Free The Lake of Dreams by Kim Edwards Page B

the voices coming closer. It wasn’t until they started gathering on the shore that we saw them, milling on the broken shale, their faces briefly visible in the flare of lighters as they pulled out cigarettes and joints, their laughter cutting through the night air, through the rush of water. There were a dozen or so people from the in crowd that hung together at lunch and downtown after school. They were mostly wealthy, dressed in boat shoes and designer jeans and polo shirts, driving brand-new cars. Keegan and I stood, as quiet as deer, until the beam from a flashlight caught me in the face.
    “Oh, it’s just Lucy. Lucy Jarrett and Keegan Fall.”
    We had no choice then but to make our way to them.
    “Hey, cousin,” Joey said, emerging from the group as he cracked open a beer. Someone had lit a flare and his face was strangely shadowed in its flickering light. Since the rift between our fathers we’d passed each other in the school halls as if we didn’t even know each other, and I didn’t trust his sudden friendliness. “How about that? Why’d you cut your hair so short, cuz?”
    “Because I wanted to,” I said.
    He laughed; it wasn’t his first beer. “I hear you’re heading west.”
    “That’s right.”
    “I hear you got a big scholarship, too.”
    “I did,” I said; the letter had come just the day before, and the thought of it still made me flush with pleasure.
    “That’s good. Glad it worked out.” And then, before I could say thanks—I was actually about to thank him—he added, “I mean, since you needed it so bad.”
    “Come on, Lucy,” Keegan said softly. His strategy for dealing with fights—his mother was a very vocal member of the Seneca Nation, so he’d had his share of taunts over the years—was always to slip away and disappear, but I stayed where I was, the stream breaking around my ankles.
    “What do you mean, Joey? I earned this scholarship.”
    “Sure,” Joey said. He was a shadow on the moonlit shore. “You do what you have to do in life, right? If you have to work, you do.” He shrugged and lifted his beer. “I’m glad you’ll get to go to college after all, Lucy. Cheers to you.” And he drank.
    Keegan caught my arm. “Let’s go,” he whispered. I let him pull me away, but we didn’t leave the gorge. I couldn’t let it go. I knew even then that I was caught up in something beyond this moment of foolish insult, some dark dynamic I’d inherited as surely as I’d gotten the Jarrett eyes, the gift of listening to locks. Keegan and I crouched a few feet away in the dense green summer foliage; I waited until Joey and his friends shed their clothes and waded out to the falls so they could dart beneath the pounding water or linger in the pools it had formed in the rock over time. When I was sure they wouldn’t see us, I scrambled to the shore, grabbed Joey’s clothes and keys, and ran. “Is this a good idea?” Keegan asked, but I didn’t hesitate. I flung his clothes to the highest branches. His red shirt was a distant flag, his trendy jeans flopped over an unreachable branch, his keys sailed far into the darkness, rustling dense brush as they landed. At that moment I didn’t care if Joey walked home naked. He could search for his clothes all night; he could climb to the top of the falls and crash to the bottom for all I cared.
    My cousin still dressed well, in parachute-cloth pants and a dark blue cotton shirt. When he smiled up at the waitress, his eyes crinkled at the corners, charming and flirtatious. Her answering laughter floated over the deck. Some things didn’t change, after all. I closed my folder with its dusty discoveries from the past, packed up my computer, and paid my bill, trying to slip out amid the crowded tables before they realized I was there. It was too late, though. Art saw me, called my name, and waved me over. To my surprise, Joey stood up when I reached the table and swung one arm around my shoulders. I wondered if he even remembered