Shifting. Part 15

He studied me for a long minute. "Good. I'm not supposed to date local girls. Family rule."

He stood before I had a chance to ask him why.

"I want to show you something else," he said, gathering up our lunch trash from the ground. I took a bite of my apple and followed him down the hill, past the car, and over to the base of the mountain. A breeze, cold and mysterious as an autumn night, blew the hair away from my neck.

"Did you feel that?" I gasped, holding my hands out in front of me. "There's cold air right here."

Bridger smiled and pointed to a dark, jagged gash running from the base of the mountain all the way to the road. Gnarled tree roots jutted out of the side of the gash, dangling down into the darkness. I wanted a better look, so I took a step closer, but he grabbed my wrist.

"Whoa! Don't go any closer. The ground has caved in there, falling into the ancient mine shaft. This whole area is riddled with them." He bent and picked up a small rock, then threw it into the black shaft. I strained to hear it land and looked at him when it didn't. He put his finger to his lips. Then, unexpectedly, a hollow thud echoed up out of the sunken earth.

"That is so deep," I whispered. "What would happen if I fell in?"

"Best-case scenario, if you weren't lucky enough to grab hold of one of those tree roots, you'd crash to the bottom, break your neck, and die. Worst case, you'd trigger a rockslide and we'd both fall in, be buried under a ton of earth, and search and rescue would have to come and try to save us. We'd probably still die, but slowly and painfully. So be careful." He tugged me a pace farther away from the mine shaft. "The whole mountain is covered with places where the earth is caving into the mine. If this wasn't private property, I have no doubt something would be done to seal the mine and the collapsing shafts. Come here. I'll show you another."

We walked along the dirt road, the mountain to our right and the open valley to our left. We hadn't taken a hundred steps when Bridger took my hand in his and pulled me into a clump of scraggly trees. Before I saw the gaping hole, the cool air touched my arms and face, and then I was looking down into blackness. We stopped a good five feet from the edge. I picked up a rock and threw it, counting in my head while I waited for it to land. I counted to six before the hollow thud reached my ears.

"That's more than half a mile deep." I breathed, remembering a math lesson on measuring distance with sound. Picking up an entire handful of rocks, I chucked them down the mine shaft. They scattered, eventually sounding like the thud of fat raindrops landing in mud. I smiled and looked up to see Bridger's reaction. He was staring at me, studying me with serious eyes.

"So, are you going to save me from eating alone again tonight, or am I going to be turned down? I'm not used to being rejected when I ask someone out. And it doesn't have to be a date. We'll go as friends," he said, stepping so close I could smell him. He looked right into my eyes.

"Um, well," I stammered. He took my hands in his and my heart seemed to turn into a hummingbird's frantic wings.

"I can see your answer in your eyes." He dropped one of my hands and we strolled back out to the road. "Do you want to go home first? To freshen up, or anything?"

I was still wearing the grimy clothes I'd weeded and manured the garden in. "I need to shower and put on something nicer," I answered, trying to figure out how he had gotten me to consent.

17.

Later that afternoon, I climbed into Bridger's SUV and my face started to burn. He wore dark gray dress pants, a pale blue b.u.t.ton-up s.h.i.+rt, and glossy black shoes. I had on torn jeans, a purple cotton tank top, and Jenny Sue's worn running shoes. My damp hair was loose around my shoulders, and I had put on makeup after I'd showered, yet I felt put to shame beside him. A dandelion compared to a rose.

"Do you mind if we stop by my place for a minute?" Bridger asked as we pulled away from Mrs. Carpenter's house.

"Whatever." I rolled down my window and stuck my arm out into the breeze.

We drove through town and started up the road to the abandoned mine. "You live up here?" I asked.

"Yeah. My great-grandfather owned the mine when it was still running. My parents' house is on mine property."

That is when I knew exactly which house had to be his, and I felt even more underdressed than before. I wanted to turn into a cat, slink out of my clothes, jump out the open window, and never see him again. Instead I sank down in my seat and stared out the winds.h.i.+eld.

I was right about his house. We pa.s.sed all the really big houses on the road and then came to the enormous stone-fenced mansion that I had stared at earlier. Tall, wrought-iron gates barred the entrance to the mansion's driveway. Bridger pushed something that looked like a garage door opener and the gates slid to the sides.

We drove along the tree-lined driveway in silence-I was rendered speechless by the size of the three-story stone house. It looked like something out of a British movie, some kind of English country estate complete with a rose garden, a fountain, and a pristine white gazebo. Cotton floated in the air like a million fairies dancing their way to the ground.

When Bridger stopped the car, I turned to him to tell him to take me home. I didn't fit into his world.

He glanced at me with anxious eyes. "Don't say anything," he pleaded. "Just wait here."

