We ate at Grandma Adele’s that night, which gave me enough time to sneak in another poem. I’d tried to read them fast, read the entire journal straight through, but after I gobbled down those first few poems, I was struck with the thought: I only get to do this once. The first time through. The first time getting to know my mom. So as tempting as it was to rush, I rationed the poems.
That night at dinner, I kept staring at Dad, wondering how on earth the words spun gold had ever left his mouth. He stared right back, probably wondering how—after five years—Landon Scott had ended up in our kitchen.
It was close to nine when I pulled Dad’s Blazer into the driveway. The headlights illuminated a shivering figure on our porch. Sure, it was warm, especially for late March, but going without a coat wasn’t an option. Unless you were Nissa, in which case it was mandatory. A coat would crush the delicate, mostly see-through top she wore over the delicate, mostly see-through camisole. And even in the dim porch light, it was pretty clear she’d opted to go braless.
Dad exited the truck, scowling like he had a migraine. “Nissa?” he said.
“Hey, Mr. Meyers.” Nissa jumped up from the porch steps. “I was wondering if I could borrow MacKenna.”
“You want to borrow her?” Dad sounded amused.
“There’s this party, and my mom’s on a date and has the car, and MacKenna—”
“Is a great designated driver,” I finished for her. It was the reason I was driving the Blazer, since Dad drank a few beers at dinner.
But that wasn’t what Dad zeroed in on. “How’s your mom doing?” he asked.
“Good, good,” Nissa said, plucking at her blouse. “She really likes this guy.”
“Even though he doesn’t own a car.”
Dad’s comment flew right over Nissa, but he skewered me with a look that meant: Date a loser who doesn’t own a car and I’m locking you in your room until you’re fifty.
Dad could be judgmental.
Inside, he rummaged through the coat closet and pulled out an old physical training sweatshirt, a gray one with a zipper that split the word Army in two.
“Boys like a bit of mystery.” He handed Nissa the sweatshirt. “Trust me on that.”
We headed upstairs since Nissa insisted I change. She flopped on my bed and adjusted the sweatshirt cuffs. They were so frayed it looked like silver fringe dangled from her wrists.
“Your dad is completely adorable.” She dropped her voice an octave. “Boys like a bit of mystery.” She burst out laughing. “As if.”
“He’s a riot,” I said.
“Still.” Here, she sighed. “It’s too bad … he, I mean they never—”
“Yeah. I know.”
Back in grade school, we had regular “Parent Trap” sleepovers where we watched both movies over and over again and plotted our own version—to trap Nissa’s mom with Dad. We made elaborate plans for a new shared bedroom that was sure to come from this glorious union, and we tried a few times to get Dad and Nissa’s mom together. Nissa’s mom seemed more than willing. Dad grimaced like he was undergoing a root canal. Later, I realized that when it came to single (and good-looking) men, Nissa’s mom was always willing. Something, I guessed, Dad knew all along.
From my closet, I pulled a skirt and the stretchy camisole that matched Nissa’s. We’d gone in together on a buy one, get one free sale. Hers was bubblegum pink, mine olive green. I added a canvas shirt I’d found at the Army-Navy surplus store, and the ultimate accessory: My knee-high Chuck Taylor pleated silk shoes. They were my absolute favorite. I rationed wearing them, since finding a replacement pair would be expensive if not impossible.
“You’re kidding,” Nissa said. “Could you show a little skin?”
I rolled up the sleeves of my shirt.
“Ha, ha. Seriously, don’t you want to meet someone?”
I thought about that. I mean really thought about how showing some skin—or going braless—upped my chances of meeting someone, and what sort of someone that would be. “No. Do you want me to get out of the house?”
Nissa made a face. She’d heard the patented Grandma Adele lecture on how dressing like a slut does not empower you. Dad had his own version, one he liked to give in various clothing stores in the mall, in his military command voice.
“What is this?” he’d say. “The skank-in-training department? I refuse to let my daughter dress like a tiny whore.”
Shopping with Dad? A blast. He and Grandma Adele were a united front when it came to clothing. The day he handed me a credit card and let me do my own back-to-school shopping was one of the happiest of my life.
I adjusted the camisole and unbuttoned a few shirt buttons. “So?” I asked Nissa.
