I pulled out a pen from my backpack, ‘cause it was something to pull out, then doodled on my napkin. I didn’t look at Sawyer but still felt his gaze. I drew a heart, then stabbed an arrow through it and colored it in with my pen. I wasn’t paying attention though. I was trying to distract myself, put distance between me and everything. Jeremy hating me. It seemed he did. It really, truly seemed he did. He was so mad that he had to move out. I didn’t blame him though. I mean it was his house. And Sara, his sister, has three little kids, and lives in this tiny, little duplex. She wouldn’t even let him bring his dog. He loves that dog.
When we were done eating, Sawyer took me back to his house and we played pool for a while down in his basement. Basically, we just hung out and had a good time. It was strange, but I felt as though I’d known him for a long time.
“Look, I’m sorry to end this so soon,” he said as we lingered at his car. It was well past seven, but he didn’t seem to want to say goodbye.
“I seriously can’t come to the practice?” I peered into his eyes, searching for the problem. “I’ll sit in a different room. You won’t even know I’m there.”
“I’d know,” he said quietly. “Look, I lied about not having people over when we practice. We always have people—lots of people. They really do distract us though, and sometimes we start showing off for them instead of practicing.” He was silent for a moment, as if searching for the right words. When he spoke again, I could tell it was from his heart. “The thing is, I like you—a lot. I want you to get to know me, and like me too, before you meet my friends.”
I blinked, then sighed. Relief! He wasn’t embarrassed of me, wasn’t afraid Kenzie would pop up. Good. I hadn’t let myself realize I’d been so worried about that being the reason—until I learned it wasn’t.
“Sawyer, I do like you.”
“No. I want you to like me more,” he said. “I don’t want you to go to my practice with us just friends, or we’re going to stay that way.” He took my hand, then linked his fingers through mine. “I don’t want to just be friends with you. I have a lot of friends.”
“I don’t,” I said quietly, trying to make him understand. “I really need a friend, Sawyer.”
“Okay—well, I’m that for you. But I don’t want you to come to The Clutch practices—not until we’re more than that.” He squeezed my hand. “So hurry and fall for me, okay?”
“Right,” I said lamely. “I’ll get right on it.”
He played with a tendril of my hair, apologetic or something. Then his eyes lit on something in his car and he furrowed his brow. “What’s that?”
I followed his gaze.
Folded on the driver’s seat was a note. Sawyer unpinned me and reached through his open window. He grabbed the pink slip of paper and unfolded it, then read. His brow furrowed, then a grin crept on his lips, like whatever it was, was weird—but amused him.
“What?”
He sniffed the paper, his grin growing, then he handed me the note. It was sprayed with perfume. I rolled my eyes, then read the note aloud: “Hey Sawyer, I know a secret. Love, L.”
I looked up at him, cocking an eyebrow. “Who’s L?”
He shook his head, still grinning, but he looked baffled. “I have no idea.”
***
After Sawyer dropped me off, the memories of everything flooded back. I paced around my room, disturbed, thinking about multiple personalities. I’d tried to make an appointment with a psychiatrist I’d found on the internet who specialized in grieving disorders, but their phone lines were busy. So far, they hadn’t returned my call or email. Maybe they were super busy. Maybe a lot of people were running around, turning into wild party girls with multiple personalities because their dads had offed themselves in gruesome ways—or more like their dads had been actually murdered but the police were just too stupid to realize what they were saying just couldn’t be true.
I paced and paced, but suddenly, I remembered something.
I got out the notebook I put under my mattress the first night I got here. My laptop battery had given out on the plane, but Dad had just died and I was grieving and freaking. I’d needed to write and get all my feelings out or I would explode. So, I’d written in my school notebook, the whole time bawling.
I had planned to transfer everything I’d written that day over to my laptop since it was password protected and my notebook wasn’t. Mom was a nosey alien these days. I didn’t want her snooping in on my thoughts. But geesh, I had written a lot on the plane. Too much. It was all pretty much rambling anyway. Just a pile of confusion. The way Dad died—it was grisly, gruesome. Full on scary. And the freaked out police—the idiots—they surmised he did it to himself. But I knew Dad. He wouldn’t do that. No way. And definitely, definitely, DEFINITELY not like that.