He jumped out of the car and ran to the front door, which I noticed had a keypad beside it instead of a lock. He pushed some b.u.t.tons, opened the door, and went inside.

I stared at his towering house and felt lost in its shadow, completely out of place. I didn't know what Bridger was thinking, wanting to take me out to dinner. Again.

I had my hand on the door handle, ready to open it and run home, when he burst out of the house wearing a pair of jeans, flip-flops, and no s.h.i.+rt. With s.h.i.+rt in hand, he sprinted to the car.

"Don't you dare leave!" he yelled.

My hand froze. He yanked the driver's-side door open and looked at me, his mouth a grim line.

"You were about to ditch me, weren't you!"

I wondered how he could possibly know that.

"Admit it," he said.

"Fine! I was about to ditch you. I don't know why you want to be friends with someone like me when you come from a house like this." I pointed out my window.

He stared at me for a long time, emotions playing across his face. "You have been through a lot of c.r.a.p, haven't you?" he finally said, climbing into the car.

"I have been through enough c.r.a.p to know I don't want some rich boy to try and save me," I replied, trying not to stare at his bare chest. His skin was golden, like he'd recently been in the sun, and his shoulders were square and strong, his torso covered with lean muscle. I jerked my eyes away before I lost my train of thought. "I don't need you, Bridger. I've already saved myself."

"Good, because the last thing I want is some stupid girl dating me because I live in a big house. I am sick of that. And besides, does it matter, since we're just friends?" He was practically yelling.

"I don't know. I haven't had much experience with friends," I yelled back.

"Well, friends accept each other for what they are, rich or poor, happy or sad, weak or strong. So do you want me to take you to dinner, or do you want me to take you home so that you can wallow all alone in your bedroom?" he said, his voice hard.

"I don't wallow," I retorted.

The anger faded from his eyes. "But you could."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means that you have been through enough c.r.a.p to have a very good excuse to feel sorry for yourself. Yet you don't." He fiddled with his s.h.i.+rt and pulled it over his head. It was a simple, worn gray T-s.h.i.+rt with some faded words across the front.

"Why'd you change clothes?"

"I was embarra.s.singly overdressed. Not to mention, I'm more comfortable in a nice worn pair of jeans." He started the engine and glanced at me as the car pulled away from the house. I couldn't help but smile. All of a sudden, I felt comfortable in my own clothes. Exactly, I imagined, how one should feel in the presence of a friend.

We drove to Deming, a town almost an hour away. When Bridger pulled up to the restaurant, an old, stately house surrounded by beautiful gardens and hedges trimmed to look like animals and shaded by tall trees, I was speechless. I had never seen anything like it. The sign above the door read TARA'S-SOUTHERN CUISINE AT ITS FINEST.

Bridger opened the restaurant door for me. I stepped past him and paused. The woman playing hostess was dressed like a man, in a fitted black suit with a bow tie, but she was beautiful and elegant and wearing enough eye makeup for three women. She took one look at me and pursed her lips.

"I'm sorry, but we only take customers who have reservations." She glanced at my worn sneakers and raised one pencil-darkened eyebrow. I felt my cheeks grow hot, was about to stammer an apology and leave when Bridger's hand pressed against the small of my back.

"We have a reservation," he said. "The name's O'Connell."

The woman studied him and smiled. She batted her fake eyelashes and jealousy surged through me.

"Right this way, Mr. O'Connell," she said, grabbing two menus and leading us into an old-fas.h.i.+oned dining room with a real fire burning in a hearth, regardless of the air-conditioning pouring out of the vents on the floor. "Will this be all right?" She motioned to a candlelit table for two by a window overlooking a hedge sculpted into the shape of a giant bunny.

"Maggie Mae?" Bridger asked.

"Sure. Looks dandy," I replied, pulling a chair out and sitting down with my back to the dining room.

Bridger sat and pa.s.sed me an open menu.

"When did you make reservations?" I asked.

"This morning."

"This morning? But you ... we ... Were you originally planning on taking someone else?"

"I was hoping to take you."

Warning bells chimed in my head. "Why?" I asked warily. There had to be some underlying motive. For a nanosecond I wondered if, maybe, he believed Danni and was hoping I was easy. It had happened with other guys.

While all of these thoughts raced through my head, he studied me. Finally he said, "Do you want the truth, or do you want the safe version that a.s.sures I won't hurt you?"

"The truth," I stated, bracing myself for some creepy, perverse answer.

He leaned across the table and stared right into my eyes.

"She was a Phantom of delight When first she gleamed upon my sight; A lovely Apparition, sent To be a moment's ornament: Her eyes as stars of Twilight fair; Like Twilight's, too, her dusky hair; But all things else about her drawn From May-time and the cheerful Dawn; A dancing Shape, an Image gay, To haunt, to startle, and way-lay.

