Second Child (10 page)

“Why didn’t you get it?” “It was coming right at you!”

“Game!” Jeff Barnstable yelled gleefully from Brett’s side of the net. “Anybody want to play girls against the boys?”

“Give me a break,” Ellen Stevens groaned. “You never wanted to play that two years ago, when we were all bigger than you guys!”

“So?” Jeff countered, grinning impudently. “Things change. Got to keep up, Ellen.”

Ellen abandoned the court and flopped down on her beach towel. “I’ll tell you what,” she offered, stretching languidly as she applied another coat of sunscreen to her
arms and felt Jeff’s eyes admiring her. “After lunch we’ll get a tennis court, and Cyndi and I will take you and Kent on at doubles.”

Jeff groaned, dropping down beside her. “You think I’m nuts? I’m not gonna let everyone at the club watch you whip me.”

Ellen’s brows rose. “But it’s okay if everyone watches you guys beat us at volleyball?” she teased. “You’re such a sexist creep sometimes.”

Jeff picked up a handful of sand, and Ellen rolled away from him, giggling. A second later Jeff let the sand trickle through his fingers. “Hey,” he said to no one in particular. “Has anyone seen Teri yet?”

Cyndi Miller shook her head. “It’s weird—she’s been here two whole days. Wouldn’t you think she’d be on the beach?”

“Maybe she’s as nutty as Melissa,” Marshall Bradford said, the corners of his eyes wrinkling with a grin. “And she’s a couple of years older—maybe they have to keep her locked up in the attic.”

Ellen Stevens snickered. “My mom keeps telling me I ought to call her, but what am I supposed to do? Invite her over and not ask Melissa?”

“Why not?” Cyndi countered. “I mean, it’s not as if Melissa likes us. She actually kicked us out of her birthday party the other day.”

“Some party,” Brett groaned. “A game of water polo and some of Cora Peterson’s Ritz crackers with peanut butter. Big deal. We could have—” And then he fell silent, frowning slightly as he gazed up the beach to the north.

Jeff Barnstable followed his friend’s gaze, then nudged Ellen Stevens, who was stretched out on her back, one arm shielding her eyes from the sun. “Guess who’s coming down the beach? Melissa and someone who has to be Teri MacIver.”

Ellen uttered an exaggerated groan. “Can’t they do something about the pollution around here?”

Jeff snickered, but as the two girls drew closer, with Blackie frolicking at Melissa’s heels, he nudged Ellen again. “If you ask me, Teri doesn’t exactly look like a lump of tar.”

“I didn’t ask you,” Ellen replied, but nevertheless sat up
and blinked as the sun struck her eyes. A moment later her pupils adjusted to the glare and she saw the familiar figure of Melissa, a little too plump, with her brownish hair hanging limply around her shoulders, walking along the beach just above the waterline.

But next to her was another girl, and the contrast between the two made Ellen’s eyes widen slightly, for Teri, her perfect figure clad in a slightly too tight bathing suit that exposed most of her skin to the sun, was the exact opposite of Melissa. Her blond hair, brushed back from her face, had the kind of natural highlighting that Ellen herself had been struggling for a month to coax out of a bottle from the local drugstore. Her tan, a deep glowing bronze that was set off perfectly by her black bathing suit, was absolutely even, and Ellen found herself automatically glancing down at the pale patches on the insides of her own thighs.

“California girl,” she commented, knowing even as she spoke that the words sounded like sour grapes. She glanced around at her friends, all of whom—even Cyndi Miller—were staring at Teri. “Come on, you guys—she’s not
that
gorgeous.”

“Oh, yes she is,” Brett Van Arsdale said. “Face it, Ellen,” he added, never taking his eyes off Teri, “she makes you look like dog meat.”

“That is so gross!” Ellen snapped. “You’re the one who looks like a dog, Brett. Your tongue’s hanging out and you’re practically drooling. And just because she’s wearing a bathing suit a couple of sizes too small! Why don’t you grow up?”

“I think I just did,” Brett sighed. “How am I going to meet her?”

“Have you thought of just walking up to her and saying hello?” Ellen asked, her voice acid.

“I could have, if you hadn’t been so crappy to Melissa the other day.”

“Me?!” Ellen shrieked. “What did I do?”

Brett’s eyes shifted over to fix on Ellen. “Oh, get off it—I heard what you and Cyndi were saying about her, and she did, too.”

