My First Love (10 page)

We started with the merry-go-round, two of us clambering onto one horse. Then we bought big blue clouds of cotton candy and spent forever hurling a baseball at a pyramid of cans, hoping to win an enormous purple bear.

By the time we got to the Ferris wheel, we were on a giddy high from sugar and laughter and exertion. But as the wheel carried us slowly to the top, my body began to relax
into Chris’s. He gently circled my waist with his arm and drew me even closer as we went up and up and up.

I sighed with joy as the lights of Phoenix spread out under us, the air grew still, and the music grew faint. When we reached the very top, the Ferris wheel paused and our little basket swung from side to side. I had that thrilling buzz in my stomach of looking down a long, long way, yet feeling safe at the top.

Chris held me in his arms and kissed me so tenderly that the world stopped and the music stopped and all of my thoughts stopped except for one: that I wanted this moment to last forever.

Reality set in the next morning.

Ten minutes before physics, I sat outside on the school lawn, still trying in vain to cram facts and figures in. Blythe brought me frosted doughnuts and a Coke from the school snack bar, on the theory that sugar and caffeine would make the information stick.

“I’ve never seen you like this,” she muttered once or twice while watching my agonized face as I hurriedly flipped through the textbook.

When the first bell rang I slammed the book shut on
Copernicus and took a big swig of Coke. “We might as well go to physics and get this over with.”

Chris’s seat was empty. I worried for a moment that he would miss the test, but he burst through the door at the last minute, walked over to my desk, and handed me a bouquet of daisies. “Good luck, Amy,” he said with a heart-melting smile. “I’ll be thinking of you.”

“How about if we try to think of physics?” I suggested, but I couldn’t help feeling surprised and charmed by the flowers. And they made me feel hopeful too.

Somehow, when Chris was around, it seemed that anything was possible. Even getting straight
A
’s without studying, or winning that day’s meet in spite of a sloppy flip turn. I sat up straighter in my seat and even said thank you when Tayerle passed out the test.

But my hopefulness slowly turned to panic as I read the first question, then the next and the next. I kept skipping questions, trying to find one I could answer. Then, before I knew it, I was halfway down the page. The problem was, Tayerle was asking about patterns and systems and distances, while I’d been fixed on the mysterious movement of the planets and the coppery glow of the eclipse. Clearly, I had learned about astronomy the wrong way. There was absolutely no room on Tayerle’s exam for romance.

The hands on the wall clock seemed to spin faster than I could think. Everyone around me was calmly filling in
answers, but I was frantically scribbling. When Tayerle said, “Time’s up,” I tossed down my pencil, half in frustration, half in relief that at least it was over.

“That was tough,” I told Blythe afterward.

“Really?” she said, her face registering surprise. “I thought it was a piece of cake.”

I suddenly had the sick feeling that I’d really blown it; even my bouquet of daisies couldn’t console me. Frustrated, I vowed to swim during my lunch hour, practicing flip turn after flip turn until I got it right. The only way to save the day from total disaster, I decided, was to come in first at that afternoon’s meet.

But in the next moment I wavered, when Chris caught up to me outside and gently took my hand. “Are you free for lunch today?” he asked. “I borrowed my mom’s car again, and I was thinking we could do our own private carbo load.”

I knew I needed the practice time more than I needed a carbo load, but I just wanted to be cheered up after the awful morning I’d had. I threw my arms around his neck, surprising Blythe and even Chris with this outburst of affection.

“Yes, please, take me away from all this!” I said, only half joking.

At lunch, Chris and I shared a chimichanga and drank milk shakes in the front seat of his mother’s Saab. Outside, rain was threatening, and the clouds looked heavy. “I’m
stuffed,” I said when we’d finished. “Actually, I don’t feel so well.”

But it was more than just the chimichanga—it was too many days in a row of staying up late. Just thinking about that health project I hadn’t started yet made me feel even more tired. I laid my head back on the car seat and sighed.

“What’s wrong?” Chris asked, stroking my hair.

For some reason, I didn’t want to admit to him how behind I was, or how badly I’d done on the test. “I’m just thinking about today’s meet,” I lied. “I hope I can remember how to swim. I didn’t get very much sleep after we got home last night.”

