No Strings Attached
Read No Strings Attached Online
Authors: Randi Reisfeld
No Strings Attached
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Excerpts from
The Outsiders
© 1967 by S. E. Hinton.
Used by permission of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
SIMON PULSE
An imprint of Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing Division
1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
www.SimonandSchuster.com
This Simon Pulse edition June 2012
CC (Cape Cod)
copyright © 2005 by Randi Reisfeld
Partiers Preferred
copyright © 2007 by Randi Reisfeld
All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.
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Designed by Karina Granda
The text of this book was set in Adobe Caslon Pro.
Library of Congress Control Number 2012931626
ISBN 978-1-4424-5978-6
ISBN 978-1-4424-5979-3 (eBook)
These books were originally published individually by Simon Pulse.
Mandy's Got Big Ones (Hello, Plans!)
Mitch Makes the RulesâLike It or Not
Katie Knows JossâBut She Doesn't Know Why
Joss Knows Harper. Only He Doesn't Know Why.
Alefiya Gets This Party StartedâThe Fireworks Go Off!
Katie Kicks Butt, but ⦠Harper Self-Destructs Anyway
Mitch and Mandy Take It Sweet and Sour
Harper and Joss: Treble in Paradise
Hang On, HarperâKatie Coughs Up a Truth Ball
The Clambake: Everyone, Out of Your Shell!
Lindsay: “Didn't You Used to Be â¦?”
California, Here We Are: Nick and Eliot Find Nirvana
Naomi: Fear and Fireworks on Independence Day
Jared Plays House, Lindsay Plays Games
Nick and Eliot Get Really Nervous
Lindsay and Sara: Two Auditions
Sunday Morning: 6:17 a.m.: The Earthquake
Shirt and Shoes Not Required excerpt
What Katie Did
“Darling, your ride is here,” Katie's mom trilled. “Should I call for
Carlos to help with the luggage?”
“I'm on it, Mother,” Katie volleyed back in a light tone, calibrated to match her mom's. “Be right down.” She had only to force her bulging suitcase closed, and wipe away that last bitter tear.
For someone so petite, she was strong: mentally and physically. Way stronger than she looked, and fierce when determined. Nothing sidelined Katie Charlesworth. Certainly not a trifle like a Tumi bag stuffed to triple its capacity. Least of all a telltale emotion.
Katie surveyed her bedroom. Had she overlooked anything? The light on her phone was blinking, indicating multiple new messages. She erased them without listening. For good measure,
she loosened the phone jack, just enough to break the connection without looking unplugged. She double-deleted her e-mails, then changed her password. No one would ever guess her new one: Lilyhaterforever. With that, Katie closed the door and descended the stairs, “game face” on.
“Just one suitcase?” Vanessa Charlesworth asked. Her professionally plucked eyebrow did a practiced arch as Katie came into the living room to say good-bye. “Won't you be needing more clothes? For an entire summer on the Cape?”
Her mom's question didn't signal skepticism. In sixteen years (seventeen in August), Katie had never once given Vanessa a reason to doubt her. Not that Nessa would've noticed, anyway. The matriarch of their Boston brownstone floated through life on her happy bubble, never conceding it could burst. If only she knew the truth, thought Katie, fighting hard to sound normal over the lump in her throat. “Duh. I FedEx'd the rest of the luggage ahead.” The lone truth in a sea of lies.
Vanessa raised a glass to her daughterâher morning toast was liquid. “That's your Charlesworth brain, always thinking.”
The taxi driver leaned on the horn, not for the first time.
“Have the best summer
ever
, Mother, and kiss Dad good-bye for me.” Katie stood on her tiptoes to plant a kiss on Vanessa's papery cheek. “Be careful to use lots of strong sunscreen. You'll need it on the cruise of the Greek Islands and the tour of Bali.”
To which Vanessa parried, “I will, sweetie. And you: Do not forget to buy Lily's aunt Sylvia a serious giftâsomething for the house, I'd think. And don't wait until the last minute. It was very generous of Sylvia and Henry to let you and Lily live at their home for the entire summer.”
Katie nodded. “Already handled, Mom. I know exactly how to thank such gracious people.” If an ounce of sarcasm escaped, it went unnoticed.
Pleased, Vanessa hit the “play” button in her clichéd (unfortunately, alcohol-addled) brain: “Breeding will always win out, a trait you and Lily share. I would have thought”âa tiny
tsk-tsk
in her voiceâ“she'd pick you up in the Lincoln Towncar. Why the taxi?”
Surprised that it had taken her mother that long to ask, Katie trotted out the prefab fib. “Her dad sent the Lincoln for an airport run, her mom's got the Esplanade, and one of her brothers commandeered the Jeep. By the time I get to her house”âKatie was afraid she'd spit if she said Lily's name out loudâ“I'm sure one of the cars will be back. Not to worry, Mother, we'll arrive on Cape Cod in style.”
Katie and Vanessa's exchanges were like a badminton game, light and airy volleys, little puffballs of superficial information bopping from one to the other. All very polite. No slamming, spiking, or sweating. Nothing weighty or substantive crossed into the other's personal space. Anything out of
bounds stayed that way, was not retrieved. And no one ever argued the point.
Katie didn't see any reason to change the rules now.
The taxi driver, grizzled, grumpy, and BO-stinkified, made sure Katie knew she'd been charged for “all the waiting time.”
Whatever, she thought, resisting the urge to hold her nose.
“Where to?” demanded the crabby cabby.
Katie gave him the address of the bus station. She shuddered. Not that she'd personally ever been there, but she imagined the Greyhound terminal a depressing, grimy place with dirty windows, sticky floors, and surly ticket agents (for some reason, she pictured them old and wrinkly, with stringy gray hair and bad teeth). As for the passengers? Desperate and ashamed that bus travel was their only option.
Today she was one of them.
She'd been to Cape Cod dozens of timesâby plane, limo, or SUV. She hadn't even realized buses went there. As a kid, she'd spent summers in the tony town of Chatham, staying at posh resorts, or renting a mini-manse where her mother would entertain and her father, a Boston banker, would come up weekends.
Once Katie's friends were old enough to drive (or find someone with a license), her crowd would go for weekends, crashing at someone's parents' summer home. The girls, bikini waxed and
pre-tanned, spent lazy days on the beach, barbecuing and (except for Katie, who abstained) downing prodigious amounts of alcohol. Some capped evenings off with a random and/or romantic hookup. It never “meant” anything. Always, there was loud music, raucous laughter, salty munchies, like-minded friends, and freeform fun. Oblivion. Lovely oblivion.