Giftchild (11 page)

Dad put a hand on the back of my chair. "I was a sixteen-year-old boy once, too, and you know what your mom's experience was like."

I did. And I knew Dad was just trying to protect me, but the idea that Rodney was someone I might need protecting
from
made me even more nervous about the leap we'd taken. He'd never hurt me intentionally. But people in relationships hurt each other unintentionally all the time, didn't they?

Like
I'd
done to
him
. I sank back into my chair. "I get it."

Dad nodded. "You're a good kid. I know you'll be smart."

As he headed back toward the kitchen, I rested my forehead on the desk. Dad trusted me. Rodney had, too.

I was totally going to hell.

I spent Sunday with my phone ringer turned all the way up, trying not to check it obsessively. I should have gone to Athena's, because homework and photo editing were not enough to distract me from staring at it, willing it to ring. But Rodney didn't text, and he didn't call.

I made it to the afternoon before I broke down and texted him.

Busy?

He responded immediately.
Ish. What's up?

I was thinking about dragging my boyfriend to a movie.
Could I call him that? I deleted and retyped the word "boyfriend" twice before hitting send.

When the phone vibrated, I squinted at it through one eye.

Hope you two have fun.

I couldn't help but smile. I set my phone down and counted as the seconds ticked by. Slowly.

A minute passed. Two. Three.

My knee bounced up and down. Was he really going to blow me off like that? I picked my phone back up, and began to type my comeback when he finally texted again.

Pick you up at six?

I breathed a sigh of relief and answered:
You'll make my boyfriend jealous.

I'll try.

My pulse picked up, and I flopped back onto my bed. It's okay, I told myself. The awkwardness was probably all in my head.

Be cool.

I spent the hour before Rodney showed up flattening my hair, so it hung long and sleek down my back. I put on makeup I didn't usually wear—mascara and eyeliner and lip liner, too. I wore a pair of skinny jeans with no-nonsense boots and a loose, flowing shirt with chiffon sleeves floating down to my wrists.

When I came down the stairs to wait for Rodney, Mom and Dad were both sitting at the kitchen table, bills and budget sheets spread out before them.

"Careful," I said. "Don't overdo the fun."

Dad looked up at me over his reading glasses. "Going out?"

"Yeah," I said. "Rodney's picking me up. And we're going to a movie. In a public place, see?"

Both Mom and Dad smiled, and I tried to return it. I was a good daughter. I
was
.

When I caught sight of myself in the entryway mirror, I wondered if they'd both been laughing at me. I'd overdone it, big time. I'd never dressed up to see Rodney before. But some things should be different now, shouldn't they? Why couldn't this be one of them?

I jumped when Rodney knocked on the door. He opened it right away, like he always did when he was expected. He stepped inside wearing a plain white t-shirt and jeans. The only thing different about him was the way he looked at me, staggering slightly as he took in my face, then letting his eyes travel the length of my body.

I'd been checked out before, of course, and it usually made me want to hug my chest and hide. But today my pulse quickened, my body soaking up heat, not from embarrassment, but from the sheer thrill of being
wanted
.

"Hey," he said.

"Hey," I said back. And we both shifted, like we'd suddenly forgotten what to do with our hands.

I turned to the coat closet to get my jacket—mostly for something to hold—and I caught Dad leaning around the corner and watching us. "Goodbye," I shouted.

"Have fun!" Dad yelled back.

"And be safe!" Mom called.

But I couldn't help but think that if Rodney and I got in a car wreck, I wouldn't have to explain any of this to them. Ever.

We walked to the car, and Rodney unlocked my door and held it open. And then he stood there long enough for me to climb all the way in, so he could close it for me as well. I settled into my seat, like I had a hundred times in Rodney's car. But this time felt surreal. This was really happening. Rodney and I were really together. And, just like I'd always thought it would, that fact gave me so much more to lose.

Rodney climbed into the car beside me and started the engine. And in addition to not knowing how to dress, I also didn't know what to say. "What movie do you want to see?" I asked.

