Mia Luce

The Movies

I felt so utterly guilty as I drove home through the rain. I sincerely wished that my car had a dent as big as the one it had inflicted in Jack’s.

But that wasn’t the only thing I was thinking in my over-crowded head. I kept seeing the scene over and over again; Jack climbing out of his car and running towards me. It had all happened so fast… and he had been so worried about me…

Pay attention to the road, I scolded myself. You can’t afford to run into anything else.

Traffic moved at an almost caterpillar-like pace, since every car was headed the same way. It wasn’t until I reached quiet little Elm Street and Vanessa’s house was in view that I remembered my date with Chris. I glanced at the dashboard clock, and I had two hours to get ready.

Once I was parked I leapt out of my seat with my bag over my head to keep it dry (even though my hair was already soaked) and went to inspect the damage to the front of my car. There was nothing noticeable but a teensy little scratch in the black paint. I made an “Ugch” sound and proceeded to the door.

Vanessa was already there when I walked in the door. I dropped my sopping bag at the foot of the stairs and went into the kitchen to find her, my clothes dripping on the tile. She was stationed at the counter, trying to shove fruit and ice into an unwilling blender.

“Oh, hey, honey!” she trilled with her back to me, pressing a button. The blender whirred loudly, and she had to shout over it. “What happened to you?”

“Rain happened to me!” I grumped.

She laughed. “How was school?”

“Good,” I said blandly. I watched the chunky fruit gradually turn into liquid fruit before adding, “Uh, Vanessa?”

“Yeah?” she shouted over the protesting blender.

“I’m going to the movies tonight.”

She shut the blender off, finally. “What was that?”

“Chris Wallace asked me to go to the movies with him tonight. I mean, if that’s all right with you.”

Her face lit up and she rolled up onto her tiptoes. “Of course it’s all right with me! Is it just you and him? What movie are you going to see? Cecilia Brown told me about this one she saw, it’s supposed to be really good-”

“Whoa, slow down, Vanessa. Gage Nelson and Tiffany Gray are coming too, and I’m not sure what we’re seeing. They’re picking me up at six, then we’ll go to the movies, eat, and be back at ten,” I explained slowly.

“Oh good!” Vanessa chimed, like it was she who was going on a date. “You’ll have fun. I don’t know why your father was worried you wouldn’t make friends here.”

Probably because I didn’t have friends before, I thought, but I didn’t say anything.

She went back to her noisy smoothie-making and I hit the shower. It was soothing with the hot water running all over the place and the vapors rising to the ceiling. I stayed in the bathroom longer than I should have. When I was dried off at last, I ventured to my closet. There, I spent an hour, the longest it had ever taken me to get dressed, looking over all possible outfits until I ended up with dark-wash jeans, black flats, my pretty blue halter top that still had the tags on it, and a black shirt underneath. I ran a brush through my wild hair and pulled it into a ponytail. Finally I stuck some blue studs in my ears and went downstairs, trying my hardest not to hurt myself at the last minute.

Vanessa exploded.

“Oh, darling!” she cried, pulling me into a tight mom-hug. “You look so beautiful!”

I rolled my eyes, but I couldn’t stop from grinning. “Thanks.”

“When is he picking you up again?”

“Six o’clock,” I reminded her.

I looked at the clock over the sofa in the living room. It was five fifty; we had a few minutes.

Vanessa turned on her favorite sitcom and sat with me in the living room. I twiddled my fingers subconsciously and kept staring out the window. Once in a while Vanessa would look at me and grin.

When the clock struck five fifty-eight, I ran back upstairs and checked my reflection in the mirror. The doorbell rang.

I ran down again and almost crashed into the coffee table in my haste to get to the door before Vanessa, then realized she hadn’t even moved from the couch. She giggled. Oh well, at least I didn’t die.

I pried the door open and there was Chris, looking very handsome in jeans and a brown henley. His dark eyes raked over me, then the living room, then Vanessa bouncing on the sofa, and he smiled.

“Hi,” I muttered shyly, glancing at Vanessa, who was acting like a complete spaz by now.

“I won’t hold you to up,” she chimed. “Have a nice night!”

I understood that was a dismissal. “Bye,” Chris and I both mumbled. We stepped out onto the front porch and shut the door. It was almost dark, and the porch lamp cast a pool of yellow light over us. A very scratched-up blue minivan was grumbling in the driveway; two dark shapes were in the front seats.

"You're mom's nice," Chris said randomly. Then he chuckled. "Tiffany's dad interrogated Gage for ten minutes."

He motioned towards the car. Although the rain had finally stopped falling, it was very cold out. I shrugged into my jacket as I climbed into the warm, comfortable back seat. Tiffany turned around to greet us from the passenger’s seat. Her hair was curled and she wore a crinkly green camisole under a white shrug. I saw, with a jolt of anxiety, that she and Gage were holding hands. Chris noticed too. His hand twitched slightly as we were pulling out of the driveway, and a few tense minutes later, he took mine gently in his palm.

