In Your Dreams

CHAPTER 5



Kayla scowls, her eyes darting away as if she’s just remembered she doesn’t like me. She scoots closer to Kieran on the bleacher bench and shoves herself against him to wake him up.

“I guess is the first time you’ve seen them?” I ask my family. I don’t need to wonder how they figured out the kids were the Laniers, since Kieran and Kayla would have been the only two people sitting on the Titusville side of the gym they didn’t already know. Plus, I told them about Kieran’s condition, so the sight of a sleeping boy in the bleachers would be a dead giveaway.

“It’s been so cold I haven’t been out much,” Gramps says, referring to how he likes to kind of putter around on the porch and in the front yard when the weather’s warmer. “I think I’ve seen him—the father—drive by a few times, probably on his way to and from Sumner.”

“We wanted to give them some time to get settled in before we started being all neighborly,” Gram adds, “being neighborly” meaning bringing over baked goods and invites to sewing circle, book club, writing group, or one of the other thousands of activities Gram’s involved in around town and in Sumner. “Tonight’s as good a night to meet them as any, I suppose.”

Up in the stands, Kieran’s woken up and Kayla’s working herself into her coat. My guess is there’s no way they’d want to hang out with my family, much less the Booster Club, the team, and team’s families, but I can’t really say that.

“Sure. I’ll ask. Then I’ll go clean up and meet you in the cafeteria, okay?”

Gram and Gramps bob their heads and turn to head off the court, but my mom catches me by the arm. “He’s cute,” she hisses in my ear as she stares up at Kieran. “How come you didn’t tell me how cute he was?”

“I am so not having this conversation with you right now.”

“Well, I’m just surprised you never said anything. I mean, I kind of wondered when you kept talking about this boy all the time, but I had no idea—”

“I don’t talk about him all the time, so calm down,” I warn. “Anyway, aren’t you always telling me you’re cool if I don’t date until I’m thirty?”

“Assuming he’s a nice guy,” Mom starts as the Laniers descend the bleachers, “I’ll make an exception for someone who looks like him. That guy just screams ‘Hot Prom Date’.”

This is an unreal amount of gross even from my mom, whose talent for embarrassing me knows no bounds. “Please stop,” I beg. “Kieran and I are just friends, but maybe you should ask him out if you think he’s so hot. I’ll put in a good word for you.”

“Thanks. I think he’s a little young for me, though.”

“Well, he should be turning eighteen soon. I’ll even help you pick out a Prom dress if you want, although I don’t know if you’re allowed to go to Prom as someone’s date when you’re older than most of the chaperones.”

Mom ignores this last dig. “Shut it, Zip—they’re coming.”

We flash broad smiles as the siblings make their way to the gym floor. Kayla turns in the direction of the outside entrance, but Kieran grabs her coat sleeve, gently pulling her back as he starts walking toward us.

Mom takes two steps forward and holds out her hand. “Hi. April Shipman. You must be Kieran.”

“Nice to meet you. This is my sister, Kayla.”

Kieran nudges Kayla forward, and she offers my mom one of her trademarked bland smiles along with her hand. “Nice to meet you, Ms. Shipman,” she says in that breathy voice of hers.

“Please—call me April.”

We fall into the awkward silence of four people trying to think of small talk subjects until Kieran saves us. “Good game. I mean, what I saw of it was a good game.”

“Thanks,” I say.

Mom smiles at him and elbows me in the ribs. “Well, Zip’s grandparents are probably wondering where I am,” she says. “You know, when they walked out to the cafeteria, I said I’d be right behind them.”

On her obnoxious emphasis of the word cafeteria, I draw in a breath. “So, there’s this…thing. Sort of a party, I guess. The Booster Club’s got food and stuff set up for the team, and we can bring people with us if you wanted to hang out for a while.”

Kayla opens her mouth but doesn’t get a syllable out before Kieran answers for them both. “Sounds great. Thanks.”

“Awesome,” Mom chimes in. “Well, Zip’s got to get cleaned up, so why don’t you two come with me?”

Kieran gives Mom one of his crooked grins while Kayla bites her lower lip, and I suspect she’d rather be forced to cut her own leg out of a bear trap than have to spend five minutes with my family.

“See you in a few,” I say, turning to jog off to the locker room while Mom steers Kieran and Kayla out the main gym doors towards the cafeteria.

