Things I’ll Never Say (17 page)

The den screen door whined open and slammed. “Look who's here,” a female voice caroled. Jake knew without turning that Baby Robert and Jessica were making their Grand Entrance.

“Bring that boy over here,” boomed Granddaddy. “How old is he? Three weeks? Time he learned about football.” Jake knew his grandfather was only partly kidding.
Those Campbell boys are born with a pigskin in their hands
, people said.

Jake's half-swallowed cake turned to a boulder in his throat. He wondered what Drew and Trey and Cam were doing today. Not watching football, that's for sure.

Actually, he didn't have to
wonder.
The Blakelys wrote him long weekly e-mails about
Aidan.
Jake knew
Aidan's
every burp, smile, and coo. He knew Cam played something called
Classics for Babies
while she fed
Aidan.
Aidan
liked baths but hated diaper changes.

The e-mails came with endless photo attachments.
Aidan
in his swing chair/crib/stroller. With Cam, Trey, friends, relatives. By the time Jake had gotten home last night, pictures from the Botanical Gardens were already in his e-mail in-box.

Aidan. Drew. Two boys.
Not
two boys. One. Without warning, Jake saw himself, midfield at the Jefferson County game. Hearing two voices, two coaches . . . and then . . . well, it was all over then. The game. His knee. Football forever.

He knew what he had to do. Tell the Blakelys that he wouldn't see Aidan anymore. He would still write them, and they would write back. Trey would send pictures. But Jake would see his son grow up in pixels, not in person.

“Go, Camden!” the men around the TV shouted, as if they could influence a game played five months ago. Jake turned and watched his cousin Chad. Twenty-five, he calculated. That's how old Chad was. Cradling his new son, he looked so much more . . . what? Not older. Mature, Jake decided. More mature.

Maturity wasn't a matter of years, Jake knew. Some of his uncles still acted like the frat boys they had been twenty years ago. There were kids in his class who helped support their families with after-school jobs. They were mature. Jake knew he was not. He was not ready to be a parent.

Aidan was the Blakelys' son.

Now he understood why Brynn had held that stupid teddy bear at the hospital. She'd cradled the toy against an empty feeling. The emptiness that Jake felt right now, knowing he wouldn't see Drew again.

Not unless a grown-up Drew wanted to see him.

Jake stood, smacked the dust from the seat of his pants, and dumped his cake plate in the porch trash. Time to go home.

But first . . . Jake took a shaky breath and grabbed hold of a hard truth. For the rest of his life, whenever he saw Chad's son, he would know that somewhere, his son, his Drew, was the same age, living with people named Blakely. No, not just
people.

Parents.

Jake pushed his way through the crowd around the porch TV until he found a redheaded young man, an infant sprawled across his lap.

“Yo, cuz,” called Chad. “Where you been hiding? You want to hold the baby?”

Jake leaned over as his cousin placed the first Campbell great-grandchild in Jake's arms. The baby opened his eyes. In them, Jake saw Chad and Granddaddy and all the male Campbells that had ever been. Even himself. He would know those eyes anywhere. Even if, someday, he happened to see them on a member of the Yale tennis team.

“Hi, li'l guy,” he whispered. “I'm your cousin Jake.”

“I can't remember what my name is supposed to be.”

“Weren't really listening, were you?” I ask him, looking at my boring new hair in the mirror on the back of the overhead visor. “Were you?”

“Your fault.” He pauses at the train tracks, looking both ways, as if looking for a train but actually checking the access roads in case sometime in the next few weeks we have to cut and run and there's an actual train cutting off our route.

“Left,” I say, already looking at the mirror again. “Hundred feet, cut across the grass to the alley, left on Fourth, right on 151, straight shot to the highway.”

“Assuming a lack of multiple cars in pursuit,” he says with a tip of his head.

“Of course.” Formerly homeschooled Hannah is dressed to blend. Blending is the key, even if it's boring as hell. Maybe for the next gig, I'll go punk. Or goth. Something less middle-class boring. I add just a little more shadow, enough to enhance the blue of the new contacts without standing out. Then some more highlighter to thin my nose. Maybe just a touch more gloss would be good.

“Isn't that a little much?”

“Like you can say shit about my face when you didn't even listen to the rundown.” I pull out my gloss. “And if you swerve, I won't tell you one damn thing.”

He regrips the steering wheel, correcting out of the intentional swerve.

“You're supposed to be a freshman. Innocent. Sheltered.”

“So?”

“So . . . maybe you should try to look more . . . innocent.”

“At least I know my name.”

“Screw you.”

“That's the way to get me to tell you.”

“Liv?”

“Ah, ah, ah. You know better than to break role once we go live.”

“Hannah,” he corrects.

“Yes?” I give him my best innocent, wide-eyed freshman look.

“How many times have I bailed your ass out, force-feeding you info and covering for you?”

“And every time, you throw it in my face. Every time you act —”

“Is this about Toledo? I said I was —”

“Save it.” He has his worried face on. Again. “I blew it in Toledo. I know.” I give him my sad face. “But I've got this,” I say, adding a dash of determined.

“We don't need to draw
any
attention.”

“I'm not the one who can't even remember his name.”

“Look,” he says, pausing at the four-way stop. “I'm not trying to be a jerk. I just need some downtime. Toledo was . . . intense.”

He has no idea. Pulling his strings on top of my part of the con is exhausting. “Yeah, well, let's just hope our trail is good and frosty.” And that Daddy shows up soon with the take. Toledo was supposed to cover us for a while. For a long while. Maybe a nice-long-trip-to-Europe while, with plenty of time and distance to figure out what to do about Kit. Instead, here we are, treading water, waiting for Daddy, watching for tails and worrying about contingency plans and trying not to crawl out of our skins with nerves. At least Mom found a job, so we can eat while we wait. Too bad she hates working.

