Chapter 4

I slid my hand along the wall, searching for the switch, and light soon flooded the basement and spilled onto the steps.

At the bottom, Jo had her face pressed against Callum's door. She grinned as she turned the doorknob and pushed.

I crept behind her but stopped in the doorway. By the basement light and the blue lava lamp in Callum's bedroom, I could see well enough.

Callum was face down on his bed with nothing covering him but his boxers. The Monroes' cat, Elf, sat on top of Callum's butt and stared at us, his eyes like perfect circles of reflective tape.

Jo tiptoed to Callum's dresser. Her hand closed over the keys, and she turned back toward the door.

Callum stirred, but Elf managed to ride out the wave of him.

Her eyes wide, Jo hurried toward me.

"Weed," a muffled voice said, "what are you doing?"

"Nothing," Jo whispered. "You're dreaming."

"If you're stealing my car again, I'll tell Mom and Dad, and they'll never get you your own car."

"Whatever, Cal. I'll tell them you snuck out last night even though you're grounded," she warned.

Callum muttered a string of curse words. Elf, still on Callum's butt, settled down into a crescent shape and closed his eyes.

"How about I just take you where you want to go?" Callum asked with a sigh.

"Fine." Jo crossed her arms across her chest. "We'll wait upstairs."

We watched television with the sound off while we waited. Making up our own dialog for commercials and shows was just one of the many exciting things Jo and I did for entertainment. Today, though, my heart just wasn't in it.

"I'm ready," Callum announced when he came into the living room. His brown hair was disheveled, but at least he had clothes on. "You still have my keys, Weed."

Jo chucked them at his head, but he ducked. "Don't call me that. You can call me Giraffe Girl, but Weed takes on a new meaning in high school."

"Okay, Weed," Callum said with an evil grin, picking up his keys. His gaze flicked to me and his grin softened into a smile. "Hey, Leigh."

"Hey." No rambling on or awkwardness around the girl whose mom just died. A smile fluttered across my lips and was gone.

"You're taking us to Whaty-Whats. And to get more hair dye," Jo announced.

"That stuff'll warp your brain more than it already is," Callum said.

Jo shoved him out the door, and I followed.

"Such a chick magnet," Jo said as we neared Callum's car. It was clunky and gray with trash all over the seats and floor. When Callum unlocked the passenger door, a gust of wind picked up an empty bag of chips from inside the car and threw it in the street. Jo ran after it.

"Sorry." Callum dove headfirst into the passenger seat and shoveled the garbage into the back. When he scrambled out, he gestured with both hands for me to take the semi-spotless seat.

"Thanks," I mumbled and got in. The smell of cinnamon and tacos filled my nose.

Jo appeared next to the car again, the escaped bag crumpled in her fist.

Callum nodded to the backseat. "You're in the back, Weed, with all your friends."

"Bite me," Jo said and climbed inside.

Callum laughed as he took his seat next to me. I'd never been in his car with him in it, too. It was always just Jo and I on a joyride. One nice thing about Callum's junk mobile was that at least a dozen other people in Krapper had one just like it. Nobody ever claimed to see underage and license-free Jo driving around town, especially since she wore dark sunglasses and parked as far away from our destination as possible when she drove. But today she sat in the backseat, preaching at Callum about the need to recycle while she rustled through the trash.

He didn't interrupt her, but I could sense him looking at me every once in a while. I tried to focus on the sky, which finally released its weight of rain, but I had to admit his sudden curiosity piqued my own.

But maybe it wasn't so sudden. All those times in junior high when I'd caught him staring at me while Jo and I hung out at their house kind of made me wonder. But when he'd gone on to high school, I never saw him. Now that we went to the same school, I still never saw him.

Tires squealed as Callum slammed on his breaks. My hand shot forward to brace myself against the dashboard. An oversized pickup truck barreled through the intersection and missed us by an eyelash's length. I glanced up at the streetlights hovering above us. Ours was green. Oversized pickup asshole's was red.

Callum looked at me. "Are you okay?"

The concern in his eyes was intense, and I could only nod.

"Fucker!" Jo yelled at the pickup truck. "Pay attention to where you're going!"

Callum's jaw clenched as tight as his grip on the steering wheel. He drove the rest of the way in silence while Jo continued to preach at him.

As we neared Whaty-Whats, the rain eased. The used clothing store was disobedient by design. It dared to be two stories high on a street where almost all the other buildings were leveled at one. Its cracked, wooden sign was so faded that only one word could be clearly seen. What. Jo came up with Whaty-Whats after we decided the inside was just as rebellious as the outside.

Callum parked, and only a few raindrops joined us in our parking space. When the little bell above the door dinged a welcome, the twin grannies who owned Whaty-Whats waved at us in perfect synchronization. Jo and I waved back while I breathed in the smell of musty cedar. We left Callum behind and trotted up the creaky stairs to where the women's clothes were kept. Jo went straight for the rack of skirts, and I searched for my usual black or plaid.

Jo found a blue skirt with flowers on it for her, and I found a black t-shirt with one word scrawled across the front in red letters that dripped blood: Girrrl. It was absolutely perfect.

We decided the skirt and shirt were all we needed, so we headed back downstairs to pay. Callum, who'd been relaxing in a chair by the door, stood when he saw us.

"Ready?" he asked.

"Some of us civilized people pay for our purchases before we leave a store," Jo told him.

"Civilized, my ass," he said and turned away from us.