Cousins Forever (Snowy Cove High School Book 2) Page 3

  “No! You can't tell anyone. I told you in confidence. Please don't tell or I'll never trust you again.”

  “You mean you trust me now?”

  We're at the house now, and I don't want to continue this conversation inside, so I stop where the shovelled sidewalk meets our driveway.

  “Sure, I trust you,” I say. “We're family, and roommates. I have to. I ate the cinnamon, didn't I?”

  Tick jumps at me, throwing her arms around my shoulders. I shriek.

  “And best friends!” she says as she squeezes me in what I now realize is a hug.

  “Sure, best friends.” My eye twitches.

  Over Tick's shoulder, I see Aunt Trudy at the front room's window, next to my mother's treasured vase. She's holding up her little digital camera, and the flash goes off.

  “Your mother just took our picture,” I say as Tick lets me go.

  “She's so embarrassing,” Tick says.

  She fluffs up the collar of her jacket, which is some sort of khaki military surplus thing, layered over an anime-frog-print polar fleece jacket. It's almost too much to look at, along with her purple dress and striped leggings.

  “Right,” I say. “Your mother's the embarrassing one.”

  * * *

  After dinner, Mom and I are doing dishes in the kitchen, and I ask, “Exactly when does Tick lose her guest status and have to do dishes?”

  “I'm not sure. We're fine on our own, aren't we?”

  “But Mom, it isn't fair!”

  She squirts some lavender-scented dish soap into the sink. “Life is both cruel and beautiful, yet it is never fair.”

  I grunt with displeasure, then say, “Shoot me now.”

  “I want to ask you something,” Mom says, and she shuts the door so we can talk privately.

  Chapter 3

  With the door shut, the kitchen feels claustrophobic. Our house was built long ago, before kitchens were all open to everything else. My parents have talked about renovating—Mom has a file folder packed with magazine pages, and she's just discovered Pinterest on the internet—but I think planning to renovate is more fun for her than actually doing it.

  Mom asks, “Did your cousin cause trouble at school today?”

  “Not much. She was weird in Drama, but she was actually not bad in the other classes.”

  “The calm before the storm,” Mom says ominously.

  “I don't know,” I say. “Sure, she looks like someone going to a cosplay or a comic convention, but she's not exactly a juvenile delinquent.”

  Mom stops loading the dishwasher and raises her eyebrows meaningfully.

  I say, “What? Is there something you're not telling me? Was she in trouble in Seattle? Is that why they really came here, and not because of Aunt Trudy's broken leg?”

  “Hand me that platter.”

  I clear the crumbs off by putting them in my mouth. Dessert was my favorite, pecan squares on a shortbread base.

  I rinse some more plates and hand them to my mother. “Is there something I should know about my cousin?”

  Her voice low, even though the door's closed, Mom says, “There's something fishy, but I don't know what. I heard your aunt yelling on the phone the other day, and she lied and told me it was a wrong number.”

  “Weird.”

  “Just keep your eyes open. And not a word about our little conversation.”

  “But you always say we don't keep secrets in this family. We don't slam doors and we don't keep secrets.”

  She frowns at the dark window over the kitchen sink. “It's not a secret, it's discretion.”

  The door squeaks and my father walks in, saying, “Tea?”

  “Putting the water on now,” Mom says, grabbing the silver kettle and filling it under the tap.

  “Terrific,” Dad says. He pushes the door, snapping it back to its usual open position, held in place by the strong magnet on the wall. “I'll be in the den,” he says as he leaves.

  Mom gazes out the window over the sink again, even though there's nothing to see in the murky darkness. “I wonder what Olivia's doing right now.”

  “Probably studying while everyone else in the dorms is partying, wearing bedsheets as togas. She's probably getting ahead on her assignments. It's so much better than waiting until the last minute.”

  Mom turns and smiles. “How did I get so lucky, with my two good girls?” She gives me a kiss on my cheek. She seems shorter than usual today. We're done the dishes, so I tell her I'll stay behind and prepare the tea.

