The Fine Art of Truth or Dare (26 page)

I eyed the cigarette he'd dropped in the gutter. He did his teeth-baring thing. I tossed my cold meal in the trash, knowing I wouldn't have eaten it anyway. The inside of the Jeep wasn't all that much warmer than out. “Here.” Daniel took off his black leather jacket and held it out for me. It was heavy and smelled a little bit like a burned cookie. It went on over my own coat; the sleeves went past my fingertips. “You look like frozen—”

“Don't say it,” I muttered as I settled into the battered seat.

“You have no idea what I was going to say,” he shot back, grinning. “Something rotten in the state of Marino?”

“And you ask that because . . . ?”

“Really? It's four in the afternoon, and instead of being with Sadie and my brother or at home, eating something colorful, you're sitting outside by yourself here. Not exactly rocket science. Care to share?”

“Do I have to?” There was a comforting hollow in the seat. I snuggled into it, coat and all.

“Nope.” There was a pair of thick wool gloves on the dash. Daniel handed them to me, then pulled away from the curb. “I'll take you home. I'm on my way to drop some stuff in Fishtown.”

I looked around; the backseat of the Jeep was filled with sealed cardboard boxes. They looked like they'd been loaded in a hurry. There was also some sheet music. And an empty condom wrapper.

Maybe it was because I was wearing his stuff, or maybe it was just that he was there and looked just enough like my best friend. “Tell me about your girlfriend,” I said.

The music—this time it sounded surprisingly Irish and traditional—was loud enough that I had to shout a little.

“I don't have a girlfriend.”

“Right.”

Daniel looked at me just long enough to make me squirm, and only just avoid flattening a granny who was crossing against the light with her shopping cart. “Excuse me?”

I sighed. “Let me guess. She's as tall as you are and looks like she spends her leisure time in a lace bra and angel wings.”

“Jesus, Ella, what was in that cup?”

“What? Guys like you always have girlfriends like that.”

He reached out and jabbed a button on the dash. It took two tries, but the music stopped. “Sounds good to me, but there's no girlfriend—”

I got it, a little late. Apparently, I'm slow that way. “Ah. I get it now.” I slapped my forehead. It was unsatisfactorily silent; his glove was that thick. “Slow. Okay.”

“You
look
like an ordinary girl, but in truth—”

I gave him the Hand. It looked silly in his glove. “
Truth:
I am a completely ordinary girl. There are tons of us around. Always have been.”

Here's the thing about South Philly. My part of it is small. Daniel was already turning onto my street. There was an electrical crew fixing the light in front of the Grecos'. They were holding doughnuts.

I was halfway out the door before Daniel had even stopped. I slipped off his coat and gloves. “Thanks,” I told him.

“Hey.” Quick as a snake, he leaned across the passenger seat and thrust out his hand, stopping the door from closing. “Hey! I have something to say here.”

“Absolutely. Shoot.”

“You're welcome,” he said.

“
That's
the something?”

“Nope. That's
a
something. This is
the
something . . .” He pinned me with those almost-black eyes, and I had absolutely no doubt as to why his invisible girl climbed happily into the back of the Jeep with him. “You listening?”

“Sure.” A little hypnotized, maybe, but functioning.

“There is not a single ordinary thing about you, Loco Girl.” He pulled the door closed with a snap and was gone.

“He's right, you know,” Edward was saying almost before I'd made it into my room. I had crept through the house unnecessarily. No one was home.

“Your assertions have lost a bit of their value these days, Mr. Willing.”

“You
know
,” he repeated.

I tossed my coat onto the bed. The stark black and white of my quilt was broken by a purple stain now, the result of a peaceful interlude with grape juice turning into a gentle wrestling match. The stain was the size of my palm and shaped like, I thought, an alligator. Alex insisted it was a map of Italy. Later, we'd dripped the rest of the juice onto the thick pages of my drawing pad, finding pictures in the splotches like the Rorschach inkblots used in psychology.

“Well,” he'd said in response to my pagoda, anteater, and Viking, “verdict's in. You're nuts.”

The pictures were tacked to my wall, unaccustomed spots of color. I'd penciled in our choices.
Viking (E), pineapple (A). Lantern (E), cheese (A). Crown (E), birthday cake (A)
were over my desk, over Edward.

I turned on my computer. It
binged
cheerfully at me. I had mail.

 

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Date: December 15, 3:50 p.m.

Subject: Should you choose to accept . . .

Tuesday. I'll pick you up at 10:00 a.m. Ask no questions. Tell no one.

—Alex

 

“Ah, subterfuge” came from over the desk.

“Shut up, Edward,” I said.