“Here,” she said, “sit.” She shook out her purse and cosmetics rained down on my desk. With me captive in the chair, she went to work. “Close your eyes … pucker … hold still already.”
And so on. After five minutes, she offered up the compact with its little mirror. Nissa had a knack with makeup. Me? A little gloss, a little mascara, but anything more, and I’d end up venturing into Bozo the Clown territory. But this? Looking back at me? Almost amazing.
“Thank you.” I meant it too. I could never look this good on my own.
“You know,” she said, “it makes you look like …”
She let the sentence trail, but I knew how it ended. Nissa had been to Grandma Adele’s plenty of times, and I heard the echo of her unspoken words.
Like your mom.
I almost showed her the journal then. But bracelets jangled on her wrists and she was close to chewing off all her carefully-applied lip gloss. Party now. Journal later.
Downstairs, Dad sat in the den, TV tuned to The History Channel. In the kitchen the coffeemaker grumbled and sighed. I contemplated keeping Dad and the First World War company. Instead, I poured a cup of coffee and set it on the table next to his chair.
“I’ll be good in a couple of hours,” he said. “Phone charged?”
I pulled it from my knapsack purse and held it up for his inspection.
“Call if you need anything,” he added.
“You shouldn’t drive,” I said.
“Couple of hours.” He took a sip of coffee and winced at its heat. “I’ll be good to go.”
We had a deal, or rather, a “no bullshit” deal as he called it. Dad never pretended parties—especially those Nissa dragged me to—weren’t what they really were.
“There’s nothing you can do at one of those that will upset me,” he always said.
The first time he told me this, I must’ve given him a for real look, because he laughed.
“I’m serious, princess. I’ve been seven flavors of stupid. I’m not going to hold it against you if you’re one or two.” Then he paused and considered not me, but our ceiling. “I just want you home safe.”
We did all this without painful discussions or pledge signing. If I needed to, I could call. It was that simple.
“Go,” he said now. “Have fun. Keep an eye on Nissa.”
“That’s going to be the hard part.”
Out in the driveway, my Jeep was like ice, even with the hardtop. Dad had gotten a deal on it, so I had both covers, the soft-sided canvas and the hardtop.
Dad on soft-sided, canvas covers: Sucks during a Minnesota winter, princess.
He was right about that. I cranked the heat but Nissa shivered, despite Dad’s PT hoodie.
“You are so lucky,” she chattered more than said.
I knew she was talking about the Jeep and not necessarily life with Dad.
“So, are you pumped?” she asked.
“About?”
“The party,” Nissa said, sounding cold and annoyed. “It’s going to be the best. It’s got to be. It’s Lukas’s last one.”
She believed, and kept on believing, that the next party, or dance, or whatever, would be the one. The one for what I never figured out. What were we—or maybe it was just Nissa—looking for? I didn’t think we’d find it spouting from a keg on a sticky basement floor.
Sometimes I missed the other Nissa, the one who constructed false bottoms for her pencil cases (to hide lip gloss), the one who didn’t care quite so much about parties and boys. (Although, honestly, it was hard to remember a time when Nissa hadn’t been boy crazy.)
So, no. I wasn’t pumped or anything else about this party, not even the very last Lukas Jakobitz spring break blowout—or whatever the thing was called.
I’d started the turn for the newer sections of Black Earth when Nissa grabbed the wheel. The Jeep swerved, my heart revved, and for one black second, we skidded sideways toward someone’s Lexus.
“What the—?” I began once I’d regained control.
“Sorry, sorry.” Nissa’s apology came out with panting breaths. “I forgot. I told Sierra and Jodi we’d pick them up.”
I stopped the Jeep. “What. The. Hell.”
“Come on, they’re not that bad.”
“Are we talking about the same Sierra and Jodi?”
Nissa rolled her eyes. “People change.”
Well, maybe people did, but I wasn’t so sure about those two. Back in eighth grade, they whispered about Nissa’s bargain basement wardrobe. In grade school, they labeled Landon a “retard” because he was in remedial reading. They told me I was going to hell because Dad never took me to church. Call me cynical, but I didn’t think they’d changed all that much since then.
