Free The Smart One by Ellen Meister Page B

her arm around me.
    Teddy asked how we planned to dispose of the industrial drum at the curb. When I told him that we intended to leave it there for the garbage truck to pick up, he clucked in disapproval. “They won’t pick that up. Not without knowing what’s in it.”
    “Why not?” Clare asked.
    “Because it could be toxic chemicals. If you want the sanitation department to take it, you have to open it yourselves.”
    Joey clapped her hands. “Cool! Let’s do it now.”
    The thought of doing anything other than taking a hot shower and getting into dry clothes made me shudder. “We have to get cleaned up,” I said.
    “But look,” Joey said, pointing to the window. “It stopped raining.”
    “That doesn’t make me any less cold and wet and filthy.”
    “Bev’s right,” Clare said. “We should get showered and changed.”
    Joey tsked. “You two are such old ladies.”
    And you’re such a two-year-old , I wanted to say, but instead I reminded her that it would still be there in an hour. Then I asked Kenny if he could get something from his mother’s closet for Joey to wear so we could run next door. Joey folded her arms and pouted.
    Teddy said he and his wife would be gone by the time we got back, and told Joey and Clare it was lovely meeting them.
    “Don’t you want to see what’s in the drum?” Joey asked.
    “We just don’t have the time, dear,” Mrs. Goodwin explained.
    “Then let’s do it now!” Joey demanded. She looked at the rest of us. “Please.”
    Kenny looked at me and shrugged, as if to say he had no choice, and I shrugged back, agreeing. After all, how long could it take? He announced that he’d go upstairs to get something for Joey to wear, and asked if someone could go into the mudroom and find a screwdriver to pry off the lid.
    “I’ll do it!” Joey said, and dashed to the back of the house.
    Moments later, when she returned, she was indeed carrying a screwdriver. She was also wearing the pink ball gown.
    “For heaven’s sake, Joey,” Clare chided.
    Kenny, descending the stairs just as Joey entered, spotted her. “I was going to offer you these old tennis shorts,” he said, holding up some clothes, “but I guess a gown’s appropriate too. You can’t be overdressed for these gala industrial drum openings.”
    I looked at Clare, who simply threw up her arms in defeat. Joey clapped her hands, delighted, and together we all went outside and watched as Kenny wedged the screwdriver under the lip of the lid and tried to pry it off.
    “It’s like opening Al Capone’s vault,” Joey said.
    “That was empty,” I said. “Remember?”
    “I mean the suspense.”
    “Doubt there’ll be anything very dramatic inside,” Kenny grunted as he pushed on the screwdriver. He used both hands and forced his weight into it. Was anything happening? He stopped and pulled out the screwdriver, holding it up for everyone to see. It was bent. The lid held fast.
    “Well?” he asked. “Any suggestions?”
    The sun peeked through the clouds and I was glad for the warmth. My hair was drying and I felt like my body was absorbing some healthful vitamin D. And Kenny. Kenny was starting to glisten, with dots of sweat seeping through the front of his thin T-shirt, highlighting his sculpted pectorals. Goodness. It really was starting to heat up. I shook my hairout to try to distract myself from what I was feeling, but when I looked up he was staring straight at me, as if he knew what I was thinking and refused to let the moment pass. I held his gaze and something happened. It was as if his look penetrated so deeply that my boundaries vanished and my very cells were becoming unglued. I felt my body opening to the forces of nature, letting the heat of the sun enter through the top of my head and move downward, while the coolness of the earth rose up through my feet. The two fronts were about to meet and explode in a storm somewhere south of my equator when someone spoke.
    “You can’t just do one