Rodney shrugged and looked over his shoulder, backing the car out of the driveway. "I thought you were the one with the plan."

I hadn't even checked the showings. "Sorry. I hope I didn't interrupt anything important."

"Eh," he said. "Nothing big."

Nothing big? He couldn't see me at all this weekend for
nothing big
? "You didn't have plans with your family?"

He shrugged again. "My dad's showing a big old house in San Jose. He let me go with him yesterday to take pictures."

"Really?" Rodney's dad never did that—he thought photography was a waste of time. It was no secret that he didn't think Rodney was ambitious enough.

"Yeah," Rodney said. "I think his normal photographer was out of town, and he needed some shots in a hurry."

That was the irony with his dad; he'd employ photographers, but still thought going into photography would make Rodney unemployable. The part that really ticked me off was that Rodney believed him. "That's great," I said. I stared at the dash, trying not to add the obvious:
You didn't invite me?
Finally, I settled for, "Get anything good?"

Rodney wobbled a hand. "I'll upload them. You can tell me."

An uneasy silence settled between us, and for once, Rodney didn't call me on it. I was grateful I'd suggested a movie and not dinner. The less talking required, the better.

When we got to the theater, though, Rodney grabbed my hand, and we walked up to the box office with our forearms touching from elbow to wrist. My skin hummed against his, but it wasn't enough. As we looked up at the marquee, I stepped in front of Rodney and pulled his arms around me, so he held me from behind. I could feel his heart beating against my back, pounding out a steady rhythm, and I wished I could align my nerves to that beat.

We found a six-thirty showing of a disaster movie. The theater was all but empty, and I pulled Rodney up the stairs to the very back row. At that moment, I didn't care about the movie, only about the heat of Rodney's arm against mine.

When we reached our seats, Rodney pulled up the armrest so I could squeeze up against him, but even the thin layers of his shirt and mine felt like too much between us. So I shifted up into his lap with my feet resting on my own seat, took his face in my hands, and kissed him.

He kissed me back fiercely, like he hadn't seen me in months. By the time the previews started, Rodney already had his mouth on my neck, and the last thing in the world I wanted to do was pull away.

We barely watched the movie. We flipped up the armrests and lay down across the empty row, hands up under each other's shirts, heat burning so intensely I was honestly surprised when the seats didn't go up in flames around us.

After the movie, Rodney parked in my driveway and kissed me long and deep, like he didn't want to let go any more than I did. In all the times we'd made out before, I'd never been so aware of him, of the slight dampness behind his ears, of the subtle way his back arched when I kissed his neck.

My parents could have been watching us from the window. The living room was dark, so there was no way for me to know. I put my hand on the car door handle, but the idea of retreating alone into my dark room was unbearable. I ran my fingertips over Rodney's forearm, raising goose bumps. "Come in," I said. "Go park the car around the corner, and meet me at my window."

Rodney bit his lip, meeting my eyes. His body swayed toward me even as his fingers tightened on the gear shift. "Are you sure?" he asked.

I didn't want to think twice. I slipped my nails under the collar of his shirt, and Rodney groaned.

There was no way I was letting him go. "See you inside," I said. And I climbed out of the car and shut the door.

I stood on the doorstep while Rodney drove away, and then ducked inside. Mom and Dad had already gone up to their room; they had the door open and the TV on. I breathed slow and steady for a while, to make sure I could be calm before I passed by.

"Goodnight," I called.

"How was the movie?" Mom asked.

"Lame," I said. "I'm exhausted, so I'm going to bed."

"Night," Dad called. And they both turned back to the television.

I was glad for it, because the noise would cover the sound of me locking my door and opening the window. I stood in my room with the pane pushed aside, breath steaming into the night air, waiting in the dark.

Rodney appeared on the roof a few minutes later, and eased himself over the windowsill. He had his hands on me before he was even all the way in the room. When his feet hit the floor, he whispered in my ear: "Are you sure I should be here?"

