Even the Moon Has Scars (5 page)

“I’m here to pick up a car part, Lena, not a prom dress,” Gabe says.

The flimsy door behind the counter opens and a young guy with a scruffy face and a grease covered t-shirt comes in.

“Can I help you?” he asks.

“I’m here to pick a special order from Paul,” Gabe says.

Counter-dude looks me up and down. Gabe notices. I know because Gabe takes a step forward and blocks half of my body with his tall frame.

“Aluminum valve cover for a Corvair,” Gabe says, staring down counter-guy. “He called me, said I could grab it before closing.”

“A Corvair? Like the car from
Mr. Holland’s Opus
?” Counter-guy asks.

“Yep,” Gabe gives a quick nod.

“That’s so...
cute
,” Counter-dude says with a condescending tone and laugh to match.

“So, do I pay you or Paul?”

Counter-guy leans around Gabe and asks, “What’s with the shorts?”

“I—I was—” I stutter.

Gabe reaches back and pushes me further behind him. “You don’t owe him an explanation,” he says through clenched teeth. “How about you just go get the part, man?”

“I don’t know where it’s at, and Paul’s not around.” The guy says. I finally catch a glimpse of his nametag: Dreak. I wonder if that’s his given name, or a prison nickname, or some term of endearment for being such a prince? Whatever the case, he’s pushing Gabe, and I don’t know him well enough to know if that’s an incredibly bad idea or not.

Gabe sighs. “When’s he gonna be back?”

“Don’t know.” Dreak says.

“Helpful,” Gabe mutters.

“You’re free to hang out, sit there or whatever,” Dreak motions to the beat up chairs, then back to me. “Might be cold on your legs. You’re welcome to come in the back with me.”

“Yeah, that’s not going to happen,” Gabe says. His stone cold voice matches the stare he gives Dreak. Gabe tears a piece of paper from the pad on the desk and scribbles a string of numbers on it before shoving it back toward the counter prince. “Here’s my number again. I need this part. Make sure someone gives me a call when Paul’s back.”

“Will do,” Dreak says. “See ya, shorty.”

Gabe takes me by the arm and leads me out the door.

“What are we going to do?” I ask.

His voice is still tight and controlled. “Coffee. But first, my place.”

“Your house? Wait, back to Gloucester?”

Gabe shakes his head. “No, my Mom’s place here. We’ve got to find you some clothes.”

“You have a doorman,” Lena says, a cheesy grin stretched across her face.

The mood is lighter now that it’s just her and me compared to how it was back at the parts shop, where I wanted to fucking throttle the guy behind the counter.

I had to walk away though, because assholes like Dreak are just the kind of trouble I’m supposed to be avoiding.

“I do. Or, my mom does.”

I press the button for my floor and lean against the glass wall as the elevator doors close.

I haven’t been home in weeks, and even though the gaudy marble and crystal chandeliers have never been my style, it feels good to be surrounded by familiar things. Just having Bruce, who’s been our doorman since I was a kid, say hello and tip his hat like he always has made me a little less pissed off about the shithead at the parts store and the way he was looking at Lena.

Oh, and the part not being available yet of course.

“But this is
your
home, too. It’s just cool. I’ve never been in a building with a doorman.”

Her smile melts what little bit of anger still clung on. And I can’t help but chuckle.

There hasn’t been a lot more than small talk since we left Gloucester, but I get the feeling this girl is more than just the cute exterior. There’s something clawing at her beneath the surface. Something that wants out. She just hasn’t shown the true Lena tonight.

I know because I’m pretty damn good at hiding, too. I wonder when the last time she
did
let her out was.

“You seem—” I try to choose my words carefully, not wanting to offend her since I do want to get to know her better. “You seem like you haven’t—been out a lot.”

It’s my nice way of saying I think she’s full of shit when she said she wasn’t a sheltered, stereotypical homeschooled kid.

“My parents...they worry a lot about me,” she says.

I probably would too if I had a daughter as cute as her. But I don’t think that’s the whole story.

“So they probably wouldn’t like that you’re here with me right now, huh?”

She shakes her head and smiles politely. “No, probably not.”

The elevator doors open and I block one with my arm and motion for her to go ahead. “This is us.”