I was strangely relaxed on the short drive to Westwood, Oakridge’s larger and nicer neighboring town, and also the location of the movie theater. Chris’s eyes were glued on my face; I wondered if there was some kind of insect on my forehead. I started seeing things about him that I hadn’t before, like how long his eyelashes were and how unusual his combination of light blond hair and blackish eyes was.

We parked  in the front row of the Westwood Cinema. It didn’t seem to be too crowded for a Friday night; we had a good chance of getting decent seats. Everyone piled out of the car and approached the ticket booth.

“So what are we seeing, exactly?” I asked, browsing the various movie posters in blinking frames on one side of the brick building.

“That one,” Tiffany answered, pointing to one on my right. It was blindingly pink. At the top, in bold, letters, it said “Shiprecked Summer”. There was an amazingly pretty blonde girl standing next to a blond guy on a beach. This was precisely the kind of movie I was sure to hate. “I’ve been dying to see it for weeks,” Tiffany cried.

“Oh, that looks…really good,” I lied.

We each bought our tickets while Gage took care of the popcorn. Theater Eleven was, as predicted, almost nearly empty. The previews had just started. We all sat in the middle of the theater, and when the lights dimmed, Chris took my hand again.

The pretty blonde girl from the poster was leaning over the rail of what looked like a cruise ship. The endless blue ocean churned beneath her and the wind whipped her dainty little party dress. Her face was streaked with tears. I wondered how anyone could possibly be sad on a cruise ship.

The film obviously held no interest whatsoever for me. The female lead, Amber, ended up stranded on some island with Nate, who was also on the poster. They ended up in love, and all that crap. My eyelids started drooping thirty minutes into the movie, and the next thing I knew I was being prodded awake.

I sat up rapidly, realizing I had slouched down in my chair. There were bright lights in my face. Huh?

Chris was leaning over me. “Uh, Campbell, the movie’s over.”

My mouth fell open. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry! I have this habit of falling asleep in dark places…”

“It’s okay, Campbell,” Chris sad, laughing. “At least you didn’t snore.”

I sighed in relief. “Oh, good.” I stood up, and after gathering my jacket followed him to the lobby. Gage and Tiffany were waiting by the doors.

Our group piled back into the minivan, each of us in turn declaring how hungry we were.

“Where do you guys want to eat?” Gage asked, piloting the car through a line of restaurants. It was now completely dark outside, especially with the heavy trees that blocked out the moon.

“I don’t care,” Chris replied, placing his arm around my shoulder. I shifted around uncomfortably. “How about Ruby Tuesday’s?”

Gage swiveled into the parking lot, and we all went into the building.

“How many?” the hostess stationed at a podium asked us as we walked through the glass doors.

“Four,” Tiffany said, picking a toothpick out of its holder.

Our waitress, who looked barely sixteen, led us to a booth and took our drink orders. The whole time she was fluffing her bleached hair and gazing at Chris. I felt a stab of annoyance and gave her a suspicious look; she stopped immediately.

After looking around a bit, I deduced that we had chosen a fairly nice restaurant. There were low lamps hanging off the walls, dark hardwood floors and tables, sports posters and paraphernalia everywhere, Jack Lewis in the corner…

I did a melodramatic double take. Whoa! What was he doing here? I knew it was him, there was no mistaking that pallid skin and head of jet black hair. My stomach did a backflip and a few cartwheels, then dismounted and stuck the landing. So there he was, in a booth near the back, alone. He was giving the untouched hamburger in front of him a dirty look, as if it had called him an insulting name. His white fingers tapped the table in boredom. I wondered if he had seen me come in. Well, I was in plain sight. I turned my head swiftly back around just in case.

“Are you ready to order?”

I started. The waitress was standing over me.

“Oh… uh… I’ll have the… chicken salad,” I stammered. There had to be a chicken salad somewhere on the menu, right? Apparently everyone else had already placed their orders, because the waitress sauntered off. The others continued their discussion on “Shipwrecked Summer" while I sat in silence, very paranoid, imagining that Jack was staring at me. There was a prickly feeling on the back of my neck. I kept telling myself repeatedly that I wasn’t allowed to think about him. So what if he had coincidentally chosen the same restaurant as us? This was a small town. Well, a slightly bigger town next to a small town. And what reason could someone like him have for staring at someone like me?

“Campbell, did you like it?” Gage asked, looking expectantly at me.

“Like what?”

“The movie.”

“Oh. It was… pretty good.” I blushed. “I mean, the part I saw before I fell asleep…” Chris chuckled and I blushed harder. “What about you?”

“I thought it was pretty stupid,” Gage remarked. We laughed, and Tiffany lightly slapped his arm. Finally, someone who thinks like me, I thought.

