The Stranger Inside (10 page)

“Hi, I’m Jodi Logan,” I told the tall blond.

“Oh, hi.” She looked up at me curiously. “I’m Nora, the store manager. I’m the one that called you this morning.” She turned to the girl with the nose ring. “Hanna, watch the store. I’m going to interview Jodi.”

I followed Nora into the backroom. She asked me a few questions about myself, then said, “We’ll only need you for a couple of hours a few nights a week and then half a day on Saturday or Sunday—not many hours at all. Is that okay?”

I shrugged. “Sure.” It sounded as though I had the job. Did I have the job?

“Okay, then, I’ll have you start next Sunday,” she said as she got up from her chair.

My pulse raced. I followed Nora out of the backroom, my heart going yippee, yippee, yippee! I was actually happy about something. Cool.

Out in the store, Nora had Hanna come over to meet me. “So, you’re Sawyer’s friend, huh?” she asked as Nora drifted off to help a customer.

“Yeah, I am.” I wondered if she was sorry she got me the job.

“He talks about you all the time.” She had a husky, friendly voice. “He adores you. Seriously, he’s got it bad.”

“Really?” I couldn’t help smiling. Sometimes I wondered how Sawyer really felt about me. He was always saying that he liked me a lot, and he acted like he did—he really did—but I still couldn’t shake the cold, hard fact: he wouldn’t let me meet his band. What exactly did that say? I wasn’t sure.

“You wouldn’t believe it.” Then Hanna shrugged. “Well, I guess maybe you would, since you’re dating him and everything. But I’ve known Sawyer a long time. It’s weird to see him so devoted.”

That made me smile too, but then I bit my lip. Did I
wan
t him to be devoted? Seriously devoted? I felt sort of conflicted. And claustrophobic; confined. All of that, and maybe even a little bit sick. ‘Cause it seemed maybe my heart should feel a certain way. And it seemed maybe it was bad if it didn’t.

Hanna handed me my nametag. “I made you this,” she said. But then she didn’t let go. We were both holding it and she got this weird look on her face. It was scary. She tilted her head. “Were you in a car accident?”

I blinked. “Huh? No.” Why’d she ask that?

Hanna looked confused for a second, then quickly let go of the nametag. I mean, dropped it, like it was on fire. “Sorry,” she said, backing away. “I better get back to work.”

She dashed away from me—practically ran. I watched her go, my stomach churning. What was that about? I shrugged, trying to shake it off. I guess everything spooked me these days.

I exhaled.
I got the job!
I tried to focus on that. But I saw Hanna gaze back at me from the other side of the store. When she saw me look, she jumped. Literally jumped. Something was definitely up with her. She was spooked, big time. By me.

Why?

***

When I left Looks, I headed over to see Sawyer. His store was swamped, so I was pretty sure my plans to have him take a break and visit were nixed, but I hung around anyway, wanting to tell him my big employment news.

I found him across the store, at the counter, ringing up a customer. He looked up absently from his register, maybe feeling my gaze, then saw me and did a double take. His eyes lit up and a smile spread across his face. It did something funny to my heart—seeing I had the power to do that—make him light up just from seeing me. It kind of made me uneasy, but at the same time it made me smile back, feeling warm. It was nice to be adored.

He gestured at the busy store—like,
busy
. And I nodded, like
I know
. I turned to leave, but he shook his head. So I waited, flipping through CDs.

“What are you doing here?” he asked, still smiling, when he was finally able to leave the busy register.

I curtsied. “I got the job.”

“Great.” He gave me a hug, squeezing me tight. “We’re swamped right now, but we’ll celebrate tonight when I get off work.”

I nodded, still incredibly excited.
I’m employed! Yay me!
I bit my lip. “Your friend Hanna … she’s …” I didn’t know what to say.

“She’s what?” He smiled. “A witch?”

“No. She’s nice, but …”

“No, she’s a witch,” he said. “Or well, that’s what everyone used to say. In fourth grade, she told our teacher, Mr. England, he was going to hurt himself in the fall. Then the next day, he broke his leg. He
fell
and broke it. Hurt himself in the fall.”

“Hm.” That was almost interesting, but . . . “Well, she thought I was in a car accident, but I wasn’t.”

