The Reckoning Page 17

  Beckett still didn’t really know Eva, hadn’t gotten much time to talk to her to find out more than the basics about her, but she didn’t seem to mind and so he decided to follow her lead. She had told him that she’d had her eye on him since the start of the school year, which had flattered him, but the way she’d said it had kind of reminded him of Emmeline, and he sincerely hoped he wasn’t about to start dating the latest iteration of Emmeline Strandquest. He’d really have to question his judgment then.

  ***

  Tristan made it through worship, though it felt about twice as long as it usually did, and the family stayed through the news and closing ceremony. They blended into the rest of the crowd that streamed out of the clearing, as suspected, and Sol gave her a relieved smile as they reached the dinghy with the Crenshaws.

  Tristan yawned broadly, and Celes smiled at her.

  “Aren’t you tired?” Tristan asked, squinting against the rising sun, and Celes shook his head.

  “I’ll be good until tonight.”

  “How?”

  Celes laughed, and both families got on the boat. They crossed the river without incident and all said their goodbyes, the adults agreeing they were looking forward to the Solstice Celebration the following weekend. Tristan fell asleep pretty much as soon as she got in the car, her head propped on her arm, which she rested on the window ledge and folded beneath her head. The Solstice Celebration, the looks she knew she’d be getting from Celes when she was all dressed up and now this newfound urge to maybe let him look at her that way, was the very, very last thing she wanted to think about just then.

  Chapter 14

  Tristan had held out some small hope that, though Beckett and Eva had their tongues down each other’s throats on Saturday night, it had not gone any further, but school on Monday morning dashed that hope entirely. As Tristan made her way to her locker, she passed Eva and Beckett, who were at Eva's, their heads close together as they talked.

  “Morning Tristan,” Beckett greeted, as usual, and Tristan smiled at him. She was not going to punish him for finding someone who made him happy, especially since she herself had done nothing but keep him at arm’s length since October.

  “Morning Beckett.”

  Eva did not turn around, so Tristan didn’t bother with her. She looked away from Beckett, continuing on to get her books, reassuring herself that she’d done well, and that eventually seeing them together would stop bothering her. She also reminded herself, once again, that senior year was not the time to get caught up in emotion.

  ***

  “Taco Tuesday,” Beckett said from behind Tristan, the next day at lunch.

  Tristan turned, grinning.

  “Taco Tuesday.”

  “I’m glad you came around. You can thank me at any time for opening your eyes.”

  Tristan laughed, shaking her head.

  “How was your weekend?” Beckett asked.

  “It was fine. The same as always, really. You know you don’t have to ask me that every week? I don’t ever do anything but work or see family.”

  Beckett shrugged. “I still want to know.”

  Tristan looked away, biting her lip. Her lines were blurring with him, her rules falling out of place the more she saw him. Nothing could or would come of a friendship with him, but it was getting tiring caring about the bigger picture.

  “My weekend was good too, not that you asked.”

  Tristan turned back around with an apologetic smile.

  “Sorry. I’m glad you had a good weekend. Did you do anything fun?”

  “Football, Mack’s, the usual.” Beckett shrugged.

  Tristan nodded, waiting to see if he’d say more, but he didn’t. Instead, he suddenly looked like he remembered something, and a mix of confusion, fear, and urgency crossed his face while he looked back at her. Tristan raised her eyebrows.

  “Are you OK?”

  “Where were you this weekend?”

  Tristan frowned.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Were you home all weekend?”

  “Uh.” Tristan looked around nervously. “No, not all weekend. I went out of town, to see family, on Saturday.”

  “Were you OK?”

  “What’s with the questions?” Tristan prickled, still frowning.

  “I just…” Beckett shook his head. “I don’t know. It would sound crazy if I even told you. Maybe I got struck by lightning or something.”

  “Do you need to go to the nurse?” Tristan asked, squinting at Beckett. She touched his forehead, which was cool. “Lie down?”

