101 Ways to Bug Your Friends and Enemies (21 page)

“But if it were me, I would take the risk and tell her the truth. Because if you don't, you run the risk of hurting her even more. I wouldn't want that to happen. Would you?”

I thought of Hayley: the scratchy snag of her callus . . . the defiant tilt of her chin . . . her funny jig after shooting a hole in one . . . the blue of her eyes and the way they smiled directly into mine . . .

I swallowed at thick guilt in my throat. “No.”

“Let's go downstairs,” Dad said. “I'll make us some hot chocolate and we can talk more about this. What do you say?”

“Not tonight, Dad. I just want to lie here and think about—stuff. But thanks.”

“Any
time, my son,” Dad answered, heading for the door. “Anytime . . .”

 

Friday night. 11:30 p.m. Gadabout Golf.

The Great Pyramid loomed before me in the dark. Steep, solid, mocking:

Hayley shared my secret with you,
it seemed to say
. Now she's whispered my secret to someone else. It doesn't matter he doesn't actually know. What matters is this:
You won't always be the only one.
Did you really believe you would be? Did you really believe you were special?

“Shut. Up
.” I kicked a cement block. My toes yelped. I crunched a swear word and tasted blood.

I hobble-hunched along the wall, my fingers feeling for the small, smooth bump—

The door sprung open.

From within the tunnel, Hayley's voice floated out into the night: eager, echoy, tentative.
“Cullen?”

My anger and determination drained away. I deepened my voice, trying to sound like Cull, trying to sound Hawaiian and handsome and muscley. “Yeah, it's . . . me.”

“Come on in!”

“No can.”

A snort. “Of course you can! Crawl. The Tomb Room isn't far.”

“No.”

“What's wrong? You sound . . . weird.”

I forced myself to speak from deeper within my chest. But the words lurched, scratching my throat. I coughed. “I too big for da tunnel.”

“I'll come out!” I heard scuffling. Saw the faint glow of her lantern bobbing toward me.

“No!”
I jerked away from the entrance.

The scuffling stopped. “Don't you want to see me?”

My heart flip-flopped. I croaked: “More den I want to breathe.”

“Do you have a cold? Why can't I come out?”

I crouched and spoke into the tunnel again. “If your dad see us, you get into much
pilikia
—trouble.”

“I just want to
talk
.”

“Hayley, dis not right. I too old for you. I not . . . who, or what, you think I am.”

“What does
that
mean?”

I sucked in a breath. Forced it out. Steam rose, mingling with the evening chill. “I was wrong to write you da e-mails, Hayley.”

“I'm pau—done with dem now. I'm sorry I sent dem.”

I could almost hear arms crossing, her chin tilting. “Well, I'm not! They're the most beautiful things I've ever read. Nobody writes like that anymore. Nobody!”

“But I'm seventeen, almost eighteen. You're only thirteen. If your dad read doz letters, he could make
pilikia
for you
and
me. Dat's why no can e-mail you anymore. Why no can be friends. If we seen together, I might get kicked off da golf team. Or out of school.”

Hayley's voice stretched thin and tight. “I wouldn't want that . . .”

“Mahalo. Thanks for understanding.” I leaned closer toward the tunnel, and whispered, “I'm sorry, Hayley. I gotta go now. Aloha.”

“Cullen, don't go yet! Cullen, are you still out there?”

I crouched again at the tunnel opening. “I'm . . . here.”
I'll always be here . . .

“Couldn't we just keep talking like this—me inside, you outside—for a little longer?” she asked, voice desperate. “My dad's asleep. No one can hear us. I won't come out. I promise.”

I glanced around. The course was quiet and empty and the air smelled of all the things I loved: King Arthur's murky moat . . . the lemony tang of golf-ball-washing solution . . . the oily metal of machinery . . . and the faint sweetness of late-summer peaches.

“Just a little longer?” Hayley asked.

I closed my eyes. Slid to the ground, my back resting against the pyramid's slanted wall. The concrete blocks still held the day's heat,
her
heat. It seeped deep into my shirt, into my skin, my heart . . .

Against my better judgment, I said in a hoarse whisper, “Okay, Hayley. Just a little longer.”

“Talk to me,” Hayley said. “Talk to me the way you did in your e-mails.”

I didn't answer. I lifted my head to take in the enormous star-studded sky. No words could describe . . .

“Cullen? You still there?”

“Yeah.”

“You don't sound very sure.”

“It's the tunnel. My words have to grope their way through the twists and turns to find your ears.”

“Huh. My words don't have that trouble!”

“That's because they already know the way by heart—to my heart.”

“Your words could see better if I brought the lantern closer!”

I heard her scuffling, creeping toward the entrance.

“That's far enough!” I said. “This is better. Me, a shadow. You—a glow.”

“Why is it better?”

“Because this way,” I whisper-rasped, “I can actually tell you how I feel. Not by writing the words, but by speaking them in my Very. Own. Voice.” Or a hoarse facsimile thereof.

“You sound so different now! Nothing like the day Marcos hit the golf ball through my window.”

“Because I'm not speaking Pidgin English?”

“I don't know . . .”

“I think I do. It's because tonight . . . for the first time . . . I'm not scared.”

“What were you scared of? Me?”

“You
laughing
at me.”

“I wouldn't laugh.”

I thought of my chapped, runny nose . . . my shaggy hair and straggly sneakers . . . my broken inventions and broken friendships. “How could you not laugh at a big, hulky guy trying to act sensitive, romantic?”

“I'm
not
laughing.”

“I know.”

“So what do you want to tell me?”