“Well, if you’re so crazy about Melissa all of a sudden,” Ellen complained, “then why don’t you go ask her to introduce you to her sister?”

“Maybe I will,” Brett said, but made no move to leave the blanket he was sharing with Kent Fielding.

“Well, go on,” Kent goaded, giving Brett a shove. “Why don’t you go talk to Melissa? First you can tell her how sorry we all are about her crappy birthday party, and then you can tell her you have the hots for her sister.”

“Aw, Jeez,” Brett groaned. “Give me a break,
will
you?”

“Well, how else are you going to meet her?” Jeff asked.

Brett shrugged. “Well, I’m sure not going to try with you guys around. Anyway, she’s bound to show up at the club.”

Cyndi Miller snickered. “Right. Along with Mrs. Holloway and Melissa. Forget it, Brett—you’re not going to get to Teri without getting stuck with Melissa, too.” She rolled over, turning her back on the two girls, who had now stopped fifty yards down the beach and were busy whispering to each other. “And who cares anyway? I’ll bet she’s just as weird as Melissa.”

“But don’t you know them?” Teri asked, her head tilting toward the group of teenagers clustered on the beach next to the volleyball net.

Melissa chewed at her lip. She knew Teri wanted to meet them, but the painful memory of her birthday was still fresh in her mind. “Yes, I know them,” she finally admitted. “But that doesn’t mean I like them. They’re just a bunch of snobby Cove Club kids.”

Teri frowned. “But we’re members of the club, aren’t we?”

“Yes, but …”

“But what?” Teri pressed. “I mean, you’ve been here every summer of your life. Aren’t they your friends?”

Melissa took a deep breath, then shook her head. “No, they’re not,” she finally admitted. “They—They don’t like me.” Her eyes fixed on the ground as she spoke the words, unable to meet Teri’s stare.

“What do you mean, they don’t like you?” Teri asked. “Why wouldn’t they?”

Melissa shrugged, wishing they hadn’t come to the beach today. But for the last two days she and Teri had lain around the swimming pool, and this morning, when Teri
had suggested they take a walk up the beach, she hadn’t been able to admit she didn’t want to because she was afraid of running into the kids from the club. And yet, when she finally managed to look up at Teri, her half sister wasn’t looking at her in that awful superior way the other kids always did.

“They just don’t, that’s all.”

Teri glanced once more at the group of kids sprawled on their blankets and instantly understood. Even from here she could see that all of them were alike—they all had blond hair, the girls were all slim, and the boys were all broad-shouldered with deep chests and well-developed muscles.

They were the kind of kids she’d seen back home sometimes, when she and her friends took the bus into Beverly Hills to look around, not doing anything, but just hanging out. She’d always been able to spot the kids who lived there—they all looked alike, and they all did their shopping along Rodeo Drive, and spent their days during the summer lying around their pools and playing tennis on their own courts.

And when they glanced at Teri and her friends at all, which they practically never did, Teri thought she knew what they were thinking:

You don’t belong here—why don’t you go home?

And yet as she stole another glance at the group of kids on the beach, she was certain at least one of them was giving her a look she’d seen before, a look that said he, at least, wanted to get to know her. Unless he was just staring at the skimpy bathing suit she’d found in the poolhouse yesterday.

He was the tallest one of the group—a little over six feet, and when he grinned at one of his friends, she could see deep dimples in his cheeks. “Who’s that?” she asked Melissa.

Melissa didn’t even have to look at the group of kids to know whom Teri was talking about. It had to be the boy on whom she’d had a secret crush for the last two summers. “Jeff Barnstable,” she said out loud. “Isn’t he adorable? I love his curly hair, and his eyes are just incredible.”

Teri eyed her half sister speculatively. “You like him, don’t you?”

Though Melissa shook her head in denial, her flush of embarrassment belied the gesture. “Well, maybe I’ve got kind of a crush on him,” she finally admitted, then sighed heavily. “But he doesn’t even know I’m alive.”

Teri squeezed Melissa’s hand sympathetically. “Well, don’t worry about it,” she said. “I bet if we can just get his attention, he’ll notice you. Besides,” she added, “it wasn’t him I was talking about. Who’s the tall one?”

Melissa covertly let her eyes scan the group of teenagers, and then understood who Teri was talking about. “Brett Van Arsdale,” she said.

“What’s he like?”