"That's Wordsworth."

"Yeah. I know. We memorized it for English last week, moron." My voice trembled.

"Maggie, that poem might as well have been written for you. 'To haunt, to startle, and way-lay' ... You're the most captivating person I have ever met." His eyes were serious and so dark they looked like storm clouds on a moonless night.

I grabbed my menu and put it in front of my face, hoping he hadn't seen the blood burning my cheeks.

"Maggie," Bridger said gently. I lowered my menu so only my eyes showed above it. "You asked for the truth."

"Thanks," I squeaked. I put the menu between us again and began looking it over. The prices! I couldn't believe it! My stomach started to hurt-twenty-two dollars for chicken fried steak and baby potatoes? And the fried chicken and collard greens-twenty dollars? I could hardly believe my eyes. The worst was the vegetarian plate: beans, rice, corn bread, and salad, for seventeen dollars.

"What's the matter?" Bridger asked quietly.

"The prices! Twenty dollars for pork chops and string beans?" I whispered, afraid someone might overhear. "Mrs. Carpenter could make that for probably eight dollars, if not less! If you wanted southern food, I could have made you some."

Bridger's concerned face broke into a grin of amus.e.m.e.nt. "Maggie, I'm not here because I want southern food. I'm here for you. You said your foster mother used to make it and it was the best food you'd ever had. Since I'm paying, ignore the price."

"I just don't see how a twenty-dollar plate of fried chicken can taste any better here than what they serve at Kentucky Fried Chicken for five dollars!"

Bridger laughed.

"May I bring you something to drink?" a female voice interrupted.

I looked up, dismayed to see that the woman who'd seated us was also our server. "What do you want to drink, Maggie?" Bridger asked.

"Water. It's free, right?" I asked.

The server pulled her eyes away from Bridger and looked down her nose at me.

"Of course the water isn't free. We are a five-star restaurant. Our water is imported from Europe." Her eyes lingered on my faded tank top. "If you can't afford imported water, we have a wide range of soda. Or milk."

A familiar burn started beneath my skin, like when I'd get picked on at school and knew I had to fight back. I glared up at her. She lifted one drawn-on eyebrow and smirked.

"Whatever. c.o.ke. But just so you know, there's nothing wrong with drinking water from the tap," I snapped.

"Well, then why don't you go eat somewhere that is better suited to trailer trash," she mumbled under her breath. But I heard every word. My hackles rose and my skin felt too tight. The urge to pounce on her and scratch her black-lined eyes out made my entire body tremble.

Bridger stood. "You know, Maggie," he said lightly, "I think I would rather have Kentucky Fried Chicken after all." He wrapped his long fingers around my upper arm and yanked me to standing, then looped his arm around my waist and literally forced me out of the restaurant.

I struggled against him as he opened my car door-I wanted to go back into Tara's and start a fight with that stupid self-righteous waitress. But Bridger more or less tossed me into the SUV and slammed my door. My hands were shaking so badly I couldn't buckle my seat belt. When Bridger got into the SUV, he leaned over and hooked it for me.

As he backed his big four-wheel drive out of the parking s.p.a.ce, he asked in a stiff voice, "Are your previous brushes with the law for fighting?"

I took a deep breath and forced my tense muscles to relax. "No. I've only been in two fights I started myself, and one was with Danni. So thank you for getting me out of that place before I did something monumentally stupid."

"You're welcome." He glanced at me again. "So why exactly do you have a juvie record?"

I sighed and pressed on my temples. "You know, I'd rather not talk about it. Just know it had nothing to do with hurting another person, or drugs, or prost.i.tution, or anything like that."

To my relief, Bridger nodded, as if he knew how much I didn't want to talk about it. As if he knew exactly how I felt....

"Okay, Bridger," I blurted, feeling really bold all of a sudden-probably a by-product of the adrenaline zooming through my blood. "I need to ask you something."

"Ask away."

"There is this ... thing ... about you that's bothering me. Something unnatural."

He pulled the car to the side of the road, turned off the engine, and looked at me as if I'd just admitted I had a forked tongue. "What?" he asked. If I didn't know any better, I would have said he was scared.

"Are you psychic? Because you keep doing things that make me feel like you know what I'm about to do."

"What do you mean?"

"Well-" I paused, thinking where to begin. "When we went to your house tonight and you ran in to change. I had my hand on the door, ready to leave, and you ran out and yelled at me not to. And in the restaurant just now. You made me leave when I was about to snap. I might have pounded that woman's face in for no good reason if you hadn't pulled me out of there. And you changing your clothes as if you knew I felt-"