Drawn

  “Are you all right?”

  “I’m going to the bathroom to look at it, okay?”

  I nodded. “I’ll clean up. Do you want to keep the stuff I cut?”

  “What for?”

  “I don’t know. In case your mom freaks out and you want to glue it back on?”

  She didn’t want the hair, so I put the chair back under a desk and wrapped up the tarp to stuff in the trash. I dropped the scissors and the razorblade back in the cup on Miss Downey’s desk and looked around for leftover evidence.

  Mia returned with the biggest smile I’d ever seen on her face. “I love it.”

  “You look really different,” I said.

  She hugged me. “Mom’s going to have a cow when I get home.”

  Mia picked up her backpack and almost skipped out the door and down the hall.

  I turned back to the window. Damon hadn’t moved.

  “Are you still looking at those sketches?” I asked.

  “You did this one.”

  “How can you tell?”

  “It’s obviously yours. That, and the initials. What’s the A stand for?”

  I leaned against the windowsill. “Alexis. What’s your K stand for?”

  “How’d you know my middle name starts with K?”

  “You signed your note on my Hirsch sketch, remember? DKS.”

  “See. You have an excellent memory. Kyle.”

  Kyle. I sighed. “I have a great memory for anything I can see. If I’ve seen it, I remember it.”

  “That’s very cool.”

  I pointed to the sketch he still held. “Miss Downey sometimes gives us a theme to draw from. Today’s was ‘sacred’.”

  “His eyes are amazing.”

  “I know, right?” Way to sound like a jerk, Juliet. “I mean, I was surprised how good they came out. It’s Jesus.”

  Thank you, God, that I didn’t do Damon and me on the raft.

  He smiled at me, like Duh. “Yeah, I know. And that’s the lake, isn’t it? Your lake?”

  He’s going to think I’m such a freak.

  Damon looked back at the picture. “That’s a great place.”

  “I go there a lot.” What if he thinks I take guys there all the time? “Alone, I mean. Or with Mark in the summer, to swim.”

  “I hope you don’t mind. I hung out there for a while when I went back to get the bike on Sunday morning.”

  “Really?”

  He put the canvas back on the stack. “I kind of hoped you’d show up.”

  He hoped I’d show up. “I was at church. I did go later. The bike was already gone.”

  “Yeah. Bad timing.”

  Then we stood there and just looked at each other. Words that flowed so easily seconds before flew somewhere far away, and not a single thing came to mind except for the furious clash of two totally opposite instincts. One part of my brain screamed “Run away!” and threatened my defenseless body with all sorts of physical humiliations if it didn’t obey. A different need, one I’d never come across before, riveted my eyes on his face and brought up this heat to my skin that felt nothing like its usual eruption into a bonfire of terror.

  Damon swallowed.

  The new thing in me willed him to come closer. The brain I knew flooded my muscles with icy adrenaline and screamed at me to flee the room. And the planet.

  Then the door burst open and we jumped about six feet away from each other.

  Dolph, the custodian, swiped a push broom in front of him and stopped short when he saw us. “What are ye still doin’ hare, Miss Juliet?”

  I swallowed hard to get my heart out of my throat and knelt to pick up my bag. “I just had a project to finish.”

  Dolph skewered Damon with narrowed eyes. “A project, ye say?”

  “We’re just leaving,” I said.

  “Ye get yerself home now.”

  “I will.”

  Damon and I almost ran down the hallway and when we burst out of the front doors of the school we stopped, looked at each other, and broke out laughing.

  “A project, ye say?” Damon mimicked Dolph so well that Dolph himself would’ve cracked up if he’d heard.

  “It was a project. Project Mia.”

  He pointed to the bike rack. “Come on. You’re supposed to be grounded, aren’t you?”

  “Yeah. And you’re the reason.”

  When we got to the bottom of the stairs he pulled his bike key out of his pocket.

  “That reminds me,” I said. “Where’s my heart pendant?”

