Sweet Sixteen, Chapter 3 ~ Enamored

“Watch this.  Okay, imagine I’ve just done some wicked stunt and I take off my helmet, like this, and kinda shake out my hair . . . do you think it’d be too much if I ran my hand through my hair?  Well, either way, then I take a drink and hold the bottle out and say, ‘Firebomb High Energy: I fuckin’ drink it.’”

Eric was poised in the Markson kitchen, helmet dangling in one hand and Firebomb High Energy drink outstretched in the other.  Elly blinked at him.

“What?”

Eric huffed, halfway between incredulous and disappointed, and said, “My commercial.  For Firebomb.  Earth to Elly!”

“I’m sorry, I wasn’t paying attention.”  Elly absently kicked the legs of the stool where she sat at the kitchen island, and took a sip of her after school soda.  “You’re doing a commercial for Firebomb?”

“Duh!”  Eric threw up his hands.  “Tomorrow!  Where have you been for the past month?  I did a commercial for Sick Sportswear last week, I suppose you didn’t know I was doing that, either.”

“Sorry.  Are you really going to say ‘I fuckin’ drink it’?”

“No.”  Eric rolled his eyes, slumping onto the stool next to her.  Eric was used to having a rapt audience for everything he did, and Elly’s preoccupation with staring off into la-la land was a mystery to him.  He took a swig of his Firebomb.  “That was a joke.”

“Ah.  I’m surprised Mom’s letting you do that, she doesn’t like you drinking that stuff.  It must be 100% caffeine.”

“65%.  And you know how much I had to beg Mom to let me do it.  Dad had to convince her for me over the phone.”

“I see.”  It was all making sense, now.

Eric had been the youngest contestant in the Summer X-Games that year, his first time competing in the extreme sportsworld’s biggest event.  That hadn’t stopped him from taking home two medals; a bronze in a skateboarding event and his pride and joy, a gold for a dirt bike race.  He’d also earned the nickname “Fearless” because in all the events he’d entered he’d proven himself just that.  He’d been more than a little disappointed that his father was overseas, but not many people could see it, because his spirits had been so high.  Elly had known.  Elly usually paid closer attention to her siblings than she was doing now.  She knew guiltily that Eric was extremely hyped about the advertising deals that had arisen from his breakthrough into professional sports, and that he expected her to be as enthusiastic about it as he was.  But she just couldn’t think about what Eric was up to, now.  She had Sien to think about.

Their mother came into the kitchen, then, and Eric guiltily snatched his helmet off of the countertop.  “Is Dad up?” he asked before she could make a fuss about it.

“Yes, with you kids home from school and galloping around the place there’s not much point in trying to sleep, is there?” Liseli responded, but she said it lightly.  She was obviously in a good mood.

Russ had gotten home around six in the morning, said he hadn’t slept all summer, and went to bed.  But not before he’d been forced to witness Eric’s newest stunt on the skateboard.  Eric had his own private skateboarding half pipe in the back yard.  Elly wouldn’t have been surprised if Eric had gone to bed fully clothed, padded, and helmeted the night before so he could jump out of bed ready to rumble the minute Russ walked in the door.  And tired and jet-lagged as Russ obviously was, he obligingly stood outside and watched Eric try his best (and fail) for about half an hour.  Then it was time to go to school.

The whole family was going to go out tonight and celebrate the fact that Russ was home.  Elly usually enjoyed and looked forward to this post-tour tradition, but this particular evening her heart just wasn’t in it.  She just wanted to be alone where she could be preoccupied with her thoughts of Sien and not be interrupted constantly by her family talking to her.

Then there was still the worry that Marcus would tell them that he’d seen her riding helmetless on the back of a motorcycle.  As if Eric didn’t routinely do much riskier things.  And so what if she was clinging to a boy as they rode, didn’t Eric always have girls clinging to him?  These were the excuses she’d use if Marcus did tell.  But she hoped he didn’t.

She’d planned on cornering him after school and begging or threatening him not to tell, but she realized that she didn’t want him to know how concerned she was about it.  She didn’t want anyone to know how important she felt this meeting was.

Elly slid off the stool and said, “I’ve got homework.  Knock on my door when it’s time to go.”

She didn’t really do homework, of course, when she slid into her chair it wasn’t her textbooks she spread out on her desk.  She pulled out blank paper and her drawing pencils, and went to work sketching Sien’s face.  Now that she had been able to stare into it openly she thought she could do a better job than when she had tried earlier in the month.

He was so hard to draw . . . he had that twinkle, that mysterious knowing look in his eyes that pencil couldn’t capture.  At least not in her inexpert hands.  Elly lost track of time, bent over her paper, unconsciously copying Sien’s facial expressions as she tried to bring them to life on the paper, impatiently scrubbing out her missteps.  She was practically unaware of her surroundings until she heard:

“Who is that?”

A thick line of pencil gashed Sien’s cheekbone as Elly jumped.  “Hollie!” she exclaimed harshly.  “Don’t you knock?”

Hollie, hovering at her shoulder, peered at her in surprise.  “Your door wasn’t closed all the way,” she said.  “Who is it?”

Elly calmed a little; it was only Hollie, after all.  She didn’t like people sneaking up on her, but then, Hollie was the only one who could.  Usually when people tried to sneak up on her she could hear or sense them coming and it only annoyed her.  It was insulting, to one who could move through life unseen by all and only sensed by animals.  Hollie on the other hand could sneak without even trying.

