Handcuffs

  CONTENTS

  Cover Page

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Copyright

  To Jamie

  who never let me forget I was a writer

  1

  She runs out of the room crying.

  Let me start over.

  My mom runs out of the room crying.

  Um, let me start over.

  My mom gets up from the couch, lets out a little gaspy sob, the kind that lets you know someone is crying even when they aren’t doing the big boo-hoo routine. She wipes her eyes, violently, like she’s going to fling the teardrops away, pushes her hair back from her tear-streaked face, looks at my father, looks at me, and then she exits the room.

  My dad glares at me like I’m the Antichrist and gets up to follow her. Leaving me there on the couch holding my Christmas stocking, wearing my dorkariffic red pajamas, surrounded by wrapping paper and crisp white boxes with carefully folded sweaters in tissue paper.

  The door doesn’t even slam. It makes a little dink-dink sound. Then it’s quiet except for the blam, blam, blam of the television as Miracle Child test-drives his new video game. Blam, blam, blam, ka-pow!

  The key is still in my hand. I imagine throwing it across the room, breaking a window with the force of my rage and disappointment. I imagine letting it drop from my nerveless dead fingers with an anticlimactic clink as it hits the glass coffee table. I picture the guilt as my parents lean over my coffin and see that I am still clutching the key in a death grip, my fist wrapped around it, my fingernails painted to match the plush purple velour of the lining.

  I am the one who should be crying. I am the one who should be running out of the room, with people chasing me and trying to console me. I am not a terrible ungrateful little bitch. Usually. In this case, I got set up.

  Let me start over.

  It really, actually happened like this.

  “Look, look at all the presents!” Preston, my ultrahyper brother, sprinted down the hallway. The Christmas tree rocked back and forth as he dove headfirst into the heap of gifts.

  We’ve done Christmas morning the exact same way forever and ever. The week before Christmas, the sibs and I put our gifts for Mom and Dad and for each other under the tree. I wasn’t truly expecting much from my brother and sister. Little brother shopped at the grocery store with a ten-dollar bill Dad gave him. That made my share of the loot two dollars and fifty cents’ worth of grocery store–bought lip gloss or Cheetos or whatever seemed like a good present to him. Now, my sister—well, let’s just say my birthday present still hasn’t been delivered. She thinks I’m dumb enough to wait patiently for my box from Amazon. com, and I have, but so far, nothing.

  Christmas morning is supposed to be about wonder. After we go to sleep, my parents put out all the big presents, piles and piles of them in every shape and size. Even though we’re all too big to believe in Santa, and have been for years, my heart still missed a few beats when I went downstairs and saw the tree and all the glittering gifts underneath.

  Even if we were still young enough to believe in magic, I doubt we could after the year we’ve had. Another reason Christmas now sucks is that sweaters and shoes aren’t really thrilling; it’s not like it was when I was little and I got a heap of toys that I’d been putting on my Amazon wish list since September. This year I was supposed to get a new computer, a gorgeous little refurbished notebook from Dad’s work. I guess that’s out of the question now that Dad no longer has a job. On top of all that, my sister didn’t show. I don’t like things to change. I like tradition. She won’t be coming over for dinner, either, because her rich in-laws guilted her into abandoning us. You’d think Mom would have cried about that, and you might imagine that Paige would be the official Christmas traitor, but no. Not quite.

  “Parker, catch!” Preston lobbed a present right at my head.

  “Honey, honey, some of these might be breakable.” Mom hadn’t put in her contacts, so she was squinting through this old pair of glasses that sit crooked on the end of her nose.

  My brother stopped throwing the parcels and began to sort them, making neat piles in front of each of us, with a pile for Paige, too. Skipping out on Christmas does not mean you don’t get any gifts. No way.

  The heaps weren’t as big as when we were kids and you could be buried under an avalanche of dolls and puzzles and games, but they weren’t shabby, either. We went back and forth opening, and it got weird taking turns because there are usually three of us in a circle.

  Preston happily ripped into his video games and racked up an addition to his already-superb collection of athletic shoes. I got mostly clothes. Some I loved, some I would never wear. My mom thinks she gets my style, but she’s usually a few steps behind. She’s always trying to buy me things with plaid or flower prints. She says I should wear bright colors while I’m young. But I like basic jeans and solid-colored T-shirts and classic sweaters. Maybe a cute oxford with stripes. I mostly just like to blend in.

  Some of the excitement disappears when you stop getting toys. And I’m not one for showing lots of emotion. Some people—well, mainly my sister—say I’m an ice princess. But my lack of visible excitement isn’t that terrible because my brother jumps up and down and makes enough noise for both of us. Still, I couldn’t keep from worrying that my parents, the way they were watching me, wanted something more.

  I remembered a Christmas long ago when Paige and I got a Barbie Dream House to share, and that made me wonder why, even when I was young, I would want some silly Barbie crap. It’s all so artificial. Who wants the Barbie sweater set with the faux fur leopard collar when you can have a cute sweater for your very own? Not that you’ll look like Barbie when you wear it, unless you happen to be my gorgeous sister. Paige was always playing wedding with her Barbies, and last year she staged her own real-life dream wedding. Is that what she was thinking? Who wants the Barbie dream wedding when you can have your own dress and your own cake and a blond groom with hair that isn’t plastic?

