Page 30 of Save the Last Dance
She wouldn’t seriously try to stop her from seeing Ethan?
“Neither are you,” Ally shot back, her emotions a wild tangle while she searched for a mascara wand in the clutter of discarded hair ties and lip glosses around the sink. “You’re wasting away to skin and bones while everyonepretends not to notice. But you don’t let that stop you from going to work or talking to people.” Seizing the mascara from behind the faucet, she whipped out the brush and coated her lashes. “Why should I be any different?”
She’d never back-talked to her mother as much as she had in the past ten minutes. Ally didn’t know if it was blood loss messing with her judgment or if maybe the sedative they’d given her two hours ago was making her run off at the mouth. She should try to rein it in, though, because if her mother grounded her and wouldn’t let her see Ethan…
“I’m sorry, Mom,” she blurted, giving up on the makeup, since she already had a Bride of Frankenstein thing going on. Brushing past her mother on the way out, she stopped to lean her head on her mom’s bony shoulder. “Those meds must be making me loopy.”
The doorbell chimed before her mother could say anything. Ally yanked a red long-sleeved flannel off a hook by her bedroom door and slipped it on to cover the bandages. She felt light-headed by the time she hit the top of the stairs, so she went down slower. One ER trip per day was more than enough.
Her father reached the front door before she could.
“It’s for me.”
Her dad frowned.
“Are you sure?” He looked up the stairs, from daughter to mother, his face taking on that tense mask it always did when he looked at her mother lately.
Ally couldn’t deal with an argument about this, which did not involve themat all.
“It’s fine,” she insisted for what seemed like the millionth time. “We’re just going to talk, okay? I’ll be right outside.”
Flinging open the door, she came face-to-face withEthan through the screen. Or, face to chest. She tilted her chin up to meet his gaze in the dim glow of the porch light.
“Hey, Ally.” He made a half wave at her parents, who still stood behind her.
How awkward that her whole family had come to the door.
“Hey, yourself.” Her voice trembled a little and she hoped it was from exhaustion and not because she was still wildly crushing on him. Especially not if he was dating Rachel.
Swallowing down the dread, she pushed open the screen and met him outside, grateful she at least still wore her socks even though she had no shoes. The night air was cool, but the days were still mild enough that her mother left all the patio furniture out, from bamboo rugs in bright colors to hurricane lamps on the tables between Adirondack chairs.
“What’s up?” she asked as soon as her father—thank you, God—closed the door behind them.
Leaning against a porch rail, she used her thumbs to grab the buttons on each cuff of her shirt and anchored her sleeves over the bandages with a tight grip. If he hadn’t heard what happened, she sure wasn’t going to give it away.
“You tell me.” He joined her at the rail, except he looked out over the lawn toward her grandmother’s old farm while she kept her back to the rest of the world and a wary eye on her own house. She didn’t need her mom spying through the blinds.
“What do you mean?” She bit her lip, bracing herself in case he knew she’d been dragged out the back door of The Strand Salon in a flood of tears and scratches.
“I thought we were going to meet up this weekend.” He turned to rest a hip on the white wooden railing while he shook his head. “Don’t you remember? You said we’d makeplans for—you know.” He glanced up at her house and lowered his voice. “The great escape.”
A smile played around his lips and Ally wondered if he really hadn’t heard about her meltdown. And what about Rachel?
“Unless…” He folded one arm over the other and crossed his ankles as he leaned back next to her. “You weren’t serious about that after all.”
“No.” Her head was close enough to his shoulder she could have tilted it an inch or two to the right and she’d be resting her temple against the gray cotton of his thin sweatshirt. “I was totally serious. I thought maybe I’d see you last night?—”
Once she started that sentence she had exactly nowhere to go with it. She didn’t want to admit she’d been staring at him and Rachel for the better part of an hour, watching them laugh together while her heart broke.
“You must have left before I could talk to you. Didn’t you see everyone from school over by Davy’s truck?”
Should she ask about Rachel and risk looking jealous when he wasn’t even her boyfriend? Or just fake like nothing unusual had happened?
“I must have been distracted.” She kept her hands tucked behind her.
“How’s tonight?” Ethan jerked a thumb toward the truck in the driveway. “I’ve got some wheels. You want to…take a drive?”
Her heart raced. “Really?”
