His name is Rapp Robinson and he drives a maroon Trans Am,” Socko said, putting Uncle Eddie on alert. “I don’t think he’s going to come, but if he does, don’t try to do anything. Just call the cops.”
“I saw that girl sit up in the truck after you all pulled through. Wondered why she was riding back there. I get off in half an hour, but if you want I can sleep in the booth.” Uncle Eddie picked up the flashlight he always kept handy and swung it like a weapon.
Socko took a good look at the old guy and his flashlight and told him to go home after his shift. If Rapp showed up in the middle of the night, Uncle Eddie would get himself killed—or else he’d sleep right through it.
All that evening Socko prowled quietly from window to door, checking the road. Sometimes he stopped and rolled his shoulders, but his muscles stayed tight.
The General and Delia watched a couple of game shows. Junebug’s eyes were pointed toward the set, but after a little while she curled up on the sofa, her sparkly shoes on the floor.
Socko’s mother and great-grandfather quietly debated where to put the girl for the night. They had a room for Junebug, but no bed. “Leave her here on the couch,” the General said. “I’ll be close by in the recliner if anything happens.”
Socko wondered, had the General or Uncle Eddie ever noticed they were old? What would either one of them do if something actually did happen?
The next day Livvy’s mom offered them a fold out couch, which Luke and Socko horsed up the stairs. Without even opening it, Junebug stretched out and went to sleep again.
It was late afternoon by the time she wandered down the stairs. Socko and Livvy were playing cards with the General. Delia was reading an old magazine, enjoying the luxury of two days off between jobs.
“Hi.” Junebug stood in the door, her thin arms wrapped around herself.
“Cuppa coffee?” the General asked, laying down his cards.
Junebug nodded.
Socko was surprised when his great-grandfather made the coffee himself. He wasn’t Mother Teresa yet, but he sure was headed that way.
As the General handed her the cup, Junebug’s eyes seemed to focus for the first time. They were fixed on the hand holding the cup. “How do you do you even zip your fly with those long nails?”
“How is that any business of yours?” he shot back. “Actually I do almost everything with great difficulty,” he admitted. “But I got too much arthritis in my hands to cut ’em myself, so I’m kind of stuck.”
“You should’ve told me!” said Delia. “I got scissors.” Socko and his mother had never thought the General might need help with cutting his nails or anything else. They’d taken his orneriness as an order to leave him alone.
“Scissors! I can do better than that.” Junebug disappeared into the living room where her fat purse sat on the end of the couch. She returned with a small plastic case and a piece of paper. “I’m a certified nurse’s aide.” She presented the General with the paper and unzipped the case with a flourish.
“I’m sure you are,” he said, offering her his hand.
After Junebug had cut, buffed, and filed his nails, the old man admired them for a moment. Then he zeroed in on her with his good eye. “You want a real challenge?”
“Feet?” she asked.
“You know it, sister!”
“Sure thing, but first I better let my aunt know I’m okay. Delia, can I borrow your emergency phone? My cell’s gone. I took everything out of my bag, but it wasn’t in there.”
Socko remembered the contents of Junebug’s purse scattered on the asphalt behind the Phat. Livvy must have missed the phone in her hurry to pick everything up and get out of there.
“It’s been two days,” said Livvy. She and Socko were in the back of the truck, heading toward the day’s planting site.
“I know,” said Socko. But something was still bothering him. Despite being a Tarantula, Damien hadn’t ratted him out when he left with Junebug. Damien was still more loyal to him than he was to Rapp—and all Socko could do in return was go back to planting with Livvy and Luke?
He tried to come up with something as he dug holes. He’d told Damien he’d have his back, but so far Damien had covered for him every time.
It was late afternoon, and the sun was beating down by the time Socko walked over to the guard booth. “See anything?” he asked Uncle Eddie.
“Nope. No desperadoes, hoodlums, horse thieves, racketeers, mobsters, or malefactors. Not even a stray dog.” The old man sounded disappointed. “You think we’re in the clear?”
“I guess.”
Uncle Eddie gazed at the empty road that ran in front of the subdivision. “I’m thinking about bumping the threat level down from orange to green.”
“What does green mean?”
“Low probability of a terrorist attack.”
“I don’t know … you might wait another day or two.”
“Okey dokey.”
“See ya, Uncle Eddie.”
