Saint Anything (19 page)

Mac started the truck and we backed out, still not talking. Finally he said, “It’s the only time I wish we actually did have another driver. When I see an order come in from here.”

“You’re pretty popular,” I agreed. From his expression, this was not the adjective he would have chosen. “What? Some people would be flattered to be so admired.”

“Would you?”

I thought about it for a second. “Probably not, actually.”

He nodded, as if this was what he’d thought I would say.

“But I’m kind of used to being invisible,” I continued. “So any kind of attention makes me nervous.”

This was something I thought a lot but had never said aloud. It was the first time, but far from the last, that I understood being with Mac had this particular effect on me. Before I could regroup, he spoke.

“You? Invisible?” He glanced at me, then turned on his blinker. “Seriously?”

“What?” I asked.

“I just . . . I never would have thought of you that way, is all.”

As he said this, I caught a glimpse of myself in the side mirror and wondered how, exactly, I did appear to him. “Well,” I said, “you don’t know my brother.”

We were at a light now, slowing to a stop. “Big personality, huh?”

I looked out the window, this time making a point not to see my own face. “He just . . . When he’s around, he fills the view. You can’t look anywhere else. I feel that way about him, too.”

“Sometimes it’s preferable to not be seen, though,” he said. “Before I lost the weight, people either stared or made a concentrated effort
not
to look at me. I preferred the second option. Still do.”

I thought of all those girls at the gym window watching him. How strange it must be to go from looking one way to such a vastly different other. For the attention to change and still not feel better. Maybe the invisible place wasn’t all bad, all the time.

“I think,” I said, “that the best would be somewhere in between. You know, to be acknowledged without feeling targeted.”

“Yeah,” he said as the light changed. “I’d take that.”

A car pulled suddenly in front of us, and Mac hit the horn. The lady behind the wheel shot us the finger. Nice.

“I still can’t believe that was you in the pictures I saw,” I said. “Did you really just lose the weight with diet and exercise?”

“A
strict
diet,” he said. “You tried those Kwackers. They were my
dessert
. And lots of exercise.”

“Like wandering in the woods.”

He shot me a look, then smiled, stretching his fingers over the wheel. “It was a free workout and right outside the back door. No excuses. Whenever I had time, I just went into the woods. I brought my GPS and tracked the route, so I knew how far I’d gone.”

I thought of the map I’d seen on his bedroom wall, the pencil marks. Tracing his way, out and back. “And you found the carousel.”

“
That
was a good day. I just rounded a corner, and there it was. For a long time I didn’t tell anyone about it, not even Layla. But eventually, it was too good a secret to keep.”

Good secrets,
I thought.
What a novel idea.
“I miss exploring the woods. My brother and I used to do it so much.”

“It’s not like it’s gone anywhere,” he pointed out.

“True.” I thought of Peyton, ahead of me, leaves crunching beneath our feet. “It just feels different now. Scarier.”

“Really?”

I nodded, then looked at his pendant. “Maybe I need a patron saint. Of wanderers. Or woods.”

“I’m sure they exist,” he told me. “They have them for everything. Boilermakers, accountants. Divorce. You name it.”

“You’re an expert, huh?”

“My mom is.” He sat back as we hit another light. “She always liked the idea of protection, but especially since she got sick. I’m not wholly convinced. But I figure it can’t hurt, you know?”

Sometimes, this was the best you could hope for. Not an advantage or a penalty, but the space between. “Yeah,” I said. “I do.”

Back at our meeting spot, Layla had still not shown up, so we parked by the curb to wait, Mac undoing the pliers to kill the engine.

“Thanks, by the way,” I said to him after a minute. “For bringing me along.”

“You like running deliveries?”

I turned to face him. “I do, actually.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” I paused, looking down at my hands. “It’s something about seeing all these people in their separate places. Like little snapshots of the whole world as it’s happening, simultaneously. Is that weird, to think of it like that?”

Straight-faced, he said, “Yes. Very.”

“Nice,” I told him.

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding.” He reached over, touching my wrist, his fingers the slightest weight there. “I get what you’re saying.”

“But you think it’s crazy, drawing some deep symbolism from pizza delivery.”

“A little,” he admitted. I made a face. “But I kind of like it. Makes the job seem more noble, or important, or something.”

“I’m such a moron,” I said, yet again speaking aloud a thought I had so much, it had worn a groove in my brain.

“Nah,” he said, tightening his fingers on my wrist. “You’re not.”

For a moment, we just looked at each other. It was late afternoon in the fall, the sky the pretty pink you only see right before sunset, like the day is taking a bow. I was in a new place, with someone I didn’t know that well, and yet it felt like the most natural thing in the world, another groove already worn, to lean forward as he did until we were face to face, his fingers still gripping my arm. Then Spence and Layla pulled up beside us.