Lena walks timidly out the elevator, letting her hand run along the thick, fabric wallpaper. Everything she’s touched tonight, she’s touched with such care. Like everything impresses her, everything is new.

It makes me want to show her more. It makes me wonder how much she’ll let me show her.

I fumble for my keys in my pocket and pause outside the apartment door.

“This one?” Lena asks. She looks sort of ridiculous in my long coat, with her boots and shorts, but it’s an endearing ridiculousness. “Is your mom going to be home?”

“Nah,” I say.

“What if she is? Will she mind me coming by like this? Are you even supposed to be here? Never mind, that was rude,” Lena rambles, nervously rubbing her hands down her sides.

“She won’t be.”

“But are you sure, because, look at me—”

“Stop. She won’t be home. I’m positive.”

And I am. If my mom were home, Bruce is a good enough man that he would have warned me. Besides, it’s too early in the evening. She’s still at her office or maybe out schmoozing some judge or politician that she can ask for a favor later on down the line. I shouldn’t complain too much about that, since it’s one of those favors that kept my arrest off the books and my ass out of a cell since the minute she swooped down to spring me.

I’m not sure Mom ever sleeps, and I’m certain she survives on a diet that consists solely of trail mix, espresso, and some expensive, bottled juice she has delivered to the apartment by the case each week.

“Okay,” Lena says, though her eyes say anything other than ‘okay’.

“Look, even if she were,” I turn the key in the lock and press the door open. “Trust me, she wouldn’t care who I brought home.”

That’s not entirely true. If I had Jemma with me right now, Mom would probably have us both thrown in jail.

“Used to lots of strange girls following you home?”

Lena’s features and tone relax now that the door is open and she can see for certain that we’re alone. I like the joking side of her. The quick wit that keeps peeking out from behind the shy smiles and wide eyes.

“Hardly.”

I take a step into the pristine apartment I called home until just over a month ago and Lena follows. It smells like the pine-scented disinfectant that the cleaning crew wipes down every counter, cabinet, and surface with twice a week, and, as usual, it doesn’t look lived in. The long, white couch has no dents in it from each of us having a usual spot. The pillows are perfect squares, basically brand new. The glass tables have no fingerprints, no rings from a glass that was sitting there too long, no books or magazines left half-read on the cushions.

I close the door behind us and say, “My mom is just more interested in prosecuting than parenting.”

“Right, the whole ‘always watching’ thing.” Lena blinks her dark lashes over her hazel eyes, and I catch myself staring a little too long.

I toss my keys onto the antique table that my mother brought home from her solo trip to Prague last year. The one she claimed was strictly a business trip. Though, to be fair, I’m pretty sure she brought along her young paralegal Travis with her.

“Yep. And it’s an election year, so she’s around even less, but somehow, watching even more.”

“Sounds like she’s busy. You must be proud of her.”

“It’s a job.” I shrug. 

In truth, her career
has
afforded us a nice, comfortable place to live. It put me in multiple private schools, bought me expensive clothes, gadgets, and tickets to any concerts I wanted to see. But I’d actually be
proud
if she loved my dad as much as she loved a win in the courtroom. Though I guess that wouldn’t have made
her
any
happier. Ever since I was a kid, that’s pretty much been the central focus of our household—making sure Mom was happy.

It’s why Dad and I went to games every single weekend, so that we could stay out of her hair while she prepped for a trial. It’s why he and I did the cheesy Freedom Trail walk every Thanksgiving morning together because Mom was busy working—even on holidays—and we needed some way to pass the time that wasn’t staring at each other from across the long table that no one ever used. It’s why after Dad was gone, I so easily ended up in a relationship with someone like Jemma.

My phone buzzes in my pocket, and I know it’s Jemma without looking. So this time, I don’t even bother checking. There’s nothing left to say between the two of us. She said what she wanted, and now she’s trying to backpedal.

“Listen, I’m going to run up to my Mom’s room, see what I can find for you to wear. Help yourself to anything in the kitchen, or you can just hang out on the couch. I’ll be right back.”

“I don’t know if I feel right about borrowing your mom’s clothes,” Lena says. She shoves her hands into the pockets of the coat I gave her—the coat that is nearly swallowing her whole.

“Well, we aren’t going home yet. So, are you going to stay in shorts all night then?” I joke, already halfway up the steps. “She won’t even notice.”

