Pants on Fire (8 page)

Which is the only explanation I can give for why my own eyes started drifting closed, and my mouth started getting closer and closer to Tommy’s, until suddenly he broke the silence between us by whispering, his breath warm on my face, “Katie.”

“Hmmmm?” I asked, fluttering my eyelids.

“Do you think I’m going to kiss you, or something?”

“Oh,
Tommy
,” I sighed, and closed my eyes in anticipation of an intense, soul-searing lip-lock.

Except that the next thing I knew, Tommy Sullivan had let go of me.

Seriously.

Oh, he didn’t drop me, or anything. It’s just that one minute I was lying in his arms, and the next, I was completely vertical and on my own two feet again.

As I blinked up at him in confusion, Tommy said, with a wry smile, “I think you’ve had enough kissing for one day, Katie. Come on. Let me drive you home.”

Obviously, I was totally insulted. Not to mention completely mortified. What is
wrong
with me?

I had no choice, of course, but to refuse his offer of a
ride. Even if I hadn’t had my bike with me, I’d sooner have
walked
than ridden home with a cretin like Tommy Sullivan.

Except that it was pretty hard to keep thinking of him as a cretin when he insisted on cruising along behind me in his car—the Jeep Wrangler, it turned out—to make sure I got home in one piece. Because, he said, even with lights and a helmet, he didn’t think it was safe for me to ride a bike in the dark, what with all the drunk drivers they bust on Post Road every night.

Which—okay, I’ll admit—was totally sweet of him. Seth doesn’t even follow me when I’m on my bike to make sure I get home all right. And he’s my
boyfriend
, not my mortal enemy.

But then Tommy had to blow any warm feelings I might have been harboring for him by stage-whispering my name when I was halfway across the dew-dampened lawn to the front door after parking my bike.

I didn’t want to turn around. I didn’t want to speak to—let alone see—him ever again.

But it had been nice of him to follow me home.

And—well, whatever. He really does have totally cute lips.

So I stopped, then turned.

“What?” I demanded in my least friendly voice.

“There’ll be plenty of time for kissing later,” he had the gall to assure me, in a voice that made it clear he was doing everything possible to keep from bursting out laughing.

I was so mad, I practically hurled my bag at his head,
wet bathing suit and all.

“I wouldn’t kiss you,” I informed him acidly, not even caring if Mrs. Hall, our snoopy neighbor from next door, overheard me, “if you were the last guy on earth!”

But Tommy didn’t even have the sense to be insulted. He just laughed and drove off.

And it was definitely a
MWA ha ha ha
evil laugh, and not the
ha ha
kind.

“Honey, are you feeling all right?” Mom wanted to know, poking her head into my room before she went off to work the next morning.

“Yeah,” I said, in some surprise. It’s not often my parents ask after my health, which is exemplary, aside from the motion sickness thing. Usually they’re more worried about Liam, who has a tendency toward sports-related injuries. “Why?”

“Well, honey,” Mom said. “It’s almost nine o’clock in the morning, and you’re usually up and out the door by now. You have to admit, being in bed at this hour is highly unusual behavior. For you.”

“Sorry,” I said. “I was just…thinking.”

That my life is officially over.

“Without your iPod on?” Mom smiled. Because I can’t
think—much less do homework—without listening to music. Preferably loud rock music. “Heavens, it must be about something serious. You’re not even on the phone with Sidney.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Well, this isn’t something I can really talk to Sidney about.”

“Oh,” Mom said. “I see. What, about Seth?”

Oh, God. I shook my head quickly. “No. Not really.”

“Well,” Mom said. I could tell she was totally hesitating—do her parental duty, and open a whole can of worms she’d probably be happier not knowing about, and risk possible lateness to work? Or just say
Have a nice day
, and keep moving? She seemed to remember
Dr. Phil’s Step-by-Step Plan for Creating a Phenomenal Family
, and said, “You know you can always talk to me, don’t you, Katie? Is it something to do with”—she lowered her voice, even though Liam was already outside with my dad, tossing around a football before Dad left for work, and couldn’t overhear—“boys?”

“You could say that,” I said miserably. “
A
boy, anyway.”

“Is it Seth?” Mom asked, dropping the smile and looking worried. “Katie, is he pressuring you to—”

“Oh, God, Mom,” I cried with a groan, realizing belatedly what she was getting at. “I am not having sex with Seth. Or anyone else, for that matter. I don’t even
like
Seth enough to—”

Oh, God. I dropped my pillow over my face. I couldn’t believe I’d even said that. Of course I liked Seth. I
loved
Seth.
It’s just that…well, Tommy had sort of had a point: If I loved Seth so much, what the heck was I doing out there behind the emergency generator with Eric Fluteley every day?

