The Moon and More(20)
Author: Sarah Dessen

5

I ONLY CHEWED gum when I was nervous, and could always gauge the stress level of anything by how many sticks it took to calm me down. Sitting outside the Reef Room that evening waiting for my father and Benji, I was up to four and counting.

This was not where I wanted to be. It had been a long day, and Morris and I had planned to go to the movies, then meet Daisy when her shift ended to hit whatever parties were going on down at the Tip. Instead, I was in my car with a sore jaw, wondering how dirty a person could actually get from cleaning pools all day.

I hadn’t planned to bring reinforcements, figuring this would be weird enough without throwing anyone else into the mix. But then, as I was leaving my house, I panicked.

“Are you chewing gum?” was the first thing Luke said to me when I finally got hold of him. I’d already left two what I’d hoped were casual-sounding voice mails, but clearly he could hear the Big Red in my voice.

“What’s weird about that?” I shot back, entirely defensive. “You chew gum sometimes, you know.”

He was quiet for a moment, so I could fully absorb how crazy I sounded. Then he said, “What’s going on?”

I told him. And opened another piece. By the time I’d stuffed it into my mouth, he’d assured me he would get back to his house, take the fastest shower possible, and meet me as soon as he could. Now, though, as a Subaru wagon with Connecticut plates pulled into the lot, I knew it wasn’t soon enough.

I hadn’t seen my father since the previous September, when he, Benji, and Leah were down over Labor Day weekend. They’d stayed at Miss Ruth’s, although she’d already moved to an assisted living facility by then, and we’d had dinner together at this same restaurant. I was in the thick of my pre-application madness then, so my father and I spent much of the meal strategizing. So much so that I’d actually felt kind of bad for Leah and Benji, who, clearly not as enthused about the subject of power essays and early admissions as we were, left to take a walk on the pier when they’d had enough. I had to admit, though, I’d liked having his full attention, as well as this project in common. I was happy to share anything, actually, other than our weird, somewhat shameful origin story.

Fast-forward to April, and that last e-mail, followed by the long stretch of silence, and the memory took on a different tinge. As he parked a few rows over, I opened another stick of gum. But with my jaw already aching, one cheek protruding, for once I knew better than to make a bad situation worse. So I put the stick on the dash instead, then spit my wad of gum into a tissue. Without it, my mouth suddenly felt light and huge, like I could say anything.

I’d just gotten out of my car when I saw Theo, the guy from Sand Dollars. Just my luck. He was climbing out of a white van a few spaces over, a cell phone pressed to his ear.

“Right,” I heard him say as I shut my door. “Two orders of the chicken satay, the big Caesar with no olives, one Margherita pizza. Got it. Anything else?”

If I started towards the restaurant now, he’d see me, and I had enough on my mind. So I stalled as he passed, checking my reflection in my fingerprint-smudged back window. Who had been touching the outside of my car like this? It was tempting to blame Morris, but I knew that was just reflex.

“Emaline?”

Crap, I thought, even as I arranged a surprised look on my face and turned to face him. “Oh, hi,” I said. “Theo. Right?”

He nodded. “We have to stop meeting like this.”

It was a weird line, which—judging by the slight flush over his face—I was pretty sure he realized about the same time I did. It made him look kind of cute, though: like embarrassment worked for him. “So,” I said, “how’s the Clyde project going?”

“Good, really good,” he replied, stepping aside so a BMW searching for a space could pass on his right. “We’ve gotten some great interviews with locals this week. Up until now there’d been a lot of resistance, for whatever reason.”

“Really.”

He nodded. “Ivy says it’s often like that in rural areas when you come in asking questions. There’s a sense of protectiveness of the subject, a need to keep away outsiders.”

“Or maybe,” I said, “it’s just that nobody has anything to say.”

“Oh, I doubt that.” He brushed a hand through his hair. “Clyde Conaway has a real story. Even if part of it is that no one wants to tell it. Actually, I was thinking that I needed to get in touch—”

“Emaline!”

I turned, and there was Benji, about a foot taller than the last time I saw him, running in that sloppy, ten-year-old way right towards me. He was grinning and his hair was too long, hanging in his face. When he was about an arm’s length away, he launched himself right at me, throwing his arms around my waist.

“Hey,” I said, surprised by this sudden show of affection. Benji had always been sweet, but we’d seen each other only a handful of times, each separated by multiple months. “How are you?”

“Good,” he said, still hugging me tight. I looked over his head, to the Subaru, where my father was standing watching us, his keys in one hand. As soon as our eyes met, he started walking, as if he had to be sure it was me first. “We’ve been in the car forever.”

“I bet.” I ruffled his hair, because that’s what you do with kids this age (I thought). Must be, because he loosened his grip, stepped back, then looked squarely at Theo. I had not been planning any introductions, but now they seemed unavoidable.

“Um,” I said, very much aware of my father coming ever closer, “this is my brother, Benji. Benji, this is Theo.”

They exchanged hellos, and then my father was joining us. Unlike Benji, he didn’t look all that different from the last time we were here. Same black-framed glasses, same kind of clothes: a white button-down shirt, jeans and loafers, no socks. “Hello,” he said to me, and then somehow we were hugging, quickly and awkwardly. “How are you?”

“Good,” I said, already stepping back. “How was the trip?”

“Great. The hardest part was getting out of the city. The GW was backed up for miles.”

Theo smiled. “It always is.”

My father looked at him for a moment, then extended his hand. “Luke, right?”

“Actually, no,” I said quickly. “This is Theo. He’s down for the summer.”

“From the city,” my father said, clarifying.