Punk Like Me (29 page)

Bad idea, bad, bad, very big bad idea.

Soaking wet, her hair streaming down her back, Samantha stood before me as naked as the day she was born. If I said she was beautiful before, I lied. She was breathtaking. Her eyes, now a calm and deep blue, held mine, and I felt my pulse pounding in my neck, realizing, as if I’d never thought of it before, that I had always felt that way—how every single one of her smiles was like the sun breaking through the clouds for me, and her tears broke my heart; how we always found a reason to sit next to one another; how much I wanted her shoulder against mine every time we joked, or her hand on my waist as she leaned over my back to grab something that was out of my reach when we were doing detention or whatever silly thing.

I also realized that it wasn’t too much purple Hi-C and clear liquors that had made me feel the way I had at the beach—it was Samantha—it was me.

I watched the color of Samantha’s eyes deepen, and now they were like a night ocean under the moon, and they were closer to me than they’d been before.

I had a funny revelation: I actually liked detention because Samantha and I spent time together; that we would have, should have spent more time together this summer, except her life had blown up in a horrible and tragic way and she needed the time, so I became close with Kerry and now…Kerry. I was fucking stupid.

Suddenly I realized that I was staring, that I was just as naked, and I blindly reached for the taps to shut the water off, my face steaming hot.

“I’m done.” I grabbed my towel and threw it over my head to hide the blush I could feel burning a path up my cheeks. “I’ll see you in a few,” and wrapping myself in the towel, I rushed off to my locker and my clothes.

Stupid, Nina, fucking stupid, I told myself over and over as I shoved myself into my underwear and bra. Just motherfuckin’ stupid.

Maybe my father was right after all; I was too stupid to fucking live, I thought bitterly as I jammed my feet into my boots.

I packed my gear and sat on the bench. Great. Fuckin’ great. I had a situation here and one waiting for me the second I opened the door to the main hallway.

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PUNK LIKE ME

Samantha came up out of the showers, and I faced the long end of the bench, away from her so she could dress privately. “Sam?” I asked as I heard her start to jam things into her bag, “would you mind if I followed you to the bridge from the parking lot? I’m not really sure of how to get back to the Island from here.” Samantha closed the locker and dropped her bag on the bench, good indications that she was dressed. I stood and turned around, and she was shaking her head. “You’re not driving,” she said incredulously.

“I’m driving you.”

She hefted her bag over her shoulder and I slung mine. We did a quick check of the locker room as we made our way to the exit, making sure no one and nothing had been left behind.

“Nah, Sam, Kerry’s here. She’s got my brother with her, and she doesn’t have a permit—I do. I can’t let her drive my brother like that.” We kept walking and, Þ nally, there was the door. Samantha put her hand out and leaned on it, holding it closed so I couldn’t open it. I turned to face her.

“I’ll take Nicky, too,” she offered decisively. “She can drive herself. Those are her own consequences for doing something so fuckin’

stupid.” Samantha’s face was severe.

“I can’t do that, Sam. She’s my, well, she’s”—I didn’t want to say it, not now; I wasn’t sure anyway and it was too weird—“she’s my friend, and I can’t leave her like that.” Samantha huffed and looked at the ground, then back at me. She was deÞ nitely mad. “I don’t like your,” and her lip curled in anger,

“girlfriend.”

Ooh, that came out nasty and cold, and I got angry in return. I could feel my eyes glint back at hers. “Then
we
,” and I paused for emphasis, “have a problem,” and I swung open the door and stepped out. I was so damn angry I almost couldn’t think, and I didn’t know how to explain it to Samantha, anyway.

Of course it was a better idea, safer all around, to go with Samantha.

But let’s just see here a minute. I had just made, no, Kerr and I had just, um, shared this big, momentous, incredible, Þ rst-time, life-altering thing the night before.

Telling her to go fuck off after all of that, after she’d taken the risk of borrowing her parents’ car and driving to see me at my meet,

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didn’t seem like the right thing to do, did it? It didn’t to me. Even if it was dumb. And wrong. And just stupid. And even if we hadn’t “done the deed,” so to speak, what kind of a friend would I be to let someone else just go blindly into trouble like that? Especially if, wrongheaded or not, she had done it for me. At the very least, I could take some responsibility for the situation and try to make it a little better. Besides, Nicky and Kerry were both younger than me, even if it was only by a little bit. I was older—it was my responsibility.

