Hoax (3 page)

             
Screw it.  I quit.  I’m just gonna be me.  If he doesn’t like it, well, it’s just gonna suck. 

              I took out my frustrations on the white crackling paint which coated the window frames of the storage building.  Abel had already prepped the barn.  I finished the window frames and moved to the door frame.  I could feel the back of my neck getting sunburned but I didn’t want to wuss out.

             
“Hey,” Abel came around the right side and looked at my work. “I’m getting thirsty.  Wanna take a break?”

             
“Yeah, I think I’m getting sunburned too.” He went behind me and hissed through his teeth. “You already are.  I’m sorry.  I should’ve warned you.”

             
“It’s fine.  It’s the summer, right?  Bound to happen.”

             
We went inside and I groaned at the seventy degree air hitting my face.  Abel groaned behind me at the same feeling. 

             
“Water, sweet tea, lemonade…” I rattled off our drink choices.

             
“Lemonade, please. Glasses?” He moved to open cabinets, trying to find cups.

             
“Top right.” I pointed them out to him. 

             
He got two out and we cooled off with ice cold lemonade.  When he emptied his glass into the sink, I thought we were going out to work again. 

             
“It’s four o’clock, so I’m going to head home.  Thanks for the help today. And take care of that.” He swiped the pads of his fingers across the apples of my cheeks.  What I wouldn’t give for him to swipe his fingers over my lips, down my neck, lace them through my hair.

             
“Yeah, okay.  Do you work every day?” 
Desperate much?

             
“During the week I do.  So I’ll see you tomorrow?” He said.

             
“Sure.” I watched him walk out the back door.  Alone again.

              Later that night I sat on the couch with nothing better to do.  There was nothing on TV and the only movies they had were kids’ movies and the only books they had were about kids and parenting.  I had cleaned the entire house again after Abel left even though it didn’t need it.  I finally gave into my boredom and went to bed. 

             
By the end of the week we had everything clean and prepped for painting.  I went inside to take my weekly phone call from Angela.  I was supposed to wait for her call around noon every Friday.  We had a short conversation.  There was just so much I could say. Yes, the house is clean and I read the rules.  No, the house hasn’t burned down.  Yes, Abel is getting the painting done.   No, he hasn’t even attempted to kiss me, not even close. No, I didn’t think about his face or overanalyze every single thing he said.   I silently added those last ones to the conversation. 

             
Abel came to the back door and knocked.  I assumed it was to tell me that he was leaving for the day.  I motioned him in.

             
“Did everything go ok on the phone,” he asked.

             
“Yeah, clean, unburned-down house, no orgies. I’m good. And you are getting ready to paint and you are mowing the grass Monday. So you’re good.” 

             
I was really not looking forward to a weekend alone.  I mentally pleaded for him to say something, chanted it in my head.  Ask me out, ask me to groom his dog, ask me to drool over him—I wasn’t picky.  But I knew all along he wouldn’t.  He was quiet but very sweet at the same time.  And it had only been a week. 

             
“I’m gonna head out.  I will see you Monday, I guess.” I swore I heard a buzzer sound behind me telling me that a foul had occurred.

             
“See you Monday.” I watched him walk out the way he came in and listened as his truck turned over. I turned and walked up the stairs to my room. I plopped in the big plush chair by the window and pouted.  At least at school I had a roommate.  Sometimes they were nice and sometimes they weren’t.  They didn’t stay for long.  Their parents took them out when they grew disciplined or just plain missed them and brought them home.  I held the record for the longest time at Wellsley.  I almost wished I was there.

             
Saturday morning I went into town to find the library.  Calling it a smaller library was an understatement.  It was tiny. I got ten books—that would carry me for a while.  I then went back to the park.  It was more of the same scenario from the other day.  Boys played football, girls tanned, toddlers squealed.  I read for a few hours and before I knew it, the sky grew dark around me.  The toddlers were gone and the girls were too.  The boys remained, playing for the win. 

             
One of them had light brown hair and when he pushed it back I realized who it was.  It was Abel. His shirtless abs were on display and they were lean and cut just the way I liked, well, just the way I’d seen in movies. As if he heard my mental recognition he looked straight at me but didn’t wave or smile.  I waved a little and when I found it unrequited, I got up and went home.

Abel

              After leaving the Stephenson’s house, I went home to find Brett on my porch tossing a football and smiling like he knew I was going to show up any minute.  I groaned within the cab of the truck before getting out and facing a person who I had hoped to go through the whole summer without.  Brett Anderson was the king of jerks.  He was cocky and rude.  He ruled with an iron fist too.  He bullied and beat on anyone in school who was different in the smallest way and it didn’t take much to set him off.  I didn’t like it but the consequences of going against Brett were such that I didn’t want to face them.  Besides, we only had one more year of high school left.

             
He moved down the porch to meet me halfway. 

             
“Yo Conners, where ‘ya been man?” He practically screamed it.  I blew out a huff of breath in preparation for whatever he had to say next.

             
“Workin’ man.  What’s up with you?” 

             
“You work too much Abel. Come hang out with us.”

             
“I’m whipped Brett.  Maybe tomorrow.” 
Translation: Please go away.

             
“All right man, but tomorrow, at the park, two o’clock, or else.” He laughed when he said it but I knew the truth of the matter.  Or else in Brett’s book wasn’t fun.

