“Whatever,” she mutters. “You’ll be sor—”
I laugh as she stumbles on the last word. “Go ahead,” I challenge. “Finish it.”
“Sorry.”
“Sorry you said it?”
She shrugs. “Sorry I forgot already. Being on the same side might take some getting used to.” She looks at me with a truly puzzled look on her face. “What am I supposed to do with all of the extra time I’d usually spend”—she looks around like she’s searching the night air for the word she needs—“plotting?”
I was going to say torturing. “I don’t know, I guess we just plot together? And we do normal summer stuff? Like we used to?” My eyes have fully adjusted to the dark and I can see the pained expression on her face. “I’m not saying we have to do it together,” I add, just to make sure we’re on the same page. “I mean, the plotting, yes. But the other stuff…”
She doesn’t let me finish. “Plan.”
DAY 11
Sidney
I’m not a mean person. I’m really not. And while I don’t love parties and huge groups of strangers, I’m not straight-up antisocial, either. So it probably shouldn’t be this hard to force myself out of bed. Why does the thought of sitting at our kitchen table with him make me feel like my bed is the only place I could ever be truly happy? Any normal person would think that not being in a feud with someone would make life so much easier.
Except that when someone has been your nemesis for long enough, it’s not easy to switch off that little voice in your head. The one that says you have to be alert. Watch for traps, be prepared for retaliation. Set your own traps before he catches you in one of his. Do. Not. Trust. Because what if this truce is the longest prank ever? Asher seemed genuine when he suggested the truce—and I do want to make Nadine’s life miserable—but that voice is still screaming in my head, telling me that now is not the time to let down my guard and trust him.
I glance at the clock; it’s 6:02. I’ve already listened to the soundtrack of Asher’s morning. The open and close of his door, the bathroom faucet turning on. Does he brush his teeth before he gets in the shower? Weirdo. He took a short shower—barely long enough to have washed everything—and then there was the click of the door again. Listening to it all felt a little bit like being in the bathroom with him; my room even faintly smells like his body wash now. As if this whole situation could get any more disturbing.
I’m running out of time—if I procrastinate much longer he’s going to give me crap about forcing him to get up early when I’m not even going to show up on time. Or maybe he won’t. Does our truce require us to be civil at all times? More than that, are we going to be friendly now? Or are we simply stopping the pranks? I really wish we’d outlined more specifics on how this whole thing works. It’s not that I can’t be nice to Asher—I’m not a monster, I think I could be nice to anyone. I just want expectations.
When I finally walk into the kitchen at 6:32, Asher is sitting at one of the red stools at the breakfast bar, shoveling oatmeal into his mouth from a little glass jar. The kind my grandma makes strawberry jam in. He meets my eyes and nods toward the mug sitting in front of the chair next to him. I press my lips together. I mean for it to be a smile, but it’s like my face doesn’t know how to do that when looking at Asher. I’m pretty sure it looks more like a grimace, or like I’m constipated or something. It’s not great, is what I’m saying. Trying again would be even weirder, so I don’t.
Shake it off, Sidney. Just treat him like a normal person. A normal person who filled your yogurt cups with sour cream last summer, and froze your bathing suit once, but is now making you coffee.
I go to the refrigerator to dig for fruit and yogurt—that is hopefully not sour cream—and notice the top shelf is lined with pretty little jars like the one Asher is eating. They’re stuffed with oatmeal. Some of them have strawberries, and others have swirls of gold and brown—honey and maple syrup, probably—and nuts. “Your mom makes these for you?” I say, picking up one of the little jars and examining it more closely.
“Am I twelve?” He shakes his head, and it reminds me of his dad. Like he’s scolding himself. “Sorry. No, I make them. Feel free,” he says, jerking his chin toward me and my little glass jar. Apparently I’m not the only one struggling to adjust.
I put the jar back, then hesitate and pick it up again. It’s just oatmeal.
