Lock and Key

  Glass in hand, I made my way through the crowd, which had grown considerably since the last time I’d checked the ice and music. Jamie was still in the foyer, answering the door and taking coats, when I finally reached the bar area to get the white wine.

  “Macaroons!” I heard him say suddenly. “You shouldn’t have.”

  I turned around. Sure enough, there was Nate, in jeans and a blue collared shirt, his hands in his pockets. His dad was beside him, shrugging off his jacket and smiling as Jamie admired his offering. “They’re Belgian,” Mr. Cross said. “Very expensive.”

  “I’ll bet,” Jamie replied, clapping Nate on the shoulder. “Now, let me get you a drink. What’s your poison, Blake? We’ve got beer, Scotch, wine . . .”

  He gestured toward the bar, and as they all turned, Nate’s eyes met mine. Mr. Cross lifted a hand, waving at me, but I just picked up the glass, quickly folding myself back into the crowd.

  When I returned to the spot where I’d left Cora and Barbara, however, they were both gone, a couple of Jamie’s UMe.com employees—easily identified by their so-nerdy-they’re -cool glasses, expensive jeans, and vintage T-shirts— in their place, jabbering about Macs. I turned slowly, scanning the crowd for Barbara. Instead, I came face-to-face with Nate.

  “Hey,” he said. “Merry Christmas.”

  I swallowed, then took in a breath. “Merry Christmas.”

  There was a pause, which then stretched to an awkward pause, even as someone laughed behind us.

  “So I brought you a present,” he said, reaching behind him and pulling out a wrapped parcel from his back pocket.

  “Let me guess,” I said. “Macaroons.”

  “No,” he replied, making a face as he held it out to me. “Open it up.”

  I looked down at the gift, which was wrapped in red paper decorated with little Christmas trees, and thought of myself standing at his door that night, my own small offering in hand. “You know,” I said, nodding to the glass of wine I was still holding, “I should probably—”

  “Never delay opening a gift,” Nate said, reaching to take the glass from me, putting it on a nearby counter. “Especially one that’s already belated.”

  Emptyhanded, I had no choice but to take it from him, turning it over in my hands and running a finger under the tape. Two women passed by us, chattering excitedly, their heels clacking, as it fell open to reveal a T-shirt. On the front, in that same familiar block lettering: USWIM.

  “Your personal philosophy,” I said.

  “Well,” he said, “I looked for one that said ‘If you expect the worst you’ll never be disappointed,’ but they were all out.”

  “I’ll bet.” I looked up at him. “This is really nice. Thank you.”

  “No problem.” He leaned back against the wall behind him, smiling at me, and I had a flash of us in the pool together, how he’d grabbed my hand and pulled me under. The memory was so close, I could see every bit of it. But just as clearly, there was the other night, how his face had looked, retreating through the crack in that door. Two opposite images, one easing me closer, another pushing away. “So,” he said, “how was your Christmas?”

  “How was yours?” I replied, and while I didn’t mean for there to be an edge in my voice, even I could hear it. So could he. His face immediately changed, the smile not disappearing, but seeming to stretch more thin. I cleared my throat, then looked down at the shirt again. “I mean, you had to expect I’d ask.”

  Nate nodded, glancing across the kitchen to the living room, where I could see his dad was talking to a stout woman in a red Christmas sweater. “It was fine,” he said. “A little stressful, as you saw.”

  “A little?” I asked.

  “It’s not a big deal, okay?”

  “Sure seemed that way.”

  “Well, it wasn’t. And it’s ancient history.”

  “It was three days ago,” I pointed out.

  “So the holidays suck. That’s not exactly a news flash, is it?” He ducked his head, a shock of hair falling across his face as the same women passed back by in a cloud of perfumed hand soap, leaving the powder room. When they were gone, he said, “Look, I’m sorry I couldn’t talk to you that night. But I’m here now. And I brought a gift. That’s got to count for something, right?”

  I looked back down at the shirt. You swim, I thought. Like he’d said, it was better than sinking. Maybe this was just part of staying afloat. “I don’t have anything for you, though.”

