Now we’re both quiet.
“Never heard crickets like that,” he finally says. “Must be a million of them, chirping up a storm.”
“They’re not crickets,” I tell him. “Those are coqui frogs. They’re invasive.”
“What?”
“The coquis don’t belong here. They’re eating all the native tree frogs. Pretty soon, we won’t have any left.”
Why am I talking about frogs? He must think I’m really weird.
Faron grins. “Maybe they can be friends.”
Too bad it doesn’t work like that. I’ve read enough to know. If you don’t fit in, the world’s going to swallow you up.
“What about gators? Ever seen one in this canal?” he asks.
“There aren’t any gators in Water Tower Park.”
“Okay. I dare you to walk to that tree over there.” He points at a straggly palm. “Bring back a leaf.”
What does he think I am? A dog that plays fetch?
I stand there, not moving.
“Thought you weren’t scared,” he says.
“Fine.”
This is so stupid. I start making my way down the canal, lifting the hem of my dress. When I reach the palm, I tear off a frond. Sure, there aren’t any gators. But as I head back through the dark, I can’t help looking over my shoulder once or twice.
“Here’s your prize,” I say, handing the leaf to Faron. He nods like I’ve done a real good job and tucks it behind his ear.
“Thanks, fehlerfrei,” he says.
Fehlerfrei. An Old Order word that means “perfect.”
I look away.
Maybe he thinks I’m “high-minded,” as Dad would say. Trust me. I’m anything but perfect.
Something tickles the back of my neck. It scares me so bad, I jump. Then I turn around and see Faron holding that stupid palm leaf. I’m so mad at him, I tug his sweatshirt off my shoulders and toss it in the dirt.
“Hey,” he says, scooping it up.
“Probably time you washed that thing,” I tell him.
He brushes it off. No big deal. As he tugs himself into the sleeves, he says, “Don’t get so fired up.”
I’ve really had it with him.
“We should probably go back now,” I say.
Faron’s hooded face looks down at mine. “You got someplace to be?”
When he smiles, a jolt burns through me. I bet he’s used to girls following him around. The quiet one. Well, if he thinks I’m going to laugh at his jokes all night, he better guess again.
I turn and start heading across the bridge. I shouldn’t have walked so far alone. I just wanted to get away from that party. The loud music. All those people. Now I’m shaking again, but it’s not like music can hurt you.
“Lucy,” he calls out.
I keep walking toward the lights behind the trees. I need to find Alice and talk her out of running away. If she’s looking for a place to hide, where could she go?
The world isn’t big enough.
chapter five
sunrise
All around me, the music pounds. In church, we never sing like that. We’re not even allowed to clap. That would be like showing off.
I push through the crowd, searching for Alice. She’s not with the Old Order girls dancing behind the oak trees. They’re all dressed plain. I can tell where they belong, just by looking at the length of their skirts. The color of their bonnets. Alice is the only one who belongs nowhere.
“Alice?” I shout over the music.
Nobody pays attention to me. They’re snowbirds. And they know I shouldn’t be at this party.
I keep moving toward the park entrance. There’s a bunch of people drinking in the woods. They could almost pass for English in their hoodies and jeans, but there’s something weird about those Rumspringa boys. I don’t want to talk to them, but I’ve got no choice.
As I walk closer, the boys start talking in Deitsch, big words that sound strange and familiar at the same time. I’m so nervous, I take a step backward.
“I’m looking for my friend,” I tell them.
The boys laugh, like this is real funny.
“Me and you can be friends,” says the guy in the baseball cap. He shoves a plastic cup in my face.
“No thanks.” I push it away.
“You got a problem?” he says, grabbing my arm.
I can’t believe he’s touching me. I try to pull myself free, but he doesn’t let go. I reach for the plastic cup and throw it at him. Beer soaks through his T-shirt and darkens his jeans.
I take off, running. But you can’t run very fast in a dress. Or very far. I don’t stop until I reach this big open field near the parking lot. It’s so empty. No one’s around. Then I notice a girl in skinny jeans and a tank top, face-down in the grass, as if she fell asleep.
Alice.
I run over to her, stumbling in my long skirt. “Alice, it’s me.”
She doesn’t move.
“Please wake up.”
I shake her. Hard.
Alice slowly raises her head. She gives me a long stare. “I’m so wasted.”
“What happened? Are you sick?”
“Tobias got me another beer. I probably drank it too fast,” she mutters. “Thanks for leaving me.”
“I didn’t leave you.”
“Yeah, you did. I saw you walking by the canal with Faron.”
A rush of heat floods my neck. “We were just talking.”
“That’s all?” She gets up, swaying a little like she’s going to fall.
“Are you okay?” I ask.
“I’m more than okay.”
“Well, you don’t look it.”
“Me and Tobias got in a fight,” she says, brushing herself off. “Whatever. He’s being really stupid.”
“Where is he?” I ask.
She doesn’t answer.
I glance at the cars streaming out of the parking lot. “We should probably head back.”
“You’re not coming with us?”
“Where?”
“Everybody’s going to Lido Key to watch the sunrise.”
