Swimming Sideways (Cantos Chronicles Book 1) Read online

  Why hadn’t Seth mentioned they were friends? That day when he explained the Freak Challenge, he could have. Good Abby intervenes: Would you if you were trying to maintain your reputation? I hated that she was right. Hadn’t I done the same thing when he helped me in the hallway? “And he doesn’t have any friends?"

  “Nope. A loner. I tried reaching out, you know at the beginning of sophomore year, but he just isn’t interested in letting anyone befriend him.”

  We stand and move in the opposite direction of where Gabe disappeared toward our class. "That is sad," I say.

  Later in the evening, as I’m working on homework, my cell phone alerts me I've got a text. I ignore it for the Algebra problem I’m attempting. When I finish, I pick up the phone and read:

  Good time to call?

  It's from Seth.

  Smiling, I text back: Yes.

  A few seconds later the landline rings. This interruption also has become a part of the evening routine, and since my brothers dive bomb for the receiver, I don't bother trying to get it.

  Matt knocks and pushes open my door. It hits the wall with a loud thud since my mom finally insisted I pick up the clothes. “It’s for you, Saggy. It’s Seth.” He smiles and then simulates kissing his free hand.

  I snatch the phone from him. “Hello?”

  “Hi,” Seth's voice reaches toward me from the other end of the line. “It’s me.”

  “Hey." I take a deep breath. My pulse rushes. Good Abby is pacified sort of - since it’s Seth, it-boy of Cantos High. I push Matt out by his forehead as he continues his one-sided make-out session.

  “What are you doing?”

  “The usual: Math. So much homework."

  This leads us into the delicacies of school, people, jokes, memes, and after twenty minutes, Seth changes things and says, “I was wondering if you’d like to go out this Friday.”

  “That sounds fun," I say but Hannah’s warning from earlier comes to mind.

  The rules! Good Abby reminds me. This makes my rebellion rise up and I wonder if I’m supposed to remain a hermit.

  Yes! Good Abby says. If it keeps us protected, free and clear.

  “We can iron out the details tomorrow at lunch,” Seth says.”

  I make a noise of consent, though I know I’ve drifted away in my thoughts, suddenly anxious if this is a good idea. He’s my friend.

  “Shit. Dad’s calling. Wish I could talk longer. I gotta go.”

  “Oh. Okay,” I say. “See you tomorrow,” but he’s already hung up.

  I return the phone to its cradle.

  What happened to not drawing attention? Good Abby asks. To maintaining anonymity?

  This is me selectively choosing my friends, I think. That’s within the rules.

  But even though I’m following the rules, good Abby has laid out to keep me safe, my naʻau is bubbling with trepidation. Poppa always told me, “Trust your naʻau, Tita. Your gut is tethered to our moʻokuauhau, our ancestors.” I knew he’d been telling me that our collective knowledge would guide me, but then I think about Kanoa and my mistake. I distrust my own instincts because that was clearly the wrong direction. Where were they that night?

  Lost in all the alcohol we’d consumed, the Abbies remind me.

  This is a detail I selectively forget. I push Poppa’s wisdom from my mind. His old-world thinking isn’t relevant.

  Seth is safe, I think.

  How can we know this for sure? Bad Abby wonders.

  We can’t, good Abby decides, but he fits within the rules.

  I don’t know what I think anymore.

  8

  ALL SHOOK UP

  When Seth drives up to the curb outside my house, I’m a bundle of nerves and sprint up the stairs. I don’t know why I run, the instinct on autopilot. I rationalize that my anxiety is wrapped up in childhood expectations and memories that idealized into adolescent fantasy. But the fear is ever present. What if I make that mistake again? What if I ruin my life here too?

  Nate answers the front door. There are hushed voices and I hear Nate say, “I’ll get her." His footsteps resound on the stairs.

  Breathe, Abby. Breathe.

  Then I hear Matt’s voice. He says, “Haggy is ready. She ran up the stairs when she saw your truck.”

  My eyes slip shut.

  “Don’t worry about him,” Nate says from the door of my room.

  As I walk to him I say, “I don’t understand why I can’t have two of you,” and pinch his cheek.

