Golden Girl (10 page)

“Hey, Lex.”

A shadow crossed over me, and I looked up to see a tall figure dressed in a Burton hoodie, with the hood pulled far over his head, obscuring his face. At first I wasn't sure who it was, but then I caught a hint of sparkling blue underneath the hood.

“What, are you in the witness protection program or something?” I teased as Logan sat down across from me at the picnic table.

He laughed and pulled down his hood, a shock of messy brown hair tumbling into his eyes. “Nah, just banned from the mountain for the next two months,” he admitted, brushing back his locks. “Thanks to the hardworking efforts of the Green Mountain ski patrol.”

I cringed at his words. This was all my fault. Because of me, he'd gotten punished. “I'm sorry,” I said with a moan. “If I had known my dad was going to—”

Logan reached out and pressed a finger against my lips, effectively silencing my apology. “Don't worry about it,” he told me, sounding sincere and serious. “It's not the first time I've been banned from the mountain. And it certainly won't be my last.” He gave me an impish grin. “Besides, I have my superpowers, remember?” he added, reminding me of my joke the night before.

I smiled in relief. “How could I forget?” After a pause I added, “It was a good party. I mean, besides the end part. Just what I needed. Thanks for taking me.”

Logan nodded. “Anytime.” Then he shrugged sheepishly. “Well, anytime we have another mountainside party that is. Which, admittedly, might not be for a while.”

I groaned, banging my head against the picnic table. “Man, your friends must totally hate me.”

“Nah. Most people probably thought it was pretty exciting. They live for near-death escapes like that—makes for a good story the next day.” He chuckled. “Anyway, only me and Hunter actually got caught.”

I made a face. “And Hunter already hates me.”

“Hunter hates everyone,” Logan replied, rolling his eyes. “So what are you up to today?” he asked. “Are you taking part in that big tournament over at South Side this afternoon?”

I shook my head, wondering again if I should just tell him the truth. After all, though he was obviously too polite to bring it up, he had to be wondering why I froze at the sight of the ski patrol last night and didn't abandon ship like everyone else. But still, I found I couldn't bring myself to do it. It was too nice to have him think of me as a normal girl. Not as someone to be pitied.

“I'm taking it easy today,” I told him. It wasn't technically a lie. “Why? What are you—?”

“Hey, bro, what's up?” interrupted Todd Grossman, fellow Mountain Academy student and top-ranked crosser on the boys' team. If I had earned the title of Golden Girl, Todd certainly could have been crowned Golden Boy. Not that you'd ever know it by talking to him.

Todd hurdled the porch's railing, landing in front of Logan and flashing him an excited grin. I raised my eyebrow. Did they know each other? From the way Logan smiled back at him, I realized they must.

“You ready for today?” Todd asked. “It's going to be completely mad with all that fresh powder.” He raised his fist. “Time to bomb the cross like a boss, baby!” He bumped Logan. “Booyeah!”

“Sorry, man,” Logan said, waving him off. “I'm out.”

“What?” Todd cried. “You can't be serious, bro! The Burton rep is going to be there. He's handing out next year's boards to the winners—they're not even in the stores yet.” He gave Logan a look. “And you
know
you need a new board.”

Logan shrugged helplessly. “Yeah, well, tell that to Green Mountain's finest.”

“Oh man!” Todd groaned loudly. “Do
not
tell me you got yourself banned from the mountain again.”

“What can I say? I have a gift.”

“Dude! How are you ever going to make it to pro if you keep getting yourself kicked off the mountain?” Todd shook his head. “I guess I should be thanking you though. It's going to be a lot easier to win without you at my heels the whole way down.”

“Todd! There you are!”

I glanced behind the snowboarder to see Olivia running up the porch, her cheeks flushed from the cold. Or maybe just too much cherry-colored blush. With her hot pink ski jacket and face plastered with makeup, she looked as if she was about to hit the clubs instead of the slopes.

“Oh, hey, girlie,” Todd said, putting out his arm and wrapping it around Olivia. Were they a couple now? Ugh. “You need to tell your old man to stop kicking Logan off the mountain, or I'm going to die of boredom during my next race.”