This kitchen has four times as many drawers as our last one, and after I make three unsuccessful attempts at locating the silverware, Asher silently points his spoon at the one directly behind him. I open it and grab a spoon, wondering when breakfast became such a stressful time for me. I try again for a smile, and this time my mouth makes what I’m pretty sure is a C+ effort. There’s no teeth, but definitely a clear improvement in my performance.
I sit down at my mug of coffee, thankful that we’re sitting side by side and not across from each other. We’re eating in complete silence, our awkwardness accompanied by the scrape of spoons, the soft setting down of our mugs, the squeak of our stools as we fidget and shift.
Our walk to the boat is as quiet as our breakfast, and by the time we reach it I feel like screaming just to crack the silence. Is this his way of messing with me, without actually messing with me? Seeing how long he can go before I crack and say something first? No, surely not. The truce was his idea, after all. But I think of his silence at breakfast, how he didn’t say anything until I did. We’re always quiet, though. I’m not sure if I want a change, or if I’m just expecting one.
At the boat, Asher steps on and holds out a hand for me. I look at it like it’s covered in acid, and my eyes dart to him. He’s holding back a smile, and when I finally take his hand, whatever hold he had on himself snaps. While I sit in my usual seat at the bow, he sits in front of the little engine, shaking with laughter. His face is pinked with the exertion of trying to hold it back.
What is wrong with him? Apparently this truce is driving us both a little mad.
He’s barely composed himself when he tells me, “Tomorrow night we’re going to scout at Five Pines.” We finish our swim, walk silently back to the house, and carefully avoid each other the rest of the day.
DAY 12
Asher
You’d think a truce would mean Sidney and I could just act like normal people. The kind who can sit around and talk about normal things, like how to prank their former landlord. You would be wrong. Less than forty-eight hours into our truce, it’s become very clear that we don’t know how to act like normal people. We know how to annoy and avoid. And how to ride in a car in total silence. So I guess we’re going to wing our first night at Nadine’s.
We’ve only been out of the Five Pines houses for a few days, but already it feels like we don’t belong here. Lake House A and B are dark—lights off, blinds drawn. There are no cars at either house. Even the air smells different—like it’s missing the soft tang of fish that usually wafts out of the little hut next to Nadine’s house, where the dads clean their catch. After Sidney weaponized that smell, I can’t say I miss it.
“Creepy,” Sidney says from behind me. Her eyes are fixed on the tall blue elf that peers at us from beside a little bush, with a red hat slumped on his head. I’ve always thought Nadine’s statue collection was the weirdest thing ever. I swear their eyes follow you, like creepy little concrete Mona Lisas. And it’s not just gnomes, it’s frogs and dragons, and there’s even a red brontosaurus statue. A brontosaurus. There were a few here when I first came, tucked in around the tiny cabins that used to sit in a row here, but since the house went up last summer they seem to be multiplying exponentially.
Sidney shakes her head in mock disgust, and I want to laugh, but I don’t. We’re behind Nadine’s house, in the strip of trees that runs along the driveway and separates her property from the next. It isn’t the time or place to be amused by Sidney, truce or not. We parked down the road, at The Little Store, which had been closed for hours by the time we arrived, and then we walked the half-m
ile to Five Pines.
“What do we do now?” Sidney whispers.
“We scout.”
“Okay…” Her voice is sarcastic. “And what exactly does that entail? You know, for those of us who aren’t expert-level lurkers.”
“As if you’d qualify,” I scoff. “All hail Sidney, Queen of the Lurkers,” I mutter. Why can’t she just talk to me like a normal person?
“Whatever.” She takes a step ahead of me and I grab her arm, but she shakes away roughly.
“Sidney,” I whisper-yell as her dark form struts off ahead of me, moving from the cover of the trees to the driveway. She bends down next to the house, and plucks a gray—almost blue—elephant statue out of the red mulch. It has yellow swirls painted across its bulging stomach, and ruby-red gems forming a little triangle that dips from the top of its head down its trunk. It’s one of the most normal things in Nadine’s collection, cozied up next to what looks like a praying mantis statue. Sidney smiles triumphantly as she hoists it into her arms and cradles it—just as a light flicks on overhead, bathing her in bright white light. Motion lights. That’s the kind of thing we’re supposed to be scouting.
