My Lucky Stars (12 page)

“You could use an empty water bottle,” Ben suggested.

She felt her face go redder. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not a guy. It’s a little more complicated for me.”

Ben laughed.

She didn’t see what was so funny.

“Fair enough. I guess the only other thing to do is to go outside.”

“
Outside
?” she asked, certain her face was a mask of horror. “I’d have to—”

“Squat?” Ben suggested.

She looked away, too embarrassed and appalled to continue the conversation.

“It can be done, you know. When we went camping, my mom and sisters—”

“I’m not your mom and sisters,” she snapped, angry now.

He shrugged. “Then hold it. I was just telling you your choices.”

Tara folded her arms and kept her gaze straight ahead.
Some choice. I haven’t had a decent choice since I stepped on that plane three days ago.

Ben continued to eat his ice cream, whistling between bites. When he’d had enough, he put the lid on the carton and put both cartons outside on the hood of the truck. His whistling resumed once he was back in his seat.

“What are you so happy about?” Tara asked.

“I don’t know,” Ben said. “It’s Christmas Eve, I’m here in a beautiful canyon with a pretty woman sitting next to me, and I just had some awesome ice cream. Things could be worse.”

She ignored his compliment. “You’re happy about the delay, aren’t you?” she accused. “This means more time before you have to see Dallin—and probably less time with him.”

The whistling stopped. Ben turned to her, fixing his eyes on hers. “What is it with you? Why do you feel the need to pry into my personal life?”

“I don’t know,” she admitted, feeling somewhat bad that she’d brought it up again.
What
is
with me?
she wondered. “Maybe it’s because you seem so good, so perfect in every other way, that I want to know about this one thing in your life that isn’t right. There are a whole lot of things in my life that aren’t right, and being around you—Mr. Happy, Helpful Farmer—is kind of depressing. But if you give me some dirt, I might feel better.”

Ben shook his head. “I’ll never get females.”

“Get as in
understand
, or get as in
get
?” Tara asked.

“Both.” His serious tone told her he wasn’t about to elaborate.

After a minute, Tara spoke again. “I think you could—the latter get, I mean. You’re not bad looking, and if you lost the overalls . . .”

He turned to her. “I’m not wearing overalls today.”

“I know. You look good in cords.” There. She’d said it. She admitted to checking him out. She’d played another one of her cards, when he’d played none of his.

Their eyes met again, and she shifted uncomfortably in her seat. This was getting good—it was getting like her dream. Except that in her dream she hadn’t cared about finding a bathroom more than anything else in the world.

Ben must have realized she was becoming seriously miserable.

“I’ll help you find a place where no one will see you,” he offered.

Mortified was not usually a word in her self-describing vocabulary, but it pretty much summed up her existence in that moment. She was going to have to take him up on that offer. She was going to have to climb out of this somewhat warm truck and go out in the freezing cold. She’d have to walk down the road, out onto the embankment. And the people in the cars would know exactly what was up. She squeezed her eyes shut.
I can’t do it.

“You take care of your . . . problem, and I’ll tell you about Dallin.”

Tara’s eyes popped open. “Are you serious?”

He nodded. “Serious and stupid, probably.”

“No.” She gave him a smile of gratitude. “It’s like I said a minute ago. You’re just good. Too good to be true.”

Thirteen

Ben came around and opened Tara’s side of the truck. He held his hand out to her and helped her get down.

“Are you going to be able to walk for a bit? You didn’t wait too long, did you?”

“No. I’m not three. And I can walk.” She glared at him.

He tried hard not to smile, not to be amused at her latest predicament. If she’d only used the bathroom earlier, but no—she’d been too uppity for such a humble facility. Well, she was going to have to pay for that now—with frostbite on her backside if she wasn’t careful. Ben wondered how many times a similar scenario—Tara thinking herself above something and then ending up with humbling circumstances later—had been repeated in her life. Obviously not enough, or else she was a slow learner. But his sister was right about one thing. Tara didn’t seem to know any better. And after learning that she had a mother who saw Tara as an inconvenience, he felt a little more empathy.

