Broken Hollywood (Sparrow Sisters Book 1) Page 8

  “I’m not surprised you like her,” Grandpa said, returning to the earlier topic.

  “Well, she’s beautiful. Of course I noticed. And she knows her own mind, and isn’t afraid to speak it. I like that. And she’s kind.”

  He nodded. “I’ve been waiting for someone to notice her.”

  I gaped at him. “No men in this town have noticed her?”

  “I suppose they’ve noticed. But she’s only nineteen, Jesse. She spends her time here, in the caves.”

  I nodded, thinking it was more likely that she preferred to keep her dating life private, and not discuss it with Grandpa. But she was only nineteen? I would have guessed she was closer to my age. I pinched my lip, thinking it over. Four years wasn’t that much of an age difference. The thought crept in that I wasn’t staying here. I couldn’t stay here, and I bet Cat wouldn’t leave. She wasn’t like Mom, and she wasn’t like me. I didn’t know her much at all, but I already knew she was a woman who stayed.

  I was crossing the yard when her car pulled in. I sped up, having to work to keep from running, feeling plenty ridiculous. I didn’t act this way—all crazy and unable to stop thinking about a girl. I didn’t feel this way either. I didn’t want to fight it, though, because when Cat was near, the pain in my chest shrunk down to a manageable size.

  I got to the door right as she was putting the key in the lock. “Hey,” I said as I came closer, my voice rough. I cleared my throat and tried again. “Good morning.”

  She jumped a little, startled by my sudden appearance. “Oh, hi, Jesse. You’re still here.”

  “I’m still here.”

  The tiniest of smiles found her lips, but she turned and walked into the shop before I could see if it grew.

  I followed her in, and flipped the sign to open. She put her backpack down and went to the cash register, getting things ready. I ran through the questions in my mind. I had a lot of questions. I wanted to figure this woman out. I didn’t know where to start. It ended up not mattering, because she started. “How long will you be here?” she asked, not looking at me.

  Two distinct feelings warred inside me. From her tone, which was slightly hopeful and a little too nonchalant, I didn’t think she was hoping I’d say I was leaving soon, and so a triumphant warrior wanted to yell in victory. She was curious about me, too. Perhaps she, too, lay awake at night and thought of me. Maybe she cared that I stay.

  On the other hand, a defeated soldier wanted to crawl into a trench, because though I didn’t know how long I’d stay, I wasn’t staying forever. I didn’t let myself think of it. I was lost right now, and I didn’t need to think of the future. I couldn’t think of the past, and all that left was the present. Right now, Cat stood before me, and I couldn’t deny the pull she had. “I don’t know,” I finally said.

  She frowned. “But I mean, are you going to stay for a year, and do you want a permanent job here? Should you learn how to give tours? Do you want to learn cave surveying? Or are you staying another week, and just passing time by working here? In which case we can keep finding odd jobs for you to do.”

  I tipped my head, considering her. “You like knowing the plan. You like things to be settled.”

  She shrugged. “Sure.” Then she turned toward me fully, her face bright with agitation. “And it doesn’t mean I’m boring, or that I don’t like surprises. Just that in general, I feel life goes more smoothly if there’s a plan in place. If everybody knows what they should be doing and when, then there won’t be misunderstandings. That’s especially true in a work environment.” She nodded as though satisfied with her speech, and turned back to the register.

  “I’m more of a see how things go kind of guy,” I said, grinning.

  “Of course you are.” She sighed.

  I waited until she looked at me again. “But I never said I think you’re boring.”

  She waved a hand. “Oh, that. I didn’t mean to take that out on you. My sister Valerie sometimes says I’m boring. But it’s just because we have very different ideas of what’s exciting.”

  I took a step closer. “What do you find exciting?”

  Her eyes widened and she took a step backward, wringing her hands in front of her. “Oh. Well, let’s see.” She walked to a display case nearby, peering down into it and pointing at something. “I found this mammoth rib. It’s broken, but I’d spent years looking in the same spot where Emily found the mammoth vertebra.” She looked at me, her face serious, her eyes sparkling. “Years, Jesse. Hours each week, for years. I mean, if she found that vertebra, there had to be a whole mammoth in there, right?”