“Everything!” I stretched out my arms, my hands pressing flat against the pyramid to soak in her warmth. “How I dream about you every night . . . how you're the first thing I think of when I wake up in the morning. Who needs an alarm clock when your name is the sweet bell that rings within me all day:
Hayley, Hayley, Hayley . . .”

“What else?” she whispered.

“I want to tell you how even the smallest things about you stick in my mind. Like the way your chin tips when you're angry or defiant. How your Squint of Suspicion dares everyone to 'fess up—or move on. And your hair . . .”

“My
hair
?”

I laughed. “Last Memorial Day, May thirtieth, you got a new haircut, remember? You hated it. You swore you wouldn't remove your Gadabout cap for a year. But when I saw you . . .” I closed my eyes, smiling at the memory. “It's like after someone takes your picture using a camera flash. You know how everywhere you look you see only splashes of blinding white? Your hair was that flash. And for at least an hour I saw only splashes of blond . . .”

“Last
May
? But how did you—”

“And now, even in the dark, I see that splash again, Hayley.
Hayley!
You're a brilliant sun in some rare, distant galaxy. And I'm a tiny planet orbiting you, gazing at you, glowing in your reflected brilliance for a million millennia. That's all right for now. It's all I need. There's just one other thing I want—”

“A . . . kiss?”

I jolted from my trance. The coarse concrete scraped my back. “No! I can't.
We
can't—”

“I just wondered what it'd be like. It would be . . . my first.”

I closed my eyes again and saw Hayley's face and my head whirled in an orbit of words until—

When the last syllable had floated into the sky, I realized, to my shock, that the words, the poem, had come from me.

I heard a creaky sigh. Or maybe it was the creak of a windmill vane. Or the front gates . . .

“Hayley? Hayley! Are you out here
?”

Hayley yelped in stark white panic,
“It's. My. Dad!”

“Eep!” I scrambled to my feet.

“Hide!”
Hayley ordered.

In two leaps I launched myself across the path and through the tiny window of the Windmill, landing on my shoulder with a painful
oooof
.

Yuck.
I'd hidden in the Windmill once before (that's another story), but I'd forgotten its aroma of mummified hot dogs, stale cat pee, and dust.

I buried my nose in the collar of my shirt and tried not to sneeze.

“Hayley!” Mr. Barker called again. “Are you out here?”

I heard a scrabbling from the Pyramid . . . the crunch of gravel . . . the jingle of pocket coins.

“Yes, Daddy! Over here!”

Heart thudding, I peeked through the window.

A flashlight beam swept past my face.

I ducked.

“There you are, Peach! What are you doing out here this time of night? I went to fix a snack and—”

“I'm sorry I worried you, Daddy.” Hayley's words trembled. “I woke up too, and realized I—I'd forgotten to lock Gadabout's gates. Then I heard a noise. I thought raccoons were rummaging through the Snack Shack trash cans again.”

“It's pitch-black out here! Why didn't you turn on the lights?”

“I didn't think—I mean, it's such a beautiful evening . . .”

“Chilly, is what it is. You're shivering! Let's go inside. You should've put on that pretty new sweatshirt you bought with Goldie. It does wonders for your eyes—even in the dark.” I could hear the teasing smile in Mr. Barker's voice.

“The sweatshirt! I got hot and took it off. I left it in the Snack Shack. I'll get it. Meet you outside the gates, okay?”

“Here, take the flashlight.”

I heard the fading crunch of footsteps . . . the squeak of the Windmill . . . a moat frog gargling.

Then a whisper:
“Cullen! Cullen, where are you?”

I didn't answer. I took sips of breath and hoped Hayley couldn't hear the battle drums of my heart.

“If you're still here, Cullen, wait ten minutes before you leave, okay? I'll leave the gates unlocked so you can get out
.”

I still didn't answer.

“I hope to see you again someday. I still have so much to tell you. Maybe when I'm older
—”

“Let's go, Hayley!” Mr. Barker called. “It's late!”

Hayley's last, sad whisper pierced the night air—and my heart.
“Aloha, Cullen
.”

I lifted my head and watched the flashlight beam bob up the path.

“Where on earth did I put my car keys?” Mom mumbled the next afternoon as she rifled through her gargantuan purse.

I checked my watch. 1:33 p.m. Joonbi's party had started at 1:00. Because of Mom, I was late. As usual.

If only I could be late enough to miss the entire party. After last night, I didn't feel much like celebrating. Or seeing Hayley. Or anyone else, for that matter.

“I should just stay home,” I said aloud.

“Nonsense, I'll find them!” Mom dumped her purse contents onto the kitchen table.

“But my knee really hurts,” I said, hobbling a bit for effect. “Maybe it's broken.” I told Mom I'd injured it yesterday afternoon at hapkido. Actually, I'd banged it last night while diving through the Windmill's window.

Mom laughed. “You've been hanging around Mr. Hypochondriac too long. Your knee is
bruised
—not an acceptable excuse for bailing on a party at the last minute.”

“What is, then?” I asked.

“Death. And perhaps bleeding from the eyes. Ah-ha!” Mom dangled her keys like a noisy wind chime. She swept the remaining detritus into her purse. “Got your towel and Joonbi's gift? Then let's roll!”

“I have tons of homework due on Monday,” I said, trailing her to the garage. “Isn't homework an acceptable excuse?”

“Not today it isn't. Today you're going to
socialize
. School's been in session almost two weeks, and you haven't spent time with any of your friends.”

Maybe because all my friends bug me
, I thought, slamming the car door.
And vice-versa.