Just You (13 page)

I eagerly took the book and found his
picture, and when I did I had to look at the corresponding name to
make sure I had the right one. “No way,” I said, taking in his
fourteen-year-old self, which differed significantly from his
present-day seventeen-year-old self. In this picture he was chubby,
with glasses and—when I peered really close—a mouthful of braces.
This was a boy I never would have looked at twice in eighth grade.
I glanced up from the picture to see Michael watching me, cheeks
pink, trying to measure my reaction. “No way,” I said again, my
eyes lowering once again to the old him. The “before” shot.

“I told you I was a geek,” he said.

I closed the book and handed it to him.
“How…?”

He stood up to put the book back and I
studied him in awe. The “after” shot. Gone was the chubbiness,
replaced by a broad chest and wide shoulders and thick muscles. He
wasn’t scrawny by any means, but I’d never liked skinny boys. The
glasses had turned into contacts and the braces had done their job,
resulting in the bright, even smile I loved so much. The
transformation was rather shocking.

“In ninth grade I started playing baseball
and swimming and working out in the gym downstairs,” he said,
knowing what I was trying to ask. “I stopped sitting around playing
video games so much, grew a few inches taller, got contacts, and
the braces came off. That’s pretty much it.”

“I bet people were shocked when you came
back for high school.”

His face reddened again, probably from
thinking about all the girls who suddenly started paying attention.
“Well, kind of.”

I finally understood it then: he still
wasn’t all that comfortable with his hotness, maybe didn’t even
believe he was good-looking at all. His looks had been a natural
progression, effortless, unlike those arrogant guys who were in
love with their reflections and tried too hard. Generally speaking,
most guys who looked like him were jerks. But he wasn’t. The
modesty I had admired all this time was really genuine.

“Want to sit down?” he asked, nodding toward
the bed.

I sat. “You’re so neat. You should see my
room. It’s a disaster.”

“Perfectionism is one of the only traits I
inherited from my father,” he said, sitting next to me.

“Where is your father anyway?”

“At work.”

“He’s working at—” I glanced at my watch.
“—eight-fifteen on a Saturday?”

“He works late every night. Even on
Sundays.”

I felt bad for him. When did he ever spend
any time with his dad? Or did he even want to spend time with him?
“He must love his job.”

“You could say that.” His jaw twitched like
it did when he was uneasy, so I let it go.

“You know,” I said, studying the mere
faultlessness of his room. “I’m kind of a slob. I hope you can live
with that.”

“I can, if you can live with my issues.”

“I can…but you’re not going to, like, clean
my house when you come over, are you?”

He laughed, inching closer to me. “I’m not a
total freak.”

We leaned into each other and kissed, there
on the edge of Michael’s bed. After a minute he got up to shut the
door, and then we picked up right where we left off, eventually
sliding up to the middle of the bed and reclining back onto the
pillows. His bed smelled like him—cinnamon and shaving cream and
Tide laundry soap, all blended together.

“I…” he said, pulling back to look at me. My
heart thumped as I waited for him to continue. “I’m glad you’re
here.”

I went limp with relief. For a moment I
thought he was about to tell me he loved me, and I wasn’t sure how
I would have reacted. Maybe the same way I’d reacted when Brian
said it all those months ago. Or even worse, maybe this time I
would have answered.

“I’m glad too,” I said. “I liked meeting
your family. Half of them, anyway. I’d like to meet the rest
someday.”

Michael, always observant, heard my thoughts
as clearly as if I’d said them aloud. He propped himself up on his
elbow, head resting in his palm, eyes focused on some arbitrary
point across the room. When he spoke, it was in same cautious tone
he used whenever he talked about something he didn’t really want to
discuss, like his dad or his ex or his awkward junior high
years.

“My brother is in jail,” he said, his gaze
returning to my face for half a second before flickering toward the
wall again. “He’s supposed to get out sometime next year.”

I lay perfectly still, not breathing, afraid
he’d stop talking at the slightest movement. “Why?” I asked.

“Possession of an illegal substance, driving
under the influence, assault, theft, you name it. He’s been in and
out of jail and rehab for the past three years, since he was
eighteen, but he was addicted long before that. Just beer and pot
at first, then he moved on to the heavier stuff.”

