Catherine (24 page)

Nina made a hissing noise. “I know her type—taking everything for granted. So she’s
got nice skin and a good body. She doesn’t have any idea how to work it. That hair
of hers. Blow-dry it once in a while, right? She doesn’t dress like she’s trying to
hang on to her ultrahot boyfriend….” The rest of whatever she was saying was drowned
out by the sound of flushing, but when the noise died down the two of them were laughing.

“… Girl, you crack me up.”

I thought about stepping out of my stall to confront Nina, or
at least to give her the evil eye and let her know I’d been listening, but what good
would that do? Better to stay put, listen, and learn everything I could about the
enemy, because that’s what she had become.

“I’ll get my chance. Sooner or later, she’ll be out of the picture, and I’ll swoop
in.”

“I know you will. Can I use some of your lipstick? I forgot mine. Thanks. I love this
color. What’s it called?”

“Mata Hari. And once I’ve got him, I’ll make sure he’s good and satisfied. I’ll handcuff
him to my bed and take him places that little girlfriend of his has never even heard
of.”

The blond whooped with laughter. “Nina, you are way, way too much.”

After they left the bathroom, I just stood in the stall, sputtering, too mad to even
move. I stayed there for the rest of the show, listening to women come and go, unready
to face another human being.

When I finally got back to the main stage, I found Hence searching for me. He took
one look at my face and knew something was wrong. “What is it? Are you okay?”

Over his shoulder, I could see Nina and her friend, pretending to be chatting with
each other, not taking their eyes off us for a single moment.

“I’m fine,” I told him. “It’s nothing.”

“Are you sure?” Hence’s eyes were dark with worry. “When I didn’t see you out in the
audience…”

Was I crazy, or had Nina and her sidekick moved in for a better look? If they got
any closer to us, they could eavesdrop on our
conversation. A rush of anger flooded my brain, and before I could think better of
it, I grabbed Hence’s hands and wrapped them around my waist.

“You’re amazing,” I told him. And I kissed him, good and hard, as though no one was
watching. He made a surprised sound, a happy little gasp, and I released him. “Let’s
get home before the guys so we can be alone together.”

And we did. Going home with him should have made me happy. It was me with Hence, after
all, and I’d make sure that it would always be me and never Nina. Still, as we kissed
that night on the creaky pull-out couch, as I ran my lips down his throat and pulled
the T-shirt over his head, I couldn’t help feeling like I was making love to Hence
not because I felt like it, but because I had something to prove. Even worse, he didn’t
seem to notice the difference.

A sleepy-eyed man in horn-rimmed glasses answered Jackie’s door. “She’s putting the
twins to bed,” he said. “I’m Craig, her husband.” He took my backpack without a word,
carried it into the living room, and slipped away. I’d phoned Jackie on my way to
the subway, saying I needed a place to sleep, but I hadn’t said why. Now she hurried
into the room, a worried look in her eyes. “What happened? Oh, honey, you look exhausted.”
Her tone changed. “Hence kicked you out?”

“Something like that,” I said. “He confused a wall with my head and punched a hole
in
it
.”

Jackie started making up the couch. “I shouldn’t have let you go back there.” Then
she asked the exact question I’d been hoping she wouldn’t. “After you left yesterday,
I started wondering: Your dad doesn’t really know where you are, does he?”

I didn’t want to lie, so I didn’t answer.

“The man must be frantic. You could use my phone….”

What choice did I have but to make up a story on the spot? It came out all jumbled.
“He knows I’m in New York. He thinks I’m staying with a friend of mine, whose family
moved here.” I scrambled for specifics. “Her name’s Lisa. Her father works in television.
Please don’t tell Dad I was at The Underground. I’ll only stay a few more days, then
I’ll take a bus right back to Marblehead.” Then a chilling thought occurred to me.
“He didn’t try to get in touch with you, did he?”

“I never met your father,” she said. “He and Cathy got married at city hall, and she
didn’t invite me. For all I know, he’s never even heard my name.”

Had my mother really shared so little of her past with my father? At least that meant
Dad was unlikely to track me here. I sat down on the made-up couch, and Jackie joined
me there. We sat awhile in silence.

“Please don’t call my dad,” I said finally. “He wouldn’t want me to be looking for
my mom, and I’ve got to. I can’t stand it that she might be out there waiting for
me to find her.”

Jackie sighed.

I took that as a good sign. “I promise I’ll get on a bus and head to Massachusetts
the day my father expects me.” I spoke fast, hoping she wouldn’t ask when that day
was.

“I can’t even be around to look out for you,” Jackie said. “I’ve got an all-day meeting
tomorrow, and Craig has to be at the office.”

“I don’t need a babysitter.” I tried not to sound as annoyed as I felt. “I’ll stay
away from Hence. I promise.”

Jackie jumped to her feet and walked into the next room. “Since you’re here…” she
called, returning with a heavy photo album. She riffled through it and set it on my
lap. “Look what I found.”

I gazed down at a photograph I’d never seen before, of my mom and Jackie as teenagers,
perched on the lip of a fountain, arms around each other’s shoulders, heads thrown
back in laughter. I turned the page and found myself confronted by the lazy smile
of a guy with blond hair and eyes the same bright-blue shade as his polo shirt.

“Wasn’t he gorgeous?” Jackie asked. “I used to stare at that photo every night before
I went to sleep, hoping I would dream about him.”

“Is that my uncle?” An electric tingle went through me; why hadn’t I thought to ask
Jackie about him?