God. Tommy’s right. I probably do have some kind of psychological inability to stick with one guy at a time.

But why
should
I, when neither of the guys I’m making out with is completely…well,
right
for me?

“If it’s not Seth,” Mom said curiously, “who is it? You said it had to do with a boy.”

I took the pillow off my face and stared bleakly up at the white ruffled canopy over my bed. “If I tell you,” I said, “you’ll never believe it.”

“Try me,” Mom said, leaning against my door frame.

I looked at her. “Tommy Sullivan is back in town.”

She blinked once. Then twice. Then she said, “Oh,” her lips staying pursed even after all the sound had left them.

“Yeah,” I said. And dropped the pillow back over my face.

“Well, honey,” Mom said after a while. “That was a long time ago. There’s been a lot of water under the bridge since then. I’m sure no one still holds all that stuff from four years ago against him.”

“Uh,” I said from beneath my pillow. “My boyfriend does.”

“Oh,” Mom said again. “Well. Yes, but…I mean, after all, it
was
wrong of Jake to cheat. Surely even the Turners—”

“Jake and his parents—along with Seth, Coach Hayes, and the rest of the Quahogs, past and present—still insist it was all a conspiracy to force them to forfeit the state championship,” I said beneath the pillow.

“Honey, take that thing off your face. I can’t hear a word you’re saying.”

I took the pillow off my face.

“You know what,” I said to her. “Never mind. Forget I brought it up.”

“Now, Katie, be fair,” Mom said, glancing at her watch. “I want to talk about this. I really do. But it’s going to have to be later. Daddy and I have a showing. But I want to hear more about this Tommy thing. I’ll be back later this afternoon—”

“Don’t worry about it,” I said. “I’m fine.”

“Katie, honey, don’t—”

“Seriously, Mom,” I insisted. “It’s fine. Forget I brought it up.”

Mom glanced at her watch again, then chewed a little on her lower lip, even though I’ve told her again and again not to do this, as it scrapes off her lipstick.

“Well,” she said. “But we’ll talk about it over dinner tonight—”

“Can’t,” I said. “I’ve got Quahog Princess rehearsal, then my shift at the Gulp.”

“Oh, Katie. Can’t you cut back on your shifts a little? I feel as if I’ve barely seen you this summer.”

“When school starts,” I said. Providing I live that long. “I’ve already had to give up all my shifts this
weekend because of Quahog Princess.”

“Oh, but, honey—”

“I need the money,” I insisted.

She rolled her eyes. “The way you go through money. What on earth do you do with it all?”

Oops. Yeah. That’s another lie I’ve been living with, along with all the others. See, I can’t really tell Mom and Dad what I’m actually buying with the money I’ve earned this summer at the Gulp.

That’s because they got me a camera at Christmas. And if they knew I’ve been putting money down on a new camera, they’d be all, “What’s wrong with the camera we got you for Christmas?”

The truth is, there’s nothing technically wrong with the camera Mom and Dad had gotten me for Christmas. It just isn’t a professional photographer’s camera. How am I going to take professional photos if I don’t have a professional camera?

But I don’t want to hurt their feelings. They can’t help being completely clueless.

“You should see the cute new velvet jackets for fall from Nanette Lepore,” I said. Which isn’t even a lie. Sidney told me Nanette Lepore does have totally cute velvet jackets for fall.

I just don’t happen to be interested in buying one.

Mom rolled her eyes again—which is ironic, coming from a woman who owns six pairs of Manolo Blahniks at five hundred bucks a pop.

“All right, well, we’ll talk tomorrow morning, then,”
Mom said, giving up. “See you later. Have a good day.”

She closed my bedroom door again, after taking one last curious look at me. I guess she could tell. I mean, that I wasn’t quite myself.

Have a good day
. Ha. Right. Yeah, I was going to have a good day, all right. I mean, what could possibly go wrong? Let’s see: Tommy Sullivan, class outcast with whom I’d nevertheless been friendly and whom I cruelly betrayed four years earlier (though he doesn’t seem to know it), is back in town, and is not only aware that I think he’s hot now, but also caught me cheating on my boyfriend, who happens to be the little brother of the guy whose life Tommy ruined when he exposed his cheating in a middle school newspaper exposé….

Oh, yeah. No problems there. Everything’s going to be
fine.

I. Am. So. Screwed.

Especially since, that first part—about Tommy not seeming to know how I’d betrayed him?

I’m not totally sure it’s true.

