Saving Wishes (The Wishes Series) (10 page)

“Oh great.” I rolled my eyes. “And they say chivalry is dead.”

His hand swept my hair across my face. “It’s all about timing, Charlotte,” he breathed. I didn’t hate my name so much when he said it.

“Deal,” I whispered.

***

Nicole looked up from the magazine she was reading as soon as she heard the bell.

“Hi,” she said, grinning expectantly.

“Hello.”

“Where’s Adam?”

“On his way home I guess. He just dropped me off,” I replied casually.

It was too much to hope for to think Nicole would leave it at that. “Are you going to tell me
anything
?” she asked, grinning and frowning at the same time. “Are you okay? You seem a little weird.”

“I’m fine. And I’ve always been weird.”

Any intention I had of trying to explain the day’s events disappeared the minute Alex walked in.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, surprised. Surprise was good. Surprise meant he hadn’t seen my face glued to Adam’s in the car a few minutes earlier.

He picked up the magazine that Nicole had absently tossed aside. She was usually better at concealing the fact that she read the new magazines as they came in.

“I had to come. I missed you,” I explained, following him as he returned the magazine to the display stand.

He laughed. “Liar.”

The bell jingled and Gabrielle breezed in. Her eyes flitted between Alex and the floor. Mercifully, she barely glanced at me.

It occurred to me that Adam might have mentioned Alex’s crush to her. I couldn’t think of another explanation for her nervousness. I’d never seen her anxious before and it was a good feeling. It felt as if I’d inadvertently managed to unhinge both of them without even trying.

Gabrielle approached the counter leaving Alex high and dry, glued to the spot like an idiot.

“Hello, Nicole,” she greeted, smiling for the first time since she’d walked in. “I’d like ten stamps, please.”

Nicole reached under the counter, counting out loud as she unwound the roll of stamps. “Anything else?”

Gabrielle walked to my display of postcards and slowly examined the pictures scattered across the shelf.

“Did you have something in mind?” asked Alex, seizing the opportunity to speak. By the time he finished his sentence he was standing beside her like a loyal little puppy. If he’d been cursed with a tail, it would have been wagging.

I looked across to Nicole, still behind the counter with a strip of postage stamps wound around her fingers. The look on her face wasn’t what I expected. She looked irate. She tossed her head, rolling her eyes when she saw I was looking. The smile I gave her was weak and unreassuring.

“I have been collecting these,” she explained, pointing at the row of postcards. “I thought I had them all but Adam is under the impression that there are four different pictures from the cliffs overlooking the Cove. I wondered if I might have missed one.”

“Charli?” queried Alex, probably eager not to appear as oblivious as he actually was when it came to my photography. He levelled a look at me that Gabrielle didn’t see, warning me to behave.

“There are four,” I reluctantly confirmed. “We’re waiting on more being printed. They should be here next week.”

Gabrielle nodded. It bothered me that she was collecting them. Perhaps my postcards were being used in some strange Parisienne witch ceremony to cast evil spells on me. I knew she wasn’t from Paris – Adam took pleasure in reminding me that she was from Marseille every time he heard me refer to her as the Parisienne Witch. Marseillaise Monster didn’t quite have the same ring to it.

“What do you do with them?” I asked.

If she thought it was a dumb question, she didn’t let on. “I’ve sent some to my family and friends. I am also making an album, commemorating my time here,” she replied.

“Are you leaving town?” asked Nicole, a little too excitedly.

She looked embarrassed then, and I almost felt sorry for her. “Ah, no. I have travelled rather a lot in the past. I like to keep track of places I’ve been to. These pictures are just beautiful. I’ve tried taking my own but none have been quite as special as these.” She spoke slowly, as if trying to string words together in the right order although her English was more articulate than mine.

“I’ll make sure Nicole puts some aside for you when they arrive,” said Alex.

“Sure.” Nicole’s tone was acidic, but Alex was too dazzled to notice.

I spoke again. “I can print the original pictures for you if you’d like. They’d look much better in an album than postcards.”

Alex stared at me, his umber eyes boring through me as if looking for the ulterior motive – probably because there always was one. It felt as if tiny shards of glass were stabbing at my stomach as I waited for her to shoot me down with a French expletive.

“Thank you, but I actually like the charm of the postcards.”

“Okay.” I shrugged indifferently.

“I know you’ve been spending a lot of time with Adam lately. If you come to the house I could show you my albums.”

I searched for the catch, but found nothing. “I would like that,” I replied, horrified. It was easy to convince Adam that hanging out at Gabrielle’s house was a bad idea. It wasn’t going to be so easy when she’d openly invited me.

“Would you like to come for dinner tomorrow night?” Her voice almost seemed shaky. I’d never seen a single chink in her armour, until now.

“She’d love to,” Nicole shamelessly chimed in.

I ignored her. “No thank you...I’m busy.”

“Doing what?” Alex frowned at me.

I glared at him, scolding him with my eyes. It was a gesture that didn’t go unnoticed by Gabrielle. She looked to the floor, clearing her throat before speaking. “Maybe another time. Talk it over with Adam.”

“Um, okay.” I murmured, leaving Alex’s question unanswered.

An awkward silence swept over the café. Nicole finally broke it. “So, just the ten stamps then?” she asked cheerily.

Gabrielle walked to the counter. “Yes. Thank you,” she said, smiling politely. She bestowed a small smile upon Alex as she walked past him. It was the most simple of gestures but enough to make my six-foot-two brother buckle.

“See you, Charli,” she said.

That was inevitable. Even if I could think of a way of getting out of going to dinner, I still had to face her at school. I was beginning to feel overwhelmed, too far out of my comfort zone to find my way back.