It’s true. Mom collects things: shoes, clothing, art, jewelry. But she never bothers to spend the time to take any inventory of what she’s already got so things just pile up.

I stop into my room first and grab a spare iPhone charger I left behind and the stash of birthday cash I keep in my nightstand. I don’t miss this apartment too much, but I do miss my room. The room at Babci’s is fine, but it has no curtains and the sunlight is always streaming in way too early, and the floral bedspread and bright white furniture isn’t as comfortable as the dark walls and familiar bed of my own room.

I take one last glance around for anything else I may need to bring back to Gloucester with me, and I don’t know why, but when I see my favorite blue V-neck sweater folded on the end of my bed, I grab it too. Not for me to wear—I’ll offer it to Lena. Because for some crazy reason, the thought of her wearing it feels right.

In my mom’s room, I stand in her massive walk-in closet not sure where to look first. There are rows of shoes, stacks of neatly folded scarves, and a line of bags on the floor of the closet full of clothes that haven’t ever been taken out since she bought them. I pull out a couple of pairs of jeans from one of the bags, and a coat from a hanger near the back that I think will fit Lena’s tiny frame.

Downstairs, Lena has taken off the massive coat and is standing with her hands on her bony hips, staring up at the painting above the ornate, white fireplace.

My grandfather hand carved the mantel, and it’s one of the few things that Mom allowed in the house from my Dad or his side of the family. She always said that Babci and Gramps were just too simple. That
her
home was a place for beautiful treasures, not simplicity.

She complained that they didn’t push Dad hard enough when he was younger to make something out of himself, and that’s why he ended up as a bailiff and nothing more, as if there was something wrong with his chosen profession.

All of those things were easy for Mom to say, because she has always had money, passed down from her mother’s side of the family. She likes nice things, and that’s fine, but I think having her own money also helped to fuel her superiority complex when it came to Dad.

“You like oil paintings?” I ask as I reach the bottom step.

Lena glances over at me and smiles. That smile. It’s genuine and shy and there’s something else there too, a spark that she’s hiding, or trying to at least. “It’s beautiful. It’s a Summerfield, right?”

I nod. “Sure, if you say so.”

“Paintings not your thing?”

“It’s nice,” I agree. “I’m just not so good at staying inside the lines.”

“Staying neatly inside the lines all the time isn’t all it’s cracked up to be,” she says. Her voice is so quiet that I’m not sure if I’m meant to hear it.

“You paint, though. Like these?” I motion to the row of paintings behind us that stretch the length of the hallway. I bet Lena has the best instructor money can buy. She looks like she takes this stuff super seriously, and Gloucester is a huge art colony, This isn’t just a hobby to her, I can tell by the way she pinches her brows together to inspect the brush strokes, the way the corner of her mouth twitches up when she sees something that she likes.

“No, not like this. I’ve tried oil, it’s okay. There’s just—” she shakes her head. “There’s something too strict about it for me. Like it’s not random enough, I guess.”

I step in closer. I don’t mean to make her nervous, but I want to be near her. I love the excitement in her voice and the light in her eyes as she looks at and talks about the artwork.

“Not as random as ending up in the city for the night with a strange guy, huh?”

Lena’s laugh bounces off the otherwise sterile walls. “No, I guess I haven’t experienced anything quite that random before tonight.”

“So, what’s your favorite thing to paint?”

“I don’t know.”

“Come on, you must have something that inspires you the most. Favorite medium? Something.”

“Just watercolors.”

“Okay. Painting is the only thing you can come up with when I asked what you do for fun, but that’s all you got?
Just
watercolors?”

“I don’t have one particular thing that I love to paint, like flowers or scenery or whatever. I paint everything, anything. Something new almost every time I sit down. I paint in my room, and in the studio, and sometimes out on that bench by that octagon shaped house. What I’m painting isn’t as important as how I’m painting.

“And how do you like to paint?”

“I have a favorite technique,” she says, not really answering the question.

“Which is?”

“It’s sort of hard to explain, it's something called wet on wet water coloring.”

I rub my hand along my jaw. “But isn’t wet water coloring sort of oxymoronic?”

She smiles and shakes head, but the copper spark in her eyes is back.