Starkissed (8 page)

Chapter Eleven

When my dad gets home that night I expect him to be furious. But when he walks through the front door, he’s smiling.

I’m in the kitchen with Mom slicing up a romaine heart for the salad I’m supposed to be assembling for dinner. Dad swoops into the room, grabs a beer out of the fridge, pops the top, then walks over to Mom and plants a huge kiss on her cheek. Then he comes over to me, hugs me with one arm, and says, “hey kiddo.”

Maybe he doesn’t know about the phone. Or the fact that not only pictures of me kissing Grant are on the internet now, but also dozens of photos from my Facebook account.

I don’t bother speaking up. No point in ruining his good mood and inflicting his anger upon myself again. He leaves the kitchen and heads for the living room to watch the news.

“I thought he hated me,” I tell Mom.

“Just let him have this,” she says quietly.

“Have what?”

She wipes her hands off on a towel and crosses the kitchen to grab her purse off the table. She pulls out a stack of papers. They’re print outs of articles about me.

“The restaurant was the busiest it’s ever been this afternoon,” she says.

She hands me an article. I read the first paragraph.

Sydney, born and raised in West Plane, New Mexico is the daughter of Clarissa – a successful real estate agent, and Tom – owner of the downtown West Plane restaurant Canyon Grill, which locals claim has the best burgers in all of New Mexico.

“You can’t buy publicity like this honey,” Mom says when I put down the first article. There are a dozen more like it.

“Okay.”

“Don’t get me wrong, the whole Grant thing...he’s still furious. But at least this has cooled him down a bit.”

I head upstairs and climb onto my bed. I pull my sketch my pad out from my bedside table drawer and drop it on to my lap. I’m not a fantastic drawer. Not like some of the other kids at school, but I’ve got enough talent that my drawings aren’t limited to stick figures and little swirls. I grab a pencil out of my case and rest the tip of it against the creamy white paper. I draw a line, straight down, and then curved. I don’t even know what I’m going for, but it doesn’t look right. I flip the page and start fresh. This time I draw a shorter line then curve it to the right. I keep going. I add lips – a little full, a nose – a little flat, and eyes – thin, and narrow, beneath a tilted brow.

I’m drawing
him
, I realize. Grant, in profile. The way he looked that night in that split second I was staring at him, right before he caught me looking.

He is beautiful. Drawing in black and white I can’t capture the coppery tone of his cheek, or the deep brown of his eyes. But I’ve got that little tilt of his neck, and the faint dimple in his chin.

I stare at the drawing for a minute, then abandon the sketch and flip back through previous drawings. I stop near the front of the book on a drawing of Colin from almost a year ago. Sightings of him being scarce, I drew it from memory. But he doesn’t look quite right. Like I missed something, I’m just not sure what.

***

Later that night I’m sitting on my bed trying to get through my physics homework when the phone rings. Not the house phone, which is still unplugged, but Dad’s office line, which is still hooked up due to the fact that it’s unlisted and only people we know have the number.

Mom saunters into my room and holds out the cordless silver handset from downstairs.

“It’s your sister,” she says. I stare at her, awaiting further explanation, seeing as ‘your sister’ really doesn’t narrow the field of who might be calling by that much.

“Arianna,” she finally tells me.

I wrinkle my nose. The world really must be off its axis right now. Little Miss thinks she knows absolutely everything about absolutely everyone – she drives me nuts – trying to control my life and everyone else’s.

“Hello?” I hold the phone to my ear.

“Sydney,” Arianna says curtly.

“What’s up?”

“What’s up is that my sister is running around like a little harlot with some illustrious film star and I have to find out about it on the television. You couldn’t be bothered to call me, to warn me?”

I hold the phone away from my ear and glare at it. Don’t be fooled by her big words, she just called me a slut.

I put the phone back to my ear. She doesn’t even give me time to answer her question, but continues on.