I slid my tongue up the outside of his ear. "Yes," I said.

He pulled off his jacket, and we sank onto my bed. Rodney barely took his mouth off mine, except to pull both our shirts off over our heads. The rushing of my ears drowned out the sound of my parents' TV down the hall.

The weight of him on top of me sent shivers over my body. As I ran my fingers around the waistband of his jeans, reaching for his zipper, Rodney fished something out of his pocket—a square, shiny wrapper.

The room spun. I'd lied to him about the birth control.

And he
knew
.

I floated, suspended in time. But instead of confronting me, Rodney drew close. His teeth grazed my shoulder. I breathed him in and let the tide roll me under until we landed, beached and breathless, on the shore.

When Rodney left, he looked like I felt, shadows pooling in the hollows of his eyes. The cold air that swept in after him chilled my sheets, and I curled up on my pillow, clinging to the last traces of warmth where he had been. I knotted my fingers up in my pillow until they cramped, squeezed my eyes shut, and begged for sleep.

But the empty darkness rang in my ears well into the night.

I woke up in the morning to a text message—Rodney had a chess game. Could I get a ride from my mom?

I dropped the phone over the side of the bed and crunched down under my covers. What was wrong with me? Rodney often played chess in the mornings. It wasn't like it meant anything.

But when I got to school that morning, there was no rose in my locker.

Chapter Nine

Weeks Three through Five

Rodney's chess games went on, mornings, lunches, afternoons. The district chess tournament was three weeks away. Usually Rodney didn't even mention it until the week before, but this year he couldn't get enough practice. Rodney buried himself in his game, and I buried myself in our photos, and I wondered if either of us would see the light of day again.

When we ran into each other at my locker, or in the halls, Rodney would take my hand, brush my hair behind my ears, and kiss me on the cheek. It was sweet in an aching kind of way, but he didn't make any effort to get me alone, or to go further. And I didn't push him either. Since our night together, a hollow pit gaped in my chest, and whenever Rodney touched me, it seemed to bore deeper.

It was my fault, of course, not only for lying, but for the hanging uncertainty. I could be pregnant, even now, and every cramp, every twinge, every uneasiness in my stomach made me hold my breath. The day before my period I could take the test. And once I knew I wasn't pregnant, Rodney and I could figure out our relationship with no doubts hanging between us.

My mother still wouldn't have a baby, of course. But Rodney was my boyfriend now, and he'd already said no. I hadn't waited this long to be with him just to screw that up.

Days passed. Rodney texted me in the morning about his chess opponents, and in the evening about the editing work I'd done. But when we were together, I'd catch him looking at me out of the corner of his eyes, like he, too, was holding his breath.

A week later, Mom came into Dad's office while I was sitting at his desk, working on one of the pictures Rodney had taken of the house his dad was showing. It was an old Victorian, and Rodney had dumped the whole set of shots into our folder, including the boring, full-room shots he'd taken for his dad's work. Rodney must have carted a step ladder from room to room, because the angles in the photos made the house look roomy—something Victorians rarely were.

The second half of the photo set told a different story. The series of art photos showed doorways cut in half, banisters with grooves worn in the paint, the dirty corner of a window with a single, star-shaped chip in the glass. Rodney had taken shots from the bottom of the stairs, focused on the worn dips in the wood where feet had bent them down from decade upon decade of trodding.

I had one of the stairway photos pulled into my editor, and played with the levels, trying to keep the photo bright without the light from the top of the stairs pulling the center of interest off balance.

"Where is that?" Mom asked.

"It's a house Rodney's dad is showing," I said. "He went without me."

Mom looked pensive. "I haven't seen Rodney around the last few days."

I waved a hand dismissively. "He's got a chess tournament coming up."

"So it's not because of what your dad said?"

I looked over at Mom. She hadn't been there when Dad talked to me, so they'd obviously had a conversation about it when I wasn't around. Perhaps several. "No," I said. "It's got nothing to do with that."

"Good," Mom said. "Your dad was worried."