Lurlene McDaniel (10 page)

The den is off the foyer, close to the front doors. “Here,” Mrs. Palmer says, indicating a place near a bay window. “He told me to have you place it here.”

We do as we're told. “Now for the top,” Mark says. “I'll bolt it in place.”

“Whatever,” she says.

I glance at her from the corner of my eye. She's
a pretty woman, blond like Quin, but her eyes look dull. Not vacant like Analise's eyes, but not full of energy either.

We place the top on the desk and Mark crawls underneath with his cordless drill and bolts it into place. In the room's light, the mahogany surface gleams. I've brushed on seven coats of satin varnish and sanded with extra-fine paper between applications. I can almost see my reflection.

Mark's finishing up when the front door opens and Quin and some girl walk in. Quin sticks his head into the den. “Hey, Mom. What's up?”

“Your dad's new desk,” she says.

Quin takes the girl's arm and they come into the den. “Let me see.”

I stand aside. I've seen the girl before at school, but I don't know her name. She glances at me, looks nervous, glances away. I wonder what her problem is.

“Sweet,” Quin says over the desk. He looks at me. “You do this?”

“I just helped.”

The girl is jumpy and acts like she wants to bolt. Maybe it's hard for her to be around common people.

Mark takes a final swipe with a clean rag over the top of the desk. “I guess that's it.”

“Spence will be in touch,” Quin's mother says.

We go to the door and I take one final look at the room, the desk and the people. Quin and his mother are talking, but the girl is looking straight at me. Her eyes are wide. She looks for all the world as if she's seeing a ghost.

“That's
my Christmas present? A new car?”

Mom's hot, madder than I've seen her in a long time, and she's yelling at Dad. A great way to start off Christmas morning.

“Is this how you say thank you, Carla?”

“You bought me a new car for my birthday in June. I've hardly driven it. The tires aren't even dirty. I don't want a new car!” She tosses the keys to her brand-new Lexus onto the floor.

“You'll like this one too. Stop complaining.”

Dad's face looks red, and veins are bulging in his neck. I sit on the sofa, a box with a new sweater open in my lap.
Forget I'm here,
I think.

“What was wrong with my SUV?” Mom yells.

“Did you forget? It was in an accident.”

Uh-oh.
My fault. I glare at my father.

“It was a fender,” Mom says slowly, deliberately. “You had it replaced. Good as new.”

“The car took a wallop and it could have developed problems in the long term.”

“Well, why not wait until then?”

I tune them out and feel a prickle of cold sweat along my upper lip. Dad couldn't know about my accident. Not the version Laurie claims is true. Just because Analise and I were in the same vicinity at the same time doesn't mean I hit her. I swallow hard. If I wasn't afraid it might be true, then I wouldn't have let Laurie take over my life, now, would I? I already hate being involved with her. We've been together every night since school let out, and neither of us has had a good time. She's uptight and bitchy. If I try to touch her, she pushes me away.

I say, “Look, you owe me certain rights if you're going to be my girl.”

She says, “I owe you nothing. Keep your hands to yourself.”

I hate thinking about school starting up again in January and her playing my girlfriend. But I don't know how to get out of it.

The slamming of a door brings me back into the present, to Christmas morning at the Palmer house. Dad's gone; Mom is steaming. I get up, pick
the keys up off the floor. “Hey, I'll trade you for my Mustang.”

She half laughs. “I guess it does seem stupid, doesn't it? How many women wouldn't love a new car for Christmas?”

“Sounds like it's the giver, not the gift,” I say.

She comes over for a hug. “I would rather he'd gotten me something I wanted.”

“What do you want?”

She pulls away. “I don't want
things,
Quin. It's never about
things.”

I don't get it, but she doesn't need to hear that. “He's a dictator.”

“I know it seems that way.” Mom goes to the Christmas tree, repositions an ornament.

It burns me that she reverts to defensive mode toward him. I already know how he takes control and ruins people's lives. “What would you call him?”

“Spence is a powerful man.” She adjusts another ornament. “And powerful men are used to getting their way. He isn't petty, just focused. I was attracted to that once. The power. Now”—she heads for the kitchen—”not so much.”

I'm left alone. The tree lights blink. Needles have already begun to fall on the carpet and the perfectly wrapped presents, most still unopened
beneath the tree. What I think is that the SUV is gone. The one possible physical link between me and a hit-and-run accident.

And I also wonder if dumping the Caddy was just my father's way of taking out insurance because he doesn't trust me. And hasn't since I was fourteen.

“I'm telling you, Judie, it was freaky. Here I am standing in Quin's house looking right at Analise's boyfriend. I didn't expect that!”

Judie has just returned from visiting her grandparents in Florida and we're in my room on New Year's Eve, watching TV, waiting for the ball to drop in Times Square. Mom's gone to bed and this is our first chance to talk.

Judie rolls her eyes. “I hope you didn't get that deer-caught-in-the-headlights expression on your face.”

