Catch a Falling Star (22 page)

as good a view as the front. “Would you believe that I just wanted

to be with you?”

“Not really.” Even so, when he said it, my stomach flipped.

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He turned back to me. The light made the hairs of his arms

glow, which only added a sort of superhuman element. “Well, it’s

true. I wanted to be with someone who didn’t want something

from me, you know? Who didn’t see an afternoon with me as a

potential career move.”

“He says to the girl he’s paying to hang out with him.” I wanted

to keep my voice a tease, playful, but it caught a bit, stumbling

over the sound of the moving river. He must have only heard the

tease because he laughed, then dove into the ring of water. I

watched him splash around, a slick brown seal. Waiting for him to

dive under again, I hurried out of my shorts and tank and dove in

to join him, my body shocked by the cold water.

Gasping, I came to the surface, my toes trailing along the

rocky bottom.

On the other side of the swimming hole, Adam pulled himself

onto a flat rock, the sun dappling him through the trees. “You

know,” he said, rolling onto his back, “I wasn’t very happy with our

first kiss by that Fairy Tree.”

I flattened myself, belly-down, to a nearby rock, my stomach

and head both light. I told myself it was the shock of the water, but

I knew it was more likely the shock of him, of being here in this

place with him, everything green and moving water and light. “Oh

right, well, you could have prepared me a little more. Give a girl a

warning.” The sun warmed my back. With my face resting in my

overlapped hands, I closed my eyes, smelling the green scent of the

rock beneath me, slipping into a sleepy river haze.

Adam sat up. “We have more kisses coming up in the script.

Fourth of July. Big kiss there.”

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“Right. Kissing under the fireworks. Parker’s not subtle.” I felt

dizzy with all this talk of kissing. “Where is he, anyway?” I mum-

bled into my hands. “I didn’t see him today.”

“He had to go back to L.A. for some business stuff. He’ll be

back tomorrow.” I heard a splash, and suddenly, he was next to me

on the rock, his skin wet, the cool water spreading out beneath

him on the warm rock, spilling under my belly. “So, shall we

rehearse?” I felt his breath on the side of my face.

Heart racing, I pushed up onto my forearms. I could see the

curve of my body reflected in his sunglasses. “Rehearse?”

As an answer, he leaned into me, cool shoulder touching mine,

and kissed me, his mouth warm. I couldn’t be sure if the rushing

sound was the water or in my head. Or both. Definitely both. This

kiss was worlds away from the one at the Fairy Tree. Soft, slow.

When he pulled back, he smiled. “Well?”

“I’m not sure if you need to rehearse this sort of thing.” I swal-

lowed hard, my body tingling as I watched him slip back into the

swirling water.

Besides, that hadn’t felt like rehearsal.

That felt real.

Stop it, stop it, stop it
, I told myself. I could not fall for this guy,

not a guy who had approximately 16,437 individual fan clubs online.

I dropped my head back onto my folded hands, my heart

hammering.

Pul it together, Carter.
This was a job. It wasn’t real. None of this

was real. Of course, the more I told myself this, repeated it over

and over into the warmth of the river rock, the more I realized

what a big liar I was. Because it was feeling dangerously real to me.

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fourteen

“what’d you do today?” Alien Drake shook the ice at the bot-

tom of his drained mocha, his feet propped up on the railing. We sat

in the shade of his porch, the afternoon heat leaking in around us.

I sipped my drink. “Worked. You?”

“River.”

River. Flashes of yesterday’s kiss pooled in my head.

Alien Drake gave me a strange look. “You have the dopiest

look on your face right now.”

“Do I?” I tried to wrangle my dopey expression into something

resembling indifference.

Alien Drake narrowed his eyes at me. “You really like this guy,

don’t you?”

I lifted my hair off my neck, leaning into the fan we had propped

on a lawn chair nearby that funneled cool air our way. “I don’t know.”