  Her touch seemed to snap him out of whatever was going on, and Beckett blinked, watching her hand as she pulled it back.

  “Sorry,” Tristan said immediately, embarrassed. Her cheeks burned. Had she seriously just felt his head?

  “No, I’m sorry.” Beckett shook his head. “I guess I should have said my weekend was weird, because that’s what it was.”

  Tristan was dying to know what he meant, getting the distinct impression that perhaps they’d shared the same experience on Saturday night, but she couldn’t put herself at risk to ask, so instead she smiled.

  “I know how that is.”

  Tristan paid for her lunch and picked up her tray.

  “See you around, Beckett.”

  “See you.”

  Beckett watched Tristan go, his thoughts all in a jumble, his skin tingling from where Tristan’s hand had been. Was skin supposed to do that? Maybe he did need to see the nurse.

  ***

  Tristan closed her locker on Wednesday morning, turning to find Emmeline and her crew standing less than a foot from her. She jumped.

  “Jesus.”

  “Don’t you dare speak his name.” Emmeline looked personally offended, and Tristan stared at her.

  “What do you want?”

  “I want to know how many times I have to tell you to stay away from Beckett before you listen.”

  “I want to know how many times we have to have the same conversation before you listen. It's like three times a week at this point, isn't it? Also, isn’t Beckett dating Eva Revet? That was a fast breakup between you two.”

  Emmeline snorted.

  “Please. He’s trying to make me jealous by sleeping with the easiest girl in the junior class, which won’t work, by the way, not that it’s any of your business.”

  Tristan ignored the now-familiar pit in her stomach. She did not want or need to know who Beckett was sleeping with.

  “He’s getting a lot of weird attention this year,” Emmeline said, looking Tristan up and down. “First from you, now from Eva. I have you both on my radar.”

  “Is that a threat?” Tristan asked, annoyed.

  Emmeline smiled.

  “It’s a courtesy warning. Ciao, Tristan.”

  Lightning fast, damn her, Emmeline flipped Tristan’s books out of her arms, then walked away laughing with her friends. Tristan closed her eyes, summoning strength she barely had to not chase Emmeline down. Instead, she picked up her books and, clutching them to her chest the way she should have been in the first place, she headed to class, mentally calculating how many days were left until graduation.

  There must have been something in the air that day, or Emmeline had gotten to Eva, as well, because every time Tristan and Eva passed each other in the hall, the icy vibe Tristan caught from her nearly chilled her to the bone. The accompanying angry stare did the same. The bizarre thing, however, was that Eva was her usual sunshine and rainbows self whenever Tristan saw her with Beckett. Actually, Tristan corrected herself, the truly bizarre thing was that Tristan was seeing Eva alone at all with such frequency -- as a junior, they typically would not have as much overlap between classes as they suddenly did, and Tristan knew for a fact that she hadn’t seen Eva around Jamestown so much before she’d gotten involved with Beckett. It was all extremely unnerving, and Olivia’s warning about Eva bounced around in Tristan’s skull.

  The whole strange week had put Tristan on edge,
so on Friday afternoon, when Beckett unexpectedly approached her at her locker, Tristan nearly jumped out of her skin.

  “Sorry,” Beckett said, looking slightly surprised by Tristan’s reaction. “Didn’t mean to startle you.”

  “It’s fine,” Tristan replied, putting a hand to her chest. “What’s up?”

  “I need to go right home after school today.”

  “Oh OK, no problem. We can meet Monday or something.”

  “No.” Beckett shook his head. “I’m not bailing on you two weeks in a row. Do you want to just meet at my house instead of at the bench today?”

  “Your house?”

  “Yes, my house,” Beckett said, looking exasperated. “To work on our project.”

  “OK,” Tristan agreed, noticing that Beckett was unusually stressed; she didn’t want to make things harder on him by enforcing her arbitrary friendship rules that she was barely enforcing these days anyway.

