Page 42 of Stand

“Please, Dad!” Alyssa said, and her eyes filled. “I don’t want to fly! I don’t want to go back to the airport. I want to drive with Sam. She makes me feel safe.”

“Oh, honey.” Sam couldn’t resist the tears. She leaned over and hugged the girl. “I’m glad I make you feel safe, but a flight is just as safe as driving.”

“No! I don’t like the airport. Please don’t make me go back there!”

“It’s not up to—”

“Sam,” Ty cut in. Could he tell she was softening? What difference did it make to her if the kids came with her? She could drop them off with Noah and continue on to Albuquerque.

“The distance from Albuquerque to Taos is a pain,” she said.

“Can I talk to you for a minute?” he said, widening his eyes at her. In other words,talk to me or you’ll regret it.

“Sure,” she said, though she didn’t think being alone with him was a good idea.

“Don’t talk her out of it!” Alyssa said in an anguished voice.

“You have to let them make the decision,” Cat said, taking the girl in her arms as Sam and Ty—and Cairo, who’d had enough of Sam coming and going without him—left the family room and moved to Antonio’s study.

Ty closed the door. Sam swallowed.

“Listen,” he said. “It doesn’t matter now—except for me to apologize—but you have to know why we can’t go on a whole crazy car journey together.”

“Why not?” His urgency almost scared her.

“Because of those seven minutes in Heaven, and even if you’ve forgotten it, I haven’t.”

Chapter 11

Senior year. A bit of a blur if she were honest. The only time she focused was when she was applying to colleges, because she might have been angry, but she wasn’t stupid. Everything would get better in college. She would be able to put the last few shitty years behind her. She wouldn’t miss her mother as badly because there would be no reminders of her in college; she wouldn’t have Cat’s reproachful stares and meaningful conversations about not beingeasyto deal with at school. Not that Cat ever said that, of course, but she might as well have. Anyway, Sam’d be nineteen and on her own, and the thought made her squirm with longing.

Everyone always knew one kid whose parents left liquor lying around and went away for the weekend. Whether the parents were living some ideology, were just ignorant, or were alcoholics themselves and beyond caring didn’t matter. The point was that everyone who was anyone knew the place and the time and would be there.

Since it was only October, maybe the cool kids had been a little more lenient, because Sam saw right away that kids who normally would never have been invited were there. They looked awkward or defiant or afraid, but they were there, clutching beers half of them looked like they didn’t know what to do with, watching the other cliques holler and drink and take over the food. The smell of pot hung over the whole house. Sam knew the school’s primary aficionado would be set up in the master bedroom, his location of choice, rolling joints for anyone who could pay for them. She bought three.

Between that and the beer pong game and the shots she was encouraged to drink off another girl’s bare chest without using her hands, things were definitely blurry by midnight. When someone pulled her into the coat bedroom and told her she was the grand prize in a game of Seven Minutes in Heaven, she just laughed. She was safe around these guys. She knew where to disable a boy who came on too strong. And she was Sam Fielding. No one could make her do what she didn’t want to do.

One, two, maybe three guys before him. They’d found the scared ones—a cocky little shit like Dan Kowalczyk wouldn’t be nearly as much fun—and they spent their time in the closet getting a Sam Fielding-approved lesson in kissing and not much else. The bravest copped a feel and got kicked out for not asking first.

The last one was different. She knew it from the minute he got pushed into the closet and the door slammed behind him. In the half-light coming through the louvered doors, she recognized him as the gangly kid from the emo crowd. His blond hair had fallen back from his face in the struggle to get him into the closet, and as she stood up from her seated position, Sam thought she could see his eyes were a very light blue.

“Biker boy, right?”

He snorted but looked away from her.

Yeah, he was the kid on the bike. How did he not have someone to drive him? “How do you not have a ride to school?”

“I like the bike,” he said in a tight voice. “Not all of us have rich friends with cars, Fielding. You done?”

She wasn’t surprised he knew her. Everyone knew her and her crowd. That was part of their status at the school.

But what did he mean, was she done? They were in a closet for seven minutes. Did he not know how this game was played?

Not only did he not seem to know, but he wasn’t even looking at her. No clumsy crowding in the small space, no sweaty hands trying to get into a position to kiss her. He looked as if he would rather be anywhere than here.

The hell?

Sam hadneverbeen rejected before. Then again—and the merest whisper of shame crossed her shoulder blades when she thought this—she hadn’t exactly showed him she’d be interested in him.

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