  He unlocked the bike and pushed it toward the driveway. “At my house.”

  “Thief.”

  “You stole my key.”

  I looked at the handlebars. I really rode way up there? And was about to again? “I did not. I found it. And I gave it back.”

  “Think you can hold onto your bag while you ride?”

  “Do you think I can?”

  We walked out to the road. “Yeah. If you can trust me enough not to white-knuckle my handlebars again.”

  “I can trust you.” I think I could trust you forever.

  He got on the bike and held it steady. “Give me your bag while you get up.”

  I handed it to him, backed over the tire and pushed myself off the ground.

  “Much better than last time.”

  “I’m a quick learner. With some things.”

  He reached around and put the bag on my lap. “You don’t give yourself enough credit. Ready?”

  “Mm-hmm.” I wrapped one arm around it and held onto the bar with the other hand.

  Damon pushed off and we swayed a little while he built up speed. When he sat down I leaned back against his chest.

  His face appeared next to mine. “You’re a pro at this.”

  “It’s like we’ve done it before.”

  “Are you going to get in huge trouble if your parents see me?”

  “Nobody’s home.” I adjusted the bag on my lap and closed my eyes. The wind that kissed my face smelled of cut grass and charcoal. “Nobody’s ever home.”

  We talked all the way there. About school and the Academic Olympics. About Mia’s hair. About stuff he and Adam did when they lived in Benin. About math and art. Lula’s story even came up, the one I did the cover for, and we talked about riding dragons and motorcycles. I only got scared once when a rabbit dashed across the road and Damon swerved the bike to avoid it. I looked over at him.

  He laughed. “I’ve never actually seen someone’s eyes bug out of their head before.”

  “That was very close.”

  “I was in control the whole time.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Like before, we got there way too fast. We coasted past Pam’s house and Damon pulled up just short of the gravel driveway again. I slid down off the handlebars. I didn’t really want to this time, but I didn’t really mind, either. Somehow I knew I’d be on them again. This warm, bubbly sense of mine flooded out from my stomach and shivered through my arms and legs.

  “Have you seen Pam since Saturday?” he asked.

  I shook my head. “She wasn’t on the bus or in homeroom today.”

  “Study hall, either.” Damon rubbed his upper arms. “Do you think you should check on her?”

  “Like, go knock on her door? I don’t know what I’d say if her mom answered.”

  We both stared at her house for a while. They’d fixed the broken window already.

  “By the way, I really owe you,” I said.

  “What for?”

  “For keeping me from drinking. And for getting me out of there before the police came.”

  “You’re welcome.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “What happened with your brother, anyway? Adam took off through the woods when he heard the sirens, but he said Mark was still there.”

  “He ran upstairs to Pam’s room and slid down the sun porch roof.” I pointed to my house. “It’s just like the one outside my room, only on the back side of the house. He would’ve been home free if he
hadn’t run into Dad in our driveway. And he reeked of beer.”

  As we stared at my house the last of the sun dropped just enough to hide behind the treetops on the other side of the development. The air cooled suddenly with the coming dark, and the streetlight blinked on.

  “You said nobody’s home?” Damon asked. “Want me to walk you up?”

  “You can’t come in,” I blurted out.

  Stupid. You are such a baby.

  “I know. I just meant I’d walk you to the door.”

  “Okay.”

  He left his bike on the side of the road and I kind of wished he’d have pushed it along between us so I didn’t have to think about how close we walked or whether I should let my arm brush his. It didn’t matter, though. He stayed a few inches away and never tried to hold my hand or anything. We stepped up over the broken stair and I dug around in my bag for the key.

  “That’s a bunch of books,” Damon said.

  “Lots of homework tonight.” I found the key and slung my bag over my shoulder again. “Don’t you?”

  “I did it in study hall.”

  “All of it?”

  He nodded and shrugged.

  I fumbled with the keys. Once I went into the house he’d leave.

  “I guess I’ll see you in homeroom,” he said.