I put my hand on his forearm. “Why didn’t
you tell me this before?”

He dropped back onto the pillows and rubbed
a hand over his face. “Big-shot lawyers can’t have families that
are anything less than perfect, you know. We’re not supposed to
talk about it, not to anyone. My father thinks Josh is an
embarrassment to the family, but it’s mostly just to him. I mean,
he’s a criminal lawyer, and his own son’s a criminal.”

He exhaled and glanced at me again, as if he
expected me to run away screaming any minute now. I found it kind
of ironic that the first real flaw I had managed to uncover in him
was that he tried to be perfect and needed everything around him to
be perfect too. Clearly, that was his role in the family—the good
son, the one who never made waves. I could only imagine how much
pressure he felt, trying to live up to such impossible
expectations.

“Do you get along with him?” I asked,
wrapping my fingers around his. “Your brother?”

“He’s like my best friend,” he said without
hesitation. “I just hate what he does.”

I have to tell him now, I thought. Make it
even. After all, he was my boyfriend, and you were supposed to
trust your boyfriend with things like this. Personal things. He’d
trusted me with
his
issues. My heart started pounding in my
ears, and before I could change my mind or even gather the courage,
I was laying out my own family secrets, right next to his.

“When I was twelve,” I said, “my father had
an affair and left us to be with her. Then he married her. My
mother hasn’t been the same since. And, I guess, neither have
I.”

He squeezed my hand. “Wow. That’s
horrible.”

“Not as horrible as what your family is
dealing with, but yeah, it was pretty bad. I don’t hate my father
anymore, but I doubt I’ll ever fully trust him again. He really
disappointed me, you know?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I know.”

Our conversation stopped there, but we
stayed on the bed for a while, both of us drained from our
confessions and yet kind of relieved too. The worst of us had been
revealed and yet here we still lay, hands linked between us.

Chapter 12

Before I left to spend Christmas break at my
father’s house, my mother presented me with a birthday card with a
cartoon picture of a car on it, reminding me in a tangible way what
my sweet sixteen gift was this year. And possibly my Christmas gift
too, depending on the mechanic’s quote. But I was used to that.
When your birthday is a week before Christmas, you get a lot of
two-for-one presents.

This year, though, it didn’t bother me at
all. Recently, my aunt Gina bought herself a brand new van for her
bakery deliveries. She had planned on scrapping her old car, a
bucket of bolts she called Stella, but my parents decided to buy it
from her. For me. They arranged to split the cost on its
much-needed tune-up, and as soon as Stella was road-worthy (and as
soon as I passed driver’s ed), I would have my very own car, even
if it was a lemon. Still, it was the best birthday present
ever.

Well, maybe the second best.

Michael had plans to take me out to dinner
on Saturday night, the celebration I looked forward to the most.
But on Saturday morning, big, heavy flakes of snow started falling.
By evening it had stopped, leaving behind a fluffy white blanket at
least six inches high on every surface in the neighborhood. And
because the unpredicted storm had taken the city by surprise, Dad
and Lynn’s street still wasn’t plowed by seven o’clock and my
father didn’t want me going out. Michael was allowed to come over
if he didn’t mind testing out his winter tires, but we had to stay
off the roads.

“Well, this throws a wrench in my plans,”
Michael said when I let him in the front door. I reached up to kiss
him, but he tilted his face so I got his cheek instead. Even though
he’d been to my father’s house many times and felt welcome and at
home here, he still tried to be extra respectful whenever Dad was
around. He was so proper sometimes, it killed me. Of course my
father loved him, treating him like the long-lost son he never had.
It was kind of embarrassing.

“It’s okay,” I told Michael. I knelt on the
floor to help Jamie stretch the tight elastic on his snow pants
over the top of his boots. The instant he and Emma had finished
dinner, they’d bolted for the closet to dig out the winter clothes.
We could hear Leo in the kitchen, whining to go out. I handed Emma
her mittens and frowned. “I hate winter.”

Dad emerged from the kitchen and asked
Michael about the condition of the roads.

