Читать книгу The Summer List - Amy Doan Mason - Страница 14

7

The Boy Behind the Counter

June 1996

Summer before sophomore year

The last time I’d been to the Silver Skate ’n Lanes Pauline Knowland had shoved me.

It was in fifth grade, right when things started to go south for me at school.

“Watch out,” Pauline had said, in a tone wholly without fear or apology, seconds before her palms smacked the small of my back and sent me flying. I’d tried to slow down by dragging my orange toe stopper, a piece of cylindrical rubber like a giant pencil eraser. Instead I’d fallen facedown in front of the snack bar.

I hadn’t been back since.

Casey thought it was time for me to face my fears. The shabby skating rink/bowling alley in Red Pine had become cool again ever since Erin Simms threw a Roller Boogie–themed Sweet Sixteen. Now every girl in our class was talking about some college guy who worked there. He’d gone out back, behind the Dumpsters, with Debbie Finch. Debbie described this as if it were the most romantic thing in the world.

Alex was driving us to Red Pine so we could see what all the fuss was about. She clearly wanted to join us and dropped hints the whole way. “I’ve always been curious about bowling, do people really wear matching shirts like on TV?” Two miles down the road—“You two are so brave, I’d probably be a total klutz on skates.”

Never been bowling, never been skating. I added these to my list of facts about Alex. Didn’t know what a friendship bracelet was, never heard of the game Red Rover. These gaps in her childhood education didn’t surprise me anymore. Her parents had been strict, she’d said. Strict was always the word she used to describe them when I asked. Then she’d change the subject.

Casey was in the back seat, not speaking. I turned to her and raised my eyebrows, pleading silently. We have to invite her.

She shook her head. Casey was punishing Alex for something. But to me, even their rare fights were something to envy; they were the fights I imagined sisters had.

“She’s mad at me for turning a pair of her jeans into cutoffs,” Alex said. “I’m getting the silent treatment. You can wear anything in my closet, baby. You, too, Laur.”

I smiled, unsure what to say, and looked out the window.

“That’s a pretty song, what’s it called, Case?” Alex blasted the radio.

Another fact: Alex hadn’t been allowed to listen to pop music when she was younger. Now she didn’t enjoy it so much as study it like someone cramming for an exam. Casey told me this was why she’d devoured the Casey Kasem countdown CDs, worshipped the guy enough to name her child after him.

Casey not only knew the exact name of the slow, hypnotic song Alex liked, she owned it. “Fade Into You” by Mazzy Star. We’d both bought the CD the weekend before. But she didn’t name the tune. I smiled at Alex apologetically.

“I’ll listen for the title after I drop you off.” Alex grinned at me—don’t mind her—but quickly turned her eyes back to the road.

Alex was a cautious, nervous driver, never going more than a few miles over the speed limit, her hands always gripping ten and two o’clock on the wheel. She’d only gotten her license a few years before. Her parents hadn’t let her take driver’s ed when she was in high school, Casey had said, so Alex hadn’t gotten around to learning until recently.

When we pulled into the parking lot and Casey and I scrambled out, Alex called a little too cheerfully, “I want a full report.”

I watched her leave by herself like all the other mommy chauffeurs. “She so wanted to skate with us,” I said. “And that was kind of mean about the song. You’re really that mad about some jeans?”

Casey shook her head. “She was flirting with this boy at the car wash who squeegeed our windshield. He was like sixteen.”

“I get that it’s annoying but she’d never—”

“Don’t. Don’t even defend her. I know it’s not her fault. Her parents screwed her up royally. But she has to learn she’s not in high school anymore.” Casey swung open the door to the Silver Skate, releasing throbs of music.

I tugged at her jacket, suddenly nervous. “Case. Don’t you want to hang out at your house instead? Cookie dough and Grease 2?”

“We can do that any night.”

“If Pauline’s here I’m going to kill you.”

“Repeat this to yourself. ‘I’m not that girl anymore,’” Casey said as we stepped into the dark, disco-lit world of the rink.

“What girl am I?”

“You’re Laura Christie. Sophisticated Mystery Woman,” Casey shouted over the music, pulling me into line.

“Say that three times fast.”

The woman behind the register sealed circlets of glow-in-the-dark pink plastic around our wrists and we shoved through the turnstile.

“My tracking bracelet, so I can’t escape,” I said.

Casey laughed but stopped abruptly, clutching my arm. “Oh, no no no. It’s too good. Look.”

There he was. The famous Boy Behind the Counter, handing out skates. The rental counter was elevated, and by a trick of the overhead fluorescents, it seemed he was under a spotlight. His black hair caught the light as he glided between the counter and the shelves of skates behind it. Our small-town god. On wheels.

Morgan Schiffrin and some of her friends (girls we called the Hair Petters because they compulsively ran their hands down their long hair) were clustered near the rental counter, even though they already had their brown-and-orange skates. It was like an altar.

“He’s obviously loving the attention,” I whispered as we lined up. “That is the tightest T-shirt I’ve ever seen.”

“Maybe he accidentally shrank it in the dryer.”

“Please.”

“Maybe he had a late growth spurt and can’t afford to buy a bigger one.”

“He’s rich. Related to the owner, supposedly.”

“No offense, Laur, but you’re nobody to judge someone by the fit of their shirt.”