Not at all. “We managed.”
Stephanie dropped coins into Kathleen’s hand, careful not to touch her. “I was in Paris, New York, Hawaii and Brazil. My mother’s family lives in Brazil, you know.”
“So Carson’s said.”
“But I’m home now. Ready for my last year at Bryce. With Carson.”
Kathleen put the candy into a bag and handed it over.
“And I’ll be looking forward to the first party of the year. Someone always throws one, you know.”
Kathleen felt her blood boil at Stephanie’s veiled reference to the Christmas party where she’d seen Stephanie and Carson kissing—a kiss he swore she had initiated. Kathleen concentrated on what Carson had shared about a fourteen-year-old Stephanie mixing pills and booze, in an attempt to conjure up sympathy for the girl. But one look at Stephanie’s contemptuous expression and her attempt failed.
“Don’t work too hard.” Stephanie sashayed out of the shop.
“Yikes! Who was that?”
Startled, Kathleen remembered that Bree was standing right behind her. “Just a girl I know.”
“She’s beautiful.”
“She may be pretty, but she acts like a b—” Kathleen stopped short.
Bree giggled. “I know the type. Why doesn’t she like you?”
“A guy.” Kathleen was becoming flustered. Why did she allow Stephanie to rattle her so?
“Let me guess. He likes you better than her. Am I right?”
“So he tells me. I’ve wondered why often enough, but I think it’s true.”
Bree laughed. “Well, that’s no mystery. You’re nice and she isn’t. Girls that pretty think they can get anything they want just because of their looks.”
“You’ve figured that out already?”
“My father’s a psychiatrist. I know a lot of that stuff.”
“Is that why you’re a Pink Angel?” Kathleen recalled that that was why Carson had been in the program when they’d first met—because his parents had their practice at this hospital.
“Partly. I needed to get out of the house too. My grandmother is living with us now, and she’s slipping into Alzheimer’s—where no one can visit.” Bree’s sunny expression turned cloudy.
“I—I’m really sorry.”
Bree shrugged. “Mom’s trying to take care of her at home.” She shook her head. “It’s a mess.” She brightened. “Forget I said anything. Show me the rest of what I’m going to be doing in this job.”
Kathleen returned to explaining her duties, but her brain wouldn’t let go of what Bree had told her. Bree’s life was difficult too, and not even having a doctor in her family could save her grandmother from the dark places she was entering. No more than Kathleen could reverse her mother’s journey into advancing MS.
“What did you think they were going to do, sis? Let it slide? You had an e-mail correspondence going with a complete stranger. The guy could be a serial killer, for all you know.” Hunter was standing over Holly in her room.
She sat cross-legged on her bed, a pile of tissues beside her. “Th-they didn’t have to be so mean about it.”
“Mean? How do you figure that? You were stuffing the e-mails between your mattress and box spring! You knew what you were doing was wrong. Admit it.”
“I just sat through an hour-long lecture from Mom and Dad,” Holly wailed. “I don’t need another one from you!”
Hunter raked a hand through his hair and sat beside her.
Holly blew her nose, added the tissue to the heap and grabbed another one. “And he’s not a serial killer either.”
“How do you know that? You don’t even know his name!”
“He had his reasons,” Holly insisted.
“Name them.”
She threw herself to one side and cried harder. Of course she couldn’t think of any at the moment. “H-he was clever and smart and we talked about everything! I like him, Hunter.”
Hunter sighed deeply and put his hand on her arm sympathetically. “Listen, little sister, you’re too trusting. Any guy who hides his identity for six months from a girl he says he likes is up to no good.” Hunter’s tone was serious enough to make Holly look up. “The world’s full of evil, Holly. Don’t think that just because you believe in God and go to church every Sunday, evil can’t touch you. It can.”
She righted herself. “Is that what you’ve learned in that Christian college? Evil walks among us? All you have to do is turn on the news to know that. Shy Boy isn’t evil! He’s just … well … shy, that’s all.”
“Sheez … talking to you is like talking to a wall.”