As much as I disliked the sensation of keeping secrets, I hated being one so very much more.

30

THE PARTY

There was no doorman outside Harrison Kinuye's house, just a Phillite senior leaning into a huge stone urn. He extricated himself as I reached the door. “Hey,” he greeted me, sending out plumes of condensed breath and beer fumes. “Thought I was gonna heave.”

“Okay,” I said. Apparently, that satisfied him, because he opened the front door for me with a clumsy flourish.

I was in. That simple. I'd spent the entire walk over worried that I wasn't going to get past the door. I'd watched Harrison's YouTube video (cleverly posted under the complicated name “Harrison Kinuye's Party”) three times to be sure of the password. The whole video consisted of Harrison holding a piece of paper with the address, date, and time of the party. Of course, it read backward, but that wasn't much of a challenge, and I suspected it wasn't deliberate on his part. At the eighteen-second mark, he opened his mouth and let out a massive, echoing belch. Fade to black. I'd been afraid that was the password and that I would have to burp for admittance.

The music was deafening. I couldn't believe I hadn't heard it from outside. But I figured that's the way it was with these houses. Harrison actually didn't live all that far away from me—maybe seven blocks, but there were only four houses on his, all with gates and front gardens. None of them touched their neighbors'. We can set our clocks by the Channel 6 Eleven O'clock News theme that comes through our walls from the Grecos' every night.

The hall opened into a massive living room. It was full of familiar faces: mostly Phillite juniors and seniors, but I saw a few sophomores, too, and even a handful of Bees. One was wrapped around Chase Vere. I edged away. He looked pretty involved and pretty intent.

I scanned the room. Everyone seemed to be having a grand old time. The boy who'd let me in was now talking intently to a group of my classmates, waving a half-filled bottle of something clear. He offered it to one of the girls. When she lifted it to take a swig, I could see it was Hannah. I shuddered and ducked behind a convenient sophomore. Where Hannah was to be found, Amanda and Anna wouldn't be far away. There was a group dancing to the crazily loud music in one corner. I was pretty sure Amanda was in the middle of it.

I didn't see Alex. True, there was a lot I was probably missing, being short and half hidden, but I was also starting to think that maybe this had been a wild-goose chase and a really stupid idea. He wasn't there. I was feeling incredibly uncomfortable and not very brave anymore.

Wandering the seemingly unending downstairs, I peeked into a den, a closet, and what looked like a complete gym. Two doors were locked, but I figured whatever was behind them wasn't of much interest to me. He wasn't there.

It was time to go home. No Alex, no one I knew well enough to chat with, and I was still wearing my coat anyway. Unfortunately, I was completely turned around. I found myself in the kitchen. It was twice the size of the one at the restaurant, with much shinier appliances. There were six miles of counter. A few people were sitting on it, but there wasn't a toaster or coffeemaker or jar full of mismatched wooden spoons to hint that any cooking or eating actually took place there. The dinged keg in the middle of the floor looked as out of place as I felt.

Harrison was manning the tap. “Hey, Ella,” he greeted me, looking completely unsurprised to see me there. “Beer?”

“Um . . . no,” I said, shocked that he knew my name. “Thanks.”

He shrugged and handed a plastic cup to a hovering senior girl. “There's other stuff there.” He jerked his chin toward the sink. I saw a few lonely Coke cans and one bunch of celery in a bed of ice.

I wasn't really planning on staying. “Thanks,” I said again, and headed for yet another door.

This one led to a dining room with a table that could easily seat twenty. Six busy Bees were grouped in one corner, playing Quarters on the shiny surface. Beyond them, I could see the hallway and the graceful sweep of a staircase. As I watched the parade of feet going up and down, a familiar pair of gray suede Adidas came into view. Feeling cold suddenly, I went out to meet them.

Amanda was just hitting the bottom stair. Alex was right behind her.

She saw me first. Her eyes narrowed dangerously. I probably would have taken a step backward, but a group of girls pushed behind me, heading for the Quarters game. I had a choice: hold my ground, or go stumbling forward, probably ending up at Amanda's feet. I held my ground.

“Are you freakin' kidding?” She loomed over me. “Do you not understand the basic laws of nature? You are nothing. You do not exist.”

I thought of the girl on the skateboard, who had made her existence known in such a bold and impressive way. Then I thought of Edward's lover, who never got to show her face.

“Is your nasty natural?” I heard myself asking. “Or did you get it implanted?”

It wasn't my line; it was Frankie's. We'd all enjoyed it immensely before, and it slipped out so smoothly now. I wasn't staring at Amanda's chest deliberately. But my bravado only went so far, and she was still one step up.

