Shadow of the Past (21 page)

When she made it to the top she heard
it again.

It could have been a foot creaking on
one of the loose boards on the second floor near her room but it
could just been the house settling. She stopped and listened again,
but this time there was just silence.

“Hello?” she called again, wishing her
voice wasn’t wavering. There still wasn’t any response.

“Fine,” she murmured, and with a sudden
dash of speed she pulled her bag from her shoulder and swung it in
front of her as she rounded the corner to her room. If there wasn’t
anyone there she was going to have a great time explaining to her
Mom the scratches on the just repainted wall.

Instead of wall, the bag found a set of
ribs and the man attached to them.

When she realized that there was
someone there she let out one of the loudest screams she could
muster while still swinging her purse at the doubled over
intruder.

“Ahhhh, Jesus!” he yelled in a familiar
voice. “I give up! I give up!”

“Oh my god,” she said, dropping
everything. “Ryan?”

“Yeah, it’s me.” her brother groaned,
lowering his hands and straightening up. “Oh my god,” he said. “Did
you join a fucking gang or something? I haven’t been hit that hard
since the lacrosse finals.”

“I am so sorry, Ry, are you . . .” she
trailed off, and then punched him as hard as she could in the
stomach. He gasped and sprung up, waving a hand to bat her
away.

“Fuck!” he yelled. “Enough with the
fucking hitting! What is the matter with you, are you on your
period or something?”

“Fuck you!” she snapped. “You were
going to jump out and scare me weren’t you? You freaked me the hell
out!”

“Good! What did you think I was going
to be?”

“Oh, fuck off,” she said, picking her
stuff off the floor and then following him into the guest room
across the hall from hers. It was going to be where Ryan would stay
while he was home from college, but he was supposed to be there for
at least another two weeks.

“Why the hell are you here early,
anyway?”

“Well,” he said, kicking one of his
bags towards the dresser. “I finished one of my mid-term projects
early, so I got a head start.”

“Like what? You’ve never finished
anything early, although now that I think about it I did hear some
girls complaining about that in Boston.”

“God, you are so classy. I’ll tell you,
but if you say anything to Mom and Dad before I do, I’ll tell them
you got home an hour later than you were supposed to.”

“Fine,” she said. “Hey! I’m only twenty
minutes late you fucking liar!”

“They don’t know that,” Ryan grinned
evilly. “My God, have they got you on that short a leash already? I
was just guessing.”

She rolled her eyes and dropped down
onto the bed next to him. “Fine, whatever. What have you screwed up
this time?”

“Jeez, you sleep through one midterm
and all of the sudden it’s a big screw-up.”

“You didn’t!” she said, but wasn’t the
least bit surprised. Ryan’s athletics and Dad’s money had gotten
him into college, not his grades or his willingness to actually
work.

“Yeah, I did,” he said with a resigned
sigh. “The prof’s a real prick too, and there is no way he’s gonna
let me retake it, and there’s no way I can pass the class with a
zero on it, so I figure that’s just one less research paper I’ve
got to work on.”

“Well, that is a spectacular screw up,”
she said.

“Mmm-hmmm,” he said, getting up and
looking around his new room. There had been two other bedrooms, but
Mom and commandeered the other room for doing “craft projects,” and
that left Ryan with the smallest room in the house. “Anyway,” he
said, tossing another bag in the direction of the closet, “what the
hell kept you at school so long?”

“I was at the park. With my
boyfriend.”

“Boyfriend?” he asked. “Oh my god,
you’ve been here for like five minutes! Are you incapable of not
latching on to some guy to make yourself feel better?”

“It’s not like that. He’s not like
those other guys I used to go out with. He’s actually nice and
doesn’t act like a giant prick all the time.”

“Oh, he’s gay! Okay, well, do go
on.”

She just flipped him off and continued.
“I’m sick of dating those sports car driving, immature jock
assholes. Mark’s really sweet and seems to like me for who I am and
not just something to try to have sex with.”