Olivia shot Logan a disdainful look. “If he's banned, then why is he here?”

“I think that's pretty obvious,” Todd replied, giving Logan a knowing wink. “After all, what guy wouldn't risk the wrath of Masters for a chance to hang out with the lovely Lexi here.” He shot me a grin. “By the way, welcome back, Lex.”

“Thanks,” I said, unable to help a giggle. He was too much.

Olivia's face turned purple. “That's all well and good,” she spit out. “But this porch is for paying customers only.” Her eyes drilled into Logan. “No staff rats allowed.”

“But evidently mean girls are fully welcomed,” Todd shot back playfully, causing Olivia to scowl even harder. He laughed and gave her a kiss on the cheek. “Oh, come on, Cujo. Put away your fangs and buy me that hot chocolate you promised me.”

He grabbed her and dragged her down off the porch and toward the Waffle Hut. Before they left, Olivia shot Logan a lethal look, as if to say,
I'll be back—and you'd better not be here when I am.
Bleh. What could a nice guy like Todd see in a girl like her?

“I should go,” Logan said. I noticed his ears had turned bright red. He stood up so suddenly he knocked over his chair.

“No!” I cried, panic surging through me. “Don't listen to her. She's only trying to—”

Logan waved me off. “I know. But she's not wrong. I'm not supposed to be here. And if she says anything to her dad, my mom might get in trouble.” He gave me a wry smile. “It was nice to see you again though,” he said. “I'm sure I'll catch you around.”

And with that, he stepped quickly down off the porch and walked past the ski lodge. For a moment I stood stock still, not sure what to do. Should I let him go? I didn't want him to get into any more trouble because of me—I'd already ruined his life enough. But at the same time, if he walked out of my life now, I might never see him again.

And I
really
wanted to see him again.

I spotted him in the parking lot, trudging toward the public bus stop at the other end. He was walking slowly, his steps heavy. It wasn't hard to catch up.

“Logan!” I cried as I approached. “Wait up!”

He stopped, turning back to me, a small smile playing at the corner of his lips. “Yes?” he asked.

“Take me with you.”

He raised an eyebrow, and I felt my face flush. Where had that come from? Did I sound cool? Or desperate?

“You mean, back to town?” he asked, just as the commuter bus pulled up to the parking lot behind him. A few passengers—mountain employees by the looks of them—started unloading. I bit my lower lip.

“If that's where you're going,” I managed to bluster.

It was totally against the rules, of course. Underclassmen weren't allowed to leave campus without permission—or adult supervision. Never mind leave with a random boy they'd been expressly forbidden to see. If my dad found out, I'd probably end up grounded until the Olympics themselves.

But what choice did I have? Logan couldn't hang out here. And I couldn't let him go.

“Please?” I said, now pretty sure I was coming off as desperate. But I no longer cared.

The bus driver honked, signaling his departure. It was now or never. Logan stood still for a moment, as if trying to decide. I held my breath.
Please let me come. Please don't leave me behind.

“Okay,” he said at last, grabbing my arm and pulling me toward the bus. “Let's go.”

E
ven though I'd lived on the Mountain Academy campus for most of my life, I hadn't spent a lot of time in the neighboring town of Littleton, Vermont, just down the hill from the school and ski resort. If we were to go out for groceries or maybe catch a movie, my dad always preferred to head in the opposite direction, toward the vacation town of Paddington, just up the road. Paddington was the kind of town everyone thought of when they pictured traditional New England towns. It had white-steeple churches, cozy bed-and-breakfasts, antique shops, independent bookstores, and even a completely restored covered bridge from the 1900s.

Littleton, on the other hand, was Paddington's poorer cousin, a postindustrial wasteland that probably should have been put out of its misery once the engines of industry ground to a stop in the mid-1800s, leaving crumbling factories, decaying Victorian mansions, and abandoned storefronts behind.

But somehow Littleton struggled on, and eventually the ancestors of these industrial pioneers found new hope and opportunity when Green Mountain opened its resort. Today most of the town's residents worked either at the mountain itself or for some other tourist-fed side business that had grown up along the access road, their entire livelihoods dependent on each year's snowfalls and the winter warriors with fat wallets who visited.

