued to draw a blank.

  I laughed at her terminology and risked a peek at Karin. She was sitting with her eyes glaring daggers at the back of Owen’s head. I looked away quickly, before she could catch me staring. She didn’t want to be one of the unattached, but since getting in the car Owen had been doing his best to flirt with Bianca, something that was almost painful to watch. He definitely lacked finesse. Bianca had called before they arrived and told me she was going to take pity on him and play along with his attempt to shake Karin loose.

  Karin wasn’t exactly one of my close friends. She was really more of a tag along, but I still felt bad knowing that Owen didn’t like her.

  “I’m gonna go grab a drink. Wanna come with?” I asked Karin. She looked a little startled by my suggestion.

  “Uh, sure.”

  “Can you grab me a Coke, too?” Nathan pulled out a ten and held it out to me.

  I shook my head and said, “I’ll buy the drinks and you can buy the food after the first movie.”

  Karin and I slipped down from the edge of the truck and headed for the concession stand. We didn’t talk at first, maybe because we rarely spoke without Bianca or Owen around. Finally, I couldn’t stand the silence.

  “So, you have plans for Spring Break?” I asked once we were in line.

  She didn’t say anything for a moment and when she did, it wasn’t to answer my question.

  “Owen doesn’t like me does he? As more than a friend, I mean.”

  Wow. Okay, how does a person respond to that? I wasn’t the dream crusher Tonya was. I couldn’t just tell her flat out, but then again Owen would probably stop talking to me if he found out that I had encouraged her.

  “Um...I don’t know. Owen and I don’t really talk about things like that.” I avoided eye contact and focused on looking around the long line in front of us.

  “It’s okay. I figured out I’m not really his type.”

  “His type?” Owen had a type? I tried to picture him with any kind of girl and couldn’t. He always struck me as more of a loner type. He hadn’t been dating anyone recently, although I’d heard him mention an ex-girlfriend.

  “Yeah, he always seems to date really feminine girls. Super sweet and into fashion and all that.”

  I was speechless. Not only did Owen date, but he apparently had a type and it was nothing like I would have guessed. Some kind of hippie, tree-hugging girl, yeah. Fashion plate, absolutely not.

  “How do you know this?” I asked when my shock wore off.

  “Well, he dated Nadine over the summer, and that was after he hooked up with that foreign exchange student from England last year.”

  “Owen dated Jeanette? And Nadine? How did I not know this? How did Chloe not tell me?”

  “It was probably due to the complete absorption you had with your devastation over Nathan and Vivian dating.”

  “I just can’t believe it.” A mental picture formed and I cringed at the image of Owen and Nadine kissing. That was just plain wrong. Owen was...Owen. Weird Owen who we could tease and was oblivious to half the jokes we made about him.

  The line moved and we went with it automatically. Chloe was handing sodas and tubs of popcorn to the people in front of us. She smiled and acted natural, but I could see her attempting to avoid physical contact with the people. Lily was much better at hiding her reactions when she was using her abilities. Chloe, on the other hand, froze and stared off into space. The school nurse in elementary school had told dad that he should get Chloe checked out for some type of seizure. She’d brought it up again and again, until one day, Chloe looked at her and told her that her husband was going to start sleeping with a coworker. Two months later, she was separated and never brought up the possible seizures again.

  The couple ahead of us left and we approached Chloe. She was decked out in a white shirt with a pair of red lips painted in the center, the official logo of the school’s prom fundraiser. Just one more reason I was glad I wasn’t possessed by the same drive to achieve as Chloe. Spending a weekend working to raise money for a dance I wasn’t even planning on going to sounded even worse than staying at home.

  She pulled a Coke and Sprite from off the soda fountain and passed them to me along with my exact change all before I could even say a word.

  “Why didn’t you ever mention Owen and Nadine
dating?” I asked while I pretended to survey the candy selection.

  “Nadine and who?”

  “Owen. Tall, skinny, long curly hair.” I would’ve been surprised by her not knowing the name of one of my best friends if I didn’t already know how self-focused she was. If they weren’t her friends, they didn’t exist.

  “Oh, they dated?”

  “How could you not know? Nadine is like your best friend.”

  She shrugged and flipped her hair back over her shoulder. “Nadine and I didn’t talk for like three months last summer. We had that fight about Andy. Besides she’s got a new boyfriend practically every other week.”

  Karin ordered some popcorn, but when Chloe passed her the loaded bucket, she froze and stared right through me, dead-eyed. A moment later, she blinked and any enjoyment she’d been feeling before I’d come up was gone.

  “You okay?” I asked her. Karin gave us a curious look, completely unaware Chloe had had a vision.

  “Yeah, I...I’ll talk to you when we get home tonight.” She looked way to serious and I itched to drill her with questions, but I could feel the people behind me getting antsy, slowly surging forward like a wave of zombies, so Karin and I left, wandering back to the truck.

  The first movie was right out of the 80’s. Cheesy music, big hair, and ripped jeans. It was kind of weird to think that those could have been my parents, or at least my dad. My photos of Mom were right on. Her junior high graduation pictures demonstrated her vast skill with a pick and hairspray as her bangs stuck straight up a good four inches, only to curl forward at the top and fall in a feather around her face. But imagining Dad with a mullet or even a pair of ripped jeans with a patterned sweater was just plain wrong.

  Nathan and I cuddled close, trying to ignore the fact that we weren’t alone, which was not the easiest thing to do with Karin sulking in the corner of the truck bed and Owen and Bianca playfully flirting to fend her off.

  Owen and Nathan went off during the break between the first and second movie and the girls and I started to gossip about some of the people we could see from our vantage point. Couples making out or fighting, Bianca even spotted a guy from our Spanish class the previous semester picking his nose. We were discussing the various other bad habits the guy had when Lily popped up at the side of the truck. She stood up on her tiptoes and rested her arms along the side to peer over at us. Being so short must really suck.