The Year of the Great Seventh (2 page)

“Fine, there you go, Tyson,” I said, gasping through each word and handing the flyer back.

I sat back on the bench to catch my breath and saw Emma blushing with her eyes wide open.

“What’s up, Emma? You look like you just saw a ghost.”

“You’re not going to believe who was staring at you when you were fooling around with Tyson,” Emma murmured, leaning her head toward a group of people down the end of the alleyway.

Emma was typically too observant and overanalyzed people’s reactions, finding facts where there were only unconscious gestures. I rolled my eyes at Emma and said skeptically, “No, I’d never guess.”

“Nate Werner was looking at you.” Emma grinned and waited for my reaction.

The hysteria at school about Nate Werner was common among all the female student body, but I didn’t blame them because he was truly the most handsome guy I’d ever seen. His chestnut hair and almond-shaped brown eyes resembled those of models on advertising billboards. The olive color of his skin was in perfect harmony with the beautiful angles of his face. His sublime smile could make the Greek gods envious. Nate was taller and fitter than most sixteen-year-olds, and he was slightly too skinny for his size, giving him a graceful look.

I spoke after freeing a sarcastic laugh. “Emma, I
wish
he stared at me, but I’m afraid you’re wrong.”

Nate spent all his time with the popular students, and everyone else seemed transparent to him. His friends described him as confident and fully aware of his popular status. It seemed he felt no one deserved his time. Last year, Nate dated Amy Barton for a few weeks, but she broke up with him because she said he wasn’t truly interested in her. He was using her to fulfill the “popular boy dates popular girl” stereotype. Nate’s ability to always be perfect and never show any signs of weakness just fueled the general obsession. Emma was so obsessed last year that she ambushed him in the hallway, but he politely dodged her questions and walked away at the first chance.

“I swear he was staring at you. I think he likes you.” Emma insisted, making Megan laugh.

This type of comment could easily turn my life into a nightmare. Emma had made the following assumptions in the course of a few seconds: because Nate happened to be facing us, he was actually looking at us, and Nate was specifically looking at me and not Tyson. And because Emma happened to be able to read minds, she’d learned Nate was madly in love with me. Emma had gathered and verified all this evidence instantly. Unbelievable.

“Emma, I’m sorry to break the news, but I absolutely doubt that Nate was looking at me. He hasn’t paid much attention to any girl at school in two years, and I doubt he had an epiphany and decided he was in love with me,” I said defiantly, making Emma aware I wasn’t going to tolerate these types of comments.

“Girls, I know you’re obsessed with Nate Werner, but I’m sure he’s out of your league. I heard his family is absolutely loaded,” Chase commented.

“Do you guys believe everything you hear?” I complained, reaffirming my annoyance about all types of rumors.

Chase was unfazed. “It’s not a rumor. Some people from school saw him at LAX, boarding a private jet with Mark Gomes, the owner of the L.A. Dodgers, and his two kids.”

“Come on, guys. It’s obvious that people at school are bored and make up all this stuff. Anyway, I don’t care what he does in his spare time, because he wasn’t looking at me!”

“Okay, forget it, Sophie,” Emma said. “He was probably looking elsewhere.” She put her arm around my shoulders and pulled me toward her.

“I think we should go to class. We’re already five minutes late.” Emma suggested.

Tyson and Chase looked at each other and said in one voice, “Fine!”

I couldn’t help myself, so when I was getting up from the bench, I peeked at Nate to prove Emma had been hallucinating. To my surprise, Nate was staring our away, and when our eyes met, something really strange happened. An image of a row of stone coffins with some strange engravings invaded my mind. As we stared at each other, a sense of panic flowed through my veins. It wasn’t exactly fear; it was more a silencing peace that pressed against my lungs. Nate’s mouth tightened as if he could feel what I felt too. Then he turned his back warily and walked around the gym corner.

It was odd that I’d felt that way when he looked at me, but the weirdest thing of all was that Nate Werner seemed to have acknowledged my existence.

*

Later that evening when I arrived home, I dropped my backpack in the living room and walked into the kitchen.

We lived in a two-bedroom house in West Hollywood that we inherited from my grandmother. The house was built to resemble a contemporary Mediterranean villa with balconies and French doors leading out to the terraces. The kitchen and the open-plan living room had high ceilings and were practically the same room. Dad’s office was nestled in the back of the ground floor, facing the back garden. From the living room you could see an open corridor on the first floor with two doors, one leading to my parents’ bedroom and the other to mine.

Mom and Dad were at the kitchen table, eating dinner and watching the news. Mom had prepared breaded chicken with a side of peas and sweet potato. I grabbed the plate left for me on the kitchen counter and sat with them.

“How was the first day of school?” Dad asked without moving his gaze from the TV.

“Same old thing. What about yours?” I said, bringing a piece of chicken to my mouth.

My dad, Charles, was a historian and worked as a professor at UCLA. Before he met Mom, Dad spent eight years in Africa, working as an archaeologist. Mom and Dad met on a plane traveling from London to Los Angeles and dated long-distance for six months. When they decided to get married, Dad accepted a job as a lecturer because Mom didn’t want to raise a family in Africa.

I knew Dad didn’t mind teaching, but his real passion wasn’t to sit all day in a lecture hall. He wouldn’t admit it, but I knew he craved his old days, adventuring down into the unknown ruins of lost civilizations. However, when I pushed Dad to admit it, he would always say his admiration for Mom outshone any archaeological adventure.

“The classes at UCLA don’t start for another week. We only had faculty meetings,” Dad replied.

“By the way, Charles, did you have time to mow the lawn today? I’m glad you grew that hedge around the garden so the neighbors can’t see our messy garden.” Mom complained.

