Sway (24 page)

All I can do is stare at the thin piece of cardboard as the bag burns in my hands. It hurts to look at her, hurts in every single part of me. Because hurt is all you feel when your heart’s about to explode.

I can’t believe what she’s done.

Kate

“A Hard Rain’s a-Gonna Fall”

—Bob Dylan

H
e closes the bag slowly and tries to hand it back to me, his face two shades paler.

“I can’t take this. You’re crazy.”

My arms stay wrapped in front of me. I knew he would react this way, so I’m prepared with an answer. “No, what’s crazy is saying that you can’t take it. What’s crazy is thinking that this,” I nod toward the bag still dangling from his fingertips, “is more important than a foster center that feeds and shelters kids.”

His arm falls, but he hasn’t dropped the bag yet. “Kate…”

“I have a lot more, you know. Probably enough to keep the place running indefinitely. And if I need to give each of them to you one by one, I will.”

For the longest time he just looks at me, shock, disbelief, awe, relief and about million different emotions crossing his features. Then I see something that looks a lot like—

I can’t afford to process that one.

“Kate…”

“I think we’ve established that you know my name. Just take it, Caleb. Please. If I could get the cash, I would, but I can’t until my twenty-fifth birthday without my parent’s permission. This is the next best thing. I can’t live with myself if the center shuts down because of me.”

“I can’t live with myself knowing that you gave this away. You need to keep it.”

“Why? So it can sit in a frame on a cheap Wal-Mart shelf? There’s no value in that.”

“
The Freewheelin’
costs forty thousand dollars. There’s a heck of a lot of value in it, if you ask me.”

“I didn’t ask. I asked you to take it. So will you please stop arguing with me and just do it for heaven’s sake?” I try to sound tough, like I’m not hurting inside. Not because of the record or the money or the fact that my parents are going to be seriously angry with me if they find out what I’ve done, but because of Caleb. It’s been a long eight days, and I miss him. I miss talking with him. I miss laughing with him and eating with him and picking out Christmas trees.

Last week I bought a tiny, pre-lit artificial one—one covered in fake snow and everything—and put it beside my bed. My very first tree. Every night I plug it in and stare as the blinking lights lull me to sleep. No one knows this. Not even Lucy. Caleb won’t know either. Because after today, I’m not sure I’ll ever see him again. Right now, I’m giving him my last reason to need me.

He’s still staring at the bag. I sigh. “Caleb, you need money. I’ve done my research. If you lose public money—which you already have, if the news stories are correct—” I raise an eyebrow and wait. He gives a single nod. “So, your funding is gone. Will that make up the difference?” I indicate the package he’s still barely hanging on to.

“Yes, but—”

“It’s an old record. I’m not offering you a kidney, though the way I feel right now, I’d probably give you that, too.” I look away, the first pricks of tears beginning to sting my eyes. I’ve made such a mess of things. Ignorance isn’t an excuse. “It’s a record. And it’s yours. Besides, I don’t want it anymore. It takes up too much space. So if you don’t take it, I’ll probably put it in a garage sale or something.”

Finally, he looks at me, the faintest trace of a smile behind his eyes. Then his expression turns serious and he searches my face. He searches my face and I’m not sure what to think. And then I can’t think at all and my breathing turns shallow because he zips his hoodie to cover his damp shirt and takes a step forward and does the one thing I never thought he would do again—no matter how much I wished for it. He pulls me to him, and I don’t even care that he’s sweaty and sour and smells like the outdoors. There’s no place I want to be, not now or not ever. I wrap my arms around his waist, and he presses his lips to my forehead and leaves them there. I grasp the sides of his jacket and sink a little. And sink a little more. Hours go by and seconds go by, and before I’ve found enough time to fall completely, he releases me. I wish he wouldn’t. Falling is nice.

“The kids…you have no idea—” He clears his throat, rough with emotion. “No idea.” He looks at me. “Are you sure?”

I nod. “I’m sure.”

“Then I’ll take it, and I’ll use it, but I want you to do something for me first.”

Maybe alarm bells should chime in my head, but they don’t.

Instead, all I hear is music.

*

Under the cover of nightfall, it’s easy to relax, easy to forget about cameras and lawsuits and reporters and public perception, even when public perception is everything in a business like the one my parents are involved with. Then again, Caleb could have asked me to fly with him to the moon and back, and I would have gone without thought to consequence or safety or responsibility.

When Caleb said he wanted me to do something for him, I expected him to request a condition I couldn’t meet, a statement I wouldn’t possibly make. Instead, he asked for this. I haven’t seen nearly as much of the guy as I want to in the past few weeks, but still he surprises me.

We’re in his office. Inside his church. Halfway through
A Hard Rain’s-a-Gonna Fall
. Facing each other on the blue-carpeted floor while Caleb listens with his eyes closed. He’s been this way since the album started playing, and if I didn’t know better, I’d think he was praying. As it is, I’m pretty sure he’s trying to memorize this moment. I know he is, because I’ve had this exact same moment myself. It’s been five years, but I’ll never forget the first time I heard this particular album. There’s something inherently pure about the sound of a needle on vinyl—the crackle, the static, the rich undertones of music playing in its most basic, unprocessed form—especially rare vinyl that only a handful of people own.

Once upon a time, I might have described the experience as spiritual. Now, for a reason I can’t even fathom, I’m no longer comfortable with the label.

I look down at my hands, at the stubby fingernails and torn cuticles that are screaming for a manicure I will never give them because I can think of a hundred better ways to spend my money. My mind drifts to Caleb just as it has every single second of the last five weeks.

His collection of records surprises me. Haphazardly stacked a foot high behind his desk, his is an assortment of genres—blues, country, folk, gospel, and hard rock. It’s the hard rock that amazes me most. I didn’t know you could have Alice in Chains, or KISS, for that matter, inside a church.

