Just You (24 page)

“Remember when we used to go to the park
together, sweet pea?” my father said as he strolled beside me on
our way back to the house. “You sure loved watching the swan. I
could barely drag you away from it.”

“Yeah,” I said, surprised he remembered
that. Usually he needed pictorial evidence to remember
anything.

“I think I have a picture of you with that
swan somewhere.”

I smiled. I should have known there’d be a
picture.

Back at the house, we carefully folded
ourselves into Michael’s car (we weren’t the limo-renting type) and
then we were off. My family—plus Robin—stood in the yard watching
us go and waving as if we were going to Hawaii for a month instead
of just the prom.

At Michael’s house, Leanne and Owen stayed
in the car while Michael and I went in to endure another round of
pictures. Michael’s mom positioned us in front of the living room
fireplace. By now my mouth felt cramped from all the smiling, but
thankfully she didn’t go overboard like my dad. We were out of
there in less than twenty minutes. Free at last.

“Done already?” Leanne said when we climbed
back into the car. She looked a little disappointed to see us. So
did Owen. Just friends, indeed.

“You want us to go back in for more
pictures?” I asked, grinning at her.

“Yeah, because I really don’t think we have
enough,” Michael said as we pulled out of the driveway.

“Ten thousand sounds like a nice round
number.”

Leanne sighed. “Let’s just go to the stupid
prom.”

****

Two hours later, after a rowdy dinner at an
upscale Italian place downtown with several other couples, we
finally made it to the prom itself. When the four of us crossed the
threshold of the hotel ballroom in which the RHH prom was being
held, my eyes scanned the room for Elena Brewster as if by habit.
She wasn’t a senior, but I thought she might be here as someone’s
date. I wondered what her dress looked like, and if she’d dare try
to talk to Michael in front of me. Ever since the beer bottle
incident in March, she’d been wisely keeping her distance.

“Dance with me?” Michael asked. He held out
his hand for me to take.

“Oh,” I said, distracted by my search.
“Okay.”

Out on the dance floor, amid dozens of other
couples, Michael pulled me close to him. I wound my arms around his
neck and breathed in the new scent of his tux as we swayed gently
to a sappy ballad that had been on the radio non-stop last year.
The heat from his hand on the small of my back relaxed me, and soon
I forgot about Elena Brewster altogether.

“Want to get some air?” I asked after we’d
danced for a while.

“Sure.”

We made our way outside. The parking lot of
the hotel was jammed with an array of tuxes and a rainbow of
dresses as people gathered in groups, smoking. Michael and I kept
walking until we came to the back of the hotel, which faced the
waterfront boardwalk. The water was calm, the sky above it dotted
with stars. We found a bench and sat down, facing the water. The
air was cooler here, and smelled of salt and fish and fresh
flowers. I shivered.

“Cold?” Michael asked. He draped an arm
around my bare shoulders and drew me closer. I nestled comfortably
into his side.

“No,” I said. “Not anymore.”

We sat there for a long time, speaking every
so often but mostly just enjoying the peace and darkness and each
other’s company. Tonight marked the beginning of summer, and I
refused to think about September or anything other than the two
long months ahead. I’d think about September when it got here. For
now it was just us, alone on the bench.

****

Midnight.

Michael and I were walking hand-in-hand back
to the main doors of the hotel after another fresh air break. When
we got inside we discovered that a good percentage of the student
body had already left to hit the parties. Coincidently, Leanne and
Owen were going out as we were coming in.

“Where were you guys?” my stepsister said,
scratching along the straps of her dress. The skin there was
already red and irritated, as if it were revolting against itchy
formal wear. “We’ve been looking all over for you.”

“Chill out, LeeLee,” Owen teased. Leanne
elbowed him in response.

“We were down by the water,” I said.

She nodded without any further comment. “So,
should we go?”

We unanimously agreed that yes, we
definitely should.

“Maybe we should go home first,” Leanne said
as we walked to Michael’s car. “And change out of these things. I
don’t know about you, Taylor, but this damn torture device of a
dress is cutting off my circulation.”