“What part was your favorite, Campbell?” Tiffany asked.

“Uh, the beginning.”

They cracked up again, and started a new conversation. I yawned, turned my head, and hastily stifled a gasp. Jack Lewis strode right past us, looking both angry and bored at the same time. He turned and without a word or gesture of acknowledgment toward us, loped gracefully out the door. My friends noticed him this time. Tiffany froze, stunned, her glass of Pepsi poised a few inches away from her lips.

“Hey… that was Jack Lewis!” Chris said incredulously.

“What was he doing here alone?” Tiffany wondered aloud.

“He was at the movies, too!” Gage cried, his eyes alight.

“He was?” I raised my eyebrows in disbelief.

“Yeah, he was in the very back row! Do you think he’s… following us?”

“Why would he do that?” I asked.

“Maybe he was hoping to pick up tips on girls,” Tiffany suggested.

This was so ridiculous I was tempted to laugh. Chris did laugh, but not for the same reason.

“I wouldn’t doubt that,” he said, putting his arm around me again. It didn't feel as comfortable as before. “I mean, he’s never asked anyone out, has he?”

“I don’t know why,” Tiffany said, smirking. “Almost all the girls in Oakridge are chasing after him, and he barely notices.”

Gage scoffed, “He seems a bit full of himself.”

You don’t even know him! I thought. But then again, neither do I, really.

I decided not to lash out. “He seems nice to me,” I said, wondering why I sounded so protective of him. “Even when I rear-ended his car-”

“You rear-ended his car?!” Tiffany gasped.

Oh great. “It was… an accident,” I mumbled.

“That’s so awesome,” said Gage.

“What did he do?” Tiffany continued.

“He just… asked me if I was okay, and said I didn’t have to pay for repairs or anything.”

“Jeez, Campbell,” Chris remarked. “For two years he never talked to anyone, then suddenly he starts opening up to you, and you demolish his car.”

“I didn’t demolish it!” I cried indignantly. “I just made a dent.”

Thankfully, I was spared the embarrassment of saying anything more by the arrival of our food. Everyone but me forgot about Jack in their haste to eat. My salad was good, but it didn’t settle very well in my stomach.

After everyone claimed they were full, the waitress came back with the check. She smiled at Chris, but he didn’t even notice.

“I got it covered,” Gage said, pulling a few bills out of his wallet. He gave them to the waitress, along with the receipt, and she went to ring it up. She came back a few minutes later.

“Here you go! Have a nice evening!” She gushed as we pushed past the double glass doors.

Chris and I sidled into the back seat. He looked very comfortable holding my hand and didn’t notice that I was stiff and didn’t speak. Tiffany blabbered away about that “stupid, girly” waitress that had flirted with Gage and Chris. I really didn’t care anymore, but she sounded extremely jealous. I continued to stare out the windows. There was nothing but dark trees and grass.

It wasn’t fair that Jack was so impossibly gorgeous. It wasn’t fair that he made my head swim when I saw his face. What was wrong with me? I couldn’t stop thinking about him! His face was always at the forefront of my mind. No matter how hard I tried to deny it, I knew that I would rather have him sitting next to me holding my hand than Chris. Was that so horribly wrong?

We pulled up to Tiffany’s house. It was large, white, and dainty looking, with a pretty porch; exactly the kind of place I imagined her living in. Gage got out and walked her up to the door, where they said a lengthy, nonverbal goodbye.

Gage was noticeably happier when he came back to the car. The drive to my house was unbearably awkward. I hoped Chris didn’t think he had to kiss me because Gage kissed Tiffany. Oh no. I gulped. My mouth was dry. This was the first date! Surely he wouldn't...

I hopped lightly out of the car once we were parked in Vanessa’s dark driveway, trying to seem cheerful. Maybe it worked, maybe it didn’t. I couldn’t see Chris’s face.

He followed me to the still-lit porch. My every step was heavy.

“That was really fun,” I lied, fake-smiling. I could hear the TV in the living room, and I wanted badly to get in there.

“Yeah, I’m glad you could come,” Chris mumbled. He stepped closer to me. Oh, no you don’t.

Swiftly, I kissed him on the cheek. He looked into my face. I expected disappointment, but he seemed nothing short of thrilled. We said goodbye and I opened the front door as Gage’s minivan drove away.

Vanessa was lounging in the recliner, rolled up like a burrito in a pink blanket, only her head sticking out. She grinned the moment I entered the room.

“So?”

“It was fun,” I lied for the millionth time. “but I’m really tired, I’m going up to bed.”

“Okay, hon. Goodnight.” Vanessa wiggling one arm out of her blanket burrito and blew me a kiss.

How old was I, five? “’Night,” I grumbled. I trudged heavily up the stairs, a wave of sleepiness washing over me. I just had time to change into some cotton shorts and a tank top before I collapsed on the bed. The light was still on, but I was almost instantly asleep.