“Regular makeup removal is a snap. This is heavy-duty greasepaint.” She stepped back. “I think I’ve gotten it all. Go wash your face and let me inspect you again.”
He stood, ducked into the adjoining bathroom and returned in minutes with the front of his hair damp and a towel hanging around his neck. “All clean,” he said. “Do I get a kiss for bravery?”
She complied gladly. “You smell like a girl,” she teased.
“And to think I was going to give you a present before that crack.”
“A present! I want my present.”
He went to a duffel bag he’d brought and extracted a handful of thin necklaces that when snapped were chemically activated and glowed in the dark. “Left over from my clown giveaways. All different colors.”
“I’m touched,” Raina teased. She took a few of the necklaces and looped them over a bedside lamp. “Now you can find me in the dark.”
He grinned, came back to the bed and leaned over her. “I’d rather feel my way to you.”
She slugged him playfully.
He made a face, flopped backward onto her bed, propped himself up on his elbows and cocked his head. “How’s it going with you and your mother these days?”
Her smile faded. Trust Hunter to bring up the one subject she didn’t want to talk about. “We coexist.”
“How long are you going to stay mad at her?”
“I’ve got a lot to be angry about. A baby she gave up for adoption was something worth knowing, don’t you think?”
“Maybe.” He pulled her down to lie next to him and rolled to one side so that he was looking down at her on the bed. “A lot of women give up babies and never tell the families they go on to raise. It’s their right. If Emma had tracked down your mom asking to meet her biological family, it would have made sense to tell you, but Emma didn’t. And if she didn’t want to know and your mom didn’t want to tell—”
“But we’re sisters! I should know that I have a blood sister.”
“Why?”
His question stopped her cold. “Because,” she sputtered. “Just because.” She turned her head. “There’s the bone marrow thing,” she said, looking back at him. “It probably saved her life because it came from a blood relative.”
“A great gift you gave her. That’s terrific. You should be proud and happy to have done it.”
“So what’s your point?”
“I just don’t get why you’re so mad at your mother. If you had been the one needing bone marrow and she refused to tell you about a sister, I could understand it. But you weren’t. You discovered you had a sister, and you helped save her life, which pleased you. Why are you angry at Vicki?”
“She lied about our father too. She let me believe that he deserted us.”
“He did.”
Agitated, Raina sat up. “All my life, I’ve been ‘I,’ an only child. All your life, you’ve had Holly, a sibling. You’re a ‘we.’ Now I’m a ‘we’ also. It takes getting used to. And my father never even had a chance to know about me. Mom never told him!”
Hunter looked thoughtful. “So deep down, you think if he’d known about you, he’d have stuck around. Is that right?”
Maybe that was what she had thought. She was amazed that Hunter had put a name to her anger so quickly.
“He was a burned-out druggie. What difference would having another child have made to him when he never accepted responsibility for the first one?”
“It might have,” she snapped, hot tears stinging her eyes.
“Hey, hey … I don’t want to make you cry.” He took her in his arms and she stiffened. “I was just talking you through it.”
She sniffed.
“Are you keeping in touch with Emma?”
“I—I’d like to. I’m not sure I know how. She’s married and … and … we don’t have much in common.”
“You have your bone marrow.”
“She’s already thanked me for that. Truth is, I don’t know how to be a sister.”
He cuddled her. “You’ll learn.”
“I don’t know when. We live five hundred miles apart. You grew up with Holly. You’re a part of each other.”
“Scary, isn’t it?” he joked. He smoothed Raina’s hair, cupped her chin and gazed deeply into her eyes. “It takes more than bloodlines to be related. It takes work and commitment.”
“And my mother isn’t interested in being related to Emma at all.”
“But you are. And something will happen to bring the two of you closer together. I don’t know what, but something will come along. Until it does, keep e-mailing her and phoning. She’ll grow to love you like I do. Not as much,” he added, kissing the tip of Raina’s nose. “But trust me, she will love you for more than donating your bone marrow to her.”
six
“THIS SUMMER’S GOING by way too fast,” Holly told her friends. It was Saturday, and they were relaxing poolside in lounge chairs under big umbrellas at Raina’s town house complex.
“Way too fast,” Kathleen mumbled dreamily, half asleep.
“School starts in four weeks,” Holly said.
Raina threw a towel at her. “Don’t spoil the day. I’m not ready to go back.” Truth be told, she wasn’t ready for Hunter to leave. Their senior year would start the last week in August, but because he’d gotten a jump start on college last winter, he wouldn’t head off to Indiana until after Labor Day. She was dreading it.
“Aren’t you grouchy?” Holly said. “I’m looking forward to being a senior. Queen of the Hill. Top dog.”
“I can’t wait to graduate and go far, far away,” Raina said.
“How far? I thought we were all going to try for the same college.”
Kathleen raised her head. “University of South Florida for me. It’s where Mom can afford to send me.” The local university was on the north side of Tampa.
“I was hoping we’d all go to Florida or Florida State,” Holly said, disappointed, for they had talked for years about attending the same college and being roommates. “They’re both far enough away that my parents won’t be looking over my shoulder every minute.”
