All the Little Lights(57)

“It was an honest mistake,” Tess assured me.

“I didn’t even check the book. I just assumed the noise upstairs was something weird, because weird is the norm around here.”

“Don’t say that. He’ll come back.”

“They never come back.” I peeked back at her. “Don’t go up there. Stay away from his room.”

She held up her hands. “What? Have I ever done anything to make you think I would? Why would you even say that to me?”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “Just don’t.”

“Maybe this house is getting inside of your head, not that there’s enough room in there. Seems like someone is monopolizing your thoughts.”

I tried not to smile. “You mean Elliott?”

“I mean Elliott,” Tess said, sitting on a barstool next to the island. She rested her chin in her hands. “What’s he like? I’ve seen him around. He’s sort of cute.”

“Sort of?”

“He’s a giant.”

“He’s not a giant. He’s just . . . tall and covered in muscles, and he makes me feel safe.”

“Safe,” Tess repeated.

“Tonight at the football game, he ran the ball for the winning touchdown. It was like a movie, Tess. His team rushed the field—the whole crowd did—and they lifted him in their arms. When they finally put him down, he looked for me in the crowd.”

I placed a rack of clean silverware and a stack of flat cloth napkins on the counter and began to roll them for the following morning.

Looking sleepy and content, Tess watched me work, waiting for me to tell the rest of the story.

“And he”—I covered my mouth, trying to hide the ridiculous grin on my face—“pointed at me and held up his hand like this,” I said, making the I love you sign.

“So he loves you?” Tess said, her eyes wide.

I shrugged. “He says he does.”

“And how do you feel?”

“I think . . . I love him, too. I wouldn’t know, though.”

“He graduates in May, Catherine.”

“So do I,” I said, smiling while rolling the last napkin.

“What are you saying? That you’re leaving? You can’t leave. You promised you’d stay.”

“I . . .” haven’t thought that far ahead. “No one said anything about leaving.”

“Does he want to stay?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t asked. Don’t start worrying about something you have no control over.”

She stood, tears threatening to fall. “You’re my only friend. If he loves you and you love him, too, you’re gonna leave. You’re gonna leave us. What are we supposed to do?”

“I’m not going anywhere. Calm down,” I said, worrying the commotion would wake Duke.

“Do you want to leave?” Tess asked.

I looked up at her, meeting her tearful gaze. In the few seconds before I spoke, I thought about lying, but Dad had always told me to be honest, even if it was hard—even if it hurt.

“I’ve always wanted to leave. Since I was little. Oak Creek isn’t home.”

Tess pressed her trembling lips together and then stormed out, slamming the front door behind her. I closed my eyes, waiting for the guest upstairs to pitch a fit about the intrusion and now the noise.

The kitchen was clean, so I made my way upstairs, closing my bedroom door behind me. I breathed on my hands and rubbed them together, deciding to retrieve the thick blanket from the closet. The once-white quilted down comforter was folded on a shelf above my clothes. I jumped to reach it, pulling it down and spreading it over my full-size bed.

The small white tiles on my bathroom floor felt like ice on my bare feet, and the water from the shower was freezing when I first turned the knob. Another icy Oklahoma winter was ahead, and I grumbled, remembering that just a few weeks ago, the sun would broil anyone not cowering in the shade.

The hot water took several minutes to reach the pipes in my upstairs bathroom, the old metal shaking and whining as the water changed temperature. I often wondered if the noise would wake anyone, but it never did.

Tess’s anger lingered in my mind, but I refused to feel guilty. I stepped under the warm water, fantasizing of summer air tangling my hair as Elliott and I drove in a convertible down to the gulf or maybe even the West Coast. Wherever we were, all I could see was highway and palm trees. He reached for my hand, sliding his fingers between mine. We were driving toward a place where summer never died, and when it became too hot, the ocean would provide a reprieve.

My fingers massaged shampoo into my hair as I envisioned our road trip, but the longer we drove, the darker the sky became, and the colder the wind. Elliott drove us down the California freeway, but he wasn’t smiling. We both shivered, realizing we were suddenly the last vehicle on the road. I turned to see that the houses on each side of us were all the same—the Juniper. We passed it again and again, and no matter how hard Elliott pressed on the gas, there it was. Night surrounded us, and the streetlamps extinguished one by one. Elliott seemed confused as the car sputtered and finally came to a rest in the middle of a barren two-lane overpass that seemed to loom over Los Angeles.

All the front doors of all the Junipers opened, and there stood Mama, something black smeared all over her face.