We jerked back from each other, just as she lowered her window. Immediately, I felt guilty, not knowing what she’d seen. But it was Layla who said, “Hey. I’m sorry.”

Spence smiled. “You must be Mac.”

“Yep.”

Silence. Except for my heart, which was pounding in my chest and ears. But nobody else could hear that. I hoped.

“Isn’t his car awesome? It’s just like that one you’ve had your eye on,” Layla said to Mac, a bit too eagerly. When he didn’t reply, she sighed. “Look, it’s not his fault I didn’t tell you about him. I was just worried about how Daddy would react.”

“To keeping secrets and lying?” Mac asked. “I’m guessing not well.”

“Fine,” she said, throwing up her hands. “I’ll bring him to Seaside tomorrow, okay? Will that make you happy?”

“It’s not about me,” Mac said. Then, “We should go. Mom’s waiting.”

Layla looked back at Spence, then at us. “Let me just say good-bye, okay?”

Before he could respond, they’d pulled up and parked alongside the curb in front of us. As time passed, I could only imagine what was happening behind the tinted windows. Mac, looking equally uncomfortable, picked at a loose stitch on the steering wheel. Had I really just almost kissed him? It seemed unreal now, like something I’d dreamed. Or, if not, the best secret of all.

“Well,” I said finally, “I should get home, too, I guess.”

“You want a ride?”

“Nah. It’s only a block or so.” I opened the door. “Thanks for taking me along, seriously. It was fun.”

“Anytime,” he said. I smiled, then hopped out. As I shut the door and started to walk away, I heard him say, “Hey. Sydney.”

“Yeah?”

“You had on a shirt with mushrooms on it, and your hair was pulled back. Silver earrings. Pepperoni slice. No lollipop.”

I just looked at him, confused. Layla was walking toward us now.

“The first time you came into Seaside,” he said. “You weren’t invisible, not to me. Just so you know.”

I didn’t know what to say. I just stood there as Spence drove off, beeping the horn, and Layla climbed in where I’d been sitting. “Let’s go,” she told Mac, then looked at me. “See you tomorrow?”

Mac cranked the engine, and our eyes met again. Layla was digging in her bag, already distracted, so she didn’t notice that it was to him, and really only him, that I replied. “Yeah. See you then.”

CHAPTER
15

I TRIED
to stay away from Mac. I really did. But it was hard when Layla was always pushing us together.

“I just feel
bad
,” she said at Seaside one afternoon about a week after she’d brought Spence to meet her dad and, in doing so, made their relationship official. He wasn’t volunteering in the afternoons as much anymore—Layla claimed he’d overcommitted and decided to ease back, but I wondered if he’d just served out his hours—so I saw her only on days he had other obligations. “I never wanted to be the girl who dumps her best friend for her boyfriend.”

“You haven’t dumped me,” I said. “We’re here now, aren’t we?”

She nodded, then picked up a piece of her pizza crust, considering it for a moment before returning it to her plate. “But when I’m not, you can ride along with Mac. He said you liked doing that.”

“Layla.” I put down my pencil. “You don’t have to arrange babysitting for me. I’m fine.”

“I know, I know,” she said, putting her hands up. “I just—”

There was a beep as her phone lit up. She scanned the screen, smiling, then typed a response. Funny how just a couple of words from someone could make you so happy. But I got it, especially lately.

Since Mac had told me he remembered seeing me for the first time, something was different. Before, the thought that we might get together was a far-fetched fantasy, the most ludicrous of daydreams. But now, with Layla immersed in Spence, us hanging out more, and what had almost happened in the truck, there was a sense of inevitability about it. No longer if, just when.

* * * 

“That’s twenty-six forty-two, charged to your card,” I said to the frazzled-looking woman in the doorway wearing sweatpants and a rumpled cardigan. Behind her, several children were jumping on the couch in front of a TV showing cartoons.

Wordlessly she reached out for the two pizzas I was holding. As I gave them to her and she tipped me, one of the kids tumbled off the couch, hitting the carpet with a thud. There was a pause. When the wailing began, she shut the door.

“Five bucks,” I said to Mac as I climbed into the truck. “And I was right: only cheese pizzas means kids, and lots of them. You missed one doing a face-plant into the carpet.”

“Bummer,” he replied. He shifted into reverse. As I went to slide the bill into the plastic cup that sat in the console, he said, “You keep that. You did the work.”

I just looked at him. “I walked to the door.”

“It counts,” he told me. I put it with the rest anyway.