He hits the brakes hard, tossing us both forward and then slamming us back but barely missing the minivan stopped at the light in front of us.

“Oh, my God,” he says.

“'S okay. You didn't —”

“Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Shit!”

“It's okay. Kit, it's . . .” I grab his arm, try to get him to stop hitting the steering wheel, to stop freaking out. “It's fine. You didn't hit her. We're fine.”

An accident would have sent us scurrying. Paperwork that wouldn't have matched up and a paper trail we can't afford. We'd have been aborting and bugging out today, on to another suburban hidey-hole.

“We're okay.” I rub his arm and he nods, calming down, his face going from red to pink, color draining from his temples as the adrenaline fades away, leaving him paler than before. “We're okay.”

He starts to drive again but timid, scared, so nervous he's going to draw attention. People notice someone reeking of anxiety, even if they don't know why they noticed him.

He passes the school and turns onto a side street. Parking lots are dangerous. They're the first place people will look, and this school's lot could easily be blocked. He pulls over and parallel parks between a beater of a truck and a shiny VW Bug. He surveys the area before shutting the car off. A spot chosen for its lack of foot traffic and directional advantage facing the fastest route out of town on this side of the train tracks. Used to be Kit trusted this, us, more.

“I know you didn't mean to blow it in Toledo,” he says, the closest we've come to talking about this. “I've been there, in the middle of a job and something gets screwed up and you panic.”

I fiddle with the bracelet — Hannah's bracelet, not something I'd ever choose for myself — so he'll think I'm feeling guilty and agreeing with his assessment. He never was good at reading people, but his head is so far up his ass now, he doesn't even see the tells anymore. He doesn't see anything.

“With us in the same school, you blow your cover and we're both sitting ducks.”

“I know.” He has no idea.

“Good.” He smiles at me, and I don't know whether to hug him or hit him. Claw his face. Scream in frustration. Shake him until he sees me, really sees me, and we can just have this out for real. But he's not ready. “Okay,” he says, finally turning off the car. “We're the Evanses. You're Hannah, Mom is Kelly again.”

“Complete with the stupid accent.”

“And Dad is now our stepfather, Mike.”

If he ever shows up. “And you are?” I ask.

He grasps for it. Fights for it. Holds his breath and reaches for it, then blows out his breath in defeat. “Screwed. I'm screwed.”

“No,” I say, “but close.” I open my door and allow my body to transition from Liv to Hannah. Hannah's walk and the way she holds her head. Her combination of self-consciousness and lack of awareness. Shorter than Liv thanks to a little slouch. Hannah's nervous habits and restless movements.

I can hear him say my name, my real name, then my current name, but I'm down the sidewalk and crossing the street, fully transformed into Hannah, before he catches up.

“Please?”

“You're gonna wish you were Chad again.”

Vice Principal Bertolucci's office smells like permanent markers and lemon-scented-ammonia cleaner, with a dash of flavored coffee.

“As we discussed when you came in with your mother, we get a lot of transfers, so . . .” She trails off like we're supposed to understand what she's saying. We nod and she smiles. “You'll both get the hang of it in no time. Here are your schedules.”

She hands me a half sheet of paper and then leans across the desk to hand one to Kit. I pretend to read mine while reaching for a pen from the cup on her desk, timing my movements with the moment her eyes focus on Kit.

“Sorry,” I mumble, scrambling to right the cup and all the spilled pens, knocking a stack of papers to the floor. “Sorry, sorry.”

I steal a glance at Kit. He's staring at his schedule.

“It's fine.” She smiles, waving me back down into my seat before I can do any more damage. She points to my schedule and rights the cup, picking up the spilled pens.

English. Biology. Algebra. “Life Skills?” I ask.

“Required for all freshmen,” Bertolucci says with a suck-it-up smile. “The room numbers are the first column . . .” She drones on about the rooms and numbers, and I glance around the office, feigning nervousness and checking out Bertolucci at the same time.

Kit's rubbing his temple, scrutinizing the schedule like the answers to all his problems are hidden between the classes and room assignments. Oblivious. Unbelievable. He clears his throat, leans forward in his chair, but then slumps back without asking any questions, glancing reflexively at me, twice. Whatever he wants to ask, he doesn't want me here.

“Oh,” I say. “My mom sent a note I'm supposed to give to you?” I lean forward and take out the note I wrote this morning, sliding my treasure into the front pocket of my bag at the same time. “Here.”

She opens the sealed envelope — good paper I lifted at a B&B in Iowa. The flowing script that imitates Mom's purposefully loopy suburban-soccer-mom script well enough. Kit's eyes are wide. Bertolucci reads the note — nodding, nodding, sympathetic look. “That's fine. Just go to study hall instead of physical education seventh period. And if you have any . . . issues, I'll alert the school nurse to your situation.”

I look down and squirm, the picture of the mortified sheltered girl, embarrassed by her own body. “Thanks,” I mumble. Darling brother looks equal parts curious and furious.

A knock at the door and then it opens. A girl with braids and glasses, whose mother clearly still picks out her clothes — from some sad catalog.

“Janet Nichols, this is Hannah Evans and her brother, B.J.”

I barely hold back the snicker.

“Hi,” the girl says, smiling at me but ducking her head when she looks at “B.J.”

“Hannah, Janet is in your homeroom, first period, and lunch. I've asked her to walk you to homeroom and then on to your first period, and if you are looking for someone to eat lunch with, I'm sure Janet would be happy to have you join her.”

Janet looks less than thrilled, which almost makes me want to accept the foisted invite. But even as I smile and nod, I know there's no way I'll be sitting with her at lunch.