Shit.
Sidney
When I was a kid, I was a big believer in the T-Rex method of hiding. You know, the whole Don’t move and they won’t see you approach. My mom loves to tell stories about how she’d catch four-year-old me doing something, and I’d freeze in place, convinced that I was invisible if I could just stay still. Apparently my parents thought it was so hilarious that they played along, and I was eight before I fully grasped that this was actually the worst method of hiding ever. But ten years later it’s still my first instinct when the light flashes on. I’m as still as the stone statue in my hands as the halo of light floods down around me.
Asher whispers my name so loudly he might as well just be talking. “Move.” Then louder. “Sidney, move.” And louder. “Run.”
The word snaps me out of it and I start sprinting across the yard like someone’s just fired a starting pistol. Asher takes off after me, and I can hear his feet padding on the grass behind me. The elephant is cradled under my arm like a football as we hit the sidewalk next to Lake House B, both of us on the same side for once, and it’s not until I hit the stairs and am barreling downward, toward the water, that I realize this probably wasn’t what Asher had in mind. I should have run toward the car, not away from it.
Where the stairs descend past the row of dense bushes, I come to a stop, practically throwing myself onto the ground beside them. Asher is two seconds behind me, and we’re lying on our stomachs behind the bushes, in a row: Asher, me, and the elephant—I’m going to call her Edith—next to me. If we had rifles we’d look like something straight out of a WWII movie. Well, except for the elephant.
Asher looks over at me, to where I have one arm draped over Edith. “What were you doing?” His face is so close to mine I can feel his breath.
I scrunch up my nose in mock disgust. “Brush your teeth next time there’s potential that we’re trapped next to each other.”
“We wouldn’t be trapped”—he rolls his eyes as he says the word—“if you would have just waited to hear the plan.”
“Because you’re the leader?”
“You asked me what to do!”
He’s right, but I can’t give him the satisfaction. Across the yard a door slams, and we both freeze. Through the gaps of the bush I can make out a silhouette in front of the house.
“We have to leave,” Asher mutters.
Obviously. I get up slowly, hunched over so I stay below the tall bushes.
“This way,” Asher says, jerking his head at the water.
“You want to swim?” I shake my head at him. “That’s how people die, Asher. You don’t swim across a lake in the dark, are you nuts? We should at least take a canoe or rowboat and go that way.”
He shakes his head, looking at me like I’ve completely lost it. Maybe I have. I’m feeling very Bonnie and Clyde right now, like we’re standing on the edge of a cliff, being closed in on by the police. I think that’s what happened. Except the police are Nadine and the sirens are her yippy little dog circling the yard on its leash. The cliff is this lake I love so much, and I’m so worked up right now, I’d swan-dive off the edge for drama’s sake if I wasn’t sure I’d break my neck in the eighteen inches of water along the shore.
“We’re not swimming. And we’re not stealing a boat.” He mutters what sounds like, Are you kidding me? “We’re going to walk down a few houses”—he says it slowly, like if he talks too fast I won’t comprehend any of it—“and then we’ll circle back up to the road.”
“Oh.” That’s a much better idea. A much simpler and safer idea. He doesn’t need to know that.
“Follow me.”
“So you can run ahead and leave me to get snatched?”
“Snatched? By what exactly?” His eyes are wild. “We’re not going to jail tonight, Sidney. I mean, unless you decide to go rogue again.”
“Fine, let’s go. Lead the way, Oh Wise One.”
Asher looks down at my feet. “We can’t just leave it here.” He’s eyeing the squatty little statue still lying on the grass.
“I can’t steal it.”
“Oh, so jacking a boat for your big escape is fine, but tacky yard sculptures is where you draw the line?” He rolls his eyes. “Can you just stop arguing with me for ten seconds?”