  After she leaves the room, I open the fridge and take out the plastic container she's been filling up for my sister's next care package.

  There are sixteen pecan squares.

  I take out one and eat it. Now it'll be obvious to Olivia that one's missing, so I have to take the rest of the row. I slide them into a ziploc bag and then slide the bag into the kangaroo pocket of my sweatshirt.

  The whistle of the kettle howls, and I jump. My heart is still pounding as I first warm the teapot with hot tap water and then pour in the boiled water for tea.

  * * *

  That night, just as I'm falling asleep, Tick says, “Do you think they miss me, back in Seattle?”

  “I'm going to smother you with my pillow.”

  “They probably didn't notice I was gone,” she says.

  “I find that very difficult to believe.”

  Her bed squeaks, because now she's doing a shoulder-stand on her bed, with her legs up the wall.

  “What would happen if you moved away from Snowy Cove?” she asks. “Would Briana and Genna replace you with a new girl? Or would it be like you died?”

  “Don't talk about depressing things.”

  “Like dying? But you have to think about it, or you don't appreciate being alive.”

  The room feels too small, and too warm, suffocating. “You really don't know the first thing about appropriate conversation material, do you?”

  She draws her legs back down and tucks them under the covers. “I'm sure a few people would miss you,” she says.

  Once she's quiet again, I try to think about other things, like clothes, or taking singing lessons, but it's too late. The bad thoughts are back.

  I can't sleep, for all the images in my mind, of funerals, and the sun exploding, engulfing everything that ever was or will be, in flames.

  * * *

  The lack of sleep is getting to me. My legs feel twitchy all the time, and my thigh bones ache.

  I'm still wondering about the big secret my cousin alluded to her second night here. Was she in trouble back in Seattle?

  The rest of the week, I watch Tick at school for clues about what kind of trouble she might have gotten into.

  She does this thing where she waves her hand desperately and squirms in her seat. Then when Mrs. Rose, our English teacher, calls on her, Tick doesn't have the answer at all, but asks to have the question repeated.

  This starts the whole class laughing and Mrs. Rose makes her I'm-getting-too-old-for-this face.

  “Patricia Murphy, while I appreciate your enthusiasm, please try to pay attention.”

  “My name's Tick.”

  “No,” Mrs. Rose says. “I have no one in this class by that name, Patricia.”

  An exchange like this has happened every day this week. Tick isn't exactly qualifying for teacher's pet, but I wouldn't say her quirks are leading to an expulsion.

  * * *

  On Friday, we meet up with my friends and take our usual places in the cafeteria for lunch. Genna sits at the end of the table and shows us a new free app she's downloaded to her iPhone.

  “You can read books on there,” Briana says.

  “Whatever. I've been working on the address book,” Genna says. “I have most of the school programmed in already.”

  I rest my chin on my hands and make a sad-puppy face. “I wish I was fifteen already.”

  My parents say I'll get a cell phone for my birthday, but not before. My father's concerned about something call
ed brain plasticity, which is a fancy way of saying he thinks computers and cell phones give people ADD. He runs a software company, so he thinks he's the expert on everything to do with computers.

  “Lemme see for a sec,” Tick says, holding out one hand. “If I like this model, I can put it on my birthday list. I wonder if I'll get my own phone, or if I'll share one with my cuz.”

  Genna hands the iPhone over, telling Tick to wipe her hands before she touches the screen, so it doesn't get greasy.

  Tick says, “My birthday's just a few days after Lainey's. Did you guys know that?”

  Her voice woven with sarcasm, Genna says, “You two are practically twins.”

  I turn and say to Genna, “Is that an insult?”

  She snorts. “I don't know. Is it?”

  Briana interrupts, asking if we watched The Vampire Diaries the night before. “Coffins and kissing,” she says. “Damon kissed Elana.”

