Lie to Me (an OddRocket title) (14 page)

Beautiful.

He’d handed me a couple of dollars and a folded piece of notebook paper with a sketch of a sailboat on one side. I could make out the shadow of words on the other side of the drawing. The paper was that thin. My breath caught. Had RD given me a note?

"Hey," Nick said, walking right up behind me. He looked at the door as it closed behind RD. "What'd you say to that guy? He's not staying?"

"He'll be back." I slipped RD's cash and drawing into my pocket. I would read it as soon as I got the chance.

As promised, the lunch crowd arrived, a busload of senior citizens on their way to a sunset cruise around Lopez Island. They packed every table and all left at once, which was a huge relief. Not the best tips, but I could tell from Mariah's smile that the numbers were better than expected. Aunt Lucy headed home, so it was just Mariah, Nick and me. For once, Nick actually managed to keep track of his section. I wondered if being jealous made him a better waiter.

"I'm going outside for a break," I said. I scooted into a booth at the end of the porch underneath the green and white awning. It was one of those bright blue days that Mom says makes you forget all about the usual gray. Maybe the day’s sunshine was a sign, I thought, as I unfolded the note in my pocket. My suspicion was right. RD had written a poem on the other side of the picture. His handwriting tall and slanted, he'd used a thin, green pen.

Standing in darkness
An unexpected light
Impossible but true
You make the stars shine brighter
Sweet beautiful girl

I'll stand beside you and look,
Just look
And remember
A secret kiss

My hands shook as I read his note again and again. The world felt different and RD knew it, too. No one had ever written anything that beautiful to me in my entire life. I made the stars brighter? Could I really do something like that? Staring down at the marina, I could make out the mast of RD's boat. The bright red canvas he used to cover the mainsail stood out. I wondered if he was aboard right now? I wanted to run to him and say, "Thank you." Even if he never touched me again, I knew that the kiss had been real. It meant something to us both.

"Cass?" Mariah opened the front door. "We need you. Another bus will be here in about fifteen minutes."

"All right then," I said, standing up, suddenly energized. "Let’s make some money."

At the end of the night, Mariah made Nick close, so I got to leave a little early for a change. It was early evening as I walked down the stairs and across the parking lot. The blue sky of the day had melted into a soft purple with the setting sun. The first stars glittered faintly above the horizon. I held RD’s note in my hand as I stood across from the marina debating whether I should stay or go.

"I heard about your mom,” a voice behind me said.

I turned to see Priya standing beside her car. She bit her lip as she leaned against it, arms crossed, her thick, black hair pulled into a sleek ponytail. She wore cropped jeans and a buttery yellow shirt that set off her green eyes. Part of me was happy to see my best friend, but a bigger part of me felt like she'd punched me in the gut with a single statement.

"Why are you here?" I asked.

"I heard." She sounded so nervous, her characteristically bossy tone gone. "I wanted to know if you are okay and I know we are fighting, Cassie, but you can talk to me. This is big stuff and I'm still your friend."

It felt like the gravel path under my feet might shift at any moment. Fighting with Priya was unfamiliar ground. "Who told you?"

"My mom works at the hospital, Cassie. She and a few of the other moms are organizing meals."

"What, does the whole island know?" I felt this rush of anger and my face flushed with embarrassment. I expected people at the marina to know, but people in my school? I didn't want meals. I didn't want anyone coming to my house wringing their hands, speaking in hushed tones.

"People want to help,” Priya said, almost pleading.

"We don't need anyone's help."

"You could have told me, Cass," she said. "I'm just so sad that this stupid thing with Nick has gotten us all mixed up… and I get now why you were so angry. I think you're really upset about your mom. You're dealing with so many emotions right now."

"Do not psychoanalyze me." I looked at Priya, this girl who had slumber-partied at my house more than anyone else in the whole world, my friend who used to know everything about my life. Within one week, Priya knew nothing that mattered. She looked the same on the outside, but the girl inside was a stranger to me now. I didn't care at all about being nice to this imposter. "That's all you have to say to me? 'Oh, Cassie you could have told me?'" I imitated her meanly. For years I'd felt the cold standing in Priya’s shadow. Priya was smarter, prettier, better than me at just about everything and now she was just a liar. I couldn't see her concern about me as anything more than her wanting a ringside seat to my family’s drama.

