Lock and Key(101)

“I gotta go,” he said to me, over the flowers. “But I’ll see you tonight, okay? Seven, at the pond. Don’t be late.”

I nodded and shut the door. He already had his phone back to his ear as he pulled into traffic. As he drove off, all I could see were a bunch of heart-shaped balloons in the back window, bobbing and swaying, first to one side, then back again.

Jamie and Cora were out for dinner—in the midst of a wave, no doubt—so I was alone, sitting at the kitchen table, my stupid gift card in hand, when the clock over the stove flipped to seven o’clock.

I stood up, sliding it into my pocket, then ran a hand through my hair as I stepped out onto the patio, Roscoe rousing himself from his dog bed to follow along behind me. Outside, the air was cold, the lights from Nate’s pool and house visible over the fence.

Call it a bad feeling. Or just the logical conclusion to an unavoidable situation. But I think I knew, even before that first fifteen minutes passed with no sign of him, that he wasn’t just late, something was wrong. Before my fingers— even jammed into the pockets of my new jacket—began to get numb, before Roscoe abandoned me for the warmth of the house, before another set of lights came up from the opposite side, lighting up the trees briefly before cutting off and leaving me in darkness again. It was eight fifteen when I saw Cora appear in the patio doorway, cupping a hand over her eyes. A moment later, she stuck her head out.

“Are you okay?” she said. “It’s freezing out there.”

“How was dinner?” I asked her.

“Fantastic.” She glanced behind her at Jamie, who was walking into the kitchen with one of those leftover containers shaped into a swan. “You should hear this CD he made for me. It’s—”

“I’ll be in soon,” I told her. “Just a couple more minutes.”

She nodded slowly. “Okay,” she said. “Don’t wait too long, though.”

But I already had. And not just that hour and fifteen minutes, but every moment that had passed since Thanksgiving, when I should have told Nate I couldn’t just stand by and worry about him. Instead, though, I had let months pass, pushing down my better instincts, and now, sitting out in the February chill, I was getting exactly what I deserved.

When I finally went inside, I tried to distract myself with homework and TV, but instead I kept looking over at Nate’s house, and his window, which I could see clearly from my own. Behind the shade, I could see a figure moving back and forth. After a little while, it stopped, suddenly so still that I wondered if it was really anyone at all.

It was over an hour later when the phone rang. Cora and Jamie were downstairs, eating wave-two chocolates out of the box and listening to her CD, their voices and the music drifting up to me. I didn’t even look at the caller ID, lying back on my bed instead, but then Jamie was calling my name. I looked at the receiver for a minute, then hit the TALK button. “Hello?”

“I know you’re probably pissed,” Nate said. “But meet me outside, okay?”

I didn’t say anything, not that it mattered. He’d hung up, the dial tone already buzzing in my ear.

Billie Holiday was playing as I went downstairs and back outside, retracing my steps across the grass, which felt stiff and ungiving beneath my feet. This time, I didn’t sit, instead crossing my arms over my chest as Nate emerged from the shadows. He had one hand behind his back, a smile on his face.

“Okay,” he said, before he’d even gotten to me, “I know that me being over two hours late was not exactly the surprise you were expecting. But today was crazy, I just now got home, and I’ll make it up to you. I promise.”

We were in the swath of darkness between the lights from his house and those of Cora’s, so it was hard to make out all the details of his face. But even so, I could tell there was something off: a nervous quality, something almost jittery. “You’ve been home,” I told him. “I saw your light was on.”

“Yeah, but we had stuff to do,” he said easily, although now he was slowing his steps. “I had to put things away, get the accounts all settled. And then, you know, I had to wrap this.”

He pulled his hand out from behind his back, extending a small box to me, tied with a simple bow. “Nate,” I said.

“Go ahead,” he told me. “It won’t make it all better. But it might help a little bit.”

I took the box but didn’t open it. Instead, I sat down on the bench, holding it between my knees, and a moment later he came and sat down beside me. Now closer, I could see his neck was flushed, the skin pink around his collar. “I know you’ve been home for a couple of hours,” I said quietly. “What was going on over there?”

He slid one leg over the bench, turning to face me. “Nothing. Hey, we’ve got two hours left of Valentine’s Day. So just open your gift, and let’s make the most of it.”

“I don’t want a gift,” I said, and my voice sounded harsher than I meant it to. “I want you to tell me what happened to you tonight.”

“I got held up dealing with my dad,” he replied. “That’s all.”

“That’s all,” I repeated.

“What else do you want me to say?”

“Do you understand how worried I’ve been about you? How I’ve sat over here all night, looking at your house, wondering if you’re okay?”