Something tells me Tommy might actually know perfectly well what it is that I did.

And that might be why he’s back here in Eastport.

Because what if the reason Tommy’s back is that he wants revenge?

And I’ve managed to hand him the perfect way to get it, on a bright, shiny, silver platter: All he has to do is tell Seth about what he saw behind the Gull ’n Gulp emergency generator, and my life is over.

Because when Seth confronts me about it, I won’t be able to lie. I can lie to Seth about having
e. coli
. And I can lie to Seth and tell him that I love him, when the truth is I’m not so sure that’s true (because if I did love him, what am I doing with Eric?).

But I can’t lie—to Seth’s face—about what Tommy saw.

The thing is, I can’t even say I blame him. Tommy, I mean. For wanting to even the score. What I did to him—even I can’t believe it, sometimes. He has every right to hate me.

And yet, last night, when I’d been in his arms, I could have sworn…

Obviously I was wrong, though. Especially when it turned out that the whole time, he’d just been laughing at me.

Tommy’s evil laugh was still ringing in my ears when I stumbled downstairs a little while after my chat with my mom. Liam, I saw, was gone. He had probably snagged a ride to the Y with my parents. He was bound and determined to bulk up a few inches more before Quahog tryouts. I’d never seen anyone more excited about anything than Liam was about that stupid tryout.

After downing an energy bar from the pantry for breakfast, I dragged my bike from the garage, strapped on my helmet, and tried to tell myself I was being ridiculous. Tommy Sullivan was not back in Eastport to get even with me. Because if he were, he wouldn’t have
warned me. Right? He wouldn’t have told me he’d seen me with Eric behind the emergency generator. He’d have just snapped a shot of the two of us together, and e’d it to Seth.

Or maybe to the entire school.

Oh, God. I am so dead.

It was hard to enjoy my ride downtown that day. I mean, really. How could he? How
could
he have taken advantage of me like that, by sweeping me into his arms that way, then
laughing
instead of kissing me? I am no Sidney van der Hoff, it’s true. My mom isn’t a former model, and Rick Stamford didn’t fall in love with me at first sight that very first assembly our freshman year (only to dump me three years later).

But still. No guy had
ever
laughed instead of kissed me.

Except Tommy Sullivan.

Whom there was obviously something very, very wrong with. I mean, besides the part about having been born Tommy Sullivan.

Comforted by this thought, once downtown, I locked my bike up to one of the bike racks—designed to look like an old-timey hitching post—outside of Eastport Old Towne Photo and went inside the redbrick, decoratively shingled shop.

Inside, Mr. Bird was, as always, unhappy to see me.

“You again,” he said grumpily. Because grumpy is his way.

“Hi, Mr. Bird,” I said, taking off my bike helmet. “Can I see it?”

“You gonna make a payment?” Mr. Bird wanted to know, still sounding grumpy.

“You bet,” I said, opening my backpack and reaching for my wallet. “I got another fifty right here. Oh, and I need to pick up my prints from last week.”

Mr. Bird sighed, then shuffled away from the register, into the back of his shop. A few seconds later he came out carrying an envelope of photographic prints, and a camera.

My camera. The one I’d had on layaway forever.

“Here,” Mr. Bird said with a grunt, and set the envelope—and the camera—down on the glass case in front of me.

I picked up my camera—or the camera that will one day be mine—very gently, and examined it. The Digilux 2, by Leica, was still as gorgeous as the day it had arrived in Mr. Bird’s shop, just waiting for someone to come along who could appreciate its outstanding optics, meticulous fabrication, and high-grade materials.

Someone like me.

“Hello, baby,” I said to the camera. “Don’t worry, Mommy hasn’t forgotten you.”

“Please,” Mr. Bird said tiredly. “Don’t talk to the camera unless you intend to pay for it in full today.”

“Not today,” I said with a sigh, and put the camera down, then opened the envelope he’d brought out.

“What’d you think?” I asked him, as I flipped through the prints he’d made me.

“Give up the sunrises and the seagulls sitting on
piers,” he said crankily, “and you just might make something of yourself.”

“Are you kidding me?” I plucked out a photograph I was particularly proud of, a picture of a pelican sitting on a boat prow, cleaning its feathers. “This stuff is gold.”

“
This
stuff,” Mr. Bird said, tapping the photo behind it, which was a picture I’d snapped just for fun, of Shaniqua and Jill having a quahog fritter fight one afternoon during a lull, when Peggy had taken the afternoon deposit to the bank, “is gold.”

“I agree,” said a deep, male voice behind me.

And I couldn’t help from letting out a groan.