The Summer of Me & You (9 page)

“Yeah, right. As if I believe that. I know you, Kaleb. You've had your eye on that girl for as long as I can remember.”

I extinguished my cigarette in the ash tray. “Shh!” I told her. “Would you keep your voice down? Kayleigh might hear you.”

“Oops. If she's drunk enough she won't.” She gazed at me, then awareness set in her eyes. “Oh, so it's
that
way, huh? You more than like her. Didn't you just graduate high school? You're grown up. If you like her that bad, you better hurry up and tell her.”

“Why?” I spread my hands out on the table.

“I thought Kayleigh didn't drink.”

“She doesn't. She just did it to impress some guy tonight.”

“A-ha. I see. You know, that's what some girls resort to doing when idiots like yourself take their precious freakin' time getting to the point. In other words, man the hell up, Kaleb.”

“You're absolutely crazy, mom. You know that? Kayleigh would never go for me.”

My mom looked at me like she was about to slap me stupid. “She was drinking tonight to impress some loser guy who she doesn't even know and you're telling me that you think you don't have a chance with her? The sweet loveable girl who you've adored forever? How hard did you hit your head, Kaleb?”

This is probably the part where I rolled my eyes.

“I'm tellin' you, I've seen it happen on enough soap operas to know. You don't want to be that guy at the wedding having to object because your girl is marrying someone else. Keep it up and that'll be you in four years.” She took another bite of her yogurt.

I scooted the chair back, standing. I walked over to the counters, opening the top shelf to find a snack. “What about art school?”

She pulled the yogurt spoon out of her mouth, pondering. “Oh yeah. Good point. Didn't think of that. I almost forgot you were going to college. Haha.”

I turned my head to look at her. “Why?”

“Because you're an idiot,” she smiled up at me.

“You think you're so funny, don't you?” I hopped up onto the counter, unwrapping a chocolate pop-tart.

At the same time, Kayleigh strolled into the kitchen, her hair a complete mess. Our eyes followed her as she walked over to the fridge like she was at home, opened the door and poured herself a glass of milk. She walked over to where I sat on the counter and gazed right at me as she stole my other pop-tart and took a bite. “What time is it?” she asked.

I gawked, my eyes widening. I darted daggers at my mom who stifled a grin unsuccessfully.

Oh shit.

“Kay, how much of our conversation did you hear?”

She drank her milk, sitting the cup in the sink. “I'll pretend I didn't hear a word,” she smiled, then sauntered back into my room with her snack, and closed the door.

My mouth dropped open. “What was that? She didn't even answer my question.”

“Oh, I think she did.” Mom gave me her duh look.

***

After my mom made us breakfast, I drove Kayleigh home. The ride was silent. She just gazed out the window, until I said—

“So, I'm guessing you heard me and my mom talking about you last night.”

She sighed. “Kaleb, it's okay.” Her eyes were tired, or maybe even sad.

“So you know I like you. A lot. Right?”

“Yeah,” she said.

“Well?” I wanted, needed, her to like me a lot, too.

“Well what?”

“Do you feel the same about me?”

She avoided the subject. “Can we just talk about this later? I have a major headache.”

“It's called a hangover.” I pulled into her driveway.

“You would know,” she said, unbuckling her seat-belt. She opened the door, jumping out.

Kayleigh seemed incredibly moody. I rolled down the window. “Hey—what's with the attitude?”

She'd started to walk to her door, but she turned around and leaned down near the window to tell me, “You are trouble. You're violent and I heard you were some sex freak who was addicted to meth. So, no.”

She lingered there long enough for me to say, “That's what you heard. Don't you wanna find out for yourself if it's true?”

She shook her head. “No. Not at the expense of what might happen to me.”

I felt her slipping away. I had to say something.

“Everyone likes sex, Kayleigh—including you. One day,” I added, because I was pretty sure she'd never had sex before. “You can't hide behind those glasses forever. That's why you're afraid of me.”

“Keep my glasses out of this. They have nothing to do with it.” She pointed to her face.

I laughed at how silly that'd sounded when she'd said it. I saw a smile cross her face too, though she tried to hide it. Her eyes sparkled. “Complete nerd,” I said. She smiled more.

“But I think you like this nerd,” she said, opening the car door and dipping back into the seat next to me.

“It was only one time. The meth. I didn't know any better and she was a bitch.”

Kayleigh nodded. “Sorry,” she said. “Why did you do it?”

I quirked my eyebrow. “You never said if you liked me or not.”

“It's possible,” she said.

“Good enough for me.”

“So?”

“I didn't choose to. It just happened. It made the crazy emotions go away. For a while. But I realized the hard way that substance abuse wasn't the cure.”

She didn't comment on that, but she did say something else. “I wasn't trying to impress him.”

“What?”

“That guy you beat up last night? I wasn't trying to impress him. I don't even know him, nor do I like him. I was just really drunk, and I'm not too happy with myself that you saw me like that, you know.”

“So you
do
care what I think about you?”

She didn't say anything. She let the space fall silent. Then I said, “It's okay. You saw me in a messed up condition, too—so we're even.”

“Thanks for trying to save me last night, but my mom wasn't even home.”

I glanced up and my eyes landed on the figure standing in Kayleigh's doorway. Oh, shit. Kayleigh was about to be in trouble. I could sense it. “She is now, and she's staring at you. Hard.”