             
“Yeah,” I called back to him over my shoulder.

             
My mom and dad left a note saying they went on a date.  That was nothing new.  My parents had gone on a date every Friday night for as long as I could remember.  Me on the other hand?  I hadn’t had a date since last year’s homecoming dance. 

             
That was when Brett decided that Miranda, my date, was hotter than his date and relieved me of her presence.  It irked me but I was surprised at how much I didn’t care.  Miranda was eye candy and she asked me to the dance so I had said yes. She talked about nothing and giggled about nothing.  And her dress?  Next to nothing. 

             
I ordered pizza and sat in front of the computer.  Out of the blue I looked up Wellsley Academy in Monroe.  Three clicks in and I could tell that it was a place for snobs.  It cost nearly half of my parents’ annual salary and started college prep at Kindergarten.  It showed girls dressed in uniforms with glasses and weird sweaters as they walked to class.  But the girls on this site were nothing like the Corinne that I knew.  Who was I kidding?  I had only known her for a week. 

             
Not that I didn’t try.   I asked her questions here and there about her parents and her school but she didn’t say much.  I wondered if she didn’t want to divulge information to a stranger or if there was nothing to tell.  These were things I was willing to dig to get to the bottom of. 

             
I toyed with the idea of asking her out all week.  But then I would chicken out.  Not because of the asking part but because of the actual date.  If we saw my friends while we were out and they acted like their usual jerk selves I was sure she would want nothing to do with me anymore.  Maybe I could take her somewhere else.  Maybe she’d think I was a moron and call the Stephenson’s and tell them to fire me.  Yeah, that was probably it.  But I had to try, she was like nothing I had ever known. 

             
Saturday I hung out until about two when I met Brett and the other guys at the park to play some ball.  And of course the girlfriends of the guys came to lay around and complain about the heat.  I almost decided to go see Corinne instead but how desperate would that make me look?  We played until it was almost dark, then I looked up in the middle of a play and there she sat on a bench by the playground.  She watched us for a few minutes, I thought she hadn’t recognized me.  Then she waved but I didn’t want to alert the guys to who she was just yet so I didn’t wave back.  For the rest of the weekend I felt like a jerk.  Yes, I was who I was friends with. 

             
Monday I pulled up to the house fully expecting an angry female but she wasn’t home.  I worked through until the afternoon missing her company and her laugh.  She had a whisper quiet laugh.  You could only tell she was laughing if you looked at her and saw her smiling and her shoulders shaking.  Not that I needed another reason to look at her. 

             
“I think you get more work done without me.” I exhaled a relieved breath at the sound of her voice.

             
“Hmmm. I think so too.  Nothing to distract me.”  I said truthfully.

             
“Distract you?  Hardly.”  She laughed.

             
“What? Your mad scraping and sandpaper skills confound me.” I said.

             
“Yeah, that must be it.” She laughed. “I had to go to the post office and the hardware store this morning for pool chemicals.  Some guy is supposed to come and shock the pool or something.”

             
“Yeah, that’s Mr. Lambert.  He’s pretty nice.”

             
“So, you ready for a break?” She said.

             
“Actually I am.”  I threw down my scraper satisfied.

             
“Good, I got you a snow ball.”  She smiled and began walking backwards towards the house.

Corinne

              I swear every time I open my mouth the words that come out reach new levels of lameness. 
Good, I got you a snowball.

             
He probably thought I sounded like a seven year old girl with pigtails.  ‘Hey Abel, I like your t-shirt.  You like Spongebob too?  I got you a snow ball!’ 
Idiot.

             
He interrupted my self-loathing, “Really?  I love those things.  I try to get one every day of the summer.” 

             
“Shut up.” I said sarcastically.

             
“What?  I do.”  He said and shrugged.

             
“I got you blackberry the same as mine.  I didn’t know what flavor you’d like.”

             
“I’ve never had blackberry, sounds good.” He said.

             
I began to think that Abel was the easiest going person I had ever met.  But I also had a feeling that if anyone ever did piss him off it wouldn’t be pretty.  Plus the fact that I couldn’t get the picture of him shirtless out of my head.  I mean really?  How was I supposed to think straight around him now?

             
“So, I saw you at the park.” I said as he dug into his drink with gusto.

             
He looked up at me with the straw still in his mouth.

             
“Yeah, I saw you too.  I just…” He huffed out a breath, “Look, some of my friends are real assholes and I didn’t want you to think that I was like them.  And if I waved back…”

             
“Then they’d want to meet me right?  No, it’s fine.  I get it.”  I totally didn’t get it.  Since when do people call their ‘friends’ assholes.  And if they are so bad, why be friends with them?  Not that I wrote the book on social situations.  I was raised by teachers and people who resembled the tin man.

             
“Yeah, I’m sorry.  I really don’t like to hang out with them much but one of them cornered me.” 

             
Even though I was hurt, probably more than I should be, I smiled and changed the subject.

             
“So, what else is there to do around here?  I drove around for a while Sunday but the only thing I saw was a bowling alley.” 

             
“Um, there’s that and a pool hall.  Other than that you have to go into the next town over or into Monroe.” He took one last pull on the straw and I could hear that his cup was now empty.