Lifted Read online

  “Thanks.” Tilting the steaming cup to my lips, I took a tentative sip. “I just wanted to get some new stuff, that’s all. I don’t know . . . jeans . . . and maybe a pair of shoes?” Not that I needed shoes; alternating between my combat boots and Converse suited me just fine. I just said that so maybe she’d give me more money for the one thing I really did want: the True Religion jeans.

  She grabbed her purse off the back of a chair and unsnapped her wallet. “I don’t see a problem with that.”

  As I glanced at the two twenties and one ten dollar bill in my palm, my joy melted into a puddle of disappointment. It was a nice chunk of cash, but not nearly enough for the crazy-expensive jeans on my wish list. “Thanks.”

  “Your new friends seem really nice,” she said.

  “Let me get this straight. You know, so when I’m lying in bed tonight wondering if this really happened, there won’t be any question in my mind.”

  “Okay, go on,” Mom prompted.

  I took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “Are you saying you’re proud of my essay and you like my fancy new friends?”

  She pursed her lips pensively. “Yes, I guess I am.”

  “Hmm.” I eyeballed Mom’s cup of tea. “What’s in this stuff, anyway?” Though I joked, it amazed me how much it meant to me that she was impressed, that I had her approval. At least for right then.

  “Ha ha.” She placed her cup on the counter and then picked up the bright pink flyer I had left there. “What’s this? The GOV Club?” Her whole face lit up as she read it. “Hmm. This looks interesting. Have you joined?”

  “I don’t know. I guess Whitney started it up for some sort of scholarship she’s applying for. Mary Jane and all of them are in it, but I don’t—”

  “I think you should, Poppy. It will give your college applications a boost. You know, good grades aren’t enough these days.” She handed me the flyer. “Oh! I just remembered. I have something for you. I’ll be right back.”

  I glanced at the pink paper and did a double take. GOV wasn’t a shortened version of “government” like I’d presumed. It was an acronym for “Gift of Virginity.”

  At the heart of the GOV Club is a pledge to save the most precious gift you have for your future wife or husband. It promotes a pure, healthy, Christ-centered lifestyle. Choosing to remain a virgin until marriage isn’t easy, so the GOV Club offers support, education, and inspiration to anyone who wishes to make this very important promise to God.

  No freakin’ way. I put down the flyer and smirked to myself. “You want me to join an abstinence-till-marriage club, Mom?”

  “Sure! Why not?” she called from her office.

  Well, okay, so most parents would prefer their teenage kids be virgins and not sluts—especially a parent who’d had a baby when she was a teenager and wanted her daughter not to have to struggle in the same way. No shocker there. I clicked the remote, turning off the TV.

  I walked into my bathroom, turned on some music, and grabbed the metal crate I kept my polish remover, clippers, file, and polish in. Next I sat on the counter and began the process of making my fingernails look decent, the whole notion of the GOV Club weighing heavily on my mind.

  First of all, if starting a school club was a requirement for a certain scholarship Whitney wanted, why had she chosen a virginity club of all things? Maybe it was ’cause Calvary was a religious school and even if students weren’t technically virgins, they’d join so their parents, teachers, and peers would be under the illusion that they were. Would those same people treat them differently if they chose not to join? Would a nonmember be considered sexually active, whether or not it was true? Maybe this whole thing was just another way to build up the facade of pious perfection so many people hid behind. Or, on the other hand, it would give those who wanted to wear the proverbial white dress at their weddings a support system whenever they experienced a bout of horniness.

  And what’s more, what would it mean if I joined? Would it mean I was a fluffy white sheep in the Calvary High flock? Would it make me a good friend and supporter of Whitney Nickels and her plight to get a scholarship? Or perhaps just someone who wanted to pad her future college applications with extracurricular activities?

  And would it all be worth it if it kept Mom in this joyful mood of hers?

  “Oh, there you are.” She poked her happy face into my bathroom and turned down my music.

  I waved the fingernail file in the air. “Yep, here I am.”