After a brief team meeting to deconstruct the game, I hit the showers. Knowing my family would probably insist on staying for the Booster Club party, I brought jeans and a sweater to change into instead of sweats, although now that Kieran and Kayla are coming, too, I sort of wish I’d packed something a little more glam than an old black cable knit, remembering the pretty royal blue belted cardigan Kayla chose to wear tonight. I get dressed and tuck my damp hair back behind my ears with a black cotton headband before stuffing my sweaty uniform and warm-ups into my gym bag, grabbing my coat, and rushing down the hall to the cafeteria where the party is already in full swing.

Bad pop music blares over the PA system, and the Boosters have strung the white cinder block walls with blue and yellow streamers and balloons, a “Congratulations Lady Titans” banner hanging over the area where students usually stand in line to buy food. About half of the tables that would be occupied by gossiping kids during the week now hold players, families, boyfriends, and, in some cases, random friends who happened to be invited, like Kieran and Kayla. I find my family sitting toward the front of the cafeteria at a table already littered with half eaten food and empty drink cups. Mom and Gram have cornered Kieran, while Gramps finds himself completely mismatched with Kayla, given that he’s Mr. Personality and she’s apparently trying to see how little she can say to people and get away with it.

“So, given much though to college, Kayla?” Gramps asks as I slide into the seat next to him.

“Some.”

“Well, I know you just moved to the area, but you should take a look at Sumner. Great town, good school, strong liberal arts curriculum. I don’t know what you’re interested in majoring in but—”

“Give the girl a break, Dad,” Mom interrupts, rolling her eyes for Kayla’s benefit. “Sorry, Kayla. He’s retired from the art department, so he likes to talk the place up. I’m sure you’re learning everything you need to know about Sumner from your dad.”

Kayla shifts her stare to the table, clearly uncomfortable, which I don’t get considering she’s gorgeous enough that she’s probably been the center of attention for most of her life. Tonight, her sweater magnifies the blue in her eyes and makes her black hair seem even darker than usual, but her thin lips hold a tight smile that I’ve come to recognize as the smile of endurance, the smile of “I’m only putting up with this stupid crap because I have to.”

“Zip tells me you’re an athlete,” Gramps tries.

“Track.”

“Running or field events?”

“Running.”

“Long distance or sprint?”

“Distance.”

I glance over at Kieran. His eyes flutter as he struggles to stay awake in the warm room, but he still manages to give me a sly smile at his sister’s behavior. As I wonder when Gramps is going to crack after getting so many clipped responses, my Mom pipes up with “Honey, you should go get some food before it’s all gone. I’m sure you’re hungry.”

My stomach must hear her, as hunger gnaws at me for the first time since entering the cafeteria. “Okay,” I agree, standing. “Anybody need anything?” Heads shake all around, and so I head to the food table near the windows, but before I can start loading the plastic plate, my mom’s at my arm.

“Hey. We’re leaving soon,” she whispers.

“But I just got here,” I say back at normal volume.

“Not you. I mean Gram and Gramps and me. I put my car keys in your coat pocket and I’m going to ride home with them,” she explains, since Gram and Gramps had come to the game from some club meeting or other while Mom and I drove straight from our house. I don’t immediately say anything, so she continues, “Go out with your friends tonight. Celebrate. Hang out with this boy and have a good time—he seems like a great kid.”

Kieran is officially the first guy to receive my mother’s stamp of approval, probably because he’s the first guy I’ve shown an interest in beyond choosing partners for two-on-two basketball games.

“Don’t have too good of a time, though,” she corrects herself. “You know the rules. No crazy stuff, and call if you’re going to be out past midnight, okay?”

“Got it.”

She leans in and plants a kiss on my cheek. “I’m proud of you, Zip. Tonight and every night.”

“Get out of here before you start crying,” I say through a sigh, watching her tear up. She blinks and gives me one last kiss before walking back to the table, where my grandparents are putting on their coats and saying their goodbyes to Kieran and Kayla. After I load up my plate, several boosters and parents of my teammates stop me to offer congratulations and tell me what a good game I had, and rather than waiting for me to struggle through the crowd back to my seat, my grandparents make their way to the middle of the cafeteria to hug me good night as best they can with me holding a plate of food.

Once my grandparents have gone and everyone else has left me alone, I cross the cafeteria back to Kayla and Kieran. Kayla’s standing behind her chair, coat on, while Kieran sits picking at some potato chips.