I thumbed through the notebook and read my woe-is-me ranting. No, no, no. Nope. No need to keep any of it. Ready to trash the whole book, I accidentally caught sight of the last page. My stomach lurched. In big, bold print were the words: He was trying to save you, idiot.
I gasped, starting to shake uncontrollably as I stared at the words. Who wrote that? Who? Not me, but who else knew about the notebook? No one.
But who could have written that message?
My heart jolted as realization washed over me.
It was Kenzie.
CHAPTER 4
That notebook message had me sick and shaking and sweating for days. But two weeks had passed since Kenzie popped up. I was starting to think—really believe—my alternate personality would never show up again. I knew she just showed due to all the grief I was feeling over losing Dad. And it didn’t help I had no one to talk about it with. The pain and confusion had all been bottled up inside me, waiting to explode. It made me long for a “best friend” more than usual. Someone to confide things in.
But now … it was kind of weird. Now I had Sawyer. That was something I hadn’t expected. He would catch me lost in dark thoughts and whisper in my ear, “I’m here if you want to talk.”
It was comforting to hear that. But I couldn’t do it—couldn’t confide.
Jeremy was the only friend I’d ever had who I’d trusted like that—with everything—my heart, my secrets, my whole life. So when he betrayed me, that was it. It destroyed me. What we had was to the soul. That’s why it hurt so much now, being here, in this house again, where Jeremy had loved me, because now everything was awful. So messed up. He didn’t love me anymore, didn’t even want to see me. Knowing that made me shake and feel cold all the time, like I needed a jacket. Jeremy had been my jacket.
And Mom was so—I don’t even know—baffling. She tried ignoring the fact I even knew Jeremy, or even that there was a Jeremy. She tried to smile at me and act all, isn’t it great we’re together again. Act like Dad hadn’t died and I hadn’t been forced to come back here.
She smiled at me now, then smoothed down my wild morning hair. She placed a plate of toast slathered in peanut butter next to my orange juice at the kitchen table. “I remember how much you love peanut butter,” she said, moving on to get herself another cup of coffee.
I eyed the toast, the mounds of peanut butter Mom had heaped on to it. It made me clutch my stomach, overcome with a memory:
“Here—try this.”
Jeremy beckoning me with a wooden spoon, enticing me to sample his “special secret chocolate sauce.”
Later I learned his “secret ingredient” was peanut butter. That became his secret ingredient for everything, once he learned I loved peanut butter as much as he did. We heaped it into everything.
But now … I couldn’t even look at peanut butter. I pushed my plate away, the toast untouched.
“Don’t you like it?” Mom asked.
I shook my head. “Sorry,” I mumbled feeling bad, knowing she was trying to be nice, that she made it as a treat. “I hate peanut butter.”
Mom eyed me over her coffee mug, tilting her head as though I was an alien creature she couldn’t figure out.
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I rinsed my breakfast dishes and went upstairs, avoiding the den as yesterday it made me burst into tears. Seriously. The den phone made me bawl.
Okay, yeah, my emotions were wacked-out because of Dad dying, wacked-out big time, obviously, but that wasn’t totally it, not totally. Because even that phone held a memory. Of Jeremy. Even the phone.
See, we had this thing we used to do with the den phone every Friday. We made a special call on it.
I squeezed my eyes shut, trying not to think about it, refusing to think about it. The memory was too tender. Hurt too much.
That sucked, having so many memories of Jeremy. At the most unexpected moments they would slash through my soul, rip me to shreds. Not that the memories were bad. They weren’t. They were good. Too good. That’s why they hurt so much. Jeremy and I, we had been happy together. And I’d never exactly been happy since.
Not being able to pick up the phone or a jar of peanut butter without thinking of Jeremy was traumatizing.
