Secrets She Left Behind (18 page)

Andy

“I
CAN’T READ THIS ONE,” KIMMIE SAID. SHE STOOD BY THE
cork wall in my room. She was writing things from my calendar into her special phone that has a calendar in it. At night when we talk, she reminds me what I have to do tomorrow.

“What one?” I got up from my desk where I was doing organizing and walked to the cork wall.

“This one.” She pointed at the October 2 square. It was Mom’s handwriting. Usually I could understand it, but not when she wrote uphill. I turned my head sideways to try and read it.

“Shergletropskinder,” I said.

Kimmie laughed. She thought I was funny a lot of times. “Say it again,” she said.

“Shergletropskinder.”

She giggled so hard she had to flop onto my bed. I loved when she laughed ’cause a lot of times she was serious. Like Mom. I flopped next to her and laughed, too. My ceiling had little stars on it that lit up at night from when I was a kid. I could see them now even though it wasn’t dark.

I turned to see Kimmie. She was looking at the ceiling and I just stared at her because it wasn’t impolite to stare if she didn’t know I was doing it. She was so pretty. I wanted to hug and kiss her. She
had on a green shirt like her eyes and I liked how it went over her breasts like hills. I would’ve really liked to touch them. I never did, except when I hugged her and could feel them on my chest. I had a hard-on again. I had one most of the time around Kimmie.

I knew a lot about sex even though I never did it. Uncle Marcus told me stuff a long time ago. Mom did, too, but she never explained about hard-ons and everything because of being a girl. I also seen magazines Max brought to school sometimes. Max called hard-ons boners. One thing I knew was that you weren’t supposed to do sex unless you loved somebody and you were supposed to use a condom, too. So I started thinking about the condom Uncle Marcus gave me back when he did the sex-talk thing. I found it in my clutter drawer a few weeks ago, but the date on it said 10/07 which meant it was too old.

“Okay!” Kimmie all of a sudden sat up. “Back to work. Did you organize your desk?”

I sat up, too, so she wouldn’t see my hard-on. “Almost all of it,” I said.

Kimmie was a neat freak. Uncle Marcus called her that and Mom said, “Don’t knock it.”

“Okay,” she said. “Then we can do our homework now.” She walked over to my desk to get our book bags. She has a bad limp because of her foot, but it doesn’t hurt her.

We were at the movies once and a girl called Kimmie a gimp. I didn’t know what it meant, but I knew it was mean. Like when somebody called me retard. I wanted to hit the girl. I used to actually do it—hit people when they said things I didn’t like. But now I had self-control. Instead, I just told Kimmie not to listen and about the sticks and stones and everything. Kimmie said the girl was just an igoramus. That was a funny word and made me laugh. So
instead of hitting the girl and getting in trouble, I was laughing. My life was lots better with Kimmie in it.

Kimmie gave me my book bag and sat next to me on my bed. We both liked to do homework sitting on our beds. It was one of our things in common. I opened my book bag and pulled out a bunch of papers.

“Your book bag is a total mess,” Kimmie said. “You should clean it out before you start.”

“Yeah, you’re right.” I never cleaned it out. I wasn’t even sure which papers were my homework and which were old.

Kimmie leaned against the wall and started reading her history book. I sat on the end of my bed and dumped all the things out of my book bag onto my dresser. It
was
a mess. I even had cigarettes in there that were so old I forgot about them. I got my trash can and started putting the old things in it. I found a card from Maggie. It was a thank-you card she made in prison, but I couldn’t remember why she thanked me. She drew a picture of a big yellow flower on it. I didn’t want to throw it away, so I pulled out the clutter drawer of my dresser and put it in there. I could hardly get my clutter drawer open. I’m allowed to keep it messy, though, so it was okay. Even Kimmie knew I was allowed to keep that drawer messy.

“Do you need help?” Kimmie asked.

“I’m good,” I said.

I found some tests with B and C on them and put them in my clutter drawer, too. Then I found an envelope. I thought it was a note from a teacher I forgot to give Mom until I turned it over.
Keith,
it said on it. I was confused.

“We’re going to invite Keith to move in with us,” I said to Kimmie. I kept staring at the envelope, trying to remember.

“The boy whose mother is missing?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s so cool. Two more kids and your family’ll be as big as mine.”

Why did I have that envelope? Then I remembered it was mail for him from the day I was sick. That was so long ago. He’d make fun of me that I forgot to give it to him. I threw the envelope in my clutter drawer and pushed it all the way to the back.

