26 Kisses (13 page)

“Ryan, I never would have done anything like that while I was with Mark. Okay?”

He nods, and I let my arms fall to my sides. “Did you tell him?” I ask.

The beat of silence that elapses before he speaks is the only answer I need. “I had to,” Ryan says, his chin jutting out. “I thought maybe you had been cheating on him, and that’s why you broke up.”

“Well, it wouldn’t have mattered at this point, would it?” I turn away from him and break into a slow jog, trying to avoid thinking about how hurt Mark must have been to hear about the Dexter kiss.
Not as hurt as I was when he dumped me.

“Veda, wait!” Ryan’s footsteps crunch over the path behind me, and I slow down again. There’s no use trying to outrun him—he’s much faster than I am and has more endurance. “Look, I’m sorry,” he says. “It was none of my business.”

“You’re right,” I say, spinning to face him. “It wasn’t. And I’m actually trying to finish my run here, so if you could just leave me alone, that would be great.”

He doesn’t leave, but he doesn’t keep talking either, just falls into step beside me, easily matching my pace. I shove my earbuds back in and turn up the music, trying to forget he’s there. We run three miles together, all the way into town, before I’m totally exhausted. I slow down to a walk, my chest heaving, struggling to remember exactly what I ever loved about running.

“It’s not safe for you to run alone,” Ryan says. Annoyingly, he’s barely even breathing hard.

I look up at him and raise my eyebrows. “Ryan, we live in Butterfield, Michigan. How is it not safe to do anything here?” I slip my hand into my pocket and shove the pepper spray farther down, hoping he can’t see the outline of it through my thin athletic shorts.

He doesn’t respond but just stands there, smirking at me.

“Anyway, I’m training for a race, so I really need to get going.” Of course I’m not training for anything, and I couldn’t run another step even if there was a bear chasing after me, but it’s all I can think of to say to get him to leave me alone.

“You’re training for the half?” Ryan brightens. “Me too.”

I close my eyes briefly. The Butterfield Half Marathon takes place at the end of every summer. Just another reminder of something Mark and I used to do together.

I sigh and cast a withering look at Ryan’s antelope-like body. “Do you even need to train?”

“Of course I need to train.” He looks insulted. “Look, I’m sorry for giving you crap about Dexter. It was just weird.”

I nod reluctantly. “I’m with you on that.”

He stretches his arms above his head and yawns. “So, you’re pretty good. Do you want to run together sometimes? We can keep each other on track.”

Great. Now I have a running buddy for the half marathon I wasn’t even planning to do. I cock my head to the side, not sure whether he’s being serious or not. “Why?”

Ryan looks uncomfortable. “I don’t know. Sometimes it’s more fun to train with someone. Especially on the long runs.” He holds up his right hand. “I swear I won’t give you any more crap about Dex. And I’m not trying to hit on you or anything.” He lets his breath out in a rush. “What do you say?”

“Sure,” I say, mostly to get him off my back so I can go home and weep over the two new blisters on my ankles. I give him a sarcastic smile. “Text me. You can get my number from Mark.”

Before I bumped into Ryan out on the trail, I had no intention of running the half marathon. But for the rest of the day, as I bum around the house with Jeffrey and look up George Bernard Shaw quotes on the Internet (with occasional breaks to click through Killian’s Facebook pictures), I can’t stop thinking about it. If I am going to do the race, I definitely need new running shoes. And one of those CamelBak water bottles would be nice. The next day, as I’m indulging myself by online window shopping for running clothes I can’t afford, Jeffrey barges into my room.

“What the hell?” I yank the sheet up to my neck. I’m wearing sleep shorts and a tank top, but still.

“Can you take me over to Dad’s?” Jeffrey’s hair is still wet from the shower, and he smells like he was involved in an explosion of the men’s fragrance department at Macy’s.

“Now?” Lila’s dreaded party isn’t until tomorrow night.

Jeffrey blows air out through puffed cheeks. “Yeah, I decided I want to go now and stay over.”

“Mom’s at work, isn’t she? I don’t have a car.”

“Can’t you get Seth or Mel or someone to drive me?”

