Exit Stage Left (11 page)

I’m not dead. That’s a relief. But I must have hit my head, because no way did I hear the person I just thought I heard.

Theresa kneels down next to me as my vision clears. “How do you feel? Does anything hurt?”

I turn my head and spit out some straw. “My shoulder.”

“Can you sit up?”

I use my left arm and pull myself up. Theresa moves my right arm forward and backward as if I’m one of those freaky-jointed dolls. Behind her, Tamale’s prancing around the barn, acting like he didn’t just try to kill me.

“You’ll be okay. Nothing broken,” she says.

“I think I hit my head, though. I thought I heard—”

“Casey? What are you doing here? Are you okay?” Oliver appears above me, holding a rake.

Or maybe I didn’t imagine it. “Riding a horse. Or, falling off it. What are
you
doing here?”

“Mucking out stalls.”

“Oliver’s mom just bought the barn,” Theresa says.

Never in a million years did I expect to see Oliver in his tie-dyed Grateful Dead T-shirt and torn jeans at a horse barn.

Harrison finally runs up, panting. “Sorry, I couldn’t get off the horse. Are you all right, Case?”

“I think so. I—”

“Oliver? What are you doing here?” Harrison ignores my response and stares at Oliver.

Well, that’s interesting. Harrison must have a thing for dark hair and bargain-basement clothes.

“C’mon. I’ll tell you while we get an ice pack for her shoulder. Hey, Casey, you’ve got a . . .” Oliver points at my face and then reaches down and brushes off a piece of straw that was stuck to my cheek.

“Um, thanks.” Not exactly the posh equestrian look I was going for. And my cheek tingles where he touched my skin. I rub at it as Oliver strolls off toward the stalls with Harrison at his side.

Theresa helps me up and sits me at a picnic table near the side of the arena. Then she catches Tamale, grabs Pants’s reins, and makes her way back to the stalls. “Just wait here for that ice pack,” she calls over her shoulder. “And maybe I’ll see you next week?”

I nod. But no way on God’s green earth am I coming back next week. Or ever. In fact, I’m never getting on a horse again. Alone in the arena, I test my shoulder, rotating my arm back and forth. It doesn’t hurt too badly.

“Try this.” Oliver appears from behind and hands me an ice pack.

I try to get it in place, except I’m not left-handed and the ice pack is kind of huge.

Oliver hops up onto the picnic table. “Here, let me.”

I pull my hand away and let him adjust the thing until it’s covering my entire shoulder, while I attempt to unbuckle my helmet one-handed.

“You need help?” Oliver’s smiling at me.

And I’m pretty sure I look less than competent right now. “No, I’ve got it.” I fumble around for another few seconds before the stupid buckle finally gives. I yank the helmet from my head and instantly regret it. There’s no mirror, but I’ve got to be sporting some amazing helmet hair right now, complete with droopy ponytail. I can’t even look at Oliver, not like this. Just because I’m trying to get back with Trevor doesn’t mean I want to go around all bedraggled and helmet-headed in front of other cute guys. I snag my ponytail holder and free my hair, finger-combing it with my free hand. Probably not my best look, but anything’s better than what I had.

“You look fine,” Oliver says.

Okay, didn’t mean to be that obvious. I do something useless with my hand that involves scratching an imaginary itch on my forehead, as if that’s what I was meaning to do all along. “Um, thanks.”

“I—” He catches the ice pack as it slips off my shoulder and sets it back into place. “There.” He doesn’t finish whatever he was going to say before, but he breaks into a soft smile when he catches my eye.

There’s a thump and a horse whinnies from somewhere down the aisle with the stalls. I must have PTSD now, because it about makes
me jump off the table. I pull my eyes from Oliver to look for runaway horses hell-bent on murdering me. “I think one of them is trying to make an escape.”

He laughs. “That’s just old Gertie. She gets cranky when she doesn’t get enough attention.” The ice pack slips again. He moves it back onto my shoulder. “You might have to hold this.”