  “Sorry. I tossed these in my office and they fell behind some boxes.” She hoisted a paper bag onto the side of the tub and unloaded a variety of books, stacking them onto my bathroom counter. “Anyway, I thought you might like these.” She reached into my crate, and while she shook up one of my nail polishes, I glanced at the titles: Everything You Need to Know Before Applying to College, This is It: The Countdown to College, The Student’s Survival Guide for Getting Into College, The Road to U.S. Colleges and Universities, as well as several that promised higher scores on ACT, SAT, and AP tests.

  Great. “Wow, Mom. Thanks,” I said, unimpressed and unsurprised.

  “You’re welcome, honey.” She set the polish she’d been shaking—a shimmery lilac I got when I was, like, twelve—next to me. “Such a pretty color.”

  After she left, I swapped it for my raisin polish, turned up my stereo, and painted my nails.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  When the doorbell rang later that day, I stuffed the last armful of clothes into the dryer. Then I sprinted into my room to give my reflection a once-over. “It’s for me,” I called to Mom. “I’ll be right there.”

  I still needed something . . . an accessory, perhaps. I sifted through my jewelry box and came up dry. Then I thought of the earrings from Claire’s. I took them out of my backpack and put them on. They looked perfect. I paused a moment to see if guilt would set in—if I felt guilty all night, it wouldn’t be worth it, regardless of how good they looked—but for some reason it never did. Then I blew out my candle, flung a piece of Trident into my mouth, and turned off the light.

  “Don’t be late,” Mom said, glancing up from her computer. “And make sure you take your cell phone so I can get ahold of you. Or in case you need me to pick you up.”

  I waggled my cell to show it was on me and headed out the front door, where Mary Jane waited on the squeaky porch swing. Where couches bedecked front porches in Boulder neighborhoods, I quickly learned that no porch in Pleasant Acres was complete without its swing.

  Mary Jane stood and poked her pretty blond head into the house to say, “Have a nice evening, Emily.” Man, no wonder Mom liked these girls and their freakin’ manners.

  Draping my sweater—a loosely knit, light gray one that used to be Mom’s—over my arm, we walked out to her car. The air smelled of laundry detergent and damp soil.

  “As Andrew would say, you look ‘slick as snot’ tonight,” Mary Jane said.

  Whitney sat shotgun, filing her square-tipped nails. “You sure do,” she said. “That top is way cool. Love the detail work. Where’d you get it?”

  “I made it.”

  “You made it?”

  “Well, I bought the tank, and then I just added some embellishments.” I’d snipped the straps, replaced them with frayed ribbons that knotted at the top of the shoulders, and stitched metal-studded viscose and coins on the front, leaving a two-inch band at the bottom. The whole process took me about a week, and like Whitney said, it turned out pretty damn cool.

  “Wow,” said Mary Jane. “You’re good. I don’t have a creative bone in my body.”

  “Oh, wait. I forgot your scarf, Whitney,” I said. I’d draped it over the back of my chair so I’d remember it, but that tactic obviously failed.

  I turned to go back inside and get it, but Whitney said, “Don’t worry about it, Poppy. Just keep it. I’ve got entirely too many.” Mary Jane gave me a “Told you so” nod.

  “Thanks,” I said, still shocked that anyone would own so many scarves, let alone g
ive one away like a Tic Tac or something.

  Blue sky peered through the wispy, heather gray clouds. Soggy patches stippled the lawn and puddles collected in every crack and dimple in the driveway. Birds and bugs were back in full force. As I ducked into the backseat I felt a sharp prick and squished a mosquito that just slurped his last supper from the back of my knee.

  “And we’re off,” Mary Jane announced, reversing down the driveway.

  “When’s it going to start cooling off around here, anyhow?” Whitney rolled up her window and turned up the AC. Next she blotted her face with a piece of lightly powdered tissue paper she kept in a dainty silver box in her purse. “It feels like July.”

  “It’s not so bad,” said Mary Jane. “You’re just anxious to wear your new denim jacket.”

  “Wanna see it?” Whitney bent over and, after some rustling, produced a midnight blue jacket—the one she was holding back at Hamilton’s—with its tags still attached.

  “It’s awesome,” I said, even though it looked like an ordinary jean jacket to me.

  “I know. I just had to have it.” She admired her new jacket a little longer and then put it down.