“Please.” Nissa gave me a sly look. “I’ll be your best friend.”
I laughed, couldn’t help it. Popularity, boys, parties, prom, it meant so much to her—and going along didn’t hurt me.
“Okay,” I said at last. “But they have to sit in back.” The back seats were like blocks, and in this weather, blocks of ice.
“Done,” Nissa said.
The second I pulled into Jodi’s driveway, the two of them burst from the front door. Back in grade school, Jodi had a mass of red curls that she now wore ironed flat. That, I thought, must take her two hours every morning. She was short, petite, and a killer in field hockey. She wasn’t a bad swimmer either. If she didn’t slavishly follow Sierra in everything, I might actually like her.
Sierra was one of those Nordic goddess types, tall, blond (but not as blond as Nissa, and personally, I think Sierra resented that). She double dipped, not in girls’ swimming and synchro, but gymnastics—and acted like she was doing us all a huge favor by being on the team.
Nissa hopped out and pulled back her seat. Sierra gave her a look, but Nissa merely shrugged. A wave of perfume shoved its way in first, followed by gasps and exclamations.
“Oh, my God, MacKenna, you’re the best,” Sierra was saying. “My mom is such a bitch. She knows Lukas always has a spring break party and she took away my car keys anyway.”
Jodi made a sympathetic huffing noise.
“Why’d she take away your keys?” I asked. From what I remembered, Sierra’s mom was actually pretty nice.
“I just told you, she’s a total bitch.” Sierra didn’t say duh but it was there in her tone. “Maybe she’s going through menopause. How should I know?”
Jodi and Nissa giggled. I had the sudden urge to drive off a cliff. Actually, what I wanted to do was stop the car, swing around, and get right into Sierra’s face. Then I’d say: At least you have a mom. At least she’s more than splinters in your palm, more than some old teapot, more than poems about to crumble into sand.
I knew better than to give Sierra that kind of ammunition.
“Maybe it was that D in Chem,” Jodi added a moment later. Then, “Ow! That hurt.”
I’d like to say we drove the rest of the way in either companionable silence or scintillating conversation. But, we didn’t. After they catalogued every junior on the synchro team (present company excluded), they started in on the seniors.
“I seriously think Kayla and Brad haven’t done it yet, and they’ve been going together for how long?” Sierra asked—us or the air, I wasn’t sure. It didn’t matter, because she kept talking. “I’m telling you, that’s not natural.”
“It’s not actually any of our business, either,” I said.
Silence crashed inside the Jeep. If not for the dirty look Nissa threw me, it would’ve been wonderful.
“Then there’s Constance,” Sierra continued, seemingly undeterred, “but there’s a reason she hasn’t done it.”
Jodi burst out laughing and even Nissa snickered.
“Oh, that’s right, you’re swimming a duet with her.” Sierra leaned forward between the front two seats. “Good luck with that.” She treated me to a blast of hot air and perfume.
Again, I found myself thinking: What. The. Hell. I glanced at Nissa and she mouthed, “I’ll tell you later.”
Great.
What was normally a ten minute drive felt like ten hours. At last we turned into the subdivision where Lukas Jakobitz lived, the sort where it was difficult to tell the McMansions apart. I leaned forward and squinted as if that would help me figure out which house was his.
Lukas hung with mostly obnoxious jocks, although he occupied a subset—obnoxious jock who was okay if you got him alone. Sadly, Lukas Jakobitz was almost never alone. He always had a crowd—of friends, fan-girls, and hangers-on working their way up the Black Earth High social strata. So naturally, his was the house surrounded by the most cars.
We crunched icy grass on our way to the back deck. A keg sat in one corner, cups on a nearby picnic table. Wingman Tim McPherson manned the spigot. Nissa dragged me toward him and certain beer while Sierra and Jodi ducked inside. Tim siphoned off a beer. Foam slopped over the rim and he licked it before handing the cup to Nissa. She giggled, batted her eyelashes, and for a moment, he clearly forgot my existence.
“You?” he said to me, sounding startled to find me standing there. He raised a plastic cup, presumably one he hadn’t licked—yet.