He grimaced like he’d swallowed something sour. “Ugh, you

do, don’t you?”

“Subject change!”

He shrugged. “Fine. You want to grab something to eat?”

I checked my watch. I had a couple of hours until I taught my

dance class at Snow Ridge. “Sure.”

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“Unless you have to make out with your movie star.” He folded

his arms across his chest.

I sipped my iced tea, widening my eyes at him. “Well, that’s a

tone I don’t love.”

“Sorry. Where is he, anyway?”

“Working. He has a job.” Adam was shooting a scene in an old

house by the river, and they didn’t really have room for me to just

hang out there. I’d be stuffed in another room wearing a headset.

He was scheduled to shoot for twelve hours, and I’d barely get to

talk to him.

Alien Drake made another unpleasant face. “I didn’t think

movie stars actually worked. I thought they partied on yachts with

supermodels.”

“Only between shoots.”

He pressed his plastic cup against his forehead. “What is
with

this heat? Satan’s complaining. I hope it’s not this hot for the Fourth.”

He was so
pissy
today. It wasn’t like him. “Do you hear that? It’s

your Hawai an ancestors calling you a wuss.” I spritzed him with the

water bottle sitting next to us on the porch swing and gave up my

spot in front of the fan. Like I had minutes ago, he was trying to

change the subject. Our standard operating procedure when things

got snappish between us. Change the subject before (not after) a fight

erupted. Alien Drake didn’t fight. He just wouldn’t let it get that far.

If it got close, he’d suggest going out for Taco Bell or frozen yogurt.

But for some reason, I found myself changing the rules. “You

don’t like him, do you?”

Alien Drake shook the ice again, clearly deciding whether or

not to engage. Finally, he said, “Why do
you
like him?”

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I’d known Alien Drake long enough to know this was a signa-

ture move, answering a question with a question. “I just do.” And

as I said it, I realized that yes, I liked Adam Jakes.

Too much.

I pulled the lid off my iced tea and fished out an ice cube.

Aiming, I tossed it at the birdbath in the center of the patch of

grass in Alien Drake’s front yard. “You seem like you have a prob-

lem with that.” No more questions for Alien Drake. I’d give him

statements.

He fished around in his drink for some ice. “I’m just surprised.”

Following my lead, he tossed it at the birdbath, hitting it on the

first try. A blue jay hopped back, taking a swipe at the cube of ice;

startled, it squawked away. He tried again. Perfect shot. “To be

honest, I’d expect this kind of behavior from Chloe and, well,

most of the other girls in this town, but not you.” The disappoint-

ment in his voice had a blade.

“I’m not allowed to have a crush on a movie star? Not practical,

predictable Carter — is that it?” Something unknown began sim-

mering in me, something deep that felt like lava thickening.

“That’s not what I meant.” Alien Drake did not look happy to be

having this conversation. He looked like he was having non elective

surgery. His third cube missed the birdbath by about a foot.

“What did you mean, then?”

“Never mind.”

“No, not never mind. Is it really so impossible to believe I

might like him and he might like me?”

So I almost couldn’t hear it, he said, “Actually, yes.” Two words.

Only two, but he might as well have heaved a stone house on top of

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me for the weight they held. “Sorry, Carter. It’s weird. Chloe’s got

pictures of this guy tacked all over her wall and now you’re
with
him.”

I stood, leaving my iced tea on the white wicker table next to

our chairs. “Are you mad at me or Chloe? Because she’s the one

drooling all over someone who isn’t her boyfriend.”

“Because he’s a
movie star
.” He kept shaking his head. “It just

doesn’t make any sense.”

I took his porch steps two at a time. When I hit the landing, I

turned. He sat miserably in his chair, his wide face flushed, no

trace of his usual smile. I started to try to fix it, but for some rea-

son, I wanted to stay mad, I didn’t want to fix it. Not right now. I

felt guilty for not telling him the truth about Adam, but it didn’t

matter what was true. “Look,” I told him. “I don’t know what’s

going to happen with Adam. It’s all really new and strange. I can’t

explain it, but the thing is, with you, I shouldn’t have to try.”