“So he’s a loser. A gay loser,
apparently.”

“He is not a loser!” she snapped. “He
may be different, but he’s not a loser. He’s sweet. And
cute.”

“Cute and sweet. But different. Huh. So
have Mom and Dad met this spastic gay loser yet?”

“Yes, they have,” she said, hitting him
on the arm. “They have some issues. They don’t seem to want to give
him a chance.”

“No, not Mom and Dad! They wouldn’t
possibly be close minded about something!” he said, sitting down
next to her.

“Yeah,” she said, hoping he wouldn’t
press her for details. “They’ve known we’ve been going out for
almost a month and a half and Mom hasn’t even mentioned having him
over for dinner.”

“Shit,” Ryan murmured. She had tried to
downplay the importance her mother placed on “Sunday Dinner” to
Mark, but once she or her brother even mentioned the fact that they
were seeing someone, her mother was all over them every waking
second to have that person over.

“Look,” Ryan finally said, “if you keep
my academic screw-ups on the down-low, I bet I can get Mom and Dad
to have this totally straight, normal boy over this
Sunday.”

“Really?” she said, sitting up quickly.
“You’d actually do that?” While Ryan had a spectacular track record
of irritation and disappointment as a brother, he did have a way of
negotiating their parents into doing what he wanted.

“Yup. Besides,” he grinned, “you’ll owe
me one, and I have got to meet this ‘super-different guy’ for
myself. I haven’t had a good laugh in ages.”

Deep breaths. Just take deep
breaths and you’ll be fine.

It was easy to think that, but as soon
as Christine’s door opened on Sunday, deep breaths went right out
the window.

“You must be Mark,” the brother from
the pictures said with a wide, gleaming white smile. “I’m Ryan,
Christine’s brother. C’mon in, big guy.”

“Yeah, that’s me. I . . . well, it’s
nice to meet you.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Ryan said,
waving Mark further into the house. Mark had tried to be as excited
as Christine had been when she told them her brother had talked
their parents into asking him over that weekend. As the day got
closer, Mark realized spending time in the Baker’s palatial estate
was far, far down on his list of things he wanted to do.

“Take it easy, buddy,” Ryan said,
clapping a hand onto Mark’s shoulder and leaning in to whisper.
“This’ll be over in about an hour, tops, and then you guys can take
off. Have a little, y’know.” He shot out his fist with a little
whistle, giving Mark’s shoulder a hard slap. “You know what I’m
talking about, stud.”

“Right,” Mark said. Ryan’s pictures
hadn’t done him justice. He was at least a foot taller than Mark
and with every slap and squeeze Mark could feel himself getting
smaller and Ryan’s smile getting wider.

Boy, we’ve got to get him
and Jack together. They would have a field day with you. Literally.
I think this guy could throw you 50-yards, easy.

“Hey,” Christine called when they
walked into the dining room, looking up from the silverware she was
arranging on the table. “You’re sitting next to me. I hope that’s
okay,” she winked.

“Uh, yeah, fine,” Mark said, taking the
rest of the room in. In addition to the gigantic conference table
they were apparently going to eat at, the room was lined with
glass-faced hutches all filled with various plates and silverware
that looked like they belonged in a museum rather than somewhere
Mark could knock into and send them and his future spilling to the
floor.

“Hey,” Ryan said, clapping Mark on the
back so unexpectedly that it almost knocked him over. “Let me get
your jacket. Don’t want to get it all messed up, do we?”

“Yeah. I mean, I guess not,” Mark said,
fumbling with the ratty denim he wore almost year round. Getting
dressed had been funeral-level nerve wracking. What he’d managed to
put together was a button-down shirt that was trying to squeeze him
to death and pants that screamed ‘Hey, check out these crappy
socks!’

“Nice jacket,” Ryan muttered, probably
too low for Christine to hear in her time-zone on the other side of
the table. “You don’t see a lot of these anymore.” Mark sighed and
made his way over to Christine.