Sara
His Wife
1990

I
F I HAD TOLD ANYONE ABOUT MY LIFE, THEY WOULD HAVE
thought I was out of my mind. I was married to a man I didn’t love, expecting the baby of a man who was my soul mate—although not my lover; not since that one time—and I was nurturing a friendship with that man’s barely functional wife. Why? Because I felt his love for me even though he could promise me nothing more than that. Because every time I was in the Free Seekers Chapel with him on Sundays, I still felt lifted up by the space, by the sound of his voice, by the way people responded to him. Because there was an honesty between us we couldn’t have with anyone else. And because I made a decision to appreciate the richness of what he could give me instead of focusing on the limitations. Yet the longing would always be there. Always.

I worked out a schedule with Jamie to check on Laurel, bringing lunch over to the Sea Tender once a week, making sure she was at least out of bed. By then, Laurel had started drinking. Jamie wasn’t sure how bad it had gotten. I hadn’t actually witnessed her drinking, but I’d seen empty wine-cooler bottles in the kitchen.

“It’s Marcus’s influence,” Jamie said. Marcus had moved out of
the Sea Tender and now lived next door. “I appreciate that he’s keeping an eye on her, but I think he brings booze over and encourages her to drink with him.”

I was four months along when I decided it was time to tell Laurel about my pregnancy. It was a sparkling November afternoon, and we ate sandwiches I brought to the Sea Tender—or rather, I ate a sandwich, while Laurel picked at hers. Laurel didn’t seem quite as down as she usually did, though, and I was amazed when she agreed to join me for a walk on the beach.

“Bare feet in November!” I said as we walked near the water’s edge. “I’m
never
going back to Michigan.”

“Good,” Laurel said. “I’d hate for you to leave.”

I looked out to the horizon. When Laurel said things like that, I felt the depth of my deception. What had happened to my self-respect? My integrity?

“Well, I’m not going anywhere,” I said when I got my emotions under control, “but things
are
about to change.” I rested my hand on my stomach. “I wanted to tell you before it became obvious,” I said.

“You’re
pregnant?
”

I nodded. “Due in May.”

“Congratulations!” Laurel said. “Is Steve excited?”

I laughed. “Oh, you know Steve. Always cool, calm and collected.” I had a sudden, almost irresistible urge to tell Laurel the baby was Jamie’s. To finally bring this thing to a head. But I couldn’t do that to him. I just couldn’t.

I couldn’t even do it to Laurel.

Keith

J
EN LOOKED EVEN BETTER THAN I REMEMBERED HER FROM
the grocery store. When she opened the door to the house where she was staying, she had on this short little strappy dress, one of those that made certain girls look pregnant even though you knew they weren’t. On a girl like Jen, the way it hardly covered her ass, it just made her look hot. Her legs were long and curved just right, and her feet were bare.

“Hey,” I said. I tried not to think about how I must look to her.

“Hey.” Her smile was so sexy, but I hardly had a chance to take it in before she put her hand on the back of my neck, leaned forward and Frenched the hell out of me.
Damn.

We were still kissing as I staggered into her house, thumping into the doorjamb with my knee, just managing to get the door closed behind me. Then I was devouring her. I was unstoppable, and she didn’t want to stop, either. You could tell when a girl really wanted it and when she was just faking, and this one
wanted
it. She was every bit as hot as she looked. She had me flat on the living-room floor before I knew it, straddling me, tossing that hair around. I reached up to touch her breasts, braless beneath the slippery stuff her dress was made out of. Her nipples pressed against my palms, and I ran my thumbs over them.

It took me about twenty seconds to discover she had no panties on under that dress. I knew chicks liked sex slow, but damn. What was I supposed to do? It’d been way too long. She rubbed against me through my jeans. I finally held her hips still.

“I’m gonna come if you don’t stop it,” I said.

She laughed, leaning forward to kiss me, and I reached between us to touch her. She was wet, slippery as silk. I groaned, and she undid my zipper and whipped off my jeans like she did it every day of the week. Then she sank onto me. I tried to hold back, but two thrusts and it was over.

“Sorry,” I said when I managed to catch my breath. I could usually hold out long enough to get girls to come. I used to be good at it.

She laughed in my ear. “That’s okay, baby,” she said. I felt her muscles tighten around my cock. “You needed it.”

We lay like that awhile longer, with her head on my chest and my aching arms around her. Her hair smelled incredible, the scent just about making me drunk. I needed another Percocet, but I didn’t want to move.