  “Great. I’ll meet you there.” Beckett disappeared without waiting for an answer, and Tristan watched him go, frowning.

  “Is it me, or is this week weird?” Olivia asked, appearing beside Tristan. “Is it because the solstice is coming?”

  “It is,” Tristan replied. “But around here I think it’s because winter break is coming. What are you doing here?”

  “I was following Eva,” Olivia said casually, pointing at Eva, who Tristan had not even noticed go by.

  “Olivia!”

  “What?” Olivia asked. “I was trying to see if she was stalking you or Beckett.”

  “Stalking? What are you…? You know what? I have to get to class. I’ll see you at home.”

  Shaking her head, Tristan closed her locker and headed off down the hall, the same way Beckett and Eva had gone. She made it to English class without incident, looking over at Beckett, who was staring absently at the front of the room. His jaw was working, a dark expression on his face, and Tristan hoped he’d tell her at some point what was bothering him.

  Tara caught her eye, raising one eyebrow and smirking at her, then slowly shaking her head. Tristan just looked at her before turning her eyes to Ms. West, who entered the room, greeting the class as she pushed a stand with a TV and a DVD player on it ahead of her.

  “If I’m interpreting everyone in this school correctly this week, you all have winter break-itis ahead of the start of the break next Wednesday. As an educator, I like to feel like my students are at least a little bit interested in what I’m teaching, and since I am not feeling it from you, I am not feeling teaching you. So there.” Ms. West turned the TV on and picked up a DVD case, holding it up. “Since we’ve been discussing 1984 this year, I thought I’d show you the movie. We’ll watch it today and finish it up on Monday or Tuesday. It should really get you in the Christmas spirit.”

  “That was a joke,” Ms. West said wryly, when no one laughed. Shaking her head, she put the DVD into the player and dimmed the lights.

  Tristan tried to focus on the movie, but she’d already read the book twice and seen the movie once before, and her head was brimming with thoughts about Beckett, Beckett and Eva, Olivia, school, and, oddly, Celes. Until the most recent gathering, Tristan hadn’t felt nervous about the upcoming Solstice Celebration. In fact, she’d never really felt nervous around Celes at all -- mainly, when they weren’t interacting as friends, she felt dread about a future with him. She still mostly felt that way, but it had lessened substantially since she’d spoken the truth of her upcoming decision to Olivia and Evander. Tristan was not joining the community, but she also wasn't going to die over it. She’d run if she had to, lay low and cut all ties with her family until it was safe for her to reach out; she’d think of something anyway, if that’s what it came to, but she was not living the life expected of her and she was not giving up her own life in exchange. This knowledge had empowered her, even though she was terrified of the fallout, but it had also, ironically, made room for the attraction that had suddenly sparked between her and Celes. It was all bad news, and Tristan knew she should entertain none of it, especially not outside of community gatherings, but again, her emotions worked independently of and with no regard for her rational attempts at thought.

  The bell rang, rousing her, and Tristan collected her things, deciding to use her free period to clean out her locker. She grabbed a large trash can and dragged it over to her locker, marveling at the junk that had accumulated in the narrow cavity in just three short months. She took her time, fitting tests and quizzes into one folder, loose homework into another. She threw away hall passes and scraps on which she’d written herself notes, random candy wrappers and stray pen caps. When she was satisfied, she put the trash can back where it belonged, deposited her books into her backpack, and headed out to her car. Before she drove to Beckett’s house, she looked in the visor mirror, shaking a hand through her lifeless hair and smoothing balm over her dry lips. She looked slightly better, but felt very blah overall about her appearance, which was unlike her.

  Tristan was about to pull out of her parking spot when Evander and Olivia approached. She rolled her window down instead.

  “I’ll be home later. I’m going to Beckett’s so we can work on our project.”

  “Oooh.” Evander wiggled his eyebrows, and Tristan made a face at him.

  “We know,” Olivia said, glancing at Evander. She tried to keep a straight face, failed. “We walked by Beckett explaining to Eva in great detail why she couldn’t go home with him today. It legit sounded like he was talking to a preschooler.”

