Aftershocks (2 page)

“Yeah, I talked to him this morning,” Wyatt said, as he opened the door to his room. I could hear the TV in the background.

His roommate Chris seemed to be a little agoraphobic. He was always home, the TV was always on, and he hadn’t realy made any friends at school. Wyatt was trying to be nice about him since he knew first-hand what it felt like to be scrutinized for being different, but he hadn’t made much headway. Chris didn’t realy seem interested in human interaction.

“Chris, would you mind turning the volume down just a little?”

I heard the volume on the TV drop considerably but never heard Chris respond. I couldn’t imagine sharing my space with such a weirdo, and from what I gathered, Wyatt’s dorm room wasn’t very big. I was glad I wouldn’t have to suffer through the on-campus living experience. Wyatt and I already had plans to get an apartment off-campus the folowing year when I joined him at Michigan.

“Just cal Jack, Abby,” Wyatt said then, and I knew what their conversation had entailed. Jack had no doubt regaled Wyatt with his tales from the bedroom. “He needs a friend.”

“He has friends,” I said snarkily. “They’re named Sara and Amanda and Taryn – at least those were they were his friends last weekend. Maybe he’s moved on since then. You tel me.”

“He’s upset over Kerry. This is his way of dealing with it. Don’t hold it against him.”

Grrr.
As much as I loved Wyatt, he realy had a way of pounding things into the ground, especialy when he knew he was right.

“Fine,” I said, through gritted teeth. “I’l think about it.”

I knew Wyatt was smiling. “Thank you.”

“Dinner’s ready, squirt,” my brother Aaron caled up to me a few hours later, puling me out of the book I’d started reading after I’d hung up with Wyatt so he could finish the studying he hadn’t gotten done at the library.

It wasn’t until I looked out the window of my tree house that I realized the sun was setting. It seemed my family had left me alone al afternoon, but now it was time to rejoin the world of the living. My parents understood how hard it was for me to be separated from Wyatt, so they’d given me a wide berth to do my own thing since he’d been gone, but they stil expected me to be at dinner. Dinnertime was family time when we were al together.

Wyatt loved our family dinners. He came from a family who ate in front of the TV and didn’t speak to each other, so to be asked about his day by someone who realy wanted to know thriled him. I honestly think he had been so grateful that my parents took him in that he would have done anything to please them, but even before he lived with us he used to love coming over to our house for dinner.

“I’l be down in a minute,” I caled back. “And don’t cal me squirt.”

“Okay, squirt,” Aaron said, and I could tel he was grinning.

I roled my eyes but smiled to myself. I hated that nickname. Aaron had caled me that since I was little. I’d been realy short for my age for years until I had a growth spurt in ninth grade and shot up to 5’8”. Unfortunately, by that point, the name had stuck.

But even though I hated when he caled me that, I also knew I’d miss it in a few days when he went back to school. He was a sophomore at the University of South Carolina, so I didn’t see him very much during the year. My parents hated that he’d gone so far away to school, but he’d gotten a ful scholarship and an offer to play Division 1 basketbal, so at the end of the day, they hadn’t fought his decision to go out of state.

I honestly think my dad was more concerned about his son going to colege in the south than he was him being a plane ride away. He had deep-rooted fears that Aaron would fal in love with a southern girl, become a Braves fan and register Republican which would continue to haunt him until Aaron was back in Massachusetts ful-time.

These concerns were exacerbated when Aaron came home for Thanksgiving his first year of school and dropped ya’l into the conversation at dinner. I thought my dad was literaly going to fal out of his chair. Aaron hadn’t even realized what he’d done at the time.

He’d looked perplexed as my dad started choking in the middle of Aaron’s story about how we had to come down to see him start against Kentucky in a few weeks. Wyatt and I had burst out laughing, unable to control our laughter, as my mother hit my father on the back repeatedly while teling Aaron we’d definitely be down to see him play.