Ew. No thanks. I shook my head. Alcohol zapped my endurance, completely. Dad had let me try beer, and once, wine at Christmas. It took me a week to recover my stamina. How the jocks did it, I never understood. Technically, Black Earth High had a zero tolerance policy. In reality, I think most everyone regarded it as just a technicality.
“Aw, come on,” he said. “I made it myself.”
Nissa giggled again. I managed an eye roll. I tugged her across the deck, toward the kitchen door. She did this two steps forward, one step back thing, always turning to look at or say something to Tim.
“He’s a contender,” she whispered when we reached the door.
“A what?”
“For prom.”
“King?” I doubted Lukas would let someone else into his spotlight.
“Date. For prom.”
We stepped inside, the warm air clinging to my skin after the cold. In the kitchen, bags of chips and plastic soda bottles lined the counter. Two guys were concocting drinks from vodka and orange soda, but most everyone was downstairs. The bass from the music vibrated through the soles of my feet until I felt it in my jaw.
“So, you’re what?” I said. “Taking prom date applications?”
“Look, these guys would wait until the day before prom if they could. So you gotta, you know.” Here, Nissa shrugged. “Be prepared. Speaking of which, MOA road trip?”
By which she meant, me—and the Jeep—and the Mall of America.
“There’s nothing on the racks around here,” she added. “So?”
“So what?”
“You, a date, a dress.”
The beat from downstairs shifted, the relentless thump, thump, thump from the bass mellowing into an almost melody. Apparently a bunch of jocks took that as their cue to leave, because a moment later, the stairs and kitchen were filled with them and Nissa’s high-pitched giggle, her question about prom forgotten.
Lukas, still sober enough to play host, wrapped an arm around my waist and Nissa’s, then pulled us close. He wore the legendary spring break T-Shirt, an old Hanes Tee two sizes too small, which meant being treated to every pec ripple and ab flex. On the front, penned in Sharpie, were the words:
My parents went to _____ and I didn’t even get a lousy T-shirt.
Below the blank were the following:
Barbados
Aruba
The Seychelles
Costa Rica
This year’s destination appeared to be Mykonos in Greece. If the Jakobitz knew—or cared—that Lukas threw the biggest party of the year the second they entered international air space, it wasn’t clear.
“Two of my favorite girls,” Lukas said now, probably because we were the only two girls in the room.
I slipped out from under his arm and shot Nissa a look. Normally, I wouldn’t leave her alone in a room full of guys, but she sat on the kitchen counter, swinging her legs and holding court. I left her to sort out all the prom contenders and headed downstairs.
I paused at the foot of the stairs, my eyes adjusting to the reddish glow—someone had draped a cheerleader’s “spirit” bandana over a lamp—and saw Landon. He stood on the far side of the room, behind a long, floral couch that separated the high end stereo from the masses. He wore the cuffs of his oxford shirt rolled, his expression all studious, as if selecting the right kind of make-out music required his full attention.
I decided that diverting his attention was the last thing I wanted to do. And I wasn’t about to join Sierra and Jodi who stood near one of the speakers. So I played wallflower, inching my way along the paneling. I was nearly out of his line of sight when I spun and crashed into someone.
“Whoa,” Constance said. “There’s an exit if it gets that bad.” She pointed at the basement door that led out to a patio.
My mouth refused to work. My mind, on the other hand, worked overtime. Gossip from the Jeep flooded my thoughts and a stupid blush heated my cheeks.
“Man, this sucks ass. And he.” She pointed at Landon. “Isn’t helping.”
A few more jocks had migrated downstairs. One was in a heated debate with Landon about the state of the music. From where I stood, neither boy looked to be winning.
“What are you doing here?” I asked. This wasn’t her crowd; it wasn’t really mine, either. The question popped out of my mouth, but Constance didn’t appear offended.
“I promised Sam I’d chaperone ... babysit ... make sure they—” She gestured at a few freshmen swim boys huddled in a corner. “—didn’t drink more than two beers each.” She studied the boys for a moment, and one of them gave her a wave.
Sam Avery was captain of the boys’ swim team and president of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. He was one of those guys so totally unobtainable—physically, morally—that most girls in school had stopped trying. Still, he could part the rowdiest group of jocks like Moses parting the Red Sea.
“I figure this is one of those things you got to experience, just so you know it isn’t what everyone says it is.” She turned back to me. “You?”