Melissa, relieved that it wasn’t Jeff who interested Teri, shrugged indifferently. “I don’t know—he’s okay, I guess.” She started walking once more. “Come on—just ignore them, and they’ll probably leave us alone.”

Side by side they walked along the waterline, the foam from the gently breaking waves lapping at their feet. Teri could feel the eyes of the teenagers on the beach watching them as they passed, but she didn’t look up. When they were about a hundred yards farther along, she glanced at Melissa. “Let’s go for a swim,” she suggested. “I’m all hot and sticky.” Without waiting for an answer, she turned and dashed into the water, running out until she was knee deep, then diving into a small wave. The chill of the water hit her skin with a shock, but she swam underwater for a few yards, then surfaced, rolling over onto her back. “Come on in,” she called to Melissa.

Melissa hesitated, then waded into the water, stopping when it reached her knees. “It’s cold!” she called.

Teri laughed and started swimming toward her half sister. “It isn’t cold—it’s freezing! But come on in. If I can do it, you can do it! And once you get numb, it’s not bad at all!”

As she heard Teri’s laughter, Melissa felt a pang of hurt stab through her. But then, as she listened to what Teri was saying, she realized Teri wasn’t laughing
at
her at all—she was laughing
with
her! Taking a deep breath, she held her nose, then dropped down into the water, only to jump up again, screeching with the shock of the sudden cold. “It’s the only way I can do it,” she told Teri a moment later, finally stretching out into the water and
slowly dog-paddling toward the other girl, with Blackie, who’d plunged happily into the water the moment she’d started wading in, swimming along beside her. When she came close to Teri, she rolled over on her back, too, and they floated for a while, side by side, the warmth of the air on their faces barely compensating for the ocean chill.

They drifted for a few minutes, enjoying the gentle rise and fall of the swells, and finally Melissa let her feet drop down and began treading water. Though they hadn’t been floating more than five minutes, they were already thirty yards from the beach. “Teri?” Melissa called. “We’d better go back—the tide’s taking us out!”

Teri rolled over and glanced around. “We’re fine. You go back if you want to—I’m going to swim for a while.”

Melissa hesitated. Did Teri think she was chicken? But then Teri said, “Really—go on back to the beach. I’ll be fine.”

Still Melissa hesitated. “Okay,” she said. “But come in closer, all right? If the tide pulls you out of the cove—”

“Then I’ll drown,” Teri finished for her. With a couple of strong strokes, she swam over to Melissa, passed her, then slowed down to let her half sister catch up. When they were in water shallow enough for them to stand up in, Teri paused. “Okay?”

Melissa nodded, then swam on in to the beach, where she dropped down onto the hot sand, shivering from the freezing water. A moment later Blackie trotted out of the water, bounded over to her and violently shook himself, covering Melissa with an icy spray. Teri, floating on her back again, was bobbing once more on the gentle swells. Melissa watched her for a few minutes, then a flock of sandpipers, skittering along the waterline a few yards up the beach caught her attention. When Blackie dashed off to chase them, Melissa’s concentration shifted from her sister to the frolicking dog. The birds fanned out in front of the lumbering animal, letting him get within a few inches of them before spreading their wings and leaping into the air, wheeling out over the water, only to settle back on the sand an enticing few yards away from the dog. Melissa watched the game for a few minutes before her attention was jerked away by a terrified yell.

“Help! Someone help me!”

Melissa leaped to her feet, her eyes scanning the bay. A moment later she saw Teri, fifty yards out now, frantically waving her arms in the air. Melissa gasped, and instinctively ran down to the water, but to the north she saw Brett Van Arsdale already sprinting across the beach. He dived into the water, and launched himself into a powerful crawl that took him out to Teri within less than a minute. Meanwhile Melissa raced down to the beach to join the group that had gathered at the water’s edge, her feelings about the other kids forgotten. Jeff Barnstable was in the water now, too, swimming strongly, but not fast enough to catch up with Brett before he’d reached Teri.

Almost before it had begun, it was over. Brett, one arm curved around Teri’s chest, was using the other arm in a clumsy backstroke, but after a few moments Teri said something and Brett let her go. Side by side, with Jeff escorting them the last twenty yards, they came back to the beach. Teri, shivering with cold, pulled herself out of the water and dropped onto the sand. Instantly, the small crowd of teenagers surrounded her.

“Are you all right?” Ellen Stevens asked.

Teri, gasping, nodded, then spat some saltwater out onto the sand. “Dumb,” she finally managed to say. “I feel so dumb.”