After dinner when Aaron, Wyatt and I were in his room playing
Call of Duty
on his Xbox, he asked me what had happened, and I had to explain why we’d almost had to pick Dad off the floor, to which Aaron laughed uproariously, fel over sideways and dropped his controler on the carpet. When he recovered, he told me roommate was from a smal town in Tennessee and had a realy thick southern accent. It seemed Aaron had picked up some of his vernacular. From that point forward, though, he would strategicaly drop in southern terminology whenever he was around my father just to freak him out which was hilarious since I knew he was doing it.

As I heard Aaron walk back to the house, I put my book down, spine up and sat up from where I was laying. Although the tree house had been Aaron’s when he was little, it had realy become more of a hangout for Wyatt and me over the past year. I continued to retreat there daily after Wyatt had left.

“Come on, Jordan. You gotta catch that. It was an easy pass. Get your hands ready while you run, and glance back for the bal so you can gauge the distance.”

My ears perked up at the voice coming from the yard behind me. I turned around and peeked surreptitiously out the back window of the tree house which was open to let the fresh air in. From my vantage point I could see Connor Richmond and his brother, Jordan, tossing a footbal around their backyard.

The Richmonds had moved a few days after Wyatt had left for school. I’d never officialy met Connor, but I’d been paying attention to him ever since I’d noticed him that first night. I had been sulking in my tree house, missing Wyatt and wishing he’d waited until August to start school like most people, when I heard someone shouting. Puling myself out of my personal angst, I’d looked out the window and saw a guy around my age with dark curly hair yeling into his cel phone as he paced around his backyard. After a few minutes of listening, and shaking his head at the person on the other end of the line, he hung up without saying goodbye and sank down to the bottom step of his back porch and dropped his head into his hands.

I’m not sure what it was about him, but I was instantly intrigued. I watched him for a few minutes wondering who he was and why he looked so distraught. Maybe he seemed like a kindred spirit in that moment since I was feeling so low or maybe I just thought he was cute.

Either way, I couldn’t take my eyes off of him.

A younger boy, who I could only assume was his brother since they looked so similar, came out a few minutes later. Sitting next to him, I’d watched Connor’s mood suddenly change. He shook off his frustration, smiled widely, put his brother in a headlock and laughed with him. I was amazed at how quickly he’d gone from sulen and frustrated to light-hearted and cheerful and wondered if it was for the younger boy’s benefit.

Over the next few weeks, when I was up in my tree house after dinner, I would see the two boys in their backyard playing footbal. I enjoyed the dynamic between them and would find myself watching them, taking in Connor’s patience, even when Jordan got visibly frustrated when he couldn’t master one of the drils they were working on.

I felt bad for them both because they were new in town and had moved after the school year had ended, so it wasn’t like they had much of a chance to make friends. I knew the polite thing to do would be to introduce myself to them – it’s what my parents would have expected – but I didn’t want Connor to know that I knew who he was. What would he say if he knew I’d been covertly watching him for weeks from my backyard? He would think I was a creep or a stalker. There was no way I was going to just walk over and say helo to him, so I continued to watch him from afar, imagining what I would say if I ever got the opportunity to talk to him.

Then the first time I actualy came face-to-face with Connor I wasn’t expecting to see him, so of course my wit eluded me. He came into The South Shore Surf Company where I worked one afternoon in early August. He was with Rich Crowley and Cameron Baker, two guys I couldn’t stand. They were footbal players who dated cheerleaders and were basicaly jerks. They were also the last two guys I expected Connor to be friends with when I’d been imagining his personality and picturing his life. He seemed like such a nice guy.

My friend Nicky, who I’d become close with when we started working together at the beginning of the summer, helped them pick out a surfboard as I sat behind the counter pondering how he’d falen in with those guys. When Connor broke away from Rich and Cameron to look at some boardshorts at the front of the shop, I found myself staring at him. He ran a hand through his longish curly black hair, and as he walked around the rack I realized I was ogling his tan, toned calves. He ran his hand absentmindedly over the rack but didn’t pick anything up.

“Those are on sale right now,” I caled out, not realizing what I was doing until I heard my voice out loud. I felt my face turn bright red as soon as the words were out of my mouth. That definitely wasn’t the briliant prose I’d dreamed I’d say the first time I got the opportunity to speak to Connor Richmond.

