Stolen Wishes (2 page)

“
That’s twice what I paid your
mom.”

That’s just something mean boys say. I know
that. But I also know the looks Mom gets when she goes into town.
Women who used to be kind to her now duck their heads and hurry in
the other direction when they see her coming.

I told myself Kenny was just an asshole
trying to show off for his friends. I told myself he was just
trying to get a rise out of me, to see what I would do. But even if
that’s true, it doesn’t mean he’s lying about Mom. And even if I
want to tell myself he’s a liar, part of me already knew the truth
about the state of her “massage” business.

And last night when she came onto the porch,
barely decent in front of William Bailey, disgust roiled in my
stomach. Now every time I look at her, all I can think is,
Did
you take money to give Kenny Riles a hand job?

“And Frankie said he would do it if she gave
him her lunch,” my little sister Drew is saying.

I blink at her, realizing I’ve missed half
her story. I try to be a good listener for Drew. Someone needs to
be.

“And so she did,” she continues, “and on
recess,
he did!
”

I fill her bowl with cereal and milk as she
settles into her seat at the kitchen table. “Did what?” I ask.

“Ate a
worm
,” she squeals.

“That’s disgusting!” I wrinkle my nose, and
she giggles. She’s in first grade and generally a happy kid,
despite everything. “Gabby,” I call. “Want some cereal?”

Gabby hops up from where she was playing in
front of Saturday morning cartoons. She toddles toward me. “With
milk,” she instructs in her little voice.

I settle her into the chair across from Drew
and pour her cereal.

In the living room, Mom is sleeping on the
couch, oblivious to our daily early-morning ritual.

“Cally eat?” Gabby asks, her mouth half full
of cereal.

I shake my head. I can’t handle the idea of
food when Mom’s purse is staring at me from the kitchen counter,
her datebook inside.

My stomach flips when I think about what I
might find there, but I have to know.

I leave the girls at the table, giggling
about something they saw on a cartoon. The zipper seems to screech
as I pull it open. I peek around the corner into the living room,
but Mom is still sleeping. With a deep breath, I pull the black
appointment book from her purse and leaf through it. Last month,
last week. I scan over the scribbled names and I’m almost
relieved.

Then I see it. Thursday afternoon.
Kenny.

I snap the book shut quickly, as if staring
at his name next to 4:00 might show me more than I want to know
about their appointment.

“Can I have a Pop-Tart?” Drew asks.

I shove the book back into Mom’s purse and
zip it up, pushing it to the back of the counter where I found it.
“No Pop-Tarts. There’s enough sugar in that cereal.”

“My have Pop-Tart?” Gabby asks. She’s
talking a lot for her age, but she always substitutes “my” for “I.”
It’s ridiculously cute.

“How about an apple?”

The girls groan, but I grab a knife from the
drawer and an apple off the counter.

So what? Kenny got a massage from Mom. That
doesn’t mean he got anything
more
than that. Does it?

I slice the apple into two bowls, removing
the peel from Gabby’s half. I’m handing the bowls to my sisters
when my father emerges from the bedroom.

“You ladies are up early.” He pushes his
glasses up his nose and attempts to smooth his bedhead. He probably
fell asleep reading in his recliner again.

“This is pretty much the normal time,” I
mutter.

He rubs his hands together. “I think it’s a
good day to go book shopping in Indianapolis. What do my girls
say?”

“Yay!” the girls chorus.

“I think I’ll pass,” I say. I’m too
preoccupied with the whole Mom and Kenny thing to enjoy a rare day
with my dad. The girls will have a good time. Dad goes to these big
used bookstores where the girls can get half a dozen new books for
under five dollars. Of course, Dad will likely spend too much,
buying more books about Taoism and Buddhism and any other -ism that
promises to make sense of the universe. But the time with Dad is
good for the girls, and the time alone will be good for me.

Mom shifts on the couch. “Cally? Are the
girls up? Do they need anything?”

I close my eyes and bite back my
frustrations. She wants to be a good mom, just not more than she
wants her next fix. “It’s okay. Go back to sleep.”

***

“I have a problem.”

Lizzy Thompson crosses her arms and looks me
over disapprovingly. “That you do. I can’t believe you kept this
from me.”

