Thousand Words (7 page)

He plugged a couple of quarters into the machine and pressed buttons. A box of Hot Tamales rattled to the bottom, and he bent to retrieve it. He held it out to me, doing all of this without ever making eye contact.

“Thanks.” I took the box and tore it open.

“No problem.” He ripped into his box and tossed his chin up, pouring a few candies right into his mouth. I could smell the cinnamon.

I wasn’t sure what to say to him. I knew so little about him, it seemed impossible to start a sentence. I was curious, but I didn’t want to start prying into his life, asking him a bunch of questions. I liked my anonymity, such as it was, and hated it when Kenzie took it upon herself to talk about my business, so who was I to dig into someone else’s personal life?

But I felt like an idiot standing there eating candy and saying nothing, so I asked the least invasive question I could think of.

“You go to Chesterton?”

“Not anymore.”

“Oh.”

The bathroom doors swished open, and I heard conversation bubbling in the background. In a way, it felt like Mack and I were in a little hiding place in the shadows under the stairs, away from everyone, away from all the drama.

“You used to, though?” I asked.

He nodded, chewing. “Until a few months ago. We had domestic arts together in ninth grade. You were partners with that Vonnie girl.”

“She’s my best friend. Well… sort of,” I corrected. I’d seen Vonnie in the hallway earlier that day. She’d been walking with Will Mabry and he’d had his arm around her. I’d waved to her, wondering when that had happened, when
she’d gotten so close to Will, and why she hadn’t called me to tell me about it, but she didn’t see me wave—or at least I didn’t think she saw me—and had walked right on by.

“She’s kind of a snot,” Mack said. “You should get a better best friend.”

I wanted to defend Vonnie, to tell him that she was a great best friend. But at the moment I couldn’t do it. I didn’t know where Vonnie and I stood. I didn’t know if she was mad at me, or if I should be mad at her, and I didn’t know if she was still friends with Rachel, which seemed like an impossible barrier between us, even if I could understand that Vonnie felt torn between the two of us after what had happened. It was weird the way Vonnie and I weren’t hanging out together anymore. It was like after everything had gone down, she’d moved on without me. She didn’t seem mad; she just seemed uninterested.

“We probably should get back before Mosely freaks out on us,” I said.

He chuckled. “Mosely’s all right,” he mumbled, and with that he slid past me and out into the hallway, holding his box of Hot Tamales casually in one hand and completely ignoring Darrell when he tried to get some from him.

I stood in the shadows for a minute longer. What did he mean, I should get a better best friend? And why couldn’t I remember this guy if we’d been in the same high school together? Especially if we’d been in the same class together?

But by the time I unrooted my feet and followed him, Mack was already at his computer, earbuds in place.

I called Kaleb as soon as I read Sarah’s email about her brother seeing the picture I’d sent the night before. My hands shook around the phone.
What if it got out?
Kaleb had asked at the lake. Was he asking because he knew it already had?

“Miss me already?” He was still in his truck, driving.

“Oh my God, Kaleb, how did Nate see my picture?”

Silence, except for the rattle of the truck hitting bumps on the road. “Huh? What do you mean?”

“Sarah sent me an email saying Nate saw a picture of me naked. Did you show it to him?”

“No. He didn’t see it. There’s no way. I didn’t show anybody.”

“Did you tell him about it?”

“Well, yeah, but… I swear I didn’t show it to anybody.”

My eyes burned. “You told him about it? Did you tell all the guys?”

Another beat of silence. I heard the distant sound of brakes squeaking, the ambient noise of the truck movement fading away. He was stopping. “Don’t make a huge deal out of it, Ash.”

“It
is
a huge deal to me. I didn’t send that picture to you so you could show it around.”

“I didn’t show it around. I already told you that.”

“Then how come Nate says he saw it? God, Kaleb, we had such a fun day, too.”

“I don’t know why he’s saying that. I have no idea, really.” He paused, and it sounded like he’d started moving again. “Listen, I’ve got to go. Don’t make a big deal about it. I’ll talk to Nate and figure out what’s going on. Call you later, okay?”

I closed my eyes and rubbed my temple with my fingers. I didn’t believe him. And I’d never had that feeling with Kaleb before. I’d never not trusted him. But somehow I knew he was lying. And I hated that I was now feeling so angry at him after having such a good day together.