“You’ll do fine,” Christine said,
kissing Mark on the cheek while they were still alone.

“You sure? I think Ryan might be hiding
my coat. I hate when that happens.”

“Mark, just relax,” she said, patting
him on the arm.

“I’ll try,” he said, looking around
some more. “Do you eat in here every night?”

“Yeah,” she said, going over to a
cabinet and getting a set of cloth napkins and napkin rings. “It’s
a little weird with just the three of us, but Dad hates to eat in
front of the TV.”

“Right. That would be
weird.”

Ryan came back in with his parents in
to greet Mark with almost warm smiles and loose handshakes. They
sat while Mrs. Baker and Christine went back into the kitchen to
retrieve the food. After several trips, the two managed to fill the
table as Mark took turns nodding and smiling at all the members of
Baker family.

When they finally sat down and he was
served, Mark realized that he had too many forks. Like, twice the
normal amount of forks. He almost opened his mouth to say
something, but caught himself when he realized he hadn’t just been
given everyone’s forks but there was an equally excessive amount of
forks for everyone at the table.

There was salad, soup, bread, cheese
for the bread, and some kind of steak and mushroom dish he wouldn’t
have been able to spell, much less pronounce on his own. Ryan and
Christine’s parents had white wine, and he and Christine had
soda.

“We wouldn’t want you riding your moped
under the influence,” her father said, smiling and getting a laugh
that was a little too big from Ryan. Mark would’ve corrected him,
but realized that it was about as pointless as his assortment of
many-sized forks.

The only thing that made Mark feel
better was the fact that Christine’s parents (Harold and Cynthia,
they offered, but Mark stuck to Mr. and Mrs. Baker) seemed as
uncomfortable as he was.

“So what do your parents do, Mark?” her
mother asked during the soup course, Mark heard the quick gulp from
Christine, who had been taking a drink.

“Actually, Mrs. Baker,” he said, “my
parents passed away when I was young. I live with my Uncle Joe.” He
paused, and then said. “He works at the post office.”

“Oh.” Cynthia said. “I’m so sorry.
Christine didn’t say anything about your parents.”

“Why would I?” Christine said, an edge
creeping into her voice.

Mark wondered if he dropped one of his
forks, how long he could stay under the table “looking” for it
before he was missed. Long enough to tunnel to freedom? Worth
pondering. He glanced across the table at Ryan, who smiled at him
from around his third glass of wine.

Harold simply cleared his throat, and
Mark watched as the Baker women stifled the rest of their argument.
Ryan gave Mark another nod and smile.

Well, someone’s having fun,
so that’s good. Chin up, kiddo, only two more courses to
go.

Ryan’s estimate was right, and about an
hour after he had given up his coat he got it right back. Mark
tried not to look like he was running for his life as he and
Christine left, and he was sure he saw a fair share of relief in
her parent’s eyes. “You kids take care of yourselves,” her father
called after them as they headed down the walk.

“Dad!” Christine called over her
shoulder.

“Right. Just . . . be careful out
there.”

“Oh, that was a blast,” murmured Mark,
reaching into the storage compartment to get the spare
helmet.

“It wasn’t that bad, Mark,”
Christine said, lightly slapping him on the back. “I’ve seen much
worse, and I am so sorry about the whole ‘parents’ thing. I
know
I told my mom about
your whole family situation.”

“Great,” Mark muttered, passing her the
spare helmet.

“What was I supposed to say?” she said.
“I mean, lying to them wasn’t going to do any good, and they’d find
out sooner or later.”

“I would have preferred later,” he
said, staring the V up and just barely avoiding peeling out of the
driveway.

“Hey!” she yelled, grabbing a hold of
his jacket. “I wasn’t even ready back here!”

“Sorry, sorry,” he said, stopping at
the intersection and waiting for her to get situated.