Bright Before Sunrise (7 page)

I roll the bottle of It’s Raining Luck between my palms and let my eyes drift over the other colors lined up on the neat racks. I tune out the chatter and background noise in the spa and breathe in the dizzying scent of Friday afternoons: aromatherapy oils mixed with nail polish and acetone.

“Really, Brighton, I don’t know why you even stop and look. We both know you’re going to get Pointe-Shoe Pink like every other week.” Mom takes the bottle from my hand and laughs as she replaces it on the wall rack. “Green glitter? Who would wear that? Take off your ring, Mina’s waiting.”

I stick my ring in the front pocket of my purse and take the chair next to my mother’s, across the counter from Mina. She has my polish ready, a pale wash of pink half a shade darker than my bare nails.

“Evy’s flight lands at five thirty. We’ll go pick her up from here,” Mom announces while settling herself into her chair and paying Mina and Pearl so she won’t have to handle money with wet nails. “Your sister is going to be the death of me.”

“Why? What’d she do this time?” Freshman year she’d organized a naked race around campus on the last day of finals.

“She was almost mugged last night,” Mom answers as she dips her fingers into the bowls of warm water and beach stones Pearl has set before her.

“What happened? Is she okay?” I ask shrilly. Mom gives me a don’t-cause-a-scene look.

“She’s fine. Honestly, Brighton, what kind of mother do you think I am? Would I be here if she wasn’t?” She gives me a look of pure exasperation.

“Sorry.”

“Now, this is Evy’s version of the story, so you know it’s exaggerated, but according to her, she turned to them, told them they’d picked the wrong girl. She told them she was a black belt—which we both know is not true, unless she spent her spring semester in a karate studio, and even then, she would’ve told us about it
in detail
. And she screamed at the two would-be muggers until they backed down. Then she got in her car, locked the doors, called the cops, and
followed them
until the cops arrived.” Mom removes one hand from a bowl and rubs her temples—leaving watery streaks in her foundation that roll toward the collar of her crisp white shirt, but don’t drip; like they know stains aren’t tolerated in Mom’s world. “Your sister has far too much ‘fight’ and not an ounce of ‘flight’ or common sense.”

“What am I?” I ask. “Fight or flight?”

Mom smiles indulgently at me. “Baby, you’d manage to make friends with them. But, barring that, flight. You hate conflict.”

“And Evy loves it.”

“Evy’s more like me. You’re just like your father.”

“How so?” I lean forward, sloshing water over the edge of my bowl and causing Mina to tut and tug on the hand she’s jabbing with cuticle scissors.

I need this—concrete answers to this comparison everyone keeps making. I want to know more than we had the same eyes, or we both ran Key Club. I need to know
real
things. I feel like I’m forgetting everything that matters.

Mom’s face softens to sadness and I backtrack, “You don’t have to talk about that, sorry.”

She nods a little and stares down at the wet hand that’s creating a damp circle on the fabric of her skirt.

I bite my tongue and want to curl my fingers into fists and trap all my questions there.
Don’t you miss him? And the way things used to be?
Stupid questions, because I know she does.

But I wish family dinners hadn’t died with him. I wish I still started my mornings by sitting beside him at the breakfast bar in the kitchen while we ate cereal and he drank coffee. His mantra had been: “Your goal each day should be to make the world better by being in it,” and before I’d leave for school he’d kiss my forehead and say: “You’ve already ‘Brighton’d’ my day, now go get the rest of ’em.” Each night we’d go around the table and share one thing we’d done to make the world a better place. Evy was sometimes snarky, Mom often complained about it, but I always took it seriously and mentally screened my whole day for the story that would make him proudest.

I still lie in bed each night and whisper my answer to the ceiling.

If I say this to Mom, she’ll sigh. One of those long breaths that are drenched in her desolation and whisper,
Why would you tell me this when you know it’s only going to upset me?

I need to change the subject, but my thoughts are stuck and it hurts to breathe.

“He was the perfect therapist …,” Mom says softly, and I don’t dare look at her for fear she’ll stop talking. “He made each of his clients feel like the most important person in the world, yet he left all their sob stories in the office—shook it off and came home. You’re the same, baby. You make everyone feel better about themselves, but not much touches you.”

Could he
really
compartmentalize like that? Or had he been haunted by his clients’ problems, like how I can’t forget the way my thoughtless words hurt Silvie earlier? There’s a difference between not caring and not
showing
that you care.

“Teflon girl,” I mutter, switching hands for Mina.

“What?”

“That’s Amelia’s new thing—she says nothing sticks to me. Of course,
everything
sticks to her.” My best friend with her
causes du jour
and debate club presidency wears her heart on her sleeve. Actually, she wears her heart like a billboard.

Mom laughs. “I like that. So, what are your plans tonight?” This is usually her first question once we are settled in our chairs. I guess we’re back on script.

“After we get Evy?”

“Sure. Or I can drop you home on my way to the airport.”

I pick my words carefully. Is there a non-insulting way to say I didn’t make plans because I’m waiting for her to break down?

“I figured the three of us would do dinner and then I’d wait and see.”

“I can’t do dinner—I’m meeting Aunt Joan. Maybe Evy? But no. I’m pretty sure she mentioned plans with Brooke.” Mom’s inspecting the cuticles Pearl just trimmed, her voice matter-of-fact.

“Oh, but …” I swallow the rest of the sentence.

“Do you want me to cancel?”

“No, you don’t have to.” I pull my hand out of my bowl and set it dripping in my lap. Mina clucks her disapproval but continues to shape my other hand with her file. “It’ll be good for me. Relaxing.” My mind is cycling through surprise to extreme relief. I need to hold it together now for Mom, summon enough energy to be excited to see Evy—but then … then I can climb under the covers and hide until tomorrow.

