Page 31 of Blade

“We’ve got some cool shit inside ...” Sporty said.

Jolene liked the sound of that. “Really?” she said. “Like what?”

Kayla walked to the back of the van, and then Jolene followed. “Come on!” they shouted in unison.

Indy looked at Ana and shrugged. Like she was silently sayingit’ll be okay if we stay together, and also likemaybe it will be fun. But Indy was a little drunk, and away from The Palace and Patrice and Dawn, so there was no telling what part of Indy she was seeing, and if she’d ever seen it before.

Excitement and curiosity won the battle of emotions, and both girls climbed out of the back seat.

The inside of the van was set up with beanbag chairs and a shag rug and two enormous speakers. Wiry put on Led Zeppelin, and Kayla shook her head and whispered louder than she realized. “I think we’ve been transported to the seventies.”

“Shhh!” Jolene gave her a shoulder bump.

But Kayla didn’t shush. “We’re a decade off with the shirts,” she said. “We should have gone with some bell-bottoms. And clogs maybe.”

Jolene ignored her, plopping down in the red beanbag. And when Jean Jacket plopped down next to her, Jolene’s smile was so big Ana thought it might devour her whole face. Becausethiswas happening. Boys were happening.

“What do you think?” Sporty asked, his face beaming with pride at the party room they’d created in their motor vehicle. He sat on the floor, cross-legged, and Kayla sat next to him. Ana watched Kayla’s face change, slightly, the way Indy’s had. Her disdain for life taking on more feminine attributes. What was that look, Ana wondered? Pouty—that was it. Kayla, of all people, lookingpouty.

This was going to be trouble.

Jolene asked Sporty, “What do you have to drink?”

And there they were. Kayla and Sporty, now sitting side by side on the shag rug that lined the floor of the van. Jolene and Jean Jacket on the beanbags. That left Ana and Indy, trying to stand, their heads brushingthe roof, next to Wiry and Wavy Hair, waiting for someone to decide what would happen next.

And then, like gusts of wind:

“Wanna score some weed?” And Kayla was gone.

“Wanna go for a walk?” Then Jolene was gone.

“Be good!” she said, winking at Ana.

Indy was next, hopping out right behind Wavy Hair, telling him she wanted to find their friend from Avery Hall, the Spanish skater named Hugo.

“You’re skaters?” Wavy Hair asked. And then, “Cool,” and then they were gone.

Leaving Ana alone in the van with Wiry, and all of her emotions, excitement and curiosity still in the lead. Fear coming in next, but the other one—the anticipatory humiliation—was right behind it. Saying things to her likedon’t do anything stupid, and bystupidit meant things that would expose her ignorance, her inexperience, her age.

Because tonight she was not a skater. She was not an Orphan with a sick mother. She was not lying on the ice waiting for Dawn to slice her neck, turn her into a zombie.

Not being any of those things felt like a giant stone had been lifted off her chest.

And then, before she could hear the rest of the chaos going on inside her own head, Wiry moved closer, grabbed her wrist with his bony fingers, and pulled her onto the beanbag left vacant by Jolene and Jean Jacket.

Then, “Want a beer?”

Then, “What’s your name?”

Then, as if by magic, the opening bars of “Stairway to Heaven.”

And the sound of metal on metal as he closed the doors.

Chapter Twelve

Ana

Now