"But we're friends, Cassie."

"My life is not something that you and everyone else gets to gossip about. And I'm sorry you lied to me so you didn't get to be the first one to report on the latest island tragedy."

"That's not fair," she whispered.

"Fair? You don't think it's fair?" I couldn't help that I was yelling. A gold mini van pulled into the parking lot and a young mother got out helping her toddler out of the back seat. I didn’t lower my voice. For once in my life, I didn't care about making a scene. "I'll tell you what's not fair. It's not fair that you and Nick lied. It's not fair that I was humiliated. It's not fair having a mom that is sick. It's not fair having to live with my lame Aunt Lucy and not knowing if Mom is going to live or die."

"I'm sorry."

"Yeah. And you didn't get to be the first one with the inside scoop. So, I'm really sorry. Did it ever occur to you that this isn't about you? For once, you are not the center of the universe. Our fight doesn't matter to me."

Priya looked down, tears streaking her face. I had finally done it. I'd said the kind of hateful things you're never supposed to say to someone if you still want a best friend. “I didn’t mean to, I wanted to help,” she said, her voice choked with tears.

“Well, you can’t.” I held my ground and kept my voice stony concentrating on my anger. I would not let her make me feel sorry, not after what she’d done.

“Okay, okay then,” she whispered and wiped her nose before climbing into her car.

I watched her drive away my whole body shaking. Priya and I never fought. We had tiny arguments, silly spats about things like which movie to watch on a Friday night, or which song to add to our perfect summer playlist. Alternating waves of anger and fear rolled through me. Anger at Priya for thinking she could just erase the past and fear that news of my mother’s illness had spread for a reason.

I looked up the hill at the Hideaway. The front deck was empty and RD’s car was in the parking lot. Aunt Lucy expected me to close tonight, so nobody knew where I was. It was the perfect moment to disappear and I wanted to dive so deep that I’d never be found again.

I walked straight down the dock checking over my shoulder to be sure the coast was clear. RD sat on the back of his boat, feet up, a notebook in his hand. “Hey.” He smiled for a moment, but then I think he saw my tear filled eyes. “What happened to you?” He said, putting down his book.

"I just can't breathe. I can't take a breath." I tried to keep my voice steady, but I felt so broken I couldn’t pretend for another moment.

He glanced up and down the dock. Checking I think to be sure we were alone. "You're okay. Come here." He took my hand and led me below deck, just like I'd hoped he would. He sat me down on one of the blue bunks, sitting beside me.

"I got your note," I said.

"Oh, yeah?"

"It was really beautiful."

"I meant it."

I looked up at him, my whole body aching for his touch. "You're the only thing that is good in my life right now, you know that? The only thing." I leaned into him.

"I'm not good, Cassie." I felt his chin on my head, his arms wrapped around my waist.

"Yes, you are." I pulled him closer. "I don't want to be sad anymore. I don't."

He kissed my forehead, his lips lingering. "We can't," he said, lifting my chin. He kissed me, soft at first, then fiercer. "We can't."

"I won't tell," I said. "Please." His lips pressed against mine. I felt the familiar, warm, rush move through my whole body and I felt light-headed like I'd taken strong medicine, the good kind, a magic pill that made everything feel better and heated me up from the inside out. He stopped and held my face between his hands and looked at me.

"This is a big mistake," he said. And then he kissed me again and again and again.

For a full week, I tried to get my hands on Addie's camera. It was never where I needed it to be, mainly in my hands. If it wasn't at home, the camera was in her backpack, in Mom's car, in her locker at the Boys and Girls Club. I casually asked her about the film, whether or not she'd developed a roll yet. She said the same thing every time. "I’m taking my time, and I can't blow up any pictures until we go on our field trip to the dark room at Walgreens."

Apparently, somebody's dad owned the local franchise and a part of "career week" at Day Camp was getting some old school photography experience.