“I was in the pub at school this afternoon when your photo came on the screen and suddenly everyone was saying, ‘West Plane, aren’t you from West Plane Arianna? And isn’t your last name Kane too?’ Before I could come up with some reasonable way to pretend I didn’t know you, everyone had figured out we’re related! Now I’m the girl whose sister is with Grant West. Do you know how hard I worked to establish a reputation on this campus, and in one day you wiped it out. No one cares I’m the editor of the Law Review. No one cares that I got an A plus on my last final. All they care about is whether or not you’re going to take me to the premiere of
Deader than Night
.”

“Well that sucks for you,” I sigh.

“You should have called.”

“I think I have bigger things to worry about right now.”

“Oh hardly. So are you?”

“What?”

“Going to get me tickets to the premiere of
Deader than Night
. It’s in three weeks in New York. He’s your boyfriend, not mine. You should know these things.”

“Grant isn’t my boyfriend Arianna. I can’t get you tickets to anything.”

“Well what use are you then? Goodbye.” She hangs up.

***

The next few days play out pretty much the same and the previous two. People at school follow me around like I’m some Mecca, Michelle tries to get me to try out for cheerleading, and Mr. Hughes actually starts calling on me during class. The good news, though, is that by Thursday night it seems most of the country’s reporters have given up on me and we can finally plug our main line back in. Caroline was right. The more time that passes, the more people are starting to realize there’s nothing exciting about me and they’d be better off trying to get pictures of starlets exposing themselves while improperly exiting limos.

On Friday after school I rush home and jump in the shower. I know taking my car to the garage to have a stereo installed isn’t exactly a date, but I’m going to see Colin and the last memory he has of me is me standing, frenzied and rumpled, in the middle of the grocery store needlessly ripping apart plastic bags. So in the shower I take care to shave my legs, and when I get out, I put on that expensive moisturizer Mom got at Sephora, the one that she forbade anyone else from using.

I spend nearly half an hour staring at my closet, trying to find the perfect outfit. I can’t look like I’m trying too hard...but I want to look good. I pull on a pair of deep blue, skinny jeans, and a long, turquoise camisole. Then I grab a gauzy white v-neck sweater and pull that on over top.

No. I’m going to a garage, not the mall. And that sweater cost like ninety dollars. What if he wanted to reach out and brush the hair off my shoulder, but the grease on his fingertips smeared the sweater? Wishful thinking, but it could happen...maybe. I take the sweater off and grab a black cardigan. Better.

I use a flat iron to straighten my already mostly straight hair so that it hangs like a curtain on either side of my face. Then I carefully wisp on some silver eye shadow and coat my eyelashes in mascara.

“Where are you heading looking all hot?” Ava says as I’m pulling on a pair of calf-high black suede boots.

“Nowhere,” I lie. I grab my keys and purse off the buffet table in the hall and stream out the front door.

At four thirty on a Friday afternoon, the garage isn’t exactly hopping. The other guys who work there have taken off for the weekend and mine is the only car being serviced.

“Hi,” I wave at Colin. He’s not in his usual work getup of coveralls, but instead wearing some black jeans and a white t-shirt. He leaps up from the chair he’s sitting on and walks over to me.

“Hey Syd.”

“Um, so thanks for doing this.” I step aside so he can look in the car. He fiddles with something then pops back out.

“No problem. It’s my job,” he shrugs. “Did you want me to take you home?”

“What?”

“Well it might be a couple hours. I could take you home, or somewhere else if you like, and then come and get you when I’m done.”

I swallow. Sure, being in a car with Colin would probably make my life, but the idea of explaining to whoever is home why he’s driving me to and fro...not so fun – not because I don’t have a good explanation, but because whenever I talk about him I turn beat red. Besides, I was kind of hoping to hang around and watch him. God that sounded creepy.

“Nah,” I shake my head. “That’s okay. I can just hang here. If that’s alright?”

“Yeah sure. There are some chairs in the waiting room,” he points to the glassed off area on the other side of the garage. My stomach sinks. “Or you can keep me company if you want. But there might be some work involved.”

“How so?”

“Well for example,” he grins. “Try handing me that wrench?” He points to a tool sitting atop a big black box on my left.

I pick it up and hand it to him. “How did I do?”