“Well, now it’s ruined.”  Elly sighed ruefully at the thick line through her drawing.  No amount of erasing and redrawing would fix that.

“Who was it going to be?”

Elly paused, studying Hollie’s face as she casually bent over the desk to look at the drawing.  “Do you believe in love at first sight?” she asked suddenly.

Hollie’s eyes slid from the page to her face and stopped there, silent.

Elly had wanted to ask someone that question for a month, now, but there was no one she trusted enough.  Her friends from school would think of Sien as just another boy to flirt with and have a crush on, a boy to date, but not a person to love.  They would giggle over his looks but she couldn’t confide to them the deep, confusing, strange feeling of stumbling upon something you couldn’t begin to understand but wanted very much.

Her mother she would not dream of telling.  Her father could barely keep from growling at any boy who got within a ten foot radius, so he was the last person to talk to.  And Hollie was only eight.  But it came out, because Hollie’d seen her drawing and she had to ask someone.

“Nevermind.”  Elly shook her head when Hollie didn’t answer.  “This is no one, I’m just practicing my sketching.”

Hollie, still silent, hoisted herself up to sit on the edge of the desk, dangling her legs over the side.  “Elly,” she said, looking across the room, “only Kiki came to pick up Ade from school today.”

Elly smiled a little, glad that Hollie’s attention could skip from one thought to another so easily.  “Oh?”

“Yeah.  And Uncle Jake didn’t come by the house this morning with Daddy.”

“Well, they were probably tired like Daddy and went straight home, and maybe Uncle Jake was still sleeping when Kiki picked up Ade from school.”

“Do you think so?”  Hollie’s eyes begged for honesty.  “I think they broke up again.”

“Why are you asking me?”  Elly waved her pencil toward the door.  “Why don’t you go listen to Mom and Dad and find out what’s going on?  I’m sure he’ll tell her if they broke up again.”

Hollie shook her head.  “You know they don’t talk about anything important when I’m around.  They think I’m too young.”

Elly smiled again.  Of course, she was always forgetting.  Hollie couldn’t just make herself invisible and listen in on their parents’ private conversations.  She could be stealthy but she could not be unseen; Elly was sure of that because she was sure she’d know if her sister was like her.  “Well you are too young,” she said. “You’re only eight, you should be blissfully unaware of all that is problematic in the world.”

“I’m almost nine.”

“I know.  I was being facetious.  Look, I’m sorry, Hollie.  I know how close you and Ade are and how Kiki flies off with him.  But she’s really trying, you know, to keep them all together.”  Elly pivoted in her chair to look Hollie in the eye.  “You know what I think?  I really don’t think you need to worry about Kiki leaving forever and you never getting to see him again.  Kiki and Jake are a little like Mom and Dad in some weird way . . . no matter what problems they have with each other they just can’t live apart.”

Hollie’s eyes opened wide, a spark of indignation kindling them into green flame.  “Mom and Dad never have any problems!  Daddy never cheats and Mom never runs off with us to get back at him.”

“Oh for pity’s sake.  Of course not.  I said they’re a little like Mom and Dad, not that Mom and Dad are exactly like them.”  Elly held a hand out as if to block laser beams from her sister’s eyes.  “Nevermind what I said about Mom and Dad having problems, you’re too young to remember.”

“But—”

“Just don’t worry about Ade, okay?  My point was that Kiki always comes back, for whatever reason.  And even if she didn’t, you don’t think Jake would let her keep Ade away from him?”  Elly’s assuring smile turned a little forced at that.  She knew that if Kiki wanted to she could easily convince the courts that Jake was an unfit father, what with all the drugs, alcohol, and women of questionable moral character in his life.  He’d probably get visitation rights but that wouldn’t mean much for Hollie.  But she didn’t want Hollie to worry so.  Eight year old girls shouldn’t be eaten up with worry that the people they love will disappear from their lives, Elly thought fiercely, remembering the worried child she had been.

“I suppose,” Hollie replied, not sounding all that convinced.

Elly resisted the urge to pat her hand, just because she knew Hollie would find the action patronizing.  It was terribly sweet how close she and Adrian were, like twins rather than cousins.  She didn’t deserve all the worry that Kiki and Jake put her through.  Elly half smiled at the thought of herself stomping up to her uncle, who had never been anything but nice to her, and telling him to get his shit together for Hollie’s sake.  Or Kiki — sweet, benign Kiki — she’d tell her to get a fucking backbone (as Dad would say) and face her problems with Jake instead of just leaving.  What good did leaving ever do?  Oh, they aggravated her; she couldn’t begin to understand them and Elly did not like to not understand things.

Hollie hopped off the desk.  “It’s time to go to dinner.  Mom sent me up here to tell you.”

“Oh.”  Elly frowned.  And here they’d sat around gabbing, while the rest of the family was waiting for them.  “You should have said so right away.”

“I forgot.”  Hollie headed for the door as Elly stood up, wiping pencil smudges from her fingers.

Hollie paused in the doorway and turned around.  “Does that mean you love him?”

Elly looked up, startled.  “Yes.  I think I do.”

Hollie nodded.  “Okay.”  Then she left.