Kathleen shrugged. “I have to live at home. Dorm living costs too much.” She didn’t add that she also felt an obligation to stay nearby for her mother’s sake. A recent flare-up of Mary Ellen’s multiple sclerosis had laid her low, and despite her support system, Mary Ellen had needed Kathleen more than ever. Her form of MS—relapsing-remitting—was like that; it came and went, but the relapses could be incapacitating. Kathleen said, “The bright side is that Carson plans to go to college around here too.” She didn’t mention the community college, which was still being discussed by his parents.
“And I’m looking at colleges closer to Hunter,” Raina said.
“Since when? What about the plans we made?” Holly was surprised, then irritated.
“Plans change.”
“When were the two of you going to say something to me? This just stinks!”
Raina and Kathleen exchanged glances. Raina said, “Holly, it’s not a conspiracy against you. It’s just the way things are working out.”
“Money’s a real issue for me,” Kathleen said.
“No,” Holly said coolly. “You both have boyfriends and they’re dictating your plans.”
No one spoke.
“I’m right, aren’t I?” By now Holly was worked up and getting angrier by the moment.
“It’s a combination of things,” Kathleen said. “Yes, Carson will stay in Tampa. But the money—”
“Spare me.” Holly turned to Raina. “And you?”
“All I’ve ever wanted is Hunter,” Raina said quietly. “You’ve always known that.”
Holly felt something inside her explode. “And how about the God stuff? What are you doing about that, Raina? How will you fit into his life if he becomes a pastor? Do you think he wants to drag along an atheist for the rest of his life?” Holly saw that her words were hitting Raina like rocks, but she didn’t
care. She was usually the one in the middle, smoothing over Raina’s ruffled feathers or shoring up Kathleen’s sagging ego, and now they were both heading off in different directions without giving her feelings a single thought.
Kathleen attempted to defuse Holly. “Look, it’s not the end of the world. You’re smart, Holly. Your grades are in the stratosphere, and you placed in the top five in our school on the ACT last year. You’ll be accepted to any college you choose. Pick one. Go for the gold.”
“I want to be with my friends,” Holly said through gritted teeth. “What’s crystal clear is that my best friends don’t want to be with me.”
“That’s not true. We have our whole senior year together. And the rest of the summer too. We’re all Pink Angels—”
Holly stood up. “Don’t throw me crumbs. I’m out of here.” She grabbed her towel and stalked toward the gate.
Kathleen jumped up. “Don’t leave.”
Holly unlatched the gate without a backward glance.
“I brought you. Don’t you want a ride home?”
“I’ll call my mommy like a good little girl!” Holly shouted over her shoulder. “She’ll be thrilled that I need her.”
She slammed out of the gate and Kathleen turned to Raina, who still hadn’t recovered from Holly’s verbal assault. Kathleen dropped onto the chair beside Raina. “She … she didn’t mean all the things she said. She was just upset. She’ll get over it.”
“She was right, though.” Raina’s voice sounded thick. “What’s Hunter going to do with a girl like me?”
“He’s going to love you, as he has for years.”
“We’re miles apart on a few big issues. They’re like a mountain between us. He needs someone who’s more like him, who can see the world through his eyes.”
“He needs you,” Kathleen said emphatically.
“You’re kind to say so, but I’ll just drag him down.”
Kathleen stopped offering protests.
Raina picked up her towel. “Let’s go back to my room. We’ll make some popcorn—” Her voice cracked and Kathleen’s heart went out to her. Raina steadied herself. “Do you think Holly will stay angry at us?”
“No way,” Kathleen said as they walked. “It’s not in her nature.”
Kathleen was wrong. Holly stewed in her anger for the rest of the week, going so far as to ask her mother to drive her to and from the hospital so that she wouldn’t have to ride with Raina and Kathleen.
“Did you all have a falling-out?” her mother asked.
“Can’t I have some privacy on this?”
“I’m not prying. I’m just asking if it’s something you’d like to talk about.”
“No, Mother, I don’t want to talk about it.”
Evelyn didn’t ask again, but she did allow Holly to drive herself to the hospital two days the following week when she didn’t need the car. For that Holly was grateful, because her anger had morphed into deep hurt over Raina and Kathleen’s betrayal. She went online and searched for colleges for herself. She didn’t need her friends. It was time for the Three Musketeers to go their separate ways.
Holly didn’t even cave when Kathleen called and asked if they could go shopping together for school clothes. “I’ve saved enough to buy some things, and you have a fashion eye and I don’t,” Kathleen said enticingly.
“Sorry, I’m busy,” Holly told her.
“We could go another day.”
“Maybe Raina will go with you.”
“Holly …,” Kathleen chided.
“Got to run,” Holly said, and hung up. Then she cried. Only her pride was standing in the way of her being with her friends—former friends, she told herself. Yet she couldn’t seem to get over the hurt.
“You going to stay mad at them forever?” Hunter asked one evening, standing in the doorway of her room.
“Maybe,” Holly answered, knowing he was asking because Raina had urged him to.
“Not very mature.”
She stuck out her tongue at him. “They hurt my feelings and I can do whatever I want. Go away.”
He did.
