Lost in the Sun (11 page)

So I stopped her before she could get there.

“I did a bad thing,” I told Fallon. Staring off at the foil hot dog wrappers littering the floor by the trash can. Trying to ignore the tightness in my throat. “Whether it was on purpose or not, I did something bad. Somebody
died.
And if I just . . . stop thinking about it, if I don't even feel
bad,
then what? If you do something bad, you're
supposed
to feel awful.”

Fallon shook her head. “I think you're wrong,” she said. Like that was that. Like she just
knew.

I squinted at her. “What do you know?” I asked, folding my arms
over my chest, rubbing them dry against the front of my shirt. I didn't know why I'd even
told
her. “Just shut up about it, all right? I don't want to talk about it anymore.”

I figured Fallon was going to get mad then, about me telling her to shut up on her birthday. But she didn't. She took a deep breath, through her nose, and let it all out through her mouth.

“Sometimes,” she said, staring off at the same trash can where I'd been looking a second before, “bad things just happen, and it's not anyone's fault.” Outside the bumper car cage, kids were laughing and screaming, running around. Probably eating too much cotton candy. “And you can't go on forever, thinking and worrying and feeling bad about something that just
happened.
It's over, Trent. Let it be over.”

My arms were mostly back to normal, then. But I guess
I
wasn't.

“Is that how you got your scar?” I asked her. I knew she didn't want to talk about it, not really, even though she talked about it all the time. “Did that just happen too?”

Fallon stared off at the trash can for what felt like a century.

“No,” she said finally. “Someone did that on purpose.”

And that was all she told me about that.

We sucked on our sodas till they were just ice and someone who worked at the park finally noticed that there were two kids inside the closed-down bumper cars.

“Hey!” the guy shouted at us, super angry. “Get out of there! What are you
doing
? Can't you read?”

Fallon grabbed my arm again and we lit out of the bumper car lot, ducking under the rope, laughing the whole time.

“Sorry about the trash!” Fallon called over her shoulder.

After that I decided to buy her a cotton candy. I knew I didn't technically have to, like Fallon kept saying, but I guess I sort of wanted to anyway.

•   •   •

The Dodgers lost to the Cubs, 7 to 6. Which meant that they missed the playoffs by one stupid game. Which meant that their season was over. Kaput.

And that wasn't even the worst thing that happened that night.

Just after ten o'clock, when I was already in bed getting ready to sleep, Mom knocked on my door and then came into my room. “For you,” she said, holding out her cell phone. I took it, and looked at the screen.

Dad.

Mom waited in the doorway while I put the phone to my ear.

“Hi,” I said.

I didn't really mean it.

“Trent. Nice to finally talk to you.”

“Why are you calling so late?” I asked.

All the way off in Timber Trace, my dad sighed. I probably could've heard it even if he hadn't been on the phone.

“I thought you'd like to know,” he said slowly, “that you have a baby sister. Jewel Annabelle Hoffsteader Zimmerman. She was born at seven fifty-six p.m., and she weighs seven pounds, four ounces. Both she and Kari are doing fine. Doug's here too. He got to be at the hospital for the birth. Kari went into labor at the picnic.”

Dad said that like he thought it was such an amazing treat, about Doug being there for the birth. Like I should feel bad that I was riding roller coasters all day instead of sitting in a stinky hospital, waiting for a baby to be born. I would've bet a million dollars Doug would've gone for the roller coasters if he'd had the choice.

“Trent?” my dad said.

I ran my tongue between my teeth and my gums. Looked at my mom in the doorway. She was trying not to look back.

“Was there anything else?” I asked.

He sighed again. A pause. Then another sigh. “I just thought you'd want to know, Trent. About your sister.” He paused again. “Most people say congratulations.”

“Congratulations,” I said. I felt bad for the baby, that was the truth. She had my dad for a dad and she didn't even get my mom. She had
Kari.
“Did you and Doug win the egg race?” I don't know why I asked that last part. What did I care?

“No,” Dad said. And then he must've been finished talking to me, because he said, “I'll talk to you later, Trent.” And he hung up the phone before I had the chance to say “Bye.”

I pressed End on the phone, and Mom came to retrieve it from me.

“Good news, huh?” she said. But I couldn't tell if she believed it or not.