“You bitch!” she snapped, and, raising one clawed hand, launched herself off the step.

Chase was there before she touched the floor, one arm sliding around her waist. “Come on, princess,” he said cheerfully, carrying her off. “Let's dance.”

She kicked and hissed a little, but he was bigger and, I thought, drunker. I didn't watch where they went. I didn't care.

Alex came down the last couple of steps. “What are you doing here?”

“Looking for you.” It was that honesty thing he brought out in me.

“Why?”

That one was harder, not to answer, but to say aloud. “Can we talk about this somewhere other than right here?”

He shrugged. “Want a beer?”

“No.”

“Good. Me, either. Let's go.”

“Go where?” I asked. He had his hand on my back and was propelling me down the hall.

“Elsewhere.” He pulled his black Russian coat from a pile in the foyer. “Unless you want to stay . . . ?”

“No.”

“Good. So . . .”

A minute later we were on the sidewalk. He pulled on a knit cap and buttoned up his coat. I hoped he would reach for my hand, but he didn't. He just shoved his back into his pockets.

“Some party,” I said, staving off the inevitable.

“Not really. He does it whenever his parents are out of the country.”

From the sound of it, that was often. “Who cleans up?”

“The Kinuyes have a staff of many. They're used to it.”

“Typical,” I muttered.

Alex shot me a look. “Hey. Don't get pissy at me. I don't throw parties in my house.”

He started walking toward South Street. I hurried to catch up. “Where are we going?”

“That depends. Answer the original question. Why did you come looking for me?”

Truth thing aside, there didn't seem to be much point in lying. I'd come looking for him. He was found, and fully aware of it. “I wanted to know if you were there, if that was the thing you were doing that you wouldn't tell me about.”

“Why didn't you just ask?”

“Would you have invited me along?” Before he could answer, I blurted, “You wouldn't have. You don't want anyone to know about us. I just . . . needed to see it for myself.”

He stopped in his tracks. I could see his breath in the cold air—short, sharp puffs.

“You know, Ella, if you'd said just about anything else—that you missed me and wanted to see me, or even that you were jealous of . . . I don't know what you might be jealous of—it would be a completely different thing. I would be thrilled. But this . . . this is bullshit.”

In that moment, I felt something slipping away. It's a pretty distinct, unmistakable feeling. “You didn't exactly look overjoyed to see me, however I came to be there.”

He grunted. “Don't do that. Don't try to turn this around.
You
were at the bottom of the stairs, looking at me like I'd peed on you over the banister. I know the look, Ella. It's pretty familiar.”

“You were with Amanda.”

“I was not with Amanda. I was using a bathroom upstairs. She was waiting for me when I came out. No”—he shook his head when I opened my mouth—“I am not going to tell you what she said. It's none of your business. But I will tell you that the entire conversation took place in the middle of a hallway and lasted maybe three minutes.”

“Did you tell her about us?”

“No.”

My heart did a pretty decent cannonball. “So I was right.”

He started walking again, fast. I had to run to keep up.

“You really don't want anyone to know,” I pressed.

He stopped again. I couldn't look at his face, so I looked down, at our feet. Between us, carved into the sidewalk, were the words
Bainbridge Street
. I was sure it was a sign; I just didn't know of what.

“What I didn't want,” he said tightly, “was to rub Amanda's face in the fact that less than a week after we split up, I'd already gotten involved with someone else. You might not like her—I might not blame you—but I used to like her a lot. What sort of asshole would I be if I were to broadcast the fact that I
dumped
her for someone else? Huh?”

“Especially someone like me,” I shot back. I read somewhere that women take longer than men to end an argument. That we're almost guaranteed to say something we might regret, just because we're determined to make our point. I was determined to make my point. “Someone beneath the lofty Phillite sphere.”

Alex just stared at me for what seemed like a very long time. Then he sighed. “You really don't get it, do you? Me being a snob—which I'm not—isn't the issue. It's the fact that you actually believe I might have something to be snobby about.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“It means, Fiorella Marino, that only the person who thinks crappily of you is you. That is really sad.”

He touched me then, pulled me into a one-armed hug. Just as I started to wrap my arms around his waist, he stepped away. A taxi was stopping at the curb beside us. I hadn't seen him flag it.

Alex opened the door. I climbed in and scooted over, waiting for him to slide in next to me. He didn't. He handed the driver ten dollars and gave him my address. “I'll see you later,” he said, and closed me in.

As the taxi pulled away, I realized neither of us had mentioned Tuesday. I had no idea if he was even going to show up. I had no idea if he'd just dumped me on the corner of the street that shared his name.