“Perfect, well except that was a screwdriver. But who cares. I’ve always wanted an assistant. I try and get Gill, that kid who works here after school to get me stuff all the time, but he’s such a little punk, just shakes his head and walks away.”

For the next hour I perch on the edge of a somewhat dirty chair while watching Colin work. Every once in a while I hand him something he points at, but my assistant duties are thin at best. I have absolutely no idea what he’s doing, but it doesn’t stop me from enjoying the view.

So I don’t look like a complete idiot, I hide behind my eBook reader, sifting through a trashy romance novel I got for free online. But every time I come across a line with even the tiniest bit of sexual innuendo I feel myself blush – like reading something like this in the same room as Colin is the most embarrassing endeavor, ever. I finally have to put it down.

There’s a desk beside me covered in papers and books. Out of the heap I procure a slightly battered copy of
The Count of Monte Cristo
by Alexander Dumas.

“Is this yours?” I ask Colin when he pokes his head out of the car.

“Uh yeah,” he grins somewhat sheepishly. “I just started it.”

“I love this book.”

“Really?”

“Oh my God, yes. It’s great. I mean it takes forever to get through, but it’s so worth it. There’s just something about Edmond...I don’t know. And the whole revenge thing, I guess I just get it...especially now,” I add under my breath.

“You like it that much, huh?”

“I guess so. How do you like it so far?”

“Oh, um. Actually it’s for a class I’m taking...to be honest it’s a little difficult. There’s just so much to follow. And the language is a bit dated.”

“Oh.”

“I’m more of a Dan Brown or Robert Ludlum kind of guy.”

“I love
The Da Vinci Code
,” I tell him.

He laughs.

“But
Angels and Demons
was better,” we both say in unison. I feel goose bumps trickling down my arms. Am I really having a conversation about books with a guy? A guy I like? I didn’t think it was possible. I mean sure I know guys who read...but the last book conversation I had with Zane was about some stupid graphic novel he was trying to get me to read.

He drops something on the ground, and bends down to pick it up.

“The movie is really good.”

“What movie?”

“Oh um,
Count of Monte Cristo
. Not the old one, well I’ve never seen that one actually. But the one they made in like 2002 with that guy who played Jesus in
Passion of the Christ
. It’s an awesome movie. Really different than the book, maybe even better. You should check it out. You might like it.”

“Thanks for the tip.”

“I actually have the DVD, if you want to borrow it or something sometime.”

“I’ll definitely keep that in mind.” He turns back to my car.

“So you said you’re taking a class?” I say to his back.

“Uh huh. At the university in Albuquerque. Just some upgrade classes right now. I’m moving out there in the Fall though, going full time.”

His words slam into me like a car, my body buckles under their impact. Colin is moving away?

“Oh. That’s great. Good for you,” I say, struggling to make my voice sound normal, not strangled with anguish. It’s what, the end of March now. He’ll be gone by August. That’s maybe four months. I guess I shouldn’t have counted on him hanging around West Plane forever...but I never thought he would go away. What if I never see him again?

“Thanks.”

“Um...so what are you going to study?”

“I don’t know for sure. I was thinking Mechanical Engineering. You know I’ve always been good with cars and engines. Taking things apart, putting them back together. I like figuring out the way things work.”

He turns back to my car and I sag back against the chair, watching him.

It takes him another hour to finish, but when he’s done I’ve finally joined the twenty-first century and have a CD player and iPod hook up in my car. The speakers are so powerful that the seats vibrate when he turns them up full blast.

I hand him the wad of cash I took out from the bank machine, fifty for the stereo and another twenty-five for the work.

“Thanks again,” I say from where I’m sitting in the front seat, fiddling with the shiny buttons on the new stereo console.

He leans over, resting his hands on the roof of the car, and looking in through the open driver’s side window.

“So big plans for the night?”

I shake my head.

“Not even with Grant West?” He grins teasingly.

My mind jolts. Somehow over the past two hours I forgot all about Grant. And I’d actually been hoping that Colin lived under a rock and had no idea about the kiss or the pictures. “Uh no. He’s not my...I mean it was just a stupid kiss that turned into a big ridiculous story. We’re not together.”

“No?”

“Definitely not.”