The Color Of Grace (13 page)

So I rode with Todd in his beat up Jeep Cherokee to Ryder
Yates’s house. Thankfully, the drive ended up being not as bad as I thought it
would. Three others rode with us. Two cheerleaders and a boyfriend of one of
the cheerleaders, though I couldn’t name any of them. Todd had me sit up front
with him in the passenger seat while the other three packed into the back,
complaining about their cramped ride the entire way.

“God, Todd,” one of the girls grumbled, tugging up an empty
Gatorade bottle on which she’d been sitting. “Don’t you ever clean your car?”

He grinned into the rearview mirror. “Clean it for me and
I’ll give you five bucks.”

She snorted. “I’ll pass. It’d take twenty just to run this
heap of mud through a car wash.”

The boy passenger found a sheet of paper he’d wrinkled under
his shoe. After squinting at it in the sparse lighting, he pulled back and
lifted his eyebrows. “Dude, weren’t we supposed to hand this in, like, last
week?”

“Hey, that’s where that paper went. I
told
 
the teacher I’d
finished it.” Todd snatched the sheet and tucked it into the cubby between his
seat and mine.

I bit my lip, worried about his grade for him. “Can you
still turn it in?”

He shrugged, a bit too nonchalant for my taste. “I’m sure I
can sweet-talk my way into getting the teacher to accept it.”

His confidence surprised me. He must be used to cajoling
teachers. I was usually too intimidated and guilty to even try when I wanted
more time. That’s probably why I never turned in anything late.

Todd slowed the Jeep and pulled into a driveway. As the
headlights swept over Ryder’s home, I sat forward, scoping the place out. It
was a large, split-level home. Todd parked behind a new model, extended cab
truck and a rusted old car. I had to guess the truck was probably Ryder’s and
the car belonged to one of their other friends.

Behind me, the still nameless cheerleaders and boyfriend
piled out into the cold, dark night. Todd killed the engine and grinned over at
me. He always seemed to be smiling at me. It made me wonder if he was truly
that happy of an individual or if he was forcing his enthusiasm for some
strange, nameless reason.

“Ready?” he asked.

Not really, but I followed him and the other three along the
drive and right past the front door. I glanced back toward the entrance, and
shrugged, figuring we’d probably go around to the back. But instead, the four
in front of me paused on the shadowy east side at a brightly lit window that
led into the bottom level of the house.

“Knock, knock,” Todd called as he ducked his head into the
open space and started to climb inside. I watched, mystified, as the other
three followed him, entering the house through a window.

Were we sneaking in? Did his parents not know he had so many
friends over? I stood outside in the cold by myself for about two seconds
before Todd popped his head out.

“Need some help in?” He held out his hand.

“Um, no thanks. I got it.” Shrugging, I crouched and shimmed
my way into Ryder Yates’s bedroom.

The nerd herd was so not going to believe this.

I refused to stick my backside in first and climb inside with
my spine to the window. So I sat on the ground outside, tucked my feet in
first, then ducked my head and dropped about three feet to the floor. Once my
shoes hit carpet, someone called, “Shut the window. You’re letting all the cold
in.”

Todd appeared beside me and did the honors. I leaned toward
him and quietly asked, “Why did we just come in through a window?” hoping my
question didn’t have some kind of foolishly obvious answer that I should’ve
already figured out.

He just shrugged. “’Cause it’s fun.”

I shrugged too. Well, okay, then. And finally, I looked
about me.

Ryder’s room consisted of two levels.
The main portion took up the bottom level. It contained his huge, king-sized
bed, a giant entertainment center that held a forty-inch flat screen and the
works in electronic gadgets. Then a full-size couch hogged one wall. After all
that, he still had plenty of room to fit in dresser drawers and three doors,
one that was open and led into his own private bathroom. The other two, I
guessed, would lead into the rest of the house and the room-sized closet Mindy
had spoken of earlier. A ladder ascended to the upper second level, where a
huge oak desk sat with a personal computer and printer and a filing cabinet.
Three people hovered around the computer, laughing at something on the screen.

Another three people sat on the couch, discussing the game.
Todd paused at the entertainment system and started shuffling through
DVD-looking cases, while Ryder lay stretched out on his bed, his back to the
headboard and legs sticking out across the mattress with his girlfriend planted
on his lap, facing him as she tried to extract out his tonsils. With her
tongue.

I was pretty much ready to go home.

Loitering by the window, I hunched inside my Dad’s oversized
coat, debating how easy it would be to push up the window and escape without
anyone noticing and stirring up a bunch of questions I didn’t want to answer.

I wasn’t so sure if I really wanted to hang with this crowd.
Okay, honestly, I was absolutely certain I did
not
want to hang with them. They seemed superficial. I liked Mindy,
and Todd was nice to me, but...

“Grace!” Mindy called, noticing me for the first time. She
smiled and waved. “Come sit by me.” She patted the last available cushion on
the couch next to her.

As I reluctantly left the window and moved toward her, I
noticed Ryder from the corner of my eye grasping Kiera’s arms to physically
break their kiss and set her away from him. He ran the back of his hand over
his mouth as if he wanted to rub off the feel of her lips. Or maybe that’s how
I wanted it to look. A petty and spiteful wish on my part, but I didn’t really
care.

Behind me, the window opened again. I glanced back to see
two more guys joining the party.

One boy waved a six-pack of beer over his head. “Anyone
thirsty?”

My stomach dropped into my knees. This was exactly what I’d
feared most. If someone pulled out drugs next, I was going to be so out of
there…and look like a total moron in the process.

I was out of my league.

But Ryder snapped, “Put that away!” He surged off the bed in
order to corral the beer-waver back toward the window. “Don’t ever bring that
crap into my house again. Do you know how dead I’d be if my parents saw alcohol
in my bedroom?”