I rubbed my sleeve against the grimy bus window, trying to get a peek outside. I'd never cared much about Littleton before now, but suddenly I was intensely curious about the town that had produced a boy like Logan. This was where he'd grown up, where he went to school. Where he worked and played and ate and slept. I wanted to know everything about it.

“This is our stop,” he announced as the bus pulled up to a nondescript intersection. I followed him out of the vehicle and onto the street.

“So, um, where are we going?” I asked, trying to sound casual even though I was more than a little nervous. I'd never snuck away from school before.

“You'll see.”

He led me down the snow-caked sidewalk until we reached a redbrick building with no windows and a flickering neon sign that read
BILL'S
with the
B
burned out. Logan chivalrously opened the creaky door, allowing me to step inside first.

My eyes widened as I entered. It was a coffee house—but also an arcade. Not just any arcade, though, but an arcade packed with vintage games popular back in the 1980s—the kind my dad used to play when he was a kid. Pac-Man, Dig Dug, Crystal Castles, even Dragon's Lair. I'd tried a lot of them out on our PlayStation—Dad had bought the arcade games collection, jokingly saying he needed some kind of ego boost after losing to me on Mario Kart for the hundredth time. But I'd never seen any of them in their original big-box packaging. I flashed Logan a grin. How cool was this?

“Lexi!”

I suddenly found myself surrounded and smothered by two familiar faces. Scarlet and Lulu descended upon me, hugging me enthusiastically as they chattered about last night's adventure. As Logan had predicted, the two girls seemed to have no inkling as to my involvement in the whole ski patrol thing, thank goodness.

“And Logan! Poor, poor Logan!” cooed Scarlet, releasing me. “Banned from the mountain, once more with feeling. Whatever will he do now, with all his spare time?”

“Why, he'll start hanging out with us, of course!” Lulu chimed in, tossing a blue-streaked braid over one shoulder. “I mean, sure, at first he'll pretend he's only coming here for the video games and strawberry smoothies. But in time, he'll have to admit the truth. He's become a Manic Pixie superfan and he's helpless to resist us!” She crowed loudly, making a huge flourish with her hands, then bowed low.

Logan rolled his eyes. “Oh yeah. Cause that'll happen.”

“Manic Pixie?” I repeated curiously, remembering them talking the night before. “That's the name of your band?”

“Yup. Check it.” Scarlet pointed a chipped, neon-green-painted fingernail to the other end of the coffee bar, where, sure enough, there was a drum set, amps, guitars, and other such band-type equipment haphazardly sprawled across a small stage. “Bill's my uncle, and he said we could practice here after my mom got sick of us using her garage,” the redhead explained. “As long as we promise not to scare off any customers.”

“As if Bill
has
any customers besides us,” Lulu added, throwing an affectionate look at the older man behind the coffee bar. I realized he was wearing an eye patch over his left eye and kind of looked like a pirate. “We keep him in business with our chili cheese fry orders alone.”

“So it's just the two of you?”

“And my brother Roland, who you met last night,” Scarlet added. “I play the drums and Lulu is our bassist. Roland's on guitar—and right now he sings, too. Ever since Carla quit the band.” She made a face. “But while Roland is admittedly the most amazing guitar player ever, let's just say he . . .”

“Sounds like a sick cow when he sings?” Logan suggested helpfully.

The girls groaned in unison.

“Seriously, the whole situation totally blows,” Lulu moaned. “There's this big battle of the bands thing at school in a few months. We signed up ages ago. The prize is like a thousand dollars. And maybe even a chance at a recording deal.”

“But we won't have a prayer with Roland on the mic.”

“Hey, I heard that!” Roland cried, coming out from the men's room. He swiped at his shaggy hair, giving the girls a playful grin, telling them he didn't really mind their complaints. Which made me think he really must be as bad as they claimed.

The two girls looked at one another and then turned to me. “You sure you couldn't come sing for us?” Scarlet asked suddenly. “After all, you were amazing last night. We could really use someone like you.”