“They’re mostly clear now.”

“I still don’t want you out on them,” Dad
told me, sinking into the recliner with his newspaper and bottle of
beer.

I started to protest but quickly realized
how pointless that would be. My father was permissive about a lot
of things, but when it came to someone he cared about driving in
bad weather, he refused to budge. He’d been in a winter car
accident as a teenager and it had left him a little
traumatized.

“Daddy, can Leo come out with us?” Emma
asked.

“If you agree to dry him off when you come
in,” Dad said from behind the newspaper.

Emma agreed and called for Leo, who came
skittering down the hallway at top speed, nearly knocking her over.
The three of them bounded out the door.

“How are your snowman-building skills?” I
asked Michael.

“It’s a hidden talent of mine.”

I would have cracked a joke about his
various other hidden talents had my father not been sitting right
there. “Prove it to me, then,” I said instead.

The sky was clear and full of stars as we
stepped outside into the front yard. I breathed in the smell of
fresh snow and chimney smoke and was reminded of my childhood, when
my whole world revolved around playing and having fun. I remembered
winter evenings in the yard with my father, the crunch of snow
under my feet as I helped him shovel the driveway, and making snow
angels and sledding with my friends. I remembered the incentive of
hot chocolate and the uncomfortable feeling of numb, wet hands and
physical exhaustion enticing me inside after dark. Life seemed so
straightforward then.

My reverie was interrupted by a cold, sharp
thud on my lower back. I spun around with a shriek to see my sister
and stepbrother packing armloads of snow for the base of their
snowman, pausing every few seconds to scoop a handful up to their
mouths for a taste. Leo bounced around haphazardly, stopping every
few seconds to dig holes. Then I looked at Michael, who was
standing a few feet away with his hands in his pockets and gazing
up at the sky with a sudden, intense interest.

“You think you’re so sneaky, don’t you,” I
said, wagging my finger at him.

He blinked at me. “What?”

“Just so you know,” I said, crouching down
to gather up my own handful of snow, “I’ve never lost a snowball
fight in my life. I throw like a boy.”

“No kidding?”

“Oh yeah.” I backed up, forming my snowball
as I moved. “Other little girls on my street were playing hopscotch
and skipping rope and I was at the park playing catch with my
dad.”

He studied my hands as they constructed the
ultimate weapon. “A tomboy, huh? I never would have guessed.”

“Do I not look like a tomboy to you?”

His eyes drifted from my hands up to my
chest, taking in the curves still visible even under my padded
jacket, and then traveled up a few inches further to admire my long
hair. “No.”

We all turned our heads to the grinding
racket of the snow plow as it passed down the street. Leo barked
toward the noisy machine as if it were an intruder. As it went by
the house, it swept a pile of snow into the opening of the
driveway, which Dad had cleared late that afternoon. As I wondered
if I should get the shovel and clear it again, I felt another
snowball make contact, this time with my left calf.

“That’s it.” I glared at Michael, squeezing
my icy missile into shape. “This means
war
.”

I threw the snowball at him and he ducked,
causing it to miss him by a few inches. It arched over his head,
landing at the edge of the neighbor’s fence.

“You do have a good arm,” he said,
impressed. As he was looking over his shoulder, his gaze trailing
the path of my snowball, I quickly fashioned another one and threw
it overhand-style, pelting him square in the stomach. He turned
back to find me smiling mischievously.

“Told you,” I said.

He glanced down to where the snow had hit.
“Too close for comfort. Not fair.”

I snickered. “Sorry. I’ll aim higher next
time.”

He bent down to retrieve another chunk of
snow and I zigzagged across the yard, laughing, daring him to get
me. Leo started barking and nudging his wet nose into my jeans, and
I had to keep pausing to shoo him away so I wouldn’t trip over him.
Emma and Jamie, intrigued by the commotion, left their snowman
project to join in on the fun. This promptly turned into a fierce
boys vs. girls (vs. dog) smackdown. Emma and I, strategic yet
level-headed females, easily won the battle after a mere twenty
minutes (and when the melting heaps of snow ran out). But the boys
refused to admit defeat.