“So,” Kayla begins, “we were just about to—”

“We were just about to stay here and talk with Zip while she eats. Right, Kayla?” Kieran interrupts, shooting Kayla a look of fake innocence that she matches with a death glare.

“We told Mom and Dad we’d be home right after the game,” she says, her voice hard with warning. “We’ve probably been out too long already.”

Kieran hitches up his shoulders and nods down at the bit of food left on his plate. “Go home then. I’m still eating.”

“Kieran…”

“Kayla.” He mimics her whine. “Seriously. If you want to leave, leave. I can get a ride with Zip, right?”

“Yeah,” I say, not really wanting to get in the middle of this building sibling squabble, but not wanting to be a jerk about giving Kieran a ride, either.

“So what am I supposed to tell Mom and Dad, genius?” Kayla asks, folding her arms across her stomach. “You’re out with some strange girl they’ve never met? They’ll love that.”

I have to bite back a laugh at Kayla, of all people, calling me some strange girl.

Kieran picks at his potato chips again. “Well, yeah,” he tells his sister, not looking up from his plate. “You can tell them I’m out with a really nice girl. Tell them I have a real live friend for once and I actually want to hang out like a regular kid. Tell them I got kidnapped by aliens. I don’t know—tell them whatever you want. I don’t care. Worry about yourself for once in your stupid life.”

Kayla’s mouth falls open as if she’s trying to swallow the right words out of the hot air of the cafeteria to spit back at Kieran, but she presses her lips together instead, shooting me a look so sharp and severe, I feel like I’m being cut open. She turns on her heel and storms away from us, pushing past a small group consisting of Cassie, Lauren, Bill, Ashley, and Brad Wallace standing near the cafeteria doors. They stop whatever conversation they’re having as Kayla whizzes by, her speed twisting them around as if they’re weathervanes spinning on top of a barn.

“So, your sister hates me,” I tell Kieran, putting my plate down on the table and deciding now is as good a time as any to get Kayla’s icy treatment of me out in the open with at least one of the Laniers, if not the one I should be confronting.

“She doesn’t hate you,” Kieran says through a tiny laugh as I pull out a chair and sit down across from him.

“Well, she sure doesn’t like me very much.”

Kieran shrugs and proceeds to contradict himself. “Kayla hates everybody. That’s who she is. It’s, like, a defense mechanism or something.”

“Against what?” I ask, shoveling in a few potato chips.

“Everything, pretty much. It’s her protector thing, I think. She’s seen me get made fun of or ignored enough times she’s put up this wall around both of us to keep the haters away. It’s like she’s so used to being pissed off at people it’s her permanent state of existence at this point. Don’t take it personally.”

“She called me some strange girl,” I point out after a bite of turkey sandwich. “Hard not to take that personally.”

“Again, Kayla being Kayla. She’s probably just having a hard time adjusting to someone being nice to me for once. And, anyway, you are a strange girl.” He flashes that grin at me and I almost take pride in Kayla’s description. “I mean that in the best way possible, of course. I like strange girls—strange girls with unique nicknames in particular.”

“Thanks.” On the outside, I’m giving him a snarky smile, but inside, my heart’s racing because I’m not used to guys flirting with me.

“You’re welcome,” he says, stealing a chip from my plate since he’s finished all of his. “Seriously, though, don’t stress about Kayla. She’ll come around. We’ve never had close friends, and neither have my mom and dad. We don’t have one of those houses where people come over and hang out, and my parents don’t socialize a whole lot. It’s always sort of been us against the world for some reason—my condition, I guess.”

Unsure of what to say, I turn my attention back to my food, and Kieran watches me eat in silence. After I’m done, I look around and notice the crowd’s thinned out. A few of my teammates stand around in the main hall, probably making plans for the rest of the evening, while several adults linger at the cafeteria tables—Booster Club members, I assume, who would have to stick around and clean up after everyone.

“We should probably go,” he tells me, seeing that we’re alone with a bunch of adults. “Hanging with you all night would be fun given what’s probably waiting for me at home, but I’m guessing I shouldn’t push this whole ‘Ditching My Sister’ thing too hard on the first try.”

We put our coats on, and Kieran picks up our plates and cups while I grab my gym bag and sling it over my shoulder. Kieran dumps our trash on the way out of the cafeteria and follows me down a side hallway by the locker rooms, which allows us to avoid the group of girls standing in the front entry—not that they’d invite us to go anywhere with them anyway, since everyone thinks Kieran’s creepy and they probably assume the two of us want to be alone so we can run off and get married or something.

