Imaginary Enemy (12 page)

When we’d finally untangled ourselves and were heading for the baggage terminal, Aunt Jane took my hand and said, “Look at you, Sweet Jane! All grown up, and so lovely.” She held my hand and pranced through the airport like she was the Queen of England.

Dad gave me the eye, so I pretended I had to adjust my shirt in order to extricate myself. Fourteen-year-olds don’t hold hands with ancient wonders in public places. It’s unheard of!

“Come tell me about your life,” said Aunt Jane, moving over on the love seat to accommodate another person (that person being me).

“There’s nothing to tell,” I replied, but the look on Mom’s face told me to sit down and talk, so I did. I told Aunt Jane about my friends and my classes and the other usual stuff, and it sounded awfully dull, but she acted like I was Homer reciting
The Odyssey.
With such a rapt audience, I began to elaborate and embellish, and soon even Zander was laughing at my exaggerated version of middle school. Naturally, my stories centered on the ineptness of the teachers and the intelligence, glamour, and daring superiority of the kids.

“These modern children are certainly a smart bunch, aren’t they?” Aunt Jane said to Mom. But I thought I saw her wink, and wondered if all kids throughout history had thought themselves a cut above the previous generations.

When I marched through the auditorium at graduation, I scanned the crowd for my family, my heart thumping and my fingers crossed. I could just picture Aunt Jane, dressed like some exotic bird or beast, sitting in the front row and blowing an airhorn when they called my name. Then I saw her perched between Dad and Carmella, wearing a sedate navy blue suit and a string of pearls, looking as respectable as the first lady at the presidential inauguration ceremony. Relief flooded through me, and I gave Zander a thumbs-up as I paraded past, eyeballing other families with their eccentric members.

By the time Aunt Jane left, I’d grown attached to her. Mom was right, she was great: entertaining and adventurous and funny. And she understood me and the issues in my life even though she was a relic. “Aunt Jane’s totally cool,” I said on the way home from the airport. Mom groaned and Dad laughed.

“I kissed Bryan Latham,” I whispered to Emma in the backseat as Dad drove us home following a graduation party at Madison’s house.

“Bryan Latham?”

“Yes.”

“But he’s such a creep. Why him?”

“My goals. Remember? Besides, I couldn’t go to high school unkissed.”

“Jane, that is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. I could go a lifetime without being kissed unless the right guy came along. Bryan Latham? Yuck. How was it?”

“Awful. He tried to put his tongue in my mouth but I clamped my teeth shut. He slobbered! It was so gross.”

“Yech! I wouldn’t even want him to touch me. I mean, he’s not bad looking, but he’s such a creep, and you know he’s going to tell everyone.”

“He better. That’s the whole reason I did it.”

“Jane! That’s disgusting.”

“At least I won’t have to sit at the geek table.”

“Don’t you get it? You wouldn’t have had to anyway.”

“Insurance.”

“Would you do it again?”

“No way.”

“There’s hope for you yet.”

Chord sat beside me on the steps. “So, Jane, did you meet your eighth-grade goals?”

“What?”

“Your eighth-grade goals. You know, no Ds or Fs, paint your bedroom, collect can tabs, all that.”

“Oh, that. How’d you know about that?” I asked.

“Harmony and Carmella.”

“Figures. Those little snitches.”

“So did you?”

“Actually, yes,” I said proudly.

“Even the kiss?” he asked.

I felt the blood rush to my face. “They told you about
that
?”

“Wasn’t it on the list?”

“Maybe.”

“So did you get your kiss?”

“Maybe.”

Sharp walked up. “What’s goin’ on?”

“I’m just asking Jane about her eighth-grade goals,” Chord said, grinning.

“Oh yeah, her goals. How’d that work out?” asked Sharp.

“He knows about it, too?” I asked.

“Everyone knows,” said Chord.

“Everyone? Who’s everyone?”

“Use your imagination,” Chord replied.

“So did you meet your goals?” Sharp asked.

“None of your business.”

“What about the kiss? Did you kiss anyone?” he persisted.

“I have the right to remain silent….” I crossed my arms in mock defiance. Both boys laughed.

“You don’t have to tell us, because Carmella already did,” said Chord, smirking.

“What?”

“Does the name Bryan Latham ring a bell?” Chord taunted.

“Bryan Latham? Carmella was making that up,” I protested.

Sharp shook his head. “I don’t think so. Not with the way you’re blushing.”

“I’m not blushing. It’s just way too hot out here.”

I heard them laughing as I jumped up and stalked into the house.

“Carmella!” I shouted when I shut the door. I wanted to wring her neck.

Dear Bubba,

Remember that time I requested vanishing cream? I’m renewing that request. There’s nothing I want more than to vanish. Immediately.