“Sure,” I said.

“Having a sister will be nice.”

I shrugged.

Mom kissed me on the forehead. “Your father loves you, you know.”

“What kind of name is
Jewel
?” I asked.

Mom smiled a real smile then. “I love you too.”

“Sucks about the Dodgers.”

“Yeah. There's always next year. Get some sleep, all right, mister? We're leaving for the store bright and early tomorrow.”

“Okay. Night, Mom,” I said.

“Night.”

“Mom?”

She turned.

“I love you too,” I told her.

As I walked into the gym for P.E. first period on Monday, Mr. Gorman was standing in the doorway as always, holding his clipboard. “Am I going to like the kid I meet today?” he greeted me.

“Your guess is as good as mine,” I told him.

I couldn't play tennis, since I had a pulled muscle in my neck from all the roller coasters on Saturday. That's what I told Mr. Gorman. Anyway, I figured I better save my strength for intramurals that afternoon.

I wasn't really in the mood for drawing thoughts, so while everyone else pretended to be having a great time whacking tennis balls with rackets, I sat outside in the dirt by the tennis courts and read Mom's latest
Sports Illustrated
that I'd snagged from home. I wondered who the intramural coach would be, if it was a teacher I already knew. Anyone had to be better at leading a team than Noah's uncle. All he did
was look up from his clipboard occasionally and say, “Great! Keep hitting the ball!” Like if he didn't say that, maybe they'd start swallowing it instead.

Where did the school
find
these people?

Mr. Gorman didn't particularly seem to like the kid he met that day, but I didn't bother to ask.

•   •   •

During social studies, the wrinkled old crone handed me a stack of worksheets and asked if I would hand them out for her. I could tell just by the look in her eyes that she expected me to say no (or worse). Maybe she
wanted
me to say no (or worse), because I hadn't had detention since the very first day of school, and she was probably just itching to see me suffer.

But I didn't tell her where she could stuff her stupid worksheets. Partially because that was probably exactly what she wanted me to do, and partially because I had intramural baseball after school, so I didn't need her dumb detention anyway.

“Sure, Ms. Emerson,” I said, smiling. It really freaked her out, you could tell. “I'd
love
to.”

•   •   •

So anyway, the day was going pretty well.

And then it was time for lunch.

All the outside lunch tables were taken by the time Fallon and I got there. Totally filled. The one we usually sat at, that one had people at it, too. Three people.

Jeremiah and Stig and Noah Gorman, to be exact.

I grabbed Fallon's elbow so hard, she almost dropped her tray.
“Come on,” I said. “Let's eat somewhere else.” Noah had already spotted us—I saw him look at us, just ten feet away, then shoot his eyes down to the table. Jeremiah's back was to us, and I didn't think Stig had seen us yet either.

“There's nowhere else to eat,” Fallon said. “Let's just sit down.” She yanked her elbow free. “It's a big table.”

What was I supposed to do, just let her go? Of course not. Those guys would eat her alive if she didn't have me with her, I didn't care
how
brave she thought she was. So I followed her.

There may have only been three of those guys, but they were spread all the way around the table, taking up the whole thing, like they thought they added up to twelve people. Maybe they did think that, for all I knew. They were all morons.

“Hey,” Fallon said to Jeremiah and the other guys. Pretty nicely, too, if you ask me. “Would you mind scooching over, please? Thanks.”

Jeremiah turned around, to see who was talking to him. When he saw it was Fallon, with me behind him, he rolled his eyes. “Get lost,” he told us.

“No,” Fallon said carefully. She blew a lock of hair out of her eyes. “I don't think we will.” All I wanted to do was stare at the lumpy mashed potatoes on my tray. I could feel the heat in my chest starting up. But I didn't stare at my potatoes. I kept my eyes focused on Fallon.

“Fallon,” I whispered, “we should go.”

Fallon ignored me. “Scooch over,” she told Jeremiah again.

By this time, obviously, Stig had noticed us, and Noah couldn't
pretend he hadn't. But they were clearly waiting for the boss man to tell them what to do.

I was surprised, I guess, by what he said.

“You heard her,” Jeremiah said to his buddies. “Scooch over.”

They looked as surprised as I felt by that, but I guess when the Boss Moron tells you to do something, well, you do it. So they scooched, and Jeremiah scooched, and suddenly there was plenty of room for us.