At the end of the hall, I push one of the double doors open out into the February cold. “So you think you’re in big trouble?” I ask, my words slow and heavy, as if they’re struggling against the wind chill to leave the warmth of my mouth.

“No idea,” he rasps back. “Never told Kayla to leave somewhere without me before.”

After what seems like a miles-long trek through the winter gale batting us in the face, we reach my mom’s other baby, a black 1967 Chevy Camaro she and Gramps bought and lovingly restored a few years ago, parked in front of the fence lining the football field. I unlock Kieran’s door and head around to the driver’s side, starting the engine and cranking the defroster up high once I’m inside. The front window thaws and I pull onto Main Street, making the almost immediate left turn down the county road.

Kieran and I don’t talk in the three minutes it takes me to drive to his house. I’m too busy thinking about how guilty I feel that he’s probably going to get in trouble for fighting with Kayla and staying at school with me, and he seems preoccupied with unzipping his coat to stick his hand inside, feeling around like he’s searching for something in an inner pocket.

“Do you want me to go in with you?” I ask, turning right into the McCafferys’—I mean, the Laniers’—driveway and heading up the slight hill. I’m offering just to be polite because I’m not sure I want to meet his parents under these circumstances. Thankfully, Kieran lets me off the hook.

“Nah. I should probably handle this one myself,” he tells me as I pull in behind Kayla’s Jeep Cherokee. His hand is still inside his coat, making him look like a modern version of the Napoleon painting reprinted in my world history textbook from freshman year. “Okay. This is dumb,” he says, pulling a folded square of paper out to give to me. “But this is for you.”

I take the gift and unfold it into a sheet that’s about as large as an eight by ten photograph, something sketched across the surface that I can’t make out in the dark. When I turn on the interior lights, I discover Kieran’s given me a pencil drawing of a single rose with two leaves on its narrow stem, expert shading creating the contrast between the individual petals.

“I drew that during some free time we had in art class,” he explains, his eyes not meeting mine when I look from the paper to him.

“It’s beautiful,” I breathe.

“Well, I wanted you to have it. You know—for Valentine’s Day.”

My brain races, trying to recall the date. I visualize my basketball schedule in my mind and remember that it’s February tenth. “Valentine’s Day isn’t until Wednesday,” I point out.

“Yeah. I know. But your Regional game is Wednesday, right? You’re going to be pretty preoccupied between now and then, so I brought this with me tonight in case we ended up alone at some point.” Kieran looks out the windshield toward the garage, but I can still see the now-familiar grin. “That’s why I started in on Kayla—I wanted to make sure we’d have at least a few minutes alone so I could give this to you.”

I give an awkward little laugh, but my heart’s freezing along with my brain because I’ve never been in a situation like this before.

What do I do now? Do I kiss him? Wait for him to kiss me?

“Thank you,” I say, wishing I didn’t suck at everything not involving school or sports.

Kieran glances at me, face red, and since my cheeks are on fire as well, I turn the interior light off to save both of us. I stare down at the drawing for a few seconds and when I lift my eyes, I see that Kieran’s fallen asleep, his body turned toward me in his seat, his left cheek smashed against the black cloth. Slowly, because I’m not sure if I should, I reach out and touch his face, the skin still warm with embarrassment, and he blinks back awake beneath my hand, prompting me to jerk away as if I’ve touched a hot stove burner.

“Sorry,” he whispers, not saying anything about my touching him.

“It’s okay.”

“So, I should go inside, I guess,” he says, whatever moment that may have been about to happen between us now broken thanks to his momentary sleep. “Mom and Dad are probably aching to yell at me. Wouldn’t want to keep them waiting any longer.”

“Probably not.”

Kieran opens the door, the tension draining from the car out into the frigid air. “So I’ll talk to you Monday, if not before,” he says, slipping out of the seat belt.

“Sure. Text me if you want to talk about A Separate Peace,” I add, referring to our current novel in Mrs. Harvey’s class, the rare work neither of us has read before.

“I will. Later, Zip.”

He slides out and I call “Later,” at his back as he shuts the door. Placing the rose drawing on the seat where he was just a moment before, I watch Kieran as he lopes behind the car over to the narrow concrete walk connecting the driveway and the front porch, his shoulders hunched up against the cold. Once on the steps, he gives me a little wave and, knowing he’ll soon be safely inside, I make a K-turn and head back down the drive towards the road, my heartbeat steady for the first time in several minutes.