  “Yeah.” I turned the key in the lock and pushed the door open. The inside pulled at me, a sucking current that dragged me where I least wanted to go. I stepped over the threshold, then turned back. “Hey. Call me when you get home. Just so I know you made it okay.”

  “What if your parents pick up?” He grinned. “And anyway, I don’t have your number.”

  “Then I’ll give it to you.” I grabbed a pen from the outside pocket of my bag. “And I’ll make sure I answer.”

  Damon held out his hand. “Write it on here.”

  My stomach did that carbonation thing again when I took his palm in my left hand and steadied it to write across the wide, tanned space above his knuckles.

  “Do a picture for me, too.”

  I looked up at him and my knees went a little weak. “A picture of what?”

  “Of you.”

  “Come on.”

  “Seriously.”

  I jotted down the numbers, then did a quick caricature of me on the back of his wrist. “There.” I let go of him.

  He twisted his hand around to look at the sketch. “That doesn’t look like you.”

  I stepped back out and turned to see it alongside him. “Sure it does.”

  “Huh-uh. If that’s what you look like to yourself, you need your eyes checked.”

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  He looked at me, then down at the sketch and then at me again. “You’re much prettier than that.”

  Did he just lean closer? Oh my gosh. He’s going to kiss me and I think I want him to. But I don’t know how to kiss and what if I do it wrong?

  “We’ll work on your self-image.” He smiled that dimpled smile, then backed down over the steps. He turned around and walked away.

  Disappointment shoved relief off a ledge at the far end of my mind. It plummeted into a dark abyss and fell so far into nothingness that I never even heard it hit bottom.

  I hugged my bag against me, went inside and watched him out the window. He climbed on his bike and stood there for a minute. He looked at his wrist again, then looked back up at the house. Could he see me? I raised my hand to the window, but he moved away. He pushed off and disappeared down the long, shadowy road.

  Then I noticed the strange car parked in Mom’s spot. A green Jeep.

  I turned around and froze in my steps.

  A man sat on the couch and grinned at me.

  CHAPTER 19

  My lungs and legs shuddered as I screamed. Every capillary in my body felt trapped in concrete and when I ran out of breath my vision exploded in silver stars.

  He jumped off the couch and held up both his hands. “It’s okay! Take it easy!”

  Breath heaved out of me and I fell back against the window. A blond Magnum, P.I., took up half the space and all the air in my living room.

  He smiled, wide and toothy, with a square chin and long dimples. “Hey! I’m not going to hurt you!”

  I clutched my bag against me with both arms. “Who are you?”

  He stepped toward me and I reached for a table lamp.

  “Stop! Listen,” he said. “I’m a friend of your mom’s.” He reached in his pocket and pulled out a handful of keys. “Look,” he said as he flipped through them. “I have a key.”

  “Why do you have a key to our house?”

  He put both palms up and nodded at me, then sat back down on the couch. “Your mom was running late and told me to come in and wait for her.”

  He saw Damon and me. He heard the whole thing.

  “I work with your mom.”

  “She doesn’t work.”

  “Sure she does.” He reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and pulled out a card. “Look. Sheri Brynn. Life Coach and Personal Organizer.”

  The client. “You’re Mr. Pierson.”

  He exhaled and smiled. “That’s right. Jack Pierson. Your mom’s helping me with some projects.”

  “That still doesn’t explain why you have a key to our house.”

  He hummed, like he agreed that I had a point.

  A car crunched up the driveway and I leaned back to look out the window. “Mom’s here.”

  Jack Pierson stood up, walked over and opened the front door.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Letting your mom in.”

  “She can let herself in.” I circled around him toward the stairs. “Does my dad know about this?”

  He stood still for a couple of seconds, then turned his back to the door and closed it again. The charming, innocent-bystander expression disappeared and he half-smiled, a lot like Amica. “I’m guessing your dad doesn’t know about the boy who rode you home on his handlebars.”

  My legs threatened to collapse.