“Same here.” Not only was my dress cutting
off my circulation, but I had to use the washroom in the worst
way.

“What time do you have to be home?” Michael
asked me as we left the hotel parking lot, and the prom,
behind.

“Two.”

“Are you serious?” Leanne said from the
backseat. “It’s after twelve now. I don’t have any curfew tonight.
Mom told me to be in by dawn. Think you can talk your dad into
letting you stay out later?”

“He’s probably asleep by now,” I said.

But he wasn’t. Leanne and I crept into the
dark house to discover my father and her mother suctioned together
on the couch, making out like teenagers. Clearly they hadn’t been
expected us back so early.

“Gross, you guys.” I turned away, groaning.
Leanne rolled her eyes and did the same. They’d been extra
touchy-feely like this ever since they got back from their weekend
of “reconnecting”.

“Why are you home so early?” Dad asked. Lynn
shifted away from him and dabbed at her lips with the back of her
hand.

“We came home to change,” Leanne said,
choking on a laugh. Our eyes met, and we both started giggling.

“So you’re going back out?” Lynn asked
hopefully.

“Yes, Mother.”

Now my stepmom smiled. “How was the
prom?”

“Great,” we said in unison, still laughing.
We were eager to get upstairs and change. Our dates were
waiting.

“Well, we’ll see you later, then,” my father
said, just as eager for us to leave.

Leanne gave me a meaningful nudge and I
stepped forward. “Um, Dad? About my curfew. If I have to be in by
two, I’ll only have another hour and a half for the party. And
Michael will have to drop everything to take me home right in the
middle of it and, well…may I please stay out later?”

Dad started to shake his head. “I don’t
know, Taylor. I think two is a fair curfew for you tonight.”

I wasn’t about to give up that easily.
Besides, Dad had that “keep at me and I’ll relent but don’t tell
your mother” glint in his eye. “Come on, Dad. Leanne is staying
out, and I’ll be with her.”

“She’ll be with me,” Leanne confirmed.

“Leanne will be with her, Steven,” Lynn
said, grinning at her husband, who was visibly torn between
worrying about me and wanting more quality time alone with his
frisky wife. He scrunched up his face.

“Well…”

I gave him a thousand-watt smile. “Please,
Dad?”

Leanne wrapped her arm around my shoulders
and we stood side by side, smiling wide together. “Yeah,” she said,
touching her head to mine. “Please, Dad?”

My father blinked, surprised, and then his
expression softened. Even if it was only sly manipulation on
Leanne’s part, that “Dad” coming from her lips was what prodded him
over the edge. We stood there grinning like idiots until he finally
gave in.

“You win,” he said, sighing. “Just be in by
sun-up, all right? And
be careful
. Both of you.”

“We will,” we promised, and darted up the
stairs before he had time to change his mind.

Chapter 23

“Ready?” Michael asked when the four of us
were once again settled in our respective seats, dressed down and
tired, but ready to party, indeed.

The mood in the car was festive. As Leanne
and Owen snuggled in back, effectively abolishing their “just
friends” status for good, Michael and I sat quietly in front and
enjoyed a moment of reprieve before being submersed into crowds and
noise for a second time tonight.

“Want some?” Michael said, offering me a
package of his ever-present cinnamon mints. I shook out two and
popped them into my mouth.

“You know why you love these so much?”

“No.” He took a handful for himself. “Why do
I love these so much?”

I smiled. “They’re spicy
and
sweet.
You get the best of both worlds in one little package.”

“That,” he said, smiling back at me, “is
exactly
why I love them.”

“Knew it.”

R.J.’s house was packed when we got there.
Everyone had gathered in the backyard, enticed outdoors by the warm
weather and the recently-installed underground pool. Several people
were cooling off in the shimmering water when we arrived.

“So this is how the other half lives,”
Leanne said, her eyes wide as she took in the expansive yard. Her
expression—a cross between awe and repulsion—probably looked much
like the one I’d worn at
my
first party here. “I feel like I
just walked into an old episode of 90210.”

I laughed. It was Leanne’s dry sense of
humor that had surprised me the most about her.

