Letters to Nowhere(7)

“Oh God!” slipped out of my mouth as my eyes unwillingly traveled up to the brunette’s hair, which was covering Jordan’s face and keeping me from seeing their mouths locked together. “Sorry— God…uh…totally sorry.”

I dove into the safety of the kitchen, wanting nothing but to crawl under the table and never come out. Instead, I knelt down on the floor and stuck my head in a cabinet full of pots and pans, pretending to look for something really important. I could hear voices talking softly, then the girl’s laughter, followed by the front door closing. A few seconds later, Jordan was in the kitchen, flinging open the fridge as if nothing had happened.

My face was hotter than hell and I must have looked like one big mess of chalk dust and sweat, but I wasn’t too chicken to at least apologize. I mean, this was his house and I’d just walked right in. I should have knocked or something. The key was probably for emergencies, like when nobody was home. Why else would Jordan lock the front door while he was inside? Obviously he had wanted to prevent situations like these.

“Um, sorry,” I said, standing quickly and turning to lean my back against the counter. “I should have knocked or rang the doorbell or something.”

He shrugged and tossed several items from the fridge onto the counter. “Don’t sweat it. She had to leave, anyway.”

“It won’t happen again,” I promised, crossing my fingers that he wouldn’t find something to complain about to Coach Bentley and have me shipped off to the Grandma’s or Blair’s house. Mrs. Martin was too much of a mom and Mr. Martin too much of a dad. I wouldn’t last a day in that house.

Jordan gave me a lopsided grin that was too genuine to be fake. “It’s fine. Really.”

It occurred to me, right then, that maybe he was concerned about me getting him in trouble. He had gotten caught in a pretty intense make–out session.

Coach Bentley had left a huge stack of forms for me to fill out, finalizing my change of address and insurance and a whole bunch of small details that no one ever thinks about when they decide to live with a nonrelative. I grabbed a pen and sat at the tiny kitchen table, which I just noticed had only two chairs, and went to work on filling in my social security number five hundred times. My stomach continued to grumble as I worked. I hadn’t eaten since eleven thirty, right after morning practice, and it was now nearly eight at night. I gulped down half of my water bottle while Jordan continued to mess around in the fridge and kitchen cabinets.

Eventually, he sat down across from me, holding two plates, each containing a sandwich. He slid a plate over to my side of the table. “I made you one, too. Thought you might be hungry.”

Okay, he’s definitely worried about me squealing on him. I stared at the deadly–thick, forbidden slices of white bread wrapped around cheese and meat. Would it be rude to ask for whole wheat pita bread?

Jordan jumped up and grabbed a can of Coke from the fridge, offering me one. I shook my head and nodded toward my water bottle resting beside my plate. He drank half the soda in about five seconds and started on his sandwich.

A hunger headache was already forming, along with an allergic reaction to paperwork. I rubbed my temples and sighed before finally conceding, throwing out any amount of manners I’d been taught in my sixteen years. I tossed the top piece of bread off my sandwich and removed both slices of cheddar cheese, setting them beside the bread before picking up a slice of turkey and munching on it, my focus still on the paper in front of me.

I could feel Jordan’s gaze on me, but he didn’t comment. Not a word. Not that I was really surprised. You could practically hear his internal debate in the near silence, always returning to the same words that followed me everywhere…dead parents, dead parents, dead parents. It wasn’t like he could ask me why I was acting so weird and get a better answer than…dead parents.

And nobody wants you to actually say that answer out loud. In fact, most people would do everything in their power to avoid hearing me speak those words. I could probably get away with murder. Or kidnapping. Or underage drinking.

Coach Bentley came home when I had just finished my third slice of turkey and Jordan was down to only the crusts of his sandwich. Bentley stood in the kitchen, sifting through a stack of mail in his hands, not looking up at either of us.

“Did you make it to practice okay?” he finally asked me. “Jordan was here when you got home, I hope?”

I swallowed my last bite of turkey, washing it down with a large gulp of water, while Jordan’s eyebrows lifted, waiting for my answer. “I got to practice just fine. And he was here when Stevie dropped me off.”

I could have sworn I heard Jordan let out a breath, but I wasn’t sure. Coach Bentley nodded his approval and started to walk out of the kitchen. He stopped suddenly and moved toward the table when he saw me picking a fourth piece of turkey out of my sandwich.

“I’m sorry,” Coach Bentley said quickly. “I didn’t think to ask what you liked to eat. McDonald’s is around the corner. I’ll run and grab you something else.”

Wow, he really is the complete opposite of Coach Cordes.

I scrambled to put the sandwich back together and tapped the pen nervously against the table. “It’s not that I don’t like it.” I spun halfway around to face him. “But some of it’s not on the diet and…” I trailed off, hoping this would spark some kind of recognition.