Socko walked along, watching his feet and thinking thoughts that went about as far as a hamster running in its wheel.
“Hey! Pool’s full!” When he looked up, Livvy was striding toward him wearing a polka-dot two-piece swimsuit.
He avoided looking at her white stomach with its frowny belly button, concentrating instead on her weird tan. Like his, her pale skin turned bright pink in the sun. Her burn started and stopped so abruptly it was like she was still wearing her shirt and shorts. He pointed to the flexible foam logs resting on her shoulders. “What’re those?”
“Pool noodles.” She tossed him the purple one. “Want to stop at your house and change into your swimsuit?”
Socko didn’t have one. “Why waste time? I can swim in my shorts.”
Livvy dipped a toe into water that was pink with the sunset. “Nice!” The pool noodle she tossed in landed with a splash.
Socko threw his in too and shucked his T-shirt. Livvy stared at his pale chest a moment, then looked away. “Let’s jump on three!” she said as he draped his shirt on one of the bushes he and Luke had planted.
Embarrassed by his own exposed skin, he launched before she’d even said “one.” The water was cool but not cold. His feet touched bottom. He opened his eyes in response to the explosion of Livvy hitting the water. Slowed by the water, she drifted down, her eyes open too. Her hair, tinted orange, swirled around her face like flames, and silvery bubbles escaped from the corners of her mouth. Together, they popped to the surface.
“Ohmygosh! This is so great!” Livvy slicked back her wet hair with both hands, then paddled lazily toward the yellow pool noodle. She hung her arms over it.
He fanned his own arms in big circles and tried to act cool. Was she his girlfriend?
“There’s that thing at the school tomorrow, the open house?” she said. “You think your mom could take us?”
“She starts her new job tomorrow.”
She frowned. “My parents can’t take us either. They’re meeting with the guy who wants to buy those houses on Orbit Lane.” The deal was being offered by another builder, one who was buying distressed properties at bargain prices, then finishing the houses and selling them at a profit. Livvy had told Socko that her parents didn’t like the idea, but that the sale of six houses would make the partners happy. “Maybe Junebug can drive us.”
“Or we could give it a pass.” School would start soon enough.
He rolled onto his back and hung still in the water, listening to the hum of the pool pump, smelling the chlorine. For a second he imagined he was on the roof with Damien, but it felt faint and faraway. He was in a swimming pool with a girl. He was wondering what it would be like to kiss a girl in a pool when a wave surged over his face. He stood up, choking, chlorine burning his nose. “Why’d ya do that?”
“To get your attention?”
He vaguely remembered some blugga-blubba sounds coming through the water. “Did you have to get my attention by drowning me?”
“Sorry.” She stood up too. A water droplet dangled from each earlobe. “What do you think our new school will be like?”
“I dunno.” His old school had been as dead and decayed as the president it was named after. According to Livvy the new school was almost as new as the houses in Moon Ridge Estates. How was he supposed to know what that would be like?
“Come on, Socko, predict.”
“I predict … rubber pizza in the cafeteria.”
She twisted her wet hair with one hand and pressed it against the back of her head. The water held it in place. “What do you think will happen the first day?”
“We’ll write what we did on our summer vacation.” His first day last school year, Socko had written about exploring the North Pole. He’d read a book about it over the summer while sweating in their apartment. The assignment was dumb anyway. No one at GC did anything on their summer vacation.
“Last summer I went to Switzerland,” Livvy said. She scooped up water in both hands and watched it slip away between her fingers.
“And this summer you’re saving Moon Ridge Estates.”
“And Junebug.” She dove under the darkening water and then came back up. “And Luke and his family. You can write about that too—unless we’re in the same English class. Then I call it.”
She’d forgotten he’d be in seventh, she’d be in eighth, and even if they were in the same grade, she’d be in the smart class. He’d be in the one where kids killed time sharpening pencils.
But even if by some fluke they were in the same class, he’d still write about it. He already had a title picked out: My Summer on the Moon.
“It’s all good,” Delia had said that morning. “Rapp is history and tomorrow I start a new job!”
But even if they never saw Rapp again and her new job was great, it wasn’t all good—it was just different. A lot had happened since he and Damien had busted the Hurtler celebrating the start of summer vacation.
Like meeting Livvy.
He thought again about kissing a girl in a pool, but Livvy was climbing out.