“I own the car.”
Constance laughed. “And you’re too nice to tell Snake Eyes to fuck off.”
Snake ... Eyes? Sierra whirled around at that moment, her face pinched, her eyes dark, small, and, I realized now, close together. Yeah. Snake eyes.
“That’s mean,” I said.
“But oh, so true. Look, if she were a guy, she’d be pulling the wings off of flies. Instead, she does the symbolic equivalent to the freshmen class. And there’s nothing I hate worse than a bully. Next year on the team is going to suck if you guys don’t reel her in.”
“Thanks for that day brightener.”
“Don’t mention it.” A thoughtful look crossed her face. “I was thinking of asking Patti if I could come back as an assistant coach.”
“I thought for sure you’d swim at college.” The second the words left my mouth, Constance’s face closed off. It was such a stupid thing to say. The synchro team wasn’t a competitive team. We were good, but no way could we compete with clubs in the Twin Cities, never mind on a national level.
Except for Constance. I’d watched enough competitions to realize she could swim at that level, assuming she had unlimited resources and money. And, of course, she didn’t.
The gooey make out music cut off, leaving the basement in a strange kind of quiet. Muted footfalls echoed above our heads before a half squeal, half shriek filled the silence.
Constance wrinkled her nose like something reeked. “Looks like she found some prey.”
I turned to see Sierra and Jodi talking to Landon. Sierra brushed her nails against his bicep. My stomach lurched, then settled back down. I turned away from them to find Constance contemplating her freshmen charges, still hunched in the far corner.
“We’ve got practice tomorrow,” she said. “You need to be on.”
Without another word, Constance left me standing there. She nodded at the swim boys, who followed her from the basement like a litter of puppies. And if someone thought to bother one of them, a look from Constance had them rethinking that.
I gave the room a quick scan—Z-pattern, like Dad had taught me—but no person or group looked inviting, never mind safe. A cheerleader had commandeered the stereo and some Top 40 pop tune poured through the speakers. I caught Landon’s frown, and got caught—period.
Our eyes locked. The perturbed expression faded, replaced by something I couldn’t name. With two huge steps, he reached my side before I could escape.
“Want to go somewhere to talk?”
I stared at him. When that didn’t work, I crossed my arms over my chest and stared even harder.
“What?” he asked.
“That is such a line.”
A grin tugged at the corners of his mouth until a dimple appeared in his left cheek. Oh, I’d forgotten about that lone dimple. If Helen of Troy had a face to launch a thousand ships, Landon Scott had a dimple to break a thousand hearts. Back in grade school, I used to make him smile, all so I could run my finger along that hollow. I curled my fingers into fists to keep myself from doing it now.
“Okay,” he said. “It’s a line. What of it? I do want to talk.”
One pop tune shifted to another. Landon’s dimpled vanished and he looked like he just swallowed lukewarm beer from the keg.
“And I really don’t want to do it here,” he added. “Come on.” He reached for my hand, but at the last second, pulled back.
My legs appeared to be under Landon’s direct control, because I followed him, up the stairs, through the kitchen and past the jocks, and finally, to the Jakobitz’s living room. Only then did my legs wise up. Not even the most obnoxious jock strayed into the Jakobitz’s ultra-white living room. No one sneaked in for a quick make-out session. No one crossed the threshold, period. Except Landon, who barged in like he lived here. In truth, I’d never seen Lukas barge in like he actually lived here.
“I think this room is off limits,” I said.
“Which makes it the perfect place for talking.”
I remained at the threshold as if a velvet rope held me back. The room looked like it could be a museum diorama. Just call it: Early Twenty First Century Conspicuous Consumption.
“Please.” Landon stood by the fireplace. “It’s too cold for a walk, and I want to ask you about the Army.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “What about it?”
“Why do you want to join?”
“What makes you think I do?”
“Because no one stands outside Army recruiting for fifteen solid minutes just for the hell of it,” he said.
“What? Were you timing me?”
He raised an eyebrow. “So?”
“Why don’t you tell me something,” I said. “What’s up with you and your dad?”
His expression froze and I knew I’d hit a target, maybe even a bull’s-eye. My subconscious must have been working overtime, mulling the cryptic comment Landon made in our kitchen.