  A rainbow of wild flowers whizzed past the window as a kitschy song rained through the speakers. The farther we cruised, the sparser, older, and smaller the houses became. Eventually we passed oil derricks and herds of longhorns in the wooded pastures. There were so many big, leafy oak and maple trees, the ponds appeared dark green instead of blue. We traveled up and down rolling hills, bumped over train tracks, and sloshed through pothole puddles.

  By the time we got to Pastor Hillcrest’s fifties-style ranch house, I’d chewed all the cinnamoniness out of my gum. I spit it out in the grass as the three of us headed to the backyard. “Don’t worry, Poppy,” said Mary Jane. “It’ll probably get boring, but we’ll stay just long enough to make an appearance.”

  A bonfire sputtered on one side of the sizable backyard, opposite a weathered barn. Teenagers and a handful of adults joked around and gorged on hot dogs, corn chips, and neon-yellow potato salad. Some had already staked out lawn chairs or grassy patches.

  “Howdy, Pastor,” Whitney called. “This is our friend Poppy Browne. You’re gonna love her.”

  The tall, slightly balding man saluted from the deck. He looked less like the man who preached the morning services every day at Calvary High and every Sunday at church, and more like just an everyday dude in his khaki shorts, “World’s Greatest Dad” apron, and white tube socks. He said, “That goes without saying, if she’s running round with y’all,” as he loaded the grill with wieners.

  Oh, no. Bridgette. She stood behind a table, filling a Dixie cup with lemonade. I caught her looking at me, but I pretended not to notice. In my peripheral vision, I saw her heading straight for us. She probably had some choice words for me—words I admittedly deserved for blowing her off at lunch.

  I leaned out to see past Mary Jane. Bridgette hovered a mere ten feet away. This time, I couldn’t pretend not to see her. She walked right up to me—too close—and said brightly, “Hi, Poppy. Can I talk to you for a sec?”

  The others looked on with apparent curiosity. “Um, okay,” I said, and we walked over to the picnic table. “What’s up?”

  “You’re not wearing the bracelet I gave you,” she said, biting into a dill pickle.

  “Yeah, well, it kind of clashed with what I’m wearing.” Even if it weren’t a lie, it sounded lame. “Listen, Bridgette, about lunch . . .” Ugh. How to say I’d rather eat ninety-nine-cent tacos with Mary Jane and the gang than my home-packed lunch with Bridgette and the Good News Choir? There was just no nice way to word it. I took a peanut from a blobby clay bowl that I guessed some child had made at school. “I want to apologize for not eating lunch with you today. I backed out on my word and that’s not cool. And . . . okay, I lost the bracelet you gave me. But in all honesty, I don’t think I’d wear it anyway. I’m not really one to wear something . . . like that. No offense.”

  I took a quick look around the yard, but I didn’t see Gabe or any of his buddies. Maybe they hadn’t gotten there yet. Next I glanced over at Mary Jane, Whitney, and Ellen. Several other girls had joined them in my brief absence.

  “Go on,” Bridgette said, gesturing to the girls. On the one hand, I wanted to get away from Bridgette. She was such a killjoy. But I didn’t want her to be mad at me, either.

  “I’ve been hanging with them ’cause I have fun with them. Not because I’m trying to hurt you or piss you off or anything like that.”

  She faced me, her eyes soft and pleading. When she opened her mouth to speak, I spotted a green globule wedged in her braces. “I’m just trying to help you, Poppy.”

  “Yeah, you said that. But what do you have against them? What terrible, unforgivable thing have they done?” I paused, giving her ample time to fill me in. But she just pressed her lips together. “Well then. I’m not in the habit of disliking a person just ’cause somebody says I should. So, thanks for your concern, but I’m fine. Really.” As I left, Bridgette grabbed a paper plate off the table and scooped her spoon into the potato salad.

  When I got back to the group, Mary Jane stopped talking about her sister’s sorority adventures and planted her hands on her hips. “What was that about?”

  Whitney shook her head. “Don’t tell me she’s ticked you went to Taco Casa with us.”

  “Something like that,” I said, hoping to sound flippant. “But it’s cool now.”

  “Don’t let it bother you,” said Ellen, brushing a piece of grass off her skinny white jeans. “Everybody knows Bridgette is supersensitive.”