  I start grumbling about how my father and Aunt Trudy have been hogging the den lately, watching the only TV in the house. Aunt Trudy loves CSI and Law & Order and can't miss an episode, even if it's a repeat. I couldn't watch Vampire Diaries online either, because Tick was using my computer to “do homework,” which involved using a free graphics program to draw My Little Pony art.

  “Have you guys heard of Bronies?” I ask my friends. “It's grown men who are into My Little Pony stuff. Is that not the weirdest thing ever?”

  Genna says, “Geeks are the grossest.”

  Briana says, “You're a geek.”

  “No. Just because I use Facebook and Twitter doesn't make me a geek. That stuff is totally normal.”

  Briana shrugs. “I'm a geek. Am I gross?”

  I look over at my cousin, wondering why she's not telling the group about her favorite pony. She kept me up late last night talking about the one who goes DERP.

  Some cell phones around the cafeteria start beeping and humming simultaneously. This isn't that unusual, because we're not allowed to have them on during class, so lunchtime is rush hour for messages. A second wave of beeping starts.

  “Hey, Genna,” Josh calls over from the table next to us. “I love you too.”

  Ty stands up with his hand over his heart. “Genna, baby? I though what we had was something special.”

  All around the cafeteria, people laugh while looking at Genna.

  One of the Senior boys, Calvin, I think, says, “I love you too, but you're a minor niner, so I'm sorry, but we can't be together.” His friends, a group of Senior guys and girls, find this hysterical.

  Tick begins to whistle—one of those fake guess-what-I-just-did whistles.

  Genna grabs her cell phone from the center of the table and jabs at the touchscreen. Her cheeks turn red, along with the rest of her face.

  “Murphys!” she says, showing the phone to Briana.

  Briana laughs into both hands, then says, “Wait, Murphys? You're mad at both of the Murphys? But it was obviously the new one who did it.”

  I say, “I didn't do anything!”

  Briana shows me the phone, with outgoing text messages full of hearts and kisses going to everyone on Genna's contact list. Briana pulls out her own cell phone and checks the screen. “Yup, I got one too. And I do love you back, Genna.”

  In unison, Josh and Ty call over, “Not as much as we love you, Genna!”

  Ticks puts her hand in the air and waves it around, like she does in Mrs. Rose's English class. “Lainey did it,” she says.

  Genna ignores my cousin and turns her corrosive gaze on me, saying, “I'm not an idiot. I know your parasite of a cousin sent this. You know you need to keep her on a shorter leash, starting now.”

  “Wait, how am I responsible for her?” I ask.

  “Same last name,” Genna says, her carefully-lined gold-brown eyes still narrowed at me. “Like it or not, you share a reputation.”

  Something tells me that's something she's heard a lot from her mother, who is a police officer.

  Some of the Senior girls call out, “We love you Genna,” and the whole cafeteria laughs. I'm having a tough time keeping the smirk off my face. I have to admit that was a rather clever prank on Tick's part—something I never would have thought of, but then again, I don't have a devious mind.

  Across the cafeteria, someone drops a tray of food with a clatter, and just like that, all the attention shifts away from Genna's mass text and onto making fun of Brad Boxer, Briana's older brother.

  “There,” I say to a still-fuming Genna. “Your five seconds of high school scandal is over. I'm sure my cousin is very sorry.” I turn to Tick. “Isn't she?”

  Tick innocently chews a strand of her cherry-red hair. “Give me the phone and I'll do a whaddayacallit. A takebacksies. I'll delete them all.”

  “You can't take back text messages,” Briana says.

  “I'll show you,” Tick says, smiling sweetly. “Hand me back the phone.”

  Genna's voice rises in pitch. “Are you insane?”

  “Yes, she is,” I say. “Or maybe she's just being funny. Come on, you like it when she's funny in Drama class.”

  “She needs to know when to turn it off,” Genna says. “And I don't mean to be a b-word, but does she own any clothing that isn't purple? She looks like a circus reject.”

  Tick retorts, “You're a circus reject, Yellow Pants.”

  I kick my cousin under the table and send her a psychic message to try apologizing instead of fanning the flames.

