The Rules of You and Me (5 page)

So this was what normal people did on a Friday night. My mother would be so proud if she could see me right then.

For some reason, it all made me think of my ex-boyfriend Zac. Not that Zac got drunk and did stupid things. Actually, I had never known Zac to care much for drinking. But he did love parties and hanging out with a bunch of people. He was always so full of crazy ideas, most of which lead to him injuring himself or breaking something. But he was so passionate about enjoying life.

“
You’re too uptight all the time,” Zac had complained once. I had gotten mad at him for climbing onto a table at the Rose Castle and dancing to the song that had just come on the radio. It had made everyone else in the restaurant laugh, but all I could think about was how much he was embarrassing me. Why couldn’t I have had a normal boyfriend who stayed firmly in his seat? “You need to have fun.”

“
I do have fun,” I had argued.

“
When do you
ever
have fun? You’re always studying or stressing out about a test or rushing off to yet another club you’ve joined. Stop worrying so much about your future and enjoy the now.”

At first, the way he was so free and unconcerned about about rules was what had attracted me to him. But after a while it became exhausting to figure out what crazy thing he would do next. And my mother’s constant reminders that Zac wasn’t good enough for me frustrated me until something had to give.

What would he think if he saw me now? I pulled out my phone and tapped out a text message before I could change my mind.

I’m at a wild party in the middle of the woods.

A moment later my phone buzzed with a response.

Who are you and what are you doing with Hannah Cohen’s phone?

See? I actually can loosen up,
I texted back.

Where are you?
Zac texted.

I bit my lip. I shouldn’t have texted Zac. He was still in Willowbrook for the summer, as far as I knew, so he could tell anyone that I wasn’t really where I said I was.

In Paris,
I lied.
Partying with the French.

Nice. Bring me back the Eiffel Tower?

I couldn’t help smiling a little.
Sure, if it fits into my carry-on.

I stuffed my phone back into my pocket and scanned the area. I was at a party in the middle of nowhere, but I didn’t really feel like I was a part of it. Tons of people I didn’t know surrounded me on all sides, and yet I still didn’t feel like I was enjoying the now. It all felt kind of ridiculous.

A figure walking alone near the fire caught my attention. The slope of the shoulders and the hair looked familiar. When the figure turned around, I saw the face of the guy who had stopped to change my tire the day before.

I clutched the beer to my chest with one hand as I watched him. He walked alone, his hands buried in his pockets. He moved through the crowd of people as if they weren’t there and they seemed to part to allow him through.

A group of guys stepped in front of him, almost blocking my view. They spoke to him, but I couldn’t hear the words over the other noises of the party. In the firelight, I saw his expression change, the shadows darkening the lines of his scowl. The guys laughed, but he slammed hard into the shoulder of the tallest one as he passed. The guys watched him walk away, shouting words I still couldn’t make out.

When he was only a few feet away, he looked up and his gaze locked with mine.

I wondered if I should wave or smile or acknowledge the fact that we had met before. But he didn’t wave or nod, and his expression didn’t change at all as he kept walking. I couldn’t tear my gaze away from those gray eyes as he drew closer. Just a few steps more and he would reach me.

I sucked in a breath, waiting for him to say something.

He walked right past me, finally breaking our locked gaze. I turned around, watching as he walked toward the hill into the darkness. Had he even recognized me?

“
Hey,” I said to Ashton and Kate. “Who’s that guy over there?” I pointed toward where my mysterious rescuer climbed the hill.

“
That’s Jude Westmore,” Ashton said. “He lives a couple blocks over from your aunt. Do you know him?”

I shook my head. “No. I was just wondering what his deal is. Doesn’t look like he’s having much fun.”

Kate and Ashton exchanged a look. Silence passed between them, then Kate said, “Jude doesn’t really talk much to people these days. Not since his brother died.”

Great, now I felt like a complete bitch. “Oh,” I said. “How did he die?”