7. Heavy Head

Weaselling out of shifts at the café was becoming increasingly difficult. Alex was on to me. Hanging out at the library for a day didn’t make me studious – it alerted him to the fact that I was falling behind.

Agreeing to cover a shift for Nicole while Carol dragged her to the dentist in Sorell for a check-up was a strategic manoeuvre on my part. According to Alex I was becoming unreliable and preoccupied, and I needed to prove him wrong. I wasn’t expecting to see Adam that day, so seeing the Audi parked at the café was a surprise. Skipping my usual afterschool rendezvous with him had done nothing but make our liaison in the library the day before seem even more awkward. I’d spent half the night analysing it and by morning my confidence was shot. He’d told me it was a timing issue, but I let darker thoughts creep in. Maybe it was a Charli issue. I was hopeful of stealing the minute I needed with him to set everything straight but the instant I got out of the car, I knew it wasn’t going to happen.

Adam sat at one of the two tables on the veranda, deep in conversation with Jasmine Tate. He looked up and saw me.

“Charli,” he breathed, sounding relieved.

“Charli, we were just talking about you.” Jasmine’s voice oozed innuendo.

“I’ll bet you were.” I dragged myself up the four small steps.

“I had no idea you and Adam were such good friends,” she purred. Adam shifted uncomfortably in his chair.

“I think you’ve been misinformed. We barely know each other.” My tone was ice. “Maybe you should vet your sources a little better.”

Jasmine threw her head back and gave her trademark shrill cackle. “Oh, poor Charli. You just can’t catch a break can you?”

I knew exactly what she was referring to – and it made me want to crush her like a bug.

Adam seemed to be having trouble understanding my about-face. “Charli, please sit down,” he said politely, motioning to a chair next to him.

“Yes, go ahead. I was leaving anyway,” said Jasmine, as if I needed her permission.

“No, I’m not staying,” I said.

Adam groaned. We’d been down this road before. I didn’t know how not to hurt him when flee-itis set in. I just wished it wasn’t playing out in front of a Beautiful.

“Of course you’re not staying,” he said. “You’re going to run away.”

Content that her evil work was done, Jasmine smiled. “I’m just going to leave you two to it,” she said, and tottered down the steps in her dangerously high heels.

Neither of us acknowledged her. Neither of us even looked at her. The look Adam gave me wasn’t kind, and I deserved it.

“Sit down, Charlotte.”

I sat.

“I can’t believe that’s its only just occurred to me that all the time we spend together is alone – which suits me fine. The problem is, I’ve been so wrapped up in you that I never realised we were hiding. I’ve just endured twenty minutes of interrogation from Jasmine.”

“What did you tell her?”

“Nothing scandalous,” he said, matching my sore tone. “You never told me this was supposed to be a secret.”

“It’s not a secret.”

Adam pulled in a deep breath through his nose. “You’re reckless and impulsive, yet guarded and secretive at the same time. You can’t have it both ways.”

“You don’t know what she’s capable of,” I warned.

“Do you seriously think she’d ever get the best of me? I don’t think so, Charli.”

“You wouldn’t even see it coming.”

He shook his head, muttering something under his breath.

“Jasmine Tate is a twin,” I told him, right out of left field.

“Lily and Jasmine are twins?”

I shook my head. “She has a twin brother. His name is Mitchell and he is the reason I’m so jaded and mean a lot of the time.”

“I’m sorry Charli, but for what it’s worth, she never mentioned a word about it.”

“No, of course she didn’t. She’s saving it for another day.”

Adam reached across the table for my hand but I pulled away. “Beat her to it.” His tone was rough, like he was daring me to be brave.

“Excuse me?”

“If you’re worried about her telling me something, tell me yourself,” he urged.

I wished I could say there was nothing to tell. I hated that I had to suffer the indignity of explaining it to him, but if I didn’t, he might finally break and wash his hands of me.

The Tate family lived in a majestic-looking house on a huge vineyard on the south side of town. Their father had made his fortune producing wines that rivalled the best in the country. The Beautifuls seemed to think they were society debutantes because of it.

Mitchell was nothing like his sisters; his ideas were different. He moved into a shack on the property as soon as his parents, allowed. The epitome of free-spiritedness, he wanted to conquer the world by surfing every beach on it. He never played by the rules, never cared much about consequences; and I gravitated towards him because of it.

Our relationship was tricky to define. It was like a strange dance, always stepping sideways and never quite meeting in the middle.

When he and his best friend Ethan decided to embark on a journey around the world with nothing more than a couple of hundred dollars in their pockets, I had no right to object. We were friends and nothing more. But in the days before he left, when the excitement in him was brewing, the total hopelessness of it all started to crush me. I didn’t want him to leave. I toyed with the idea that it might have been because I loved him. Looking back, I think it was just that I needed to have him around.

The single biggest regret of my life occurred on the day before he left. I lied to Alex, telling him I was staying at Nicole’s, and headed to Mitchell’s place after school, convinced that I could make him stay.

“I was dumb enough to think I was enough to hold him here,” I told Adam.

“So you told him how you felt?”

I looked across the table at him, wondering how I was going to tell him I’d done something much worse.

“I spent the night in his bed – as if that was the very best I had to offer.” I paused, expecting him to stand up and leave. But he didn’t. I sucked in a sharp breath and continued. “I gave him every single part of me and he left anyway.” I looked into his eyes, expecting to see the revulsion I felt for myself. All I saw was concern. He was honestly good to the core. “His sisters found out. The whole town knew before I even got home.”

“I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “That must have been horrible.”

“My name was mud. My name is
still
mud. It was a stupid thing to do and the only one who regretted it more than I did was Mitchell.”