After a few days of delivering together, we had worked out a system: Mac drove and kept up with the orders waiting at Seaside, and I did the legwork, running in to get the food and taking it to customers. He claimed this was efficient, that his time was better spent coordinating the next stop and our return trips to pick up more orders. But I was pretty sure he was just indulging my interest in seeing what was behind each door.

“Sorority girls,” I reported from the next stop, at a big yellow house right across the street from the U. “Should have known it from all the salads.”

“Look at you. You’re like the order whisperer.”

“There is a science to it,” I agreed, sliding the tip in the cup. As I sat back, I realized he was looking at me. “What?”

“Nothing,” he said, smiling and shaking his head.

It was only a couple of hours every other afternoon or so, but no matter: this time had quickly become the best part of my week. Layla might have felt she needed to apologize for falling so hard, so quickly. She didn’t realize I was doing the same thing.

Just then, my phone beeped. It was the latest text from Jenn, one of several we’d exchanged while trying to work out a time to get together. With her after-school job tutoring and activities and my new routine with Mac, we’d gone from seeing each other at least once a week to hardly at all.

Frazier at 5?
she wrote now.
Off at 4:30. Mer can come late.

I looked at my watch. It was four p.m., which left me with another two hours with Mac before I was due home. I thought of Layla, all her apologies, and felt my own guilt for putting my friends second to a boy, especially one who wasn’t really mine. But then I did it anyway.

No can do. Tomorrow?

Gone till Monday,
she replied.
Next week for sure.

Which meant two more full afternoons without any other obligations. Jenn was a good friend, even when she didn’t realize it.

Definitely,
I wrote.
XXOO.

The last delivery of the day was in the Arbors, right inside the front entrance. It was for two extra-large pepperoni and sausage pies with extra cheese, and I’d had it pegged as guys for sure, probably ones drinking beer. Instead, the door was answered by a small, very tan woman in tennis whites who called me “hon” and tipped me ten bucks. I was thinking I’d lost my touch until I was heading down the driveway and noticed a sign on the truck we’d parked behind.
BASSETT CARPENTRY
, it said.
DECKS OUR SPECIALTY.
When I glanced into the backyard, I saw a group of guys digging into the pizzas. They were drinking beer.

“You’re like Layla with her face thing,” Mac told me when I relayed this to him. “Just be sure you use your powers for good, not evil.”

“I’ll try,” I replied as we pulled out of the driveway. We’d only gone a short way when I saw something. “Hey. Stop for a second.”

He did, and I turned to my window, peering closer. There, just across the street and beyond the sidewalk, was a small opening in the brush.

“What is it?” Mac asked.

“See that clearing? Between the skinny tree and the stump?”

He leaned across me. “Yeah.”

“That used to be the best path into the woods from this neighborhood. You could get on it right here, where the houses begin, and follow it all the way back to where I live. It went for miles. We always wondered who put it there.”

“Probably some kids, just like you.”

“There was this one part,” I continued as a car slowed, then passed us, “where there was a giant sinkhole. Huge. Somebody had managed to pull this fallen tree across it, and everyone always dared each other to walk across.”

“Did you?”

“No way,” I said, shuddering. “But Peyton did. He was the only one I ever saw do it.”

Just saying this, I could see it all so clearly in my head. The bareness of the trees in late fall. Broad blue sky. And me and those older kids we’d come across in the woods that day watching as my brother put one foot in front of the other, slow and steady, all the way across.

“We can go, if you want,” Mac said now. I turned, distracted, to face him. “We’ve got time. You can show me.”

I looked back at the path, barely visible. Who knew how it looked now, what was back there. Part of me wanted to see, especially if I wasn’t going to be alone. But another part, heavier, wasn’t ready. Yet.

“Maybe another time,” I said.

At six p.m., like always, we returned to Seaside so I could head home, while Mac kept delivering until close. Usually, for the rest of the evening I’d wonder what he was doing. It hadn’t occurred to me that he might do the same about me. But that night, when I was sitting on my bed doing some reading for English, my phone beeped.

3 deluxe, 2 pepperoni mushroom. 6 orders garlic knots. Go.

I smiled.
Has to be a team. All men.

A pause. I tried to go back to my book. Finally, a response: a picture of the sign in front of 7-10 Bowling Center.
Impressive,
it said below it.

I do my best,
I replied.

Will stump you eventually,
he wrote back.

I laughed out loud, alone in my room.
Bring it.

That was how the texting started. No longer was Layla the only one who kept her phone within easy reach at all times. At night while I was eating dinner and doing homework, Mac crossing town, then back again, we kept in touch. It was the next best thing to being there. Or maybe the best thing, period.

