Change of Heart (17 page)

“You’re right.” Rich turns toward the door. “I think I hear Amanda calling. You ready to eat?”

Chapter
Nine

Dinner passes quickly and without incident. True to her word, Amanda plays the perfect hostess. I do my best to smile and avoid provoking her. I don’t even comment on the obvious way she keeps eyeing Rich the entire time.

It’s late by the time dinner winds down. Everyone is tired. Rich settles down on an armchair and falls asleep. Amanda goes to her own room, and I lay down on the bed she’d originally intended for Rich.

Whatever I do, however, I cannot find a comfortable position on the mattress. Maybe it’s the uncertainty of everything going on around me. Maybe it’s the fact that I’d slept until three in the afternoon the day before. But after a hopeless hour and a half, I decide to get out of bed. I tip-toe to the kitchen.

I spot a kettle and turn it on. A cup of chamomile might help me get to sleep.

I’m pouring the hot water when I hear a floorboard creak behind me. I spin around—and find Amanda’s dog staring up at me.

I don’t move. I don’t know how the dog feels about strangers, least of all ones his owner obviously dislikes. The retriever considers me for a long moment… then wags his tail and pads over to the fridge. It sits down, then paws at the metal door and makes a sad, whimpering sound.

I walk over to the dog, still cautious. Carefully, I kneel down at his side. He turns his head to look at me. He seems gentle enough. I reach out and put a hand between his ears. “You’ve got a beautiful coat,” I say softly.

The retriever surprises me by giving a happy yelp and licking my face. I’m so shocked I lose my balance and stumble back. Then I laugh.

“Aww, you’re just a big softie, aren’t you?” I coo, going on my knees to give the dog a thorough rub down. “What’s your name?” I hold up the tag on its collar. The word
STEEL
is etched in caps on the metal. “Steel, huh? So you’re a boy, I take it?” He growls. “Sorry. A
man
.”

That seems to appease Steel. He nuzzles at my fingers. “Well, you’re not scary at all when you’re being all friendly like this,” I tell him, rubbing his head, neck, and belly. “What are you doing up so late?”

He makes another whimpering noise and looks to the fridge. “Oooh. I get it. You’re hungry, aren’t you?”

He lets out a small bark. I put my fingers to my lips and shush him. “Shh,” I whisper. “Amanda probably doesn’t want you eating late.” I look back at the empty kitchen and the dark hall outside. “But she’s not around, is she?” Another whimpering sound. “Okay. Tell you what,
Steel
.” I shake my head. “That’s a terrible name, by the way.” I grin at him. “But it’s not your fault your owner’s a moron, is it? No, not your fault at
all
.”

I emphasize the last word by rubbing him even more vigorously. He seems to like it. “Okay, so if you promise not to tell—” I make a point of holding his muzzle
between my hands and looking him straight in the eye, “—I might be willing to bend a few rules for you.
If
you behave.” I stand up. “Do you know any commands?
Sit
!”

To my surprise, his hind legs fold under him and his rear hits the floor. “Very good!” I praise. “What else can you do? Um… roll over?”

Steel doesn’t move. He just hangs out his tongue and looks very adorable. I giggle. “You know, I always wished I had a dog growing up. Of course, they didn’t allow pets at the orphanage—”

“You grew up in an
orphanage
?”

I spin around. Amanda is standing in the doorway, wearing nothing more than a white, semi-translucent gown. “Amanda!” I exclaim. “What are you doing here?”

She gives me an odd look before walking through the door. “It’s my house, isn’t it? Aren’t I allowed to be here?” She opens the pantry door and takes out a big bag of dog food. Steel goes to her right away. “You didn’t answer my question.”

“Oh.” I look down at my feet. “Yeah, I guess so.” As much as I can, I try to avoid mentioning that aspect of my past to people I meet. I’m not
ashamed
of it. I just found it impossible to predict how people would react. Some would start doling out all kinds of fake sympathy—as if they really knew what not having any parents was like. Others would instantly change their impression of me, making me feel like I’d become some kind of second-class citizen in the blink of an eye.

That fake sympathy was always the worst.

Amanda, however, does neither of those things. She just intones, “Hmm,” as she pours the brown pebbles
into a bowl. Steel starts munching it right away. “So I take it you don’t know your parents?”

“No.” I don’t want to talk about my family, least of all with Amanda. I take my cup and turn around. “I was just going back to bed—”

“I never knew my mom, either,” she comments in an offhand sort of way.

I look back. “What?”

“My mom,” Amanda repeats. “I never knew her, either. And my dad died when I was only six. I was raised by my two older brothers.”

“Oh.” I hesitate. “I’m sorry.”

“Please.” Amanda makes a face. “You probably know better than I how insincere that makes you sound. I
hate
when people assume they know everything about me just because I’ve known some hardships.” She tosses her hair. “Am I right?”

I turn to face her. “That’s exactly how I feel, actually.”

Amanda laughs. “Good. Come here, sit down.” She gestures across the table from her. Then she winks. “I don’t scratch.”

I step around the mess Steel has made on the floor and come to the table. I look at Amanda warily.

She sighs when I don’t sit down right away. “Penelope, you can relax. I don’t think there’s any reason for us to hate each other.”

“I don’t hate you,” I say, choosing my words carefully.

“But you don’t like me much, either, right? Don’t deny it. I can see it in the way you look at me. Truth be told, I probably deserve it. I don’t get many visitors out here. You were a bit of a surprise. I guess what I’m trying to say…” Amanda takes a deep breath, “…is I’m sorry for acting like a bitch when I met you.” She smiles in a stiff sort of way. “There, I said it.”