When it comes to Caleb, I’m quickly finding out that I don’t know much. I’m also discovering that every one of my pre-conceived notions about Christians are as laughable as the idea of me inside a place of worship.

Yet even that doesn’t seem so far-fetched all of a sudden.

I swallow and close my eyes, disturbed by that last thought. I barely recognize myself anymore. At the same time, I find myself liking the old me less and less. This new version of me seems much more pleasant. A lot less suspicious. And not nearly as closed-off.

The song ends and another one begins, but I keep my eyes shut. If Caleb gets to hide inside himself, so do I. At least that’s what I try to do for a few seconds, until he speaks.

“Dance with me.”

My eyes fly open and I gape at him. “Dance? In
here
?”

“No, on top of the roof,” he says without skipping a beat. “Of course in here.”

“But we’re inside a church. Don’t they have rules against that?”

Caleb has the gall to look amused. “Only that we can’t use a disco ball. Not that I would want to, considering that I hate bell-bottoms and I wouldn’t be caught dead in—”

“Caleb,” I stop him. “I am not dancing with you inside your church. What if we get caught?”

He stands up and brushes off his shorts. “Then I suppose we’ll be hauled off to jail, but the sentence isn’t nearly as long as you might think. Not since the president loosened up restrictions last year.” I can feel my eyes go wide as he pulls me to my feet.

He laughs as one arm snakes around my waist. With the other, he pulls me to him, locking our hands together and bringing them to his chest. My half-hearted attempt at resisting melts at the feel of him so near. He seems happy. Like this is the best idea he’s had all day and I’m certainly not going to spoil it for him. Ignoring the doubts that assault my mind, I tuck my head into his neck and let him sway us back and forth as the song ends and another one begins.

“So I take it you were kidding about us going to jail,” I say against his skin.

He laughs over my head. “You’re so cute.”

“Gullible, you mean. Stupid and gullible.” His laughter fades, and I smile. An intense quietness invades the room for several seconds even as the music continues to play. Not an uncomfortable silence, not the kind where awkwardness settles in and no one knows what to say. This silence is different. There’s an expectation to it, a lingering. Like neither one of us wants to leave and we both have a million things to say and absolutely no idea where to start. This is where my training should kick in, but it doesn’t. I’ve made dozens of speeches over my lifetime—all written for me, all designed to rail against God and caution multitudes of youngsters my age not to fall for religious brainwashing. But here, with Caleb, I’m completely lost for words. Ashamed and lost, the most heartbreaking combination. Maybe someday I’ll quit feeling so intimidated. I doubt I’ll ever get over the regret.

I realize then, with a generous amount of defeat, that I’m hoping for a someday. With Caleb, I don’t see a way for someday to come. We’re too different, on opposite sides of a very wide fence, even though my patch of grass seems to get smaller every day.

As we dance, I think back to a few minutes ago when Caleb first brought me inside this church. I was scared, felt like a trespasser with the spotlight of a thousand sins shining directly on my head. But this church isn’t what I expected. First of all, there’s no finger-pointing Jesus that I’ve come to associate with Christianity—the kind of Jesus that says “I Want You” with a stern expression on His face, Uncle Sam-style. I have no idea if this Jesus exists somewhere or if I made Him up, but He definitely isn’t in this building. In fact, I haven’t seen a picture of Jesus at all, only a few Bible verses framed against the wall that speak of loving your brother and doing unto others, and a rough cross mounted behind a make-shift stage in the auditorium. It’s weird—but with its blue cushioned chairs and airy, glass-encased walls, this place almost seems normal. Like a mall. Or a museum. Definitely not a building with something to hide.

Second of all, I don’t smell bleach. Maybe that’s crazy, but the one time I do remember entering a church—sometime during my ninth year and only because protesters backed me into a doorway—the overpowering scent of bleach is the only thing I recall. When I asked my parents about it later, they explained that churches are cleaned daily to scrub the smell of sin from the air. I was young, so I believed them. I’ve believed them this whole time, but something tells me now that it might not have been the truth.

It seems I no longer know what’s true anymore.

“Do you want to keep moving like this, or should I turn the album over?” Caleb says over my head.

I blink up to look at him, having gotten so accustomed to the quiet and my own thoughts that I didn’t hear the album stop playing. I feel stupid knowing we were dancing without music all because I chose this moment to space out, but Caleb doesn’t laugh. He doesn’t even smile. Instead, he’s looking straight at me in a way that makes me think he can peer into my soul. I have things inside me that I don’t want him to see, so I look away before he can.

“Sorry. I didn’t hear it stop.” My arms fall to my sides and I step back. “How long has it been over?”

“A couple of minutes, but you seemed to be thinking pretty hard about something so I didn’t want to interrupt you. Do you want to hear the other side, or…” He lets the sentence hang, an open invitation.

I want to. Stay, I mean. If I could have anything in the world, I would stay here all night. With him. Doing nothing but sitting knee to knee on this outdated carpeted floor as we finished this album and moved onto another. I haven’t listened to Alice in Chains in years.

But I can’t. It’s time to go. Anything else is just prolonging the inevitable, and for Caleb and me, the only inevitable thing is goodbye. Because even if I decided to drop it all and join him on his side, my background wouldn’t make things that simple. My family is too sensational. Our cause is too.

I can’t do that to him. I can’t do it to me.

“I should go. I have class tomorrow and…other stuff to do.” I pick up my purse and hang it over my arm, fully aware that the excuse is a flimsy one at best. But when your heart is breaking, sometimes a lie works like a Band-Aid; it patches you up just long enough to make a getaway before everything falls apart. I’m two seconds away from bleeding everywhere.

He looks at me a long moment as though waiting for me to change my mind. I don’t.