“Yo, man, sorry. I didn’t know.”

“Just…take it back to your car,” Ryder ordered, ushering his
friend outside.

After the beer disappeared, I could breathe easier, but no
way could I sit down now. My feet felt too antsy, wanting to flee. I lingered
next to the couch beside Mindy, not that she noticed my presence as her
boyfriend put his arm around her and pulled her close for one of those long,
why-in-the-world-are-you-doing-that-in-public kisses.

I began to hum “
Amazing
Grace”
in my head, trying to mind my own business and not look like a
dork in the process. Lifting my face, I glanced at the pictures on the wall.
Poster-sized but framed with nice oak wood, they weren’t prints of what I’d
guess a teenage boy would put on his wall. No wet, tanned models in skimpy
bathing suits. No sports heroes. No movie actresses. Ryder put tasteful
pictures on his wall. The Eiffel
Tower at night lit up
with lights. The San Francisco
Bridge at sunrise, vivid
red framework against vivid blue sky and sea. A looming skyscraper taken from a
diagonal angle, rising from a nest of fog. The Hoover Dam. A Ferris wheel.

“So what do you think?” that spine-tingling voice said next
to me.

I held my breath a moment before glancing over and looking
up into Ryder’s beautiful green eyes.

He grinned before nodding his chin toward the Ferris wheel
poster. “You can’t tell me
that
picture makes you feel sad and lonely.”

Chapter 11

Pink is love and purity. A pink
carnation for a new baby or a pink rose for the beau you just discovered. Every
time Ryder draws near, I turn pink. Why? Why can’t I forget that fresh blush of
interest I felt when I first looked up and drowned in his perfect, pink smile?

* * * *

A little spot in my chest ached because Ryder had to go and
remind me of our glove conversation. He thought I’d been analyzing the pictures
on the wall and reading the meaning behind them. I liked that, yet it irritated
me that I still found myself liking anything about him.

Instead of answering and being forced to admit I hadn’t been
dissecting the picture—I’d been dissecting him—I cleared my throat and studied
the Ferris wheel.

“You like photography?” I guessed. A strange warmth worked
through me as I asked. Could it be possible I had the same passion as Ryder
Yates?

But he shook his head and corrected, “Architecture.”

For some reason, his answer wasn’t disappointing at all.
Surprising but definitely not disappointing. Architecture, like photography,
was simply another form of creativity, which still gave us a small bond
together.

Embarrassed by my own thoughts, I cleared my throat as I
bore a hole through the Ferris wheel with my gaze. “I guess all the things in
these pictures
did
have to be
designed by architects, didn’t they? I always just think of houses, and malls,
and skyscrapers when I hear the word architect.”

Ryder nodded, his eyes lighting up as he smiled. It was as
if he’d just discovered he’d found a kindred soul. “You’re right, most people
do think that. But really, architects construct
all
physical structures.”

He wanted to be an architect. I mean, he really wanted it.
It wasn’t just some passing
oh, hey,
architects makes money; I’ll be that
wish. By the way his eyes sparkled and
his smile bloomed, I could tell he actually loved architecture.

I liked that about him too, dang it. And I couldn’t help but
notice he didn’t seem so very upset about me standing in his room, looking at
his posters. It was as if he’d never said, “
You
don’t belong.”

“Did you know the Ferris wheel was named after its designer,
George Washington Gale Ferris, Jr.?” he mused aloud as he studied the poster.
“It was made in 1893 and was put into the World’s Columbian Exposition in order
to provide some kind of competition for the Eiffel Tower
that had been made only a few years before. Which I don’t really understand,”
he added, casting a conspirator’s look my way. “Since the Ferris wheel was only
two hundred sixty-four feet tall and the Eiffel Tower
was over a thousand feet tall. That’s not really any comparison at all if you
ask me. But you know what does amaze about the first Ferris wheel?”

“Hmm? What’s that?” I said, wanting to watch the amazing
light in his eyes continue to beam as he blathered on. But honestly, he charmed
me with the fact his passion could so fully suck him into raving about
something as trivial as year and size and names of people no one had ever heard
of.

“The first wheel could carry over two
thousand
 
people at a time.
It was made of thirty-six cars and sixty people could fit into each one. Isn’t
that crazy? Do you have any idea how much it would cost to construct something
like that today? But back then, they only charged fifty cents a ride.”

Todd appeared next to us, shaking his head. “How the heck do
you know all that?”

Ryder shrugged. “Read about it somewhere, I guess.”

Todd laughed as he clapped Ryder on the shoulder. “Man, you
are such a freak.”

“Who’s a freak?” Kiera demanded to know as she danced over
to us. When she spotted the poster we’d gathered around, she rolled her eyes.
“Oh, brother. Are you talking about that stupid Ferris wheel again?” Cupping Ryder’s
face in both hands, she looked him deep in the eyes. “Baby, no one cares.” Then
she pecked him on the mouth and twirled away to prance off toward her friends.

I frowned after her, wanting to smart something off like
she
should care. Since this kind of
stuff mattered to her boyfriend, then it should matter to her too, by God. No
one wanted the people closest to them to make fun of their biggest passions.

Setting my shoulders with determination, I spun back to
Ryder and pointed to the next poster. “So how tall is the Statue of Liberty?” I
challenged.

“One hundred fifty-one feet,” he rattled off the answer
before giving me an odd look. “Why?”

I shrugged and stared up at the jolly, green woman holding a
torch. “No reason. I’ve just always wondered.”

“Did you know the copper it’s made of is only two point four
millimeters thick?”

Lifting my eyebrows because, honestly, I thought that was
way too thin for something so enormous, I said, “Really?”