  “Definitely,” I said, enraptured by her enthusiasm.

  “Well, last summer I found this rib.”

  I looked at the rib. To be honest, I would never have known it was a mammoth fossil if Cat hadn’t said so. It looked much like the coyote leg bones I would sometimes find in the woods when I was a kid. But when I looked back at her face, and saw her pride and excitement, a matching pride filled my chest. “That must have been intensely satisfying.”

  She released a breath. “It was. When I told Valerie, she said, ‘That’s great, Cat. How cool.’ and then she asked me what color she should paint her nails for her date that night.”

  “Ah, she’s the shallow sister?”

  Cat glared at me, and I immediately knew I’d said the wrong thing. I held up both hands in surrender. “Sorry, I take it back.”

  “Valerie is not shallow. She’s wonderful. She’s just different from me. She finds her excitement in social interaction. I find mine in ancient bones.” She chuckled. “She’s probably the most thoughtful of all of us, actually. She puts a lot of care into her relationships. She really gets to know people. She cares deeply about them. Honestly, she’s a better person than I am. I just don’t know how she juggles so many friends.”

  “You don’t have a lot of friends?”

  She smiled at me over the display case. “I have just the right number of friends. I have my sisters. I have Otto. My best friend since first grade is Lila. She’s away at college now, but we still talk every day. How about you? Which type of person are you? Do you hold a hundred friends dear, or do you have only a couple of close ones?”

  James’s face flashed in my mind. James at ten, riding big wheels with me around the apartment parking lot. James at fifteen, skinny, wearing his basketball uniform and sitting on the bench but so proud he’d made varsity. James at twenty, crying desperately on my couch because his girlfriend of two years had broken it off. James two weeks ago, grinning at me and giving me a salute before he did the stunt that took his life.

  I blinked hard and straightened up. “I don’t have any friends.”

  It was quiet for a long moment. I could hear the low hum the cave produced, as if it were alive. I could hear Cat’s soft breathing. “Jesse?”

  I met her eyes, hoping she wasn’t about to suggest she and I be friends.

  “Are you okay?” She didn’t look away.

  “Not right now,” I said.

  “I hope someday you will be again.”

  “Cat?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Will you teach me how to give the tour?”

  Cat and I stood at the back of the boat. I held a script, the piece of paper familiar in my hands. I already had it memorized. It wasn’t that I had an especially good memory, I just had a lot of practice and mental tricks that helped me remember my lines.

  The rumbling of the motor lulled me as it propelled the boat forward. Cat steered and controlled the speed, so I could focus on the script. I studied various rock formations. I wasn’t going to call them speleothems. At the start of the tour, I tried to pronounce it, and my tongue twisted up. Cat laughed at me, at first hiding her smile behind her hand. I tried again, bungling it a second time, and she laughed heartily, along with the eight people taking the tour. Even the kids had laughed at me. So from here on, I’d simply call them rock formations.

  Cat poked my ribs with her elbow. “It’s ti
me for the part about the flowstone.”

  “Oh, right.” I cleared my throat. “To your left, you’ll see a prime example of flowstone. Flowstone is composed of calcite.” I continued my speech as we moved through the cave system, aware of Cat’s presence at my side.

  When we entered the low-ceilinged section, Cat and I sat. We were facing each other, her on one bench, and me on the other. Our knees bumped occasionally. I could have moved back. Perhaps I should have, but she didn’t move either. I liked the accidental-but-not-really touches. I rested an arm along the side of the boat, but I was aware she was looking at me. Right at me. I slowly turned my head.

  She smiled. “You’re a natural tour guide. It didn’t even sound like you were reading from a script. It sounded like your own, off-the-cuff words.”

  My neck burned. I tried to relax my face and smile at her. “Speleo-whatever definitely wasn’t one of my words.”

