Just You (4 page)

“Ah, the joys of being short staffed.” She
beamed her smile on me and went back to the sink. “Hey,” she said,
running water over the casserole dish. “Jamie’s birthday party is
tomorrow. Want to give me a hand? I’m having it here at the
house.”

“Sure.”

She gave me another grin. Another quality I
liked about my stepmother was that she always seemed so
appreciative. I knew she felt grateful to have at least one teenage
girl around who wanted to spend time with the family on occasion.
Especially since her own daughter treated the place like a
pay-by-the-hour motel.

Months before our custodial weekend visits
with Dad started, I had begun to notice something quite
disconcerting about my stepsister Leanne: she hated us. All of us,
even Dad. We were intruders, unwelcome guests in her house.
Luckily, she wasn’t around often. In the year before Dad and Lynn
got married, I saw Leanne only a handful of times, so I barely knew
her when our families blended, and I still barely knew her two
years later. She kept herself scarce, spending most of her time
hanging around with her friends and pretending the rest of us
didn’t exist.

These days, I didn’t exactly feel like an
intruder anymore, but Lynn’s house still didn’t feel like home. To
my stepsister, I was just
there
. Like a coat rack, or a
lamp, only noisier and less useful.

Like now, for instance. She strode into the
kitchen and skirted around me, barely acknowledging my presence as
I stood there drinking my Coke. I could have been a chair.

“Where are you going?” Lynn asked her
daughter, her smile slipping. She didn’t sound confident and firm
the way my mom always did. Lynn’s face took on this softness—tinged
with a hint of guilt—whenever she looked at Leanne. Her first
husband, Leanne’s father, had been physically and mentally abusive
the entire time they’d been married. Then, as if that wasn’t
traumatic enough, he ended up dying in a car accident when Leanne
was ten. My stepsister had been through a lot over the years, which
I guess accounted for her wariness toward us.

“Lisa’s,” Leanne said as she grabbed her bag
and headed for the sliding glass doors to the deck and outside.
“I’ll be back tomorrow.”

“Now wait a second.” Lynn moved away from
the sink to follow her daughter. “I want you back first thing in
the morning. We’re having Jamie’s party, remember? I need your
help.”

Leanne paused at the door. “Whatever. I’ll
be here.”

As she turned to escape her blue eyes met
mine for a fraction of a second, showing nothing, and then she was
gone. Lynn stared after her as she descended the stairs off the
deck and disappeared around the house. When she turned to face me
again, her smile was back in place, wide and steady. My stepmom
never stayed discouraged for long.

“Two helpers for tomorrow,” she said, all
cheerful and bright. “Wonderful. Ten ten-year-olds…what was I
thinking?”

“Maybe slip some tranquilizers into the
cake.” I tipped my can, drained it, and then tossed it in the
recycle bin.

Lynn cocked her head, considering my
suggestion, as I slipped out of the room.

****

“What I wouldn’t give for your ta-tas,”
Robin said an hour later as we were getting ready in my bedroom.
She looked incredible in her black cami top and skin-tight jeans,
and I’d chosen my favorite jeans and a red tank top belonging to
Robin. Even I had to admit that I filled it out a lot better than
she did.

“What I wouldn’t give for your cheekbones,”
I replied in turn. We had this exchange often. She envied my
figure, I envied her everything.

At eight o’clock, we applied anti-frizz
cream to our hair and body glitter to our bare shoulders. We were
ready.

I did have to lie to my father a little bit.
I’d told him Robin’s mother was driving us to the party when in
fact her mother still hadn’t returned from her date the night
before. Devon was picking us up. Lynn had agreed to get us at
midnight, which I knew would be too early for Robin. She was used
to staying out until one or two at the earliest.

Before we left my room I found my black
sweatshirt and put it on. I didn’t want Dad to notice how skimpy my
top was.

“It’s really warm out,” Robin said. “Like
summer.”

“Nah, it’s a little chilly. Feels like
rain.”

“I’d show ‘em off proudly if I were you,”
she mumbled as we left my room.

“Would you stop talking about my tits?” I
snapped at her, just as Dad emerged from the kitchen and stopped in
front of us.

