For someone padding down the driveway in bare feet.
Mrs. D’Angelo isn’t wearing much. It’s mid-afternoon, and I don’t know whether she’s a stay-at-home mom or if she goes to an office every day, but I do know Lucas’s dad does. He works in Indy at a big law firm. And whatever he is doing at the D’Angelos’ house right now doesn’t look like business. It also doesn’t look neighborly. It looks like a secret, the kind I’m certain my dad had. The kind that rips families apart.
Her T-shirt rises up the length of her thigh as she lifts up on her toes and reaches through the driver’s side window. They kiss. That much I can infer. She takes his hand and he lets her as she falls back down to her heels, the white sleeve of his dress shirt rolled up to his elbow. I wonder if he even bothered to tuck it in. A sourness coats my taste buds at the image, and whether I want to or not, I superimpose my dad in the same position, of leaving some woman’s house who isn’t my mom after having . . .
They hold on to each other in the way people in love linger, only this . . . it isn’t love. It’s a scandal. It’s four in the afternoon, and I’ve seen way too much.
The truck’s brake lights go dark again so I duck low in my seat, completely hidden. There’s nothing more to see. Now, it’s only time to wait. I’m tempted to sit up tall enough to catch Mr. Fuller’s face as he drives away, but I don’t know what I’d do if he saw me. I’m already sitting in a car he could recognize. If he sees me here, I’ll be living with more than knowing this secret, I’ll be living with knowing that he knows I know.
That’s messy.
Messier.
I feel sick.
The truck’s engine fades into the distance, the familiar turn up ahead signaled by the change in gears just before I hear nothing. I can’t fathom Tory’s mom hanging around the front of the house in the thinnest, shortest T-shirt in the world, but maybe she is, so I stay hunkered down for almost a full three minutes. I lift myself up slowly, my legs cramping from the awkward position, and I rub at my knees and thighs as I get up high enough to scan my surroundings.
The street is quiet. The house is quiet. I glance to my right, to the seat where my school papers are splayed out with Tory’s on top. He doesn’t really care about any of this. And he won’t do anything with them if I give them to him. I promised Mr. Newsome, but really, what do I owe that guy?
I might be tipping the scale in the direction I want, but who cares? I crank the engine, thank every god I’m aware of that it starts, and drive home the long way so I don’t have to turn around and risk being noticed.
I told Abby I would be over today, but all I want to do is hide and figure out how to emotionally sort this new baggage. I want to donate this baggage; give it away. It’s not mine, yet here it is, taking up my mental space!
I can’t stop diving into my life of two years ago, my dad explaining to me that sometimes people grow apart while my mother sobbed and slammed doors upstairs. His quick departure. His quick engagement. How young the other woman is. How disappointing my father had become. How much it hurt to go through. It would hurt Lucas, learning this. He wouldn’t believe me because, well, we don’t talk. But eventually, he would have to.
I . . . could hurt him with this.
I shake my head, hating the satisfying feeling that thought leaves etched in my chest. This is not the person I am.
My trip home isn’t long enough, and the punk music I turn up loud enough that my nearly dead speakers buzz doesn’t do shit to distract me from processing all of this. I’m not stupid—people cheat on other people all the time. My father included. But that was my life crisis. I had no choice but to suck it up and push through to the other side. Seeing Lucas’s dad having an affair forces a choice on me like a ton of falling bricks. It’s this heavy wet blanket that suffocates me. I have a choice: tell Lucas, or keep this to myself and try to simply forget. It’s that I know why I would be telling him that eats at me. I would be telling him to watch him go through everything I did. And then I’d step back and watch him do it alone.
He and I aren’t friends. We don’t talk, though I will see him every day for the next several months. If I tell him, he probably won’t believe me, and he’ll hate me for being the bearer of the news.
Nobody knows what I saw. I’m the only one who has to live with this. If it ever comes out some other way, the fact I kept this secret won’t be relevant. Nobody will care, because I am nothing to Lucas Fuller. He said as much. He has his life, and I have mine.
Resolved, I pull into my driveway and put my car in park without even a glance at the house to the left. Kicking the drip pan under my car, I purposely walk sideways, avoiding any temptation to check the other driveway, to inspect the garage, or to change my mind. I move to my passenger side and grab my papers from the seat, taking Tory’s too. I’ll just buy two of everything and set him up with supplies for the semester. I’ll pick up a shift at the bowling alley to cover the cost.
I make it to our garage door, to the keypad, type in my birthday followed by my mom’s, and duck to get inside faster. Mom is out with the van, so I halt for a moment in the center of the garage, giving myself one more chance to weigh my options. My gaze lands on the extra remote taped to the wall with Velcro. The higher the garage door rises, the more defined the remote becomes thanks to the light. What are the odds? Me and the D’Angelos have the same goddamn garage opener.
I blink at it once then curl my right hand into a fist, the memory of the one Lucas handed me vivid in my memory—that night, the look on his face, playing in my head like a hi-def movie. I push aside the temptation to retaliate, hurt for hurt, and leave the burden of what I witnessed behind me on the garage floor. Then I march forward and slap my hand on the remote to close it off behind me. I push through the door and head straight to the stairs, not bothering to stop in my room before stripping away my clothes and turning on the hot water for a shower. I’m numb as I step under the falling spray, and don’t really want to clean anything. I just want to stand here for a while and think, or rather try not to think. It’s inevitable, though. As small as my world feels sometimes, right now, the box is closing in. I heave a sob—just one—and press my palms into my eyes. I tilt my head back to let the water wash away any evidence along with the renewed rage I have for my dad. Opening my mouth to let water fill the space, I test my voice in case I need to scream. The urge is gone, so I right my head and spit the warm water out.
Football practice isn’t over until 6:30. I could go out for my supplies and be back without ever having to see anyone from that house about a hundred feet to the west of me. My body is listless, though, so with a towel wrapped around my hair and another wrapped around my body, I pad out the door, leaving steamy footprints on the wood floor.
There’s this strange pain in my heart that holds me to the bed. I want to see him. Both of them—Lucas and his dad. I’m not sure why. Whatever the reason, I don’t think it says anything good about me.
She started calling about forty minutes ago, and eighty-one missed calls means I probably slept through a lot of vibrations on my phone. Amazing, since it’s stuck to my face. My head aches from the pull of the towel still wrapped around my damp hair. The towel on my body is still loosely held in place. I catch Abby’s current call right before she hangs up (no doubt only to try again).