  She laughed and shook her head. “No. But really, you’re good at it. Do you do a lot of public speaking?”

  I scratched the back of my neck, which was still hot, and looked away from her eyes to the cave walls around me. “Something like that.”

  She watched me a little longer, waiting for me to elaborate. When I didn’t, she said, “Well, you can give the tours any time you like.”

  I leaned forward in my seat, sensing an opening. I pitched my voice low and looked her square in the eye. “I need you to come with me. To drive the boat.”

  “I can teach you to do that, too.”

  “I’d rather have you with me.”

  “Oh. Yeah, sure.” Her cheeks took on a pink cast. She licked her lips, her eyes darting this way and that, and stood up. “Time to disembark.”

  Chapter 11

  Cat

  Sunday morning I woke too early. I hadn’t been sleeping well lately. At night I lay awake thinking. Imagining. Daydreaming in the dark. It was unsettling. I was not a daydreamer. I did not wander around with my head in the clouds, imagining scenarios and inventing outlandish possibilities. I was a realist, and I always had been. I lived in the present moment. I was practical and forthright.

  And there I was, awake at six in the morning again, my mind already buzzing with thoughts of Jesse. What if?

  It was silly to think of him this way. Completely ridiculous. I’d known him for only two weeks. He almost certainly didn’t have these kinds of thoughts about me. There was no way…except, I thought, for the millionth time, about the way he’d looked at me in the boat. The way he’d leaned close. The way his voice had gone smooth and low, and he’d said, “I’d rather have you with me.” The hair on my arms prickled at the mere thought, something which had happened a thousand times since it happened, because I’d thought of it a thousand times.

  I told myself he was just a flirt. Of course a guy who looked like that would be a flirt. Valerie was a flirt. I considered asking her to translate his behavior. But surely he didn’t mean anything by it, and so I’d kept it to myself and kept from looking like a fool.

  And yet...

  I sighed and threw off my covers. Maybe I was no longer quite so practical, and maybe I was slipping into fantasy land, but there was one thing about me that would never change—I was too curious not to find out.

  I got dressed and went downstairs, tiptoeing so I wouldn’t wake my sleeping family. Mama, Dad, and Audrey would be up in another hour to get ready for church. Valerie and I didn’t attend with them anymore, which made Mama fret. Dad was able to soothe her, though, by explaining that if they forced us it would push us farther away from the sanctuary. Audrey still went, though she’d told us it was only because she couldn’t bear to upset Mama. I’d never been comfortable in church. When I felt a personal connection with someone, be it a friend, a family member, an animal, or God, I’d never been able to do so in the midst of a crowd. I needed privacy for the deeper feelings.

  I poured a glass of orange juice and drank it fast. Now that I’d made up my mind what I was going to do, I couldn’t get there fast enough. I wasn’t hungry, so I tossed some protein bars and bottles of water in my backpack, and headed toward the door.

  “Where are you off to?” Dad asked, his voice slow with sleep.

  I turned, my quick getaway foiled, and smiled at him. Dad told me once that when life throws something in your path, accept it with grace. He’d been driving Mama home from the hospital once early in their marriage. She’d had her appendix out, and was very sore. He drove slowly, in order to jostle her as little as possible. Horns had honked, engines revved as cars passed, and the other drivers wore rage on their faces. And then when he pulled up to an intersection, one of the cars that passed him had been hit by a big truck.

  It had made him take stock. He figured that if he’d sped up, if he’d allowed the anger of others to influence him, he could have been the one hit. And if the other drivers had just been more patient, understanding that there was a reason he was going slowly, even if they didn’t know what it was, perhaps there wouldn’t have been an accident at all. He was now the most patient driver I knew.

  He said this lesson had repeated itself many times. Not necessarily with cars, but something would happen that would remind him not to be so invested in his plans that he couldn’t pause to roll with what was happening.

  I took his lessons to heart, so I set my backpack down and pulled out a chair at the table. I sat and watched as he started the coffee. “I’m going to the cavern,” I said.

