Conviction (3 page)

He opened his mouth to speak but was interrupted by Polo, whose arms were overflowing with cushions and pillows. “Hey, Addie!”

I waved again. “Hi, Polo.”

Polo tried to wave and dropped all of the merchandise in his hands. Visibly frustrated, Reid sighed and smacked him upside the head before kicking one of the pillows. Polo chuckled and hurriedly picked everything up, tripping over himself to follow Reid into the next room.

“That boy is so easily distracted. I’m not entirely sure if Polo should be allowed to drive that
thing
out there…” Ben trailed off

I remembered the outrageous sports cars in the driveway and almost choked. “One of those is Polo’s?”

Ben locked eyes with me and nodded very seriously. “Yes, the Aston Martin. The boys play ‘hide the keys’ from him, though fortunately he doesn’t show much interest in driving, anyway.

From somewhere close by, the sound of glass shattering echoed in our ears.

“Sorry, Elise!”

Ben and I both cringed.

“So, um, you were telling me how your holidays were?”

Within the architecture of Ben and Elise’s house there were three complete wings. The central house contained their massive kitchen, living room, dining room, three bedrooms, and two bathrooms. This was the only portion of the house that I had been exposed to up until this point, and since my first and only visit had been so brief—little time had been left for exploring or curiosity.

Charlie had explained to me later that the attached west and east wings were identical and fixed with hallways and big empty rooms that never had anything in them. There were two bathrooms in each wing, and in the east wing a large study that was used as a sort of library. Elise pointed me to a staircase I had never seen before and apologized she couldn’t show me herself. She then went back to yelling at some poor florist on the phone and reconfirming her guest list.

“Leave your bag here!” she scolded me. “Make Charlie get it later.”

His name bounced around in my head like one of those balls from the machines that children beg their parents spare change over. To think he was so close and I could finally have him full-time! As soon as I thought the group was out of sight, I took the steps two at a time—not caring when I tripped over my sneakers and hit my shins.

At the top of the stairs I could see the finer points of Elise’s decorating skills. The west wing was far bolder than the main house, which was open and simple. Up here, the walls were painted burgundy in a fine glossy hue. Instantly, I was tempted to remove my shoes and feel what looked like some intensely lush ebony carpet beneath my feet, but decided I could indulge later. At the ceiling’s centers there were old world chandelier pendants—they had the same ebony tint as the carpet below, giving off a low lighting so that one could see the silver frames that held the occasional picture of Tyler on the walls.

The hall felt like it went on forever. With doors on both sides, I began to think I should have asked a little more specifically where Charlie was. I knocked on the first door but there was no answer. The second door on the same side was open and completely empty except for a few plastic boxes and what looked like some old furniture. I started on the other side but the results were the same.

Just as my anxiety was getting ready to set in, I heard one of those unique Southern profanities I had openly come to adore.

“Dag nab it!”

I contained my glee and followed the trail to a larger room towards the end of the hall. Before I even looked inside I could smell fresh paint and the scent of wood shavings but it didn’t concern me enough to take much notice—I only had focus on one thing.

“Charlie?”

He rose from his spot in the corner, kneeling very close to the wall with his back to me. He moved as though the world were ending, running to the doorway to sweep me up in his arms and back into the hallway. Our lips were back together again like they had never been apart—my knees became useless.

“When did you get here?” he demanded.

“Wh-huh?”

He laughed and pulled me close to him. “They were supposed to call me when you got here.”

I turned to mush in his arms. “Everyone is a little busy right now.” I could hear his heart beating slightly faster than usual, as always it made mine beat more quickly as well..

“Uh yeah, ‘bout that…there’s this party tomorrow.”

“Gee, no kidding?”

“I didn’t tell you ’cause you wouldn’t have come.”

I feigned offense. “You don’t know that.”

Charlie grinned. “You woulda made up some excuse to not come out until after the first.”

Rolling my eyes, I forced myself back into his arms. “It wouldn’t have been an excuse,” I mumbled. “I would have found a very legitimate reason.”

He laughed.