“Guys! Over here!” a voice called from the
other side of the yard. It was Kayla, sitting on one of several
chairs lining the patio and waving us over. R.J. stood next to her
at the grill, spatula in one hand and a beer in the other.

“I’ll catch up with you guys later,” Leanne
said as Owen led her away to join up with some people they knew at
the other end of the yard.

I repeated Dad’s parting warning from
before. “Be careful.”

She grinned. “You too.”

Michael and I joined Kayla and R.J. and a
few others on the patio. Virtually everyone around us appeared
either close to drunk or full-on drunk. I knew if I had one beer
I’d be passed out asleep on the lawn, so I stuck to water. Michael
had to drive me home later, so he did too.

“This is better than some stuffy ballroom,
huh?” Kayla said once we’d settled into some vacant chairs.
“Taylor, you looked
amazing
tonight.”

“Thanks,” I said. Kayla had been acting
extra nice to me since the night she inadvertently spilled about
Elena. She’d even called me a couple of days afterward to apologize
again for any problems she may have caused. She thought I knew all
about it, she swore, or else she never would have said anything. I
told her not to worry about it, that she’d done us a favor, really,
because it got a lot of things out in the open.

“What are your plans for the summer?” Kayla
asked me a while later. Michael and R.J. had gone into the house to
get more food.

“I’ll be working,” I said. This was only an
assumption on my part. I still had to find a job, and not many
places were eager to hire inexperienced sixteen-year-olds. But I
didn’t have much of a choice—my car wasn’t going to run on air.

“Same here.” She slapped a mosquito off her
arm. “Man, I can’t believe high school is over.”

“I know,” I said, even though I still had
two more years to go. Part of me wished I was graduating too, but
another part of me felt lucky to be two whole years away from
adulthood and the real world.

“You still have so much ahead of you,” Kayla
said with a sigh. “I envy that, a little.”

I was about to tell her that she sounded
like someone’s grandmother when something caught my eye,
distracting me. A flash of white fabric on smooth, tanned skin.
Elena Brewster. She was standing by the pool, wearing a tiny white
bikini that barely covered what needed to be covered. She was
stunning, more beautiful than I could ever hope to be. I felt that
familiar burn in my stomach.

“Hey,” Michael said from behind me. He
pressed an ice cold bottle of water against my bare shoulder,
trying to make me jump. But the cold felt good. He kissed the top
of my head before dropping into the chair beside me, keeping the
bottle on my skin the whole time. “How you holding up? Exhausted
yet?”

I shrugged and took the water from him. “I’m
okay.”

“Let me know when you feel like
leaving.”

“I will.”

My gaze kept returning to the pool. Elena
was still there, talking to a blond guy who floated in the water
right below her. Every few seconds she would glance around, as if
checking to see who was checking her out in her miniscule swimsuit.
Most of the guys in the yard
were
sneaking peeks at her,
even the ones who were with other girls. Those other girls stared
at her too, but in a narrow-eyed, “Who does she think she is?” kind
of way. She seemed to enjoy that kind of attention even more.

Then, as if she felt the weight of my gaze,
Elena looked in our direction. Her eyes met mine for a fraction of
a second, and then flicked over to land on Michael. I watched as
her mouth drooped ever so slightly, almost as if something had
disappointed her. I looked over at Michael too, fully expecting to
catch a look passing between them, or at least the understated
ogling thing all the other guys were doing. But he wasn’t looking
at her at all. In fact, he was looking at me.

Not at Elena. At me. Out of the two of us,
I
was the one always thinking about Elena Brewster.
I
was the one who cared.

Then suddenly I didn’t anymore. Sure, she
was beautiful. And she still wanted Michael. Wanted him so much
she’d probably never give up.

But I was the one who had him.

I let myself see her one last time. She was
laughing now as the guy in the pool splashed her, trying to entice
her into the water. “No!” I heard her squeal, and then she backed
away toward the lounge chairs, where she sat down and wrapped
herself in a towel. The blond guy, discouraged now, hoisted himself
out of the pool, leaving it empty except for a couple of beach
balls. The water rose and fell for a moment in his wake, but it
quickly became calm again. Irresistibly calm.