And Bubba, why’d I have to get the loudmouth of the millennium as a little sister? And why’d you tell her about Bryan Latham? You must’ve, because I certainly didn’t. Can’t anyone around here keep a secret?

Exposed,
Gabriel

Moving On

“I
’ve got the cushiest new job in the world,” said Luke one hot August afternoon.

“You quit working for Dad?” I asked, astonished. Luke loved the marina at least as much as my father, maybe more. He introduced efficient ways of performing tasks and suggested upgrades on a regular basis. Dad and Uncle Grayson always praised his accomplishments. I couldn’t imagine him working anywhere else.

“No, I’ll still be doing that. But Mr. Marcello hired me to live on his houseboat. Can you believe it? I’ll be getting financial rewards for not living at home anymore.”

“What’s wrong with living here?”

“Nothing, really. But this is the opportunity of a lifetime.”

“What about when Mr. Marcello wants to use the boat?”

“He won’t. His company transferred him to Singapore for at least the next three years, so I’m his caretaker.”

“Won’t you miss us?” I asked, dismayed at the idea of his leaving. He was still my hero.

“It’s not like I’m the one going to Singapore. I’ll be a few miles away.”

“Dad’s okay about it?”

“Yeah. Geez, Jane, I’m not a five-year-old. I’m a high school graduate with a job. And this is a business agreement between me and Mr. Marcello. It has nothing to do with Dad.”

I’d been shocked when Luke announced that he didn’t want to go to college and Dad backed him up. We’d been fed from the college spoon since infancy, so it seemed the natural follow-up to high school. Then, at the dinner table one night his senior year, Luke said he wasn’t going. I held my breath, expecting my parents to lose it. Instead, Dad simply asked him why not, and Luke explained his position, which was basically that he’d never liked school and wanted a full-time job at the marina. He enjoyed working on boats and being around the water. All Dad said was, “I just hope your decision is based on your dreams and your vision of the future and nothing else, son.”

“It is,” Luke assured him.

“Fine, then. And if you ever change your mind, that’s fine, too.”

I’ve always admired, but also envied, the relationship my father and Luke share. They seldom fight, and seem to understand one another without speaking.

I briefly enjoyed the delusion that once Luke moved out I’d have my own room. The truth slapped me like a bucket of icy water. “I can finally move the computer out of the dining room,” Mom said.

“It’s fine in there,” I protested.

“Jane, we need an office. Dad does most of the marina paperwork at home, and it’s inconvenient for him to have his files scattered all over the house. This is the obvious solution.”

“Not to someone stuck in a room with Carmella.”

“Forget it. Now help me move these file boxes, Jane.”

When Chord went to Jefferson High after his three years in the homeschool brigade, I assumed Sharp would return to real school, too. That he’d start wearing normal clothes and behave more like Chase McClusky and his crowd. I should have saved myself the trouble.

One afternoon the last week of summer vacation, Sharp and Jazz were sitting on my front steps waiting for Zander to get home from a dentist’s appointment so they could go to the park and play basketball.

“Where’ve you been?” Jazz asked when I walked up to the house.

“The marina. I was helping Luke paint the bait shed.”

“That explains your tattoo,” said Sharp. “Looks like a duck.”

I studied the blob of paint on my forearm. “A goose, actually,” I corrected him. “Where’d you get that shirt?”

He was wearing a red T-shirt with Stonegate School of the Arts silk-screened across the front in black letters. “Had freshman orientation today,” he said. “You like?”

“You’re going there?”

“Yeah.”

“Since when?”

“Got accepted last spring. I told you about it, remember?”

“I thought you meant you were enrolled in their summer program. You’re not going to Jefferson with Chord and me?”

“Chord’s transferring to Stonegate. Elliot’s got lots of friends who teach there. He says it’s a great school.”

Stonegate is a magnet school offering classes in music, visual art, drama, dance, and writing. It made sense for the deMichael boys to go there—they would fit right into the curriculum and the student body, an eclectic group of avant-garde kids, freaks, and misfits who listened to underground music and NPR, read the
Village Voice
and the
Onion,
wrote their own zines, and bought their clothing at thrift stores, garage sales, and flea markets.

I sat beside Sharp on the steps. “You know, you’ll have a lot of social adjustments to make. You’ve been out of commission for three years.”

“You still don’t get it, do you, Jane?” Sharp looked at me and folded his arms across his chest. “I was homeschooled, not dead. I still saw people, did things. Maybe you’re the one who needs more exposure…. Did you ever think of that?”

I was stunned. Me? Lacking exposure? I was at least as savvy as any of the homeschool brigade. “What do
you
know?” I headed for the house, and while I didn’t exactly slam the door, I did shut it with more force than necessary.