“It
rattled
me,” I say.

“Because you feel guilty. But you can't let guilt ruin your show.”

“Don't psychoanalyze me. I was the one in the car with Quin. Now I know we hit that girl.”

“ ‘We’?” She looks puzzled. “Quin was driving. Where's the ‘we’ in that? What are you thinking?”

She just doesn't get it. “All I'm telling you is I got a case of the nerves when I saw Jeremy at Quin's house. That's all.”

The holidays have been a big boring disappointment for me. Mostly because Mom's been working, Judie's been gone and my dad didn't come like he'd promised. At the last minute, an assignment came up and his editor pressured him to take it, so he did. Mom blew off his no-show, but I really missed seeing him. “I'll come over spring break,” he said. “Promise.”

Judie asks, “So when does your hotshot boyfriend get back from his family ski trip?”

“Tomorrow.”

“And school's on again in two days. So tell me how bad you feel once you start walking down the halls by Quin's side. Once you're the girl of the moment. The one he can't drop. And once baseball season starts, let me know how freaky it is being Quin Palmer's girlfriend then.”

I screw up my courage and ask, “Why are you doing this? Why are you helping me get Quin Palmer? We've been friends a long time, but this is hard to understand, Judy. Why?”

“Because I can.” Her flip answer doesn't match the look in her eyes, which is solemn.

“Okay. I must ask you. Tell me what do
you
get from this? What do
you
want?”

“I want to be tall, thin, blond and pretty like you. I've always wanted that. I think that's not news to you.” The old smart-aleck Judie returns.

I smile. “What else? Be serious.”

“I don't like that crowd you want to run with, Laurie. Actually, I'm not blaming you. They think they're so cool. So perfect. I'll never get in— especially because of my looks. But you can. I like knowing that between us we can make them jump through our hoops.”

“So you see it as being a puppet master?”

“Something like that. Think of it as a real-life Xbox game.” She grins. “I like pushing buttons. Not yours, of course. Quin and his type will never notice me or care about me, but I have the satistaction of knowing I can make his life miserable. I get secret pleasure out of that. It's a fun sensation even if it is our secret. Don't call me crazy either.”

When Quin and I walk into the commons on January second, every head turns in our direction. Some of the kids begin to whisper to one another, and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that some are betting on how long Quin and I will
last. I hold the trump card that no one knows about: He won't be dropping me until I say so.

The feeling is delicious, almost sweet. I am startled at how happy it makes me feel. I think of how my mother is not on my back so much and how I've taken control instead of feeling weak and insignificant. Well, I can't deny to myself that I feel just a trace of bitterness because I know how I got here. I shove it out of my mind, move closer to Quin's side, take his hand. I can be tough, why not? He doesn't let go either, but I can feel by his grip that he doesn't like it.
So what?
I am capable of dealing with more than I have ever imagined.

When the bell rings, I give him a kiss on the cheek. I feel his jaw tighten. “See you at lunch,” I say, and sashay off to class. I sometimes cannot believe the new me. I am almost transformed. I still am secretly amazed.

Later, passing me in the hall on the way to the cafeteria, Kathy, a girl from the cross-country team, stops me. “So what's with you and Quin and the PDA in the commons? I thought the two of you were over last October.”

PDA, shorthand for public display of affection, isn't my usual behavior. I offer what I hope is a coy smile. “Obviously we patched it up.”

She looks skeptical. “Make sure he's had his shots. He's done a few girls between last October and now.”

I flinch. “Not every girl he dates has sex with him.”

“Oh, right. And you're an exception because … ?”

I feel my cheeks redden. “Because I tell him no, and I am not as ordinary as you'd imagine.”

“Why didn't I think of that?” Kathy says, slapping her forehead. “Oh, don't look so surprised. It was one time only at a party last summer. And just to ease your mind, we used a condom. At least he
knows
how to be careful.”

Speechless, I watch her walk away.

S
ometimes when I rise to the surface, I hear Mom reading school lessons to me. I like the sound of her voice. It soothes, like ointment on a burn. My parents are so loyal to this cause of waking me from my coma. I appreciate and admire their determination. Yet I hear what the doctors say.
Three months.
That's kind of a magic number in coma land. Once I've been down for three months, it's unlikely I'll ever emerge. Me. Analise Bower. What remains is a breathing vegetable.
Funny, ha-ha.
I'm little more than a carrot, or an onion. Tubes feed me. Bags hold waste from inside me. Other people care for me. My family, my Jeremy, a friend or two come and watch by my bed. The onion sleeps.

I remember philosophy class again, all the wise and learned men who have tried to explain the unexplainable, who write entire books in an effort
to comprehend mankind's existence and our purpose in the universe. I read once in my textbook about a philosopher, Nietzsche, who had become famous for declaring “God is dead.” In the margin of the book, someone had written in ink: “Nietzsche is dead. —God.” Very funny because it's true. We all die. But I don't want to die. Not yet. Not until I know who did this to me.