  “Why are you kicking me, Lainey?”

  I kick her again, not that it will do any good.

  Tick says, “And why are you eating all those fries anyway? Aren't you on a—”

  I clap my hand over Tick's mouth. “She's sorry, Genna. About the text messages. It won't happen again, you have my word.”

  Genna gets up and gathers her things, burning me with her gaze the whole time. She leaves the cafeteria, even though we still have ten minutes until the bell rings.

  Briana opens her paperback and starts reading. Tick steals three of my fries.

  Genna and I were supposed to go shopping together this weekend, but something tells me those plans are off.

  That means I'll be spending the entire weekend with my cousin. Shoot me now.

  * * *

  On Sunday afternoon, when Dad discovers we haven't left the house all weekend, he says something must be done. Mom suggests church, for the later service, as she always does, but we outvote her these days.

  Tick says, “What about swimming? I'm totally a water baby.”

  “Or shopping,” I say.

  “That's a good idea, Patricia. The pool,” Dad says. “I haven't even been to the new Rec Center since the grand opening.”

  “I don't know,” I say.

  “Come on, you love the water too,” he says. “You were our little water bug.”

  “I used to love the water. You guys go without me. I have a lot of homework.”

  “No you don't,” Dad says. “You did it all on Friday night, same as you always do. Look me in the eyes and give me one good reason why you won't go swimming.”

  I can think of three: my legs, my arms, and my butt.

  “Fine.”

  * * *

  When we get to the Snowy Cove Rec Center, I'm shocked to find Tick's swimsuit is green, not purple.

  In the changing room, while we're putting on our swimsuits, she asks me, “Do you think Genna will stop wearing those yellow pants, just because I said something about them?”

  “Probably. That reminds me, we should buy her something at the mall, to apologize. We could get her a nice sweater, or a gift certificate.”

  “No. The only things you should apologize with are words,” Tick says. “Or hugs. But not stuff.”

  “You could start with some words, at least. Once you get to know Genna, she's really nice, but—”

  Tick holds her hand up to my face. “Nice but! Nice but! No! Nice but means she's not nice. She's like one of those girls who says she'll be frie
nds with you on the bus, but when you get to school, she doesn't know you.”

  I put on my long t-shirt over my two-piece swimsuit. It doesn't cover everything, but it helps camouflage.

  “Genna is nice,” I say. “She doesn't like getting teased. Most people don't.”

  Tick runs ahead of me to the pool, her bare feet slapping on the tiles.

  “No running,” I call out, and speed walk as fast as I can without technically running.

  Why am I rushing?

  I guess I'm excited. The smell of the chlorinated water hit me as soon as we walked into the place, and now that I'm about to get in the water, I'm practically giddy.

  How long has it been since I swam at the pool? Two years? Three years? The old one was closed down for a while before the new one got built, and I got out of the habit, I guess.

  Wow, do I love the pool.

  I love the echo of the splashes bouncing around the big metallic-sounding space. I love the steamy air paired with the view of the snow outside. I love the little tykes in their water wings, squealing and splashing.

  This new pool is way nicer than the old one, and bigger. I feel like I'm on vacation, in some other town, and not even in Snowy Cove.

  I approach the shallow end and wade in. I sink down to my chin and relax, weightless, my arms floating out at my sides.

  At the other corner of the pool, my father gives me a wave before he snaps on his goggles and dives into the roped-off area for laps.

  Mom's not here with us because she's not into swimming. She used to come on occasion, and read a book in the hot tub, but she wasn't feeling up to it today.

  Aunt Trudy said she wished she could come, but her leg cast would melt. My mother seemed to be reconsidering coming with us once she realized she'd be stuck entertaining her sister-in-law, but in the end, she accepted her fate.

  Aunt Trudy's probably helping my mother right now, pointing out surfaces that could use a little dusting, and making a big production out of helping out by crashing around and doing the dusting herself.

  In the water, here, like this, I don't even care.