  He swats my hand away and follows me down the stairs.

  Seth is waiting near the front door as I descend. He smiles. That dimple. All of Abby is affected by that look.

  “Sorry you had to wait,” I say. “I forgot something upstairs.” I wish I could shoot daggers from my eyes at Matt. My brother makes a face at me, and I roll my eyes even if I love him.

  My mom walks from the kitchen a dish towel in hand. “You must be Seth,” she says. “I think I went to school with your dad.”

  They chit-chat for a few more moments, and then those awkward moments exist between meeting my parent and trying to get out of the house. I’m thankful that Dad is at work or awkward wouldn't cover it. Humiliation probably would. It is a relief when we escape out the front door, down the steps of the porch, and across the walkway to the curb where his truck is waiting.

  “You look great,” he says and opens the door to the truck for me.

  “You’re sweet. Thanks.”

  Seth smiles and closes the door after I’m in the seat. He gets into the truck and the old model Chevy rumbles to life. “Your mom is nice,” he says and moves the vehicle onto the road.

  “When she wants to be,” I say.

  “Aren’t all parents like that?”

  “I guess. Some days the jury is out.”

  “Don’t I know that,” he says more to himself than to me. I wonder about it and then I remember one summer afternoon of Seth crying in the fort, his body bruised. I glance at him and wonder if his father is still that sort of monster.

  He parks the truck on Main Street and we walk down the sidewalk to a fifties inspired restaurant called The Diner. We pass Morton’s Pharmacy, a one-screen movie theater. Across the street is D&M Hardware, where I saw Gabe the other day in the light bulb isle, among other shops.

  It appears that most of Cantos High “it-crowd” is in attendance when we walk into the restaurant. A variety of people crowd the red-vinyl booths accented with shiny chrome and the jukebox is playing “All Shook Up” by Elvis. Seth waves at some of his friends assembled at tables they’ve drawn together. Dread covers me like a coat when I think he might be leading us to sit with them, but I’m able to shrug out of it when we pass them for an empty booth on the opposite side of the restaurant. That much social power doesn’t feel like anonymity even if it is a solid selection of friends. Maybe it would be safer though should someone find the video.

  The point is to not instigate anyone looking, good Abby reminds me.

  An adorable waitress in a cute pink outfit with the white apron and a black name tag that reads Norma welcomes us. After taking our beverage order, she shows us how to order using the mini jukebox on the table.

  “So, how does it feel to be back in Cantos?" Seth asks after Norma’s gone.

  “It’s not Hawaii,” I say and swipe a finger down the sweating water glass. The statement lodges in my chest and hangs there as though if I let go it might fall to its death. I picture Poppa, surfing, the ocean washing me clean the moment I dive in. Pounding the kalo into paʻiaʻi and its sweet flavor on my tongue. The little ʻōlelo I know caressing my lips and how it’s slipped away now into English only. I mentally shake myself. These things are gone. They are twenty-five hundred miles away and I’m trying to fix what I broke. I can’t hold onto them. I need to box up Hawaii and the ache I feel and store it in an attic that I visit and remember with fondness. There is nothing there that will help me with this world.

  “Cantos is a freaking drag.”


  That is probably true, but agreeing on some level is a lie for me. Coming to Cantos has saved me, in a way. I turn the glass of water, run a finger down the glass, swiping the condensation in a linear pattern around the whole cup. Instead of commenting, I let him fill in silence with his own assumptions.

  “Maybe some things are alright?” He straightens the fork, knife and spoon on the white paper napkin and checks to make sure the bottom of each utensil is aligned.

  “Possibly,” I answer watching him. I smile at how endearing he looks making sure things are just right and suddenly, we’re ten again. My smile widens. “Too early to tell, but tell me about how much this town hasn’t changed.”

  “Isn’t that the truth! We go to Portland for any real excitement. Have you been to P-town yet?”

  “Not officially. Just through it,” I say.

  “We should go sometime,” he suggests.

