Desert Crossing (12 page)

I nodded.

“You took her bracelet?”

I nodded again.

“That's messed up.”

I pressed my face against his shoulder. “I know,” I said into his shirt.

22

The urge to stay like that, with my cheek against his shirt, was so powerful that I couldn't bring myself to move. But I didn't have a choice. Kit pushed me back, tilting my face up so he could look at me.

“You stole her bracelet? Off her
body
?”

It sounded so much worse when he said it that way. I couldn't answer him.

“But why? Why'd you do that?”

I rolled backward on the bed and covered my face with my hands. “I don't know! I don't know.”

He didn't say anything. When I spread my fingers to see what he was doing, he was staring at the bracelet, lifting each charm and turning it in his hand.

“I didn't mean to,” I said hopelessly.

Kit just looked at me.

“Okay, I meant to, but not to steal it. I—” I stopped. He wouldn't understand. No one would understand. “I wanted to keep it safe. You know? The police were coming and I knew they would take her away and I just wanted to—” How could I explain it? I didn't even understand it myself.

“When did you take it? I didn't see you.”

“No. You and Jamie were talking to Beth. It was right before the ambulance came.”

“This is so messed up,” he said again. “The police said she didn't have any ID on her. Something like this could be important.”

“I know. I know.” I touched his hand, and his fingers immediately curved over mine, so the bracelet was pressed between our palms. The warmth of his skin sent little prickles through me. “But if I tell them now, if I try to give it back … isn't it stealing? Won't I get in trouble?”

He turned my hand over and uncurled my fingers, lifting the bracelet. It swung in the air between us, inches from my face. The room was almost dark now. I could barely see it, or Kit's expression. I couldn't tell what he was thinking.

I swallowed. “Should I tell them?”

He shook his head. “I don't know.”

I lay back on the bed again, turning away from him. “What if it's some kind of clue? Would it help the police figure out who she was?”

The mattress shifted and I felt him sink down beside me, his shoulder almost touching mine, but not quite, so there was a charged silhouette of space all around me, thin and electric. After a while, his voice came out of the darkness. “Is there anything on it? I mean, besides the charms?”

“No. No name, nothing like that. I checked. Just charms. The kind you get at jewelry stores. At the mall.” I pointed to the silver heart. “I have one just like that on my charm bracelet at home.”

“Then maybe it wouldn't matter anyway.” I knew he was trying to make me feel better.

I looked out the window at the blue-black night. “It's the worst thing I've ever done,” I said hollowly.

Kit snorted, sounding like himself again. “No way.”

“It is. I stole something from a
dead
person.”

“Oh, come on. You must have done worse things than that.”

“No. Really.” I turned slightly, watching his fuzzy profile in the dark, feeling the warmth of his body close to mine. “What's the worst thing you ever did?”

He started to laugh, but suddenly I wanted to know. It seemed important. “Tell me,” I said.

“Are you serious? That would take all night.”

“Not everything,” I said, frustrated. “Just the worst thing. Please.” I was almost whispering. “I told you mine.”

Kit turned toward me and his face was inches away on the pillow. I watched his lips move in the dark, softly changing shape. “The worst thing? Jeez.”

“And not one of those stunts you and Jamie pulled at school, either.”

He was quiet for a minute. Then he clasped his hands behind his head and stared at the ceiling. “Okay. The worst thing…” In the last bit of light coming through the window, I could see him chewing on his lower lip. “Last year, Jamie and I were out at a bar, late—”

Immediately, I wished I hadn't asked him. Of course it would involve Jamie, and it wouldn't be something I wanted to hear. “You mean drinking?”

“Uh, yeah, that's generally what you do at a bar. But not around home, you know? Not where someone would recognize us. We were over in Winston.” Winston was almost an hour away, a small town with a community college, mostly farm kids, and a tiny, run-down main street. “And we'd been there awhile—two, three hours—when this guy comes in with a really pretty woman, a redhead. They're a little drunk, kissing, and everybody's looking at them, and…” He stopped.