I reach up for it. His hand covers mine as he moves the ice pack to the right spot. And I’m pretty sure he lingers a little longer than he needs to.

“Thanks,” I say, needing to break the silence. “No offense, but I don’t think horses are going to be my thing.” My legs feel shaky from hanging on to the horse, and my lower back aches from sitting up so stiffly. I don’t think my fingers will ever straighten out again. Not to mention the bruised shoulder and my brush with smashing my brains out on the floor.

“What are you guys doing here anyway?” Oliver asks. “I never really pegged you and Harrison as horse people.”

“Yeah, we’re . . . not. You’re not exactly horsey-looking yourself, you know.”

Oliver shakes his head. “You got it. Riding makes me sick, actually. I like them just fine when I’m on the ground—just not in the saddle. They’re great animals. I think it broke my mom’s heart when she figured out I wasn’t ever going to be some kind of great rider.”

“It made me sort of sick, too.”

“Clearly,” he says with his sort-of smile. “But you didn’t answer my question.”

I chew on my lip as I try to figure out how much I want to tell him. He looks so interested to hear though, and what the hell? Maybe it’ll help to get someone else’s perspective—someone who doesn’t automatically associate me with theater. So I lay it all out—my Broadway dreams, losing the part and everything that came with that, and how Harrison and I are looking for something to do with our lives.

He’s quiet for a moment, almost like he’s thinking over everything I told him. Or possibly questioning my sanity.

“You think it’s crazy, right?” I finally ask.

“No, not at all. You thought the world was one way, and now it’s not. So you have to do a little soul-searching to figure it all out.”

“Huh. That’s exactly it.”

“I’m glad you’re still in the show, though.” He reaches a hand to the one I have resting on the table and squeezes it. It’s such a comforting, familiar gesture, even though there’s nothing familiar about him at all.

“How come?” I ask.

“Because your heart might still be in theater.”

“Ha. No way. Not when I’m Mother Abbess.”

He shrugs. “And because it’s nice to see you.” He’s looking at his knees, or maybe the straw on the floor, when he says this, so all I can see is his neck tinging pink.

“It’s nice to see you, too,” I say in some weird, non-Casey-ish whispery voice.

The manure and straw smell of the barn hangs over us as neither one of us says anything else. He raises his head and studies me with
those warm eyes.

His eyes are gray
. That’s about the only coherent thing in my brain right now. Well, that and his hand is hot on mine, and I almost feel like
something
should happen, but I don’t know what.

“Hey, Case, you ready to go?” Harrison calls from across the barn.

“I’ll, uh . . . see you tomorrow,” I say to Oliver as I practically leap off the table.

“Sure,” he says, running a hand over his hair and smiling that funny half smile.

I glance back just before Harrison and I round the corner toward the door, and Oliver’s still standing there, helmet in hand, looking tall and decidedly out of place. Holding my ice pack, I think about why it is that I keep spilling my deepest thoughts to Oliver. And why it is that whenever I’m with him, Trevor doesn’t even cross my mind.

Friday. The night of the group thing with Amanda and Trevor. Amanda’s coming straight from her piano lesson, so I’m stuck getting a ride from my mother. Which means I don’t arrive at the movie theater until after the previews start.

“Where’ve you been?” Amanda asks. “I was afraid you weren’t coming.” She actually looks a little panicked.

“Of
course
I was coming.” I’m not about to explain Mom’s need to run three errands before dropping me off.

“Hey, Case.” Trevor leans forward and flashes me his perfect smile. He’s sitting between Amanda and Steve-o Grimaldi.

“Hey.” The way he smiles at me gives me hope that he’s still into me, and this thing with Amanda has been just a passing flirtation. Or a way to make me jealous.