I’m pretty sure he doesn’t think much of me at all.
I didn’t know a lot about Mr. Scott. Sure, Dad complained about him. I had a vague memory of Landon’s dad on the sidelines of Little League and soccer games. And a lot of yelling. I remembered a lot of yelling from those sidelines.
Landon stood there, not moving, not talking. The choice was mine now. I could walk away, find Nissa, and go home. Or, I could talk to Landon.
I took a single step into the room.
“I know I don’t have to tell you this,” he said while I picked my way across the ice-white carpet. “But there is a war going on, two of them, last time I counted.”
“And?”
“And I’m pretty sure you’ve thought about that.”
I halted, my feet on the tile in front of the fireplace. A hint of soot hung in the air. For a room OCD as this one, a cheery fire, the promise of s’mores seemed impossible.
“Which means,” he continued when I didn’t say anything, “that you’ve probably made the connection. War.” He held out a hand. “Military.” Landon held out the other, then he clapped them together. “I don’t think you’ve missed the obvious.”
Of course I made the connection. I made the connection every damn day.
“What about you?” Landon asked, softly. “What’s up with you and your dad?”
There, in that strange living room, I found myself confessing. I could barely see Landon’s eyes, yet there was something about them, about him, that compelled the words from me—a memory of past, whispered confessions, the secrets we shared. Five years melted away and he was again the boy I could say anything to. I told him about the fight with Dad, about the ROTC brochure, about why charred curtains hung from the kitchen window.
He didn’t offer a solution, didn’t tell me everything would be okay. He did what he’d always done. He listened.
“What about you,” I said, when I ran out of words. “What about you and your father?”
“It’s nothing.”
“A whole five years of nothing? I don’t believe you.”
Here, Landon laughed, loudly, too. “Ever break someone’s heart?”
I didn’t know what to say, so I shrugged.
“Ever do it with your own?”
Now I really didn’t know what to say. In the quiet, a shadow crossed the entrance to the living room. My pulse raced. Landon merely tucked his hands into his pockets and looked serene.
“MacKenna?” Nissa sounded incredulous. “What are you—” Her gaze darted, from me, to Landon, and back again. “—doing?”
No one spoke. A rumble of voices came from the kitchen. Hip-hop music filtered through the air, and the scent of soot mixed with Nissa’s perfume.
“I want to leave,” she said, the order sharp, non-negotiable.
So did I. Confession might be good for the soul, but it made my legs tremble like I’d just run a marathon.
On the way through the kitchen, I spotted Sierra with her lacquered nails wrapped around Tim’s arm. No wonder Nissa was pissed. Right then, I decided Snake Eyes could—and probably would—find her own way home.
Landon walked us out, an arm linked with mine and one with Nissa’s. He was so tall now, lanky, almost skinny, the sort of guy a jock might push around, but it’d been all high-fives and fist bumps back in the kitchen.
No one said it was like old times. It wasn’t the start of something new. We weren’t twelve and the three of us loving each other unconditionally seemed bizarre. If anything, it was like the sad refrain of a song you could barely remember.
When we were inside the Jeep, he walked to an almost-but-not-quite vintage Corvette. I started the engine, but let the Jeep idle, and felt like I was doing the same. Nissa stared through the windshield.
“So,” she said, her voice tight, hands planted on the dash. “You and Landon.”
“We were just talking.”
“Huh.”
“About the Army.” I sighed, gave her the Cliff Notes version of Dad, ROTC, and Landon catching me outside the Army Career Center.
“Really? The Army?” she asked, her voice softer. In the dark, it was all I had to go on. I drew in a deep breath, then exhaled, gratefully. We were still friends, despite Landon, Sierra—despite everything.
“Practice is going to suck tomorrow,” Nissa said as I pulled from the subdivision.
That it would, and how. I glanced at the clock. “Today,” I corrected. “It’s going to suck today.”
Nissa groaned. “The party was probably a bad idea.”
I clamped my mouth shut. I knew it would be this kind of night. No matter when we left, these parties always ended the same way, with Nissa depressed and me tired. I didn’t have the heart to say I told you so. I just wished I could help her find what she was looking for.