Forbidden Boy (8 page)

How’s it going? Need anything?”

Julianne thought for a split second before getting up and gathering her things. “Yeah, Mitch, actually I do.

Can you please tell Bill I’ll be working on my sketches from home this afternoon? I just don’t feel right about hogging our project manager’s desk any longer than absolutely necessary.”

“Yeah, no problem. Everything okay?” Mitch tilted his head and looked at her curiously.

“Yup. Absolutely fine.” Julianne nodded. Brushing past Remi and Mitch, she dashed out of the trailer as quickly as humanly possible. She couldn’t wait to get home.

Julianne was exhausted beyond belief when she got home half an hour later. Her confrontation with Remi, followed by the threat of nasty drivers cutting her bike off, had left her wanting to do nothing more than curl up in her bed with a sketchbook, e-mail Kat, and then call it a night—even though it was only three in the afternoon. She turned her key in the door and had barely placed one foot on the doormat when she heard spastic panting coming from the next room. It sounded like someone had let a hyperactive puppy in from the sun. Before Jules had a chance to think about it, Chloe ran into the hallway—her hand clapped over her mouth—doing measured breathing exercises to avoid hyperventilating. Julianne hadn’t seen her sister this worked up about something since her college acceptance letters showed up a week late. Normally Chloe was calm, upbeat, and cheerful. Standing in front of her right now, though, was a trembling mess who just happened to be wearing Chloe’s straight-legged, dark-wash Joe’s jeans and fitted pink blazer.

“Chloe, what’s wrong? What’s going on?” Julianne felt her own heart race as she stared at her shaking sister.

“Is it Dad? Is Dad okay?”

Chloe nodded and pulled Julianne by the wrist over to the beach-facing bay windows in the family room. A few hundred feet down the beach, Julianne could see what was inhibiting Chloe’s breathing. While Julianne was at work, the Moores had set up huge orange fences all the way down the beach. Every five feet a hazard sign hung off the fences shouting PRIVATE PROPERTY: ALL

TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED.

Jules couldn’t believe it—just when she’d thought things couldn’t get any worse! She stood with Chloe at the window, rubbing her sister’s back and muttering,

“Those rats, those little rats. Those complete and total dirtbags.”

Chloe, whose breathing was finally slowing to normal, managed to squeak out, “What? Who?”

“The Moores, who else?” Julianne practically spat the name out. The orange gates looked offensive and menacing, even against the baby blue afternoon sky. It was like they were living in a biohazard zone or a bombed-out shell of a city. The gates themselves were aggressively orange—like they were there specifically to tell every other part of the color wheel to go to hell.

Their father, who had been working down the hall in his studio, ambled into the room.

“Girls, what’s going on in here?” He stopped short when he saw their eyes fixed on the orange fences. “Oh, yeah, that.”

“Had you already seen this?” Chloe yelped. Their father was always mellow, but they expected more of a reaction when their home had just been surrounded by what appeared to be giant, Day-Glo riot gear. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“It’s not worth discussing,” Dad replied, turning from the window. “It’s just a show. It’s just supposed to scare people away. If they were really planning on doing something, they wouldn’t need to make such a big spec-tacle about it. They’d just do it.” Chloe and Julianne both nodded. It might have been cold comfort, but he definitely had a point. “Don’t worry, girls. It’s going to be fine. We’ll figure something out.” He sounded so certain, so sincere, that Julianne couldn’t help but relax a bit.

“Okay, I need to shower. I’m covered in dust from work. But I think I’ll go for a quick run first.” Jules turned toward the stairs. She got as far as the doorway before the vision of the glaring orange gates compelled her to spin around toward the window for one last look.

Dad was sitting on the window seat, his face tilted slightly away from the beach view, his fingertips lightly touching the glass. For the first time, Julianne saw something behind his eyes that hadn’t been there before. For all of his mild-mannered, easygoing confidence, their father was scared.

✦ ✦ ✦

After her run, Julianne took the steps two by two on her way back to her room. Her sneakers were still caked with a little bit of sand, but, for the first time all day, her head was clear. She held on to the banister outside of Chloe’s room, stretching her calves and quads, and listened to the ebb and flow of her sister’s voice as she chatted on the phone. She was obviously catching up with one of her Kappa Delta sisters, so Jules decided to leave her be until after she’d showered.

