Part 14 (2/2)
I get on my mom's bike. ”Okay. I'm not worried.”
Jayson lifts his hand good-bye. I lift mine back.
”Thanks,” he says, ”for everything.”
”No problem,” I say, and head back home.
15.
Later that day, I head to Dylan's house.
When I get to her gate, she's walking out the door in a gray jump-suit that makes her look like a fas.h.i.+onable gas-station attendant.
”Oh,” I say. ”Are you leaving?”
She glances at me. ”I'm on my way to the post office.”
”But it's Sunday. The post office is closed.”
”I'm just using the stamp machine.”
”Can I walk with you?”
She looks up at the sky and squints, pushes her rolled-up sleeves over her elbows, shrugs, and starts walking.
I follow her. We get to the end of her street and turn before I manage to make myself tell her that I'm sorry.
”I'm kind of working through a lot of stuff right now, but I shouldn't have taken it out on you.”
”That's true,” she says. ”You shouldn't have.”
”Well, I'm sorry,” I say.
We keep walking, and then suddenly we're by the empty lot where I took my landscape, except it's not empty anymore. The bones of a house are coming up.
”Hey, look,” I say.
Dylan glances at the house. ”Yeah,” she says. ”The owners already booked my mom to cater their housewarming party.”
”I wonder how it'll look when it's finished.”
We start walking again.
”So, nice work on the treehouse,” Dylan says. ”You're making progress.”
”Oh my G.o.d. Stalker!”
Dylan laughs. ”I had to ask you a question, so I went over to your house, but no one was home. I knew you were building one, so I walked down the hill and found it. Your parents have a ton of property.”
”What did you want to ask me?”
”Actually, it was Maddy who wanted me to ask you,” Dylan says. ”She has the lead in a play. She's a really great actor, you know. Anyway, she wants you to come. I don't know if it's such a great idea.”
My stomach sinks. Maybe I really have ruined our friends.h.i.+p for good. ”Why not?”
”The play is Romeo and Juliet Romeo and Juliet. I didn't know if that's something you'd really like to see right now.”
”Oh,” I say, but I'm not sure what she means.
We cross the street to the strip mall and head toward the post office. Dylan pauses outside the gla.s.s doors. ”I'll just be a second.”
I walk over to a pole and lean against it. Why would Dylan think I wouldn't want to see Romeo and Juliet Romeo and Juliet? I'm pretty good at English. It's not like Shakespeare's over my head or anything. We read it freshman year. Actually, I think I can recite a few lines. I try to remember the different parts I know-the balcony scene, the part with Juliet and the nurse, the part when she realizes that Romeo drank all the poison . . . Oh. Oh.
Dylan comes back out and sits on the curb.
”Today is Ingrid's birthday,” I tell her. ”She would have been seventeen.”
Dylan remains quiet, and even though I'm close to tears, I smile. Here she is, once again, never saying things just to say them.
”I'd like to go to the play. When is it?”
”Friday.”
”We'll go over together?”
Dylan shrugs. ”I don't know.” She hugs her knees to her chest. I want to ask her a million questions about her life, but I don't think it's the right time.
She smirks. ”So what have you been doing lately? Just running into people?”
”Mostly hiding in the bathroom, actually.”
”Sounds lovely.”
”Well, it's a really nice bathroom. Oh, and you know Taylor Riley?”
”Yeah, he's in my chemistry cla.s.s.”
”I kissed him.”
She stretches her legs out in front of her. ”Oh yeah? Good for you.”
”No,” I say. ”I mean I threw myself at him. I mean I took off my s.h.i.+rt and attacked him.”
Dylan squints up at me. I can't tell what she's thinking.
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