Dances We Dance

Chapter One

Okay, so here's my decision for the day. I really hate the heat. Really really a lot. Especially in Vermont. People come to Vermont to ski all winter. Why is it so hot in the middle of August? It doesn't make any sense to me. I shouldn't have to be sitting on the lawn with the grass scorching my legs.

All I could think about was how the weather just hadto break before school started up in two weeks. I didn't think I'd be able to manage sitting in a classroom in heat like this. And everyone kept saying that seventh grade was serious stuff — though how it was so much more serious than sixth grade, no one was quite sure.

There had to be something to do. There just had to be. It was definitely too hot to stay out here without risking heat exhaustion or something equally dramatic. I could sit and read a book, but I'd read everything that I had. Borrowing a book from Emma would be okay — actually, pretty good, as Emma has very good taste in books — but all the books were in our bedroom. Also in our bedroom was Kai, Emma's best friend. This had never been a problem before. I mean, Kai always spent summer days at our house. She said her parents' house just got too stuffy, and she got lonely. And they always included me when we hung out. I mean, always. Maybe I didn't get all the jokes, and if I started being annoying, I got tossed out, but I always got a chance.

Today, when Kai arrived about seven seconds after Mom left for work (9 AM prompt; Mom hadn't been late for work in six years), I'd followed her up towards Emma's and my bedroom only to have Emma stop me at the door and say "Sorry, Wren, not today. We need to talk about girl stuff."

Huh? 'Scuse me? What's that about? Since when am I not a girl? I have the breasts to prove it, much to my shame.

But I took it in stride. At least, I think I did. I tried to be all grown-up. I said, "Oh, yeah, okay," like I didn't care. And I probably wouldn't have cared — if I hadn't left my copy of The Two Towers sitting on my bedside table. Aragorn and Co had just been accosted by some strange guy in white, and I was absolutely dying to know what was going on. But I couldn't find out, because Kai felt it necessary to completely monopolize my sister with some sort of silly girl-thing. It's not like I didn't live in this house, too!

And I couldn't even go hang out with my own friends. Out of all the girls I talked to at school, only two of them really counted as friends. Jill's family always spent the last three weeks of summer at the beach, and Cara was out west somewhere, visiting her father's horse ranch for the summer as part of a joint custody thing.

But then, maybe I was just being overly grumpy. The heat was definitely get to me. Maybe they didn't mean to exclude me, but how much fun would it be to coo over the sexy guys in . . . what did the miniskirt girls at school read? Seventeen and Cosmo Girl? . . . with your little sister staring over your shoulder? Maybe they didn't think I'd be interested.

To be fair, they were kind of right. I didn't mind boys, but I couldn't stand the way girls at school fell all over themselves falling over the boys, as if boys really wanted some sort of drooling fool for a girlfriend. Mom always said being yourself was the most important thing there was. Having a boyfriend would be a lot of fun, if they were the sort of boyfriend you could play baseball with or go swimming with or . . . stuff like that. Just sitting around and being moony at each other sounds boring to me.

All the mini-skirt girls at school — the ones who dressed in clothes Mom wouldn't let Emma wear, and who wore makeup in the fifth grade — had boyfriends, and they were definitely the most popular girls in school. But they were all mean to the girls who weren't their friends, and even seemed to be pretty mean to their boyfriends. At least, you never saw the boyfriends and the girlfriends talking to each other; just heard about all the places they'd gone and kissed. Especially in the gym locker room. Yuck. Yuck yuck yuck; that's what I thought of it. Baseball until dark sounded like a pretty good date to me.

I heard a vague ringing inside. The phone. That was okay; Emma'd get it. It was too hot to move.

"Wren!" I heard, out of the upstairs window. "Can you grab the phone, please!"

Sigh. Emma was going to have to make one heck of a dinner to make up for this day.

I picked up the phone in the living room. "Hello?" I said.

"Could I speak to Wren Leary, please?" said a shaky boy's voice.

"This is she," I said. Waited. Congratulated myself on my grammar. I always got As in English.

"Um . . . hi," said the boy. There was a long pause, then, "This is Colin Jacobs."

I found myself suddenly out of breath. When I did think about boys, it tended to be Colin that my mind wandered to. All the mini-skirt girls were crazy for him, but he ignored them. That was a big point in his favor. Plus, with thick black hair that never stayed where he put it and dark blue eyes, he was definitely cute; even I could see that. He didn't smile very often, and the miniskirt girls called him "mysterious and deep" because of it. I saw him smile, once. I was sitting in the library at school, totally engrossed in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, and he stopped and just said, "I love that book." Then he smiled and wandered off, but I felt my heart beat faster. None of the other girls could claim that he'd smiled at them.

Now my heart was beating faster again, and I was breathing too quickly. Crazy. I made myself take a deep breath and calm down. Who knew why he was calling?

"Hi, Colin," I said. "How's your summer going?" How lame a question was that? But why was I asking questions anyway? He'd called me.

"Oh, pretty good." Another long pause. "I was wondering if maybe you might want to go bike riding some time when it's not quite so hot," he said, all in one breath.

My stomach started churning. Silly. I squashed that as hard as I could. "Yeah," I said. "That'd be nice." After all, miniskirt girls never went bike riding — you had to wear pants that actually let you move to do that. So bike riding wasn't baseball, but it would be okay.

"Yeah?" he said. His voice sounded so nervy I wanted to laugh.

"Yeah." I giggled. Huh? Why was I giggling? I never giggled. Definitely weird.

"Okay. I hear it's going to rain tonight, and the weather will be better tomorrow," he said. "I'll call you then."

"Okay."

"Well, um . . . bye?"

"Bye," I said, and I couldn't help laughing. He laughed too. It was a great, warm sound; I liked it a lot. I hung up the phone with his laughter sounding in my ear. I stood there in the living room, grinning like a fool. My ear was all hot from being squished up against the phone, but I couldn't stop smiling. Very strange.

But gooshy and happy as I felt now, I still needed something to do for the rest of the afternoon. I still couldn't get into my own bedroom, and it was still hot and stuffy inside. And I definitely needed to find out if Aragorn and the guys were in trouble.

I shook my head to clear the fog and went back outside. I found a bit of grass in the shade and stretched out. Maybe if I could imagine a cooler place, I wouldn't feel so hot and sweaty. At least, it was a theory. Besides, Kai never stayed for dinner; odds were she'd leave in about an hour and a half or so. She was usually gone before Mom got home, in fact. So if I could just occupy myself until then, I'd be all set. And tonight, I'd talk to Emma about getting locked out.

I closed my eyes and pretended I was on the beach by the lake. This fantasy was a frequent one; I knew all the grains of sand on the beach. So it was easy to imagine the sounds of the waves washing up onto the narrow sand shore, the sounds of people barbequeing and playing music. I could almost feel the soft towel under my shoulders shielding me from the heat of the sand. Yup, I'd remembered to dig down a little, to where the sand is cool and moist, and I'd laid my towel over the sand so that the coolness was rising up into my shoulders, easing the heat, and there was Colin, walking back from the Quikstop with my soda —

Colin? What was he doing in my beach fantasy?

And then there was something cold and slimy all over my feet. I yelped and sat up. Jellyfish were not supposed to be in my backyard — what the heck was going on today?

But then I had to laugh; no jellyfish in the grass. Just Jonesie, Emma's huge, furry, Humane Society mutt. We figured he was part sheepdog, but the other parts were anybody's guess. Today, he looked completely miserable. He peered out at me from under his bangs, his tongue lolling, and let out one little whine.

"Oh, poor Jonesie," I said. "You must feel awful."

He barked once and gave me a long look with his big, black, sorrowful eyes.

"I'm sorry," I said. "You're probably lonely, huh? Do you have any water? Let's go see."

I hauled myself up and went back into the kitchen. Jonesie followed me, his nails clicking on the linoleum in the hallway and the kitchen. His water bowl was completely empty. I filled it up for him; Jonesie gave me a thank-you wuffle and started lapping.

He was utterly Emma's dog. He liked me and Mom, sure, but Emma was the one who'd found him at the Humane Society. The second we'd walked into the dog room, this hairy, squirmy puppy had been at Emma's feet, tail wagging so hard it shook his butt back and forth. Emma picked him up, and it was all over. Dad'd had his eye on this little chocolate lab puppy, and I'd wanted a cat, but Emma just ignored us both until we gave in and agreed to the dog. Jonesie slept at the foot of her bed like an extra blanket and waited for her by the door when she got home from school.

I sat down on the lineoleum, letting my legs cool down.

When Jonesie'd had enough water, he sat down and looked at me.

"You can't possibly want to play," I said. "I'm dying in this heat, and I'm not wearing a fur suit."

Jonesie just sat there, staring at me, tongue lolling. I moved my legs to avoid the little drool puddle.

"You're bored, too, huh? Wish Emma'd come out of her room and play?"