Twenty minutes later, Kelly Clarkson was blasting from Chloe’s Bose iPod dock and the girls were shouting along at the top of their lungs. “Since you been gone, I can breathe for the first time …” Chloe was up on the bed in full-on rock-star air-guitar mode, her hair flying wildly around her, while Julianne was sprawled out on her back on the floor, her bare feet propped up on Chloe’s bed. When the song ended, Chloe flopped down on the bed, laughing, and straightened her flowered pajama bottoms and shell-pink tank top.

“Why do I love that song so much?” she asked Julianne. “It’s already a few years old.”

“Yeah, but it’s definitely a classic.” Jules laughed.

“Which must be why they still play it on the radio, like, constantly.”

Chloe shrugged. “I told Dad we’d handle dinner tonight. What are you in the mood for? Fish? Pasta? Or maybe just a big salad?”

Julianne really wasn’t sure what she wanted. Not in terms of dinner, not in terms of anything. Her fabulous summer job was going to be tainted with special guest appearances by Remi Moore. Her special tribute painting to her mom was getting more difficult by the day.

And the construction and the gates on the beach certainly weren’t helping anything. Her photography was better than ever this summer, but nothing she did made her painting seem any more polished. Julianne pulled her feet off of Chloe’s bed and tugged her body up from the floor. “Do you mind if I check MySpace?” she asked.

“Kat promised she’d post some pictures of Madrid.”

“Sure, it’s on,” Chloe tossed back. “Just make sure I’m logged out.”

Julianne sat down in Chloe’s gigantic rolling chair and piloted it into the computer cove of Chloe’s white wicker desk. She ran her fingers over the touch mouse to turn off the screen saver (a rotating photo slide show of Chloe with her sorority sisters, Chloe with her premed friends, Chloe volunteering, and Chloe crossing a bunch of 5k finish lines. Damn—her sister’s life looked exhausting!) and logged into MySpace—her current go-to method of procrastination.

Julianne looked at the familiar blue banner spread across the top of the screen and checked her “bulletin space” for news from her friends who were away for the summer. She tried to ignore her disappointment that Kat’s photos still weren’t up, and she skipped over to her own photo collection. Mitch had taken a picture of her in a hard hat this morning and promised he would post it.

“Whatcha’ looking at?” Chloe asked, coming up behind her sister to peek at the screen.

“Not much,” Julianne said, flipping through her photo album at a rapid pace. She wasn’t really amused by MySpace at the moment.

“Ooh, I like that one,” Chloe piped up, pointing to a picture of Julianne sitting on a cooler at a beach bonfire.

Her hair was blowing everywhere in the beach breeze, and her face was lit orange by the fire.

“Hey!” Chloe smacked Julianne on the shoulder in excitement.

“Hey what?” Julianne asked, rubbing her shoulder.

“Let’s look up your new favorite project manager!”

Chloe laughed, putting quotes around “project manager”

and deepening her voice.

“Ew! No!” Jules squealed, giggling. “I am adopting a strict ‘no bringing work home with me’ policy from here on out.”

“Oh, c’mon!” Chloe wheedled, using the camp counselor voice that suckered Julianne in each and every time.

Jules folded. “Okay, you do it though. It’s your idea.”

Julianne got up and surrendered the cushy rolling chair to its rightful owner. Chloe slid into the computer corner and pulled her laptop closer to her. She selected search and typed in “Remi Moore.” Julianne tried to contain her nervous laughter.

“Jackpot!” Chloe burst out. “There are seven pages of Remi Moores. There are literally dozens of them. Who knew so many people shared such a weird name? Let’s put our detective hats on. If I were an obnoxious project-managing, land-destroying hipster, where would I be?”

Julianne laughed as they started clicking.

About six pages in, Chloe stopped clicking and excitedly poked Julianne. “Found him! This is so totally him!” Julianne leaned down and squinted at the computer, momentarily wishing that she wore glasses.

“What does his headline say?” Julianne asked.

“Pompous land-hog seeking non-sustainable relationship,” Chloe answered.

“Wait,
really
?” Julianne whipped her head around and squinted at the screen. As much as she wanted to dislike Remi, that didn’t seem right at all.

“No, of course not,” Chloe fessed up. “But I think it would be much more apropos than ‘He who awaits much can expect little.’”

“Is that actually his quote?” Jules asked, her eyes wide with disbelief.