* * * 

“This is a collect call from an inmate at Lincoln Correctional Facility. Do you accept the charges?”

I could hear the garage door opening as my mom idled in the driveway. In just five minutes, she’d be inside. But Peyton was calling now.

“Yes,” I said.

There was a click, and then I heard my brother’s voice. “Hello?”

“Hey. It’s Sydney.”

“Oh. Hey.” He cleared his throat. “How are you?”

“Good,” I replied. “Mom’s just getting home. She’ll be here in a second.”

“Okay.”

We sat there for a moment, the only sound the empty buzzing of the line. Finally he said, “So, how’s school? I hear you’re at Jackson now.”

“It’s okay,” I replied. “Different. But I’ve made some friends.”

“That’s about all I can say about this place.” He laughed softly. “Although I’d pick high school over it any day of the week. And I hated high school.”

“You did?” I was genuinely surprised. For all that had happened, I’d never doubted that Peyton had enjoyed himself, at least when he wasn’t in trouble.

“Oh, yeah,” he said. “It was probably why I was such an idiot. Misery makes people do stupid things.”

It was so weird, talking like this. Like he was someone else I didn’t know at all. “Why was it so bad?”

He was quiet a moment. “I don’t know. The regular reasons. Bad grades, pressure from Mom and Dad. You know.”

But I didn’t, not really. I’d just assumed being the firstborn meant all the privilege; it hadn’t occurred to me that another level came with it, one of responsibility, everything happening to you first.

Thinking this, I said, “I saw that path the other day, the one we used to take into the woods here. Remember?”

He was quiet for a second. “Yeah. With the sinkhole.”

“Yeah,” I repeated. “You walked across it that time, on a dare.” As I said this, I realized how much I really did want him to remember.

After a pause, he said, “Not my brightest moment.”

Again, I was surprised. How much else did we see differently? “But you did it,” I said.

“Yeah.” He sighed. “Like I said, I did a lot of stupid things.”

Neither of us spoke for what felt like a long time. It was so awkward that I finally said, “So I’m looking forward to our visit. We all are.”

“Your visit?” he asked.

“The graduation. From your class,” I told him. “Mom’s been talking about it for ages.”

“You’re coming?” He sounded surprised.

“Yeah.”

“Oh.” A pause. “You don’t need to.”

“It’s okay. Mom said you’d filled out a form for me,” I told him.

“I did. But that was just for . . .” He trailed off. “It’s really not a big deal. I doubt anyone else’s family is coming.”

“Mom’s planning this whole thing, though.”

“She is?”

“Yeah.” I could hear my mom putting her keys in the door. “I’m, um . . . It’ll be good to see you. Finally.”

Silence, but a different sort. The kind that means not only that no one’s talking, but that something very specific is not being said. My mom came in carrying two bags of groceries, her purse over her shoulder. “Sydney. You’re home already.”

“Is that Mom?” Peyton asked.

“Yeah.”

“Can I talk to her?”

“Sure.” I walked over to where she was beginning to unload her bags. “Mom. It’s Peyton.”

“Oh!” She turned, smiling, and took the phone from me. “Hey, honey. What a nice surprise. How are you?”

I went back over to the kitchen table, where I picked up the plate, now empty, I’d used for the slice I’d brought home with me from Seaside. I’d only stopped in, as Layla was with Spence and Mac was at band practice. My after-school piece of pizza had become enough of a habit, however, that I found I couldn’t miss it, even when I was missing them.

“Well, I told you. I heard about it from Michelle.” My mom reached up to put a can of soup in the cabinet in front of her. “The family liaison I’ve been meeting with, who’s helping me communicate better with the administration at Lincoln.”

I was putting my plate in the dishwasher. Something in her voice, suddenly defensive, made me shut it slowly, quietly.

“Yes, I did, Peyton. Several times, in fact.” She took out another can, but this one she just held. “No, I do remember that discussion. But you said you would be ready, eventually, which is why you did the form. And I thought this would be a great opportunity—”

Distantly, I could hear my brother talking. A lot.

“I’m fully aware of that,” she said after a moment, so abruptly it was obvious she was having to interrupt. Then, “Because I don’t agree that it means we should abandon you, or not acknowledge your accomplishments. And—”

I picked up my backpack, pretty sure it was time to make my exit.

“Well, that’s not what Michelle thinks. And it’s not what I believe, either.” She put the can down on the counter with a thunk. “Well, I hope that you do. I think that if you really take the time to look at it—”

Another interruption from Peyton, louder this time.

“I think maybe we should table this for now. You’re clearly upset, and—” I watched as she reached up, putting a hand to her face. “Okay. Yes. Fine. Talk to you later.”