  “Not even Belgian macaroons?”

  I shook my head.

  “That’s all right. They’re actually pretty overrated.”

  “Really.”

  He nodded, glancing over across the party again, then reached down, sliding his hand around my free one and tugging me a bit down the hallway, around the corner. There, out of sight, he leaned against the wall, gently looping his arms around my waist and pulling me closer. “Okay,” he said, his voice low. “Let’s try this again. Merry Christmas, Ruby.”

  I looked up at him, taking in the line of his chin, his eyes and long lashes, the way his fingers were already brushing a bit of my hair off my face, entwining themselves in the strands there. So nearby now, after the distance before. But he was here.

  “Merry Christmas,” I said, and it was this closeness I tried to concentrate on—not that it might be fleeting, a feeling I knew too well—as he leaned down and put his lips to mine, kissing me, as around the corner the party went on without us, noisy and continuous and completely unaware.

  “Cora,” I said as we pulled up outside the mall, “we really don’t have to do this.”

  “We do,” she replied, cutting the engine. “Like I said, desperate times call for desperate measures.”

  “That’s just my point, though,” I said as she pushed open her door to climb out and I reluctantly did the same. “I’m not desperate.”

  She just looked at me as I came around the back of the car, then hoisted her purse over one shoulder. “First,” she said, “I gave you money for clothes. You bought four things.”

  “Seven, actually,” I pointed out.

  “Then,” she continued, ignoring this, “for Christmas, I gave you gift cards, with which you bought nothing.”

  “I don’t need anything!”

  “And so really, you have given me no choice but to take you shopping by force.” She sighed, then reached up, dropping her sunglasses down from their perch on her head to cover her eyes. “Do you even realize how happy the average teenage girl would be in your shoes? I have a credit card. We’re at the mall. I want to buy you things. It’s like adolescent nirvana.”

  “Well,” I said as we passed two moms pushing strollers, “I guess I’m not the average teenage girl.”

  She looked over at me as we approached the entrance. “Of course you’re not,” she said more quietly. “Look, I know this is kind of weird for you. But we have the money, and it’s something Jamie and I want to do.”

  “It’s not weird,” I told her. “Just unnecessary.”

  “You know,” she said as the automatic doors to Esther Prine, the upscale department store, slid open in front of us, “it’s okay to accept things from people. It doesn’t make you weak or helpless, even if that is how Mom felt about it.”

  This was a bit too reminiscent of the ground I’d been forced to cover during my first (and hopefully only) therapy session a few weeks earlier, so instead of responding, I stepped inside. As always, I was temporarily blinded by the gleaming white tile of the store, as well as the polished-to-a -high-sheen jewelry cases. To our left, a guy in a tuxedo was playing Pachelbel by the escalators. It was always kind of odd to be talking about my mother, anyway, but in this setting, it bordered on surreal.

  “It’s not about Mom,” I said as Cora gestured for me to follow her up to the next floor. “Or not just about her. It’s a big change. I’m not used to . . . We didn’t have much these last few years.”

  “I know,” she replied. “But that’s just what I’
m saying. In some ways, that was a choice, too. There were things Mom could have done to make things easier for you and for herself.”

  “Like get in touch with you,” I said.

  “Yes.” She cleared her throat, looking out over cosmetics as we rose up higher, then higher. “But it goes even further back than that. Like with Dad, and the money he tried to give her. But she was so stubborn and angry, she wouldn’t take it.”

  “Wait,” I said as we finally reached the top, and she stepped off into Juniors. “I thought Dad never gave her any money. That he dodged her for child support, just disappeared. ”

  Cora shook her head. “Maybe he did later, once he moved to Illinois. But those early years, right after he moved out? He tried to do the right thing. I remember.”

  Maybe this shouldn’t have surprised me. After all, by now I knew my mom had kept so much secret, tweaking her history and my own. Cora was not what I’d been led to believe, so why would my father be, either? Thinking this, though, something else occurred to me. Something that also didn’t belong in the polished world of Esther Prine, and yet I had to bring it in, anyway.