“Mmm-hmm,” Chloe confirmed.

“That’s Gabriel García Márquez. I love that quote,”

Jules murmured, impressed. Why did he have to be so smart? Couldn’t he just be the weaselly jerk Chloe thought he was? It would be so much easier.

“Well, unfortunately, there’s no rule that great authors are the exclusive domain of those who don’t suck, so I guess he’s entitled.” Chloe yawned, lazily twirling her hair with one hand as she clicked around the rest of Remi’s profile. “Oh, check out his pictures! This is hilarious!” Chloe had flipped right to a picture of Remi in costume for some sort of campus party at UW—

dressed as the Mona Lisa.

“Well, with the wig … and when he tilts his head that way … I guess I can see the resemblance.” Julianne laughed. Although she didn’t want to admit it, she was amused by Remi’s costume, even more than she was amused by what an awkward-looking woman he made.

They flipped through his other photos: Remi and his friends after a tug-of-war. Julianne had to pinch herself to stop from swooning at how cute he looked in his sweat-soaked T-shirt with mud-streaked cheeks. Remi and his dad at the top of a mountain. Remi at a micro-phone, sound-checking for someone’s band. Julianne’s heart caught in her throat when they flipped to a picture of Remi with his arm around a pretty redhead in front of the Space Needle. Then she caught the caption: “Sophie visits Seattle. How many Moores can one city handle?”

Ah. Sophie
Moore—
a cousin, perhaps? Julianne was a little taken aback by how hard she’d been hit by jealousy before she read the fine print. She reminded herself to play it cool—maybe she’d find something in the profile that would prove once and for all that he was actually a bad guy. But as Chloe clicked through, picture after picture registered for her as neutral to positive. Finally they came back to Remi in his Mona Lisa getup.

“Never in my life have I seen someone look that much
worse
as a drag queen!” Chloe howled with laughter. “Let’s see—what else can we find out about Mr. Moore here?”

Jules read from the screen “Status: single. Here for: networking, friends. Hometown: Seattle. School: University of Washington.”

“C’mon, get to the good stuff!” Chloe urged.

Julianne might have felt the slightest pang of anticipation. “Okay, okay, here goes. General interests: architecture, music, movies, building things, politics, soccer, surfing, screen-printing band T-shirts, guitar, hiking.

Music: the Killers, the Gossip, Mates of State, Sufjan Stevens, Common, Mos Def, Sinister Urge.” Julianne had to hand it to the guy—pompous jerk or not, he had pretty awesome taste. His hobbies, his favorite music, his favorite books, they were all really cool.
Stop it,
she reminded herself.
That’s not the point.
“Heroes: Frank Lloyd Wright, Olmsted, Gandhi, my dad.”

“Wow, so he’s totally got a hero-worship situation with his dad, huh?” Chloe asked.

“Maybe he’s like a little dad-bot—a clone or something!” Julianne laughed, happy to find something to criticize. Even as she said it, though, she felt a smidge of guilt. She knew what it was like to feel that way about a parent—even if she’d never admit it publicly.

“Hey, Jules, how’s this for a crazy idea,” Chloe began thoughtfully, as she got up from the rolling chair. She steered Jules toward the chair by her shoulders and, once Julianne had plunked herself down, swiveled the chair back toward the monitor.

“Uh-huh,” Julianne responded, enjoying the change of view but not quite sure what Chloe was thinking.

“You should stalk him!” Chloe said brightly.

“Um, Chloe, hate to break it to you, but that’s exactly what we’re doing right now. We’re total stalkers,”

Julianne reminded her with a laugh.

“Hold on—let’s think about this,” Chloe suggested.

“What if you really did it?”

“What? Stalk him?” Julianne was incredulous.

“Not like actual stalking—no restraining orders required or anything. Maybe ‘spying’ or ‘personal information recon’ is more like it. You know, like, ‘know thy enemy’?”

“Something about that just doesn’t feel okay to me,”

Julianne countered hesitantly.

“Jules, you’re going to spend all day with him, all summer. In an environment where talking about building is the norm. Aren’t you the least little bit curious to find out what else the Moores plan on conquering?

With the surveyors and the gates? What better place for someone to casually mention his or her home improvement plans than at a contractor’s site? They’re never going to be up-front with Dad—it would take away all of their bargaining ability. It’s the best way to stay a step ahead,” Chloe pressed.