The Grimaldis are on the other side of Trevor, followed by a girl who I guess is the Grimaldis’ cousin, and . . . Oliver. I didn’t even know he was invited to this thing. I really hope he hasn’t told anyone
about my horse incident. I’ll have to catch him later and tell him to keep his mouth shut. Last thing I need is word getting around that I almost critically injured myself via horse. Or that I might have a little thing for him, but he doesn’t know that. I think.

I look farther down the row, but there’s no Harrison.

“Um, where’s Harrison?” I ask Amanda. “And where am I sitting?” I give her a look that clearly says she needs to relocate, pronto.

“He was supposed to be here,” she says at the same time Trevor says, “Case, sit there” and points to the one free seat at the end, next to Amanda.

As in, not next to him.

I’m trying to come up with some reason why Amanda needs the end seat—she has to get up and pee a lot, she gets muscle spasms in her right arm and it tends to shoot out and smack whoever’s on her right side—when she stands up.

“I’ll take the end. I get claustrophobic otherwise.” She settles herself carefully into the last seat.

“No problem,” Trevor says. And he scoots down a seat too, leaving the free one between him and Steve-o.

I can
not
believe he just did that. I turn away for a second, the preview from some bad kung fu movie flickering into my face, and steady my breathing so I don’t go all batshit crazy on him. I’m supposed to be making him remember that he wants me, not scaring him.

It’s no big deal, I tell myself. I still get to sit next to him. I have a solid two hours(ish) to remind him how much he misses me. And I’m far enough away from Oliver that I won’t have to think about
whatever it was that happened between us yesterday.

So I climb over Amanda and Trevor and sink into the free seat. I squeeze as much to the right as possible to get closer to Trevor and far, far away from Steve-o, who reeks of pot and smirks at me when I sit down.

“Long time, no see,” he says as his brother peers around him and stares at me.

I ignore them both, yank my phone from my purse, and text Harrison.

Where R U?!!!!!!! I need backup!

I glare at the screen until he replies.

Sick. Got flu. Or maybe the plague.

Srsly? Pathetic excuse.

Glad u miss me.

Am by myself here. All ur fault.
I squish myself closer to Trevor, who’s whispering something to Amanda.

Not by yrself. A there. Gs r there. And scary cousin.

A trying 2 ignore T. Gs can’t form sentences. Oliver here.
I don’t say anymore on that subject.

Then get him 2 b yr backup. Have 2 go puke now.

That’s hilarious. Really hilarious, Harrison. I sneak a look down the row, avoiding locking eyes with Johnny Grimaldi, to see if Oliver can somehow sense that I’m thinking about him. Again. But the lights have dimmed for the movie, and I can barely even see him over everyone else.

I shove the phone into my purse. Why didn’t Harrison warn me
he wasn’t coming? Probably because he knows I’d have gone and dragged him out of his house. He’s probably faking because he was afraid of the scary Grimaldi cousin. And she doesn’t even look all that scary. She’s more Selena Gomez than Snooki.

And, Harrison was supposed to be my ride home. Although . . . that totally opens up the possibility for Trevor to drive me home. That’s not so bad.

I glance at Trevor, who’s looking at the screen. Sitting here next to him, like we’ve done a million times before, feels so
right
. He’s got a big tub of popcorn in his lap. I snake my hand over—making sure to brush his arm—and grab some.

“Thanks,” I whisper.

He gives me about half of his usual smile and turns back to the movie. Okay. Well, better than nothing, I guess. I drop the popcorn into my mouth—and nearly choke on the massive amount of butter that clogs my throat.

I force myself to swallow the fat-laden stuff and lean over to whisper in Trevor’s ear, “What’s with the butter?” He never got butter on his popcorn before, because he knows I hate it. And he knows I like to steal some from him.

“Hmm?” He’s still watching the movie.

I put a hand on his arm to get his attention. And to, well, put a hand on his arm. “The butter?”

“Oh yeah,” he whispers without looking at me. “Amanda said she liked it.”

I’m sorry,
what
? I lean forward and glare across Trevor at my
friend. Except she’s watching the movie too, and doesn’t even notice. As I sit back, Trevor moves the popcorn toward her and shakes it. She holds up her hand in the universal sign for
no
.

