Transient - Complete Book One (Episodes 1 - 4) (Transient Serial) Read online

  They sat in the pickup truck awhile, looking at the ocean, watching the waves.

  “I always thought I wanted a house on the beach,”he said.“Just to look out at the water and the sky and forget about everything.”

  “Then you should.”

  “Yeah, maybe I will.”

  Only for Constants.

  “It’s practically sunset,”he said then.“We should get going.”

  “Where?”

  He pointed to the dunes.

  “I suppose you bring all the girls here ...”

  “I don’t want to talk about other girls. There are no other girls. There’s one and she’s here with me and that’s nice, the nicest thing in a long while, but it would be much nicer watching from the dunes.”

  “Okay, then.”

  He opened his door and the wind rushed in. It was freezing cold.

  Rae shivered and drew her arms across her chest.“I should have brought a jacket.”

  “It won’t seem so cold once you’re out in the sun.”

  “Which is almost gone,”she pointed out.

  The sun was nearly touching the horizon now, diving towards the sea.

  “I have a blanket in the back.”

  I bet you do.

  Not that it bothered her. She was glad he’d planned ahead, whether he was planning for her or not. Maybe he did bring other girls here. It shouldn’t bother her. Logan and Rae had hardly spoken in school, except to argue in Mrs D’s class. He was right about that. She wondered what had taken them so long to really hang out together. Probably the jock thing and the labels and the stories Chloe told about the guys on the team.

  Rae tried to remember what Chloe had said about Logan. She always told stories and always named names and most of the stories were about the bad boys who got in trouble, or almost in trouble, and with whom. Now that she thought about it, she realized Logan’s name almost never came up. Maybe he was a bad boy like the other rowdies, but just kept his nose a little cleaner. He certainly acted the part at school, with that campus strut and the high fives and the long stares at the girls and the way everyone seemed to like him, even the teachers. Especially the teachers.

  She thought the teachers gave Logan a pass on his grades, because of how he smiled and how he was important to the team and they had a shot at the state finals this year if Logan stayed healthy as wide receiver and second-leading scorer. The whole school seemed to be counting on the team to win for school pride, like it was Logan’s job and the job of his teammates, to keep everyone happy. So Rae thought his grades were part of that, keeping the football team intact, something political from the principal who was a huge sports fan, even if some of the teachers like Mrs D, weren’t.

  But Logan had finished his English paper early. And he always had things to say in class. Rae didn’t think he was usually right, in fact he was almost always wrong in her view, but he had an opinion about everything, and he did the reading and he got called on a lot, but maybe it wasn’t favoritism. Maybe the teachers just liked the way he argued. And now that she thought about it, he often took the opposite of the first view presented, like playing devil’s advocate.

  He’s competitive, she realized. In sports, in class, in his assignments. He wasn’t just a jock. He was competitive in everything. It was like a driving force in him.

  It made him seem a little cocky and arrogant, and he could cut you off in a debate if you couldn’t get to your point fast enough, but he challenged and needled, and made the class discussions more lively. Of course the teachers liked that.

  Rae was starting to see another side to Logan, a side that was always there in plain view, but she was too stupid to see it. Not stupid, maybe, but blind.

  Blinded by the label. Jock. Yes he was that, but not only that.

  She hadn’t figured Logan out totally, not yet, and maybe she never would.

  But she might like trying. She might like that a lot.

  Logan stepped out of the truck, and went to the back for his blanket. It had a pattern on it, with geometric designs like an old Native American rug, but it was really just a cotton blanket and it felt soft and warm.

  They held hands as they walked from the parking lot to the cement bike bath that wound through the beach sand like a petrified snake.

  The parking lot asphalt was hard and cold and pebbly, but Rae’s feet felt much better when they got to the sand, which was still warm from a full day in the sun. It was a nice contrast, her feet warming the rest of her body, which was chilled by the wind blowing off the water. The air was full of sea smells, and had a misty quality to it. She smelled the salt and the seaweed and a kind of decaying odor underneath it all, but it wasn’t a rotten smell but a natural scent that suggested this is the place where life meets death, and everything is regenerated with the rising and falling of the tide.

  They avoided the cement path and stayed on the sand. Bikers came and went, weaving around the few pedestrians. Some of the bikers were younger kids in packs of two and three. The older bikers were mostly commuters, dressed in casual work clothes with their jeans rolled up or tied at the ankles to keep them from catching in the gears of their bikes. They saw one older gentleman with a white beard and long thinning hair sticking out the back of his bike helmet, some old hippie gone corporate, wearing a blue and grey business suit, but with a power tie in tie-died colors. He smiled at them as he cycled past.

  “He’s got the right idea,”Logan observed.“Sell, but don’t sell out.”

  They took the first sandy rise, a brief incline from the parking lot, and walked along the crest of the dune, holding hands, not saying anything, just listening to the gulls crying and the sounds of children playing in the distance.

  “There’s a good spot a little further down,”he said, and pointed to the tallest dune.

  Rae didn’t see any people on that dune, though there were kids playing and kicking the sand between where they were and where they were headed.

  I hope they leave.