Not fun.
At least things were better now—better than when I first got here. Slowly, I was starting to feel like I was going to be okay, not stuck in Jeremy-Mourning-Central. Or Crazy Town. Slowly, I was coming to terms with everything. It helped having Sawyer. He got my mind moving in other directions.
Since meeting him, we’d gotten together every day. Usually we didn’t do anything special, just hung at his house playing ping-pong or video games or shooting pool. It was nice though because his dad was in the Navy and out to sea on a three-month tour. So we had the place to ourselves.
But he still wouldn’t let me come to the practices.
I was still bugged about that even as I came back downstairs and waited for Parker to pick me up and take me to Sawyer’s. So far it worked out perfect having Parker come to get me. Mom stayed off my back pretty much, and she was even kind of nice. A little bit.
“You really like Parker, don’t you?” Mom asked now, as I sat looking out the living room window, waiting for him. “He seems very nice.”
I furrowed my brow. She had barely spoken two words to him, ever. She was just pleased I hung out with Parker because he looked like a dork. Anger sparked deep inside me.
“You don’t know the first thing about Parker,” I said, though I knew I should keep my mouth shut. “For all you know he’s a drug dealer with thick glasses.”
“Well, he has you home early, and he’s very polite,” she said. “Why don’t you have him over for dinner?”
Dumbfounded, I could do nothing more than stare at her. Suddenly she was so pleasant—like one of those moms on TV, one of those nice ones that say stuff like, “I’m proud of you,” and “I trust your judgment”—unfathomable phrases like that.
“Maybe.”
To my relief, Parker pulled into our driveway and I was able to bolt out to his car and away from the baffling being I called Mom before I did something crazy, like barf up the truth. Parker gave her a little wave as she peeked out at us through the living room window.
Seems nice, I scoffed. How can you tell something like that by the way a person waves?
Still, I thought I might invite Parker to dinner. He and I had become sort of friends. Not that I’d ever seen him outside of his car. I hadn’t, ever. But sometimes we would sit for a while and talk when he gave me a ride home from Sawyer’s. He had a strange, dry sense of humor. He made me laugh.
Also, he played the saxophone, and I played the flute. We were always talking about getting together and playing a duet. So, his coming to dinner seemed alright. I figured it would be nice to have a friend that could actually come in the house.
When I got to Sawyer’s he was on the phone. I heard him say, “I need to go—No, don’t come over.” Then he said it again, “Don’t come over.”
I knew he was talking to one of the guys from his band. I didn’t even bother to ask. Sawyer had issues with girlfriends coming to his band practices. Apparently, The Clutch all steal each other’s girlfriends. Or something. Whatever. I didn’t need the drama.
Still though, it seemed more than that, like Sawyer was keeping some sort of “secret” about the band. He would act weird whenever I brought them up—get all stiff and cautious. Weird, weird, weird. I tried to not let it bug me though. Tried. We all have secrets, right?
Like, well, I didn’t tell him about Dad—what happened to him. I couldn’t. It just sat in my stomach like a rock. So, I let Sawyer have his secret, knowing secrets are painful, but maybe … necessary? Sometimes? A little bit?
We played a little ping-pong down in his basement and I got the socks beat off me, then we went up to his room to play Wii. His house was like an arcade—one with free snacks. It was cool. And void of parents, which was a good thing, except Sawyer was alone so much.
“The Clutch is pretty much my family,” he’d once told me.
I was glad Sawyer had his band. When he was eleven, his mom had abandoned him. She just took off while his dad, who was a captain on a nuclear submarine, was out on patrol. She never came back. Sawyer didn’t talk about it much, but I knew it hurt him. How could it not?
“Oh, hey, don’t eat that,” Sawyer said, tossing the slice of pizza I’d grabbed into the garbage. “That was from last week. Are you hungry? I can make you spaghetti.”
“No, that’s okay. I’ll just stick with the chips.” I glanced around his room. “Your cleaning lady’s about due, isn’t she?”