“Thanks so very much,” Fallon told them.

I saw it before she did. And I tried to stop it, I really did. But there wasn't time.

Just before Fallon sat, right next to Jeremiah, looking so nice and friendly you just knew he was up to something, Jeremiah let out a fake sneeze and plopped a heaping forkful of mashed potatoes on the seat next to him, exactly where Fallon was about to sit. And there was no time to stop it from happening—not for me, because I was too far away, and not for Fallon, who was halfway to sitting when she must've figured out what was going on—so gravity just plopped her
PLOP!
smack in the pile of potatoes.

The fire in my chest then, it moved on to the rest of me. Felt like my intestines were boiling. My fingertips twitched with heat. I wanted to punch Jeremiah in the face. I wanted to pull him off that bench by the collar of his shirt and smack him between the ears. I wanted to throw him on the floor of the cafeteria and kick him and yell at him and tell him to pick on people who actually ever
did
something to him, and not the one nice person in this whole stupid town. And then
when I was done beating the crap out of Jeremiah, I wanted to beat the crap out of his friends, too.

I swallowed the rage down.

Instead, I turned to Fallon. “Are you okay?” I asked. Which was a stupid question, because it wasn't like she sat on a firecracker and her butt exploded. She sat in a pile of mashed potatoes. She wasn't bleeding. She didn't need a bandage. She needed a washing machine.

Fallon was swallowing down her own chestful of rage, I could tell just by looking at her. Her face was red and blotchy. She looked like she might cry, even. Her hair, if it was possible, looked even frizzier than it had three seconds ago. She took a deep breath. She turned to look at me, eyes purposefully not on Jeremiah.

“I'm fine,” she said. “Let's eat lunch.”

“But—” I started. She had potatoes on her weird plaid skirt. Smooshed all into the fabric, probably seeping over the hemline onto her leg.

“I
said,
” she snapped—and it was the first time I had ever seen her even the slightest bit angry—“I want to eat
lunch.
I'm
fine.
”

Well, what was I supposed to do? I sat.

I set my tray on the table, still trying to control the fire in my stomach, while Jeremiah and Stig just laughed about the potatoes, like it was the funniest thing they'd ever seen. Noah pretended he was super interested in something at the bottom of his backpack, and definitely did
not
look at me. Fallon worked on yanking her plastic utensils out of their package. Spork, knife. Individual salt and pepper. She pulled each piece out calmly, slowly, like there wasn't a wad of
potatoes mucking up her skirt. But her face was still red. Her scar was purple. And her hands were shaking, just a little.

I tried to ignore that boiling rage on my insides. I tried so hard. Because obviously Fallon didn't want me to do anything, and she was the one with mashed potato on her, so that's what I knew I should do—nothing.

I curled my hands into tight fists.

“Where did you even get that stupid skirt?” Jeremiah said to Fallon. She slowly opened her container of chocolate milk. “You know it looks dumb, right?”

“It's a shame you think that,” Fallon told him. I had to admit, her skirt was particularly weird today. Like something you'd have to wear at a private school, only it didn't exactly fit her very well. The waist was rolled over at the top, and she was wearing a piece of rope as a belt. “I think it would look really nice on you.” She took a swig of milk. “It would show off your legs.”

If you hadn't been able to see her—her red face and her shaking hands—it would've been really funny, Fallon telling Jeremiah he'd look nice in a skirt. But from where I was sitting, it wasn't so funny.

You could tell Stig didn't know from funny, though, because he hooted like it was hilarious.

“Shut up,” Jeremiah told him.

Noah was still searching inside his backpack for who-knows-what.

“If you want,” Fallon said, sticking her spork into her mashed potatoes, “you can come over sometime. My mom has some blouses that would really bring out your eyes.”

“You're so lame,” Jeremiah shot back. Which was pretty much the lamest comeback on earth, but when you were a bully like Jeremiah, with lackeys who'd do whatever you asked them to, I guess you didn't have to be too witty with the comebacks.

Anyway, I could already tell this wasn't going anywhere good. “We should go,” I whispered to Fallon. “I'm not really hungry anyway.” But she just shook her head and dug into her potatoes, glaring at Jeremiah the whole time.