“Okay,” I said.

“I love you, Ash. I’m the only one who saw that picture.”

“Okay,” I repeated again, unable to wrap my mouth around the words “I love you,” because the only word that my lips wanted to form was “bull.”

I hung up and sat on my bed for a while, my eyes glued to Sarah’s email.

I stared at those words hard, hoping they would mix and jumble and move around and spell out something different. That they wouldn’t be saying what I was afraid of:
Your boyfriend’s a liar who betrayed you.

I heard the front door open and close, the muffled tones of my parents’ voices. Dad was home and Mom had probably ambushed him from the den. Soon the smell of dinner would be wafting up to my room and they’d be expecting me to come down.

The scent of the lake water in my hair was suddenly making me nauseous. I groaned and forced myself to get up and take a shower. Only this time I avoided looking in the mirror.

Nate was still at Chesterton. So were two other guys on Kaleb’s team. What if they really had seen the picture? I would die every time I saw them in the hallway.

I leaned into the steaming shower spray and willed myself to believe Kaleb. Forced myself to trust that this was no big deal. That Kaleb had bragged to the team about what I’d sent him, and Nate was just being a guy about it. Guys lied about sex all the time. Why wouldn’t Nate lie
about this? He was probably jealous. He was totally the type to get all envious and then act like he had a part in it somehow.

By the time I got out of the shower, the water was running cold and I’d mostly convinced myself that everything was okay. It would all be fine.

I dressed and headed downstairs, where the smell of chicken curry was so strong it practically singed my nose hairs.

“There she is,” my dad said from his spot at the table, his forehead barely peeking out above the top of an open newspaper. It was his evening ritual. Come home, talk Mom down from whatever preschool crisis had her worked up, change into a pair of what he called lounge pants, although they were just a pair of soft, worn khakis, sit down at the kitchen table with the newspaper, and gripe to Mom about the articles while she cooked dinner.

“Hi, Dad.” I leaned over the newspaper and kissed his cheek, trying to shrug off the embarrassed feeling that was edging its way in, as if he knew about the photo, too. I knew it wasn’t possible, but a few hours ago, I would have said it was impossible that Nate knew about it.

“What did you do today?” Dad asked.

I thought about Kaleb and me making out on his uncle’s boat, and my embarrassment deepened. I looked down, afraid I was blushing. “Lake” was all I answered.

“With Vonnie?”

I shook my head. “With Kaleb.”

“Ah,” Dad said from behind his wall of newspaper. “And when does Loverboy leave for college, again?”

“A few weeks.”

“I’ll try not to cry,” Dad intoned. Dad had never been particularly fond of Kaleb. He didn’t have any real reason for disliking him—only that he’d thought Kaleb had “a certain prevaricatory countenance about him” that he didn’t quite trust. Mom said it was also because Dad was afraid that Kaleb would take his little girl’s innocence away, because that was what boys liked to do. If only Dad knew…

“Stop it, Roy,” Mom said from the stove, then tried redirecting. “Make the salad, Ash?”

“Sure,” I mumbled, glad to lean into the cold air of the fridge. I lingered there, pretending I was looking for ingredients.

And as I fixed my portion of the dinner, listening to Mom and Dad chat, talking to them about school and cross-country and Kaleb, the sameness of our nightly family ritual made my fear over Nate and the photo worsen rather than get better. What if Nate really had seen it? What if it got around and Mom and Dad found out I had sent it?
What if it got out?

By the time Vonnie called, asking if I wanted to take a quick spin around the mall, I was a frazzle of nerves, itching to find something to do to take my mind off everything.

“School starts in a week. You can’t show up in your old sophomore clothes,” Vonnie said as soon as I got into her
car, her giant flower ring catching the sun and practically blinding me as she backed out of my driveway. “We’re upperclassmen now. It’s my duty to make sure you look hot.”

I felt dread at the thought of going to school. I hadn’t told Vonnie yet about Sarah’s email. I didn’t want to look hot. Not with Nate and his buddies walking around knowing I’d sent Kaleb that photo. I wished I hadn’t ever sent it. If I could have taken it back, I would have.