When I said 'Emma,' his eyes lit up, and he looked over his shoulder — just in case, I guess. I really needed to talk to Mom about getting another dog. One that could be my dog like Jonesie was Emma's. This was too depressing for words.

When Emma didn't materialize, Jonesie collapsed on the cool linoleum with a huge sigh. When my legs finally started to feel a tiny bit chilled, I heaved myself up, and started back outside.

But what was I going to do out there? Let some boy I'd only spoken to twice interrupt the one daydream that cooled me down in this wretched heat? Sit outside and be bored while the grass burned the backs of my legs? No way! Besides, I was so sweaty I stank, and my shirt was all but attached to my skin. Nope. I was going in. I'd get my book and change my clothes. Emma and Kai would just have to hold off on their cooing about boys until I was done, or else do it in front of me.

Chapter Two

I trudged up the stairs and down the hall to our room. The bathroom was at the top of the stairs; our room was to the left, and Mom's was to the right. Years ago, Mom had given Emma and I permission to decorate our door with whatever we wanted. Emma's half looked way better than mine. She was a total neatnick and had carefully trimmed out pictures of Sigourney Weaver from Aliens, Faye from Cowboy Bebop, Miyu and Lava from Vampire Princess Miyu, and Utena and Anthy from Revolutionary Girl Utena. Both Kai and Emma loved anime; Kai had a DVD player at her house, and they both liked to watch anime in Japanese with the subtitles on.

On my half of the door, I had a couple pictures of Darien and Serena from Sailor Moon. I'd cut all my favorite book covers out of a book club magazine and taped those up. But all my pictures were crumped around the edges, and peeking out from underneath you could see Barney stickers I hadn't been able to get all the way off or really cover.

As I reached my hand up to knock — I would at least be that polite, so that I'd be more convincing — I heard laughter in the room. Giggling, but not. Lower in pitch . . . quieter. Like a laugh in a romantic scene in a movie.

Romantic scene? My brain was definitely thinking weird things today. After all, it was Emma and Kai in there, not Romeo and Juliet. But maybe I shouldn't interrupt them. Whatever was going on sounded a bit more private than usual. There was no loud music in the room, no real laughter, no shouting. Something was different. Maybe they'd be really upset if I busted in.

Okay. Fine. I'd have a shower and go back to the original plan of waiting until Kai left to talk to Emma. I could grab something out of Mom's study to read. Maybe James Herriot or Agatha Christie.

But I hadn't heard Jonesie padding up the stairs behind me, and I didn't realize where he was until I stepped backwards and fell over him. He yelped, I shouted — we ended up in a pile on the floor, all tangled up, and I heard Emma swear. Oh boy — what had I done now?

"Wren?" Emma called. "That you?"

Drat. Well, they'd already heard me — and what was it Dad used to say? In for a penny, in for a pound. "Yeah," I hollered back.

"You okay?"

"Yeah. Just wounded pride." Kai said that all the time. "Can I come in for a second?" I reached out and turned the doorknob. It was locked. What? That was new.

"Hold on a sec, okay?" Emma said.

We weren't allowed to lock our doors. That was one of Mom's big rules. What was going on?

What was going on was that I was being awfully suspicious. One of them probably just bumped the lock on their way by the door at some point. Nothing big like that. "Sure, I'll wait," I said. What else was I going to do?

After a minute, the door opened just enough for Emma to peek out. "Hey, kid — what's up?"

"I'm desperately bored," I said, trying to sound more like a fainting flower than a whiny kid. "Can I get The Two Towers and change my shirt? Please? Then I'll go away."

Emma glanced over her shoulder, then nodded. "Yeah, okay."

"I'm sorry," I said, as I slipped past her into the room. "I didn't mean to disturb you guys, but I figured since you heard me humiliate myself . . ." I'd argue about the details later; now I just wanted to get the book and go. "Hi, Kai," I said. Polite thing to do.

"Heyza, brown-bird," Kai said, smiling. She called me that because she said I had a bird name, and I was little and brown. "How's the summer treating you?" She had her hair twisted up into a bun, with the long ends drooping down into a kind of ponytail — she looked so calm and cool, even in the heat. Her legs were all twisted up into some yoga thing she called "Lotus pose." It made her legs look upside down, but she always looked so zen doing it. Way cool. Sometimes, when Emma was out of our room, I'd sit on my bed and try to pull off a cool Zen Lotus pose, too. No success as yet.

"What book did you want, Wren?" Emma asked.

I glanced at Emma. She stood next to our communal bookshelves, her arms crossed over her stomach. Her short brown hair was all rumpled; as I looked at her, she reached up to try and smooth it down. Why bother? I had to look pretty rough, too.

"Two Towers, I think. Though if you guys are going to be closed up here all day, something else would be nice, too. Maybe one of yours?"

Emma sighed. "Let me have a look." She turned back to her books and started to root around.

"So, what have you been up to this summer?" Kai asked. She patted the bed next to her. I picked my way through my dirty clothes and scattered papers to Emma's spotlessly clean floor. I swear, you could see the lines where she stopped vacuuming. "Anyone interesting call on the phone?"

I rolled my eyes, trying to look as cool as she did. "It wasn't anyone important," I said. "Just Colin Jacobs."

Kai's back went stiff. "Jacobs? As in Ryan Jacobs' little brother?"

"Yeah, I think so," I said. Everyone knew Ryan made trouble for a lot of kids in the high school, and he was a senior this year, like Emma and Kai — but what did that have to do with Colin? Colin never caused any trouble in school, unless annoying teachers by pretending you're less smart than you are can be called causing trouble. "I don't think Colin is much like his brother, though."

Kai glanced over towards the bookshelves, where Emma was assembling a small stack of books. She looked a long time, and then her shoulders came down just a little. "Be careful, okay? Just keep your guard up around everyone in that family."

Kai's look was intense and odd — not zen and peaceful like normal. "Okay," I said, just because she looked so worried. "But Colin seems all right. He just suggested we ride bikes some time. When it's not so hot."

Kai nodded, but it didn't look like she was really listening.

"Kai?" I said, after a long wait.

"Yeah," she said, focussing on my face again. "Sorry. Woolgathering."

"It's okay," I said.

"So, are there any other boys you're interested in? They must be getting interested in you — you're growing up fast, after all," she said, with a deliberate glance at my chest.

I crossed my arms over the breasts I'd woken up with in January, the big lumps that got in the way when I tried to throw a baseball the way Dad had taught me. Then I felt silly; Kai always looked so comfortable in her body. She said that was a big part of both the yoga and the martial arts that she did — learning to settle into your body, whatever shape it was. "I don't know about boys," I said, finally. "None of them really say much to me. They all pay attention to the girls in tight skirts and makeup."

Kai laughed in that great way she had, like the whole world was just as completely funny as you could imagine, and it made me laugh, too. Emma looked up from the bookshelf and shot Kai the most fiery look I'd ever seen on Emma's face. Kai didn't back down, though, just smiled at Emma with one eyebrow lifted until Emma turned back to her books. Kai winked at me, then, which somehow managed to send me into a whole fit of gigles. I laughed so hard I fell backwards and ended up half on the bed and half off, my head almost touching the ground. That set me off again, laughing even harder, and then Kai started tickling me — I howled.

"Jeez, you guys!" Emma said, in the same tone Mom used when Emma was roughhousing with Jonesie, and Mom had a bad headache.

I arched my back and braced my hands on the floor, trying to get enough leverage to get back up on the bed, and somehow ended up staring under the bed. Staring back at me was a black lace bra I didn't recognize. It wasn't like I watched Emma dress or anything, but we did live togethe, and I'd never seen her wear anything like that before. And it certainly wasn't anything like the little while cotton training bra Mom had gotten me over my protests. Besides, Emma never threw clothes under the bed. Whose could it be? Kai's?

This day was just getting stranger.

Glancing back and forth from my Upside Down pose, I realized I was in the middle of a staring war between Kai and Emma. Emma was glaring, with one hand on her hip, and Kai's face was tight and stormy. I'd never really seen either of them like this. Then, like it had never happened, Emma's face softened into smile, and Kai's grim look just melted. They both looked happy as anything, but I was completely confused. What exactly was going on here?

I heaved myself back up on the bed, and felt my hand come down on a book. "Hey, what's this?" I said. Emma looked over, and her eyes got awfully wide.

"Oh, hey, Wren, gimme that —"

I turned it over. The title was Tales of the City. "Is this new?" I asked.

Emma sputtered for a second. Kai said, "Yeah. It's mine."

"Is it good?" I asked, glancing back at Kai. I noticed another strange thing. Her blouse was misbutoned — she'd skipped a button, and through the gap in her shirt, I could see skin instead of bra.