Ben shut the door behind her and pulled a fleece hat from his pocket. He’d seen it when they were in line at Deseret Industries last night and had thrown it in the cart on a whim, thinking maybe Cadie would want it. But it had been too big for her. It would probably fit Tara fine.
Big head that she has.
He stepped in front of her and grabbed her shoulders, stopping her for a second.

“Wear this. It will help you stay warm.” He jammed the pink and purple Minnie Mouse hat over her head. Flower petals poking out at ridiculous angles sprang every which way, and the embroidered Minnie rested just above her eyebrows.

Tara looked up, trying to see the hat. “It’s not my head I’m worried about.”

Ben chuckled. “I’m glad to see you haven’t lost your sense of humor. Come on.” He took her hand so she wouldn’t slip in her tennis shoes.

They walked along the road for a couple hundred yards until they came to a spot where the bank steepened and sloped off into a ditch of sorts. He led Tara down the slope to a lone juniper.

“This is it.”

She looked at the tree with such despair that Ben almost felt sorry for her.

“Take it or leave it,” he said.

She sighed. “Get going, then.” She tugged her hand from his and started to walk behind the tree.

“I’ll just wait up here,” Ben called. He climbed back up to the road and stood waiting, wondering if he ought to go get some more ice cream since they’d come this far.

Two minutes passed. Then three. Then five. She really
was
going to get frostbite if she didn’t hurry.

“Ben,” a forlorn voice finally called.

He turned around. “Yeah? Want some help climbing up?”

She shook her head but beckoned to him.

Probably wants me to fetch her some Charmin or something.
He trudged down the bank again, stopping a few feet away from her. Her teeth were chattering, and her nose was excessively red—from more than the cold, it seemed. Unshed tears hovered, just waiting to spill from those big, beautiful eyes.

What now?
“What’s wrong?”

“My zipper’s stuck. I tried and tried to unzip it, but my fingers are frozen, and I can’t get it to move.” She shivered then pulled her legs close, doing a little hop up and down. “This is all your fault,” she wailed, striking out at him suddenly, pushing against his chest. “Because you wouldn’t buy me n-n-ew jeans.” Tears started to trickle down both sides of her face.

“You’re serious?” He still suspected she could turn on her faucet whenever she wanted.

“Yes, I’m serious!” she screamed. “I’m freezing to death and in pain and my stupid zipper is stuck.”

“All right, all right.” He held his hands up. “You, uh, want me to try it?”

She nodded and wiped her cheek with one hand. Still shaking, she leaned forward, arms folded across her middle. “Please hurry.”

It was the first time he’d heard her say please, so he knew she must be desperate. Feeling awkward and embarrassed and just plain bad about the situation, Ben gripped the top of her jeans with one hand, pulling them as far away from her body as possible. With his other hand he worked at the zipper, tugging as hard as he could, twisting it every which way, trying to get it to move. After a couple of minutes, he realized it wasn’t going to happen.

“Great,” Tara muttered. “Just great.”

“I don’t suppose they’ll slide down over your hips?” he asked.

She shook her head. “If you’d gotten a size larger they would have, but these are good and tight.”

Ben felt an inkling of guilt. He’d picked those jeans thinking about how her curves would look in them.
And she thinks I’m “good.”
He reached into his pocket and took out his knife again. “The only thing I can think of is to cut them. Just slice right alongside the zipper.”

“Fine. Give that to me.” Her tears were gone, and she was snappy again. Ben continued to be amazed at how fast her moods changed. He was starting to wonder if she had multiple personality disorder or something.

Unfolding the scissors, he held the knife out to her.

Tara grabbed it from him and ran behind the juniper. He hurried back up the embankment and had barely reached the top when he heard a repeat of yesterday’s colorful language.

This time he laughed.

His laughter was cut short by Tara’s bloodcurdling scream.

Fourteen

Ben whipped around, staring as Tara ran out from behind the tree, screaming. One hand held her pants up, the other flailed in the air. He took a step toward her then slid halfway down the embankment.