“I guess,” I said, and cranked up the radio all the way to the mall so I wouldn’t have to listen to her talk about how she was going to make me sexy.

We wandered around the stores, Vonnie squealing and hopping every time we ran into a “long-lost classmate” we hadn’t seen since school let out in May. I stood behind her, chewing on a strand of my hair and thinking about Kaleb. I barely said hello to anyone.

“What’s wrong with you?” Vonnie finally asked as she pawed through a rack of cardigans. “You’re being really quiet today. And you haven’t bought anything.”

“Not true,” I said, holding up the tiny bag that was looped around my wrist. “Earrings, remember?”

“What, you’re going to show up in earrings and your pajamas on the first day? So glam.”

I slid some hangers across the rack to look busy. Everything was too dressy or too casual or too bare or too prudish for me. “I’ll find something. I’m just not in the mood for shopping.”

She peered at me as if I were a stranger, her hand hovering
in midair over a hanger. “I have never known you to not be in the mood for shopping.”

I shrugged. “First time for everything, I guess.”

“Uh-uh,” she said, wagging her finger at me like a schoolteacher, her bangles clanking on her arm. “Something is up. Spill.”

I took a deep breath, rubbed my palm over my forehead, then sat down on the nubby carpet.

“I think Nate Chisolm might have seen the picture.”

Vonnie looked confused. “What picture?”

“You know.
The picture.
Of me.” She still looked confused. “At your party.”

Her eyes went wide. She held her hand over her mouth as she sucked in a breath, all of her bangles slamming with a clatter to her elbow. “The nude picture? I totally forgot about that.”

“Shhh!” I glanced around. Fortunately, there was nobody nearby. I already wanted to die of embarrassment; the last thing I needed was a crowd. “God, Von, say it louder. I don’t think the people in the parking lot heard you.”

“Sorry.” She sat next to me. “But you do mean the nude picture, right?” she added in a whisper.

I nodded miserably. “Kaleb told the whole team about it, and Nate says he saw it.”

“No way. What a jerk.”

I rolled my eyes. “It’s just… Kaleb says he didn’t show it to Nate, but for some reason I feel like he’s lying to me.
I mean, why would Nate make it up? Kaleb doesn’t want me to make a big deal about it, but… I don’t know. I’m still mad.”

“Uh, hell yeah, you’re mad. I’d be mad at him, too. I can’t believe he would do that. Aren’t college guys supposed to be more mature?”

“He’s not in college yet. And Nate definitely isn’t in college.” I covered my face with my hands, leaning my elbows on my knees. “What am I going to do?”

Vonnie reached around and rubbed my back softly. “I’m sure it’ll be fine, Buttercup,” she said. “Nate’s probably the one lying and he never saw anything.”

“I wish I hadn’t sent it,” I said into my palms.

“Oh, honey, don’t say that. He’s going away in a few weeks. You love him. He loves you. Nate’s nobody.”

“Please don’t tell anyone,” I said.

“No way,” she said, standing up and holding out a hand for me to take. “Not in a million years.”

“I hope I don’t see Nate for a while. I’ll die.”

She waved her hand impatiently and made a
pfft!
noise. “Even if it’s true and he actually did see it, you probably made his year. Nate’s a dork. He won’t see another naked girl for, like, his whole life. Unless you take another picture.” She pressed her lips together, holding back an evil smile.

“That’s not helpful.”

She shifted her head to one side. “Seriously, Buttercup. He’s most likely already forgotten about it. Everyone has.
Until you brought it up, I had. You’re the only one thinking about it right now.”

I took her hand and let her pull me up, feeling a little better. She was right. If Nate had seen it, he was probably already over it. In a week he’d be on to something else scandalous. By the end of the year, he wouldn’t even remember he’d ever seen it.

I perked up and spent the rest of the evening trying on clothes that fit snug in all the right places, every time wondering what Kaleb would think, how he’d like this outfit or that one. Trying to remember that I loved him and that I’d sent that picture to him because I wanted him to want me. It was okay to want to be desired. Everyone did, right?

We drank milkshakes in the food court with a cluster of friends, including Rachel, who was there with her cousin, and we talked about everything but texting and pictures and Vonnie’s party, and by the time Vonnie dropped me off in my driveway, the pang of missing Kaleb was so strong my ribs ached.