Chapter Text
August, 2008
Rose sat on the curb outside her house – the evening breeze perfectly cool against her skin, creating little goosebumps on her bare arms. She’d lost her keys, again. Probably at the party she’d been at yesterday with Sveta. And so, she’d gotten locked out, again. Usually, she would just knock at the Hollanders’ house and ask to hang out there for a couple of hours, but it had happened a little too many times for her not to feel embarrassed about it. This time, though, it wouldn’t be for a couple of hours since her brother was who the fuck knows where, and their parents were on a business trip. So, she had used the last of the battery on her phone and texted her boyfriend Hayden to come get her.
There was a party tonight too, she thought, but she didn’t really care. She didn’t really care about her boyfriend either, she just needed somewhere to sleep for the night. She liked Yuna and David. And Shane, of course, who’d been her best friend their entire childhood. At least until they started high school. Which was another reason she didn’t want to knock the door – they weren’t that close anymore. Shane was a jock, after all, and he wasn’t ugly or anything, she thought. Which is why she didn’t understand why Shane wouldn’t hang out with the other jocks on the hockey team. He could be cool if he wanted to. Sure, he was a nerd, but still. At least he had J.J., she hoped, but she wasn’t sure. Rose wondered if he had anyone at all now who he was close to. She missed him. They used to be friends, best friends even.
She sat there, absently playing with three long straws of grass, braiding them like her mother used to braid her hair, while waiting for her ride. She didn’t even know what time it was, but it must have been close to midnight when she saw Yuna’s white Jeep drive up the street and onto their driveway. Yuna often came home late, and a few times she’d spot Rose smoking by the side of her house, which had granted Rose a few side-eyes. But Yuna had never told on her. When Rose thought about it, Yuna had never told Rose’s parents anything that would get her in immense trouble.
This evening was different, though, because out from the passenger seat of Yuna’s car stepped a boy Rose had never seen before. A tall boy with golden curls and a duffel bag slung over his shoulder. He was a little too far away to see what he really looked like, but she could see his worn-out sneakers as she caught him staring wide-eyed at the houses and the cars on the driveways in the neighborhood.
A few seconds later, her boyfriend’s Mercedes Cabriolet turned into the street, the V8 engine roaring through the silent neighborhood. He was driving a little too fast, as usual. It was fucking embarrassing.
Yuna caught her gaze from the noise. “Oh, hi Rose!” she called into the night.
“Hi Yuna,” Rose shouted back, then smiled and waved.
The boy on the Hollanders’ driveway turned around and nodded nonchalantly. Rose nodded back.
“Who was that guy?” her boyfriend Hayden asked, frowning as Rose jumped over the passenger door and strapped herself in the seat.
“I don’t know,” Rose said. But the stranger with the golden curls was not from here, that was for sure, she thought silently. “Fasten your seatbelt, I don’t want to die,” Rose added. “And you drive like shit.”
Hayden looked offended for maybe half a second, and then his mouth slid into the same charming, careless smile that had worked on half the girls at Harbor and two of their mothers.
“I came to rescue you,” he said.
“You came to pick me up after I texted you three times.”
“Yeah. Rescue.” He winked, then leaned over to kiss Rose on the cheek.
Rose rolled her eyes and reached for the CD-player, turning the volume down partly because she was so tired of Hayden’s terrible remixes, and partly because she didn’t want to wake up the entire block. Hayden’s car smelled like leather, salt, and expensive cologne. Everything about Hayden smelled expensive. His watch, his shoes, his stupidly perfect hair.
The Mercedes pulled away from the curb, and as they slowly started driving away, Rose caught Yuna opening the front door. Warm yellow light spilled out in the evening across the sandstone path and the driveway and over the boy’s face for one brief second before he ducked his head and stepped inside the house. He looked tired.
“What are you staring at?” Hayden asked.
“Nothing.”
“Is that some new guy?”
“I said I don’t know.”
“Kind of weird though, right? Why would Yuna bring home some random guy in the middle of the night? Well. That entire family is weird.”
Rose turned slowly to look at him.
Hayden winced. “Okay, sorry sorry, that sounded bad.”
“It sounded stupid, Hayden,” Rose sneered.
“But…I mean…Shane is kind of weird, right? Didn’t you use to be friends, or something?”
“It was a long time ago,” Rose said, and glanced back a last time. The Hollander house was lit up now.
The houses swooshed by in the dark, the bushes and plants in neat, manicured figurines and shapes. White, large driveways with enormous garages and climbing plants in hot pink and lush green over walls and fences that existed only to keep the people out who wouldn’t be invited in anyway. Every lawn had been watered that morning and every driveway had at least one car that probably almost cost more than most people’s yearly salary. Rose could smell the ocean, whenever the wind shifted, the salty breeze caressing her skin. The ocean was always there, even though it wasn’t close enough that you could see it from this street. Newport. An unreachable heaven for outsiders. A hell with marble counters, if you asked Rose. But the ocean was always there. So was money.