“Me neither,” Chris said, winding a lock of my hair slowly around his closed fist.

“Were you worried about the test?” I asked hopefully. Somehow things would seem better if I knew that Chris had lost sleep over it too.

“Worried about physics?” Chris asked me, as if the idea were absurd. “No, I was just tossing and turning all night, thinking about you.”

The meet that day was not my finest hour. Not even close.

“Amy, what’s going on with you?” Coach August asked me afterward, pulling me aside as my teammates boarded the bus. “You were third in all your races, and you looked like
you were asleep on the starting block. You’ve got to do better than that.” He shook his head. “You’re the best freestyler we’ve got, Amy. We’re counting on you.”

I winced at his choice of words. “It won’t happen again, Coach. I promise. All I need is a good night’s sleep.”

“Make sure you get one before regionals,” he said. “You won’t be able to slack off when you’re swimming against some of the best swimmers in the state.”

I had my head bowed during Coach August’s lecture, but I looked up just in time to see Jill Renfrew sitting in the bus, her ear pressed against a half-inch crack in her window. “Hi, Jill,” I called out, and I could tell by the way she started that she’d overheard our conversation. She turned to talk to Shannon, pretending not to hear me, but when I got on the bus, she had this smug, knowing smile on her face.

“It’s pretty sad,” I said as I passed her, “that you’re so insecure you have to spy on me.”

I must have hit a nerve, because Jill turned around and glared at me as I headed down the aisle. “We’ll see who’s sad,” she threatened as I sat down next to Chris, “when it’s me, not you, who swims the hundred free at the regional meet.”

“I can’t stand this,” I muttered, leaning my head on the back of the seat.

Chris, who’d been reading
Science Digest
intently, looked up and smiled. “What?” he said, sounding like a space cadet.

No wonder Chris was such a good student. No wonder he had aced his SATs. He could shut out everything that went on around him when he wanted to.

Unlike me.

“Never mind,” I told him quietly. “It’s nothing.”

All Chris had to do was whisper, “Amy, I have to see you,” and I forgot all about the fact that it was a school night or that I had homework. One night we went out for pizza, another night we went to a horror movie, then drank cappuccino at the café in the mall. But most nights we met at midnight on my rooftop.

Phoenix had seen the last of Indian summer, and now the nights were growing cold. To keep warm, I would wait for Chris inside my bedroom, and crawl out the window only when I saw him round the corner on his bike.

Together, we would climb as quietly as we could up to the chilly roof tiles, like two skiers seeking the top of a slope. I always felt as if we were leaving the world of school and friends and the Dolphins behind and ascending into some special place all our own.

Each time we met, Chris brought me something he’d made in his bedroom while he waited for his parents to fall asleep. There was a sketch of me he’d done from memory, a mobile of the universe made from paper clips and notebook paper, a card with my name “embroidered” on the front of it in multicolored felt pens. Once, he left behind a baseball cap, and that was my most treasured gift. The hat was worn in places, and I could smell the soapy scent of his hair in the brim. For nearly a week, I slept with the hat tucked beneath my pillow before I reluctantly gave it back.

But one night about three weeks after we had first climbed to the roof, Chris showed up with something that wasn’t homemade. “Amy, I want you to have this,” he said, and he handed me a tiny box wrapped in pretty paper.

I was sure I knew what it was before I even opened it, but I couldn’t quite believe I was right. I mean, guys didn’t give girls rings anymore, at least as far as I knew. Maybe someone Mom’s age might have worn a boy’s ring in high school, but among my friends, “going steady” hadn’t been cool since about the seventh grade.

I tried to look surprised as I tore off the wrapping paper
and cracked the hinged lid. And then I really was surprised, because what lay there on the box’s velvet lining wasn’t a ring after all, but a small brass key.

It wasn’t a modern key, like the kind you’d use to open your front door. It was old, small, intricate, and slightly worn. “The key to your heart?” I teased Chris as I examined it, turning the key over in my hand.

“You could say that,” he answered. “It opens a locker full of treasures I used to have, this old sea chest I got from my grandpa.”

“What was in it?” I asked, imagining yellowed pirate maps and gold doubloons.