“
He was deployed,” Ashton said. “To Afghanistan. The vehicle he was riding in hit a roadside bomb and….” She shrugged. “Jude hasn’t been the same ever since.”

“
It was really hard on everyone,” Kate said. “Liam was really popular and was friends with a lot of people. He was a really nice guy. He was a few grades ahead of us in school, but everyone knew him and he never made you feel like a little kid just because you were younger.”

“
Liam and Jude were really close,” Ashton added. “They were two years apart in age, but so close a lot of people thought they were twins.”

I watched Jude climb the hill until he crested the top and disappeared into the darkness of the night outside the party. I wasn’t sure who I felt sorrier for: Jude for leaving, or myself for staying.

I pulled out my cell phone and checked the time. 9:12. Way too early to call it a night, but the party had long ago lost its appeal.

At least six different girls had already thrown up in various bushes, two guys nearly broke their necks trying to do drunken back flips, and I had avoided the clumsy passes of so many guys I’d stopped keeping count. I would have gladly taken one Gropy Garrett in their place. Ashton was off somewhere, trying to work up the nerve to talk to Carter, while Kate had disappeared with some guy I wasn’t introduced to.

So I wandered around the grassy clearing in the valley, clutching the same beer I’d carried all night. Every now and then, I’d pour a little bit out whenever I thought no one was looking. It was now half-empty. Empty enough that I could say I was drinking it, yet full enough that I could decline any offers for another one from the glazed-eyed wannabe frat boys.

I wondered if I’d stuck around long enough to satisfy Mark on the “expanding my horizons” thing. I’d been here for an hour. That had to count for something.

But I knew already what Mark would say. I hadn’t really made an effort. I’d stuck with Ashton and Kate, talking only to them until they’d abandoned me, and now I moped around the outer edge of the party alone.

“
Did you bring it?” A voice nearby caught my attention. I thought at first that the guy was talking to me, but then I saw him just over my shoulder standing with another guy.

The second guy reached into his pocket and pulled out a small brown bottle. “‘Course I did.” He rattled the bottle at his friend and grinned.

Icy tendrils tickled down my spine as little brown bottles flashed in my memory. Dozens of them, some empty, others still containing a few pills. The shoebox next to my dad’s head, where he lay so still I thought he was dead until I heard him gurgle. Mom freaking out when she found us, ripping the box out of my hands. Bottles tumbling to the floor, rolling away under my parents’ bed.

Mom had presented an image of perfection as she announced to everyone downstairs that my father wasn’t feeling well. “Probably just the sushi he had last night,” she said, laughing. Everyone had left, telling Mom they hoped Dad felt better soon. I had watched from the landing at the top of the stairs, frozen in place and unable to say or do anything. Once the last guest was out the door, expressing their concern for my dad’s condition, Mom finally picked up the phone and called 911.

Now my teeth chattered and I dropped the beer, sending the liquid splashing across the legs of my jeans. The world rocked around me and I felt sick. I had to get away. Away from the brown medicine bottles. Away from the people. Away from everything.

I stumbled up the hill, slipping on the grass and half-crawling, half-running as I scrambled to get away from the laughter behind me. I shouldn’t have come here. I should have stayed in Willowbrook. I should have gone to Paris with Mom like I had originally planned.

It didn’t matter anyway. I couldn’t hide, not here, not anywhere. I needed an entirely different planet to run to.

Once I crested the hill, I ran down the path, past cars and people, until my lungs felt like they were about to burst. When I couldn’t breathe anymore, I stopped, leaning against a car as I bent over, gasping.

I had ridden to the party with Ashton. I didn’t have a car to drive myself back to Aunt Lydia’s. I wasn’t even sure that I knew the way from where we were. We were on a very dark, very quiet two lane road somewhere in the mountains outside Asheville. Around me were cars parked along the edge of the trees, all of them dark and empty.

“
Did you need a ride?”