He looked up at me in confusion, and it was then that I noticed how clear his hazel his eyes were. “What’s that?”

I smiled in an attempt to mask my humiliation. “The boardshorts. They’re on sale this week – thirty percent off.”

“Oh, okay. Thanks,” Connor said, and I wanted to sink into the floor.

“Yo, Connor,” Rich caled then, puling Connor’s attention across the shop to where Nicky stood with her arms crossed impatiently in front of her.

I watched Connor cross the room and engage in a dialogue with Rich about which surfboard he should purchase while Nicky tapped her foot. She had very little patience for indecisive people, and the fact that the indecisive person keeping her from gossiping with me behind the front counter was a guy she’d dated for a minute two years earlier who never caled her after the night they hooked up at a party was making her mood turn from sour to downright bitchy.

I’m sure she felt like being rude was a great way to exact revenge on Rich for ignoring her after she’d let him see her topless, but it didn’t seem to be having any effect on him. In fact, I was pretty sure he couldn’t have told me who she was had she not been wearing the smal plastic surfboard around her neck with her name on it in block letters. Even then, I was quite certain he wouldn’t remember their long ago tryst at Lucy Bishop’s sweet sixteen party.

I watched the guys debate the merits of one board versus another, as Nicky sighed loudly and blew her blond bangs skyward. Finaly, Rich chose the board he wanted. Nicky snatched it from his hands and marched up to me at the front counter. Cameron snickered and mumbled something to Rich that made him laugh, and I was sure it was at my friend’s expense. Like I said, they were jerks.

“Abby, can you ring these guys up please?” Nicky asked sweetly, intentionaly not using their names. I knew it was her way of teling me she was done with them.

She knew I wasn’t a big fan of them either, but she also knew I would be polite. I’d actualy been part of the same crowd as Rich and Cameron for my first two years of high school, but we didn’t talk anymore. The year before I’d had a faling out with Alexis Blaine, their favorite cheerleader and my former best friend, after she started a bunch of rumors about me and outed Wyatt to the whole school.

Rich and Cameron had sided with her which didn’t bother me al that much since they were never my favorite guys to begin with, but then they had jumped on the ‘let’s make fun of Wyatt for being gay’ bandwagon, and I sort of started hating them after that. Now we al just pretended we didn’t know each other.

“Sure,” I said, putting aside the Roxy catalogue I was perusing and hopped off my stool. Nicky was already halfway to the backroom, shaking her head as she went. I knew I’d be getting an earful from her as soon as the guys were gone.

Very few words were exchanged as I rung up Rich’s surfboard and he paid with his father’s credit card. Connor hung back, looking at a display of hemp necklaces. He picked one up and turned it over in his hands a few times before walking up to the counter. I’d just given Rich his receipt when Connor laid the necklace on the counter.

“I’l take this,” he said. Rich and Cameron signaled that they’d meet him outside, and he just nodded in acknowledgement. “It’s for my brother. Do you think he’l like it? He’s thirteen.”

My heart started pounding in my chest. Connor was actualy engaging me in conversation, and he wanted my opinion.

“Sure, I think it’s great,” I said, giving him a smal smile, thankful I could get the words out.

Connor smiled widely at me which completely caught me off-guard. It lit up his whole face. After that I prayed he wouldn’t ask me anything else since I was pretty sure I wouldn’t be able to form words if he did. I just rung up his necklace, bagged it and told him his total.

He handed me a twenty, I gave him his change and he was out the door. As soon as it closed behind him, I let out a huge breath I hadn’t known I was holding.

“Abby! Dinner!” my dad caled, puling me back to the present.

I didn’t know how many minutes had passed since my brother had told me dinner was ready. I’d been mesmerized as I watched Connor and Jordan throw the footbal around, Connor coaching Jordan, and Jordan getting frustrated along the way. I stole one last glance at the brothers before scrambling down the ladder and running across the yard.

“Sorry Dad,” I said, sliding into my seat at the kitchen table across from Aaron. To my left my mom was spooning mashed potatoes onto her plate.

“So, squirt,” Aaron asked, as I took the potatoes from my mom and narrowed my eyes at him. “You gonna come visit me at school this year?”