“What, the place offends you?” he grinned, glancing around. “I guess it is kind of a mess, huh? Actually ol’ Betty was supposed to come by this morning, but something came up. Car trouble or her daughter had a baby. Something.”
I grinned. Obviously he wasn’t too interested in the personal life of the lady who scrubbed his toilets. But actually, the place was pretty clean considering he was a teenage boy. I think it said a lot that his dad trusted him enough to leave him alone and unsupervised while he was away.
“I don’t get into trouble,” Sawyer had told me when I first learned of his independent situation. “Seriously. For the most part I just hang out with the band. Sure we have parties, but controlled parties, you know? I don’t want my place getting trashed. Besides, we don’t get into that much trouble when we drink. We just do it until we pass out.”
He’d laughed at me when I looked horrified and promised not to drink around me. I personally didn’t drink and I didn’t want to hang out with a bunch of drunks. How depressing. Okay, I had a bias, big time. My grandfather was an alcoholic. He put my dad through hell. Drinking equaled problems. Period.
Sawyer ran his fingers through my hair. He’d put on the stereo earlier, now a slow song came on. “I love this song,” he murmured, drawing his face near mine.
“Yeah. I like it too. Kind of romantic, huh?”
He kissed me then, tender and lingering. I could have definitely gotten used to this, his soft lips, his warm kisses. But that’s not what I wanted.
I pulled away. “Friends, Sawyer.”
“Yeah. Friends,” he murmured in my mouth, still holding me tight, still kissing me.
One way or another we went through this every day. I liked him. I wouldn’t have really minded getting romantic with him. But I couldn’t risk losing our friendship for the thrill of a few passionate kisses. I needed him too much. And I could tell he went through girls really quick.
“Sawyer, come on. Stop it, okay?”
He pulled away from me, looking frustrated. “Are you always going to be like this? Are you always going to push me away?”
“I don’t know, no, maybe. Sawyer, I need a friend.”
He ran his hands through his hair, watching me take a step away from him. “Why do you act like if we get physical we can’t still be friends?”
“Because,” I stopped, frustrated, wishing I had the right words, that I could make him understand without getting all emotional—without explaining I’d been dumped and it ripped me apart and I could never, ever go through that again, ever.
I bit my lip, then sighed, kind of swerving around the complicated issues, but still spilling facts I knew were true. “Then it’s different. Everything changes.”
“Look, change is a good thing.” He edged closer, taking my hands in his. He nuzzled my neck. “I’m into change.”
“See, that’s what I’m afraid of.” I swallowed, staring down at his warm hands—hands I wouldn’t mind holding for a long, long time. They were strong and comforting. I wanted—needed—to have them around. Even right now, while I was an emotional disaster. Especially right now. But later too. “Guys change girlfriends all the time. I don’t want to get dumped, I can’t afford it.” I stared up into his eyes. “You’re the only friend I have.”
Sawyer shook his head, knitted his brow. “Man, Jodi, I promise you, give me what I want and I’ll be the best friend you ever had.”
I pulled away from him. “Give you what you want?” That was a scary statement. It had me sweating. “What do you want?”
“Look, just don’t push me away.”
“Sawyer, come on.” Ugh! I rubbed my forehead with the heels of my hands. “I just want to be friends. Right now I can’t handle anything more than that. I don’t want complications. Just a friend.”
Sawyer shook his head. “I told you from the beginning—I want more.”
I swallowed hard, trying to keep down the lump in my throat from growing more. I’d had all these plans—Sawyer and me being friends, hanging out, going to school together. I liked him. And I couldn’t go to Roosevelt alone. I just couldn’t. I needed someone with me. Someone to be my friend. And it couldn’t be Parker. Parker could be my friend, but when I faced Jeremy—when I saw him again—I needed someone to hold on to. I needed Sawyer.
But I could tell Sawyer was ready to dump me. Probably, in his next breath. Date him, don’t date him—it seemed I lost either way. And his arms were nice and warm. His kisses too.
The Stranger Inside Page 6