“Leaving?” he asked. He probably hadn’t been
paying any attention to what we’d been saying—he was perpetually
distracted—but my face burned anyway.

“Uh huh,” I said, seizing Robin’s arm and
skittering away like a cockroach that had been exposed to
light.

“Midnight!” Dad called after me.

On the porch, Robin and I burst into
giggles. “That was so embarrassing,” I said as we walked the short
distance to Robin’s house.

“Don’t worry.” She fished in her purse for a
cigarette. “It probably never even occurred to him that you
have
boobs. Fathers always see their daughters as little
girls, right?” She said this as if she were asking for
clarification on a totally foreign subject, which I guess it was,
for her.

The same silver car that had slid to a halt
across the street a couple of weekends ago did the same thing again
now. We started toward it. I had a passing thought of memorizing
the license plate number in case Devon turned out to be a serial
rapist, but I calmed down when I opened the door to the backseat to
find two extra passengers sitting there. Unless they all planned to
kill us collectively, I figured we were safe enough.

Robin made the introductions. Devon was
pretty cute, with golden blond hair and nice teeth. The other two
were Ethan and Jenna, a couple. They laughed amongst themselves—at
what, I didn’t know—the entire seven minute drive to Redwood Hills,
basically ignoring me in the process. I felt like a complete idiot
already and the night hadn’t even begun.

Devon pulled up to a house that I knew must
have cost at least five times what Mom had paid for ours.
Expensive-looking cars lined the long, paved driveway. I tried to
look cool and indifferent as we all walked up to the door. How did
Robin think I could possibly fit in here? How did she think
she
could fit in here? Like me, she was fifteen, a lowly
tenth-grader, and boringly average middle-class. Then again, Robin
was anything but boring or average. She was a chameleon, able to
blend in anywhere. I realized this as soon as we walked into that
huge, fancy house.

Me? I felt like I had a sign that read
IMPOSTER on my forehead.

Robin seemed to know
everyone
. By the
time we’d made our way though the modern rooms to the gigantic
finished basement where most people had gathered, drinking and
circling the pool table in the corner, she’d been stopped at least
six times to say hello to so-and-so. She introduced me each time
but the music was so loud and I felt so uneasy, I never did catch
the names.

“Come on,” she shouted to me over the
pounding beat of the music. “Let’s get a drink.”

She towed me toward the bar—yes, there was a
bar
in there, with stools and everything—where a cute,
clean-cut guy lined up bottles on the shiny surface.

“Hey, R.J.,” Robin greeted him.

R.J. flashed her a boyish grin as he dug
around underneath the bar. “How’s it going, Robin?”

“Great,” she said with her flirting face on.
She didn’t seem to mind that Devon had disappeared. “Will you pour
us some shots?”

“Sure. What can I get you?”

Robin looked at me. “Vodka?” I nodded and
R.J. turned his grin on me, making me blush. He grabbed a bottle
and two shot glasses, filling both to the rim. Robin tilted her
head and smiled coyly at him. “Thanks, bartender.”

“My pleasure,” he drawled, and I wondered if
this was his house and he raided his parents’ liquor cabinet every
weekend or if tonight was a special occasion.

Robin handed me my shot. “Let’s go together.
On the count of three.”

I’d never had a shot before. Just a couple
of beer at a party once. I peered down at the clear liquid and then
sniffed it.

“One…two…three,” Robin counted. On three we
both poured the vodka down our throats. Robin barely flinched while
I made a fool of myself almost choking to death. “You okay?”

“Uh huh,” I said, coughing.

“Want to do another?”

I cleared my throat and swallowed, trying to
get the nasty taste out of my mouth. “Not right now,” I said,
meaning
not ever again
.

Robin pulled two vodka coolers out of the
bar fridge before we ambled off to mingle some more. She popped the
tops off both bottles and handed one to me. “You’ll like this
better.”

I gingerly took a sip of the cooler. It
tasted sweet, nothing like the vodka we’d downed straight. I kept
sipping at it as Robin led me from one group to the other,
introducing me to dozens of kids who all had a word for her but
didn’t bother with me. She was Miss Socialite, obviously a fixture
at many of their past parties, and I was the tagalong.