  “Cora,” I said as she drifted over to a table of sweaters, running her hand over them, “do you know where Dad is?”

  In the pause that followed, I saw my entire life changing again, twisted and shifting and different. But then she turned around to face me. “No,” she said softly as a salesgirl drifted past, pushing a rack of flimsy dresses. “I’ve thought about looking for him, though, many times. Mostly because Jamie’s been really insistent about it, how easy it would be. But I guess I’m sort of afraid still.”

  I nodded. This, if nothing else, I could understand. There were so many levels to the unknown, from safe to dangerous to outright nebulous, scariest of all.

  “You never know, though,” she said. “Maybe we can do it together. Strength in numbers and all that.”

  “Maybe,” I said.

  She smiled at me, a bit tentatively, then looked back at the sweaters. “Okay, now—down to business. We’re not leaving here until you have at least two new outfits. And a jacket. And new shoes.”

  “Cora.”

  “No arguments.” She hoisted her purse over her shoulder, then pushed on into Juniors, disappearing between two racks of jeans. After a moment, all I could see was her head bobbing in and out of the displays, her expression caught in the occasional mirror, focused and determined. At first, I stayed where I was, out in the open aisle as the salegirl passed by once more, smiling at me. But then I looked for Cora again and couldn’t spot her right away, which was enough to make me force myself forward, in after her.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Wow,” Nate said. “You look great.”

  This was exactly the kind of reaction I’d been hoping to avoid, especially considering Cora had assured me repeatedly that my new clothes did not necessarily look that, well, new. Apparently she was wrong.

  “It’s just a jacket,” I told him, pulling my seat belt over my shoulder. As I did so, I glanced at Gervais, who was studying me, as well. “What?”

  “Nothing,” he said, shrinking back a little bit in his seat.

  I sighed, shaking my head, then looked over at Nate, who was just sitting behind the wheel, a half smile on his face. “So what’s the occasion for the makeover? Got a hot date for Valentine’s or something?”

  “Nope,” I said, and he laughed, shifting into gear and pulling away from the curb. As we came up to the stop sign at the end of the street, though, he reached over, squeezing my knee, and kept his hand there as we turned onto the next street.

  It was February now, which meant Nate and I had been doing whatever it was we were doing—dating, making out, spending most of our free time together—for over a month. And I had to admit, I was happy about it, at least most of the time. But regardless of how well we were getting to know each other, there was always the issue with his dad, the one part of himself he still held back and kept from me. It was only a single thing, but somehow it counted for a lot. Like even when things were as good as they could be, they could only be good enough.

  Such as Valentine’s Day, which was less than twenty-four hours away. Normally, I’d be happy to have a boyfriend (or something close to it) on the very day you’re made to be very aware when you don’t. But even as Nate hinted at his big plans for us—which, by the sound of it, were secret, detailed, and still in development—I couldn’t completely just relax and enjoy it. Rest Assured had run a special promotion for gift baskets and flower delivery for its customers, and the response had been overwhelming. As a result, they were booked fully for that day, just like on Thanksgiving, and I’d not forgotten how that had turned out.

  “It’s going to be fine,” Nate had assured me the night before, out by the pond, when I’d brought this up. We’d taken to meeting there sometimes in the evening, between our respective homework and work schedules, if only for a few moments. “I’ll do deliveries all afternoon, be done by seven. Plenty of time for what I have in mind.”

  “Which is what?” I asked.

  “You’ll see.” He reached over, brushing my hair back from my face. Behind him I could see the lights from the pool flickering over the fence, and even as he leaned in, kissing my temple, I was distracted, knowing that he was supposed to be over there, assembling gift baskets and that any moment his dad might wander out and find him gone. This must have been obvious, as after a moment he pulled back. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You look worried.”

  “I’m not.”

  “Look,” he said, his expression serious, “if this is about my gift . . . just relax. I’m not expecting anything phenomenal. Just, you know, super great.”