So it wasn't like I was going to leave her there or anything.

“You're ugly.” That's what Jeremiah said to Fallon next.

Fallon took another bite of potatoes. “Aw, shucks,” she said, batting her eyelashes. “I didn't know we were writing each other love poems yet. It seems like that shouldn't be till the fifth date at least.”

I couldn't take it anymore. My toes were tingling now. I had to
do
something.

While Jeremiah stared at Fallon, confused, I decided what I needed to do.

Fallon was halfway through her potatoes already. “Well, here's one for you then,” she said. “Just so we're even.”

With my hands hidden under the table, I
slooooowly
began to push my tray, through the metal weave of the mesh top. Invisibly. So you couldn't see it was me.

“You have the brains of a wet turkey,” Fallon said with a smile. She was clutching her hands to her chest, like a lovesick girl in a romantic movie. All swoony.

I inched the tray closer to Jeremiah's lap. Closer. Mashed potatoes
with gravy. Open container of milk. Glops of meat loaf. Closer and closer I pushed the tray. The key was doing it so slowly that Jeremiah wouldn't notice it moving.

“And the wit of a dead sloth,” Fallon said.

Closer and closer.

“Whatever,” Jeremiah shot back. Which was a terrible comeback, again. But I bet he was so busy thinking it up that he still hadn't looked at the table. He still hadn't noticed the tray.

“I'll write it down for you,” Fallon said with a smile. “In case you forget it. You can hang it in your locker.”

And then, just as the tray was two inches from perfect topple territory, Fallon—without even looking my way—picked up her spork and smashed it handle-first into my arm through the tabletop.

“Ow!”
I shouted. I pulled my arm out from under the table.

The tray remained untoppled.

“What was that for?” I hissed at Fallon.

She snatched her lunch tray off the table. “Let's go,” she told me.

“But—” I said, my eyes darting back to my own tray. I'd
had
him. I'd totally
had
him, and Fallon had stopped me.

Jeremiah and Stig and Noah just kept looking at us, one to the other, clearly confused.

Heck, I was confused.

“I said,” Fallon told me, standing up, “let's go.”

So what could I do? I followed her.

“You two are both turd faces!” Jeremiah shouted at our backs as we left the cafeteria. Only he didn't say “turd faces.”

I could feel everyone's eyes boring into me.

“Where are you going?” I called to Fallon as we entered the hallway. We were both still holding our lunch trays, and she was walking so fast, I was practically running to keep up. “Why did you stop me back there? I was totally about to mess with him.”

Suddenly Fallon spun around to face me. Only I hadn't known she was going to spin around, so I nearly careened right into her. My milk sloshed out of its carton. “I didn't ask you to do that,” she told me.

“But I did anyway,” I said. “What's the big deal?”

“I was
fine,
” she said.

“I just thought he could use a lapful of lunch food,” I said. I was confused. Why was Fallon so mad? All I was trying to do was stand up for her. I was trying to be her
friend.

“So what would happen then, huh?” she asked me. Her face was redder than it had been before. It was like I'd made her more upset than Jeremiah had. And that didn't make any sense. “He'd still be a jerk, he'd just be a jerk covered in milk.”

“That's kind of the point,” I said.

Fallon didn't say anything, only stood there, in the hallway, looking around her like she didn't know where to go.

“You're covered in mashed potatoes,” I reminded her. It wasn't usually the sort of thing you needed to remind somebody, but she seemed to have forgotten. “You should go to the bathroom and try to clean it off. I'll wait for you.” She was still just standing there, clutching her lunch tray. It was weird. I didn't like it. “Then we can go to the library and look stuff up on the Internet or something.”

She shook her head. “I can't,” she said. Her voice was small. It sounded weird coming out of her mouth. Fallon was not, I realized, a quiet girl.

“Um, okay,” I said slowly. I didn't really know why a person wouldn't be able to go to the library, but I wasn't exactly going to argue about that right now. “We can go somewhere else then. We'll find another lunch table. Or go to the blacktop.”

Fallon shook her head again.
“No,”
she said. Quiet, but insistent. “Not that. I can't go . . .” She darted her eyes away from me. “I don't like to go into the bathroom at lunch. There's always girls in there. This same group of them, doing their makeup and stuff. I don't . . .”