“Shrimp and snow peas,” I said. “Extra spicy.”
“You got it,” Sophie said. “Go get clean.”
The shower felt good against my hot skin, almost like a salve. I stood under it for a good while, letting the water run over the planes of my face and down my hipbones. I had two more blisters on my fingers, and my shoulder blades hurt when I tried to rotate them, but when I got out of the shower I felt strangely refreshed. The scent of Sophie’s mint and grapefruit body wash lingered on my skin, and my hair smelled like apricots. I fastened my hair back with a rubber band and pulled on a pair of clean jeans, a T-shirt, and shoes. Then I headed downstairs.
Sophie was sitting on the side porch, smoking a cigarette and talking on her cell phone. “Yes, I know, Greg,” she said. “You’ve told me that at least a million times. Hold on, okay?” She pressed the phone flat against her shoulder. “What’s up? You’re not going to lie down?”
I shook my head and pointed to the phone. “Is everything okay?”
Sophie dismissed the question with a wave of her hand. “Oh, yeah.”
“Is Goober there?” I asked. “Can I say hi?”
“She’s napping,” Sophie said. “We’ll call her tonight.”
“Okay,” I said. “I’m gonna walk around then. I’ll see you in a little while.”
“Go down to East Poultney!” Sophie said as I headed down the driveway. “I’m telling you, you’ll love the gorge! It’s beautiful!”
chapter
26
I told myself I was going to keep walking in the direction of East Poultney. I’d read about gorges. And now that I thought about it, there had actually been a question about a gorge on my SATs. But I’d never seen a real gorge before. It would be interesting. Something different. An adventure.
Except that when I came to the fork in the road behind the high school again, my feet had other plans. In ten minutes I found myself at the foot of the little yellow house again, studying the flagstone path that zigzagged through the grass and the strange stone wreath on the door. There was something about this house, I thought. Something that made me want to stay, to go inside and take off my shoes and sit down in one of the kitchen chairs. It would smell like cedar and apples and the wooden table in the center of the kitchen would have an enormous jelly jar in the middle of it, filled with wildflowers. Along the windowsills would be a line of the same small stones that were in the wreath, set up like so many round dominoes. The only sound in the house would be my breathing, or maybe the soft footfalls of a cat slinking in and around my chair. Nothing else. No one else.
A faint whirring sound from the back of the house made my heart beat a little faster. I moved up the lawn cautiously, wondering if Aiden would come charging down again like he had the last time and order me off. The whirring sound got louder as I reached the top. I flattened myself against the side of the house and then rolled my eyes. What was I doing, sneaking around some strange house like this? This was so stupid. Practically stalkerlike, if you really thought about it. Which was not me.
I turned around quickly and headed back down the expanse of lawn.
“Hey!” I froze as Aiden’s voice charged out at me. “Julia?”
He had the same black hat on his head, and the same black Converse sneakers. Only his T-shirt—red, with a print of Pink Floyd on the front—was different. I thought fast. “Oh, hey, Aiden. Hi. Um…sorry to bother you. I was just looking for something. From the other day, I mean. I think I might’ve dropped it around here.” I scanned the grass around my feet helplessly. “On the lawn, I mean.”
He strode down toward me, his lanky frame tilted back slightly from the pull of the hill. “What’d you lose? I’ll help you look for it.”
“Oh, it’s nothing.” I took a few steps backward, desperate to get out of the lie. I hated lying. Plus, I wasn’t good at it. “Seriously. Go back to work. It’s nothing.”
“No, really.” He was in front of me now. “I was gonna take a break anyway. What’d you lose? I’m good at finding things.”
Damn. “I, um, I think I lost an earring. But seriously, it’s not a big deal. I can totally get another pair.”
But Aiden was already hunched over, peering through the grass. “Tell me what it looked like,” he said. “Gold? Silver?”
I closed my eyes, scurried a few feet away from him, and then quickly, furtively, withdrew one of the small rectangular amber studs that Mom and Dad had given me last year for my birthday. “Um…they were amber,” I said. “And sort of…rectangular shaped.” I gasped and made a show of reaching down into the grass. “I found it! Here it is. Oh my God, I can’t believe I found it!”
Aiden came over toward me. “Cool.” He watched intently as I reinserted the earring. “Amber’s a great stone. I don’t blame you for wanting to find it.”
I nodded, relieved the scene had ended.