Okay. I take some more deep breaths. Seriously, if I have to keep up this deep-breathing stuff, I can join Mom at yoga and be a pro at it. Hmm . . . I wonder if there’s any future in yoga. Somehow I doubt that’s a major I can declare in community college, but I make a mental note to look into it anyway.

Once I’m calm enough not to climb right over Trevor and grab Amanda and shake her, demanding,
Why is he buying the popcorn you like?
I sort through the facts in my head. Just because he bought buttery popcorn doesn’t mean she asked to share it. So it’s not fair for me to be mad at her. Trevor’s just confused, that’s all. And it’s my job to make him un-confused.

I stuff my feelings of jealousy toward my best friend down into the part of my soul where I store things I don’t want to think about. Like Oliver. My dad. My sheer desperation to find a purpose to my life. My general anger at Ms. Sharp, and even more jealousy toward Amanda for taking away the thing I loved most, even if she didn’t mean to.

I need to focus on the Right Now. And right now, I need to remind Trevor that we belong together.

The movie is a lame monster film, which Trevor seems totally engrossed in. He’s got a Coke in the cup holder between him and Amanda. I lean across him in a way that’s sure to make as much body contact as possible, and reach for the drink.

“Thanks,” I say before I take a sip.

He just sort of grunts, eyes still on the screen.

Okay. Time to break out the big guns. I stretch across him again to replace the drink, pretend to lose my balance, and steady myself by reaching out to place one hand on his chest and the other on his knee.

“Shit, Casey, you knocked over the popcorn,” he says in a voice that’s louder than a whisper.

The people in front of us turn around and glare. I look down, my hands still on him. Sure enough, the tub of popcorn that was sitting between his knees is sideways, and fluffy pieces of popcorn blanket the floor like snow.

“Sorry,” I say snippily. I make sure to slide my hands off as slowly as possible as I sit back down.

Which he doesn’t even acknowledge. Instead he says, “When did you turn into such a klutz?”

My face heats up, and I’m grateful it’s dark in the theater. Almost instantly, the embarrassment turns into anger. “And when did you turn into such an asshole? Oh wait, you already were one.”

Trevor tenses up, probably ready with a comeback, but the guy in front of him turns around to glare again, and he settles for crunching up the popcorn bucket.

I can practically feel the smirk radiating off Steve-o as I cross my arms and fume and try to watch the movie. I want normal, but why does normal have to be so freaking hard?

After the credits roll, I lag behind the group as we walk across the parking lot to the ice cream place, waving the trail of Steve-o’s
cigarette smoke from my face so it doesn’t ruin my voice, and trying to plot my next move. I’ve mellowed a little since going off on Trevor, and I think he has too. At least, he seems to be in a better mood and he held the theater door for me rather than letting it shut in my face. I should probably still be mad at him, but this is just how we
are
.

Ice Cream Palace is one of my favorite places in the world. Dad used to take me and Eric here all the time when we were younger and he was actually around on a daily basis. I’d always order the biggest hot fudge sundae on the menu. And Dad would always have to finish it for me. It’s sort of bittersweet, coming in here now.

The guys push three tables together. Amanda sits first, and—of course—Trevor claims the spot right next to her at the head of the table. She motions at me to come sit on her other side, but Rosalita gets there first. I move to grab the free chair on Trevor’s other side, but Steve-o’s already sliding himself into it.

This is not going the way I planned. At all. Now I’m going to have to amp up my flirting game from a distance. I pick a seat at the very end—at least from here I have a direct line of vision to Trevor.

As I wipe the crumbs off my chair, Johnny Grimaldi shoves in next to me, and Oliver takes the last free seat to my right. It won’t be awkward at
all
to sit next to him, in his perfectly messy clothes and perfectly messy hair and that smile that makes it look like he knows exactly what I’m thinking. Then I think of the way he touched my hand yesterday, and that feeling that
something
was about to happen, and I have a hard time not scooting my chair over right next to his.