Well, fair enough, I wouldn't wear a bra either in this heat, and that explained the bra under the bed — got too hot, took it off, and it got shoved under the bed — but it was odd that her shirt wasn't buttoned right. Kai was always perfectly dressed, even if she was just wearing yoga pants and a sweater.

"Wren —" Emma finally managed to say.

"It's really good," Kai said. "You should read it some time."

"Cool," I said. Kai'd recommended a bunch of Ray Bradbury books to me at the beginning of the summer — Dandelion Wine, Something Wicked This Way Comes, and The Martian Chronicles — and I'd completely loved them. Kai'd laughed a little when I talked about them, so I must have missed a few things here and there, but I didn't care. They were so good. So now, anything Kai recommended went high up on my list.

Emma's face was stormy now. "Hey, Kai, don't you think that book's a little old for her?"

Kai's jaw seemed to lock in place. "No, I don't think it is."

I glanced back and forth between the two of them, confused. They shot looks back and forth for what seemed like ages, until Emma finally glanced away. Kai smiled just a little and nodded to me.

"It's a good book," Kai said. "Enjoy it."

"You set?" Emma said, and glanced at the door. I knew the look she had. I'd better be sweaty for the rest of the afternoon. She was really angry about something. I got up and hightailed it out of the room. The door had only just closed behind me when I heard Emma explode.

"I can't believe you just did that!"

I heard Kai say something, but I couldn't catch the words. I slipped away before I really did start eavesdropping.

Oh, crud — and I still didn't have The Two Towers. Well, at least I had this Tales of the City book. Well, then, back outside. I'd find a bit of grass in the shade of the front porch, and I could watch for Kai on the way out, and tell her what I thought of the book so far. I loved talking to Kai about books; that was almost as much fun as talking to Emma and Mom about them.

I stretched out on the grass and concentrated on not wondering what was going on upstairs. I opened up the book, and was hooked in seconds.

I could see why Emma'd protested that the book was too old for me. The characters were always talking about sex and smoking pot — but they were so completely cool I couldn't stop reading. I almost didn't hear the porch door open, but I heard the giggling above me, so I stood up, to see what was going on.

And then the whole world stopped.

Emma and Kai were standing together in the corner of the porch where Mom's climbing roses obscured the view from the road. As I watched, mouth open to catch flies, Kai wrapped an arm around Emma's waist and pulled her close. "People will see," I heard Emma whisper, as Kai nuzzled Emma's neck. "I don't care," Kai responded "I love you, and I don't care who knows it." And then Emma wrapped her arms around Kai's neck, and they were kissing. Not just a little kissing, either, the kind of pecks that Mom exchanged with some of her friends — real, heavy duty kissing.

A couple of cars went by on the street, but Emma and Kai didn't seem to flinch. I wondered for a second if anyone would be able to see through the roses, see what my sister was doing. I'd like to think that I was worried for her reputation, not mine.

They both had their eyes closed, so I'm sure they didn't see me. But I saw Kai's hands slipped down to squeze just below the samll of Emma's back . . . and I saw Emma break away from Kai's mouth and kiss Kai's ear.

Being as quiet as I could be, I dropped back down onto my knees, closed my eyes, and waited for the sound of Kai's car starting.

Chapter Three

After a minute, I heard Kai's laughter, and then the porch door slamming. I thought that maybe I should go and tell Kai I liked the book, but then, what if they realized how close I was the whole time they were . . . doing what they were doing?

My sister was kissing girls. Kissing Kai, who was my second big sister.

I couldn't think in a line. My thoughts flew all over the place, almost unconnected — but circling around one thing. Kissing girls. What did it mean? Did it mean Emma was a lesbian? Didn't some people say that sometimes kids who thought they were gay weren't really? Like, they'd experiment, but it didn't mean anything, and sooner or later, they'd get around to liking boys instead of girls, or vice versa?

My mind swirling, I stood up — and found myself staring right at Emma through the porch screen. Her eyes were wide, and her hand was pressed up to her mouth.

"I'm sorry," I whispered. "I'm really sorry. I didn't mean to spy." I didn't know what else to say.

Emma stared at me for a long time, her eyes welling up with tears. Then she turned on her heel and went back inside.

So that was it? No talking, no explaining, no nothing? Great. That was just great.

I had to get away for a little while. Had to get away from this, had to go somewhere I could think. Where I could cool off and think. Where could I go?
The park. There was a pool there, and it would be crowded today. That would be a good place to go. I went inside to get my bathing suit out of our bedroom. A blind man could have found our room; just follow the sounds of sobbing to Emma.

She was in our room, curled up on the bed. She must have heard me in the doorway; she sat up and scrubbed her face dry. "What?" she asked.

"Jeez, Em," was all I could think of to say.

There was a long moment of silence. "Are you going to tell Mom?" she asked.

"No," I said. "Why would I? It's not really my business."

She rubbed at her temples. "I don't know. You might think . . . I don't know."

I'm not a tattletale. But if Emma didn't realize that I could keep secrets after living our whole lives together, what else was I going to say? My mouth apparently knew. "What is this, then?" it said. I hate it when my mouth goes and talks without telling me what words will be coming out of it.

"What do you mean?"

I shrugged. "What do they call it? A phase? An experiment?"

Emma snorted and gave me a disgusted look.

"I'm not saying it should be," I said, mustering my meager defense. "I'm just . . . I don't know what to think."

"You don't have to think anything," Emma said.

Oh, right. Yeah, just say it's not my problem. Never mind that I'll get teased, too, just like you. You're not the only one they'll call a dyke.

I flinched away from the word as soon as I thought it. Mom always said that slurs were slurs, even if they were just in your own head, and thinking dyke or fag was the same as saying nigger or spic, and she'd kill me if I ever did that.

"But I do have to think something," I said. There had to be a way to put my thoughts into words.

"Why?" Emma flipped up, sitting up on the bed. "What does it have to do with you? Nobody gives you a hard time for dressing a certain way, or calls you names because you don't feel the way they think you're supposed to feel!"

"But don't you think they will?" Were these words coming out of my mouth? "When you start telling people, don't you think I'll hear about it, too?"

Then, Emma was in tears again. "Thanks, sis," she said, hissing out the word. "I really need that guilt trip on top of everything else. Thanks a million." Emma stormed past me and slammed our bedroom door. I sat down on my bed and pulled my knees up to my chest. The front door slammed. I made sure to be quiet, just in case Emma had only been letting Jonesie out. I was to mad to let her hear me cry.

What had I done wrong? She'd always promised that I could tell her anything, that she'd never be mad at me for anything I told her.

So what was all this . . . this shouting and upset-ness? If she was okay enough to be kissing Kai where strangers could see her — Mom's rosebushes aren't that thick — why was she yelling at me about this?

Maybe it was Kai. In romantic movies on TV, one character was always telling the other, "if anyone finds out, it's over!" Maybe Kai was so uncomfortable with this that she didn't want anyone else to know, and had sworn Emma to secrecy. After all, it wasn't like Emma to keep secrets — especially not from her family. So that explained it; Kai had stolen my sister away and replaced her with this crying, yelling, secret-keeping person.

 But that's not the Kai you know, whispered a little voice in the back of my head. Kai never lies about anything. She says that's part of yoga and martial arts, too — "truthfullness in thought and action," Kai calls it. Besides, on the porch, she was the one saying she didn't care if anyone saw them kissing.

"What about Emma?" I said aloud, ignoring that little detail about the porch. "She doesn't lie either."
No . . ., the voice said. Emma doesn't lie . . . exactly. But sometimes she doesn't exactly tell the truth. Like the time she said she'd written a letter to Dad but she'd really ripped it up and thrown it away. Or when she says that Jonesie ate the last of the chocolate fudge ice cream.

"Jonesie's eaten wierder things," I whispered, but I sounded lame and weak, even to myself. Okay, so Emma wasn't exactly a paragon of honesty, but there was a big difference between who finished the ice cream and who she was kissing when I wasn't around.

But she never lied, the voice insisted, because you never gave her a chance to lie. You never asked the question. Never said, "Hey, Em, are you and Kai tossing me out of here so that you can play Spin the Bottle" or even "Hey, sis, do you prefer kissing boys or girls?" You just assumed that she liked boys because 90% of girls do. Maybe she was dying to tell you the truth — but scared. Or maybe she just couldn't find the right words.

Oh. Hadn't thought of it like that, had I? I'd have to talk to her later, explain that I was sorry, and that it made a little more sense now — and we could talk. Really talk. Like sisters.

But Emma's a lot like Dad, and that means when she's steamed you have to give her time to cool off. Tonight, after dinner. I'd wait up until she came to bed, and then we'd talk.

Satisifed, I flopped back and closed my eyes. This thick heat made me so sleepy. I wished we had a pool. The community pool down at the park was okay, but so many people brought their kids there to learn to swim that it was always full of shrieking little kids. Yuck. Plus, you got so hot riding to the park and back, you didn't really cool off that much.