“It’s alive!” She ran straight into his chest, nearly knocking him over just as he’d caught his balance.

“What’s wrong?” He put his arms around her, trying to steady them both.

“There’s something alive back there. A wolf maybe. It tried to take a bite out of me.” She pushed past him and tried to climb toward the road.

Ben doubted a wolf would venture so close to the highway, especially with this much activity up there right now. His curiosity got the better of him, and he started toward the juniper only to see a white jackrabbit hop out from behind the tree.

Ben chuckled. “Some wolf.” He turned to Tara. “It’s a bunny.”

Tara watched, disbelieving, as it hopped away. “Told you there was something alive,” she huffed, walking along with a strange gait, one hand swinging wildly, the other clutching the front of her jeans.

“Lots of things are alive out here,” Ben said. “And most of them won’t hurt you. In fact, they’re more afraid of you than you are of them.”

“Want to bet?” She glared at him for a second before continuing her march.

“So did you, uh, take care of your problem?” he dared ask.

“One of them,” she retorted. “The other is walking right beside me.”

“Hey.” He grabbed her free arm, stopping her. “You need to knock off the attitude. I didn’t have to get out of the warm truck to help you, you know.”

“You were a
ton
of help,” she said sarcastically. “I don’t even have pants that stay up now.”

Ben couldn’t believe this. “You asked for the scissors.”

“Because there was no other choice.” Tara stomped her foot childishly. “I haven’t had a choice about
anything
for three days. I’m sick of this. I need my wallet back, my clothes . . . my
life
.”

“You can have it.” Ben let go of her arm and walked past her. “I’ll be happy to drop you off at the nearest gas station. You can get yourself to wherever it is you want to go. Or maybe your fairy godmother will come rescue you, since you’re such a spoiled princess.”

“
What
did you say?” Tara struggled to keep up. She reached out, grabbing his arm just as she lost her footing and started sliding backward down the hill.

Ben caught her. “I said you’re spoiled. In fact, your name ought to be
Tiara
instead of
Tara.
You’re a pampered . . . privileged . . . brat.”

She gasped and pushed him away. “Well, Benji, at least I’m not named after a
dog.
”

Ben narrowed his eyes. He was partial to his name. Once, around the time he was getting adopted, he’d wanted to change it along with his new last name, but that was before his adoptive mom had taken the time to explain it to him. He loved her for that, and he loved his name because of it. “I’m not named after a dog. I’m named after a king. King Benjamin was one of the finest men who ever lived.”

He turned and walked off, thinking that he wasn’t acting so much like his namesake at the moment. What was it about this woman that brought out the absolute worst in him?

He expected to hear her behind him and braced himself for another volley of insults or another physical assault. But neither came. When he reached the road, he reluctantly turned around again and saw her standing in the same spot.
Literally frozen? Nah. It’d be too good to be true.

Gritting his teeth, he retraced his steps until he stood in front of her. Her nose and cheeks were red with cold, and her lips appeared to be turning blue. “Come on. You’re freezing.”

“What do you care?” she asked.

He was the one who felt like swearing as he noticed her eyes starting to well up again. “I said I’d leave you at a gas station. Not in the middle of nowhere—without even a decent pair of pants.” He suddenly found it hard not to laugh. She looked so forlorn, standing there holding up her jeans and wearing Minnie Mouse plastered across her brow. The flowers were lying on their sides now, pressed down by the moisture from the lightly falling snow.

Tara shivered again, sending a little tremor from her head to her toes. Ben smiled. He couldn’t help it. His anger of a moment before melted in the face of such a tragic figure. He realized his moods were becoming as erratic as hers and hated to think what would happen to him if they spent much more time together.

“Come on,” he said again. He reached out, touching her shoulder, pulling her toward him.

“I’m cold,” she said. “I just want this to be over. I want to go home.”

“I know, Princess. You gotta move first, though.”

She did, stepping closer until they were less than a foot apart.

Ben reached down, tilting her chin up, so he could see her eyes. They were swimming with tears and full of hurt.

“Hey, I’m sorry—okay? I was outta line. I shouldn’t have said those things.”