“Looks like I better get inside,” she said. “See you later?”

“Maybe. If she doesn't kill you first. Let me know what happens?”

“I don't think dead girls can speak, Kaleb.” She opened the door and climbed out. Before she headed into her house, she said one last thing. “We're still not friends.”

I laughed, silently, leaned my head against the seat, my eyes still on her. “I'm not trying to be your friend, Kayleigh.” She shut the car door, then bolted up the driveway. She slid past her mother, who then closed the door.

I put the car in reverse, backed out and drove home.

CHAPTER EIGHT

That Boy

*

“Where in the hell were you, Kayleigh? Why did that boy just bring you home at 9 am in the morning? Do you have any idea what that makes you look like? You spent the night with him. It makes you look like a tramp!”

“Calm down, mother,” I told her. “I didn't do anything wrong.”

“I came home early this morning and you weren't here. I called Gunner's mother to ask if they'd seen you, and she tells me that you left with Gunner to go to a party yesterday afternoon. And now you're pulling up in my driveway with
him
?”

“His name's Kaleb, mom.”

“I don't give a shit what his name is! You're grounded. Go to your room!”

“What do you expect me to do all summer long? Sit in my room alone all day while you sleep then watch TV all night, waiting for you to come home in the morning? I'm sixteen. I'm supposed to have fun at this age.”

“Not with him you're not.”

“What do you have against Kaleb? Is this why you're freaking out? You've never liked him.”

“I have reasons not to like that boy.”

“Yeah? Let's hear them.”

“Later,” she said. “I need to rest.”

“What an excuse. There probably aren't any. You just wanna keep me caged up so you can control every aspect of my life.”

She stormed over and jammed her finger into my chest. “You're gonna stop back talking me, Kayleigh. Now go to your room.” She pointed to the stairs.

I didn't move. I wanted to show her I wasn't afraid of her. “You can't ground me. I have puppet theater at the daycare later on today.”

“Well you're not going. That's a volunteer job, not one you're getting paid for and you're only using that as an excuse to see Kaleb.”

I found my voice again. “I don't need an excuse to see Kaleb. I can see him if I want to.” Her eyes were full of rage.

“Get out of my face,” she said. I turned away from her, marching up the steps. “You're going to be just like all the other girls.  I don't even want to look at you right now.”

I went into my room, quietly closed the door even though I really wanted to slam it. I dropped to the floor and cried. Minutes later, she entered my room. “I'm going to be gone next weekend. I trust that you won't be seeing that boy.”

Ha! I'm so glad she thinks that. As if she'd even know where I am.

CHAPTER NINE

We were still doing it

*

We were still doing it.

For some reason, Kayleigh avoided me. She didn't want to see me or talk to me. We hadn't spoken to each other since I'd taken her home the morning after that party. I probably called her two dozen times over the weekend, but she never answered any of my phone calls.

If she didn't stop doing this to me, I was going to lose my mind.

Mr. Macon's film class began the following week. The reason the class was being offered over the summer was because the school's budget didn't allow for art classes—they spent all their money on funding the sports teams instead. It killed me how no one considered filmmaking a real career. I wanted to ask the idiots who said such a thing, “Oh yeah, if it isn't a real career, then who in the hell makes all those movies to entertain you then? They don't just pop into existence from nowhere.”

And someone has to make films, right? Just like someone has to perform surgery on people who need it. So why not me? What was so wrong with me aspiring to be a film director? It was no different than those who aspired to be lawyers.

I was surprised to realize we had sixteen people in the class. I hadn't realized that sixteen people at this school wanted to be filmmakers. That was a shocker.

You wanna know what else was shocking? Only two of those sixteen people were female. Wanna know who one of the females was?

Kayleigh.

And I was beginning to think we didn't have much in common. I hadn't even told her I was taking this class, so it wasn't like she'd signed up at the last minute to annoy me. She sat in the very back. I'd seen her when I first walked in, but I pretended not to. My calls had been ignored, so now I was going to ignore her. Her black hat with a film reel on it enshadowed her face. I wore my green shirt that I'd gotten from last year's short film festival in North Port. I'm not sure she'd realized I was there yet. She doodled in a notebook, not looking up. When Mr. Macon walked into the room, calling our attention, I quickly pulled my eyes away from her before she caught me staring.

“Okay,” he clapped his hands together. “Who can name an American film director?”

People began spouting the obvious names that we'd all heard of before.

“Great,” he said. “But did you know that New Wave cinema began in France? So—can anyone name a French director?

“Truffaut,” Kayleigh said with confidence. I swiveled around.

“
Godard
,” I countered, gazing directly at her.

“Oh,” she spun around in her seat. “You think he's better?” So now she had something to say to me?

“I
know
he is.”

“Why are you even in this class?”

“Why are you?” Kayleigh had spent most of her time doing theater. I had no idea she was into filmmaking, but maybe she'd only been in theater because it was the next best thing, since the school didn't offer cinematography classes.

The teacher hopped up on to the desk, crossing his arms over his chest. “You two
do
know they were friends at one point, right?”

“Yeah, well
we
aren't,” Kayleigh said. The way she kept saying that bugged me. I didn't want to be her friend. I wanted more than that. It was like she was deliberately torturing me to see how far she could take it. It was obvious how much she liked me, since she had to make it a point to remind me and everyone else that she didn't.