I shake my head, totally confused. Jeffrey hates going over to Dad’s house, the same way I hated going over to Dad’s house before I turned sixteen and opted out of the whole stupid custody arrangement. “Why do you want to go over there early?”

Jeffrey shrugs. “I don’t know. It’s boring here.”

I roll over, turning my back to him. “Give me a break, Jeffrey. You’re twelve and you’re on summer vacation. You’re supposed to be bored.”

He doesn’t move for a few seconds, and then he walks out of the room. “Shut the door!” I yell, but he doesn’t. I hear rustling in his room, the squeak of the drawers in his old dresser. Footsteps coming down the hallway, passing by my open door.

“I’m going to Seth’s to ask him to drive me,” Jeffrey calls, already pounding down the stairs.

“What? Jeffrey, don’t you dare!” The front door slams.

I leap out of bed and sprint down the hallway, using the handrails on either side of the stairs to swing down and jump the last four. Peering out the window, I see Jeffrey is already halfway across the street, his backpack slung over his shoulder, his skateboard tucked under his arm.

“God damn it.” I shove my feet into a pair of old flip-flops and go outside, standing on the cement front step.

“Jeffrey!” I call, beckoning for him to come back. “Get over here!”

He turns around and waves, a cocky grin spreading over his face. “Sorry, I can’t hear you!”

By the time I shuffle across the street, Jeffrey is standing at Seth’s door. “I already rang the doorbell,” he says calmly as I come up behind him and grab his elbow, squeezing as hard as I can.

“Get back inside,” I say between gritted teeth. I pull on Jeffrey’s arm, but he brushes me aside easily. When did he get to be so strong?

“Get off me!” Jeffrey says as I pull on his backpack, leaning all my weight onto it so he staggers backward. Just as I’m about to tip him off the step and onto the sidewalk, Seth opens the door.

“Hey,” he says, his eyes widening. I let go of Jeffrey and cross my arms over my chest.

“Hi, Seth,” Jeffrey says. “My sister wanted to ask you if you could drive me over to my dad’s house since our mom’s not home and we don’t have a car.”

Seth turns his green eyes on me, and I shake my head. “You don’t have to,” I say. I poke Jeffrey in his side. “He can wait until Mom brings the car back.”

Jeffrey gives me an evil look. “Actually, it’s kind of important that I go now.”

I sigh and push my hair out of my face, remembering only as I’m doing it that I need to keep my arms over my chest to hide the fact that I’m not wearing a bra. “Seriously, Seth, he’s being a total brat. Don’t drive him anywhere.”

Seth looks back and forth between the two of us and shrugs. “Sure, I guess I can take him.”

Jeffrey smiles and elbows me in the ribs. I swat his arm away. “Well, I’m coming too,” I say, putting as much authority into my voice as I can. “Just give me five minutes to get changed.”

I turn away and pull my shorts down over my thighs, feeling Seth’s eyes on me as I hurry back to our house.

“Thanks for making me look like an idiot, Jeffrey,” I mutter as I dig through my mostly empty drawers. With the majority of my clothes still in the laundry from my cleaning binge the other day, the best I can come up with is a too-small sports bra, a paint-spattered T-shirt I used to wear to do crafts with Mom, and long basketball shorts that might actually belong to my brother. I can already imagine the stink-eye I’m going to get from Dad for showing up at his palace looking like an artistically challenged middle-school boy.

you are in deep shit,
I text to Jeffrey. He sends back a poop emoji.

When I get outside, Jeffrey is showing off for Seth on his skateboard, doing the only two tricks he knows over and over again in the street while Seth sits on the minivan’s bumper, elbows on his knees.

“That’s sweet, dude,” Seth says as I walk over. “Ready to go?”

“Shotgun!” Jeffrey yells. I flip him off and wrench open the passenger-side door, settling onto the faded fabric seat before he has a chance to start squawking about injustice.