  “And super weird.” Whitney rolled her eyes.

  Mary Jane said, “Bless her heart.” Her dazzling smile instantly made me feel better. “Y’all ready to join the festivities or what?” She escorted Whitney, Ellen, and me to the bonfire, Wizard of Oz–style.

  My stomach somersaulted when I spotted Gabe over in the shade of a pecan tree. He slid his hands into the front pockets of his jeans while he talked to his buddies, his vintage Texaco T-shirt haphazardly tucked in. He and a few of the other guys started heading to the fire, and I lingered, acting casual as I waited for him to catch up with me.

  “Hey, Poppy. Glad you could come,” Gabe said. “Can I, um, get you something to drink?”

  “I’d love a drink,” said a sweet-sounding voice that was definitely not mine. Guess I was too distracted by Gabe to notice Bridgette’s sudden appearance to our group.

  Gabe jumped a little. “Oh, uh, sure. This round is on me. What’ll you have?” The question floated freely between Bridgette and me.

  Bridgette’s gaze drifted to me and she lifted her chin up a notch. As her lips parted to reveal a glimpse of the pickle in her metal-banded teeth, I said, “Make mine a lemonade, please. On the rocks.”

  “Ha! Good choice, Poppy. And what about you, Bridgette?” Gabe looked at me even as he addressed her, and I wondered if she sensed any awkward third-wheel vibes?

  “I’ll have the same, I guess,” she said.

  Gabe took off. Though I would’ve rather checked out his ass as he sauntered away, I decided to give Bridgette a hand. I waited until it appeared no one was paying any attention to Bridgette and me and then pantomimed that she had something stuck in her teeth. I jabbed, pointed, and twisted, but she just stared at me like I’d fallen off my rocker. And quite unfortunately, my antics attracted an audience.

  “Please tell me that wasn’t some kind of Colorado mating ritual,” David Hillcrest said, grinning. He was totally different from Gabe, who was almost pretty—David had a more rugged look, complete with a small scar on his left cheek and a hint of whiskers on his chin. He looked like he spent his free time under the hoods of old, beat-up cars. Each time I ran into him, whether in our physics class or just around school, I had to keep reminding myself that he was the son of a Texas preacher.

  “You know David Hillcrest, don’t you, Poppy?” Whitney said through tight lips.


  Though Mary Jane hadn’t mentioned David being there, I knew in the back of my mind that I’d see him that evening. It was, after all, his house. He wore a T-shirt with THE DEVIL SUCKS emblazoned across it, which I thought was kinda funny.

  “We go way back. Right, Poppy? She even has a pet name for me,” David said. “Have you mentioned it to your friends yet?”

  I mumbled, “I might have; I can’t remember,” and plopped down next to Whitney on an enormous, flat-topped log. I hoped I didn’t get splinters in my butt.

  David’s smile broadened. “‘My dear shithead.’ Has a nice ring to it, don’t ya think?” he said, sitting beside me. There was plenty of room on the log, but oh no, he had to sit next to me. He scooted so close, our legs touched. “Man, you smell good,” he added in a gruff whisper.

  I inched away from him. “Listen, I’m really sorry—”

  “Don’t be,” David said. “I like when a chick speaks her mind.”

  “Only when her mind is in the gutter, like yours,” retorted Whitney with a bout of fake coughs that made her cross necklace bounce against her chest.

  David failed to keep a straight face, and the jumble of expressions somehow resulted in an understated sexiness. “Well, I can’t argue with that. But I was going to say that I might’ve rightly deserved what she said.” A few beats later, he whispered, “That’s a cool top you’re wearing. Let me know if you get chilly. I can grab you a sweatshirt.”

  “Er, thanks . . .” I think?

  Gabe returned and doled out the lemonades to Bridgette and me. “Now, can somebody tell me what’s wrong with this picture?” Gabe asked.

  “Yeah, you didn’t get one for me,” David said, but Gabe ignored him.

  “I’m not sitting next to the new girl. Make way, y’all.” He wedged his body between David’s and mine. To my surprise, David willingly surrendered his spot. I felt disappointed. Had he put up even a slight fight, it would’ve made for some good quality entertainment, I figured.