  I truly liked the life-sized real-girl sweater. I smiled at Mom, held it up so she could see how well it would fit.

  “I love it,” I said loudly, so that she could hear me over Preston trying out his video game. I hope Paige’s life-sized real-girl marriage makes her equally happy. Happier, really, since this sweater says Dry-clean Only, so I won’t be wearing it that often. My mom isn’t particularly supportive of the dry cleaners in our area. She is more of the “why bother dry cleaning when we can wash it on gentle cycle?” type.

  Mom wasn’t particularly supportive of Paige�
�s getting married either, since Paige and West were so young and silly—but she and Dad do adore West, so she gritted her teeth and cleaned out the Prescott family savings account to make sure Paige had a beautiful dress and fresh flowers and all that. Nothing but the best for her perfect first daughter. The happy, outgoing daughter who can thaw ice with the power of her warm smile is opening presents someplace else, so all my parents have today is the unsatisfactory daughter. I try to give them the enthusiasm they crave, but I don’t like being stared at, and clapping my hands with glee does not feel the least bit natural. When did Christmas morning get so hard?

  The pressure to open each present and look surprised and happy is what got me into this mess—you know, making my mom cry and everything—in the first place. That and my dad’s being laid off from work, and my overactive imagination, and Mom’s resourcefulness. All of these things transpired in a way that was sure to screw me over.

  I put on the red pjs with the little elves on the legs of my own free will. I thought my dad would eat it up. He’s kind of the holiday decorating guru. This is the first year I can remember when he didn’t get outside and fling lights all over our house. Because of the for-sale sign in our front lawn, I think. He didn’t want to venture out there into front-yard territory. He gave up on the annual light competition with our neighbors, gave up in defeat.

  “It hasn’t been the same since the Henessys moved away, has it?” Mom asked a few days ago. Dad never answered. “The restraining order expires in February,” she continued. “I was thinking we could invite them over for a cookout”—her voice faltered—“once it’s okay for us to be in the same yard with them again.”

  Dad still didn’t say anything. Great idea, Mom, I thought, let’s invite Paige’s stalker over for some burgers. I mean, it’s not like once the restraining order expires Kyle will stop being a psycho or his parents will forgive you for pointing out to the world that their son is a crazy, potentially dangerous guy who used to climb the tree outside our house and look into Paige’s window. In the end I didn’t say anything either. Mom was just trying to remind Dad of Christmas lights and traditions from years past. She’s like me, still trying to ignore the fact that things have changed.

  I don’t think Dad even noticed the jolly-elf pjs. He just sat there beside the slightly lopsided Christmas tree and smiled each time Preston or I ripped into a package, but it was a little smile, not enough for Christmas morning. I wanted to make him really smile and laugh and get down on the floor to help us rip open the gifts, but I couldn’t think how to invite him to do this when I wasn’t smiling or laughing or rolling in the wrapping paper myself. I was watching him when he reached up and touched an ornament. It was a frame shaped like a gold star, and it sparkled around my fifth-grade picture.

  “This is my favorite ornament,” he said. It felt warm and fuzzy, felt extremely great to know that Dad’s favorite ornament on our tree was a photo of me wearing a pink shirt and a big goofy grin. There’s a picture of Paige in an angel frame on the other side of the tree. I didn’t rate the halo, probably because I look completely unangelic. Dark hair will do that to you.

  I’m a crazy mix of my parents’ DNA, with Dad’s dark hair and Mom’s blue eyes. Very cold blue eyes, like a Siberian husky’s. At least, that’s what my ex-boyfriend says.

  After the day I’ve just had, I think I should go find the aforementioned ex and have sex with him in his basement. Yikes, that comment didn’t go over well, even in my head. Now I need to explain about my ex and his basement, and the reason he’s an ex.

  Preston grabbed another box, and the crinkle crinkle crinkle reminded me of the wrapping paper, purple and silver foil, he had used when I was exchanging presents with him. This was when he was the real thing. Official. Or enough of a boyfriend that we were exchanging presents. The crinkle then was from me kneeling on the discarded paper as I reached for the last present. A guy buying you presents signifies something, doesn’t it? I mean, not love, but something?

  And as I leaned forward, he eased the zipper down on the back of my dress, slowly, so slowly—I didn’t know if I could keep my balance, if I could keep from falling face-first into his parents’ designer-decorated tree with the yards of ribbon and the enormous bows that fluttered against my cheek as I tried to breathe. I mean, that was the sort of moment when falling over would be bad.

  He is able to move really slowly and make you die wondering exactly what he’s going to do. When the zipper was just below my shoulder blades, I felt his tongue on my neck. Just the tip of it.

  The crinkle of wrapping paper and a little bit of gaspy heavy breathing. Is that what Christmas has become for me? Newly single and slightly turned on by the sound of tissue rubbing against shiny crisp foil?

