SelfSame (9 page)

Sorcha

It was Sunday, thank goodness. Sorcha lay in bed thinking about Enid’s predicament – if it could be called that. The word seemed to suggest hilarity and hijinks, but there was nothing amusing about Enid’s situation.

The man who’d burst the comfortable bubble Enid’s mother had constructed around her turned out to be Bluebird’s husband. He’d sat among them and allowed Bluebird to serve him, all the while glaring at Enid with suspicious eyes. He’d said very little before retiring for the night, leaving Enid to wonder how on earth her mother had convinced him to trade for her ‘rescue.’

But that was Enid, and Sorcha was as determined as ever to push that world aside so she could live her life.

She breezed through her morning routine, dressing in her favorite not-for-primetime sweat pants and comfy oversized shirt. For some reason, she found herself plaiting her hair into a much-shorter version of the braid Spotted Fawn had fashioned for Enid.

There was a sticky note on the refrigerator from Fay saying she’d gone to church and that Sorcha’s parents had gotten up early to go antiquing in a neighboring town. Sorcha ate her customary bowl of raisin bran and, despite her intention to ignore Enid, found herself scouring the Internet for information on the Haudenosaunee. She didn’t learn much that she hadn’t already known. Most of the tribes that made up the Iroquois Confederacy had sided with the British. Enid was now living among the enemy, in more ways than one.

The doorbell startled her. Even without knowing she supposedly needed protection, she would have taken the precaution of peeking out the window before opening the door. Ben stood on the porch, hands jammed deep into his jeans pockets. His bike leaned against the porch railing.

She turned the knob and flung the door wide. “Come in, O’ Chosen One.”

He grinned and stepped over the threshold. “You have no idea what that means, do you?”

“None whatsoever. And I have a sneaking suspicion you’re not going to tell me, right?” She shut the door and gestured that he should hang his jacket on the rack in the entryway.

“If I told you, I’d have to kill you,” he said. Under his jacket, he wore a black t-shirt that hugged his torso and emphasized the muscles of his lean frame.

She raised her eyebrows at him. “Ha, I doubt it. How can your family use me for their nefarious purposes if I’m dead?”

Did she imagine his reaction to that? Did he freeze in place oh-so-briefly before catching himself and moving casually into the living room? She suppressed a shudder of premonition.

He sat in the exact same chair Joseph had sat in, although now it was a prized antique worth thousands of dollars, so she said, “Don’t sit there. My parents would have a spaz.”

He popped back up. “Where are guests allowed to sit?”

“Is that what you are? A guest? Because I don’t remember inviting you.”

“Call me whatever you want, but you’re stuck with me.”

She flounced down on the couch and reached for the remote. He sat at the other end and said, “There’s a good game on.”

She gave him a derisive look. “Yeah, that’s gonna happen.”

She turned on the TV and started flipping through channels. He wasn’t too shy to let her know which shows he’d be okay watching and they finally settled on the cartoon network.

Despite the dubious beginning, the morning passed amicably. His comments on the cartoons they watched made her laugh more than the shows themselves. She went into the kitchen on a commercial and brought out a bag of Doritos and some soft drinks. He had to move closer to her on the couch to reach the chips and she’d become highly aware of him – and aware that she was dressed in quite possibly the least sexy outfit on the planet.

By the time noon rolled around, the cartoons were aimed at the preschool audience, so Sorcha shut off the TV. She looked at Ben expectantly.

“Now what?”

He shrugged. “When’s your mom and dad coming back?”

“Probably not ‘til late. They do this all-day date thing once a month and then go out to dinner. My grandmother should be home any second now, though.”

“Is she cool?”

“Depends on what you mean by cool. She’s rockin’ the whole granny thing, you know, except for the blue hair, but if you mean will she be okay finding you here on the couch with me, then I guess so, as long as we’re not...” For reasons that were beyond her, Sorcha’s mouth had taken his question and run aground with it. She felt the heat of embarrassment rise up her neck.

Ben gave her a cheeky grin. “Not what?”

She couldn’t stop the smile that spread over her face, but elbowed him in the ribs and said, “Shut up.”