***
Four hours earlier
Yuna was so tired. It had been a long-ass day and when she received a call from the juvenile prison, she realized it would get even longer. She had really looked forward to going home at a reasonable time for once, pouring herself a glass of wine and having David give her a good foot massage, just like he always did without even being asked to. It hadn’t just been a long-ass day – it had been a long-ass week.
But she could never say no when they needed her help at the juvie. She wondered what kid had gotten themselves in trouble this time. She got the answer shortly after that. The answer was, apparently, the kind of kid who sat hunched back in an interview room like he was born frowning and indifferent.
Ilya Rozanov. He was seventeen, soon to be eighteen. Soon an adult, according to the file. Born in Moscow. Mother deceased, found by then-twelve year old Ilya. Entered the United States at thirteen. His father had previous shorter prison sentences, and had been arrested earlier that afternoon on possession, distribution, and illegal weapons charges. Ilya’s older brother had been arrested with him. Prior school disciplinary records but no violent convictions, only one minor juvenile incident. Several absences but no expulsions and only one suspension from school. They had lived at several different addresses in the last year, and he had no other family in California willing or able to take him. He needed a lawyer, so the state of California would provide him with one. Yuna read all of that in less than a minute, then looked through the one-way mirrored glass.
The boy was sitting with his long legs stretched out under the table, fingering the rough edges of something on his necklace. It looked like it might be a cross, or a crucifix. He had a split in his lower lip and his curly hair was matted and flattened on one side, his grey hoodie worn thin at the edges. A paper cup of water sat in front of him, untouched.
“He says he doesn’t need a lawyer,” said the officer, just as tired as every officer who had ever called Yuna after nine p.m. She knew that he knew that he was asking her to help him fix a glitch in the system he had already helped make worse.
Yuna did not look away from the boy. Of course he didn’t want a lawyer, she thought.
“He’s not being charged with anything tonight. He didn’t have anything on him.”
“Then why is he in an interrogation room?” She asked and the officer shifted beside her. She didn’t get an answer. “Why is he in an interrogation room?”
“He was at the house when the arrests happened. Apparently, there was some resistance.”
“From him?”
“From everyone in there. It was pure chaos and he shoved an officer.”
“Was the officer touching him?”
The officer sighed, again. “Yuna.”
“I’m only gonna ask this once, again, was the officer touching him in any kind of way?”
“He was trying to keep my colleague back, preventing him…”
“From what?”
“His brother.”
Yuna looked through the glass again at the seventeen-year-old boy. He was soon to be a man in the system but in there, on that hard plastic chair, sat a scared kid. Yuna knew it because she had seen it so many times before. “What will happen to him tonight?”
“We’ll most likely let him go, but since he’s legally not an adult, he can also stay here for the night. Then, hopefully, we can take him to an emergency placement or a shelter tomorrow morning. We’re working on it.”
“Hopefully? Working on it?” Yuna laughed, humorlessly. “So nowhere. The streets.”
“It’s not nowhere. There might be a place that has space tomorrow. We’re doing everything we can, and you know that.”
The officer was one of Yuna’s childhood friends, because all the people around here were either relatives or childhood friends. It was a tight-knit community, but she knew they did not do everything they could. “Sure you are, buddy,” she said and patted her friend on his shoulder. “He can’t go back home?”
The officer rubbed his neck when Yuna closed the file. “No,” the officer said.
“No, what? I’m not buying the bureaucratic bullshit, let me talk to him.” Yuna said sternly, then pushed the door open before he finished talking.
The room smelled like old coffee and cheap lemon scented cleaning supplies. Yuna set the file on the table across from him. “Hi. My name is Yuna Hollander,” she said.
“Okay,” he said.
Yuna noticed that he had an accent, and while it wasn’t thick, it still gave depth to certain sounds in consonants, making it seem like every word choice out of his mouth was both deliberate and somehow unable to stop himself.
“I am an attorney,” Yuna said, not smiling.
“Congratulations. It is good job.”
Yuna sighed. Another cocky teen who probably would say he didn’t want nor need any help and that he was fine on his own. “Yes, it is. I like my job, even during long days like these,” she said, deciding to be nice. It looked like he needed someone to be nice to him.
“I did not ask for attorney.”
And there it was, she thought, and guessed she had to choose a different trajectory, especially if she wanted to come home today. “Congratulations, you got one anyway.”
“I am lucky guy,” he scoffed, and his gaze darted away.