I was
not
expecting that. An apology? From
Amanda
? After everything Rich had told me about her? It almost strained belief. “You had a right to be. You weren’t expecting anyone other than Rich.” I pick at my rumpled sweater. “I know how I must look, too. But you invited me in anyway, and for that, I’m grateful. Truly.”

Amanda smiles and sticks out her hand. “Truce?”

“Truce,” I agree, smiling back. She has a strong grip.

Amanda laughs when she lets go. Her laugh sounds like chiming bells. “Well, that’s a relief. Whew! Tell me I’m not the only one who felt the tension dissipate.”

“Yeah,” I agree. I sit across from her. “It does make things easier.”

In a flash her good humor dies and her eyes harden. “But if you sleep with Richard,” she says darkly, “I will kill you.”

I’m taken aback by the sudden shift. Just as I’m trying to catch my bearings, Amanda’s face splits into a grin she can’t hold back anymore. “I’m teasing!” she laughs. “I had you going there, didn’t I?”

I smirk back. “With skills like that, you should be on TV.”

“Or the movies,” she says. She nods toward Steel. “She likes you.”

I give Amanda a curious look. “
Steel
is a girl’s name?”

“What?” Amanda looks at me, then looks down at the dog… and then breaks out into uncontrollable laughter.

“You think her name is ‘Steel?’” she says as she gasps for breath, tears streaming down her face. “No, no!” Amanda whistles, and the retriever trots up to her. Amanda turns the collar on the dog’s neck around and shows me the tag. “‘Steel’ is the brand of the dog tag!” she tells me. “Her name’s on the other side.”

“…Mel,” I read out.

“Short for Melissa,” Amanda tells me, still grinning. “You really think I would have named my dog after a type of
metal
?”

I can’t help but laugh. “I didn’t know what to expect.”

“Well, she likes you either way. Even if you did think she was a boy. Don’t you, girl?” Amanda rubs the underside of her dog’s neck, and Mel wags her tail happily. Amanda lets go, and the big retriever comes to me. I scratch her between the ears.

“Dogs have a much better sense of people than we do,” Amanda tells me. “In fact, a lot of animals are like that. You can tell a lot about a person by how they interact with animals. You know the fastest way to introduce a bad guy in a movie?”

“What?” I ask, curious.

“Give him a scene with a puppy. Have him kick the dog as soon as it comes over.” Amanda shrugs. “The audience will hate him forever.”

I laugh. “That’s probably true.” I look down at the dog. “So is that why you were so hostile at the start? Because Mel was growling at me?”

I mean it as a joke, but Amanda takes the comment seriously. “Actually, yes. But then I saw you and her in the kitchen, and, you know…” she shrugs again. “The rest is history.”

“So Mel’s like your personal litmus test to whether you can trust someone or not.”

“Who better? When you live alone like I do, you learn to rely on your instincts.” She glances at her dog. “Or your best friend’s instincts.” Amanda whistles and pats her leg. Mel cocks her head at her, and doesn’t move. Only when I stop rubbing her between the ears does she make her way back to her owner.

“That’s something,” Amanda observes. “Mel must
really
like you.”

“I like her, too.”

“Friendships have been formed over less. Come on,” she gestures to the adjacent sitting room. “If you can’t sleep, I’d love to get to know you better.”

***

Amanda had grown up on the outskirts of Seattle. Her dad was half-native, which explained her dark coloring. She had a single picture of him, carrying her on his shoulders and holding each of her brothers in a playful headlock. It had been taken only a few months before he died.

Amanda said he went rock climbing on a cliff he’d scaled dozens of times before. But something went wrong, and he lost his grip. He’d always been too proud to use a harness.

So, Amanda and her brothers were left to fend for themselves. They all looked so happy in the picture. Her dad was extraordinarily handsome. Her two brothers took after him. But even at age six, you could tell Amanda was going to be the true beauty. Her eyes were bright and shining, her hair long and sleek and braided almost the same way it is today.

I feel a strange sadness creep up inside me as I look at the picture. Unconsciously, I finger the locket around my neck. I will never know what my father looked like. I have no pictures from a happy childhood. In fact, all I remember from when I was the same age as Amanda is in the photograph was how much I hated the place where I lived. That disdain faded as I grew up and started appreciating the orphanage for what it was, but—

Amanda’s voice brings me out of my reverie. “You have to embrace your weakness.”

“What?”

“You can’t be ashamed of who you are,” she continues. “I didn’t know my mother and lost my father early. When people learn that about me, they assume I must be some sort of delicate flower. They underestimate me. But I’ve never hidden my past. I wear it like armor. If other people see it as a weakness, so be it. It only makes me stronger.”

“I’d never underestimate you.”

“Then you’re smarter than most. But you also know what it’s like to grow up without parents. How it makes you hard. Determined.” She smiles like we share some great secret. “Sometimes, even angry. Let me tell you something, Penelope. You surprised me. I intimidate most girls—especially if they meet me the way you did. Some might get bitter or angry—you know, try to act all tough—but that’s just a front. Very few would be able to take my derision in stride like you did.”

“Thanks,” I say. “And you know, this place of yours is impressive. I can’t imagine how much it must cost.”

Amanda grins. “I’ve always had a bit of an entrepreneurial flair.”

“But to afford something like this at your age is incredible.”

Amanda waves the comment away. “Nah. You just need to be smart with your money. Know how to make the right decisions. That sort of thing.”

I look over at the clock on the wall. We’ve been talking for over an hour. Mel had curled up near the couch and fallen asleep a long time ago. I stifle a yawn.

“So!” Amanda announces suddenly. “How did you say that you and Richard met?”

My defenses snap into place immediately. “I didn’t,” I reply.

“Come on now, we’re friends, aren’t we? There’s no need to keep little things like that from each other.”

The eagerness in her voice makes me wary. “What did Rich tell you?”