  “Stage five clinger,” Evander said, and they both laughed.

  “I was still trying to think of how to warn him about her, but she’s doing my work for me.”

  Tristan watched her siblings in mild amusement.

  “You guys done?”

  “Probably not,” Olivia said, still laughing. “We’ll see you at home, though.”

  Smiling and shaking her head, Tristan waved goodbye to them, taking off. She was surprised to see Beckett’s car parked out front when she got there -- he hadn’t been joking about needing to go right home.

  Butterflies in her stomach, Tristan walked up to his door, raising her hand to knock when he pulled it open.

  “Come in.” Beckett ushered her inside, and Tristan followed him to the kitchen.

  She looked around as they walked, the small house sparsely decorated and very dark, all of the curtains drawn. The kitchen, however, was bright and sunny, a pleasing shade of yellow with dated ivory appliances and oak cabinets. Beckett’s backpack was tossed onto the long kitchen table, also made of oak, and Tristan set her bag down on one of the matching chairs, sitting beside it. Beckett, who had been looking out the kitchen window, finally turned to face her.

  “Should we get started?”

  “Sure.” Tristan unpacked her bag, pulling out the same materials she’d brought with her to the bench the week before.

  Beckett took out his notebooks and opened his laptop, and to his credit he was totally focused, in spite of whatever was going on. Nearly an hour later, they had a rough curriculum outlined, which was more progress than they’d managed to make since they were assigned the project in October.

  “This is amazing,” Beckett said, scrolling through the document. “You really did hit the resource jackpot with this.”

  Tristan nodded.

  “We might actually finish this by May, at this rate.”

  Beckett laughed, then sobered as Tristan packed her bag back up.

  “Thanks for coming here today. I’m sorry I couldn’t meet at school.”

  “It’s OK.” Tristan looked at him carefully. “Is everything OK?”

  “Everything is--” Beckett turned to look out the window behind him, and then raced to the front of the house, pulling back the curtains on one of the front windows instead. Tristan, more confused than ever, walked over to the kitchen window to see that a car had crept up the street towards the house, but stopped. After a few seconds it peeled away, shooting off down the
street with a squeal of its tires.

  “I knew it,” Beckett muttered, dropping the curtain in disgust. He was still shaking his head when he came back into the kitchen.

  Tristan just looked at him, starting to get an idea of what was going on. When he looked up at her, the anguish on his face confirmed.

  “I’m sorry,” Beckett said.

  “Don’t be.”

  “They fight all the time,” Beckett told her, shaking his head. His eyes were glassy, and Tristan’s heart ached for him. “They have been for almost two years now. I don’t know why they won’t get a divorce. I know they can’t stand each other. But I thought that was as far as it went, until recently. I got this suspicion, you know, that my Dad was doing something he shouldn’t be? I got home a couple of times and things in the house looked weird, like they weren’t that way when I left in the morning, but who actually pays attention to that kind of thing? Well I do, apparently. He was just about to pull into the driveway with the woman he’s cheating on my Mom with.”

  “I’m so sorry, Beckett.” Tristan, not really thinking about anything other than the pain he was in, hugged him.

  Beckett's arms came around her immediately, and it was mere seconds later when Tristan became very, very aware that she was in an embrace with Beckett Benson. His body was warm along the length of hers, his shoulders broad, his hug strong. She felt safe, standing there, like they’d weathered storms together before and she knew they'd protect each other if they ever had to do it again. Tristan could feel Beckett’s heart beating against her chest, and though she knew she needed to back off immediately, she closed her eyes, committing every feeling she was having to memory. If this was all she would ever get with him, and it probably would be, she was going to remember it until the day she died.

  Tristan finally pulled back, putting a foot or so between her and Beckett.

  “I’m sorry,” Tristan said again, her eyes wide, face flushing.

  Beckett shook his head, giving her the look again.