“The beach?”
“Yeah. Don’t you want to go?”
Of course I want to go to the beach. Watch the colors paint the sand. Dig for coquina shells that wash up at dawn. But I’ve got work in the morning, and Dad’s going to be looking for me.
“I can’t go.”
Alice rolls her eyes. “Can’t you have fun for once in your life?”
“This isn’t fun anymore.”
“Then leave,” she says.
I wince, as if I’ve been slapped. “Fine.”
If she’s going to be mean, I’d rather leave this stupid party.
I start walking toward the parking lot. When I glance back, Alice is gone. I’m scared for her, but I’m still angry because of the way she’s acting tonight. It’s like she turned into somebody else.
How am I supposed to get home now? I can’t figure out what to do. It’s too far to walk to Pinecraft. The buses don’t start running for a couple more hours. Then I spot Tobias in the swarm of people leaving the park. He’s got some kind of camera in his hands. He’s so busy messing with it, he doesn’t notice me.
“Tobias,” I call out and he spins around.
“Oh, it’s you,” he says, like I don’t even have a name.
“Alice was looking for you.”
“Yeah?” he says. “Where is she?”
“You just took off without her?”
“Hey, I’m not in charge of her life.”
I want to scream at him.
He brushes past me and drifts into the crowd. I stare at the ground where his sneakers have stamped patterns in the dirt—three pointy leaves and a pair of stripes. Let him deal with Alice. I’m tired of following her around. She’s supposed to be my best friend, but all she talks about is Tobias. I can’t believe she’d ditch me for a boy.
All this time, I’ve stood in the background while Alice races ahead. No
w I want to take a step forward. Where? It doesn’t matter, as long as it’s away from here.
The parking lot is filled with cars all leaving at once. I’m blinded with noise and light. When I try to cross over, I stumble in my long dress and fall on my hands and knees. A truck slows in front of me, blocking my path.
The window rolls down and Faron leans out.
“Been looking all over for you,” he says, swinging the door open. “What are you doing out here?”
I stand up and brush myself off. “Walking home.”
“Looks more like you were falling. You want to get killed?”
What a stupid question. I don’t want to go for a ride with him. Still, it’s better than standing out here in the middle of traffic, waiting to get run over.
I pull myself inside the truck and scoot next to him. “Can you drive me back to Pinecraft? I need to go home.”
“You’re going to miss the sunrise,” he says.
I stare at the rabbit’s foot swinging from the rearview mirror. “I’ve seen it before.”
“Is that right?”
“Yeah, I’ve seen it a million times.”
He grins. “You ain’t never seen it with me.”
chapter six
low tide
Lido Key is quiet at dawn. The breeze smells like low tide and magnolia blossoms. All across the beach, the Old Order girls stand near the shore, laughing as the water swirls around their ankles. They came to watch the sunrise, but they’re looking in the wrong direction.
“When I was little, I’d get up early and dig for sand dollars,” I tell Faron. “You couldn’t walk across the beach without stepping on them. Now they’re all gone.”
“What happened?” he asks.
“Some people were drilling for oil and it leaked into the Gulf. Now the water’s messed up. See?” I point at a dead shark that’s flopped in the sand. A lemon shark. They look a little scary, but hardly ever bite.
“We should have a funeral,” I say.
“A funeral for a shark?” he says, looking at me.
“At least bring it back in the water.” I kind of feel sorry for that shark lying there in the sand all alone. I start walking over to it.
“Most girls would be scared, getting close to a shark.”
“It can’t hurt me.” Why would I be scared?
“True,” he says. “It ain’t right, leaving it out in the open.”
I crouch down and grab hold of the shark’s tail. It’s too heavy for me to pull by myself. Faron comes up next to me. Together we carry it into the tide. All the muscles in his arms are straining as he drags it toward the water. But Faron is strong. You have to be strong, if you’re Old Order.
I help him pull the shark back into the Gulf. Together we wade knee-deep in the surf until we’re almost swimming. Then we let go.
“Your shark’s back where it belongs,” says Faron as we walk to shore. “Now it can go to sleep.”
What does he mean, “go to sleep”? Is that how Faron imagines death? If my dad heard me talking like that, he’d say I’d been reading too much.
Sometimes at night I try to imagine it. I wake up, shaking from a dream I can’t remember. Maybe that’s the closest thing to death. I know it sounds strange, but I feel a little better, knowing the shark has a quiet place to rest.
“That shark must’ve been sick,” I tell him. “You don’t find them washed up on the beach like that. They can see real good.”
“Yeah?”
“Even better than us.”
I’m talking a lot, but Faron’s listening. “How do you know all this stuff?”
I shrug. “Books mostly. I like to read.”
“You like to read about the ocean, huh? Wouldn’t you rather feel it?”
My face heats up. “I just like reading. That’s all.”
“You don’t want to be out there?” he says, pointing at the tide.
I do.
“There’s a school for marine biology up in St. Pete. It’s only an hour away, but my dad thinks it’s a waste of time. He says it costs too much money, but he just wants me to stay in Pinecraft forever. He doesn’t know I’ve been applying for scholarships online.”