“You could call that boy you went out with last week. What was his name? Joshua?”

“Jeremy,” I supply. “Maybe. We’ll see.”

In the six years we’ve been coming to this salon, I’ve become accustomed to treating it like the kitchen table. Mom used to say, “It’s not like they understand us anyhow,” which makes me uncomfortable in an is-that-racist-or-just-stupid? way. But Mina doesn’t offer her opinions, and Pearl never says anything but “thank you,” “sit,” and “other hand.” They communicate with us in gestures and nods, gossiping among themselves in Korean, though I know they’re both fluent in English. They take their cues from Mom, and she insists that our “girl time” include confessions and no interruptions.

Not that I ever have much to confess. It’d been way more scandalous when Evy sat between us, but she’d quit coming when she was fifteen—choosing to color her nails with Sharpies, highlighters, and Wite-Out and refusing to play Gossip Quest on Mom’s terms.

“Excuse me.” The woman at the table to my left leans over. “You’re Andrea Waterford, right? We met a few weeks ago at Emma Murphy’s jewelry party. You made that fabulous spinach dip. I have
got
to get that recipe. This must be your lovely daughter; and did I hear you say you’ve got no plans tonight?”

She’s breaking Mom’s cardinal rule of manicures—do not eavesdrop or join our conversation—but I can’t be rude; even though Mom’s brief nod and the tone of her “Oh, hello. Lovely to see you again” treads the line between cordial and dismissive.

I force a smile and a cheerful “A night of downtime every now and then can’t hurt.”

“I’m Brenda Shea. You’re Brighton, right? Your junior prom queen photo in the
Gazette
was beautiful. You are much prettier than the senior queen.”

I blush and make an embarrassed noise of acknowledgment. Compliments like that are so awkward. Mom’s too annoyed to save me, sighing loudly as she watches a soap opera on the television mounted behind Pearl’s head.

“My son goes to school with you.”

I’ve never heard of anyone with the last name Shea, which immediately makes me feel guilty. Cross Pointe isn’t big. Mrs. Shea seems to know all about me, and I can’t even identify her son. “I don’t think I know him. Sorry.”

“That’s okay, he’s quiet. Anyhow, if you don’t have plans tonight, would you be free to babysit?”

I jerk out of Mina’s grasp and am rewarded with a Pointe-Shoe Pink stripe that stretches from my thumb across the tops of my fingers. “He needs a babysitter? I’m not really comfortable—”

“No.” Mrs. Shea laughs. “He’s going off to college next year—I hope he doesn’t need a babysitter! He’s on a date. I’m talking about my daughter, Sophia. She’s five months.”

“Oh.” I apologize to Mina and turn to give my Mom a relieved look. She’s ignoring me, tapping her foot impatiently against the leg of the table.

“Normally I would never ask, but our babysitter canceled last minute and my son refuses to change his plans with Carly. We moved here not that long ago, so I don’t have a backup sitter yet. I thought if you weren’t doing anything … but if you can’t, I completely understand.”

I don’t know Carly either. Who are these people?

“Um …” I give her a once-over. She’s pretty much a typical Cross Pointe mother: Tory Burch bag at her feet, hair highlighted and sculpted, cardigan set coordinated with her sandals.

Then it hits me. New to Cross Pointe? And there’s a similarity in their dark brown eyes and the shape of their mouths—although her polite smiles are so different from his leave-me-alone scowl. “Wait, is your son Jonah
Prentiss
?”

“Yes!” Mrs. Shea beams and leans forward. “You know Jonah? Oh, that makes me happy. He’s really struggled with this move. He used to be so social, but since we’ve gotten here, he’s seemed withdrawn. I’m relieved to know he has friends, even if they’re not always over at the house the way they were in our old town. In fact, with the baby, it’s probably good I don’t have to worry about kicking out noisy teens at one a.m.”

This is the type of thing she shouldn’t be telling me. I’d crawl under this table and cry if my mother told a stranger such personal details. And I have no idea how to
respond—it’s hardly like I’m going to correct her, not when she’s this excited about the idea of his “friends.” So I smile. “He seems nice.”

“That’s so sweet of you to say. And here you are with no plans—would you even consider it? Sophia is an angel. I promise she’ll be easy. I bet my husband will even have her asleep before we leave. And we won’t be late. What do you think?”

“Mom?” I wonder if she’ll object to my going to a stranger’s home—But, no, if you’re in the jewelry/candles/scrap-booking party circuit, then you’re trustworthy.

“It’s up to you—but I want a home number and address.”

“Of course!” says Mrs. Shea.

Both of them are waiting for my answer. Me, in Jonah’s house—I’d wished for a way to figure him out and this is backstage access. Almost
too much
access—I just want to know a little more about him. I don’t need to see where he sleeps and eats his morning cereal.

But if I want to meet the deadline for ordering the plaque, if I don’t want to let down Mr. Donnelly, if I ever want Jonah to give me more than a moment’s attention, then this could be the opportunity I’ve been waiting for.

“Will Jonah be home?”

“No, sorry. As soon as school ends on Friday he’s off like a shot. I barely see that boy all weekend.” She looks disappointed. I’m melting with relief.

All that’s left for me to do is agree—and despite my desire to spend the night hibernating, I nod.

“Great!” She carefully claps her hands, now tipped with dark red nails. “Why don’t I bring you straight to our house
from here. That way I can go over all the emergency numbers and instructions with you.”

“Sure, I guess.” I wish I had even half a spine and the ability to say that word that starts with an
N
and ends in an
O
. It’s a word Jonah clearly has no problem saying … maybe after tonight I’ll understand why.

9
 
 
JONAH
 
 
5:03 P.M.