“You were standing over me like some possessive older brother. You could have introduced yourself.”
“Are we in the same dimension? The guy grabbed me like he wanted to bash me up against the wall. For no reason!” He shook his head. “What’s with you? Are you into him or something?”
“No.” She knew she was blushing.
“Good, because he could be spending homecoming in solitary confinement.”
“Okay, point taken.” Eureka gave him a light shove.
Brooks feigned stumbling backward, as if she’d pushed him hard. “Speaking of violent criminals—” Then he came at her, grabbing her waist and lifting her off the ground. He hauled her over his shoulder the way he’d been doing since his fifth-grade growth spurt gave him a half a foot on the rest of their class. He spun Eureka on the porch until she yelped for him to stop.
“Come on.” She was upside down and kicking. “He wasn’t that bad.”
Brooks slid her to the ground and stepped away. His smile disappeared. “You totally want that wing nut.”
“I do not.” She stuffed the wallet in the pocket of her cardigan. She was dying to look at the phone number. “You’re right. I don’t know what his problem was.”
Brooks leaned his back against the balustrade, tapping the heel of one foot against the toes of the other. He brushed his wet hair from his eyes. His wound blazed orange, yellow, and red, like a fire. They were quiet until Eureka heard muffled music. Was that Maya Cayce’s husky voice covering Hank Williams’s “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry”?
Brooks pulled his buzzing phone from his pocket. Eureka caught a glimpse of sultry eyes in the photo on the display. He silenced the call and glanced up at Eureka. “Don’t give me that look. We’re just friends.”
“Do all your friends get to record their own ringtones?” She wished she could have filtered the sarcasm from her voice, but it got through.
“You think I’m lying? That I’m secretly dating her?”
“I have eyes, Brooks. If I were a guy, I’d be into her, too. You don’t have to pretend she isn’t blazingly attractive.”
“Is there something slightly more direct you want to say?”
Yes, but she didn’t know what.
“I’ve got homework” was what she did say, more coldly than she meant it.
“Yeah. Me too.” He pushed hard on the front door to open it, grabbed his raincoat and his shoes. He paused at the edge of the porch, like he was going to say something more, but then they saw Rhoda’s red car speeding up the street.
“Think I’ll skedaddle,” he said.
“See ya.” Eureka waved.
As Brooks skipped off the porch, he called over his shoulder: “For what it’s worth, I would love a ringtone of you singing.”
“You hate my voice,” she called.
He shook his head. “Your voice is enchantingly off-key. There’s not a thing about you I could ever hate.”
When Rhoda turned into their driveway, wearing her big sunglasses even though the moon was out, Brooks flashed her an exaggerated grin and wave, then jogged toward his car—his grandmother’s emerald-and-gold, early-nineties slope-back Cadillac, which everyone called the Duchess.
Eureka started up the steps, hoping to make it upstairs and behind the closed door of her room before Rhoda exited the car. But Dad’s wife was too efficient. Eureka had barely closed the screen door when Rhoda’s voice blasted through the night.
“Eureka? I need a hand.”
Eureka turned slowly, hopscotching along the circular bricks lining the garden, then stopped a few feet from Rhoda’s car. She heard Maya Cayce’s ringtone—again. Somebody sure wasn’t concerned about seeming overeager.
Eureka watched Brooks close the Duchess’s door. She couldn’t hear the song anymore, couldn’t see whether he’d answered the phone.