Just in case he took her words to mean it was okay to make a move, she stood up and walked toward the kitchen. “You want something for lunch?”

He picked up the bag of chips and the cans and followed her into the kitchen. “Sure, I can always eat.”

She pointed to two aluminum trash cans and said, “Recycle’s on the left. How about grilled cheese?”

“Cheddar?”

“Of course.”

He nodded his approval.

The sandwiches ended up having more than just cheese on them; Ben raided the refrigerator and brought out tomatoes and lunch meat and onions. He found a small frying pan and nudged Sorcha aside to sauté the onions in olive oil before tossing it all on the bread and grilling it.

She got a couple more sodas out of the fridge and popped them open. “Where’d you learn to cook?”

“Juvie.”

She started to babble an embarrassed apology, but he laughed and said, “Just kidding. You should see your face.”

“Funny. So what’s the deal with you and John anyway? He’s your cousin, but he’s the reason you went to juvie, right?”

Ben handed her a plate with the perfectly grilled sandwich. He sat across from her at the table before answering. “I kind of feel like anything I say’ll sound like an excuse.”

She took a bite of her sandwich and rolled her eyes in pleasure. The taste sure beat Enid’s dinner of bland fish and strangely textured vegetables. Around her mouthful, she said, “Well, you already mentioned you’re a black belt.”

“All the Bens are.” He cut himself off and made a face that told her he’d said too much.

“The Bens..?”

“Forget it.” He rushed on with, “Me and John have always had this competition thing going. When my dad died, Uncle Sarge – John’s dad – was there for me, you know? That’s when John started giving me a hard time. We used to practice martial arts together. Back then I was short and skinny and, I don’t know, he used to tease me. Call me names and stuff. It got on my nerves one day and I said something to him that was – well, it was definitely not nice. Next thing I knew we were fighting for real. I don’t even know how it happened—how I beat him so bad, but he ended up in the emergency room with a broken arm and the cops were called. He said I attacked him, and I think he did it to get me out of the picture. So he could have Sarge all to himself again.”

“Sarge is the uncle who’s in jail?”

“Yeah. He drinks, but if it wasn’t for that, he’d rule the world. He’s got a lot of charisma, the kind of guy people listen to.”

She noticed his use of the word ‘charisma’ and wondered about it. Ben Webster was no dummy.

“That’s what Skip meant, then?” she asked. “About Sarge having everyone in tears?”

Ben had taken a big bite, but he nodded.

Sorcha had gotten him talking, though, and didn’t want the trend to end. “Does your secret family society have a name?”

He shrugged, swallowed his bite and said, “Can’t tell you.”

“Oh, come on.”

He laughed. “No really. The name kind of gives everything away.”

“How about an acronym then?”

He’d taken another bite and she waited patiently for him to chew.

“WPS,” he finally said.

“If I guess right will you tell me?”

“No.”

She wrinkled her nose at him. “Wimpy Poophead Society?”

He laughed again. “Yep. You got it. That’s us.”

A muffled thump from the living room had him on his feet in an instant. His face deadly serious, he put his index finger against his lips and moved silently toward the kitchen entryway.

“It’s just my grandmother,” Sorcha whispered.

But it wasn’t. A figure dressed in camouflage pants, a brown jacket and ski mask appeared from around the corner, black pistol gripped in his extended right hand. Before Sorcha could scream, before Ben could even react, the intruder fired, squirting a thin stream of water right at Sorcha’s chest.

“Bang, you’re dead.” The voice was familiar.

Ben’s jaw clenched and he said through his teeth, “You’re gonna wish
you
were dead.”

The intruder pulled off his mask with a flourish. It was John, with strands of his dark hair stuck up all over his head from static. “Just proving a point, Coz. It was easy getting past the stake-out. Those guys are sitting in their nice warm car barely awake – and Sorcha, babe, you really should lock the front door after yourself…or was that your protector’s doing?”

He looked pointedly at Ben.

Sorcha moved to Ben’s side, not to offer solidarity, but to put a hand on his arm to keep him from taking a swing at John. “Not in the house, please,” she said quietly.