I’m afraid my face will betray me, so I avoid Oliver’s eyes by
focusing on the other end of the table. Except that’s where Trevor’s engaged Amanda in some deep conversation. She keeps shooting glances my way, but really, what can I do from way down here?

Oliver’s phone rings while I’m feeling sorry for myself yet again. “It’s my dad,” he says as he moves away to talk.

I spend the next few minutes eating ice cream and ignoring Johnny Grimaldi, who keeps smiling at me. I think it works, because he starts passing a flask back and forth under the table with his brother. (Because it’s entirely normal to drink at a cute little pink-and-white ice cream shop.) Trevor’s moved his head closer to Amanda, and doesn’t even seem to notice that she’s moved as far as possible next to Rosalita. At least she’s trying. I have to give her credit for that, even though we wouldn’t even be in this situation if she hadn’t done the unthinkable to begin with.

“Sorry about that,” Oliver says as he sits again and dips into his half-melted ice cream. “London time, you know. I feel like a jerk if I don’t pick up when he calls.”

“Because he stayed up late?” I ask, perfectly nonchalant, as if yesterday never happened. I can, after all, act.

“Well, yeah, and because I said some really horrible shit to him when he and Mom split. I didn’t talk to him for about six months.”

Huh. That sounds more familiar than I think I feel comfortable with. So I change the subject.

“So, um, about the other day?” I say so as not to clue Johnny Grimaldi in. Although that isn’t exactly hard to do, since he’s busy pouring whatever’s in that flask into his Coke.

“At the barn?”

“Yeah. I don’t—”

“It never happened,” he says, as if he read my mind.

Wait—is he talking about me riding horses or our Moment? I hope it’s the horses. I take a huge bite of ice cream and hot fudge to shut my brain off before it goes into overdrive. I finally swallow and say, “Okay, well, thanks. So, um . . . how’d your mom end up buying a stable anyway? That seems kind of random.”

“Not really. She was a champion show jumper when she was our age. She’s always been involved in horses. We had a barn back home, too.”

“My mom’s the office manager for a law firm.” I try to imagine her on a horse in her neat skirts and button-down shirts, but that just makes me laugh. Then I imagine Oliver bouncing around on a horse the way I did, and that makes me laugh more. “Sorry,” I say. “Just thinking of the movie.”

“Did you like it?” Oliver asks.

I swallow a mouthful of hot fudge sundae. “Are you serious? Not really.”

“I thought it kicked ass straight to Staten Island,” Johnny says out of nowhere.

“And I thought Casey might be into movies that kick ass straight to Staten Island,” Oliver says with a perfectly straight face.

“Damn straight,” Johnny says, and he does some guy fist-bump/high-five thing with Oliver.

“I’m more into movies that don’t kick anything anywhere,” I say.

“You didn’t appreciate the ironic humor in that movie? I thought for sure you would,” Oliver says.

I guess that’s a compliment? Who knows. He carefully runs his hand through his hair, and I wonder what it would feel like to do the same.

Stop it, Casey. I can’t think of Oliver like that while I’m putting every ounce of my energy into getting Trevor back and making my life normal again. Oliver is not part of Normal Casey Life. Not even close.

I turn and look past Johnny Grimaldi to remind myself of why I’m here. Trevor’s actually moved his chair closer to Amanda, and he’s talking to her in this super-intense way. Probably giving her a second-by-second play of his moments onstage last year. I know, because he had that same look on his face when he came over to see me—when I was finally over the mono but a little too depressed to go to the show—after opening night last year. Never mind that we weren’t together then. Of course, that didn’t last long. It took all of five minutes for us to make up and become Casey-and-Trevor. Again.

Trevor pushes his hair back. He says something I can’t hear, and it must be really funny, because Amanda laughs. She looks up at me, like she’s instantly sorry.