“You’ve never met Q?” Jackie clucked her tongue. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.”

“Are you still in touch with him? Where does he live now?”

“The last I heard, he’d moved upstate, to some little town. It started with a
C
, I think.” She shut her eyes. “Coxsackie. That was it.”

“Do you have his phone number? Or maybe an e-mail address?”

“Heavens, no. I saw him just before he sold The Underground to Hence. In the days
before e-mail, if you can imagine that. I dropped by to see how he was doing, but
he’d changed.”

I turned the page, but the next pictures were of strangers. “Changed? How?”

“The spark had gone out of him. He’d tried to turn the club
into an expensive steak house, and the whole thing had been a flop. All he could talk
about was how badly he wanted to sell it and move upstate. He’d already bought himself
a cabin in the mountains, and he had this fantasy of moving up there and spending
all his time hunting.”

“Do you at least have his address?” I asked.

Jackie’s eyes narrowed. “Oh, Chelsea. I wouldn’t want you to get in touch with him.
That last time he seemed… I don’t know. A little bit off. Not himself. Angry. He kept
mentioning his gun collection. He said something about having enemies, and how they’d
better watch out.” She took the album from me, her expression suddenly sharp. “Promise
me you won’t go looking for him.”

“I promise,” I lied.

That night, after Jackie and Craig had gone to bed, I got out my laptop and searched
for Quentin Eversole in Coxsackie, New York. I figured that if my mom had called Jackie
when she came back to Manhattan, she might have gotten in touch with her brother as
well; maybe she’d even told him where she was headed next. But I couldn’t find a single
Q. Eversole in upstate New York. Of course, he’d moved up there a long time ago; he
might be living somewhere else by now. There had to be a way to track my Uncle Quentin
down. Jackie’s warnings aside, I needed to find him.

The next morning I woke up alone in Jackie’s apartment. She’d left a note on the kitchen
table:
We’ll be back tonight. Help yourself to anything you can find in the fridge.
She’d even left a key to her
apartment so I could come and go as I pleased. As soon as I knew for sure that she
and Craig were out, I set to work. Jackie had said she didn’t have my uncle’s phone
number, but she hadn’t said anything about not having his address.

Okay, ransacking her drawers wasn’t the most upstanding act of my life. But, honestly,
I didn’t have to look very hard; the address book was in almost the first place I
looked, a writing desk in the master bedroom. I scribbled my uncle’s address on a
piece of scrap paper and tucked the book carefully back, covering my tracks. Then
I called The Underground, hoping Hence wouldn’t pick up. I got lucky; Cooper answered
on the first ring, like he’d been waiting for my call.

“Where are you? I’ve been picturing you sleeping on a park bench, or riding the subway
all night. And what did you do to put Hence in such a foul mood?”

“I didn’t
do
anything.” I could fill Cooper in on Hence’s blowup later; for now I had more urgent
business to take care of. I told him about my latest discovery. “So I’m thinking about
going up to Coxsackie. What’s the best way to get upstate? There’s got to be a bus,
right?”

Coop didn’t sound all that excited for me. “I’m not sure that’s the best idea, Chelsea,”
he said. “Seriously. I’ve heard a lot about your uncle….”

“From Hence,” I said. “They hated each other. I wouldn’t expect him to say nice things.”

“But the guns…”

“I’m his niece. He’s not going to shoot me. And it’s not like I
have any other way of tracking down my mom. Never mind, I can look up the bus information
myself.”

“Wait!” Coop was practically shouting into the phone. “Don’t go alone.” There was
a long pause. “I’ll take you.”

“You’d do that?” I asked. “Really?” Did Coop care what happened to me after all?

“It can’t be today. There’s a show tonight, an important one. Rat Behavior. You know
who that is, right?”

“Should I?”

“Stan Hodicek, the drummer from Riptide? It’s his new band.”

“Stan from Riptide?” This was an interesting twist. “Too bad I can’t be there.”

Coop fell silent a moment; then he surprised me again. “Take the train here.”

“What about Hence?”

“You can hang out in the juice bar across the street. Wait there, and I’ll slip over
when things get quiet.”

“I’ll be right there,” I said, scrounging under the sofa for my sneakers, more eager
than I would have expected to get back to The Underground. “Thanks, Coop,” I added,
but he’d already hung up.

The next afternoon I did something I’d never done before: I lied to Hence. We were
at Unique Clothing Warehouse, rummaging through the bins, trying to replace the clothes
we’d left behind at The Underground. He fished out a top in bright orange camo, held
it up against his chest, and looked at me quizzically.

“Colorful,” I said.

“Is that good or bad?”

I wrinkled my nose and he tossed the shirt back.

“Um, hey,” I said, trying to sound casual. “I heard from Jackie. She wants me to meet
up with her and her mom in D.C. I was thinking it might be fun.”

“When would you leave?” It was a sign of how preoccupied Hence was that he didn’t
even notice the holes in my story. How would Jackie have known where to call me? I’d
made up a convoluted
backstory about how I’d left our new phone number on her answering machine, but I
didn’t even have to use it.

“Tonight. If I’m going, I should probably leave soon. I don’t want to get in too late.”

“How long will you be gone?’

“Not long.” I handed him a shirt in olive. “Just overnight.”

Hence held the shirt up to his chest and checked himself out in a nearby mirror. He
looked at me, brows knit, and for a moment I thought he would challenge my lie. “You
should go,” he said finally. “It’s hard on you, living with a bunch of guys.” He smiled.
“Don’t stay away too long.”