The heat must have made me drousy enough to fall asleep. While I blinked, the time on my alarm clock went from 1:16 to 3:24. Oops. Napping in the middle of the day always made me feel even sleepier.

I hauled myself back off the bed and downstairs. Emma was sitting at the kitchen table, her hands wrapped around — ew — a cup of hot tea. But as wretchedly hot as that seemed to me, it was probably a good idea for her; tea always made Emma calmer.

"Hi," Emma said, without looking up from her tea. "I hope you're okay with pizza for dinner. I called Mom, and she said she'd bring home a festive meal."

"Festive? What are we celebrating?" This was definitely a change from before my little siesta.

"Your first phone call from a boy." Emma finally looked at me, and she tried to smile. I give her lots of credit for that. But her eyes were red and swollen, and even five feet away I could see the wet spots on her cheeks.

I scuffed my sneakers on the floor. "Hardly worth celebrating. I mean, it's not like we have a date, or anything. It's not like he's my boyfriend." I got funny butterflies in my stomach, thinking of Colin as my boyfriend.

"All the same, it's something to celebrate."

Emma sounded so sad. Maybe I was only twelve, but I could guess why. No one was celebrating her kissing Kai, but she'd gotten Mom to buy pizza presumably just by telling her a boy had called me. Ouch. Yeah, that sucked.

"Mom'll be home around five," Emma said. "With pizza."

She took her mug and stood, walking past me without blinking. I could see her chin quivering like she was going to start crying again.

"Emma, wait," I said. "Can we talk? Please?" So many things were swimming around in my head. Not just about her and Kai, but about Colin, and tomorrow, and these crazy butterflies. Was this a date after all? How could I go on a date when I was working so hard to be different from those silly girls at school? How did I do this? What was I supposed to do? What was I supposed to wear? What was I supposed to say?

Emma didn't turn back. "No. Not now. After dinner, we'll talk. Promise." I could see her hands shaking. I followed her up the stairs to our room.

She closed the door in my face.

"Please," she said from behind the closed door. "After dinner. Okay?"

I sat down on the stairs and rested my head against the cool railing. It was too hot today. Too hot for all of this. Too hot to breathe.

* * *

Mom was home at 5:15 with two pizzas, soda, and cheesy breadsticks. That meant she'd left work at least fifteen minutes early. Cool.

Mom worked at the local newspaper office. She'd gone to journalism school, but when she'd gone to the paper, there hadn't been any openings for reporters. She took a job in layout, and now she pretty much ran that department. Very cool, but it meant that she didn't get to write much more than office memos. Everyone expected her to be all bitter and dissatisfied with her life, but she always said that she wouldn't have been a very good reporter anyway, so this was better in the end. I'm not sure about that, but I'm twelve. She doesn't respect my opinion that much. Besides, she's my Mom. Of course I think she's the best at everything.

But she's also really busy. She's here as much as she possibly can be, and I've never told her I need to talk about something and had to wait more than half an hour to do it. But since Dad left with Amanda, year before last, it seems like there are more late nights and more early mornings than there ever were before. I mentioned it to Kai, once, when Emma wasn't around. Kai said that this house probably reminded her of Dad, and everything they'd had together, so she was staying away now and then to try and heal. I didn't think that made much sense, but, as I said before, people don't think all that much of my opinion on stuff that's considered "grown-up."

The point is that even though Mom tends to work until she collapses with dark circles under her eyes, she's a pretty good Mom. A really good Mom, even.

When she saw me, her eyes started to sparkle. "Hey, Wren!" She tossed the food onto the dining room table and spun me around. "Congratulations!"

"On what?" The spinning was making me dizzy.

"Your first call from a boy, silly." Mom laughed like a kid, and leaned in to kiss my forehead. Then, for a second, she looked like she might cry. She mumbled something about growing up too fast. I tried not to roll my eyes. Not fast enough for me.

She got over her goofy-mom-moment and went back to laughing. "Where's your sister?"

I opened my mouth and didn't know what to say. Emma was still upstairs — but should I say so? Should I tell Mom about Emma and Kai? Should I keep my mouth shut? Should I cover or let it go? Emma never spent a whole afternoon up in our room, and Mom would know something was up if I said that was where she was.

"I'm right here, Mom," Emma said from behind me. Whoo — saved. "I was just having a bit of a nap."

"Are you sick?" Mom asked, all concern. Emma tried to fend her off as Mom pressed a hand to Emma's forehead.

"No, no — just the heat, I think. Makes me sleepy."

I carefully did not look at how red Emma's eyes were. At least she'd washed her face, so it didn't look like she'd been crying now. At least, unless you looked really closely. Mom tended to look closely, but I guess today she was just so excited for me she didn't notice — or didn't say anything. That made me feel kind of guilty. I mean, sure, Colin had called me — but so what? Was it really that big of a deal?

The way my heart was pounding said yeah, it was a pretty big deal.

Mom set out the food, Emma got the drinks, and I set the table. We all sat down and chowed in — at least, Mom and I did. Emma kind of toyed with her food without really saying much of anything. Not eating is very not Emma behavior.

"So, tell me about it!" Mom said. She sounded like a kid for a second. I almost wanted to laugh; she sounded like a mini-skirt girl. Then, she said in this huge, over-done valley-girl accent, "Was it, just, like, totally cool?"

"Mom," I laughed, "nobody talks like that anymore!"

She sighed, rolled her eyes. "Fine, fine. So tell the old geezer about the phone call."

So I did. In glorious detail. I didn't realize how excited I was about the whole thing until I told Mom about it. I feel sort of bad about it, but I kind of forgot about Emma as I was talking. I got so caught up in describing how my stomach flipped, and how nervous Colin sounded, and how excited I'd been, and I was, and so on . . . all day long, I'd been thinking about Emma. Funny, but it was nice to think about me.

After the third time I'd been through this story, Mom finally seemed satisfied. "Just be yourself, Wren, don't forget that," she said. "You're the one he likes, so don't go trying to be someone else just to make him happy. Odds are, it'll make you both miserable."

I love it when Mom says stuff like that. She sounds so wise. But then, she always says that was the problem with her and Dad. She says she spent years and years trying to be someone other than who she was. And then, one day, she stopped. And Dad wondered who he'd married.

Mom smiled at me, then turned to Emma. I realized Emma still hadn't touched her food, and suddenly, I didn't feel so happy or so good. Thinking about myself didn't feel comfortable, it felt selfish and rude.

"And so, Em, you said you had news, too," Mom said.

Emma turned even paler than she had already been. This didn't look good at all.

"Well . . ." Emma started, then stopped. She started shredding a paper napkin into little pieces by her plate. Her eyes didn't lift up from the table, not once. "The thing is . . ." she tried again, but still no luck.

Mom smiled her nicest smile. "It's okay, Em. You know you can talk to me about anything."

It was like there was this wall around them. They were the grown-ups and I didn't exist. They didn't look at me, they didn't see me. I wasn't there.

Emma looked up then, and her eyes were all shiny. "You know Kai."

Mom laughed, a short sound. Almost nervous. "How could I not? I wonder if her parents know Kai, she's here so often."

"Yeah," Emma said. A long pause. "The thing is, she's not just my friend."

Mom's smile disappeared.

Emma must have seen it. For a second, her mouth tightened up and her chin quivered, but she pushed on. Shut up, shut up, I thought. It can be a secret. It's okay — that's better than what's going to happen. I can feel it in the air. Don't say it — please don't say it . . .

But Emma was never a mind reader. "She's . . . we've been . . . in a relationship since Christmas."

Mom's eyes were shiny and soft, and she had her hand pressed up against her mouth. "Oh, Emma."

"I know I've been lying to you for months now. I'm sorry for that. I've been lying to both of you." A small glance in my direction and the tiniest smile. There was a pile of shredded napkin by my plate now, too. How did it get there? Did I do that? "I wanted to tell you — both of you — about this. It's the happiest thing that ever happened to me, the best thing that I ever imagined in my life. I never thought I could feel so good, so happy . . . but I didn't know how to tell you. So I kept it to myself. But then, today, Wren saw Kai and I . . . kissing." Emma laughed the same short laugh. "Really kissing. And I was mad at first, and angry that she'd seen us, and I realized that I was so upset because I thought she might tell someone. And then I thought, my mother didn't raise me like this."

Mom's eyes closed like someone had punched her in the stomach. There were tears leaking down her cheeks now.

"I thought, if I want to keep a secret to myself, that's one thing. But I couldn't ask Wren to keep the same secret for me. That's just not right. And it's not right . . . if I'm so happy and so excited, then why should I have to hide it."

"There are plenty of good reasons to hide it!" Mom exploded. I sat very still in my chair. If I moved, that burning look in Mom's eyes might come my way, and I'd disappear for real.

Emma's face changed, from the soft, scared look she'd had to something harder, something more like Dad's face when he got determined. "Really? Like what?"