Sawyer grinned. “Actually, I didn’t hear her say the leg thing anyway—it was just going around school. She used to read my palm at recess, though.” He looked thoughtful. “She doesn’t do that anymore.” He shook his head, seeming to push away a thought. “How are you getting home?” he asked, totally changing the subject.

When he found out I was planning to walk, he got one of his friends to give me a ride. For that I was extremely grateful. Sawyer was a benefit in many, many ways. And he was a good kisser too.

At home I moped around the house, alone and bored. Having nothing better to do, I practiced my flute. I’d never practiced so much in my entire life as I had since moving back here. There wasn’t a whole lot else for me to do—except become an Internet potato, researching split personalities until I was a professional on the subject. Or dwell on dream images of blood and guts. And the fact I might actually be bonkers.

So, I practiced the flute. Practiced and practiced. Norton came over and put his muzzle in my lap, looking up at me with sad, sober eyes. He missed Jeremy. I tried to be a substitute for him, but I was pretty sure the dog found me seriously lacking. I gave him a quick walk every morning, and another most evenings, but that was about all I did to entertain him.

“You’re bored too, huh?” I asked, petting him behind the ears. “You want to play?”

He raised his ears and wagged his tail, then barked. “That sounds like a yes to me.” I rose to my feet. “Okay, boy, I’ll see what I can do. I’m not making any promises, though.”

 I thought about taking him to the park. That’s where Jeremy used to take him to play. But I was afraid to go there. What if I unleashed him and he took off running? Then what would I do? Jeremy already hated me for being the reason he had to move out of his own house. I sure didn’t want to give him another excuse to hate me by losing his dog.

So instead, I led Norton out into the backyard, and found a box full of dog toys. I threw a ball for a while that he excitedly fetched. Then I threw a big stick. He fetched that too. After that, I pulled out a big, fake bone and we did the throw-and-fetch thing with that. It seemed to be a new and exciting game for him with each new toy. Sometimes he brought the things I threw promptly back, other times he ran off with them, and I had to chase him, and fight him for the toy. It was during one of those fighting-for-the-toy scenarios that I first noticed a figure standing in the back doorway, watching us.

“Mom?” I called out nervously. I didn’t really think it was her, but who else could it be? Frightened, I grabbed Norton and backed away. “Mom?”

The rear door opened. Seeing the figure that slowly came out of the shadows made my heart stop.

Jeremy.

He stared at me silently a moment, letting me recover. “Hi, Jodi.”

I swallowed. “Hi.”

For the past three years I’d imagined this moment, dreamed about it, yearned for it, but now that it was actually here I could do nothing more than gaze at Jeremy in a tongue-tied daze. Norton was whimpering at my feet, wanting to run to his master, but strangely, I clutched the dog’s collar in an unyielding death-grip. The harder he struggled to get away from me, the tighter I clenched the binding.

“Hey Jodi, you’re choking my dog,” Jeremy said

Suddenly aware of what I was doing, I let poor Norton go.

Norton raced to his master, pouncing on Jeremy’s chest, his tail wagging frantically. Jeremy laughed, stroking the dog behind his ears. “You miss me boy?” he asked as the dog licked his face.

I just stood there watching, unable to move or speak, just drinking Jeremy in. Jeez, he was beautiful. He was like a Greek god or something … beautiful.

Jeremy watched me as he pet Norton, his gaze thoughtful, intent. “You look good.”

“You do too,” I said. “Your hair … it’s long.”

“Yeah.” He grinned as he squatted down to pet Norton. “Your mom hates it.”

 “I bet.”

He stared at me a moment longer, then gazed back down at Norton, looking pensive as he scratched his dog’s belly. “Well,” he said, then sighed and rose to his feet. He walked down the landing stairs and started picking up Norton’s toys and throwing them back in the box. “Can you hand me that bone?” he asked.

Surprised, I realized I was still holding it and quickly pitched it in.

For some reason Jeremy carried the box up to the landing, though we always kept the box outside. “Can you get the door for me?” he asked, and I scrambled up the stairs to open it for him.

“What are you doing?” I managed to choke out.

“I’m taking Norton,” he said. “He
is
my dog.”

“I know, but … I thought your sister won’t let you keep him at her house.”

“She won’t,” Jeremy said bitterly as he put the box down on the kitchen counter and started rummaging through cupboards, finding Norton’s dog food and shampoo and other dog paraphernalia that he threw into the dirty box.