I start mouthing one … two … three …
“We’re not stealing it. We’ll bring it back when we can actually put it where it goes.” He waves his hand toward the house. “It was sort of hidden behind that bush, I doubt she’ll even notice it’s gone.”
I squat down and secure Edith under my arm again. “Fine. Let’s go.”
Asher
Along the lake, everyone has a dense crop of trees that divides their property from the next. They’re great for privacy and crap for walking through. My legs are getting torn up as we make our way through the long patch of trees and undergrowth a few houses down from Nadine, cutting our way back to the road.
Maybe it’s the branch that cuts a thin slice along my knee that finally pushes me over the edge. “Just pretend I’m someone else.” I can hear Sidney behind me, swearing under her breath as she probably gets her own cuts and scrapes, but I don’t look at her. I’m tired of the scowl she’s had permanently plastered on her face all night.
“Excuse me?” she says, her voice aimed at my back like an arrow.
“I’ve seen you talk to people like a normal human being. I’ve seen you be nice to Kara, to Caleb, to a random person who checks out your groceries.” My voice is level. “I know you’ve got it in you, somewhere deep down. So when we get back to the house, just pretend I’m not me…” I hold a branch up to pass under it, and let Sidney go ahead of me. She gives me a skeptical side-eye glance as she passes under it. As if I’d snap her with a freaking tree branch. The look on her face makes me want to. “… if that’s what you need, to make this truce work.”
“Is that what you’re doing?”
“I don’t need to.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Sidney … just keep walking.” I let her get a few steps ahead of me. It’s not like we’re getting lost in this twenty-foot stretch of trees. “And stop thinking about it.”
DAY 13
Sidney
Kara sits down on our blanket while I strip off my tank top and shorts. “You couldn’t make Asher do this with you? I thought he was your new swimming buddy.”
We’re at the beach, where the river cuts through the sand and empties into Lake Michigan. Some professional swimmers have those tiny training pools with a fake current that keeps them from going anywhere. I have this. And Kara, because my mom said, “If you’re going to try to strip me of my record, at least don’t drown while doing it.” Not that I’m going to drown, but when currents are involved it’s better safe than sorry.
I don’t want to t
alk about why I couldn’t ask Asher to come with me. Instead, I tell Kara he was busy, with as much indifference as I can muster, and I jog into the water. Into my happy place. I kick my legs harder, lengthen my strokes, thinking about the movements. If I can overcome the current and push myself forward, maybe I can overcome other things.
When I’m swimming, it’s easy to let my brain go on autopilot. I think about what Asher said. Just pretend I’m someone else. I think back to the first summer, and try to let that Asher into my brain again. The Asher who showed me stars and left me birthday surprises, and built fires with me. I try to convince myself that all the summers since never happened. As the current beats against me, I think about everything we did that summer—all of the boat rides and trail hikes and beach trips. The nights by the bonfire. The newness of having just met each other.
Asher told me to stop thinking about it, but maybe what I really need to do is stop remembering. I need to go back to the first day of that first summer together, and start over. Or maybe it’s the last week of that first summer that I need to redo.
And I will. The water is getting colder, and I stroke and kick, and kick and stroke, feeling the burn in my muscles. I’ll give Asher one chance. One. And if he turns the tables on me—when he turns the tables on me—I’ll strike even harder. But for now, I’ll show Asher just how wrong he is about me. I can be so much nicer than he could ever hope to be.
Asher
I’m not sure why being pissed at Sidney finally motivates me to start my letter to Mr. Ockler, but it does. Maybe because I need something to take my mind off of how horribly this whole truce is going. Why is it so difficult for Sidney to just treat me like a normal person? My phone is lying on the bed in front of me, and I stare at the blank note screen. From the bathroom door, I can hear Sidney getting ready. The faucet going on and off, and things clinking against the counter. I’d love to know what takes her so long in there. Maybe she just really likes spending time in the bathroom.
Meet Me at Midnight Page 11