“Old toys and models, mostly,” Chris explained. “Souvenirs from being a kid. But when we moved into our new house, my parents must have gotten rid of it. They swear they stored it in the garage, but I haven’t seen it since.”

“That’s so sad,” I whispered, thinking of my collection of dolphins, and the stained and scruffy animals who lived in my closet, piled cozily in an old doll cradle. I hadn’t played with them since I was a little girl, but I wouldn’t dream of giving them up.

Chris shrugged. “Mom said she wanted to start over in our brand-new house.”

“But they’re like old friends,” I protested. “You can’t just decide one day to toss them out.”

Chris took my hand and held it, so that the key was
pressed between our palms. “I hope I’ll have you forever,” he said, and I understood then that the key meant not what he had lost but what we would have together.

“You do,” I said. “You will.”

Later, when Chris helped me back through my window, I briefly thought about how fast my life was moving—faster than I knew how to handle. My days blurred together—one long run of school, swim practice, and evenings spent falling asleep over homework, then waking up and climbing out the window to see Chris. Our secret meetings—we called them the Astronomy Club—were the only parts of the day I looked forward to. I wasn’t swimming well, and I was behind in my classes.

I can’t explain why we didn’t go on more normal dates. Partly, I knew my mom would not let me date anyone on a regular basis, but mostly it was because it was so romantic, climbing up to my roof and looking at stars and having our own secret place.

“I don’t want to go in,” I said that night, hating to say good-bye.

“In that case,” Chris teased me, “why don’t you invite me in out of the cold?” He leaned forward through the open window to kiss me.

“I can’t,” I said, meaning I couldn’t invite him in, not that I couldn’t kiss him.

Just then, my door slowly creaked open, and we both heard Mom’s angry gasp. There we were, the two of us, caught
in the hall light. Mom was silhouetted in the doorway, and she was furious.

“Amy, what are you doing!” she demanded. “Who’s there with you? Do you have any idea what time it is?” She lobbed her questions at me so quickly that I barely had time to react.

“Ms. Wyse—I mean Turner—it’s my fault,” Chris said, trying to defend me. “I knocked on Amy’s window. She was just this minute pleading with me to go home.”

Mom marched over to the window. Her lips tightened with anger. “You’d better get home,” she told Chris. “If this happens again, I’ll call your parents,” she warned before slamming the window shut. I could feel myself trembling—with fear and anger—when Mom whirled around.

“I can’t believe you did that!” I screamed at her. “We weren’t doing anything wrong!” My hand sought the cover of my jeans pocket and my fingers wrapped protectively around the key Chris had given me. “Besides,” I added, holding back tears, “I can take care of myself!”

“Amy, what has gotten into you? Do you call staying up until all hours on a school night taking care of yourself?”

“I can handle it,” I said, more quietly that time because I wasn’t so sure I could. I was thinking of the C I’d gotten on the physics test, the health and English books I’d only skimmed, and the other homework I hadn’t even started.

“I know you think you can,” Mom told me. “But for the time being, you’re grounded. You’re to be in bed by ten on
school nights, and to come straight home after school or swimming practice.”

“That’s not fair,” I protested. “You can’t ground me anyway. I’m almost seventeen.”

Mom stormed out into the hallway. “Maybe this will remind you,” she told me, “that you’re not quite grown up yet.”

The next day, I strung the key on a satin cord and wore it like a piece of expensive jewelry around my neck. I was hoping it would glitter defiantly in the sunlight, but unfortunately, the day was overcast.

“What’s that? A cross?” Jill asked me at practice. We were doing timed trials for the meet the next day, and I guess she was worried that I might gain an edge on the competition by appealing to a higher, holy source.

“It’s a key,” I told her, covering it with my palm. The metal was cold. “I got it from Chris.”

“What a weird gift! You’re not going to wear that in the pool, are you?” Jill asked, pushing her straight brown hair underneath her swimming cap.

The truth was, I hadn’t been planning to—I was afraid the chlorine in the water might turn the brass green. But when Jill asked me, I felt I had to, just to spite her. We were the last two people in the locker room, and I headed toward the door. “Sure, why not?” I called back.