Two weeks before school started, she received an e-mail from Shy Boy.
SHY BOY: Are you still speaking to me?
HOLLY: Yes, but I’m pretty sick and tired of you toying with me. Either we meet or you stop contacting me altogether. It’s been six months already!
She knew she was taking a chance, but at the moment that she hit the Send button, she didn’t care. She was through being so nice to everybody. All that her niceness got her was everybody walking all over her, or taking her for granted.
The next day, Shy Boy responded:
You’re right. We need to meet. When and where?
“I wish I could tuck myself into your suitcase and go with you,” Raina told Hunter with a sigh.
They were alone down by the pool in her complex late one night. The moon scattered fractured light that looked like pale jewels across the surface of the water. They had been swimming, but were now sitting side by side on towels spread on the concrete. The warmth of the day’s sun, long gone, seeped through the terry cloth.
“We’d never get away with it. At my college, coeds are strictly segregated in the dorms.” He said it lightly, but she knew he was telling her the hard truth. He was leaving. She was staying. He put his mouth on her shoulder and sucked the moisture left on her skin by their swim.
Shivers shot up her back. “I’d be quiet as a mouse. No one would know.”
“I’d know.”
Her heart was heavy. School started for her in a week. One week later was when he’d leave. “I don’t know what I’ll do.”
“Enjoy your senior year. You’re doing that Pink Angels credit thing again, aren’t you?”
“Yes. So is Kathleen. I don’t know about Holly.” She sighed. “I don’t know much about your sister these days. She’s still in a snit.”
“It won’t last forever.”
“It’s been almost three weeks already. Kathleen couldn’t even lure her into the mall.”
He pulled Raina into his lap, cradling her in his arms. “She’ll get over it,” he said. “But I’m not getting over wanting to kiss you.”
She smiled up at him. “Don’t let me stand in your way.”
He kissed her cheeks, her forehead, her chin, tangled her hair in his big hands and finally, when every pore on her skin felt on fire, he kissed her long and deep on her mouth, sending fiery darts into her heart. Into her mind. Into her very soul.
Holly discovered that the biggest problem with being mad at her friends was having no one to talk to when something wonderful happened. Shy Boy had agreed to meet her before the Pink Angels awards ceremony that Thursday night. She was proud of herself for thinking of it. The hospital was a very public place, and meeting right before the ceremony meant that she really did have an excuse to duck away if they didn’t mesh, up close and personal. Plus no one would be the wiser, meaning her parents, if they saw her talking to some boy in the lobby before the event.
With only days left before the ceremony, she could hardly wait. Shy Boy—she still didn’t know his name—had sent her e-mails on and off for months, and now she was finally going to meet him. He’d better be worth the wait, she told herself as she drove home from the hospital on Tuesday. She itched to pick up her cell phone and call Kathleen and Raina. She quelled the urge. If the meeting went well, she’d forgive them and tell them everything. If it didn’t go well, she’d never tell them. Why humiliate herself?
Holly pulled into the garage, hopped out of the car and bounded into the house. “Mom, I’m home.”
“Up here,” Evelyn called. “I’m in your room.”
Holly rolled her eyes. Now what? Were there dust bunnies under her bed? Had she forgotten to do something her mother had asked before she’d gone off that morning? She took the stairs two at a time and skidded to a halt in her doorway, where her mother was standing stone-faced, holding a small three-ring binder—the binder wh
ere Holly had stashed six months’ worth of printed-out e-mails from Shy Boy.
seven
“NEVER LEAVE THE cash register unattended.” Kathleen was talking to Bree Sinclair, the girl who would take her place part-time in the gift shop once she returned to school.
“I’d never do that,” Bree said, her big blue eyes looking serious.
She was younger than Kathleen, a sophomore in a high school in an older part of the city, and had been with the Pink Angels program all summer. Now that school was starting, the gift shop would need more hands. Bree had an outgoing, perky personality that reminded Kathleen of Holly in many ways—when Holly was speaking to her.
“This is an inventory sheet, and Mrs. Nesbaum expects us to do an in-depth product count once a month. It’s a pain, but it’s necessary.” The older woman loved Kathleen and often left her in charge of the shop. Kathleen was going to miss the job, and the money it brought her too. Once school resumed, she’d be assigned elsewhere for her credit work. She would keep the gift shop job two Saturdays a month, however.
“This is the refrigerated unit, where we hold the floral bouquets until someone comes to deliver them.” The tall unit was at the back of the shop and contained the morning’s delivery of live arrangements from local florists.
“I’ve done that before,” Bree said. “The floral cart has a bad wheel, so it’s like wrestling with an alligator to make it go the way you want.”
The girl even sounded like Holly.
“Can I have some help here?”
Kathleen spun at the sound of the irritated voice and saw Stephanie Marlow standing at the glass-topped counter, a package of candy in her hand. Kathleen’s heart thudded and her stomach twisted into a knot. She forced a smile. “You’re home. Carson said you were away.”
“And he told me you were working here when I saw him last night.”
The information was given to unnerve Kathleen, and it had the desired effect. “Yes, I’m in charge of the shop.”
“How charming. Did you miss me all summer?”