  She wanted to be alone with Logan. She felt safe with him, and strangely happy. She had been nervous before at the pizza place, but that had drained out of her. Her belly was full and her mind was at peace, and the white noise of the waves calmed her.

  But Logan’s hand in hers was the best of all.

  Don’t let go.

  They made it to the crest of the highest dune before the sun was gone. There was only a sliver left on the horizon when they stopped, and stood there watching. Logan stepped behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist and put his chin on her right shoulder. She could hear him breathing in her ear, not meaning to, but his breath was close and it had a rhythm like the sea, and it was a calming sound in her ear, like the waves and the wind and the crying of the gulls.

  Logan said,“When I was kid, when my dad was still around, he used to tell me that if I looked really close and watch the sun hit the water, I could see the splash. It wasn’t a big splash, because the sun was doing a long, slow dive into the sea, but he told me to watch close. I always did and I almost convinced myself I could see it splashing when the edge touched the ocean. And then when he died I dreamed about that, about how the sun was splashing, but it was falling faster, and you could see it, falling so fast that it hit the water like a cannonball, and then I’d wake up crying.”

  Rae turned around to face him, held her body against his, and wrapped her arms around him. He held her tight without squeezing, and she turned her head and bent it a little to his chest, pressing her ear to his shirt to feel the warmth of him and listen to his heartbeat.

  The wind got colder and stronger. Darkness filled the air. On the water were ships with beacon lights, and the coastline was illuminated like a string of pearls, with the streetlights and house lights. A woman gathered two kids from the nearby dunes, and took them to the parking lot. Cars left one by one, until there were only two remaining, Logan’s large pickup and a small white van.

  Rae couldn’t see anyone else on the beach or on the dunes
. Even the bike path was now just a vacant ribbon through the sand.

  “Let’s get out of the wind.”He held her hand, and led her down the leeward side of the dune, where it was less windy and the hill of sand blocked most of the breeze coming off the ocean.

  Logan unwrapped the blanket from Rae’s shoulders, and spread it out near the bottom of the slope, but not in the valley itself, where eddies of sand were curling in the air as the wind currents mixed and found.

  It was big enough for two to lay down on it, so they did, close together, but on their sides facing each other. Logan had his head propped up on one elbow, and she did the same. He put his other hand on her hip, and outlined her shape. His touch was confident but gentle.

  He slid the bottom of her shirt up a little, and she felt the warm skin of his hand on the flesh of her hip, just above the belt line. His hand was warm, but the night air was not.

  “Cold,”she protested, but lightly.

  “Sorry,”he said, and pulled her shirt back down.

  Maybe later. In the car, where it’s warmer.

  He brought his free hand up and stroked her long hair with slow, brushing movements, and then let his fingertips massage her scalp a little, and she closed her eyes then and just felt it, neither of them saying anything.

  He brought his roving hand to her cheek, and stroked her face with his thumb, lightly, like a feather, though she could feel the roughness of his skin. The soft touch was like a warm soothing breeze that slid down her face and to her mouth, and when he brushed his thumb across his lips, so lightly that she almost doubted the touch, almost didn’t feel it at all. It was exciting and a little dangerous being touched so intimately by someone she hardly even knew, but was beginning to know, moment by moment, touch by touch, and heartbeat by heartbeat.

  Her eyes were still closed, and she could feel his breath, and smell him less than an inch away. He had taken a mint in the car, and given her a couple as well, but under his minty breath there was still a hint of garlic. But she didn’t mind at all, he was so close, and she liked the sensation of his warm breath on her lips, and then it moved away to her cheek and then her ear, and she could hear him breathing like a soft moan, or maybe it was Rae moaning.

  But she waited. He was taking his time and making her wait too. Confident, in no hurry, with nothing in the world to worry about and nothing to come between them, not even time, not even the wind, or his breathing now on her cheek again, and on her lips. And then she felt his lips on hers.

  Time stopped.

  Rae’s thoughts stopped and her worries stopped and all around her the world stopped. The universe paused and there was only the soft sensation of his lips on hers, gently at first, and then pressing, more urgent, and his hand came around to cup the back of her neck, and stroke her hair, and then he rolled onto her and she rolled back to take his weight, but he wasn’t heavy, his body barely touched hers but hovered over her, warm and protective and—

  Her phone buzzed.

  His mouth pulled away from hers and her eyes snapped open, and Logan’s face was rising away from hers.“No,”she pleaded.

  “Don’t you have to—“

  But Rae didn’t care about the words or the phone or her mother, and she grabbed Logan’s shirt and pulled him back down to her, and the blanket sank into the sand a little with the weight of them both, and their lips smashed together, a little jarring but she didn’t care.

  The phone buzzed again.

  “Aaah!”she cried out, a little too close to him, and he winced.“Sorry,”she said.“I have to turn this off.”

  “Don’t you want to see who it is?”

  “It’s just my mom.”

  “She’s probably worried about you.”

  “I told her where I was.”

  That startled him.“You did?”

  “I said I was out with friends.”

  The moment was gone and they were talking now, and words meant so much less than sensations, but it was cold and dark and the blanket had flown away. She looked for it, and saw it a little ways away, at the bottom of the slope. She went to get it.