  “Your mom might like to hear about that, too.”

  He pressed one hand against the door and wagged his finger at me with the other. “There’s no reason either of us needs to make trouble for the other, is there?”

  I looked past him and saw Mom approach the house. She reached the door and called, “Hello?” The doorknob jiggled, but he held it fast.

  “Are we going to be friends, Juliet?” Jack Pierson spoke so low I could just make out the words.

  Mom knocked on the door and called out my name, then Jack’s.

  I nodded and backed up a couple of the stairs.

  “Good.” He put his big smile back on, turned and opened the door. “Welcome home!”

  Mom grinned at him, then saw me on the steps. “Hey, sweetheart!” she called. She looked back and forth between him and me like a mouse caught between two cats. “I see you met Mr. Pierson.”

  Jack closed the door behind her and put his hand on her back. “Juliet’s been super entertaining.”

  “Really?” Mom stepped a little away from him, and put a hand on her hip. “So. I imagine you have a lot of homework.”

  “That’s what I heard,” Jack said.

  “Jack and I have some work to do, too. Why don’t you go on upstairs?”

  I moved up a couple of more steps. Higher felt safer. “Why are you working here?”

  A scowl shadowed Mom’s gracious hostess face. “Because it’s convenient,” she enunciated each syllable.

  “Hooray for convenience.”

  When I looked at Jack Pierson, he smiled, narrowed his eyes and tipped his head just a bit, kind of like when you meet a strange dog and you can’t tell if he wants to play or tear out your throat. I backed up the stairs until I saw them go into the living room, then turned and took the rest of the steps two at a time. When I got to my room I closed the door and locked it.

  I reached for the phone to dial Kitty, but stopped. I didn’t want to tie up the line be
fore Damon called.

  I dropped my bag on the floor and flopped onto the bed.

  Would he remember to call? If he did, would he just report that he made it home, then hang up? If not, what would I say? We talked like crazy sometimes, but when I stopped and thought about the words, nothing ever came and I stood there like a big fat lump.

  I wanted to tell him about Jack Pierson.

  But then I didn’t.

  Maybe Dad would come home and catch them.

  Catch them at what? They said they had work. He’s a client. She has a business now. That’s all.

  My stomach growled. I still hadn’t had anything to eat since breakfast. I looked at my locked door. I didn’t want to go out of my room again till Jack Pierson, and preferably everyone else, had left the house.

  “More gum it is.” I rolled over and reached into my bag for another piece. I slid off the paper wrapper, peeled back the foil, and folded the silvery-gray strip against my tongue.

  Man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.

  The strange voice returned as another odd fizzy sensation washed my tongue in electric juice. I swallowed my spit and it filled my stomach like I’d just finished off a double cheeseburger. With fries. And a large shake.

  “This is the best gum ever, Kitty,” I said. Sweet peace flooded me, along with the intense rush of flavor.

  There’s a question you’ve been dying for the answer to.

  I shivered. The voice sounded nearer now, louder inside my head.

  I shook the creepies out of my spine and reached down to get my English homework. We finished The Little Prince, and I had to get my final essay written by Friday. My notebook fell open to the handout Mr. Tollin gave us: “Choose one of the characters or symbols in the book, and explain in five hundred words how it relates to your present life.”

  Laughter in two voices floated up through the air vent under my window. “How can office organization be that much fun?” I asked the floor.

  Because it’s only an excuse for what they really want to do.

  “Which is what?”

  Forget about who and what they are.

  I rubbed my eyes with one hand and pulled my hair back into a ponytail. “Stop it, Juliet. Stop talking to yourself.”

  Another round of laughter burst into my room so I reached over to my nightstand to switch on the radio. Paul Simon was slip-slidin’ away.

  “Choose one of the characters or symbols in the book,” I read again. The rose? The fox? The snake? Love, friendship, death. What related most to my life?

  “I’m almost fourteen. I like art. And I have no control over anything in my life except what goes on inside my head. And sometimes not even that.”