I took a few steps into the corridor, fuming, letting myself breathe it all out. Samantha came out behind me. “Nina, that’s not what I meant to say, I just think—”

Sister Attila on one side, Nicky and Kerry on the other, were bearing down on us. Nicky, holding Kerry’s hand, came running over.

“That was great! You guys are incredible! I didn’t know you could swim like that!” he enthused as he arrived and gave me a one-armed hug, which I returned enthusiastically. Kerry joined in on the other side, and I gave them each a kiss on the cheek.

“Thanks, guys,” I told them, untangling myself from the tangle of arms, “it’s a very good team. Oh, by the way,” and I turned to include Samantha, “this is Samantha Cray,” I said to my brother, “otherwise known as Blade.”

“Dude!” Nicky exclaimed, and put his hand out, “you put the ice in dice, man! You were awesome out there!”

“Thanks, just part of being on a good team—we carry each other.” Samantha smiled at Nicky and shook his hand.

Nicky smiled back, then remembered something. “Oh, this is…” he started to introduce Kerry.

“They’ve met,” I told him ß atly and just then, Sister arrived.

“Boyd, Cray, ending the day the way we started it, I see?” Sister asked with a smile, then turned to get a good look at Nicky and Kerry.

“You must be her younger brother Nicholas. I can see it in your face.” Nicky blushed and dropped Kerry’s hand.

Don’t ask how Sister knew that, other than the obvious fact that Nicky and I look very much alike. Nuns know everything. Nuns have Þ les and archives. Nuns read everything. Nuns ask everything and extrapolate arcane knowledge of the universe and what you really did during lunch and summer break. Accept that, and life is easier, much, much easier. Scarier, yes, but still easier. Besides, even if they don’t

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know everything, they’re hooked up at the source—they have a direct connection to God, remember?

“Yes, Sister, I am,” he stammered. “Pleased to meet you.”

“Pleased to meet you as well, Nicholas. I do hope that you’re as proud of your sister as we all are,” and she glanced at me, still smiling,

“and that you follow her example both in school and in sport?” The smile she had for Nicky could only be described as kindly.

Samantha and I looked at each other in surprise, and my jaw almost hit the ground. Proud? Of me? The last words Sister had had for me personally were about being stupid and drowning, and that was not too long ago. Where was Attila and what had they done to her? A spaceship was hovering over the campus somewhere, I just knew it.

Nicky’s face turned almost purple. “I try, Sister,” and he glanced at his sneakers, “but she’s so very good at everything!” He gazed back at her earnestly.

My face ß amed and my ears burned. That most certainly wasn’t true, and I wished he hadn’t said it. I knew better than anyone else how stupid I really was, and if I forgot it, I had my father and Sister Attila to remind me. Every single day.

Sister chuckled. “Well, dear boy, it’s all in the trying, isn’t it, girls?” and she angled her chin at me and Samantha to conÞ rm.

“Yes, Sister,” we both nodded in agreement, still mildly numb from this new facet of Sister Attila we had never seen before—ever. I mean that.

“And you’re not her little sister Nanny, are you,” stated Sister, visually measuring Kerry. “A friend of Mr. Boyd’s or a fan of our Razor?”

Kerry blushed and ducked her head. “Um, a little bit of both, actually,” she answered from under her hair.

“I see,” Sister said, as she slowly surveyed Kerry head to toe. To tell you the truth, she probably did see. All things aside, she was one very, very sharp person—which is probably how she became a math teacher in the Þ rst place. The other possibility that remained was that she read minds—and that was never to be discounted as an option.

Forget that at your own risk.

She looked at us all for a moment, then turned to Samantha.

“As a team captain, you’ll be taking Razor here home, yes?” she asked in a tone that implied this was an order and not merely a request

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for information. Sister turned back to Kerry and Nicky. “Since neither one of you is of legal age or Ms. Boyd’s legal guardian, and this is a school event,” she paused to let her words sink in, “I can’t allow her to go home with anyone but a parent or a school representative, someone who can be legally responsible. I’m sure you understand that, don’t you?” Sister kept smiling. I had to wonder if Sister had been listening at the door to Samantha and me earlier, then dismissed the thought; she’d been down the hallway at the time.