“What?”

“And it was my dad.”

I stared at him. Kit's parents were both good-looking in a glossy, sophisticated way, like an ad for a country club.

“But…”

“Yeah. My dad. With this woman. He didn't see us, you know, so we snuck out. Right away. I mean, Jamie and I didn't want to get caught.”

“Oh,” I said. “No.”

“But then, afterwards, I knew this thing about my dad. And I was mad, right? I mean, it wasn't like a huge shock. I kind of figured he was sleeping around. But what was he thinking, going to Winston, which is only an hour away, with some other woman? Anybody could have seen him. What's up with that?” He straightened one arm over his head and tapped his knuckles against the wall.

“So I thought I should tell my mom.” His mouth curved down sharply. “He was making a fool of her, you know? I mean, why should she sit around ironing his shirts and fixing his dinners when all the time he's just…”

I leaned toward him, watching his face. I wanted to fix the angry twist of his mouth, to smooth it away. “You don't have to tell me,” I said.

“No, listen. So I'm nervous about it, right? Like, who wants to tell their mom
that?
But one day I just say it. I tell her the whole thing, how we were in the bar, what we saw.”

He hesitated.

“What happened?” I whispered.

“She slapped me. Right across the face. She said, ‘Who the hell do you think you are, telling me something like that?'”

I stared at him.

“And that was it. We never talked about it again.”

Suddenly it seemed like nothing to reach across the charged gap between us and slip my hand into his, holding it tight. I'd known him for years, but maybe I hadn't known him at all. You could spend months and months with a person and not learn anything about them, compared with what you found out in a few minutes, with one story. Maybe everyone had one story that explained who they really were.

“Kit,” I said, curling close to him, leaning my forehead against his shoulder. “That's not the worst thing you ever did. That's the worst thing they ever did.”

“No,” he said, his voice hard. “I shouldn't have told her. It wasn't any of my business. And it could have wrecked things between them. Maybe it did.”

“Why was she so mad at you? Did she think it wasn't true?”

He shook his head. “That's what I thought at first, that she didn't believe me. But then I thought, no, she believes me. She already knows. And I wasn't supposed to let on that I knew, because then it was just too hard … to keep the whole thing going. She thought it was, I don't know, disrespectful, or something. For me to tell her about my dad.”

I squeezed his hand in the dark. “I'm sorry,” I said.

“Yeah. Well, shit happens.”

In the yard we heard the loud burst of the dogs barking, and then voices coming closer. “They're back,” I whispered, sitting up. “You'd better get out of here.”

He looked at me silently for a minute, then got to his feet in one motion and left the room.

23

I slipped out of my clothes in the dark and dropped the bracelet into my backpack. I could hear Jamie and Beth in the hallway. I couldn't hear what they were saying, just the low, flowing river of their words, blending and separating, punctuated by her soft laughter, the rush of his response.

He's falling in love with her, I thought.

How could that be? It was too soon. But I could feel it.

I crawled under the cool sheets, straining to follow their voices in the stillness. After a while, I heard them open the door to Beth's room and go inside. When the door closed, the sound was firm and final, like a lid snapping shut. It sealed Jamie in, separating him from Kit and me.

*   *   *

I had another dream about the girl. I saw the road and heard the heavy rain, just as I had the past two nights. I was starting to think I'd never really sleep again. Sometimes I couldn't even tell if I'd slept until the dream came, so real that I woke up shaking.

This time the girl rose, glowing in the headlights, with her arms outstretched and her lips moving. I tried so hard to hear what she was saying, but her voice was muffled. I knew she was asking for some kind of help. But before I could figure out what she wanted, the car slammed into her.

I bolted upright, breathing hard. My watch said 2:00 a.m.

I lay back down, holding the sheets close to my chin, listening to the quiet house. I could hear faint rustlings in the kitchen. Maybe it's Jamie, I thought. Maybe I could try to talk to him again.