He started to stand, but she grabbed his arm. She didn’t want to be alone just then, and Hunter’s company beat her parents coming in to give her another blast. “Isn’t God supposed to protect us?”
“Why should he when we do something stupid?”
She grimaced. “You already sound like a preacher.”
He hauled her to her feet and put his arms around her. “Here’s a hug. You need one.”
She buried her face in the front of his shirt, pulling back when a new wave of tears threatened. “Thank you for the hug.”
“So what’s your punishment?”
“Grounded until further notice. I can’t leave the house except to go to school when it starts. No car privileges. No TV for a week. No computer activity, especially e-mail or Net surfing.” Her eyes widened. “You’ve got to do me a favor!”
Hunter eyed her skeptically. “Like what?”
“Dad nixed the Pink Angels awards event Thursday night too. I—I told Shy Boy that I’d meet him in the hospital lobby before it started. Please e-mail him for me and tell him I can’t make it.”
Hunter threw up his hands and backed away. “Oh no. I’m not telling this guy anything.”
“But I can’t go.” Fresh tears brimmed and spilled over. “I begged Dad, but he wouldn’t budge. I’m getting an award and I can’t even go pick it up.”
“I’ll get the award for you, but I won’t do the other.”
She threw herself at him. “Oh, please, Hunter! Just on the outside chance that I’m right about this guy and everyone else isn’t.”
“Can’t you ask Raina? Or Kathleen?”
“You know we’re not speaking.”
“And whose fault is that?”
She shook her finger at him. “Don’t start. I was wrong to shut out my friends, but I did and now I can’t just ask for a favor because I need them. How lame is that?”
“You can call—”
“Did I mention that I’ve lost phone privileges too? I really need you to do this for me. Please.”
Hunter gave a disgusted growl. “If I do it, I’m going to tell him exactly what I think of him for leading my sister on.”
She started to protest, but one look at Hunter’s face changed her mind. Subdued, she said, “Thank you.”
He left her room and she threw herself across her bed and cried some more.
Holly was moping around her room on Saturday when someone knocked. “Friend or foe?” she asked.
“Friends,” Raina and Kathleen said in unison.
Holly grabbed the doorknob and jerked open the door. She threw herself into their arms. “Oh my gosh! I’m so happy to see you two!”
The girls staggered back. “Don’t squeeze us to death!” Raina said.
Holly backed off, glanced down the hall. “How did you get past Cerberus?”
They gave Holly a blank look until Kathleen finally grinned and said, “You mean the three-headed dog that guards the entrance into Hades in Greek mythology?”
“That’s the one.”
“Don’t be so dramatic, girlfriend,” Raina said. “Your mother was quite nice. Although she did set the kitchen timer.”
“Come in,” Holly said. “Excuse the mess, but I’ve been a prisoner in here for days.” She scraped a pile of books, CDs and clothes off her bed and motioned for them to sit.
Kathleen held up a brown paper
sack. “We brought snacks and your award from the Pink Angels program. Everybody missed you.”
“What did you tell Sierra?”
Raina said, “That you’d had a run-in with the law, and the law won.”
“Don’t joke.”
“Unavoidable circumstances,” Kathleen said. “She was sorry.” She handed Holly the bag. “Comfort food.”
Holly rummaged inside and found two jars of ice cream toppings, a bag of candy, a box of crackers and two boxes of cookies. At the bottom she saw her award, and lifted it out. The plaque read BEST TEAM SPIRIT, JUNIOR VOLUNTEER OF THE YEAR. She’d been awarded top honors. “And I missed the whole thing! That just stinks!”
“I grabbed it out of Hunter’s hands and told him we wanted to bring it, and that he wasn’t to say a word about it to you,” Kathleen said.
“He didn’t.” A lump clogged Holly’s throat. “I—I’m sorry for the way I’ve been acting the past couple of weeks. Forgive me?”
“All forgotten,” Raina said, and Kathleen nodded enthusiastically. “I’ve asked your mother if I can pick you up on the first day of school, and she said okay.”
“Really?” Holly brightened.