“I’m a selfish guy, okay? I want you all to myself.”

I sighed. “I’m okay with that.”

We held each other for a moment before he spoke. “Hey,” he whispered in my ear. “I got a surprise for you.”

“Should I be nervous?”

“I hope not.”

He led me back into the room where the smell of the paint profoundly took over. Standing behind me, he wrapped his arms around me and folded his hands over mine. I laughed at his manipulations, but once I began to look around at the room, I was distracted by the elaborate drawings done on the wall. From the familiar lines, I knew instantly they belonged to Charlie, and as usual they were nothing short of amazing. He had taken great detail into sketching roses at the base of the floorboards so that they appeared to be growing from the floor themselves. He had even painted them a shade of blue—something I had never seen Charlie do to any of his sketches before. The bloom of blue roses bordered every wall of the room. Several inches high, they checkered and overwhelmed. Yet to avoid over accentuating them, Charlie had also created small white flowers drawn into scene, often straight in-between the blue roses. I couldn’t identity these flowers directly, and frankly couldn’t even recall having ever seen them before. They stemmed from a checkered spike that Charlie had painted a sort of gray—and little white blooms sprouted from every orifice of each cone with the tiniest yellow seeds at their centers.

I was in awe at his craftsmanship. “Wow.”

“If you don’t like it I can paint over it,” he rushed. “I wanted it to be a surprise. And it was supposed to be done before you got here, but I kept messin’ up.” As he trailed off I could see the soiled rags embellished with different shades of paints and the remains of brushes over a used tarp.

“Wait a minute.” I pulled away and turned around to face him. “This,” I gestured to the room’s walls, “is for me?”

He grimaced. “I can paint over it,” he repeated. I saw his shoulders tense up; his hands buried themselves in his pants pockets, and his eyes left mine.

I knelt in front of wall where the paint smell wasn’t quite as profound, a starting point, I guessed, and took in the specific features of the picture. Every rose appeared to be unique from the one before it; some had the look of soft, younger petals while others were in full bloom. I saw one further down the wall that was only in its early budding stages, and another whose petals were beginning to slip off.

“
Like
this? How could I like this?” I wanted to trace the outline of the little white flowers, but I was afraid they were still wet, so I held back. I ran through the dictionary in my head and tried to think of the right words to describe how the illustration affected me; like every one of Charlie’s sketches, the flowers he had drawn for me was absurdly authentic, but the color he’d added in addition to his talent was breathtaking.

I looked back at Charlie; his face revealed an astounding disappointment, as though he were trying to return to sleep after a great dream and couldn’t get the image back. Laughing, I ran back to him and threw my arms around his neck, pulling myself up and securing my legs around his waist.

“I really like it.” I kissed his face until I felt him smile. “Scout’s honor.”

Charlie sighed and squeezed me tighter, rocking me in the throes of his arms. “If you don’t, I can change it.”

“Don’t you dare. I’ve always wanted to live in one of your drawings. I just didn’t think I’d ever get to do it literally.”

He sat up on the over-extended windowsill, which was only one in a series of windows that ran across the northern wall of the room. The view faced the front of the yard, where the decayed remains of last season’s orchard withered on.

“I’m glad you like it.” He laughed. “Since you wouldn’t let me get you anything for Christmas…”

I bopped him on the nose. “No gifts.”

Laughing, he threw his head back. “You broke your own rule!”

“Some sketchbooks and charcoal pencils are nothing compared to this, Charlie. I mean it, you’ve outdone yourself.”

He recoiled but still continued to laugh. “Maybe it was good I didn’t go with my first idea.”

“Which was?” I couldn’t stop smiling.

“You need something to get you to school and back, so I figured it’d be all right get you something with four wheels.”

“Absolutely not.” I was resolute about it and my tone supported me. “I have enough money saved up to buy some kind of working vehicle, and if worst comes to worst, I downloaded the Healdsburg bus schedule.”

Charlie rolled his eyes. “So damn stubborn.” He leaned into me and combed his hand through my hair. I heard his head tap against the glass of the window pane as he rested it there.

