Betting Blind (5 page)

Crap
. Of course I wasn’t going to pass the parent test. The whole thing was a setup. But I put on my game face and followed Irina through the house, taking in the spindly polished-toothpick furniture; puffy, long, cut-in-half couches; black baby grand; and some angry-looking women staring out of gold frames on the walls.

Irina led me through
that
room to a dining room that was a little more comfortable, with a long table and wood chairs and lots of windows. “This is the breakfast room,” she said.

I was so out of my element, it was sick.

A minute later, Mrs. Petrova came in, carrying a tray with a silver pot and three tiny cups. She waved at the table. “Sit down.” Irina and I sat with a seat between us, and Mrs. Petrova poured tea and passed around cups. No sugar, no milk, just little floating lemons. Nasty.

She sat down across from us, took a sip of her tea, and stared at me. “Irina tells me you like ballet?”

So Irina wasn’t above lying.
Good to know.
“Yes, ma’am.”

“You prefer—”

“He likes the Kirov Ballet the best, Mom,” Irina cut in. “His favorite choreographer is Petipa. And his favorite dancer is Nureyev. Any more questions?”

Her mom looked back and forth between us, eyes narrowed. “Are you joking with me?”

I shook my head.

“Nureyev is really your favorite?”

“Yes, she’s amazing!” I said.

Mrs. Petrova’s forehead crunched into a glare. “Bah,” she said, disgusted, and got up and stalked out. A second later, she poked her head back in and pointed threateningly at Irina.
“You.”
Then she disappeared again.

Irina was giggling. “Rudolph Nureyev is a man, you idiot.”

“I don’t even think of ballet dancers as male,” is what popped out of my stupid mouth. Irina looked at me like I just said I didn’t know how to read. But it was true: I seriously didn’t know a guy in his right mind who would try ballet.

She stood. “Come on. We should leave before my mom changes her mind about letting me go. She danced for the Kirov Ballet. Not knowing Nureyev is like not knowing George Washington or something.”

“Your mom’s a ballerina?”

“Oh yeah.”

I was thrilled to get out of there, although I was starting to wish I’d sold some more pills and rented a Ferrari. We got in the Taurus and pulled away, and with every block we got farther away from Irina’s house, I felt a little bit of my cool coming back. I turned up the stereo and merged onto the I-5, following the directions Kyle gave me.

After we’d been driving a few minutes, I asked, “So, how come you ran away so fast when you saw your dad coming the other night?”

“If you knew my dad, you wouldn’t ask that,” Irina said.

I gave her a sideways look. I didn’t like the sound of that. “What, he doesn’t like you talking to guys?”

“He would have given you a hard time.”

“Why?”

“You weren’t wearing a dress shirt to a concert, your hair is kind of long, all that stuff.” She waved a hand.

I ran a hand over my hair. “What are you talking about? It’s like two inches!”

“Yeah, but it’s messy.”

I frowned. I worked hard to get my hair looking like that.

“Don’t worry about my dad,” Irina said. “He’s not here now, is he?”

No, he wasn’t. But the dude gave me a spooky feeling, like if I got any closer with his daughter, I’d be dealing with him.

CHAPTER FOUR

W
hen we got to Morton’s house, Irina and I went up the front steps, where some guys were sitting, smoking menthols. Kyle was one of them, and he gave me a fist bump as we walked in, and checked out Irina way too obviously.

Inside, it was more like a bad rave than a high school party. Everybody was rolling with their candy rings, the ’tronic was pumping, and you could smell the weed and liquor. A bunch of people were dancing, and one girl in a shiny pink go-go outfit was trancing against the speaker—except it was only about four feet tall, so she looked silly. On the floor, a bunch of kids with a jar of Vicks had a back rub train going on.

As me and Irina walked by, somebody said, “Gabe!” and suddenly everyone was saying hi or reaching up for fist bumps or whatever. It was pretty nice, actually, to have that happen in front of Irina. Kyle must have spread the word that I’d connected the e. Well, I’d take it. Irina didn’t need to know why.

“You want a drink?” I offered, and Irina shrugged, so we headed to the bar in the kitchen. A dude playing bartender made us some top-shelf jungle juice, and we found a spot to lean against the wall.