Mom sighed and massaged her temples. "Like the fact that there are crazy people in the world, Emma, who would be more than happy to kill you for walking down the street holding some girl's hand, never mind what poor Wren apparently saw."

"Poor Wren!" That came from both Emma and I. I don't think Emma heard me, though, she was so upset.

"What do you mean, poor Wren?" Emma's eyes were flashing; there was a real storm brewing now.

Mom let out another huge sigh. "I mean that it might have been very upsetting to your sister to see you — the big sister she idealizes — kissing another girl. I know I raised you both to be accepting, but there's a big difference between accepting something in the abstract and accepting it in fact and accepting it in your own house."

"That's not what you used to say," Emma said. "And Wren's a lot more accepting and mature than you think." She flashed me another of those secret smiles that just seemed to kick Mom's temper up another notch.

"Wren's just a little girl," Mom said. Hey now . . .

"She's old enough to be dating boys, apparently —" Emma threw back. Okay, now just when did this fight become about me?

"That's not the point," Mom said. Thank you. "But I know it's been rough on you girls, what with no male role models around —"

"Excuse me?" Emma was almost shouting now. Oh boy. That was so not a good thing for Mom to have said to Emma. So so so not good. I wanted to hide under the table with Jonesie. This was not at all someplace I wanted to be. Why in the world had Mom felt it necessary to bring Dad into this fight? Emma's eyes were practically dripping poison. "What do you mean by that?"

"I mean that some cases — and I just mean some cases, Emma, not everyone, and I'm not even saying that you're one of them — of . . . homosexuality seem to arise from people not spending enough time with people of the opposite sex in their youth."

"What are you, some kind of therapist now?" Emma was so angry she'd lost control. I could see in her eyes a million comments a billion times worse, but those were the only words she could get out in a straight line. I'd seen that look before. In Dad's eyes.

"No, I'm not," Mom said. We all had shredded napkins now. "But if that's something you're interested in."

Emma slammed her chair back so hard it fell over. Mom started saying "Really, that's not necessary —" but Emma cut her off with a look. "If you even try," Emma said so quietly that I almost had to strain to hear after all the yelling, "to get me to see some psycho shrink who wants to turn me into a normal het breeder I will be out of this house before you can blink, and you will never hear from me again. Got that?"

She lost her last vestiges of control then, and pounded up the stairs to our room, crying hard.

"Well," Mom said. "That didn't go well."

No. No, it didn't. I stared at her. Was this the woman who'd sat me down and explained that the dark-skinned girl — Pakistani, I found out later — in my kindergarden class wasn't dirty, her skin was that color, and that it was no different than my skin, not underneath, where it mattered? The woman who'd made Dad stop telling jokes about limp-wristed men, and who'd gone out of her way to point out gay couples on the street as well as heterosexual couples? This reaction I might have expected from Dad, but not Mom. Never Mom.

But I couldn't say all that when she looked so close to tears. So I just shook my head.

We sat still for a few minutes in miserable silence before I asked to be excused. Mom just waved her hand at me. I went into the computer room. When I closed the door, I heard Mom start to cry. For a second, I thought about going out and giving her a hug, but I hadn't had all that much luck with that today. I sat down to check my email so that I wouldn't cry too. If all three of us cried at the same time, I thought the house might fall down.

Chapter Four

It took a lot of deep breathing and not thinking, but I managed to stave off tears, at least for a little while. I turned on the computer to check my email.

The usual stuff filled my mailbox. Notes from a friends on vacation, an email from Dad, and something from an address I didn't recognize right away. I would have deleted the last as spam, or maybe a virus, but the subject line read "Riding Bikes." My cheeks started to feel hot again. I decided that one would have to wait until last; otherwise I'd probably end up completely incoherant, and not be able to reply to anything.

I read through Jill's note about boys at the beach and Cara's note about boys on her Dad's ranch out west. Well, that's a little unfair. Jill's email was mainly about boys, but Cara just talked about this one guy, Jacob, and then talked quite happily about books and movies and other things that I was more interested in. I emailed them both back, but I didn't say anything about Colin. I didn't really know what to say. It was entirely possible that he'd called me up, out of nowhere, in the middle of the summer, to be friendly. Maybe it didn't seem likely, but it was certainly possible.

After that, I looked at the email from Dad. Emails from Dad — anything from Dad, really — made my stomach turn over a little funny. Dad had been gone for two years now. He'd left, out of nowhere, with Mom's secretary. Well, Mom says that, looking back, it wasn't out of nowhere, but I know it surprised me. And if it surprised me, it made Emma's heart crack open. She won't have anything to do with Dad now. If he calls, she won't speak to him. If he emails her, she deletes it. I think she even set up her email address to automatically delete anything sent from his address. So when I hear from him, it becomes a whole long list of things I can't tell Emma about. Days and days of saying "oh, it was the funniest thing when . . . oh, never mind" or "Did I tell you about . . . forget it." At first, she'd harass me about what I wasn't telling her, but now she knows. It's like our code; Dad said it, and you don't want to know.

It's hard enough to talk to Dad, given how he left. Emma can make it just about impossible. But I can't do what she's doing. I just want to talk to him too much.

Today's email was a pretty typical example of Dad-communication. I read through with half my stomach still churning about that last email still waiting for me. Work was going well, blah blah blah, the weather in San Francisco was beautiful this time of year, so forth — and then I stopped. I stared. I reread the line twice. Nope, it was still there, in black and white. "Heather and I finally decided to make a commitment. The wedding will be in January, just after Christmas. If you and Emma would like to attend, please let me know so I can get you plane tickets. We'd love to have you."

Huh? Finally? What?

I should point out that Heather is not the former secretary. That girl — Amanda — took off about seventeen seconds after her and Dad's plane landed in LA. Met some casting agent who said she could be a movie star if she slept with him. She did; bye, Dad. No great loss. Mom actually told him she'd welcome him back with open arms then; he turned her down. I think that's what hurt Emma the most. Even with the Interloper, as Emma calls her, gone, Dad didn't come home. I guess Emma thought Dad had just gotten carried away by some young girl — realizing that he'd left on his own really stung.

Heather seems like a pretty okay lady. She's about Dad's age, and she's always been single. She owns this little used bookstore in the middle of San Fransisco, and Dad's been talking about her for about a year and a half. But — finally? After a year? Wow.

I could just imagine telling Mom. I didn't want to think about telling Emma.

That made me really mad, too. Why was I delivering this news? I knew Dad would never call up Mom just "to let her know," and was entirely expecting me to spread the news. He did this to me often, actually. Just told me, and if Mom had to call him up and ask him stuff, he'd say "I told Wren." Like I'm his messenger, or Mom's message-taker. It drives me crazy. But I had no idea how to tell him that.

And would I want to go to California for this wedding? I'd never been out to visit Dad, but he'd purposely gotten an apartment with enough room for Emma and I, should we ever want to visit. I didn't know what to say. In the end, I just saved the message, figured I'd deal with it later.

I felt like a fool when I clicked to open the last email. My stomach was all tight, and my palms were practically sweating. I chewed on my lip as I read.

To: Readingbird@lycos.com

From: Lanreth@hotmail.com

Subject: Riding Bikes

Hi, Wren. I got your email address from someone in class — I hope that's okay. I know I just called this afternoon, but then I heard the weather report for tomorrow, and I thought maybe we could ride down to the park. It's supposed to be nicer tomorrow, and I thought that if it's hot, we could go swimming, and if it's cool, we can ride or just hang out. What do you think? Please email me back because my Mom has a headache and disconnected the phone.

Later, Colin

I stared at the email and wished that Emma hadn't just disappeared into our room, crying, or even that Jill or Cara were in town. Any one of them would be able to decipher this message. They'd be able to tell me what to say, tell me what he was asking. I'd never had a boyfriend — I barely even talked to boys — but even I knew it was never as simple as just saying what was on your mind. I suppose that was part of the reason I never did bother talking to boys. If I couldn't just say "Hi, how are you?," if I had to spend ten minutes planning out every subtlety of what I was going to say — well, what was the point?

I took a deep breath and pulled myself back into some semblance of control. Think, Wren. Okay. This guy was rumored to be pretty bright. He seemed smart to me. And most smart people aren't into banging their heads on the walls. Okay. I made no secret of how silly I thought the boy-chasing girls were. So if he was expecting me to be one of those, he was definitely barking up the wrong tree, like Mom said. If he thought I was going to be all cooey and gooshy, it would be best to make it clear that I wouldn't be, right from the beginning. Besides, the one thing Mom had said before becoming a total spaz at dinner was that I should be myself. Okay.

"Dear Colin," I replied. "I'd love to go riding/park visiting. Do you want me to meet you at the park, or at your house, or will you meet me here? 'Til then, Wren."