“Hmm.” I sighed as I breathed him in. “I wish I could stay with you.”

The window fogged up from his huff of laughter. “Addie, you got no idea how much…” He swallowed hard and loosened his grip on me. Something remained unsaid in the gesture, though I wasn’t entirely sure what it was. “It wouldn’t be any good for you. It’s probably a lot better for you to be living at the school. ” He looked up at me again and smiled a little, although it almost seemed to hurt him to do so. “’Sides, I’d be bothering you all the time and never let you get any schoolwork done.”

I scowled. While I admired his attempt to do what he thought was best for me, I also felt his constant need to protect me was bordering on abrasive. Perhaps it was a result of the way we met that Charlie felt an obligatory need to look after me. Maybe it was our difference in age, or that he had as little social experience as I did. Whatever his reasoning, I realized my constant reassurances were doing nothing of the sort. Maybe I was exacerbating the situation by trying to assure him of my security. Possibly, I needed to let him feel in control of the situation, give him confidence that way.

Chapter 3

It was at some point the next day when Charlie ran off to help Yuri that I took the opportunity to call Dad and confirm I was still alive and safe. I had fibbed by telling him I had already checked-into my dorm, something I was confidant he wouldn’t know about one way or the other. In reality, I was in the living room, where there was so much noise it could have sounded like a college dormitory from Dad’s side of the phone.

“Yes, Dad, everyone here is very nice so far…”

“No, Dad, that isn’t a baby crying, that’s just someone’s TV.”

“Yes, it’s pretty crazy here.”

“Okay, I will…”

“Got to go, Dad.”

I took Tyler from Polo, who had been wrangled into babysitting while Ben and Yuri tried to set up the beverage fountains without breaking them. Elise had her hands full arguing with Reid over the
proper
way of threatening the catering company.

“Um…let me?” Polo was enhancing some kind of new tummy tickling technique that Tyler was completely unhappy about. He shrieked loudly in Polo’s face, determined to be released.

Polo mimicked a football toss. “Oh man! Oh man! Here, Addie! Here!” 

“Easy, Polo.” I put Tyler over my shoulder but he still trembled with little fits of fury.  Elise made this motherhood thing look easy, but my few experiences babysitting had been average at best and I couldn’t say that my number one ambition in life was maternal. Still, I had to figure Tyler would be better off with me than Polo.

“Maybe it’s better if the two of us stay out of the way,” I whispered to Tyler. “I have a feeling we’re both pretty useless here.”

I bounced Tyler all the way up to his playroom, which looked more like a warehouse for a toy store than a place for actual play. Other than the oversized stuffed animals and light-up cars, most of the toys were untouched. The boxes they came in, however, had holes cut out of them and were taped together to form a fort that was clearly as loved as it was played in.

I let him loose there, playing peek-a-boo at the open roof of one box then startling him by sneaking up on him as he crawled out the other side. I always pretended he was just out of my reach and it made him giggle louder at every turn.

“Nice job, Ty.” I gave him thumbs up. “You can never be fast enough.”

When he got bored of the boxes he climbed the small mountain of stuffed animals and I told him about my flight, bragging on about the bedroom mural. “Of course you’re welcome anytime you want—provided you can crawl up all those stairs.” He used my shirt as a napkin and chewed on a giraffe’s ear.

Later on when we felt brave enough to venture back downstairs, Elise and Ben came back in through the terrace in the early stage of a lovers’ spat. As much as I enjoyed chatting with him, I was even more glad I had Tyler with me to provide a diversion from the awkwardness of situation. Though the topic was beyond me, I caught the end bits of their conversation as they walked past me.

“He’s only trying to help, Elise.”

She huffed and stomped in her clogged heels. “Are you joking? He’s intentionally trying to annoy me and sabotage this party. You know it’s important for us to maintain good relationships with everyone in this town. I’m not just doing this for my health, you know.” I didn’t have to ask to know they were talking about Reid.

I struggled to maintain normalcy. “Has anyone seen where Charlie ran off to?”  

Neither of them even looked at me. “I think he’s in the garage,” Elise said.

