Where the Stars Still Shine(14)

“Okay, so where do you keep your clothes?” she asks, as she folds the T-shirt. I point to the red shirt I’m wearing and the green one in her hands.

“That’s it?”

“Yeah.”

“Wow, um—we really need to go shopping.” Kat pulls at her lower lip. “Okay, I have an idea. Take off your jeans.” She unbuttons the red plaid schoolgirl-style skirt she’s wearing, shimmies out of it, and then hands it to me. Besides taking coffee from strangers and oversharing about her home life, she also seems perfectly at ease standing around in her underwear. “Swap me.”

It takes longer for me to get out of my jeans. I haven’t worn a skirt since I was a little girl and I’m not sure I’m comfortable with having so much of me exposed. Still, I make the exchange. It seems easier to do this than think about my broken suitcase. I’m taller, but we’re about the same size, so her skirt fits me, and my jeans—although a little too long—fit her. She rolls up the hems.

Kat gives me the green T-shirt. “Put this on,” she says, then opens the door a crack. I hear the thump of a football being passed. “Nick, I need your socks.”

“They’re kind of busy right now,” he says. “Being on my feet and all.”

She snaps her fingers. “Socks. Now.”

By the time I get the shirt pulled over my head, Kat has Nick’s socks in her hand. They’re ankle-high white athletic-style with two green stripes around the top. She hands them to me. “Don’t worry,” she says. “He put them on clean before we came over.”

When I’m finished, Kat walks around me, surveying her fashion decisions. “You desperately need a haircut,” she says finally. My hair hangs beyond the middle of my back, a mess of snarled curls, unintentional dreadlocks, and brassy gold ends from a grown-out dye-job disguise that Mom insisted I needed. “But you look hot. In fact, I wouldn’t even do makeup. Just—” She rummages around in her purse until she unearths a Dr Pepper–flavored lip balm. “Use this. It’ll give you a hint of color.”

“Perfect,” she says, as I apply the balm. “Ready?”

“No.”

She laughs as if I’m joking and pulls me out into the backyard.

“Looking good, Cal,” Nick says, lobbing the football at Connor, who doesn’t even attempt to catch it. Instead, he stares at me with an expression I’ve seen on other faces. One that makes me want to turn around, but Kat is gripping my hand and I can’t. “And you look mighty fine in those jeans, kitty cat.”

She kisses Nick’s cheek, then uses her thumb to rub away the shine of her lip gloss on his skin. “Let’s go.”

Greg comes out of the house and his eyebrows pull together when he sees what I’m wearing. The skirt is shorter than anything I’ve ever worn. “Do you have your phone?” he asks.

I hold it up so he can see it. I’m not sure I remember how to use it, but I have it.

“Don’t be late,” he says, and I’m sure he’s already figured out we’re not going to watch Star Wars movies. “Call if you need me.”





“So what do you think of Connor?” Kat asks, as we stand at the kitchen island in the largest house I’ve ever seen. It belongs to a classmate of Kat’s whose parents are out of town. Except for the Ruskins’ house, every place I’ve lived in could fit into this house, all at the same time. And nearly every window has a view of the Gulf of Mexico. She pours a generous shot of coconut rum into a blue plastic cup and tops it off with a splash of pineapple juice. The countertop is littered with half-empty liquor bottles, a variety of sodas and juices, and blue cups like hers. And mine. Except mine contains the same beer I’ve been nursing since we got here.

“He’s—” Connor opened the car door for me when the four of us left Greg’s house and stammered that I looked pretty. Not enough information to form an opinion. “He seems nice.”

“He totally is.” Kat nods. “He’s super shy, but he really likes you.”

I glance up and he’s staring at me again. It’s not predatory, the way he looks at me. Nor is it the same as the other night with Alex Kosta, when the air between us felt alive. Kat is wrong. Connor doesn’t know me so he can’t really like me. He likes looking at my face. He likes the shape of my body. There is a difference.

“You should go talk to him,” she says, as Nick comes up with a fish-shaped tray filled with tiny plastic cups.

“Ladies, have a shot.”

Kat picks one up and sniffs it. “What is it?”

“I call it a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster,” he says. The Hitchhiker’s Guide reference makes me laugh. “But basically, it’s vodka, lemon juice, and sugar.”

She hands one to me and raises hers in a toast. “To Callie”—she leans in close to me and lowers her voice—“and Connor.”

I roll my eyes.

“To life, the universe, and everything,” Nick says.

The vodka makes my eyes sting, but the shot makes me feel warm inside. It makes me want to have another. A million. As many as it takes to feel this way all the time.

Nick places the fish tray of shots on the countertop and slides his arm around Kat’s waist. “Wanna go in the hot tub with me, kitty cat?”