“You know, when I first started at Central, everyone knew who I was. The girl with the missing brother. But I made some friends, and they didn’t care about that. They just knew me as Beth.” I think of Chita and Darla and Ainsley and wonder what they’re doing, if they’re all hanging out, and I feel a jolt of remorse at how I’ve been acting. “And then everyone at school forgot about all that stuff. They just knew me as Beth, too. The girl on the soccer team. No one special.” I take another sip of my drink. “But all that’s changed again. Now I’m Beth whose brother miraculously reappeared. Beth from national TV. Beth whose life could be a movie. But that’s bullshit, because I’m still just Beth. I just want to be Beth.” I laugh to myself, because who is that? Who the hell am I? I don’t really know anymore. I laugh again, and even in the faint moonlight I see Tark look back at me like I’m a lunatic.
I have to get away. I leave the dock and rush back up the slope to the house, back to the kitchen. I make myself another drink. I stand there for a bit, sort of in a trance, feeling like I’m not fully present in my body. Someone nudges me to get to the booze, so I walk to the main room and I see Tark talking with Margo in a corner, probably telling her what a weirdo I am. I shuffle back down the hall and bump into someone and spill my drink, splashing a little on the floor. “Sorry,” I say, keeping my head down.
“Beth?”
I look up, hearing the accent. “What are you doing here?” Donal asks.
“What are you doing here?”
“Just here with the twins.”
I see Jake and Jackson across the room, their matching dark flops of hair. “Oh God,” I moan, my stomach rumbling all of a sudden. I hand him my drink and barrel my way through people.
Bathroom. Must find bathroom. There’s a line when I get there, so instead I rush out the front door, push past a few people just arriving, onto the lawn, where I bend over and retch and then puke. I’m not sure how long this goes on. Everyone in the party must be peering through the windows, laughing.
“Beth?”
I jolt up. It’s Donal, thank God.
“You okay?”
“Can you take me home?” I ask.
“Yeah. Of course.” We walk down the street to his Jeep. He opens the passenger door for me, and I get in. “You sure you’re okay?” he asks.
“Just take me home.” And he does. And it’s like he knows not to talk to me, because we’re quiet most of the way, until we get closer to my house.
“I don’t know what I was doing there,” I say. “I made a fool of myself.”
“I doubt that,” he says. He pulls into my neighborhood. I click my phone and see it’s almost eleven, just in time for my curfew. I hope Mom and Earl are asleep. I don’t want them to see me like this.
“How’s your ankle?” Donal asks.
For a second I wonder what he’s talking about, and then I remember. “Okay, I guess.”
“It seems like you’re walking normal now. You going to be back on the field soon? Maybe we could kick the ball around?” He gives me a quick glance, probably hoping I’ll nod my head in agreement.
“Bowl?” I ask.
“Ball,” he says. “Ball.” He smiles, shakes his head. “You making fun of me?” he says, exaggerating his accent. He grins, hoping I’ll laugh, and normally I would. But my brain is soupy. “I don’t know,” I say. “I may quit.”
“You will not,” Donal says. “I’m afraid I won’t allow it.”
I almost smile. His damn accent still gets to me. Even after all these years. Is that what makes him seem different than the other guys, or is it something else?
He pulls up to my house and stops the car. We sit there and I can tell he wants to reach over and kiss me, like he did that day at his house. There’s a charge in the air of the car, and I can sense him hoping for some sign—the same kind of sign I must have given off that day.
But I have nothing to give tonight. I open my door and get out. He gets out, too, and comes around to my side of the car. But he doesn’t try to touch me. He stands there, his hands in his jeans pockets, respectful.
“Thanks for the ride. For getting me out of there.”
“Any time,” he says.
I start walking to the kitchen door, careful with my feet.
“Beth?” he says loudly.
I stop and turn back to him.
“Can you text me when you wake up tomorrow, so I know you’re okay?”
It’s dark out but I can still see him clearly because of his car’s headlights. He looks solid, tall and strong—not slouchy and awkward like so many of the guys in my class. His endearingly big ears fit his face better. I know a lot of girls have a crush on him. But he’s looking at me like I’m the only thing in the world he can see. I want to warn him away. I want to say, Don’t bother with me. Instead I say, “Okay,” before walking on.
I step inside and shut the door and lean back against it and close my eyes. A few seconds later, I hear the Jeep speed away. I open my eyes. The light above the stove provides a slight glow in the darkness. I creep into the den. The TV is off. The lights are off. I’m relieved but also ready to just collapse. I’m heading to my room when I notice something out of the corner of my eye.
Someone is on the couch, sitting in the dark. I can see the faintest suggestion of a body. “Hello?” I whisper, my heart suddenly pounding.
“Hi, Beth.” Sam’s voice cuts through the darkness.
“What are you doing?” I say, just above a murmur.
“Just sitting here,” he says quietly, as if that’s a normal thing to be doing—like watching TV, or reading a book. Just sitting in the dark.
I tiptoe to one of the armchairs across from the couch. I still have my jacket on but I sit down. Sam flicks on the little side lamp. He’s in his jeans and a flannel shirt unbuttoned over a tee, wearing his shoes, like he was on his way out somewhere. Dressed the way he was when he returned, except his hair is trimmed. Those piercings are gone. I still can’t get used to teenage Sam.
“How was the party?”
“Awful,” I say. I shudder thinking about all of it—Tark and those kids and puking my brains out. The famous Beth Walsh. “What are you doing out here?”
He doesn’t answer right away. He’s just sort of looking off to the side as if he’s searching for a response. “Sometimes I can’t sleep.”
Goose bumps bloom on my skin. “I can’t sleep sometimes, too,” I say.
He flashes his eyes at me, like he’s just noticing I’m here. “It’s so quiet here,” he says. “I’m used to . . . I’m not used to it being so quiet. That’s funny, isn’t it?” He looks off into space again, smiling that slight smile of his. “Sometimes I wake up, and I realize all over again that I’m home, not at Rusty’s. And I’m so happy . . . too happy to go back to sleep. Like I . . .”
But he hesitates, and his face goes blank, like a switch has been flipped. Do I look panicked? That name—Rusty. Wasn’t his name Russell? I feel my stomach rumble. Maybe I didn’t puke all the booze out. Or maybe I did. Rusty. A nickname. I can tell Sam is about to add something else, something I don’t want to hear, so I say, “I’m so tired.”
Sam doesn’t respond at first. I close my eyes, like that can protect me. Finally, he mumbles, “Don’t tell Mom you saw me tonight, out here. I don’t want her to worry.”
“All she does is worry,” I say, opening my eyes again.
Sam cracks a slight smile. After all these years, he still knows what our mother is like.
I feel a stab of closeness to him then, not fear. And I almost open my mouth and say, Sam, it’s okay, you can tell me about what happened.
But no words come.
No words come because I don’t want to know.