After securing Tyler in his jumper swing, I slipped out of the room as quickly and quietly as possible, running out past the enclosure of empty backyard gardens. The excitement of making it to California was reaching me in its entirety and I felt carefree and lively. Here, there were no police to ask questions, no Dads to keep secrets from, and no press to avoid. There was just Charlie—as if that was all there ever needed to be. School, making friends, all of it, was well and good, but it faded in comparison to what we had accomplished.

As I rounded the corner of the garage, I looked in the first set of windows but they were tinted from the inside and I couldn’t see a thing. I walked along the edge to the gate and let myself inside, where the driveway ended.

The sun gleaming off of the cars was nearly blinding and I had to shield my eyes away from the chrome detailing on the bright orange car. For a moment, I wondered which one was Polo’s and if it would have the most damage. Yet from what I could see, none of the cars, even the motorcycle, had any damage whatsoever—not even a scratch.

Before I even walked into the garage itself, I could hear a strange whistling noise coming from inside. It sounded like a squeaker toy, or a Frisbee flying through the air. As I stepped into the archway of the garage a circle of blue crossed over and floated up before I could catch it.

Another balloon trailed after it—this one was silver.

“Charlie, are you in here?” As soon as I took a step inside, I saw the skeleton of an unfinished car shielded in a thin sheet. On a workbench, there were scattered boxes and fuel cans. Some tool cabinets held speakers and an mp3 player that strangely, I mused, looked outdated.

“Charlie?”

“Hey!”

His face peeked over the edge of the second-story railing. All around him the ceiling was covered with balloons in both blue and silver.

“Where’d you wander off to?”

“Me?”

He laughed. “Yeah!”

“I was looking for you!”

I ran up the stairs, almost tripping over some of the balloons that lay around on the concrete floor.

“You’re on balloon detail, I see.”

Charlie took my hand before I could fall, simultaneously laughing and flinching at my misstep. I tangled my arm around his neck and picked up a balloon off an old table. I ran the elastic against his hair, laughing while it went crazy.

“It’s a good look for you.”

He sighed into my neck and shook his head. I was glad he was only pretending to be annoyed, and that he was also terrible at pretending.

“Never thought I could hate balloons so much,” he grumbled.

I jumped as I zapped myself with the hair on his arms. “How many more do you have to go?”

“The Empress wants another thirty before tomorrow night.”

“I’ll help.” I picked up a silver balloon and began blowing air into it. “It’ll go twice as fast this way.”

He smiled and strapped the balloon tip over the faucet of the helium tank. “Or you’ll just distract the hell outta me and keep me from getting this done.”

The balloon flew out of my mouth as I erupted in laughter.

“See?”

I felt the warmth of blush run to my face, and I instantly covered it and my laughter with my hands. Charlie started laughing too, and sat up from his stool to pull my hands away. “Don’t you ruin my view, now.”

When he kissed me, an electric current ran right through me from my lips to the ends of my fingers where we met again—fingertip to fingertip. Gasping, I reached behind him for another balloon and quietly, slowly slipped from his grasp.

“I’ll work over here,” I slid to the other side of the room, “and you stay over there.”

His brow furrowed. “I ain’t making no promises.”

I gathered up the balloons on the floor and secured them as best I could in the drop net before trying to blow up any more. I felt a little pathetic only being able to blow up about an eighth of a balloon before becoming dizzy. Worse yet, I only finished tying off three of them before Charlie began teasing me.

“You know if you want me to kiss you, all you have to do is ask. You don’t gotta make yourself pass out.”

I narrowed my eyes at him, blowing even harder into the balloon until it was a well-rounded sculpture.

“I mean it.” I tried to ignore him, but I could still sense he was genuinely concerned. “Don’t be stubborn over somethin’ stupid. There’s a lot to do if you want to do something—”

“You’re one to talk about ‘stupid’ things.” I volleyed a balloon in his direction. “If you keep worrying like this you’ll end up as neurotic as me.”