  “You’ve been going every day lately. It’s okay to take a day off.”

  “I know, but to me, being there is my leisure time. I want to do some surveying. With everything that’s been going on this week, I haven’t had time to get in that passage we’re working on.”

  “Ah, so you’re going early in the day so Otto can join you before the caves open.”

  I bit my lip.

  Dad sat across from me, the coffee percolating quietly behind him. Reading my face, he said, “Otto’s not going with you? Surely you’re not going alone.”

  “You know I’d never go alone. But...I’m hoping Otto’s grandson might come along.”

  Dad nodded thoughtfully. “Is he good in the caves?”

  “I’m good in the caves, and he’s a warm body who can go for help if necessary.”

  Dad laughed, and his coffee sputtered the last drips. He stood to pour his cup, holding the pot out to ask if I wanted some. I shook my head. I wanted to get moving. I didn’t want to sit and talk in the kitchen, I wanted to get to the caves. To Jesse. I wanted to be there right now, this very second. I had no plan for after I arrived, but all I could think about was getting there. When I wasn’t there, I was antsy and anxious. When I was there, I was a whole different kind of keyed-up.

  I stood up and walked around the table. I kissed Dad on the top of his head. “I’m not sure when I’ll be home. Tell Mama I’ll call if I won’t be here for dinner.”

  “Enjoy your day, Cat,” Dad said, his smile reaching his eyes.

  The drive to Otto’s house only took three minutes, and it was only that long because of two stop signs. The entire short drive, I rehearsed what I might say. I could make it sound like part of the job. Like he had no choice. Like it was just another day of on-the-job training. “Jesse, today I’ll show you how we survey the cave system.” Or I could ask him outright, but casually. “Jesse, would you like to map a cave passage with me?” Or I could try to entice him. “Jesse, remember the passageway that was blocked off with yellow tape? It’s near where your grandma found the mammoth vertebra. Want to find out what else is back there?”

  By the time I’d had those thoughts, I was there. I drove past the entrance to the cavern parking lot, and pulled into the next drive, the one for Otto’s house. I drove up the long driveway, forcing myself to keep my pace slow. All I wanted to do was rush, but Jesse didn’t need to know that. I parked and hopped out, watching my step and bounding onto the porch, hand raised to knock.

  “Good morning.”

&nbs
p; I screamed.

  Jesse chuckled as I clutched my chest and tried to ascertain if I had just passed into the great beyond. When I caught my breath, I looked over at him, peaceful and serene on the porch swing, a mug in his hands, and pajama bottoms on his legs. And nothing on his chest. His wide, tan, hairless chest. He chuckled again, and I snapped my eyes to his.

  “You scare easily,” he said, a lazy smile on his face.

  I lifted my chin and took a step closer. “Not so easily.”

  He tilted his head, assessing me. He shifted in the swing, making room for me to join him. “Want to sit?”

  The thought of being next to him on that swing, our thighs touching, our shoulders touching, his bare chest right there, out in the open like that...I cleared my throat. “Um.” That was the only word that came to mind.

  Jesse waited a second, but when I still didn’t come up with any more words, he said, “You’re here to see Grandpa? I’ll go get him. He’s inside eating his terrible oatmeal.”

  I laughed. I knew that oatmeal. Not even a pinch of brown sugar. He said the oats had their own natural sweetness, which was completely ridiculous. “No, actually, I’m here to see you.”

  He took a sip of whatever was in his mug, and looked at me over the rim. I liked the way he waited a minute before speaking. He seemed to measure his words, taking their weight before dropping them, making sure of their impact. He leaned forward a little. “You have my attention.”

  “I’m going to survey a cave today. A passage, I mean. The one with the tape? The yellow caution tape? Remember we saw it when I first took you to see the river? Anyway, I’m mapping it. I thought you might want to come. To see what’s back there, in the...cave.” I held my breath, kicking myself for such an inelegant speech. I should have taken a few more back roads to give myself more time to practice. Too late now. I watched Jesse, hoping he could parse my words and would say yes.