Mercifully, neither of her friends asked about Shy Boy, which relieved Holly because she couldn’t talk about it yet. She ripped open a cookie box. “Help yourselves and tell me everything that’s happened since the hostile takeover of my brain by my pride, making me forget just what fabulous friends I have.”
After they left, Holly ventured downstairs, sulking past her parents in the living room, where her father sat at his desk paying bills and her mother worked on the sofa doing needlepoint. The doorbell rang. “I’ll get it,” Holly said.
Without comment, her father followed behind her, which made her furious. Did he think she’d bolt down the street once the front door was unlatched?
She opened the door and faced a teen boy with sharp features. He was tall and impossibly skinny, with a full head of wild, curly black hair that hung in shaggy ringlets above bright green eyes.
“Can I help you?” Mike asked from behind Holly.
The boy’s gaze, locked on Holly, shifted up to her father. “Hello, sir. My name is Chad Kyriakidis. I think you know me by my e-mail name, Shy Boy.”
eight
HOLLY FROZE. This was Shy Boy? He wasn’t at all what she’d expected.
“Hello, Chad,” Mike Harrison said. “Is there something I can do for you?”
Holly was speechless and also embarrassed. This wasn’t at all how she’d envisioned—a hundred times over—meeting him.
“I—um—I would like to talk to you, sir. I’d like to apologize for getting Holly in trouble. I’d like to explain myself.”
Holly could feel her father’s displeasure but was heartened when he said, “Yes. Holly’s mother and I would like to hear what’s been going on.”
For the first time, Holly realized that they had not trusted her explanation of an innocent e-mail flirtation. Her face felt hot with color. She stepped aside, and Chad followed her and her father into the living room, where Chad was introduced to her mother. Evelyn nodded politely, but Holly could see by her parents’ expressions that Chad had a whole lot of persuading to do if he was ever going to win over the Doubtful Duo.
Chad sat on the edge of an overstuffed chair across from the sofa where her parents settled. She felt like excess baggage but eventually took the chair at her father’s desk. Chad licked his lips, stared down at his hands clasped on his knees. He looked up. “I’m really sorry about making trouble for Holly. I never meant to do that.”
No one said anything.
Chad continued. “I had no idea of the trouble she was in until Hunter e-mailed me. He told me he was her brother before he lit into me.”
Her parents looked over at Holly. “I asked him to,” Holly said boldly. “So don’t get mad at him.”
“I know the way I’ve handled our friendship is crazy,” Chad said, turning attention back on himself. “But even though we’ve only ever e-mailed each other, I’ve really grown to like her. A lot.”
Holly felt her cheeks grow warm again.
“Why did you pick Holly?” Mike asked. “Do you go to the same high school?”
“No. I—um—I’m homeschooled. I live over in Tarpon Springs.” That was a beautiful Greek fishing village about forty miles from Tampa, on the Gulf of Mexico. Holly had been there years before, visiting with her family. She remembered watching from a glass-bottom boat as divers harvested sponges. “I have seen her around the hospital when she helps on the kid floors.”
Now Holly was baffled. She had never seen Chad.
“Are you a volunteer at the hospital too?” Evelyn asked.
“Not exactly.” Chad shook his mane of curly hair, as if clearing his head. “Let me back up. I got hold of her e-mail address at the hospital. It was an accident; no one gave it to me. Someone named Kathleen e-mailed Holly some stuff from the medical library last year, and I just happened to see the address when I was doing some research at the same terminal.”
“I did a report for biology, and Kathleen e-mailed me some articles,” Holly explained. “She was assigned to the medical library then.”
“I already wanted to know her better but didn’t know how to approach her, so I just started e-mailing.”
“Seems devious,” Mike said.
“There were large time gaps between your e-mails,” Evelyn said. “Why was that?”
Holly squirmed because now he knew that her parents had read every word of their exchanges, yet she was glad her mother had asked the question. Holly burned to know the answer. This whole scene could have been avoided if he’d only met with her ages ago.
“Everybody uses the computer at my house. No privacy.”