There. Short, sweet, to the point. Until he said otherwise, I'd plan that he was just being friendly. If he wasn't, well, we'd figure something out. I felt calmer, but there was a pleasant heat in my cheeks and in the pit of my stomach. Nice.

When I came out of the computer room, I could see Mom in the kitchen, washing up. That was normally one of Emma's chores, but maybe Mom figured she'd better just let Emma alone until Emma calmed down. I thought of going in to tell Mom about Dad's email — and Colin's — but I decided against it. There had been enough shouting for one night, and I didn't feel like listening to Mom yell about Dad tonight. I might start yelling back.

I slipped up the stairs, as quiet as I could. If Emma'd locked the door, I was going to pound it down, yelling or not — but I was in luck. The door opened. There weren't any lights on in the room, but it was still light enough to see Emma huddled up on her bed.

I turned on my reading lamp, just to brighten things up a little, and sat down to read The Two Towers. I thought about saying something, but I figured it would be better just to leave it.

"Do you think I need a shrink?"

Emma's voice was so loud in the silence that I nearly fell off the bed. As it was, I dropped my book on the floor. "What?" I said.

Her voice sounded eternally patient — but wrung out and exhausted. "Do you think I'm sick? That I need to be fixed?"

Well, what was I supposed to say to that? "Um . . . do you?" Pathetically, it was the wisest sounding thing I could come up with.

A huge, mountain-sized sigh came from Emma's side of the room. "I don't know what I think. Sometimes . . . I know I love Kai, and I don't think love is ever wrong, no matter who you love — but if it wasn't wrong, why would so many people hate it? Or say stuff like — like that, that I only love Kai because he's a jerk?"

He? Oh, right. Dad. Got it. Okay. What to say now? "I don't know, Em," I said. There had to be something better to say than that. "I do know something," I said, finally.

The pause stretched out. "What?" she said, finally.

This seemed like one of those times when it would be a good thing to just let my mouth talk, and listen in to find out what I'd said. "I've known you and Kai for my whole life. And neither of you has ever seemed weird, or crazy, or sick, or perverted. I know I love you both. And I want you both to be happy. So if you're happy together . . . then, I'm happy." Hey, that wasn't half bad.

It sounded like Emma might be crying, but I couldn't see her face — she was still turned away from me. "Thanks, Wren. That means a lot."

I felt a soft glow kick up in my stomach. Something I'd said meant a lot? Wow . . . was this the way she felt when I came to her for advice? No wonder she put up with me when I was younger and a pain, if it made her feel this good to be able to give me advice and take care of me.

The silence in the room felt a little less sharp and chilly as I settled in to my book.

I must have read for half an hour before the phone rang. The phone sits on the night table between our beds, but Emma answered it. I only listened with half an ear; no one but Dad ever called me, and he always told me when he was going to call ahead of time.

"Hello? . . . No, this is Emma — sure, just a second."

I expected Emma to go for Mom, but she turned to me. "Wren, your boyfriend."

I rolled my eyes, even as I felt myself flush for the one millionth time today. At least Emma was teasing me again; that meant she was feeling a little better.

My phone options were down in the kitchen with Mom or up here, trying to ignore Emma watching me. I took Emma's phone; less of a walk, and it would keep up my unruffled exterior, something Emma always said was important. "Hello?"

"Hi," Colin said. "I hope I'm not calling to late." I checked my watch. It was barely seven-thirty.

"Nope, you're fine," I said. "Mom doesn't mind calls before 9."

"Okay," he said. "I'll remember that."

I felt myself smiling. He was going to remember that. Neat. "So . . . what's up?" I asked, after a long silence.

"Oh, right. Well, I got your email, and I didn't know if you'd check yours again tonight, so I thought I'd call and say that I could meet you either at the park or at your house. Which ever is better for you."

Not his house. Well, so what. If I remembered correctly, he lived much farther out towards the other end of town; if I biked to his house, and then we rode to the park, I'd be doing the same ride twice. "Well — why don't you meet me here?"

"Sure," he said. "That'll be cool."

"Okay . . . um, what time?"

"Maybe — around ten?"

"Sure. I'll see you then. You know how to get here, right?"

"Yes," he said. "I'll see you at ten."

We hung up, and I sat there for a second. I expected my skin to glow, I felt so warm.

Emma was grinning at me. "So he's coming over, then?"

I nodded.

"Good," she said. "Do I get to meet him, if I promise not to be embarrassing?"

"Sure," I said. I'd've agreed to most anything, I think. My insides felt warm and soft, and I felt more giggly than I'd ever felt in my life.

Chapter Five

I wasn't nervous when I woke up. At least, not until I remembered that I was meeting Colin to go bike-riding today. Then, my stomach started its own personal roller-coaster ride through Acid Swamp and Butterfly Valley. Nervous stomachs really suck. A lot.

Crackers and juice usually helped. I glanced at the clock; 8:30. Yuck. That meant Mom was probably still downstairs, and she and Emma would be very carefully talking around each other. Mom would be ultra-polite, and Emma would be sarcastic. "Em, could you hand me that glass?" "Sure — anything else I can do for you?" "No, thanks." "You sure? Nothing at all?" Sigh. I could handle it on a normal day, but with my stomach already roiling, I might just upchuck all over the breakfast table. Yuck.

My stomach gave another burble, and I knew staying in bed would be disasterous. Okay; kitchen it was. I took a deep breath, found my slippers, and padded downstairs.

Whistling. Someone was whistling. In the kitchen? I wandered in and found Emma making pancakes. "Morning," she said, without turning around. "I wondered when you'd get up. It's practically noon."

"Where's Mom?" Emma was definitely the early riser in the family; Mom and I dragged ourselves out of bed groaning; Emma whistled and made pancakes.

Emma shrugged. "She got up around 7:45, made herself coffee, and left. I offered her a pancake, but she didn't want it." For just a second, Emma looked really sad. "I didn't put strichnine in them, or anything like that."

I got myself a glass of water and sat down at the table. My stomach wasn't sure what to do about this new information; it could calm down, and let me have a normal day, or it could pretend to calm down, and have a really fun time later.

"Anyway," Emma said, "Kai's going to come over later, if you don't mind. Do you mind?"

I looked at Emma, standing there with her spatula pointed at me and one eyebrow raised. "This is a test, isn't it?" I said.

She stood there, waiting.

"Oh, Em, of course I don't mind. Jeez. Sure, maybe yesterday kinda wierded me out a little, but I still like Kai and everything." My fingers tangled themselves up in the hem of my pajama shirt. Was every day going to start like this now?

"What wierded you out about it?"

I searched Emma's voice for some sign that she was angry, but she just seemed calm, and maybe curious. That was good; at least she wasn't mad at me, even if she still was peeved at Mom. "I don't know. I guess I just didn't expect it. But not because of you. I didn't expect it because I never thought about it. So it caught me off guard, I guess."

Emma nodded. "Want a pancake?"

I checked with my stomach. It was quieting down. "Sure."

Kai showed up about ten minutes later — meaning that she was on her way when Emma asked me if I'd mind — and grinned at me before leaning over to kiss Emma on the mouth. Not like they'd been kissing yesterday, just a small peck on the lips. Kai's own kind of test for me. I was still smiling when she turned her eyes back on me. She nodded, and Emma passed her a plate for some pancakes.

"So," Emma said, glancing at me with a glimmer in her eyes, "Guess who has a date today?"

"You mean besides us?" Kai winked at me.

Emma rolled her eyes. "Yes, dork."

"Okay, who?"

I'm surprised Kai hadn't guessed; I must have flushed twenty-seven different shades of red. "It's not really a date. At least, he hasn't said it's a date. We're just going to ride bikes. Together. Or maybe hang out at the park. How hot is it out?" I sounded like a babbling monkey.

"Pretty hot."

Note to self: bring swimsuit. "Then we might go swimming, too."

Kai laughed. "Sounds like a date to me."

I bit my lip. Me, too. "Well, maybe it is. But I'm not sure, you see, and I don't want to guess that it's a date, because if it isn't, I'll be disappointed."

"Very wise," Kai said. "So who's the lucky guy?"

"Colin." I wondered if I was going to get another lecture on being careful, but Kai just nodded.

"Does that mean you and I are going downtown?" Kai asked Emma.

Emma nodded. "Yeah. Wren, do you want anything?"

I shrugged. "New books are always good."

Emma stared at her hands for a minute, then glanced at Kai, who nodded. I hate silent communication; I can't read it for the life of me, and I always wonder what people are trying to say. Emma took a deep breath, like she had last night at dinner. "The thing is this; Kai and I are going to the gay bookstore downtown. Since I sort of spontaneously decided to come out last night, she thought I might do well to pick up some . . . informative reading for Mom. I didn't know if you might want something along the same lines."

"What sort of informative?" I wanted to know what I was getting myself into.