He volleyed the balloon back to me. “I can’t help it.” He switched off the helium tank and stared at me for a long moment. “I ain’t ever had anything to lose before—it’s scary.”

Luckily, the one skill I did have over Charlie was curling the ends of the nylon ribbon after I tied them to the ends of the helium balloons. Charlie tried several times over, but his fingers were much too large for the tiny knots.

“A little different from tying a girl to a radiator, isn’t it?” I teased

He grumbled deep in his chest and blanched at the mention of our first meeting, but I knew he would have to get over it eventually and so tried to coax the humor out of him every so often. I kissed him on the nose and gathered up my half of the balloons.

“Hey,” he whispered. “The jet-lag got you yet?”

“Not a chance.”

“Good,” he said. “‘Cause I wanna show you something.”

Charlie walked over to the electrical outlet and started pulling switches, setting off rays of lighting from above. I leaned against the hood of a bodiless car and stared across at the shiny orange corvette. “You guys went shopping?”

Charlie laughed, leaning beside me and nodding to the corvette. “That’s Polo’s new toy. I think he’d have more fun blowing it up than driving it.”

“At least he’s not driving that.” I pointed to the motorcycle with the black and silver bodywork. Of course, I knew nothing about the mechanics of the vehicle—but it appeared rather advanced, which I imaged only meant it went extremely fast.

Charlie was visibly amused. “What’s wrong with that?”

“T-those things are death machines!”

He busted out laughing. “What?”

“People who drive motorcycles are nearly twenty-five percent more likely to experience death related traffic accidents than those who drive passenger cars.”

He doubled over laughing.

“It’s true.”

“Not if you wear one of these.” He walked over to a workbench and picked up a bulbous black helmet with tinted visor.

I watched him; admittedly my curiosity piqued as he stuck the helmet on his head and walked over to the motorcycle. As usual, Charlie moved with the same fluid ease and confidence he always had. Even straddling the leather seat and taking the keys out of his pants pocket looked as though it was his second nature. I would have been content to watch him for the rest of the day, but he stared back at me with a lazy half-smile, silently asking permission.

“No way, Charlie.”

The engine rumbled, echoing in the infinite garage. It sounded as though a monster were being unleashed from its cave and was hungry for a victim. He revved it up, and while I felt a sort of obligation to worry or scold, the only real thing I could focus on was the flex of his arm as he continually rotated the throttle.

After a minute or so he caught me staring and flipped up the visor of his helmet. “You wanna go for a ride with me?”  

“Not a chance.”

“You don’t trust me?”

I tried not to laugh. “I don’t trust this.” I tapped my head at the base of my skull.

Charlie grinned at me. “Look over there.” He nodded in the general direction of the workbench and rested his elbows against the handlebars of his bike.

Cautiously, but torn with a new sort of excitement, I went to the workbench and glanced around at the various objects—mostly tools, used rags, and some paint cans.

“What am I looking for?”

He started laughing again. “Underneath.”

I wanted to curse at him, but I became excited like a small child and any anger I might have felt was elevated at the sight of a rather large box hiding in the shadows.

“What is this?” I shook it but only heard a slight rattling which gave nothing away.

“Open it.” Charlie revved the engine again.

I smiled up at him, and it was pretty obvious he was just as excited as I was—biting on the inside of his cheek and tapping on the kickstand. I think he was trying not to grin.

The cardboard had clearly already been examined from the outside so it wasn’t difficult to remove the packing tape once more. I plowed through the foam peanuts without any regard, ignoring Charlie while he threw them back at me.

Beneath the protective foam, I saw the top of a thermo-plastic helmet, not that different from Charlie’s. Unlike his however, this helmet was considerably smaller and completely white with the exception of a petite gray skull that was stenciled at the base and the tinted visor—that I noticed when I removed it from the box—also flipped.

My eyes questioned him.

“If it doesn’t fit, you don’t have to come with me.”

I tried to glare, but Charlie rolled his eyes at me.

“I know you don’t care ‘bout your hair.”

I walked over with the helmet under my arm. While I had to admit the temptation of it all, it was still frightening not to have the same security as a car.