Actually, I found out later from Nicky that Sister had been sitting near them during the race, and some logical deduction of my own says she probably heard them talking about Kerry’s “borrowing” the car.

Nicky’s eyes widened in surprise, but Kerry wore a bland expression. “Oh, no problem, Sister,” she said, very politely. “We were going to let Nina drive because she has her permit, but Nicky has his license.” Kerry shot me a quick look. “So we’ll just catch up with her and Captain Shark at home,” she Þ nished with a smile of her own that showed all of her teeth, and reached for Nicky’s hand again.

Now you’re probably wondering why that didn’t bother me, Nicky and Kerry holding hands, I mean, and to be honest, I didn’t think anything of it. Hugging and holding hands and stuff wasn’t unusual among my group of friends. Why would I think anything about a friend holding another’s hand, anyway?

“I thought it was Blade?” Nicky questioned Kerry in an undertone, but she elbowed him into silence.

I glanced over at Nicky. License? I mouthed silently from the corner of my mouth.

He blushed and stared at the ß oor. “Dad took me a few weeks ago,” he whispered to his sneakers. “I’ve got my card.”

“Oh. Okay.”

Well, that was news. Nobody had told me about that—why hadn’t Nicky told me? Waitaminute, why hadn’t my father asked me or taken me? What the fuck was that all about?

Sister had been watching us in her usual observant silence, and when she spoke again, it jolted me out of that train of thought, and I forgot it until later, much later.

“Is everyone out of the locker room, Ms. Cray, Ms. Boyd?”

“Oh, yes, Sister, it’s all clear.”

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“Yes, Sister,” I conÞ rmed.

“Fine, then. Ladies, gentleman,” she nodded to us all, “have a good night. Ms. Cray, Ms. Boyd,” she addressed Samantha and me directly, “I’ll see the two of you tomorrow,” and she turned and started down the hallway.

“Have a good night, Sister,” and “Very nice to meet you,” we all variously called out.

The four of us just stood there awkwardly, then I turned to Nicky.

“You have your fuckin’ driver’s license?” Nicky blushed again. “Uh, yeah, Dad’s been teaching me Saturday mornings, when you’re at practice. It was supposed to be a surprise thing, so I could go out and, you know, do stuff with you and other, um, things.” The red of his cheeks reached his ears as he stared down at his sneakers.

I was furious. Nicky was my younger brother, not my older brother.

I couldn’t drive but he could? What the fuck was that? I was speechless with indignation.

“Hey, Nina, that’s how we got here,” Kerry volunteered, and I favored her with a dark look. She could have, should have just told me that before.

Samantha, silent this whole time, readjusted her bag on her shoulder. “Well, let’s get going, shall we?” she asked nonchalantly, and she began to walk down the corridor, in the same direction that the good Sister had.

I stared wordlessly at Kerry and Nicky as they stood holding hands. I was still silent, still angry. I felt trapped, confused, and even bewildered. “Do Mom and Dad know where you are?” I was Þ nally able to focus enough for a logical question to Nicky.

“Yeah, they know I was coming to your meet, and that I’m out with Kerry.”

I searched his face closely. He was sincere. “They didn’t give you a hard time?” It was weird that they wouldn’t, since my dad wasn’t her biggest fan.

“No, why would they?”

No, why would they? I asked myself. It was just me. The problem, the burden, the freak of nature too stupid to fucking live. “Fine,” I shortly returned, “let’s go,” and I started walking in the direction Samantha had

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gone, Kerry and Nicky following me.

When we Þ nally got outside to the parking lot, there were only about a dozen or so cars in it. Samantha was already waiting by hers; Nicky and Kerry had parked just one row over. I could see the metallic gold Cadillac that was Kerry’s parents’ glinting dully in the talllights that lit the asphalt.

A black Lincoln with the headlights on faced Samantha’s car.

Sister. Making sure we all got out and home in the right way.

I made my way to Samantha’s car, and Kerry and Nicky went over to Kerry’s. I stood by the passenger door.

“You coming?” Kerry called from the gold monster, where Nicky had already slid into the driver’s seat.