Then I went home to get my teaching stuff for Snow Ridge.

I dropped my bag on the chair by the stereo. Mr. Hines was already

there, waiting in his wheelchair by the window, and I gave him a

little wave. He frowned, which in Mr. Hines’s world was as good

as getting a hug.

I got the fan going and opened another window, and it helped

move the stil , warm air around the room. The room where I taught

dance had pale hardwood floors and tal , wide windows that looked

out onto the pool. Still shaken from my fight with Alien Drake earlier,

I took a moment to just stare at the rectangular blue shimmer of it, at

the two or three elderly women moving through its cool blue water.

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A minute later, Adam poked his head in the door. “This where

you teach?” He emerged into the room, trailed by what I thought

at first was a film crew, but then realized were several members of

the press, including Robin Hamilton and her cameraman from

Sandwich Saturday.

“What are you doing here?” He’d brought press to my

dance class? Wait. I scrolled through the texts from Parker on

my phone. Oh, right. He’d texted me about it last night. I just

couldn’t seem to keep everything in my head. Hurrying to the

stereo, I tried to look organized as I fed a CD I’d made yesterday

into it.

Adam’s smile faltered, but he turned to Robin. “See what I told

you? So dedicated to Snow Ridge she forgets all about me. Gotta

love her priorities.” Robin scribbled something into her notebook.

He gave me his lopsided megawatt smile. “But she’s always glad to

see me.” His look said,
Fix this please; look happy to see me
.

I nodded lamely. “Sure am.” I was a bad, bad actor.

Behind him, two of my regulars, Helen Brown and Elsa Pinter,

stood in the doorway, their lined faces confused. They wore the

sweats and light, summery shirts favored by the octogenarian

women here at Snow Ridge. “Carter?” Helen patted her halo of

white hair. “Are we having class?” Her eyes darted nervously to the

cameraman standing behind Adam.

I waved them in. “We are. Sorry for all this. This is, um” — I

bit my lip, looking at Adam — “Adam Jakes. He’s here with me

today.” I felt dumb introducing him. It felt like pointing at a tree

and saying,
This is a tree
.

Elsa squealed like a tween. “Oh, you’re the movie star! We

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read about you in the paper.” She hurried over to him, fiddling

with the loop of her too-big belt.

He made a show of kissing her hand, leaving her giggling and

pink-cheeked. “Thought I’d join you today, if that’s okay?” They

nodded their white-haired heads.

A half dozen others drifted in, making introductions or eyeing

Adam suspiciously, depending on the person. Two or three took

one look at the camera, at the woman jotting down notes, and fled

back to their rooms. “You’re scaring off my regulars,” I told Adam.

He grinned sheepishly, and I shot him the best ain’t-we-cute?

smile I could muster. Robin scribbled something on her pad.

I turned on the music, something light and peppy for warm-up.

“Okay, al . Let’s get in our places.” Elsa wheeled Mr. Hines to the front

row. Adam settled in a nearby chair, and I faced my nine students.

I worked them through a series of easy steps, the same ones we

did each week but to different music. Whatever I could find on

iTunes that sounded fun, sometimes classics, sometimes random

indie stuff I could download for super cheap.

At the end of class, they always asked me to “do a dance” for

them. That’s how they always phrased it. “Are you going to do a

dance?” As if there simply wasn’t a verb for dance, just a noun.

Usually, I didn’t blink, but today I glanced at Adam, who sat in a

chair by the window, staring out at the pool. I didn’t need a jour-

nalism degree to notice he wasn’t even really watching.

I started to pack up my bag.

“Wait!” Elsa squeaked. “Aren’t you going to do a dance?”

Adam sat up, his eyes settling on me.

“I was thinking maybe I’d skip it today.”

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They protested.