  “I guess we are friends,”Logan added, and tried to make it sound like a joke.

  “I don’t know what we are.”

  She grabbed the edges of the blanket and shook it in the wind to get the sand.

  “We’re here,”he said.

  They laid the blanket back down on the sand and got back onto it so it wouldn’t blow away. But they were sitting together now, cross-legged on the blanket, looking at each other and holding hands.

  “What do you think about the future?”he asked her.

  “I don’t know,”she said.“All I’ve been thinking about is my birthday, and what that would mean. I wasn’t really focused on what comes after. Just getting to sixteen, and then making the decision.”

  He was quiet a moment.

  “Maybe you should take the cryptograph Rae,”he said.

  What?

  “I told you how I felt about that.”I thought you understood.

  “I know,”he said,“but maybe this changes things.”

  “What changes things?”

  “This. Tonight. Being together like this.”He was trying to say something, and doing a terrible job of it.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well…I’ve got a lot of years left. I don’t want to spend them alone, and I don’t want to spend them chasing lots of girls, like some of my friends do. I’m not like that. I want to be close to someone. And I don’t mean kissing. That was nice, wonderful, great really, I mean, you’re amazing. But that should be the start of something.”He continued.“People should get closer with time. With sharing moments and thoughts and feelings. Because time is all we have and it’s so short, it can disappear like that, and every moment is a gift you can’t get back, you just spend it and it’s gone. Even when you know your expiration date. And I’m glad I know it. I can’t explain it really, except that it’s…comforting in a way.”

  “You have a lot of years left though,”she pointed out.“You’re Constant.”

  “Yes and I want to spend those with someone. Someone I really like. I never knew who that could be, but tonight spending time with you ...”

  “And?”Rae couldn’t quite believe she was hearing this from Logan Suttor but couldn’t deny that she liked it.

  “I don’t want this to end,”he said finally.

  “Everything ends. I can’t stay out here all night. That sounds pretty good right now, but I can’t, not tonight.”

  “I’m not talking about tonight,”Logan said.“I’m talking long-term. Spending a life with someone.”

  “With another Constant you mean.”

  And then he said it again.“I think you should take the test.”

  This time Rae felt a flash of anger. He was sounding just like her parents, her friends, everybody.“I said I wasn’t going to.”

  “I know, I heard you.”

  “Then why are you saying this? I thought you got it.”

  “I do, but…I just thought maybe tonight might change that.”He was backtracking now, but not by much. Just trying to calm her down, but he was arguing with her again, just like in class, trying to get her to change her mind when she knew she was right, and God she hated that about him.

  “Is that why you brought me here? To change my mind about the test?”

  “No, I—no. That doesn’t even make sense. That’s not what I meant.”

  “What did you mean then?”

  “I mean, I like you. You’re great, and this was great, the pizza and the dunes and the kiss and all of it, and I don’t want it to end. I want a future and when we were kissing, and when we stopped I thought I saw it, my future, being with someone, really close with someone. With you.”

  He looked at her, and it was a kind of question, but Rae didn’t know how to answer.

  “I know I have a future,”he continued.“I want to know if wedo.”

  “I’m not taking the test just to m
ake you feel better.”Or let you find out in advance if I’m Constant, Interim, or god forbid, Transient.

  “Don’t do it for me then, or for anyone. Do it for you, Rae.”

  She stood up, and now the wind was cold on her face, freezing.

  “Just take me home.”

  Chapter 6

  Logan dropped her off a block from the house. They didn’t say much, just goodbye, and Rae climbed out and walked the last block home.

  When she walked in, her mom was watching television and Carl was at the table doing homework. She didn’t see her dad, but his car was in the driveway.

  Her mother looked over at the door.“Welcome home.”Her tone had a slight scolding quality to it, but not as bad as Rae feared.

  Carl said,“They were talking about you.”

  “Hush, Carl.”

  Her mother turned off the TV. She shouted up at the ceiling.“Honey, Rae’s back.”

  “OK coming!”Upstairs, her father sounded excited.

  “I already ate.”Rae crossed to the stairs, but saw her father coming down with packages in his arms.“Somebody’s got birthday presents…”he chuckled and set them on the table.

  “I need to take a quick shower first.”

  A look of concern washed over her mother’s face now, and set into a scowl.“Where were you tonight?”

  “I went to the beach,”she replied,“with some friends.”

  “Yeah,”her dad commented.“I can see that. You tracked in some sand.”

  “I know. Sorry. I’ll vacuum it. But I need to take a shower first.”

  “Don’t worry about the rug,”her mom insisted.“I’ll do it. It’s your birthday. Wash up quick and come back down for presents. There’s also cake and ice cream.”

  Rae meant to take a quick shower, but once she was in she didn’t want to get out again.

  She let the warm water spill over her, massaging her shoulders, washing away what had happened with Logan and what was said. The white noise of the shower was like the white noise of the ocean, and she heard voices in it, and all the voices belonged to Logan. She tried to listen to the words, but there were no words just sounds and syllables in his voice, and she couldn’t understand what he was saying or who he was or whether they’d ever have a future together, or even if that was what she wanted.