  “That would be fun.” I can’t imagine talking my parents into that one. They may be on code yellow with one another, but their overprotective instincts with me are still on high alert. It could have to do with what happened last year. The bullying they didn’t know about, but my rebellion and retaliation on the home front were still fresh in their minds. I’d lied a lot, snuck out and fallen into dabbling with weed. They were scared and it was enough to imprison me, and maybe their over protectiveness was warranted. I don’t know.

  Norma sets our drinks on the table.

  “So why here?” Seth asks. “I mean, leaving Hawaii for the devil’s butthole has to be awful.”

  How much to say? “My parents. Dad got a job. Living in Hawaii is really expensive. There’s the short list.”

  “I’ve imagined surfing the waves in Hawaii.” He stops and takes a drink of his soda. “Actually, I’ve been planning to apply to Hawaii State.”

  “Really?” I find this bit of information ironic and say, “I’d always imagined myself going to college on the mainland. Oregon, in fact.” Had we really spent the last seven years walking in our childhood memories of one another? This thought eases my tension and settles the Abbies. How could this shared history be a bad thing?

  He’s smiling. God, that dimple. Then he looks away as though he’s affected by the knowledge as I am.

  Norma returns with our food breaking the magic spell.

  As we eat, we walk down memory lane and several summers playing games outside as superhero spies. It makes everything easy, as though no time at all has passed. There is one glaring exception, and I can’t imagine it away: Seth is so attractive. I’m doing my best to push that to the back of my mind in order to keep things light and effortless. It’s difficult though and when he smiles, that dimple continues to reduce me to a puddle.

  After dinner and an argument about my money not being accepted, Seth pays, then mutters something about how stubborn I still am. His kindness is appreciated, but this is definitely feeling more and more like a date. I lack the confidence to understand how I feel about it. Logically, it makes sense because of our history, our friendship, our comfort with one another. Emotionally, though, I’m wobbly and insecure in my ability to see things clearly. Good Abby has begun encouraging me by justifying that he’s got social capital. Bad Abby likes the way he looks.

  “Ready?" he asks and slides out of the booth. “We’ve got a long journey to make the movie on time." Now standing, he holds out his hand to help me.

  I take his offered assistance. When it would be appropriate to let go of my hand, he doesn’t. Instead, he keeps hold and I don’t pull away from him either. Truthfully, I enjoy my hand in his. I enjoy the way my heart leaps with a current running through our connection. I enjoy the thrill of knowing he wants to hold my hand. I notice the looks telegraphed between his friends as we leave the restaurant and feel the Abbies cringe: Don’t draw attention!

  I justify that Seth fits into the rules but wonder if being with Seth is like falling into the same trap as Hawaii? I conveniently dismiss that question when we walk up the ticket booth for the movie theater next door to The Diner. I lean back and look at the marquee. “The Dawn? I’m not sure I’ve heard of that one.”

  “This theater doesn’t play new releases,” he says. “We have to go to Newport or Portland for those.” Seth requests two tickets and then hands me one. “I guess we should be grateful to have a movie theater at all."

  I leave Seth in the lobby and once I’m in the confines of the black and white tiled bathroom, I stop and look in the mirror. “Be smart, Abby,” I say aloud to my reflection. It is only after the words echo in the room I think to check and see if I’m alone. I breathe a sigh of relief when I am. The weight of the night bares down on my shoulders. The comfortable ease of being with him, the way I see myself in his sight, the way I become the only girl in the room when he looks at me. I think of Kanoa and the way I lost myself in his attention. The similarities consistent. “Slow your roll,” I tell myself before returning to the lobby. When I do, I find Seth with a myriad of treats.

  “I wasn’t sure what you like,” he says holding out a box of bite-sized ice cream pieces and Red Vines. He looks like that ten-year-old boy I remember.

  I laugh. “You didn’t need to do that!”

  “But I wanted to." He smiles brightly and hands me a gigantic bottle of water.

  “Seth!" I’m still laughing.

  “You haven’t changed,” he says.

  “You either,” I answer.

  The theater is dimmed, not completely dark yet, but still dark enough to need to squint. We find two seats near the center. There aren’t very many people in attendance, so it is almost as though we have the place to ourselves. I sit and scoot low so that my head rests on the back of the seat. Seth sinks down deep into the seat so that his long legs touch the seat back in front of him. His legs are set wide and I feel his knee pressed against mine. He’s warm and I’m focused on that searing heat instead of what’s on the giant screen.