“Are you cold?” I asked, rubbing her left arm with my right. I felt my cock slip out of her.

“Not at all. You?”

“No.” I twisted some of her hair around my fingers. “You smell like oranges. Orange and vanilla. Creamsicles.”

She laughed. “Is that bad?”

“Uh-uh. It’s excellent.”

“Let’s move to the bedroom.” She got to her feet and reached down to help me up. I thought briefly about dinner—I could smell that she actually
had
cooked something—but right then I didn’t care if I never ate again.

Her bedroom was massive, the bed bigger than my whole room in the trailer. We got naked and under the covers and she wrapped her arms around me.

“Are you in pain?” she asked.

“Uh-uh.” I’d hesitated half a second too long before answering.

“Yes, you are, too,” she said. “Can I get you some aspirin?”

“I have pain meds in my jeans pocket.” My jeans were on her living-room floor and I didn’t feel like letting go of her to get them.

But she hopped out of the bed before I could stop her, and in another minute was handing me my bottle of pills and a glass of water. I popped a couple of the Percocet. Any more action like we’d had in the living room, and I’d need every milligram.

She climbed back into bed again, wriggling over next to me.

“I’m sorry you have pain,” she said.

I kissed her. “It’s all right,” I said.

“Are you angry?” she asked.

“What?”
I thought she meant about attacking me at the front door before I’d even had a bite to eat. “About what?”

“Your…the pain.”

“You mean the burns.”

“Yeah.”

Oh, yeah. I was angry.

“Do you know the whole story about the fire?” I asked.

“You mean, how that Maggie Lockwood girl was trying to help out her boyfriend by starting a fire so he could be some big hero, and—”

“She didn’t actually
start
it.” I interrupted her. “That’s the thing. She—”

“I remember reading about it,” Jen said. “She planned it and poured the gasoline around the building and then chickened out when she realized there would be kids in the building. But one of the kids lit a cigarette and tossed down the match and—”

“That was me,” I said. Then I laughed. “Cured me of smoking, that’s for damn sure.”

“Oh, Keith,” she said. “You don’t blame yourself, do you?”

“Hell, no. I blame Maggie.” I thought of telling her how Maggie and I were related, but just didn’t feel like getting into all that. “I hate that bitch. Our mothers were friends when I was a kid, so I was always stuck playing with her and her brother.” I could tell her about my mother going missing, but I didn’t want to think about that tonight, either. “Her brother, Andy, was so weird,” I said. “Turned out Maggie was even weirder, though she was good at putting on the normal act.”

“Andy’s the one they thought started the fire, right?”

“Right.”

“How could she let him take the blame?” she asked. “Did she have a crappy relationship with him or what?”

“The opposite of crappy,” I said. “She’s really protective of him. She and her mother even tampered with evidence to try to get him off.”

Jen suddenly sucked in her breath. “I think I just figured something out,” she said. “Though I hope I’m wrong.”

“About what?”

“Your mother’s not that woman who just went missing, is she?”

“That’s the one.”

“Oh, no. How
awful.
” She leaned up on an elbow. “I’m sorry. Have you heard anything? Does anyone know what happened?”

“The cops are supposedly looking for her, but they think she left
by choice, which is bullshit. I feel like I should be doing something myself, but I don’t know what.”

“Like looking for her?”

“I don’t know.”

“It must be so terrible for you. I wish I could do something to help.” She ran her fingers across the ruined half of my face. My muscles tightened up. Only my mother had touched those scars, and that was just because she was supposed to massage them to keep adhesions from forming.

“Did I hurt you?” she asked.

“No.”

She touched my cheek again. Her eyes were on my skin and I tried not to pull away. To hide. She leaned over me, pressing her lips to my cheek. Kissing it. When she lifted her head away, I saw tears in her eyes. I touched one of them where it hung on her lower lashes. My throat tightened up.

“I’m all right,” I said.

She smiled. “I know you are. And you’re beautiful. You’re a beautiful man. Do you know that?”

I laughed. “No, I don’t know that at all,” I said. If another girl had told me that, I would’ve thought she was mocking me. Not only wasn’t I beautiful, I was only seventeen. Not exactly a man. But I had the feeling Jen was being totally real.

“You are,” she said. “And you have the most amazing, big brown eyes. Don’t let anyone tell you you’re not beautiful. Not ever.”

I kissed her again, nibbling her lower lip. No tongue. Not yet. I’d try not to rush this time. I’d make it as good for her as she’d made it for me.