Once and for All(23)
“A common reaction,” he replied. “I’ll win you over. Eventually.”
She looked at me, flabbergasted. All I could say was, “I know.”
The door slid open again. This time, all I could see was an arm, a boa wrapped around it. Was it Grace? Bag of chips? Another girl? I hated that I was actually curious. “Am-brose! Where are you?”
“I guess that’s my cue.” He sat up, brushing his hands off. Then to me, he said, “You okay? All better now?”
If only, I thought. Was there even such a thing? I could feel Jilly watching me, aware of this moment, or whatever it was, between his question and my answer. “I’m fine,” I said. “Thanks again.”
“No problem.” He stood up, running a hand through his hair, then did a little bow to Jilly. “Lovely making your acquaintance.”
“You, too,” she replied, obviously guarded.
“See? You’re coming around.” He grinned, then turned on one foot, slid his hands in his pockets, and started to the door, where all the boas were now gathered, a wall of girl, waiting for him. He raised his arms, giving a fanfare as they all hooted, then reached to pull him in.
Jilly looked pensive as she took a seat on my other side. “Is it weird that I am strangely attracted to him, even as I dislike him totally?”
“Yes,” I said flatly.
“I figured. He’s not really my type anyway,” she decided. “Too good-looking, and he knows it. Not to mention he just screams of asshole.”
“You think?” I asked.
“Don’t you?”
If she’d posed this question earlier that day, or even at the wedding where we’d first met, my answer certainly would have been yes. Ambrose was cocky, entirely too confident in his own charm. He had little or no regard for other people’s time or feelings and was about as shallow in his “intentions” as anyone I’d ever met. And now he was most likely working each one of those boa girls against the others, adding to his list.
And yet, I couldn’t deny what had happened on the dance floor earlier. It wasn’t how Ambrose appeared when, in my panic, everything had gone wavery, that whooshing about to begin in my ears that would take me down. Nor was it the way he’d sat with me afterward, peppering the night with his prattle as I tried to fill my lungs with air. Instead, it was a beat in between, something small: when he took my hand and began to pull me out of the crowd, and I felt myself—my prickly, antisocial self—squeeze his fingers once, tightly. He squeezed back. Like a question and then an answer or call and response, without either of us saying a word.
I stayed at the party for another hour or so, for Jilly more than myself. I had pledged to make memories; I wanted to at least try to have them be good ones. So we danced, just the two of us, and toasted our futures with beer from a fresh keg when it arrived. I didn’t see Ambrose again, although I had to admit I did look for him every time I saw a flash of pink feathers in my peripheral vision.
At three thirty a.m., we piled into a rideshare with some guys Jilly knew and headed home with all the windows down, the night pouring in. I was dropped off second, and my house was dark. Once inside, I could see William asleep on the couch, where he often crashed when he and my mom stayed up talking late. His shoes were off, arms folded over his chest; he literally slept like a dead person. I picked the afghan off a nearby chair, shaking it out, then covered him. He didn’t budge.
I knew I should be tired too, as I’d been up close to twenty-four hours straight. But even under the covers in my cool room with the fan on, I wasn’t able to sleep. Finally, I picked up my phone from where it was charging on the nightstand and opened up one of my news apps. The story was right at the top, as I knew it would be, the featured picture that of a brick building, ambulances lined up beside it. I scrolled down past the bullet points of the story, then the introduction, looking for the only words that mattered to me.
ELIZABETH HAWKINS, 17.
DEMETRIOUS BARCLAY, 16.
SIERRA COPELAND, 17.
MARCUS SHEFFIELD, 15.
WILLA MARTIN, 16.
In the coming days, there would be pictures, remembrances, funerals. But tonight, there were just these names, no faces yet to match, the barest of bare facts. That was the way it was when it wasn’t personal, when your own heart didn’t lurch at the sight of that particular combination of letters. When they were just other people’s children, brothers, sisters, loved ones.
ETHAN CARUSO, 17, seven months earlier, was different. He had been mine.
CHAPTER
6
THE SAND was chilly on my feet as I stepped onto it that August night. With the music still audible from the patio, I hooked the straps of my shoes onto my thumb, then slid my phone into the pocket of my dress. Ahead, the beach was flat and dark, dotted with the lights from hotels and, farther along, houses. Thinking I’d only go a little way before I turned around, I started walking.
If he hadn’t been wearing that white shirt, bright almost to the point of glowing, I might not have even seen him. But he was. The boy who had asked me to dance, standing by the water’s edge. I couldn’t miss him. No, more than that. I can never picture him in anything else.
The real surprise, though, was that he saw me. When you come across someone on the beach at night, contemplating the ocean, you don’t exactly interrupt. It’s one of those unwritten rules. So I’d just walked behind him, keeping my head down, when I heard him say, “All done for the night?”