  I just looked at him, regretting once again that in a moment of weakness a few days earlier, I’d confessed to Olivia—who then had of course told Nate—that I was stressing about finding the right thing for him for Valentine’s. Her loyalty aside, though, the truth was that having dropped the ball at Christmas, it seemed especially important to deliver something good here, if not phenomenal.

  “It’s not about your gift,” I told him.

  “Then what is it?”

  I shrugged, then looked past him again, over at the pool house. After a moment, he turned and glanced that way as well, then back at me, finally getting it. “It’s fine, okay? I’m off the clock,” he said. “All yours.”

  But that was just the thing. Even in these moments— sitting by the pond with his leg linked around mine, or riding in the car with his hand on my knee—I never felt like I had all of Nate, just enough to make me realize what was missing. Even stranger was that with anyone else I’d ever been with—especially Marshall—what I was given, as well as what I gave, had always been partial, and yet that had still been plenty.

  Now, we pulled into the Perkins lot, and Gervais jumped out, bolting for the building as always. As soon as the door shut behind him, Nate leaned across the console between us and kissed me. “You do look great,” he said. “So what made you finally break down and spend those gift cards?”

  “I didn’t. Cora ambushed me and took me to Esther Prine. I was powerless to resist.”

  “Most girls I know would consider that wish fullfillment, not torture.”

  I sat back, shaking my head. “Why does everyone keep saying that? Who says just because I’m a girl I’m hardwired to want to spent a hundred and eighty bucks on jeans?”

  Nate pulled away, holding up his hands. “Whoa there,” he said. “Just making an observation.”

  “Well, don’t.” I looked down at my lap and those expensive jeans, not to mention the shoes I had on with them (suede, not on sale) and my jacket (soft leather, some label I’d never even heard of). Who was this person in these fancy clothes, at this expensive school, with a for-all-intents -and-purposes boyfriend who she was actually worried wasn’t opening up to her enough emotionally? It was like I’d been brainwashed or something.

  Nate
was still watching me, not saying anything. “Sorry,” I said finally. “It’s just . . . I don’t know. Everything feels overwhelming right now, for some reason.”

  “Overwhelming,” he repeated.

  It was times like these that I knew I should just come clean and tell him that I worried about him. Having the courage to do that was the part of me I was still holding back. And I was always aware of it, even as, like now, I did it once again.

  “Plus,” I said, sliding my knee so it rested against his, “there’s this issue of your gift.”

  “My gift,” he repeated, raising an eyebrow.

  “It’s just so all-encompassing,” I said with a sigh, shaking my head. “Huge. And detailed . . . I mean, the flow charts and spread sheets alone are out of control.”

  “Yeah?” he said.

  “I’ll be lucky if I get it all in place by tonight, to be honest.”

  “Huh.” He considered this. “Well. I have to admit, I’m intrigued.”

  “You should be.”

  He smiled, then reached over, running a hand over my jacket. “This is pretty cool,” he said. “What’s the inside look like? ”

  “The inside . . .” I said, just as he slid his hand over my shoulder, easing off one sleeve. “Ah, right. Well, it’s equally impressive.”

  “Yeah? Let me see.” He nudged it off over the other shoulder, and I shook my head. “You know, it is. This sweater is pretty nice, too. Who makes it?”

  “No idea,” I said.

  I felt his hand go around my waist, then smoothly move up my back to the tag. “Lanoler,” he read slowly, ducking his head down so his lips were on my collarbone. “Seems well made. Although it’s hard to tell. Maybe if I just—”

  I glanced outside the car, where people were walking past to the green, coffees in hand, backpacks over shoulders. “Nate,” I said. “It’s almost first bell.”

  “You’re so conscientious,” he said, his voice muffled by my sweater, which he was still trying to ease off. “When did that happen?”

  I sighed, then looked at the dashboard clock. We had five minutes before we’d be officially late. Not all the time we wanted, but maybe this, too, was too much to ask for. “Okay,” I told him as he worked his way back around my neck, his lips moving up to my ear. “I’m all yours.”