“Why was privacy necessary?”
Chad looked miserable. “I didn’t want her to know everything there is to know about me.”
That’s honest, Holly thought. But scary.
“Sounds strange,” Mike said. “What are you hiding?”
Chad took a deep breath. “I—um—I have CF, cystic fibrosis. That’s why I go to the hospital so much. It’s a lousy disease. All my life, I’ve wanted to be normal. I’ve wanted a normal girl to like me. A pretty girl.” He cut his eyes to Holly. “Pretty like Holly. Someone who won’t be turned off or freaked out by coughing and respiratory therapy and all the medical stuff that goes along with CF. I had hoped that Holly would like me through my e-mails enough to not be grossed out when she met the real me.
“Instead I got her into a ton of trouble, and so I’ve probably made her hate me instead. I’m sorry, Holly. Very, very sorry.”
“The summer has passed so quickly,” Carson’s mother, Teresa, told Kathleen in her lilting Spanish accent. They were standing in the magnificent kitchen washing vegetables for the cook-out that Dr. Kiefer was setting up on the back patio. Carson was outside with his father.
“I guess this is the last picnic of the summer,” Kathleen said. It was the Saturday before Labor Day, and the Kiefers were having a few couples over for dinner. Carson had asked Kathleen to come so he wouldn’t be stuck in a crowd of boring adults. He’d said, “We’ll watch some movies, maybe get in some lip-lock time.” Of course she’d agreed.
“Yes, Christopher and I are on call on Monday, so we had to move our party up. We’re very glad you could come.”
“Me too.” Kathleen thought back to the previous Labor Day, when Stephanie had shown up uninvited, and she hoped there wouldn’t be a repeat appearance.
“So you’ve been in school a week. How is it going?”
“There’s a ton of freshmen and everybody looks lost. Cummings is huge. Carson says Bryce Academy is a whole lot smaller. The difference between public and private, I guess.”
“That and a wheelbarrow full of money,” Teresa said with a laugh. “I must tell you something.”
Kathleen braced herself.
“You have been good for our son, Kathleen.
”
The compliment took Kathleen by surprise. “You think so?”
“Do not be modest. It is true. Carson has always been, how shall I say? Not totally manageable. Since the two of you have been dating, he is less wild. More centered. I give you credit for that.”
The flattery made Kathleen blush deeply. “H-he’s kind to me.”
“Ah, this is good to know. Kindness is a good trait. I would not put up with anyone who was not kind to me.” Teresa glanced out the window, let her gaze rest on her husband and smiled. “Like father, like son.” She turned back to Kathleen. “What do you think of Carson’s idea to become an EMT?”
Kathleen’s stomach tightened. She wasn’t prepared for this conversation. Choosing her answer carefully, she said, “I think he’d be very good at it. He’s good with people. He likes the excitement it would bring. And the variety. He’s dedicated too. Plus I think he likes medicine more than he lets on. Yes, he’d make a wonderful EMT.”
Teresa tipped her head, studied Kathleen for a moment. “This is what I have told his father. A child should be encouraged to follow a dream. This is why I am a doctor, because it was something I had always wanted. My family let me believe I could do it, although we had little money to send a girl to university. Carson should be able to do as he wishes. He is young and he can experiment until he finds the right fit.”
“He told me his dad backed off on forcing him to take some of his college prep classes this year.”
“Yes.” Teresa’s eyes twinkled. “I checked into what courses were absolutely necessary for him to graduate, enter community college and be acceptable for the EMT program. Then I suggested a senior year schedule to both Carson and Chris that was agreeable.”
The confession proved to Kathleen what she’d already surmised—that Carson’s easy charm had been given to him with his mother’s DNA.
“Where’s your brother?” Holly’s father asked as he walked into the kitchen, adjusting his necktie.
Holly, sitting at the kitchen table, had her nose buried in the Sunday comics as she answered. “He got a call from his boss, who said the morning guy was sick and couldn’t open the restaurant, and would Hunter please open and let the cooks in, and he’d take over as soon as he could.”