Irina’s expression was hard to read. “Are these your friends?” she asked, looking at the back rub train.

“No,” I said honestly. “I haven’t lived here that long, and I’m still kind of getting to know people.”

She gave me a curious look. “Where did you come from before?”

“Over by West Seattle.”

“What, like Burien?”

“White Center,” I muttered.

She said thoughtfully, “White Center? That makes sense. There’s something about the way you talk . . .” I looked at her, and she paused. “I mean, it’s just a little different than I’m used to.”

“Oh, sorry, is this better?” I said in an English accent, and she laughed. I told her, “I’m actually from New York. We moved to White Center when I was in fourth grade. So you’re probably hearing leftover East Coast.”

“Yeah, you say
a
’s different.”

I didn’t answer, because I saw some girls coming toward us from across the room. One of them was Kyle’s girlfriend, Erin, and she had three other girls with her: a redhead and two brunettes lined up in a hottie brigade.

Irina saw them and set her drink on a bookshelf. I didn’t have a chance to ask her what was up, because the girls were on us.

“Irina!” said the redhead, and gave her a cheek kiss. “I haven’t seen you in forever!”

One of the brunettes leaned in for a cheek kiss, too, and they kind of pulled Irina away into a girl knot. Well, that was good, I guessed. I wanted her to feel welcome. I wondered how they knew each other, anyway. From when Irina went to regular school?

Erin and the last brunette moved in on me. Erin asked, “Hey, Gabe, have you met Becky Philman?”

She knew I hadn’t.

Becky smiled and said, “Hi,” in a soft voice. I looked at Irina really quick, because I felt like there was a big red sign on my forehead, “Checking Out Another Girl,” but the other two were walking away with her.
Girls are so damn crafty.

“Hey,” I said to Becky. “I’ve seen you at school.” I
had
seen her; she was hard to miss—long brown hair; light blue eyes; curvy in the best way.

“Yeah, you have English third period, and I’m in chemistry next door.” Then she blushed, and man, I kind of fell for that. It’s hard to fake a blush.

“How do you like Stevens?” I asked, because I knew he taught chemistry that period, and I’d heard he was a monster.

Becky started telling me about his horrible quiz policy, and Erin said, “Oh, I think Kyle needs me,” and melted away. The jungle juice was pretty potent, and Becky was one of those soft, nice girls who look at you like you’re a king, and I started to really enjoy myself. She wasn’t hard to talk to, and I felt back in my game. I didn’t have to go renting cars to impress this girl.

There was a break in the conversation, and Kyle and Erin walked by, wrapped around each other.

“Kyle thinks you’re cool,” Becky informed me, like she was giving me extremely good news.

I raised my eyebrows. “I think
you’re
cool.”

She knocked back whatever she had in that red plastic cup and touched my wrist lightly—an invitation.

I wanted to so badly, I actually took a step after her. But then I stopped. I wasn’t
that
drunk. I’d brought Irina here, where she barely knew anybody except a few girls who were running interference for their friend. It would be a jerk move to take someone else into a back room. Besides, I’d already put a lot of effort into Irina, and going off with Becky would mess that up.

I was just buzzed enough to tell the truth. “I can’t. I brought somebody. But I wish I could. I like you.” Becky turned flame red and I felt so bad, I made it worse. “I mean, I’m not saying you want to do anything, I’m not conceited like that, but—”

Becky squeezed my arm. “It’s okay. You’re doing the right thing.” Then she disappeared.

I tossed back the rest of my juice and decided it was time to find Irina. Because I was having serious thoughts of going after Becky and telling her hold on, I made a mistake, let’s hit that closet.
Something good had better happen with Irina to make up for this.
Where was she, anyway?

I pushed through the crowd and almost knocked into Forrest. He was yelling something at Matt, and they both looked fired up. Forrest grabbed my arm. “Gabe! Where would India be without British colonization?”

I had no idea what he was talking about, but it didn’t matter, because Matt threw back, “This fool is trying to say colonization was a good thing! Forget the dead bodies in the sugar fields!”

“That was a tragedy, okay?” snapped Forrest. “I’m not saying it wasn’t. What I’m saying is that India’s jumping into the first world because they made the best of a bad situation. They looked at the British system. They said, ‘This works. Let’s use it.’ And now look at their growth rate in GDP!”