I shift awkwardly on the steps of her front
porch. I don’t even know what she’s talking about, but I’m freezing
out here. “Are you going to invite me in or leave me out here?”

She pulls the door open wider, and I step
into the warmth of her foyer. Blood finds its way back to my frozen
fingers, making them burn. I pull off my coat, and Lizzy takes it
and throws it on the banister before grabbing my hand and dragging
me upstairs to her room.

Hanna is lying on her stomach on the floor,
leafing through a magazine. When she sees me, her eyes go big. “Is
it true?”

“Is what true?” I look back and forth
between my two best friends, waiting for them to explain.

“She would have told us,” Hanna says to
Lizzy.

“Not necessarily,” Lizzy replies. “Maybe it
was an impulse thing and this is the first chance she’s had.”

“
She
is standing right here,” I
mutter. “Tell me what you’re talking about.”

“We heard you and William Bailey were
together at the football field last night,” Hanna says, pushing
herself off the floor.

“That’s true, I guess.” I shake my head at
the worry on my friends’ faces. “I don’t understand. What’s the big
deal?”

The girls exchange another one of those
knowing looks. They may not look like it—Hanna with her long, dark
hair and Lizzy with her blond curls—but they’re twins, and it can
be a little creepy how much they can communicate with each other
without speaking.

“People are saying you were
together.
In the bleachers,” Hanna says.

Lizzy rolls her eyes. “No, they’re saying
you were
fucking
in the bleachers.”

My jaw goes slack, and I stumble back and
lower myself to sit on the edge of the bed. I should have seen this
coming. William was just trying to protect me, and what does he get
in return? A bunch of rumors that he’s nailing the poor chick with
the slutty mom. God, he must hate me.

“Do you look so horrified because your
secret’s out or because it’s a lie?”

“Lizzy!” Hanna screeches.

“What? Tell me you haven’t thought about it.
How many times have we placed him in the top five hottest guys in
New Hope?”

Hanna’s cheeks flare red, and she sinks next
to me on the bed. “Ignore her. You don’t have to tell us anything,
but we thought you should know what people are saying.”

I shake my head again. It hasn’t even been
twenty-four hours, and rumors are already making their way back to
my friends. “Who told you that?”

“Krissy told Meagan who told us,” Lizzy
answers. “But Krissy won’t say where she heard it.”

“Kenny Riles, no doubt,” I mutter.

“Why do you say that?” Hanna asks.

“Kenny’s gotta be mad. Will put him in his
place last night.”

Lizzy narrows her eyes. “Put him in his
place before, during, or after he made hot monkey love to you?”

“He didn’t—”

“Don’t!” She puts her finger to my lips.
“Please don’t tell me it didn’t happen. Not yet. Not while I’m
still looking forward to living vicariously through you.”

“You’re ridiculous.” Hanna giggles. “But not
wrong. I’ll admit to having a stray fantasy or two about William
Bailey myself.”

“Just
one or two
?” Lizzy says. “He
pushed up his sleeves in French the other day, and just looking at
his forearms inspired at least seventeen different fantasies that
day alone.”

“He’s taken!” I hear their older sister
Krystal holler through the wall.

Lizzy shakes her head. “Don’t mind her.
She’s had a crush on William since they were in eighth grade and
thinks he’s hers, but he’s not into her.”

The girls make me chuckle, despite myself.
“I’m sorry to say you won’t be living vicariously through me today.
Nothing happened between me and William on the bleachers.”

With a sigh, Lizzy sinks to the bed on the
opposite side of Hanna. They lean their heads on my shoulders,
squishing me into a twin sandwich.

“Kenny was out with his friends,” I explain.
“They were drunk, and he was trying to…proposition me, I guess? He
said he’d bought a hand job from my mom and wanted to know what
my
going rate was.”

The girls gasp in unison.

“He didn’t!” Hanna whispers.

Lizzy growls, “What a fucker.”

“It was actually kind of scary,” I admit.
“But then William was there, and he told them to leave me alone.
They left, and Will walked me home. End of story.”

“Kenny is such a creep,” Hanna mutters. “But
you need to tell Will so the rumor doesn’t take him by
surprise.”