“That’s your dad,” says Faron. “What about you, Lucy? Is that what you really want?”
Nobody’s ever asked.
“I want to study the ocean.” It feels good, saying it out loud.
“You want to swim with the fish, huh?”
“And the sharks.”
Faron laughs. “Man, you’re something else. What’s so great about sharks anyway?”
“Sharks have been here a long time. They’re like living fossils.”
“Fossils?”
“You know. Like the dinosaurs.”
The teachers at my school didn’t believe in dinosaurs. They said the plesiosaur bones at the science museum are made of plastic.
“How can a shark see anything in that dark water?” he asks.
“Sharks can sense electricity. That’s why they’re really good hunters. Everything that’s alive has electricity inside it.”
“Including us?” he says.
“As long as your heart’s still beating.”
When Faron smiles, I can’t help smiling back.
“Maybe that’s why people believe in souls,” he says.
I’m stunned. All my life, I’ve been asking questions. How does a soul get inside your body? Does it switch on like a light bulb? Or is it simply part of the secret places inside us, like the ocean in a seashell?
“Do you think animals have souls?” I ask Faron.
“If we do,” he says.
I look away. “You shouldn’t say things like that.”
“Why not?” he asks.
“Because it’s wrong.”
“What’s wrong? Thinking it? Or saying it?”
I really don’t know.
We keep walking on the beach. The sky is lighter now. Soon the sun will be up. I’ve never been alone with a boy all night. But it’s easy, talking to Faron. I feel like I could ask him anything. When we stood together on the bridge, I thought he was making fun of me, joking about how it’s always Rumspringa in Florida. But I was the one judging him.
I’ve got another question for Faron. A big one.
“Why did you get shunned?”
He stares out at the Gulf. “My dad was pushing me to join the church. So I caved in. Then I left and never looked back.”
“You changed your mind about baptism.”
“After I joined the church, I thought I’d have all the answers. Instead, I got more questions. Here’s the deal. They want us all thinking the same, you know? Why is it so bad if I don’t follow the church’s rules? Why do they get to choose what’s right and wrong?”
We should think for ourselves. Is that what Faron’s saying?
“At first, I just went along with everything,” he says. “Sure, the Lord made the world in six days. Maybe I can’t wrap my head around it. Or maybe it’s just . . . you know. A way of explaining something so big, we’ll never understand it. But when I asked my dad if it’s true, he got real angry.” Faron shakes his head and sighs. “I was asking too many questions. Guess I should’ve kept my mouth shut. That would’ve made everybody happy.”
“If you weren’t sure about being Amish, why did you go through with it?”
“Felt like I had to.”
“But it’s supposed to be your choice.”
“That’s what they say. As long as you make the right one.”
Rumspringa doesn’t sound so good anymore. By the time you’re old enough to drive, you’re supposed to have your whole life figured out. If you’re Old Order, you’ve got two choices: join the church, or walk away forever.
“It’s not fair.”
“Of course it ain’t fair. But that’s the way it goes.”
“Why can’t you start over again? Everyone deserves a second chance.”
Faron doesn’t say anything.
&nb
sp; “Don’t you think?”
“Want to know what I think?” he says, leaning in close. “I think I want to kiss you.”
What did he say?
I’m so stunned, I don’t know what to do. I lower my head. Faron hooks a finger under my chin, tilting my face upward. When he brushes his lips against mine, I’m right there, feeling his closeness. I never imagined my first kiss would happen like this. Not on the beach, where headlights cut between the chainlink fence, dim, and grow brighter.
This can’t be happening. I mean, this isn’t supposed to happen. I could be in big trouble, kissing an Old Order boy who’s been shunned. What if somebody sees us?
Faron pulls back. I’m so embarrassed, I can’t even look at him. Then he tries to kiss me again, but I turn away.
“What’s the matter?” he whispers.
“Nothing. I’m fine.”
He grins. “Thought you weren’t scared of anything.”
I am scared.
It’s all so strange and new. As long as I can remember, I’ve been told to stay away from Rumspringa boys. Now I’m caught in the warmth of his arms and it feels so good, I don’t want him to let go.
I look down at his hand.
Then I notice the scars.
“How did it happen?” I ask gently.
“Got pulled into a saw at my dad’s lumberyard.” He stares at the faint lines slashing his knuckles. “Took a month just to learn how to tie my shoes again.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. I’m okay now. It’s in the past,” he says. “That’s where the past belongs.”
I know he’s not okay.
Not even close.
Faron isn’t like Tobias. He’s different from the Rumspringa boys. Older inside. And stronger too. He doesn’t run around, making a big noise. When we’re alone together, he leans in with his whole body, listening to me. Most boys don’t listen at all. They’re too busy talking.
I’m used to being alone. All I need are my books for company. Now Faron’s got me thinking. Maybe it’s okay to speak up and ask questions. When he kissed me, I didn’t want it to end. And when we were talking on the beach, I wished I could stop time.
He’s like a book I want to keep reading.
“Come on,” he says. “Let’s take a walk. The sun’s coming up.”
Snowbirds Page 4
