Lock and Key(42)
Author: Sarah Dessen

“Hey,” I said when I reached the foyer. “What’s going on?”

“Are you surprised?” she asked, giggling. “You would not believe what I went through to track you down. I was like Nancy Drew or something!”

Beside her, Jamie smiled, and I forced myself to do the same, even as I noticed two things: that she reeked of smoke and that her eyes were awfully red, her mascara pooled beneath them. Peyton had always been bad with Visine, and clearly this had not changed. Plus, even though she was dressed as cute as ever—hair pulled back into two low ponytails, wearing jeans and red shirt with an apple on it, a sweater tied loosely around her waist—she had always been the kind of person who, when high, looked it, despite her best efforts. “How did you find me?” I asked her.

“Well,” she said, holding her hands, palms facing out and up to set the scene, “it was like this. You’d told me you were living in Wildflower Ridge, so—”

“I did?” I asked, trying to think back.

“Sure. On the phone that day, remember? ” she said. “So I figure, it can’t be that big of a neighborhood, right? But then, of course, I get over here and it’s freaking huge.”

I glanced at Jamie, who was following this story, a mild smile on his face. Clueless, or so I hoped.

“Anyway,” Peyton continued, “I’m driving around, getting myself totally lost, and then I finally just pull over on the side of the road, giving up. And right then, then I see this, like, totally hot guy walking a dog down the sidewalk. So I rolled down my window and asked him if he knew you.”

Even before she continued, I had a feeling what was coming next.

“And he did!” she said, clapping her hands. “So he pointed me this way. Very nice guy, by the way. His name was—”

“Nate,” I finished for her.

“Yeah!” She laughed again, too loudly, and I got another whiff of smoke, even stronger this time. Like I hadn’t spent ages teaching her about the masking ability of breath mints. “And here I am. It all worked out in the end.”

“Clearly,” I said, just as I heard the door that led from the garage to the kitchen open then shut.

“Hello?” Cora called out. Roscoe, ears perked, trotted toward the sound of her voice. “Where is everybody?”

“We’re in here,” Jamie replied. A moment later, she appeared in the entrance to the foyer in her work clothes, the mail in one hand. “This is Ruby’s friend Peyton. This is Cora.”

“You’re Ruby’s sister?” Peyton asked. “That’s so cool!”

Cora gave her the once-over—subtly, I noticed—then extended her hand. “Nice to meet you.”

“You, too,” Peyton replied, pumping it eagerly. “Really nice.”

My sister was smiling politely. Her expression barely changed, only enough to make it more than clear to me that she had seen—and probably smelled—what Jamie had not. Like Peyton’s mom, she didn’t miss much. “Well,” she said. “I guess we should think about dinner?”

“Right,” Jamie said. “Peyton, can you stay?”

“Oh,” Peyton said, “actually—”

“She can’t,” I finished for her. “So, um, I’m going to go ahead and give her the tour, if that’s all right.”

“Sure, sure,” Jamie said. Beside him, Cora was studying Peyton, her eyes narrowed, as I nodded for her to follow me into the kitchen. “Be sure to show her the pond!”

“Pond?” Peyton said, but by then I was already tugging her onto the deck, the door swinging shut behind us. I waited until we were a few feet away from the house before stopping and turning to face her.

“What are you doing?” I asked.

She raised her eyebrows. “What do you mean?”

“Peyton, you’re blinded. And my sister could totally tell.”

“Oh, she could not,” she said easily, waving her hand. “I used Visine.”

I rolled my eyes, not even bothering to address this. “You shouldn’t have come here.”

For a moment, she looked hurt, then pouty. “And you should have called me,” she replied. “You said you were going to. Remember?”

Cora and Jamie were by the island in the kitchen now, looking out at us. “I’m still getting settled in,” I told her, but she turned, ignoring this as she walked over to the pond. In her ponytails and in profile, she looked like a little kid. “Look, this is complicated, okay?”

“For me, too,” she said, peering down into the water. As I stepped up beside her I saw it was too dark to see anything, but you could hear the pump going, the distant waterfall. “I mean, a lot’s happened since you left, Ruby.”

I glanced back inside. Jamie was gone, but Cora remained, and she was looking right at me. “Like what?”

Peyton glanced over at me, then shrugged. “I just . . .” she said softly. “I wanted to talk to you. That’s all.”

“About what?”

She took in a breath, then let it out just as Roscoe popped through the dog door and began to trot toward us. “Nothing,” she said, turning back to the water. “I mean, I miss you. We used to hang out every day, and then you just disappear. It’s weird.”

“I know,” I said. “And believe me, I’d go back to the way things were in a minute if I could. But it’s just not an option. This is my life now. At least for a little while.”

She considered this as she looked at the pond, then turned slightly, taking in the house rising up behind us. “It is different,” she said.

“Yeah,” I agreed. “It is.”

In the end, Peyton stayed for less than an hour, just long enough to get a tour, catch me up on the latest Jackson gossip, and turn down two more invitations to stay for dinner from Jamie, who seemed beside himself with the fact that I actually had a real, live friend. Cora, however, had a different take, or so I found out later, when I was folding clothes and looked up to see her standing in my bedroom doorway.

“So,” she said, “tell me about Peyton.”

I focused on pairing up socks as I said, “Not much to tell.”

“Have you two been friends a long time?”

I shrugged. “A year or so. Why?”

“No reason.” She leaned against the doorjamb, watching as I moved on to jeans. “She just seemed . . . sort of scattered, I guess. Not exactly your type.”