  So I sat under our nondesigner tree in the middle of our dollar-store-wrapping-paper shreds and watched Preston try to tear open a DVD. He had cowlicks all over his head. Preston has the biggest brown eyes ever, and even though his face is really pale, he has like ten dark freckles right across his nose. Funny how he couldn’t seem to get past the little line of tape they put at the top and bottom of the DVD case. Needed fingernails, I guess.

  “Time for the stockings!” Mom said, grabbing two of the three from the mantel.

  Preston jumped over the footstool and practically tore his from Mom’s hands. She laughed and handed me mine, and then sat down next to Dad. He took her hand and held it for a few minutes. My mind was in slow mode, a precaffeine present-induced daze. So I just focused for a moment on the way they were sitting there. It was really sweet, and it was totally weird. They’ve been fighting lately, yelling at each other. But all that seemed to be forgotten as they sat together in front of the Christmas tree watching me. Mom acted nervous. Her leg kind of bounced up and down. Weird. The stocking is the final spurt at the end of the present frenzy. It isn’t anything exciting. Unless, unless. Here’s where the imagination kicked in.

  I reached my hand in. First present, wrapped in paper scraps from the bigger packages, was a tube of Chap Stick. Cool, I guess. Next was a bottle of salon shampoo. I like the one that smells like coconuts. Then some gel pens. I really liked those in middle school. I can still use them for taking notes in history class. Mr. Leonard is big on time lines. Gel pens. Kid stuff, but it’s just a stocking, right?

  A tube of too-red lipstick (I’m more of a gloss girl), a roll of Scotch tape (dropped in by accident, I presume?), and something small and cold that snagged in the foot of the woven stocking.

  My fist closed around it. Preston was jumping up and down waving some kind of cheap little MP3 player that still had an orange Clearance tag stuck to it. Our Miracle Boy adores gadgets. My parents were staring at me hungrily, waiting.

  I turned it over in my hand. The rounded top, the grooved side. A key.

  2

  I remember Paige’s sixteenth birthday party with this complete sense of awe. Every kid in school was there. Well, not every student enrolled in Allenville High, but everyone who mattered. It was one of those occasions where, as a skinny thirteen-year-old, I couldn’t help saying over and over to myself, My time will come, my time will come.

  Paige looked really good in a hot-pink shirt and these flared jeans. Her hair was that silky sexy golden blond, and her wide slanty blue eyes were lined with this light shim-mery blue stuff that just made them glow. She was happy and laughing, greeting people, the center of attention. I couldn’t believe all the good-looking older boys who were there.

  My mom did an Asian theme. She hung these cool little lanterns all over the yard. During the party she stood behind Paige and smiled proudly. Every once in a while she walked around to make sure everyone was happy and no one was spilling Pepsi on our leather couch or sneaking off to make out or anything like that. And every time she saw my sister she smiled this radiant smile that lit her face up like one of the glowing pink lanterns, which were illuminated with votive candles. I know because I had to light them all.

  We ate outside at these long
tables, and there was soft music playing. I was beside the fountain. It made a tinkling sound. I remember picking at a scab on my knee and wondering why Paige got the head-turning blond hair and I got the dark hair.

  The only time Paige acknowledged me that afternoon was when our ex-neighbors, Kyle and Marion Henessy, came over and wanted to hang out with her. I guess Mom invited them, because Paige couldn’t get rid of them fast enough. She pushed them toward me. I stood up, waiting for her to say something after “Hey, Parker, here are Kyle and Marion. You guys can hang out with the Ice Princess.” But then she turned and left me to sit with the other party rejects. Kyle was almost the same age as Paige and her friends, but of course they didn’t want to hang around with him. She walked away. He stared after her. I remember asking him a question, but he was still watching her and he didn’t notice me. He was on the edge of being a freak even then. We just didn’t know it. The kid sister and the guests who were only invited because our moms are friends. Real cool.

  But the party itself was perfect. Someday this will be me, I thought.

  Then came the gifts. Paige had the ability to open them slowly, read each card, smile at the giver so that he or she felt special for a moment, basking in her golden attention.

  She was opening the last one, picking at the tape with her perfect pink fingernails, when the Volkswagen pulled up.

  It was unforgettable. Paige looked up, squinted, trying to see who was driving, and then when she saw that it was Dad, she screamed. A real toe-curling, bloodcurdling scream.

  Everybody stood up and clapped. The boys threw confetti, and West Thompson, the captain of the football team and my future brother-in-law, managed to get some of it in my eye. He was throwing like a maniac. Paige walked down the steps and over to the car slowly, like a sleepwalker. She opened the door, but she didn’t get in. She walked around, ran her hand reverently over the candy-apple finish. She wiped her eyes. She was crying. It was amazing.

  I wasn’t jealous of her, except that she was sixteen and I was a scabby twelve. She was beautiful and I was awkward. She had the coolest car I had ever seen. My time will come, I told myself. Four more years. It seemed too long to have to wait.