“You’re a white dude!” Matt said. “Of course you—”

“Ad hominem!” shouted Forrest.

I clapped them both on the backs, and Forrest sloshed his beer a little. “I’m going to leave you two alone,” I said. They were like professors posing as people my age. Was everybody at Claremont like this, or just my new friends?

I wandered back through the party—people were definitely flying now—and guess what? Irina wasn’t too hard to find at all. She was in the middle of a circle of rowers and lacrosse players, who were all pure undiluted first-class assholes, if you asked me. She was grinning and her eyes were sparkling, and she must have been saying something funny, because all the guys were laughing.

I walked right up to the group, edged in, and stared at her, like,
What?

She winked.
Winked!
“Hey, Gabe,” she said, and went back to talking about whatever. Then Pete Winters, who’s one of those genetic freaks with a Superman body and Polo-model face, put his arm around her!

That was it. I shoved through the admirers and said in her ear, “This is boring. You want to go?”

She looked at me, looked at Pete, and gave me this wicked smile like she knew exactly what I was worried about. Then she said, “Yeah, let’s get out of here.”

I admit it was a pretty great moment seeing those dudes’ faces as we left. But I was stinging. Leave a hot girl for one second and she gets attacked.

“You seem to make friends pretty quick,” I said the second we were in the car.

She closed her seat belt. “I know those guys from middle school. Anyway, I could say the same for you.”

I took off down the road. “It’s not my fault she was hitting on me.”

Irina laughed. “You looked like you really minded.”

Dang. I didn’t know she’d been watching.
Better change the subject.
“It’s still early. You want to check out Marymoor Park?” I’d heard it was a good place to take girls.

“You mean Hookup Park?” she teased. “I’m kind of tired, actually. I need to get home.”

I frowned. “I never said anything about hooking up. I just feel like walking.”

“Uh-huh, sure.” Irina paused, then said gently, “Gabe, I’m not into head games. I’m going to be honest with you. Nothing is going to happen between us. You should have gone for that girl, if you wanted to.”

I stared straight ahead, trying to hide my shock. Finally I said, “Why is nothing going to happen between us?”

“I’m not your type.”

I was starting to get mad. I pressed down harder on the gas. “How do you know what my type is?”

“I guess I don’t, but I’m pretty sure I’m not it.” She started ticking off on her fingers. “I’m not ‘cool.’ I’m into stuff like classical music. I’m not going to have sex with you.”

I stopped her right there. “So you’re not attracted to me.”

“I didn’t say that. I’m just not having sex until I’m married.”

I almost crashed the car. “What? Who even does that?”

“I do.”

“Why?”

“A few reasons.”

My mind was racing. It had to be religion. She was probably wearing one of those rings. A few girls I knew had them, and it meant they were engaged to God or their dad or something. I glanced down.

She saw me looking and held out her hand. “I’m not wearing a purity ring. I’m not Protestant. I’m Orthodox.”

“You’re Jewish?” I felt like an idiot. I didn’t think of Jewish people as blond.

She smiled. “No, Russian Orthodox. It’s Christian. And we don’t wear purity rings. But yeah, one of my reasons for waiting is my religion.”

“What are the others?”

She looked out the window. “You’ll think it’s stupid.”

“No, I won’t,” I said. “Tell me.”

She took a breath. “I want a relationship that’s deep. Like the best music. It takes a long time to build that. In America, everything is on the surface. People think they’re in love if they want to have sex with someone. I want to love with my mind and soul. And I want it to last my whole life, to have one great love—not a bunch of experiments. So I’m waiting.”

I snorted. “In America? Come on, you’re telling me Russians only have deep, meaningful love affairs? I don’t think so.”
Oops. Shouldn’t have said that.
I looked over, and sure enough, she looked annoyed. I tried to backpedal. “Never mind. Anyway, you don’t have to love somebody to have sex with them. You can just like them. Or you can even just want them. It doesn’t have to be all serious.”

Irina made a sound with her tongue, a Russian sound. “That’s cheap. And it diminishes people who do it.”

“
Diminishes? How?” I said.

“They’re using themselves up.”

“Sex isn’t like money. You don’t spend it and use it up,” I said. “There’s always more.”