I watched him in silence, this moment still not quite real. Here we were, finally, at last, together again.

But Jeremy went on impassive, collecting Norton’s things. “My friend offered to keep Norton at her house,” he said. “At least I’ll get to see him more than I do here.”

Hearing Jeremy’s friend was a girl kind of hurt. A lot. I blanched with unexpected pain. I knew he didn’t mean to be cruel, though. I mean, how could he possibly know that even now, three years after our break-up, the mere thought of him having a girlfriend totaled me.

“I saw your flute on the couch,” he said as he crawled under the kitchen sink to get Norton’s dog brush. “You still play that thing, huh?”

“Yeah, sometimes.” I flushed. “I’m better than I used to be.”

“You’d
have
to be,” he teased, throwing the dog brush into the box.

The year Mom and I moved into the Shade’s home I took up the flute. I did it because Jeremy was so into his guitar, and I wanted to be musical too. He wanted me to play the drums though, thinking someday I could play in his band. But Mom refused to buy me a drum set. She bought me the flute instead and when I started junior high that year I took beginning band.

“Okay, well, I guess this is it,” Jeremy said hastily, hoisting the heavy box off the kitchen counter. “You can tell my dad to call me if there’s a problem with this, but I doubt there will be.”

“Okay.” I racked my brain, trying to think of something to say—something that would make him stay.

“Well, I have to go,” he said. “I left my car running in the driveway.”

 I nodded. “Okay.”

He gazed at me. Maybe he felt bad about taking Norton away from me, the only friendly being I had in the house. “Look, you can call me if you need something,” he said. “Like a ride somewhere or … anything.”

“Thanks,” I murmured. I followed him out of the kitchen and down the hall. “I got a job today,” I blurted out.

“Oh yeah?” He turned to me with a small smile, resting the box on the entry table. Probably he knew I was just fishing for something to make him stay. I felt sort of dumb about it, but at least it worked. It kept him around … for a while.

“Yeah. At Looks in the mall. It’s a clothes store.”

“Yeah, I’ve seen it,” he said, his eyes intently on me.

“I start next week. Maybe … you could stop by there some time.”

I saw something flash in his eyes. What, I could only guess, but I felt a charge run through my body.

“Maybe I will,” he said, his eyes never leaving mine.

Just then we heard the key in the front door; a moment later Mom exploded through it. Both Jeremy and I jumped with nervous surprise.

“You two look as though you’ve been caught with your hands in the cookie jar,” she announced. “What are you doing Jeremy, seducing my daughter while you’ve got another one waiting in the car?”

He had a girl out in his car? The realization made me sort of sick. I guess that was why he had been in a hurry to get away.

“I’m not seducing your daughter, Corrine,” Jeremy muttered. “I’m getting my dog.”

“Then take your dog and go,” Mom snapped.

“You know, this was my house,” he said, anger lacing his tone. “I lived here before you did.”

“Yes, I realize that,” she said. “And you could continue to live here if there were some way to get you fixed like we did old Norton here.”

I looked up at Mom in shock “What a horrible thing to say.”

“Well, it took the carousing right out of you, didn’t it boy?” Mom rubbed Norton behind the ears. “Yes, it did. It turned you into a good, sweet boy.” She looked up from Norton to gaze at Jeremy, a wicked gleam shinning in her eyes.

“It won’t really do you any good to keep me from living in this house,” Jeremy informed her. “Unless you’re planning on quitting your job or something. I mean, you’re not around that much—if I wanted to get involved with your daughter, do you really think you could stop me?”

I hated this. Hated them talking about me as though I wasn’t even in the room. Hated that Jeremy kept referring to me as “your daughter,” as though I was so insignificant to him he couldn’t even remember my name.

“Just go out to your little girlfriend in the car,” Mom snapped, “and get out of my house.”

“It’s
my
house,” Jeremy muttered.

Mom shook her head. “Not while Jodi’s living here it’s not.”

“I’m not after your daughter, Corrine. I don’t even know her—it’s been
three
years. She’s a stranger.”

It hurt so bad hearing him say that. It was like he was slapping me in the face: slap, slap, slap. Red-hot tears welled in my eyes. I hated them. Hated them both. I wished I’d never had to come back, never had to see them again.