  I look over at him, his face so close to mine that my breath hitches in my chest a moment before asking, “You ready?”

  “For what?" He asks. His beautiful eyes study me and then drop to my mouth.

  I look away. “The movie, of course.”

  “Oh right. Yes. It’s supposed to be funny.”

  “A scary movie?”

  Seth nods. “Heard the scary parts are laughable.”

  “I don’t get scared," I say.

  “Really?" Seth laughs. “Uh, I seem to remember when we were ten, and we stole your grandma’s copy of Stephen King’s It and stashed it in the fort. We took turns reading from it, and neither of us could sleep for a week.”

  I laugh remembering. “That clown was terrifying.” My cheeks heat thinking about when we’d made it to the sex part of that book. We’d laughed and insisted it was super disgusting, but I’d look at Seth differently after that. It was the first time I remember feeling those butterflies in my belly when I looked at him.

  The lights dim reducing the theater to darkness. The movie is the story of five friends, who on a dare, sleep in a legendary haunted house. It’s a first-rate B flick. I enjoy it mostly because of the thrill of sitting next to Seth, of the way my heart races at his nearness, of the electricity of his shoulder pressed into mine, and of the magic of our hands finding each other.

  “That one part with the attic was creepy,” Seth says as we walk out of the theater still holding hands.

  “It wasn’t too bad,” I say. “I saw it coming.”

  “Really? That’s why you nearly jumped into my lap?”

  “I wasn’t that bad,” I suppress my laughter. Pressing the flirtation, I add, “Maybe I wasn’t scared,” and then regret it.

  Ah oh, the Abbies warn. Too soon.

  Seth glances down as we walk along the sidewalk and says, “I forgot how much I missed you.” He looks at me and pulls me closer, tucking my hand up against his heart.

  This makes me ache, the gravity of it mixed with the vulnerability I hope he’s committed to when he s
ays it, but I think of Kanoa, and understand that what I hope and what is true aren’t always accurate reflections. I say, “I guess Cantos was ready for me then.”

  Seth opens the door to the truck for me and I turn to climb it. As I do, I catch sight of movement across the street and stop to look. Gabe is standing behind the glass entrance of the hardware, key in the door.

  He looks up and see us.

  Later, I’ll replay the moment over and over in my mind: I raise my hand and wave to him, an impulse that commandeered my reason. Had I been thinking, I wouldn’t have taken the risk. It was as though I was in the freefall of a loop-de-loop and I lost track of who I was supposed to be. Equally perplexing, Gabe raises a hand in acknowledgement to my wave then turns and disappears into the bowels of the store.

  Seth gets into the truck and I sense a change in him, as though a wind has whipped through and pushed the energetic storm out, breaking up the clouds until nothing remains. He starts the vehicle, pulls away from the curb and turns around so that we head back up the hill toward my house. When he changes the gear, I feel the force of his energy on the stick shift. He says, “I didn’t know you and Daniels were friends.” His tone is tight and controlled.

  “Just from art,” I say. Guilt floods me as though I’ve done something wrong. Add to that the horrible realization I maybe just ruined everything I’d been working to control in a single moment.

  “The Daniels’ are such good people, taking him in.”

  “Good people?" I’m confused by this change in Seth. The contrast between earlier and now is dynamic.

  “All of those rumors about him that started the challenge."

  “Wait. I’m confused,” I say as irritation rusts the wheels of what began rolling between us earlier and Bad Abby engages. “I heard you and Gabe were, until recently, best friends. Wouldn’t you know what happened to him?”

  He takes a turn and then another until we are on my street. I have the impression he’s trying to regroup.

  Confusion knocks against my ribs, combusts and seeps through my pores. I hear Poppa’s words: Trust your naʻau. Unfortunately, I think it’s broken. If it weren’t, wouldn’t I have avoided Kanoa and everything that happened? I wouldn’t need Good Abby and I wouldn’t be trying to silence Bad Abby; I could just be one Abby.