Chapter Thirteen
On the roof outside her bedroom window, Maeve braced her feet against the shingles, tucked a flashlight into her armpit.
Spring peepers chirped in the distance. She listened for the sound of a purring motor, the low rumble of a car moving slowly.
She could hear the television from the living room below—All in the Family, Mannix, Gunsmoke.
It didn’t matter what they were watching.
Wendy Walker had asked her at school that day if she could sneak out to go to a party with her and the Nordic twins.
“Absolutely,” Maeve said, no hesitation, though she still felt the sting of her parents’ disappointment, not to mention she had a week left on her grounding. But this was worth it. It had to be.
It was eight on the dot, and for a moment, Maeve feared she’d fallen for a sick joke.
But then, headlights flickered, went dark, flickered again.
She slid her switch on and off, on and off, on and off.
I’ll be there. She shimmied down the tree trunk, stashed the flashlight under a bush, and ran toward the car waiting darkly in the road.
The paneled station wagon idled beneath the pine trees. Wendy was behind the wheel, overpowered by the size of the beast, the sink of the seat. Her hands at ten and two, she hunkered down, turned to Maeve, and grinned, accentuating a slight overbite. “Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go!”
Maeve glanced at the farmhouse and hopped in. Wendy hit the gas, and the house was out of sight before Maeve turned to say hello to the girls in the back seat. It was empty. “No twins?”
Wendy eased up on the accelerator, relaxed her hands on the wheel. She cranked her window down, glided her hand along the current. “Would you be mad if we skipped the party?”
The back road was curvy and narrow. The headlights skipped along tree trunks and branches, briefly green in the spray of light.
The center line was faded, and Wendy used the whole road.
Maeve rolled down her window too. She didn’t want Wendy Walker to know what was happening inside her body, though surely, she could hear Maeve’s heart beating, could hear her chaotic thoughts bursting like popcorn.
“Yeah, I could skip the party.”
“Cool. I have an idea. Do you trust me?”
Please, don’t let this be a trick. “Yeah.”
“What time do you have to be home?”
Maeve did not want to think of her dad waiting up again, of her mom coming down the stairs, the way she wore worry on her face like foundation every time she looked at Maeve.
She wanted to be like the other girls—go to parties, cruise the drag, kiss boys.
Whatever it was. She was finally fitting in. Wouldn’t they want that for her?
What could she say to impress Wendy Walker, to let Wendy Walker know this was no big deal? “Before sunup?”
This time they caught each other’s eyes and grinned.
A gust billowed Wendy’s hair. “Cool.” She smoothed it down with a laughing gasp.
Maeve looked ahead, shimmered like the northern lights.
On the empty beach, a fat waxing moon rising behind Seguin Light, Wendy spread a scratchy wool blanket next to a burned-out log. She pulled two bottles of wine from a paper bag. “Apricot Splash or Plum Hollow?”
Maeve was glad to be sitting. Her legs were mush. “The good stuff first—Plum Hollow.”
Wendy twisted the metal top, sniffed it snootily. “A fine choice.” She took a swig, swirled it around, swallowed, and handed the bottle to Maeve.
Maeve put the bottle to her mouth, pressed the ridges of glass that had been on Wendy’s into her lip too.
She didn’t want to do anything; she only wanted to think about why she was thinking about it at all.
The wine slid over her tongue and down her throat, burning and sweet and warm.
The second time they shared the bottle, Maeve let her tongue glance the rim.
“Sorry if this is weird,” Wendy said. “I wasn’t in the mood to be around everyone tonight.”
“Is something wrong?”
“No, I just—” She looked at Maeve, shook her head and shrugged.
“I get it. It’s nice to hang out with a friend sometimes.
” Maeve tried to keep the conversation light.
But Wendy’s mouth, the wetness on her lips, sparked other thoughts that flickered like fireflies.
Concentrate, Maeve. “Do you miss your friends in Canada? What was it? Quebec, or something? My parents went on their honeymoon there.”
“Ottawa. And no, I don’t miss it. My dad teaches college. That’s why we came here.”
“Mine works at BIW.”
They talked like that, back and forth, about their families and school, rumors about the basketball coach. When the first bottle was gone, Wendy grabbed the second.
It was the best night of Maeve’s life. She didn’t care if her butt was cold, if she was getting damp in the sea air. She didn’t care if she froze to death.
“Are you cold? Scoot closer,” Wendy said, as if she could read her mind.