I saw RD almost every day. I'd go by the boat a few hours before my shift started or when it ended. Aunt Lucy didn't seem to pay attention to the hours I worked and Mom wasn't going into work anymore. Harbormaster Bill saw us once, but it was no big deal; nothing happened until he left the dock. RD never kissed me until we were below deck and we were always very careful about making sure no one was around. Sometimes our kisses didn't last long. I think RD was nervous that people would notice we'd disappeared together. But every time we touched, I felt this heat building between us, this growing intensity that made it harder to stop.

Away from RD, I felt as though I was stepping out of my skin and back into someone else's. His voice and the deep, rolling laughter that poured out of him had the power to change me. Back home, I was just plain, ordinary me. Standing in RD's glow, I shimmered.
You're beautiful, Cassie
, he'd say and, hearing those words come from his mouth, I believed him.

After working on his boat one afternoon, I walked back to the house through the Forgotten Woods. I liked walking past our tree, the place where it had all started. My cell rang. It was Addie.

"Hey," I answered.

"Um, can you come pick me up at the Boys and Girls Club?"

"Why? Where's Aunt Lucy?" It was after five and Addie should have been on her way home by now.

"I dunno. She said she had to take Mom somewhere. She tried to call you and call you, but you weren't answering your phone." I reached the driveway. Aunt Lucy's car was gone.

"I had it on 'silent,'" I said. "Did you talk to Aunt Lucy?"

"Yes." Addie sounded exasperated. "I just told you. She said she had to take Mom, but she wouldn't say where."

"Fine." I walked toward the house.

"Where were you, Cassie? Aunt Lucy couldn't find you. You’re in trouble."

"I was around." The front door was unlocked and I walked inside. Mom had left the stereo on. Music filled the house.

"Well, Mom says if we don't answer our phones, we don't..."

"Are you ready to be picked up or not?"

"Yeah, I wanted to play one more game of Bejeweled, but..."

"I'll be there in fifteen. Be ready to go." I hung up before she could lecture me more. Seriously, did anyone else in the world have a ten-year-old sister like Addie? I doubted it. I headed into the kitchen for Mom's car keys. She always left them on a hook shaped like a cat’s tail that hung on the wall. I knew I was probably in trouble. Once again, my ten-year-old, self-righteous little sister would be right. I'd be "busted," as she liked to say. So what if Mom grounded me, it wasn't like I had a life anyway. Sneaking out to see RD was the only thing that mattered to me.

I froze in the kitchen. For a split second I thought there was blood dripping from the countertop and pooling onto the floor. My stomach lurched until I saw the open bottle of cranberry juice, tipped over and empty, on the white tile by the gas range. The ruby red liquid covered the counter and dripped down the white cupboards.

It may not have been blood, but something was wrong. Mom would never leave a mess like that. I turned a slow circle, soaking in the chaos of the kitchen, the music playing from upstairs, the unlocked front door. Someone had left the house in a hurry.

It was as if our home had suddenly changed altitude. There wasn't enough oxygen in the room and I had to breath three times as fast just to fill my lungs. One of Mom's cobalt blue glasses lay shattered on the floor beside a sticky pool of juice.

I ran out of the kitchen and straight out the front door. Even outside, my lungs still couldn't gulp down enough air. "Calm down, Cassie," I whispered to myself, thinking of RD. Remembering his voice, the squeeze of his hand, his kiss.

Backing Mom's station wagon out of the garage, I headed up the gravel drive and turned onto the main road, dialing Aunt Lucy's cell phone with one hand. No answer. Where were they? What had happened?

Then I dialed RD. His phone rang, but no one answered. I left a message. "It's me. It's an emergency. Can you call?" I hit redial right away and this time his phone went straight to voicemail, so I sent him a text message.
Call me plz..
.

Why wasn’t he answering? I felt on the edge of a deep panic. I needed RD to calm me, tell me everything was okay. I needed to hear his voice. I also had to find a way to act normal in front of my sister. She still didn’t know Mom was sick.

When I pulled into the parking lot, Addie sat on the front steps wearing Dad’s big, black camera around her neck. My heart lifted at the sight of the camera. Maybe I’d finally have my chance to clean up my little mess in the Forgotten Woods.

"Boo!" Addie stood and pretended to take my picture.