“No, I didn’t have time, as I spent all day at the university. I’ll try to do it tomorrow.”

Mom frowned, following Dad with her eyes. The house had a relatively large garden and this was the only friction point between Mom and Dad because neither of them enjoyed gardening. The garden was surrounded by a tall hedge to fence out the house from the street because Dad was paranoid about locals intruding in their neighbors’ lives.

“Can you believe that old man on TV wanted to rob a bank?” Mom announced.

Mom had the habit of making comments about the news on TV as though Dad and I didn’t speak the same language as the news anchor.

“A sixteen-year-old ran over a man because he was drunk driving. This is unbelievable,” Mom continued.

“Mom, we’re watching it, too.”

Dad chuckled at my comment and gently kicked my leg under the table for smarting off to Mom.

“By the way, Sophie,” Mom said, “you should’ve seen the kind of people that showed up for today’s casting. We got some real weird ones. There was this blonde who messed up every single line of the script. I would think that even if someone purposely tried to get every line wrong, it would be impossible.” Mom laughed.

Mom was a casting director, and like every casting director, when she was a child, she didn’t dream of finding actors who would become Hollywood stars. She dreamed of being a Hollywood star herself. But one day an opportunity came along to help cast a movie, and, tired of waiting tables and living as a struggling actress, she accepted the offer and moved on with her life. The rest is history.

“Did you find the right person for the lead role?” I asked, pouring some water into my glass.

Mom turned to look directly at me. “No, not yet. We’ve seen over two hundred actresses, and the director is getting a bit frustrated.” I definitely knew where this conversation was heading. Mom had all but given up her dream of being a successful actress. But it was her dream, not mine.

“Sophie, why don’t you stop by the casting after class tomorrow? I’m sure you’d be perfect for one of the roles. Come on! You’re so much more beautiful than all the girls I saw today.” Mom begged.

The anger I was feeling made the blood rush to my face. I couldn’t believe she was bringing this up for the fiftieth time. Trying to control the emotion in my voice, I replied, “Mom, I think we’ve spoken about the whole acting career thing about a million times. I don’t appreciate your emotional blackmail to get me to attend castings.”

“Okay, you don’t have to come if you don’t want. I was just asking.” Mom was taken aback.

“Did you get into all the classes you need to fulfill the requirements for your college scholarship?” Dad asked, trying to ease the tension building up between Mom and me.

With Dad it was a different story. We got along ridiculously well, as I had inherited his passion for history. When I was a child I used to sit in his office and stare at all the antiques. Then I would bombard him with questions to persuade him to tell me a story about his time in Africa. My favorite stories were about ancient Egypt. Dad never lived in Egypt, but he’d visited the country several times for research. I could spend hours listening to his stories, imagining I was one of the brave archaeologists who would go deep down into the pyramids to discover the lost worlds.

“Yeah, I think I should be fine. I need to get straight A’s though.” I sniffled, thinking about all the hours of study that was going to take.

This was the perfect time to get permission for Saturday’s party because I wanted to ask Mom and Dad together. Mom, being in the film industry, was aware of Ethan’s parents’ lifestyle, and I was concerned if she connected the dots from William Dulwich to Ethan Dulwich, she would ban me from the party. I decided to leave the “Dulwich” evidence out of the equation. “A student from school, Ethan, is having a party on Saturday. Can I go?”

Mom picked a piece of chicken from her plate. “Why does the name Ethan ring a bell?”

Cold sweat ran down my back. She was heading straight for the evidence. I had to act fast and explain. “Maybe I mentioned his name before. Megan, Emma, Chase, and Tyson are going to the party, too.”

“Okay, if you all go together, I guess that’s fine. Charles, what do you think?”

“Yes, sounds good to me,” Dad replied without lending it much importance.

Most likely, my parents thought this was another dull party where the host’s parents would be supervising the events of the night. I was sure Ethan’s parents wouldn’t be home that night, even if they knew about the party.

I decided to retreat to my bedroom before my parents followed with any further questioning. “I’ll be upstairs if you need me.”

Mom and Dad were again absorbed by the news and didn’t move their gaze from the TV. “Good night, honey.”

My bedroom was larger than my parents’ and almost made up a third of the house. I guess that was an advantage of being an only child. It had enough room to contain a king-sized bed, a desk, a large sofa by the window, and my pride and joy, a massive walk-in closet.

I slid the windows open to let in the breeze and lay on my bed, staring out the window. On rare occasions, Sunset Boulevard was visible from my window, but most of the time, the only thing I could see in the distance was dense L.A. smog.

That night I couldn’t stop wondering why Nate had been staring at me. Every popular girl would be more than willing to go out with him, but he totally ignored them. Why would he pay attention to me? The only explanation was probably because he disliked me, but how could he do so if we’d never spoken?

I’d never said this out loud, and probably, I never would. But I’ve had a crush on Nate since the first time I saw him. I’d never said anything to Emma or Megan because if the word got out, it would be really embarrassing. I wasn’t part of the “cool crowd,” and just the mere fact that I even considered I had any possibilities with Nate would make me a joke. I was quite sure every girl at school loved him in silence, so there was no point adding one more to the list.

The only things we knew about Nate were that he was an only child and his family had moved from Seattle to Los Angeles before his freshman year. Also, Megan was close to someone from Nate’s inner circle, and he’d told her Nate had never invited any of his friends to his house, nor had he introduced them to his family. Nate seemed to be hiding something. And whatever it was, it seemed important enough to keep everyone out of his life.

CHAPTER II

ON SATURDAY, THE FIVE of us drove to Malibu together. When we got to the gate of Ethan’s estate, a security guard wrote down Tyson’s plate number and, after speaking through his walkie-talkie, pointed us up the hill with a flashlight to the parking lot right at the top.