There it was again. That electricity. Maeve didn’t know if she could stand it much longer, the feeling of Wendy’s shoulder next to hers, their bent thighs pressed against each other.
“Can I ask you a question? It’s kind of personal.”
“Um, sure,” Maeve said. She wrapped her arms around her knees.
“You really are cold,” Wendy said. “Maybe we should go.”
“What did you want to ask me?”
Wendy moved away from Maeve, twisted to sit cross-legged so they faced each other. “I heard this rumor, about you and Claire.”
Maeve’s heart sank. She looked around, certain someone would pop out from behind a dune or stump, point at her, make fun of her for what they could see and for what they couldn’t know.
She stood, brushed off her pants. “Yeah, I knew it. You’re like them.
I didn’t do anything, okay? Nothing. One time, I wrote her name on a piece of paper.
That’s all. Then everyone turned it into something it wasn’t.
I mean, I like boys. Like everyone else.
I like . . . Oskar. The exchange student?
But my parents wouldn’t approve, so I keep it a secret. ”
Wendy was on her feet now too. She tried to interrupt Maeve’s rant but couldn’t get a word besides “no” in edgewise.
“Maeve!”
“What?” Maeve’s arms were crossed, her hip jutted. She could see that Wendy was upset, almost to tears. “What?” she asked, more gently this time.
Wendy sucked in the wet sea air and huffed out breath after breath. “I thought . . . I thought maybe you . . .” Her teeth scraped her lips. “That maybe you . . . were like me. I mean, I like you.”
Maeve didn’t know what she was supposed to do. Cry. Laugh. Run. It dawned on her. If she did or said the wrong thing, it would all be over. She would be over. “I like you too.” It was enough. She hadn’t said or done anything that couldn’t be explained if she misunderstood the situation.
“No. I like-like you.” Wendy’s posture sank, and her face softened into a grimace like she was ready to take a punch.
Maeve looked up, tried to make sense of the whole universe.
A trillion stars, pinpricks in tar paper.
“There’s a star up there for every crazy thought I’m having right now.
” There was no turning back now. “To tell you the truth, I’m scared to death you’re joking me and that I’m going to say something and all of this is going to be a giant fake out. I would die.”
Wendy took a step forward, put her hand inside Maeve’s jacket, resting it on her waist. Maeve’s own hands were paralyzed by her side.
Wendy moved closer until their bodies were practically touching.
A moment closer, and Wendy’s hand brushed Maeve’s face.
They tilted toward each other awkwardly until their lips touched, plum wine on apricot, kissing each other in little waves and then more fully, with a current as deep as the sea.
At first it was exciting to have a secret.
Maeve was inflated, floating. They had to be careful, not letting on to anyone that they were .
. . what? Maeve wasn’t sure. It was like that thing with the tree falling in the forest. Could they be going together if no one knew?
And they didn’t go on dates. They didn’t hold hands in the foyer or by their lockers.
Wendy’s prom date was the captain of the boys’ basketball team, though she assured Maeve they were just friends.
“Does he . . . know?” Maeve asked. They sat on a picnic table, eating lunch outside, spring in full bloom, a safe distance between them.
Maeve marveled at other girls touching each other playfully.
That she and Wendy wanted to touch each other made it necessary to avoid each other completely.
Instead, they shared a Coke from the machine, the can sitting between them.
“No one knows,” Wendy said. “No one can know.”
“I wish we were going to prom together,” Maeve said, though she couldn’t imagine it, not really.
A boy and girl could go together as “just friends,” so why couldn’t two girls do the same?
“Or that I was going so I could see you get crowned prom queen!” She shoved into Wendy playfully, and Wendy shoved back.
“Yeah, right,” Wendy said. “As if.” The bell rang, signaling the end of lunch. “Hey. I have an idea. Could you come over this afternoon? My mom is picking me up, but I could drive you home after.”
Wendy’s mother was a formal woman, elegant to Maeve, the way her shirt tucked neatly into a fitted skirt, pantyhose matched to her skin tone, silver-blond hair pressed into a tidy bun.
She was on the board of the historical society, a member of the garden club.
“Ladies who lunch,” Wendy said. The dusky scent of her filled the car.
“Maybe I know your mother?” Mrs. Walker asked on the short drive to their house. Maeve tried to picture her mother chatting over tea, musing about preservation, but it was impossible. Faye Sullivan was not a joiner.