"I'm not sure, really," Emma said. "Maybe some fiction — maybe some non-fiction. Stuff that expresses a more liberal opinion about gays and lesbians than you might see in mainstream media."

I thought for a minute. About how confused I'd been all day yesterday, about all the questions that I was stuffing into the back of my head for when I finally had time and energy to think about them. About how embarrassed I was about some of them, how stupid some of them sounded. How much easier it would be to get some of the answers out of a book, so I didn't have to corner Emma and play twenty questions. "Yeah, I think that would be nice. Thanks."

Kai's smile stretched all the way across her face. "Good for you, brown bird."

I blinked at her. "What do you mean?"

"Good for you for wanting to know."

"Huh?"

Kai just smiled at me mystically. When she got that sort of look on her face, it was useless digging for more information. Oh well.

Kai ate pancakes while she and Emma chatted about all sorts of things. It made me feel like I was eavesdropping, watching them. Emma kept touching Kai's hand and smiling all up through her eyes, and Kai laughed this deep chuckle that made Emma flush. It was like watching the antithesis of the mini-skirt girls and their boyfriends. Neither of them seemed to be faking anything. They weren't giggling, or posing, or hiding, or showing off. And it wasn't like they didn't know I was there — it just didn't matter.

Maybe boys wouldn't be so bad if I could find one I could smile at like Emma was smiling at Kai.

They cleaned up breakfast while I went and had a shower. When I turned off the water, I could hear Japanese coming from somewhere. I slipped on my robe; Japanese meant that Kai had brought over some anime and they were probably watching it in our bedroom.

My heart started to beat too fast. Was it okay for me to change in front of them?

I dope-slapped myself. Of course it was okay. After all, I'd changed in front of both of them a zillion times before this — it was no big deal.

So I walked into the room, didn't even look to see if they'd noticed me. I walked to my dresser, picked out clothes, and put them on, just like always. When I was dressed, and I looked over to see what they were watching. I studied the screen for a moment, then decided two things — one, I didn't recognize the series, and two, neither of them had even glanced away from the television. I felt like a real dork for thinking what I'd thought in the bathroom.

"So, when's he coming?" Kai asked, still not looking away from the subtitles.

"Around ten, he said." My face felt hot again.

"You'd better get yourself together, then," Emma said. She looked me up and down. "Is that what you're going to wear?"

I suddenly felt silly in my cutoffs and plain black tee-shirt. I felt all exposed. I'd already pulled my hair up in a ponytail — I wanted to let it down so I could hide behind it. "Yeah, I thought these clothes were all right . . . is this the sort of thing you should wear on a first date — if this is a date — with a boy?"

"How would she know?" Kai asked. I was kind of surprised by the dryness of the comment, but Emma just thwapped her in the shoulder without even bothering to glare, so I figured it was probably okay.

"That's not what I meant," I said, even though it sort of was. "I just meant — do I look okay?"

"You look fine," Emma said, without a pause. Big sister comment. Not to be trusted.

Kai actually turned away from her anime and looked at my clothes. Looked at me. "Are you comfortable, Wren?"

I took a second to check things out. "Yeah."

"Then you're all set. You look comfortable, you are comfortable, you're good to go."

"Thanks," I said.

The doorbell rang. My palms started to sweat. He was early! I glanced at the clock; 9:45. Not that early, but . . . still!

"Do you want us to come meet him or keep scare?" Emma asked.

"Um . . . scarce, I think. Not because of that," I said, all in a rush, when the tempurature in the room dropped a million degrees, "I just don't want to scare him. I mean, if this isn't a date after all."

"Okay," Emma said. The room heated back up a little. "Tell us about it later, okay?"

"'Course."

"Now go answer the door before he thinks you're not home," Kai added.

I grinned at her and shot out of the room. I heard her call down the stairs, "Good luck, brown bird!"

Part of me really wanted to stop and check my hair and everything one more time in the hall mirror. I didn't do it; it just seemed too obsessive. I just tried not to pant too hard as I pulled the front door open. Colin stood there, as expected. "Hi," I said. "I'm sorry I took so long. I was upstairs, talking to my sister, when I heard the doorbell ring, and you were a little early, so I wasn't expecting you —"

"Am I too early?" he said. "I can wait, if there's something you need to finish."

"No, no, it's okay. I just didn't expect you. I'd only just gotten dressed —" Okay. I almost certainly wasn't supposed to have told him that. How on Earth did those words ever sneak out of my mouth? I could feel my cheeks turning tomato red.

The only thing that made it even a little fair was that he was turning bright red, too. He was such a pale guy that when he turned red, he turned really, really red. A lot. And then he grinned, so I grinned back. A pair of grinning tomatoes.

He looked kind of like an anime character, in a funny sort of way. One of the sorts of characters that Kai called bishonen, pretty boys. In anime, they're boys who are exactly that, pretty. Sometimes even kind of feminine looking. Big eyes, small chins, triangular faces. That's what Colin looked like. Except bright red.

That struck me as funny — tomato bishonen — and I started to giggle. Then we were both laughing like hyenas.

Well, at least we were getting along pretty well. Even if I did feel kind of dorky for laughing like a hyena in my own doorway.

When he'd kind of gotten control of himself, he asked for a glass of water. I must have stared at him funny, because he shrugged and said, "It was a long ride. Do you mind?"

Of course I didn't mind. "No, I don't mind. Come on in."

I led him back into the kitchen and got him a glass of water. I plunked myself up on the counter and swung my feet — something both Emma and Mom hated — as he drank it down.

"Thanks," he said, finally. He stared more at his hands then at me — kept glancing up at me through his long bangs like he was all nervous or something.

So what did I do now? Did I talk to him, or suggest we should go, or talk about something silly that he might like to hear? Did I jump up and down and rip my hair out?

Nope. He'd definitely think I was crazy if I did that.

"So," he said, and I blessed him for it, "whose car is that, outside?"

Car? Oh, yeah, of course. "That's Kai's. She's my sister's —" I paused. How could I put it into words? "Friend," I finished. I sounded like a complete moron. I felt like a complete moron, too.

"Oh," Colin said. "I just asked because it's pretty hot out — hotter than I thought it would be. I thought maybe, if it was your mom's or something, she could give us a ride to the park. Today's probably more a swimming day than an actual bike-riding day. If that's okay, I mean. If you don't want to ride all that way to go swimming, that's fine."

"No," I said. "Swimming sounds nice." Nicer than sitting around the house by myself, boiling. That was for sure.

"But I wouldn't want to ask your sister's friend to give us a ride; that wouldn't be fair."

"Well, she wouldn't mind," I said, "except that I think she and Emma are going downtown this afternoon."
"And my brother'd kill me for taking a ride with her."

As soon as the words came out of his mouth, Colin turned bright red. In part of my mind, I wondered if he was experiencing that "Did those words actually come out of my mouth?" feeling. The rest of my mind just felt red-hot anger.

"Why?" I said. "What's he got against Kai? Huh? What's his problem anyway?"

Colin seemed to shrink into himself. Was I being too harsh?

"No, that's not it," he said. "I mean, it is it, but . . . Ryan's just not understanding, okay? About anybody who's different, whether they're different because they like to read or because they're gay."

"I didn't say my sister was gay," I snapped.

He looked me straight in the eye. "Neither did I," he said.

Ah. Yes, well . . . hurrah for over-reacting. I forced myself to take a deep breath and calm down. "Okay," I said. "I'm sorry. I guess I just . . ."

"I know," he said. "Ryan's always coming home talking about the new stunt he pulled to get Kai or your sister — I think it's really lame of him. I wish he'd leave them be, you know? Whether they're queer or not."

Then he smiled at me again — that soft, sweet smile I'd only seen once or twice before. I was glad I was sitting on the counter, because I felt all weird and melty inside. All I could do was smile back.

"Do you want to go swimming?" he asked.

"Yeah," I said. "I'll go and get my suit."

Chapter Six

One bathing suit, one good-bye to Kai and Emma, and one very sweaty bike ride later, we were at the park. Colin didn't say another word about Kai or Emma or sexual orientation, and neither did I. I spent half the ride trying to figure out why I'd reacted so badly to what he'd said, and the other half trying to figure out why I felt so glowy and shiny. I never acted as wacky as this; maybe I was going crazy.

We chained our bikes up and got into bathing suits. Well, we were both already wearing them. Colin had put his trunks on to ride over, and I'd put my bathing suit on under my clothes. A quick scuffle with cut-off shorts, and we both hustled into the pool. I'm proud to say that he looked just as flushed and embarrassed as I did.

It's not that I'd never been swimming with a boy; at least, there were always boys at the pool when I went swimming. But I'd never gone swimming with a boy, if you see the difference. Even though I was wearing a plain blue one-piece that covered everything, I felt buck naked. Definitely weird.

