Read Online While I'm Falling by Laura Moriarty - Free Book Online Page B

stadium. He gave me the keys, and though I got out of the car on his side, he gestured for Haylie to move from the passenger seat to the back. In the back, Haylie sat with her feet on the seat. In the rearview mirror, she looked like she had no torso, her heart-shaped face resting on the knees of her gray tights. I put the car in gear and told myself not to be nervous. I was a good driver. I tried to remember this as we rolled around the parking lot, me braking, accelerating, and turning at Jimmy’s command. I did all this with the stereo on, the German guy still shouting.
    “Okay. Yeah. I feel okay,” Jimmy said, using one hand to signal for me to stop. He got out of the car and walked around the front to the driver’s side. By the time I had gotten out and walked around to the passenger door, Haylie had moved to the front seat. She leaned forward to let me in.
    “But try not to drive too much.” Jimmy readjusted the mirror and ran his hand along his shaved head. “The weather is supposed to get shitty tomorrow. Maybe ice. But not until the afternoon. Our flight leaves in the early morning. You’ll be fine if you come straight home.”
    I frowned, looking out the backseat window, at the bright blue sky, the maple trees still dappled with a few gold leaves. I hadn’t heard about any ice.
    But I said nothing. The idea of the weekend, the cuteness of the car, the luxury of the town house, was already locked into my mind. And later, when Jimmy showed me the security code that opened the door, and I saw the floor-to-ceiling windows in the kitchen and the enormous bathtub that looked like it had just been scrubbed (it had—Jimmy informed me that a maid came once a week), I forgot all about the potentially icy roads. I was friendly and compliant. I nodded appreciatively at the rather disturbing paintings on the wall, all painted by Jimmy. (“They’re all from the point of view of a serial killer,” Haylie explained. “They might be a little edgy for you.”) And I paid close attention when Jimmy opened the door to a glassed-in sunroom as warm and muggy as an August night, and full of exotic-looking plants. He showed me which ones needed to be misted daily and how to check the humidistat.
    “Obviously I keep the sunroom warmer than the others,” he said, shutting the door behind him. “The rest of the house is set at sixty-five. So if it gets really cold tomorrow night, just let all the sinks drip a little, and open the cabinets underneath.”
    I wasn’t sure what to say. Jimmy, I knew, was from some city in California that started with “San,” not San Diego or San Franciso, but some other place that sounded like the weather was usually lovely and mild. He’d apparently heard a little about Kansas winters and freezing pipes, and he was ready to take unnecessary precautions.
    “That’s ridiculous!” Haylie appeared in the living room and gave one of his big arms a playful poke. “It’s not an old farmhouse. And she’s going to be here, running water. The pipes won’t freeze overnight.” She looked back at me, smiled, and rolled her lovely eyes.
    I had slowly begun to understand that Haylie lived at the town house, too. Now that I thought about it, I rarely saw her around the dorm anymore. Her coat was hanging in the front closet, and Jimmy had pointed out her desk in the downstairs study. But I also understood that really, the house, the car—everything—belonged to him. So even though I knew, regarding the possibility of frozen pipes, that she was right and he was wrong, I looked to him for the final word.
    He seemed to appreciate my good sense. “Turn the water on if it gets cold,” he said, looking at me, not at Haylie. His cell phone rang in his pocket. “I’ll take this outside,” he said. He kissed the back of her neck as he walked past her out of the room.
    Haylie and I were silent, listening to his heavy boots move across the kitchen and out the front door. It was the first time we’d been