But when I got to the kitchen doorway, the person I saw was Beth.

She looked otherworldly in the dark, her nightgown sliding over a bare brown shoulder. It didn't seem like the kind of nightgown she'd wear. It was so delicate, and there was nothing delicate about Beth, with her paint-splotched hands and quick competence. She was standing at the sink, staring out the window.

I held the doorjamb to steady myself and said, “You have to stop.”

“Oh!” She turned, hugging her arms against her stomach. “Lucy, I didn't hear you. What are you doing up?”

“I had a bad dream.”

“What about?”

I shrugged. “Please,” I said. “You have to stop. Jamie's too young.”

She looked at me, a long guarded look. “I know that.”

“Please,” I tried again. “I know he's—I know he's cute, and you probably never meet anybody out here, but—”

“It's not what you think.”

I swallowed. “I know what it is. I can see, okay? I can see how he feels about you. And—” I stopped, then said the rest in a rush. “And you're too old!”

She drew back, her brows contracting.

But I couldn't stop now. If I couldn't make Jamie understand, at least I could convince Beth. “You have to stop it. I mean, you're the grown-up. He just turned eighteen. You know that, right? He's going to graduate in two months. He's going to the University of Illinois next fall. He has a whole life back home … girlfriends and sports and a job.”

She didn't say anything. She wasn't looking at me anymore.

I gripped the wood of the door frame. “I mean, what about being responsible? What about thinking of the consequences?” I sounded like the Health Ed teacher at school, with her grim moralizing about safe sex.

“Consequences,” said Beth. She shook her head. “I know how it seems to you. But Lucy, the thing is—” She stopped. “You know something? Everybody says you get more cautious as you get older, more afraid of change. But it isn't true. The truth is, you get bolder. You don't think about whether it's dangerous, because you might not get another chance.” She closed her eyes and pressed her fingers against her forehead, kneading the skin. “There are consequences to everything. Not just the things you do, but the things you don't do.”

I stared at her.

“But why Jamie? Why not somebody else? Somebody who lives here, the sheriff, somebody your own age.” It sounded desperate even to me.

She kept looking out the window. “I didn't plan it,” she said. “I thought he was gay, remember?” She glanced at me, but there was nothing accusing in her eyes, just a kind of quiet understanding. “You know something? I was never lonely here,” she continued. “Not ever. Until Jamie. Then, I don't know why, I was so lonely I couldn't stand it.”

I could feel the sense of panic tightening around my chest like a fist. “But that's what it is for you,” I said. “Not for Jamie. He's not lonely. He's just a kid.” I watched the back of her head dip slightly. I hesitated. “I think he's falling in love with you.”

Beth didn't look at me. Her voice was subdued. “I know.”

I couldn't stand it. “You're taking advantage of him. It isn't fair. You're going to hurt him.”

She flinched, as if I'd hit her, and finally turned to face me, her cheeks flushed. “I can't talk to you about this,” she said. She walked past me down the hall to her room.

*   *   *

I stood trembling in the kitchen. It came to me suddenly, with the slap of truth, that I couldn't stay here anymore. I couldn't stay in this house and watch whatever was going to happen between them. It was too hard. And the only way to leave was to get Kit to take me.

The hallway was shrouded in darkness. I felt for the door to the study and paused outside it, feeling my heart kick in my chest. Then I pushed it open.

Kit lay on his back, his chest bare, a half-folded blanket dragged indifferently across him. His breathing was steady. The moon was a bright, unblinking eye outside the window, casting soft light on his face.

“Kit,” I whispered.

He didn't move.

I knelt beside him and hesitantly put my hand on his shoulder. The skin was warm, dense with muscle.

“Kit,” I said again, louder.

There was no response. His breathing didn't change at all.

I thought of the girl, and I felt cold and afraid. I lay down on the floor, close to him. “Kit, what's going to happen to us?” I whispered, my mouth against his shoulder.