“Anyway,” John continued, “If I was a bad guy, guess who’d be dead right now?”

“All of us,” Ben said. Sorcha didn’t understand his meaning, but it was clear John did. He tucked the fake gun into his waistband like he was some kind of gangsta.

“Maybe, maybe not. Either way, I just proved you’re not cut out for this, Coz. You’re too trusting. I think the elders got it wrong. I’m the Ben, not you.”

Sorcha had had enough. “What the hell are you talking about?”

From behind John came the voice of Grammy Fay, raised in anger, “Language, Sorcha! What’s going on in here? Who are these boys?”

Fay entered the kitchen and stood next to John with her tiny fists on her hips. She was dressed in her Sunday best, a floral dress covered with a pink, hand-crocheted shawl. Despite the fact that John and Ben towered over her, she was the dominating factor in the room. Her demanding gaze went from John to Ben to Sorcha.

Ben moved closer to Sorcha, and to her surprise, slipped his arm around her waist and pulled her to his side. It was a move designed to stake a claim; a move Fay’s discerning eyes wouldn’t miss.

Sure enough, her eyebrows rose. “I think introductions are in order.”

Sorcha felt her face burn, and knew that to Fay she looked guilty of something. The last thing she wanted was to tell her grandmother about the WPS and her ‘protectors.’ She stammered, “It – it’s Ben. This is Ben and that’s John…um, friends from school. Guys, this is my Grammy Fay.”

Fay looked even more suspicious. “Friends from school that you’ve never mentioned? Because what I just heard didn’t sound too friendly.”

Ben tried to help. “We’re working on a project for…” he floundered, and Sorcha knew it was because he had no idea what her classes were.

“History,” she finished for him. “I got a bad grade on a test and Mr. Lee offered me extra credit if I did some tutoring.”

Fay’s eyebrows, thinned to almost nothing because she plucked out the gray hairs, scrunched up. “That doesn’t make sense. If you got a bad grade, you should be the one getting tutored.”

Sorcha bit her lip, cursing her inability to craft a fast, convincing lie. Luckily, Fay’s attention wandered. Her laser-gaze scanned the kitchen: dirty pans on the stove, knife on the chopping block resting in a puddle of tomato juice and seeds, half-eaten sandwiches on only two plates.

“John just got here,” Sorcha said quickly. She put a pleasant look on her face and turned to Ben’s cousin. “You want a sandwich?”

John hesitated, and Sorcha could tell from the scheming glint in his eye that he was debating his answer. If he stayed in character as the voice of dissent, he was about to blow their little charade out of the water. For whatever reason, however, he decided to play along. “Yeah, sure. History makes me hungry.”

Ben let go of Sorcha’s waist and moved toward the stove. “Uh, Mrs. Fay? Have you had lunch?”

The suspicion faded from Fay’s features and she smiled. “Just Fay, dear and no, I haven’t. Can you make me one without onions? They make me fart.”

John snorted with laughter while Sorcha halfway expected her flaming face to set fire to her head, but Ben took Fay’s blunt statement in stride. “Well, we wouldn’t want
that!
”

Fay beamed with approval when he went to the sink and washed his hands. She moved to Sorcha’s side and said softly, “What a nice boy. And cute!”

Sorcha looked past her grandmother and saw that John had overheard. He stared back at her blankly. After what John had done to get Ben sent to juvenile hall, it was clear he had little affection for his cousin. They were enemies with a common goal: the WPS and whatever it stood for.

The afternoon passed pleasantly enough. Sorcha trotted out the extra credit assignment on the battles of the Civil War Mr. Lee had given her. Ben and John pretended they were clueless and in desperate need of tutoring because Grammy Fay kept making excuses to come into the living room to check on them. The boys made such a game of it that several times Sorcha had to tell them surreptitiously to tone down the dumb act. They stayed long after the assignment was finished, though, and Sorcha soon realized neither was willing to leave while the other was still in the house. The competition between the two was almost palpable. Ben stuck close to her side, pretending, ostensibly for Fay’s benefit, that he was more than a friend, but Sorcha felt it was due more to insecurity, as if he was afraid John would fill his empty space if he abandoned her for even a moment.