I nod. Talk about an awkward conversation.
“Hey, when you go back to school on Monday, everyone’s going to
think you shagged me on the bleachers. Sorry ’bout that.”

“It won’t change anything,” Lizzy warns.
“But I agree it’s better if he knows.”

“I’m sorry he said that about your mom,”
Hanna whispers. “He’s such a nasty liar.”

I swallow hard and nod, remembering Mom’s
appointment book.
Had
Kenny been lying?

Time to change the subject. “I guess I need
to talk to William,” I say. “You know, he mentioned a party at Max
Hallowell’s tonight. Would you two be up for that?”

Hanna claps gleefully. “We’d love to come
with you!”

“Han!” her sister says. “We can’t be there
when the
obvious
solution is for Cally and Will to do the
nasty so the rumor is the truth.”

Cally

“Thanks for coming with me tonight,” I say
to the girls as we walk up the steps to Max’s house.

Hanna smoothes her hair. “Yeah, going to a
party at Max Hallowell’s house is such a hardship.”

“We aren’t staying long,” I promise, more to
give myself courage than because it’s what they want to hear. “I
want to give William a heads-up, and then we can get out of
here.”

“Oh, let’s not rush away,” Hanna says. “We
don’t want to insult the host.”

“Do I sense a crush?” Lizzy asks.

Hanna’s cheeks pinken as she knocks on the
door. “No crush. He’s a nice guy, end of story.”

“A nice guy who just broke up with his
girlfriend,” Lizzy singsongs.

The door flies open, and a sleek-haired
blonde stares at us skeptically. “Can I help you?” No, she’s
staring at
me
skeptically. I think her name is Kristen if I
remember correctly. We had gym class together last semester, and
she made a few cracks about my cheap wardrobe in the locker room. I
might have
thought
a few cracks about her slutty
wardrobe.

“This was a bad idea.” I turn to leave. This
isn’t the place for me.

“Cally.”

The sound of William’s voice calling my name
has my feet stalling on the steps. Lizzy squeaks beside me as I
turn around. No one ever made jeans and a T-shirt look as good as
William does. The dark denim hugs his hips, and the white T-shirt
shows off his sculpted chest and shoulders.

“You came.” He steps outside and grabs my
arm, ushering me into the house.

“Um, yeah. These are my best friends, Lizzy
and Hanna,” I say awkwardly.

“Yeah, I grew up with all the Thompson
girls. They lived next door to my grandma until their mom built
that house on the river.” He gives them a polite smile before
turning back to me. “I’m glad you decided to come. You can throw
your coats on that couch over there.”

The girls and I peel off our jackets and
toss them on the couch, and when I turn around, William is running
his gaze over me. I’m wearing jeans and one of Lizzy’s sweaters.
It’s black and fitted and shows more cleavage than I’m normally
comfortable with, but Lizzy talked me into it. She also did my
makeup, defining my eyes with dark liner and mascara and topping
the look off with a swipe of lip gloss. Now I’m glad I let her fuss
over me. I like the way his eyes linger on my curves and lips
before returning to meet mine.

“You look gorgeous.”

“You—you too.” Damn. He’s so sweet, and I’m
just so…awkward. “Hey, can we talk?” Better to rip off the
Band-Aid.

He smiles. I’m dazzled by that smile. It
shoots something electric through my veins and back to my
heart.

I look to my friends, not wanting to leave
them before they find their place here. New Hope parties can be
cliquey, and not in a good way.

“Go!” Lizzy urges. “We’re fine.”

I sink my teeth into my lip and nod.

William takes my hand and leads me to the
stairs. A few catcalls go up as everyone watches us climb them
together. Great. This is the exact opposite of what I came here to
accomplish.

“You do fast work, man,” someone calls, and
someone else says, “Protection is in the bathroom.”

By the time we’re on the second floor, my
cheeks are burning with embarrassment and shame. Embarrassment over
the things those guys probably think we’re doing up here. Shame for
bringing that down on Will.

William leads me into a bedroom just off the
stairs and shuts the door behind us. “I’m sorry about Sam and Max,”
he says softly. “They don’t mean any harm. They’re just jealous
because they couldn’t get a girl alone upstairs if they tried.”