Once Jeffrey’s settled in the back, Seth fires up the van and pushes a piano concerto CD into the CD player, turning the volume up loud enough that we don’t have to talk. Jeffrey sighs and pops his earbuds in. I kind of wish I could do the same, unexpectedly missing the energy and strong beat of Killian’s music. With the sole exception of the songs he and Mel write together, Seth is not a big fan of music with any lyrics at all. He says words get in the way of what music should actually be doing. But now, having seen Killian’s amazing dashboard and the way those words have tied him to the emotions of the songs he loves, I might disagree with Seth on that point.

I watch the shabbiness of our neighborhood fade into the cute charm of downtown Butterfield, then open up to grassy fields and miles of clear sky before we turn onto Dad’s tree-lined waterfront road.

When we pull into the driveway, I spot Lila in the yard, an enormous straw hat perched on top of her head and tied underneath her chin with a wide ribbon. She seems to be doing some kind of gardening in the elaborate flower bed underneath the giant picture window, but there’s not a speck of dirt on her polka-dot gardening gloves or her white linen pants.

“Vee!” Kaylee appears from behind a bush and makes a beeline for me as we climb out of the van. “Hi!”

“Hey, you.” I catch her under the armpits and swing her up into a big hug. She has mud on her shoes and her knees, and I squeeze her tight against me, so happy to be reminded that, despite the fact she is growing up in a mansion with two housekeepers, she is still just a normal little kid.

“What’s going on?” Lila hurries over, her face pinched underneath the hat. “Is everything okay?”

I look at Jeffrey, who drops his gaze to the ground and scuffs his shoe against the grass. “I, uh, thought I’d come early this weekend,” he says, his voice cracking painfully. “To hang out with Kaylee.”

“Well!” Lila has the grace to turn her surprise into delight. “Isn’t that nice?” She leans over and squeezes Kaylee’s arm. “Your brother came over early to see you, baby!” Kaylee looks at Jeffrey and hides her face in my shoulder.

Lila pulls off her gardening gloves and sticks them in her back pocket. “But your room isn’t ready,” she says, turning toward the house and beckoning for us to follow. “Claudette was supposed to put fresh sheets on the bed this afternoon, but I’m sure we can get it taken care of now.”

Kaylee squirms in my arms, and I put her down so she can race after Lila.

“We actually have to get going,” I call, raising my hand in a wave. “Just dropping Jeffrey off.”

Lila waves back and disappears into the house, and Jeffrey sighs and starts after her.

“Hey.” I grab his arm. “You want to tell me why you were so excited to get over here?”

“Nope.” He slips away. “Thanks for the ride, Seth.”

“No problem.”

We watch Jeffrey trudge across the lawn and up the steps to the front door, dragging his feet like he’s on his way to the electric chair. I shake my head. Something is up with him, but I have no idea what it could be.

“Maybe he has a thing for your stepmom.” Instead of heading back into downtown, Seth drives us toward the beach.

My jaw literally drops. “Are you serious?” I say. “Is that possible?”

He shrugs. “Maybe. She’s all right, I guess.”

I shudder. “You obviously don’t know Lila. She’s like the human equivalent of”—I think for a second—“a box of chalk. Dry, plain, boring. Also, where are we going?”

“I haven’t been to the beach once yet this summer,” Seth says.

“No kidding.” I glance down at his freckled arm, the skin so pale, it’s nearly translucent.

The parking lot is already half full, even though it’s not even lunchtime on a Friday. Lots of families are out and about, staggering up the dunes with cameras in hand or running out onto the beach with towels, shovels, and buckets. Seth always looks a little ridiculous at the beach, especially once the iconic shoes come off. His bare feet are long, thin, and blindingly white, and when he rolls up the bottoms of his dark jeans, he looks like a punk rocker trying to escape a flood. He picks his way across the sand, wincing at every little rock and twig he steps on.

“Let’s go walk by the water,” I say, pointing to the overgrown shortcut that bypasses the dune climb and takes you directly to the beach. My feet are still tough and calloused from running, but the miles I did yesterday have me limping along nearly as badly as Seth.

Seth walks on his tiptoes, practically leaping from step to step. “I remembered why it’s better to just stay inside,” he says, sighing with relief as we hurry to the cool, wet sand at the edge of the lake. “You’re going to have to carry me back to the parking lot.”