Colin headed for the diving board while I just stuck to the side of the deep end for awhile. My head was spinning again, as bad as it had been yesterday. I felt entirely overheated — like a computer that has been working too hard to process too much information. Yeah, that was it — my processor was overheating. So I closed my eyes and let the cool water wash around me and take away some of that heat and that confusion.

What was there to be confused about, really? I mean, Emma was happy, Kai was happy — so why was I so unhappy? Why was I so freaky and sad and mad at her all at once? I wanted to be happy for her — I really did. And I was happy for her — mostly. But I couldn't shake the feeling that, somehow, I was losing my sister. I'd been okay with watching her and Kai being all cutesy at breakfast, but now, a little bit farther away from it, I felt jealous and angry at Kai. My stomach was roiling with tension. What was that about?

And Colin . . . Jill and Cara had always talked about boys as these amazing additions to your social life, and gone on and on about how wonderful they felt when they were with their boyfriends. Neither of them had mentioned nervousness so bad you wondered if you could keep your breakfast down, or a simultaneous glowing so bright you weren't sure where your feet were. No one had prepared me for this.

Or for deciding whether or not to tell my father to go to hell and forget about me going to his wedding, or make Emma furious by going.

The heat was threatening to turn into tears when I felt a soft touch on my shoulder. I made myself swallow the tears before I opened my eyes. Colin was kneeling on the edge of the pool, looking worried. "Are you okay?" he said. "If you don't feel well, I'll walk you back home. It's okay."

That soft glow took up space in my stomach again. "I'm okay. There's just . . . a lot of stuff going on at home right now, and I'm . . ." I shut up before I really did start crying.

I expected him to be laughing or scoffing or something, but instead he was nodding. "Yeah," he said. "I know about home stuff. You want to talk about it?"

Normally, when someone asks if I want to talk about something, I feel suspicious. People never seem to mean it when they ask. They just want you to say no, everything's fine, and leave it be so they can go on with what they were doing before you butted your nose in. Something told me that Colin wasn't like that. Something told me he'd listen forever. And all I'd have to do is talk — and listen back. "Maybe," I said. "Not now, but maybe later."

"Sure," he said. And there was that great smile again. If Kai'd seen him smile like that, she'd never ever have warned me to be careful of him.

***

We stayed at the park for a couple of hours. We swam, and then we sat under the trees and talked for a long time. Nothing serious — what books we'd read, who we had for teachers next year, what we thought of the other kids at school. It turned out that he despised the mini-skirt girls as much as I did — a real relief. We rode our bikes back to my house, and I showed him the first couple episodes of Sailor Moon. Somehow, we ended up holding hands. I kept waiting for him to try and kiss me — Cara and Jill always said that hands holding was always closely followed by kissing, and that made me nervous again — but he never did. We just laughed, and held hands.

Around two, he said he had to get home. I thought he might try to kiss me then, but he just kind of squeezed my hand and asked if I wanted to do this again. My cheeks went red, and all I could do was nod.

He took off on his bike, and I sat on the front step, watching for a long time after he was gone. Then I went upstairs and collapsed on my bed like a crazy, sappy, gushy girl. I felt giggly and sad all at once. It was silly, but books always say "she felt like she was leaving behind a part of her childhood." That was definitely over-play, but I felt different. Less gawky and awkward. That made me uncomfortable. The same books said that you were supposed to find your self-esteem and self-worth within not without, and I always figured that was true — but at the same time, I felt prettier because he said I was pretty. I looked at the hand he'd held, tracing where his fingers had been. Hand-holding wasn't kissing, but I was pretty sure that this meant we were boyfriend and girlfriend. I might double-check with Cara; Jill would only laugh at me. This suddenly didn't seem like a question for either Emma or Kai.

I felt so good — it was like a little well of sunshine was piling up in my belly and just spreading out through my toes. Very cool. If I were in a musical, I'd definitely be singing.

The phone rang, and I reached over all lazy to pick it up.

"Hello?" I said into the receiver.

Click. Empty line.

Okay, wrong number. Whatever.

I stretched back out on the bed. I could almost still feel the pressure of his arm against mine, from when we'd been watching TV. It had felt really nice — warm and soft and cuddly.

The phone rang again. Curious. No one ever called here during the day. I reached over again.

"Hello?"

Click. Empty line.

I rolled my eyes. Some stupid kids had gotten hold of the telephone and were prank calling people. Next, they'd ask me if I had Prince Albert in a can or something stupid. No one even knew what that joke meant anymore.

I didn't even bother rolling back; I hovered, waiting for the phone to ring again. Sure enough. Ring. Answer. "Hello?"

Click.

Okay, this was starting to get creepy. Even scary child-molestors asked questions — like "Is your Mommy home, little girl?" or maybe "are you wearing Pokemon underpants?" At least, that's what happened on TV. Sometimes, on TV, robbers would case a joint by calling to see if anyone was home, but any robbers should have worked out that yes, someone was here. What kind of person just kept calling and hanging up?

Ring.

I stared for a second before I picked it up. Maybe I should just let it ring. But I couldn't stand it.

"Hello?"

Click.

This time, it rang again almost immediately.

"Hello?"

Click.

Ring.

"Hello?"

Click.

Ring.

I couldn't stand it anymore. "Look, whoever you are —" I yelled, trying to sound mature and in charge, not like a shaky, scared, little kid.

A male voice spoke back. "No, you look. You make me sick, you dyke. Kissing in the street like that — disgusting. Completely disgusting."

I heard other voices, talking in the background. Some male, some female. I couldn't think of anything to say.

"I don't ever want to see it again, you hear me?" the man — no, not a man, it didn't sound like a man, but not a boy my age either — said. "You do what you want in your own private space, but if I see it, I don't think I'll be able to control my disgust. You hear me? You hear me, you stupid queer?"

I couldn't say anything.

"You say yes, I hear you! You can speak, can't you?" I heard a girl laughing, this high pitched cackling that made my ears rebel.

All I could think to do was to slam the phone back down.

I stared at it for a full minute, daring it to ring again.

Call the police. I could call the police. I could call them, and tell them . . . tell them what? That some jerk called my house and said mean things to me? That he probably meant to say to my sister? Saying mean things isn't a crime; you just have to go to school for one day to know that. Besides, I didn't even know who had called. And even if I did know, and even if the cops did go to ask the person about it, all he'd have to say is that he didn't call. And they couldn't prove anything. Who'd take my word over some almost-grown-up's?

What else could I do?

Tell Mom. Tell Emma.

Why? It would just make them worry. Mom always said that if you wanted a bully to leave you alone — and whoever had just called was clearly nothing but a big bully — you had to pretend it didn't matter that they were teasing you. And what better way to pretend that it didn't matter than to not know you were being teased?

But none of that stopped the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach.

I stood up, feeling shaky and unpleasant. No more well of sunshine now. I wished Dad was here. Dad was good at this sort of stuff. Dad was really good at sorting out friends and enemies, keeping the peace . . . Emma and Mom both pretty much did what they wanted, never mind what anyone else thought about it. I worried, like Dad.

I thought of calling him, but long-distance cost a fortune in the middle of the day. If this awful cloud didn't lift, I'd email him later. Maybe.

But I couldn't email him until I'd decided what to do about the wedding. Crud. Crud, crud, crud. Because, of course, I couldn't decide what to do about the wedding until I'd at least run the idea past Mom. And Emma, probably. And I just was not ready for that conversation.

Secrets really stink. Especially when they're completely necessary.

I heard the front door bang open, and I nearly dove into the closet. Had I made the phone-caller angry? Was he here to get me?

"Wren!" I heard Emma yell. My heart started beating again. Jeez! Why did she have to come slamming in here like that?

"Wren!" she yelled again.

"Yeah!" I called back. "Upstairs." I sat up on the bed and tried to pull myself together. My cheeks were wet; had I been crying? I wiped them off, and hoped my eyes weren't red.

Emma exploded in the door and swept me up in a huge hug. "I had such a good day!" She squealed. Yes, squealed. I stared at her. This exuberant creature was not my sister. Emma never acted like this. At least, not since high school started. Crazy.

"I've never had such a good time," she gushed, flopping down across my bed, grinning to split her face. "We walked all over, and we held hands, and we kissed in front of people — my god, it's like I've been telling everyone lies for years and years and years, and today, I was telling the truth — I feel so free, so amazing —"

It suddenly seemed to occur to Emma that I was not caught up in her joy.

"Hey — are you okay? Was your date all right?"

"I'm not sure it was a date," I said, "but no, it was fine."

"Are you sure?" Emma said. "Have you been crying?"

Crud crud crudsky. "Yeah, I guess," I said, trying to be all dismissive.

"Why?"

Hm. She was not easily thrown off the track. Of course, I was completely failing to be sneaky. "I just . . . came back here, and it was so hot I fell asleep, and I . . . had a bad dream . . ." I was inventing like an idiot. Nothing for it; I'd just have to hope I didn't sound like an idiot.