At ten-thirty she left me for a few minutes
to go outside on the enormous two-tiered back deck for a smoke. I
stationed myself next to a leafy potted plant, not wanting to go
outside with her and her friends but not feeling comfortable inside
alone either. My cooler was almost gone, and I felt kind of buzzed
already. I downed the last inch of liquid in the bottle, placed it
on a nearby table, and glanced at my watch. Where in the hell was
Robin?

“Hey, you want me to bring you another one
of those?”

I looked up to see a smiling boy in a white
Polo shirt who was only slightly taller than my five foot four
inches. He had a buzz cut and squinty eyes that were peering at me
with great interest.

“Um, no thanks,” I said, flustered.

“You sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“You want to go sit down or something?” He
kept flicking glances at my boobs, as if he were waiting for an
answer from them instead of my mouth. Creepy.

“No, thanks.” I craned my neck toward the
basement door, hoping for any sign of Robin.

“Sure you don’t want another drink?” the guy
asked again. Obviously he couldn’t take a hint.

“I’m not thirsty,” I said, edging away.
“Well, I have to, um, use the washroom now.”

He gestured toward the six or so people
lining the wall near the bathroom. “Big line up. I could show you
where the other bathrooms are.”

“That’s okay, I don’t mind waiting.”

He ogled me one last time before moving off.
“Suit yourself.”

I really did need to go, so I darted over to
the bathroom queue with my head down and my arms folded over my
chest, feeling pissed at Robin for leaving me alone for so long. I
vowed, right then and there, to never let her talk me into anything
ever again. I was totally out of my element here. How could she
think this was fun? I felt like a child who’d crashed an older
sibling’s house party.

I was standing there in the unmoving line,
shifting my weight from one foot to the other to distract myself
from wetting my pants (I had what my doctor called an “overactive
bladder”), when the guy standing to my left suddenly started
speaking.

“He’s an asshole.”

It took a few moments to register that these
words were meant for me. Feeling even stupider than I already did,
I looked over at the owner of the voice and felt my stomach drop to
somewhere around my knees. Damn. This guy was hot.

“What?” I said, trying not to stare.

He nodded in the direction of creepy Buzz
Cut Boy, who was now talking to some other girl’s breasts. “Kurt
Doyle. He’s like that with all the girls.”

I scanned him quickly as he spoke—short dark
hair, blue eyes, tall, completely out of my league. “Oh,” I said,
dropping my gaze to the floor.

We shifted a few inches as another person
exited the washroom. My face felt like it was on fire, either from
the alcohol or from being in such close proximity to this guy. I
could feel the heat of his arm right next to mine, and he smelled
amazing. When he didn’t say anything in response to my last
comment, I began to wonder if I’d imagined him speaking to me at
all. But when we reached the front of the line, he spoke to me
again.

“You go ahead,” he said when his turn came
up. “I can wait.”

By then I was busting. “Are you sure?”

He nodded and I rushed into the bathroom
without any further conversation. It wasn’t until I was washing my
hands at the sink that I realized I had forgotten to thank him. I
quickly dried my hands and opened the door, expecting to see him,
but he wasn’t there anymore. He must have gotten tired of waiting
and gone in search of another bathroom. By the size of this house,
there had to be at least five or six.

As I squeezed my way back to the living
room, I spotted Robin over by the bar, sitting on a stool and
talking to Devon and, you guessed it, the cute boy from the
bathroom line. My heart did this weird fluttery thing and I slowed
my pace, which wasn’t difficult considering people were cutting in
front of me every five seconds.

“Taylor!” Robin called, waving her arm above
her head. “Over here!”

I shouldered my way through the bodies to
get to them. The music was deafening now and people seemed to be
getting drunker with each passing minute, including my friend, who
flung her arms around me as soon as she could reach me and breathed
wetly in my ear, “Just in time.”

In time for what, I didn’t know and didn’t
even want to guess.

As I looked on in amazement, Robin threaded
her arm through the hot guy’s arm, and then clutched my shoulder
with her free hand. “This is my friend, Taylor Brogan,” she said,
swinging her other arm over my shoulders and pushing me into a
sweaty, chubby guy who was wedged somewhere behind me. “The girl
I’ve been telling you about for, like, months now. She’s
finally
single.”