Wicked Restless (Harper Boys #2)(9)

“You said average was eight falls. I’m pretty sure I fell way more than eight times,” she laughs, holding herself along the railing until she finds a bench to sit at.

“Yeah, but you fell…like…way better than most people,” I joke. She tosses her hair over her shoulder as she raises one leg to unlace her skate, and I get a little lost in watching her move. She leans forward to catch the line of my eyesight to bring me back.

“Show me what you can do,” she says. I bunch my brow, not sure what she means. “Out there. Just…I don’t know. Skate a lap or something? I want to see if my teacher is all talk.”

I laugh and shake my head, a little embarrassed by her attention, maybe a little nervous about flirting, too. When my eyes meet hers, she raises her eyebrows in expectation.

“Yeah?” I ask, not sure if showing off is a good thing.

“Please? Just one lap,” she says, and I’m struck by the word please. I’m pretty sure that’s all it would take for me to do anything for her—anything at all…ever.

“A’right,” I say, bending forward and pulling my laces a little tighter. A few girls have entered the rink, and they’re spinning in the middle, tracing lines and working on footwork. I’ve always been more impressed with what they can do. Me—I’m just fast. Those girls—they’re full of grace and beauty. Nothing beautiful about what I do at all.

I skate backward, watching Emma as she tiptoes to the glass to watch me more closely. My heart begins to race knowing her eyes are on me. I move to one corner and skid to a stop before shrugging my shoulders at her. This isn’t very impressive, but it’s what I’ve got, so I take off quickly to the other end of the rink, stopping fast and sprinting back to where I started, repeating the move again, then pausing at the other end. I wait a few seconds to catch my breath, then glide toward and away from her in circles, like I do when I’m playing defense, and eventually end back at the exit gate where she’s clapping.

“Okay,” she laughs. “That…was skating. I see the difference now. I was falling. You…you were skating.”

I laugh with her, sliding into the bench to pull off my skates. “My brothers were good teachers,” I say. There’s a simple smile spanning the space between the pink of her cheeks. It’s not fake or uncomfortable, but rather exactly the opposite—like the kind of smile you give someone who gets you and your story without even asking. I stare at it a little too long, though, and she starts to let her hands twist in her lap again, nerves creeping back in. It gets quiet when I slide my feet from my skates, and when I grab her blades to return them to the rental counter, she waits for me by the door.

I’ve only had her for an hour, and I’m not ready to give her up yet.

“You know, Illinois is way different from Delaware,” I say when I meet up to her again, holding the door open and fighting the instinct to put my arm around her as I did on the ice. “You should probably get the full tour of Woodstock from a local.”

“I was thinking the same thing. I wouldn’t want to wander into the wrong woods or something like that,” she grins at me from one side of her mouth.

“Precisely,” I mimic, holding the car door open, the muscles in my cheeks working hard to keep the excitement I feel—over the fact that she wants more time with me—from fully taking over my face. If I gave in, I’m pretty sure my feet would dance with anticipation.

I pull out from the rink’s parking lot in the opposite direction from the one we came, and I take us to the outskirts of town first, pointing out the lake that sometimes freezes over, the homes that are older than hers, if not quite as big, and the Old Town shops around the main square. After we hit the touristy stuff, I drive through a few of the woodsy areas, along the edge of the industrial strip and past the warehouse where my father worked. I don’t tell her about him then, but when I pull up to the edge of the Wilson Apple Orchard about ten minutes later, she asks.

“Is it true?”

Everyone has their own way of asking about our story. Some people gossip and whisper, others are more direct—hugging me, touching my arm, offering sympathy and grief counseling even if it’s fifteen years later than I really need it. The funny thing is, though, that few people actually really ask for the story. Most assume.

I shift the gear into park just outside the orchard driveway gates, the festival season long past and most of the trees starting to show their winter branches. My fingers grip over the top of the steering wheel as I breathe in slowly, then exhale, noticing the slight trail of fog my breath creates as it threatens to leave a steamy circle on the window. I push the heater up one level before resting my arms over the steering wheel, laying my head flat against them and looking at her next to me.

She’s beautiful. And I want this one to be the girl—the one I remember. And my sad family history is going to ruin it. But she asked. So I’m going to tell her.

My lips tight, I force a smile, not wanting to make anything about this moment sad, despite the history I’m going to share. She twists in her seat to face me slightly, unbuckling her seatbelt so she can bring her knee up to her chest.

“I’ve only ever heard the stories, too. I was one, maybe, when my dad died. He was sick. He had bipolar disorder, and his brain—it made a lot of things up. He wasn’t taking his medicine, and nobody knows exactly why he stepped from the Ferris-wheel carriage. But he wasn’t well when it happened. That’s the one truth I know for certain. My brother and mom, they don’t talk about him much,” I say, turning my head to look down at my lap. “I think what really happened is a secret that will forever be kept between my father’s ghost and a five-year-old Owen.”