I jumped at the voice behind me, clutching a hand to my chest. The guy from before—Jude Westmore, the one who had changed my tire—emerged from the shadows of the trees around the path, like he had been hiding there.

Once again, this had the makings of a bad horror film.

“
What are you doing skulking around like that?” I demanded.

Jude looked at me, his hands in the pockets of his jeans. He wore a plain white T-shirt again, and I could see the mark of the tattoo peeking from under one sleeve. “I was just standing here. Trying to decide whether or not to go back to the party. I saw you, and you looked like you wanted to get out of here fast.” He shrugged. “So…do you need a ride?”

“
N-no,” I stammered. “I’ll wait for my friend.”

“
Ashton?” Jude asked. He shook his head. “Don’t bother. She’ll hang around Carter Hannigan all night, trying to work up the nerve to ask him out. She’ll finally give up around one A.M. If you’re lucky.”

I groaned at the thought of sitting out here alone until one in the morning.

Jude started walking down the path. He didn’t look back at me as he said, “If you want a ride, the offer still stands for the next two minutes.”

Dark shapes of mountains and trees rose in the night sky around me, and stars twinkled overhead. I didn’t know which way to go, or how long it would take to walk.

Sucking in a deep breath, I started after him.

#

I seemed to have forgotten how to talk. That had never happened to me before. I was president of the class student council my freshman, sophomore, and junior years. I had been voted freshman, sophomore, and junior class queen. I had been vice president of Willowbrook High’s math club this past school year. I had run campaigns for all of those positions. I had delivered speeches, talked to almost everyone in school, stood up in front of crowds, and never once ran out of things to say.

But here, alone in this creaky old truck, with a spring digging painfully into my back, I couldn’t think of a single word to say to the guy sitting two feet away from me.

Not that Jude even attempted to start a conversation. He had opened the passenger door for me and then closed it once I was seated on the torn bench seat inside the truck’s cab. Then he’d walked around the front of his truck and climbed in, started the engine, and put the gear in drive.

I gave him Aunt Lydia’s address and then there had been silence ever since, other than the squeaking of the truck’s shocks whenever we hit a bump in the road. Even the radio was silent, and I wondered whether it worked at all.

I looked at Jude from the corner of my eye, studying him in the moonlight. He kept his right hand on the steering wheel, his left elbow propped up on the door while he chewed his thumbnail. His hair was pulled back into a ponytail, but pieces had fallen out of place, the strands slipping over his ears.

He must have felt me looking because he turned to me, meeting my gaze for a moment before looking back to the road.

I cleared my throat. “So,” I said, “I got my tire fixed.”

Jude made a grunting noise in response.

“
You were right. I ran over something big.” I was babbling now, but I needed to fill the silence. “The tire guy said he had to use the biggest plug they had, the ones they use for really big tires.”

Still Jude said nothing.

“
Um, I’m Hannah, by the way. Hannah Cohen.”

“
Jude Westmore.”

“
I’m Lydia Montgomery’s niece,” I said. “I’m staying with her.”

Jude nodded. “I know.”

I wondered how he knew, but I didn’t ask.

“
So you live near my aunt?” I asked. “That’s what Ashton told me.”

He nodded again and pulled his thumbnail from his mouth. “A few blocks over.”

And we were back to awkward silence. So far, our encounters hadn’t exactly been great. Sure, he was nice enough to change my tire. And give me a ride home. But he barely even looked at me and getting any words out of him was like torture.

Was he still mad about me offering to pay him?

“
Look,” I said, taking a deep breath, “I’m sorry about the other day. I didn’t mean to insult you.”

He raised his eyebrows. “Did you insult me?”

I gaped at him. “You kind of stormed off when I offered to pay you.”

He shrugged. “I wasn’t looking for a reward. I was raised to help people when they need it.”

“
I was raised to believe that no one does anything without a reward,” I said. “It’s one of the rules.”

Jude turned onto a street that looked a little familiar. We must have been getting close to Aunt Lydia’s house. “The rules?” he asked.