“Well, that remains to be seen, I think,” Yuna said, raising an eyebrow. He looked tired. and sad.
He shot a grin at her. “You always talk like a movie lawyer?” he asked, giving her a raised eyebrow back.
“Only when I’m tired. So please, Mr. Rozanov. Ilya. May I call you Ilya?” Yuna asked, her tone deliberately softer now. “Cut the crap with me. What happened, really?”
“I did not do anything,” Ilya said, quieter now.
“I believe you,” she answered, and he finally looked her in the eyes. It seemed to surprise him and he hid it quickly, but not quick enough. She opened the file again, but more to have something to do rather than the need to look at it. “But you were present during the arrest of your father and brother. They questioned you, right? But you refused to answer questions without a lawyer, even though you also refused a lawyer? That’s somewhat contradictory, I think.”
Ilya shrugged and looked away again.
“Your father and brother won’t be released tonight,” Yuna said, and saw something in his jaw tick. “Do you have someone I can call?”
“No.”
“Relative?”
“No.”
“Family friend? Teacher? Coach? Neighbor?”
“No.”
“You’re very quick to answer all these questions.”
“Because the answer is no, what do you want me to say?”
Yuna sighed, then folded her hands on the table. “Ilya,” she said in her most kind, motherly voice, and watched him flinch slightly. “I need you to understand the situation,” she said. “You are seventeen, which simplifies some things and complicates a hell of a lot of other things. You are not being charged right now, which frankly, I’m surprised you’re not, considering the situation you were caught in. That is good. But you also do not appear to have a safe place to go tonight. That is bad.”
“I have a place.”
“The house was searched and is closed off for investigation. It is not available to you. You can’t go there.”
“I can stay with a friend.”
“Who? I’m going to need a name and address so I can reach you, since I am your assigned attorney.”
Ilya looked away, staring into the wall, and Yuna waited. She didn’t mind waiting, because she was good at waiting. The clock ticked on the wall and Ilya swallowed, grinding his teeth. All obvious signals of anxiety and unease. He picked at the edge of the paper cup until its edges were rolled out straight.
“Okay,” he finally said, admitting. “No friend.”
It was so casual it almost broke Yuna’s heart. Because it would mean that he would be homeless when they released him tonight. Where would he go? A motel? And then what? Yuna had trained herself, for years and years, not to let every child she encountered climb into her chest with their ruined lives and sad eyes and set up camp in her heart. A camp that very, very easily became permanent. She had trained herself because otherwise she would have burned out by thirty-five and she had seen enough burned-out mothers and attorneys to know that that was not something she wanted. So, she had taught herself boundaries, and she believed in boundaries.
And still.
In front of her sat a boy in dirty clothes with no one coming from him. Although technically still considered a child, he was legally soon to be an adult – a young man from one day to another. The same age as her son at home who was probably already sleeping in his freshly made bed with soft sheets.
“What happened to your lip?” she asked.
“Walked into a door.”
“Did the door have a badge?”
Ilya’s mouth twitched, but just barely. Then it was gone. “I am fine,” he said.
“Sure, honey. That’s what everyone in these kinds of rooms say.”
“Maybe everyone is fine. Ever thought of that?”
“You’re very cocky for someone who’s on the brink of being homeless,” she said, looking at him so he would understand the seriousness in her statement. “But no, they’re usually not.”
He stared back at her for a long time, and Yuna looked at him. The split lip, the guarded eyes, the duffel bag by his feet. He leaned back again, crossing his arms over his chest. “So what happens now, movie lawyer?”
She thought of David, who would sigh at first and then probably ask the boy if he was hungry before he asked her why she had brought him home. She really hoped she wouldn’t regret this. “I’m going to give you a suggestion. But I will treat you as a person who can make their own decisions, even though you’re legally not considered an adult, so you can say no. You can come with me, for the night.”
“Where?”
“To my house, for tonight.”
“No.”
“Okay then,” she said, and started folding the file. “Then I wish you all luck, Mr. Rozanov. Ilya. I’m sorry, but there’s nothing else I can do.” She put her card on the table in front of him. “Here’s my card. I am still your assigned attorney.”
She saw his flickering gaze, darting around him as she stood up.
“I do not know you.”
“Correct. But I don’t see a lot of other opportunities. I was trying to be nice.”
“You could be a murderer.”
“I’m not.”
“That is what a murderer would say.”
Yuna knew that he was stalling, so she sat down again, only for a moment. “Ilya, I have been awake since five-thirty this morning. I have argued with two judges, been in a fight with a school board, eaten half a donut and a protein bar for lunch, and then I missed dinner and I really love chicken parm. I am giving you the opportunity to go somewhere with a shower, a bed, and breakfast in the morning, although it’s probably some kind of bland, organic cereal, because that’s what my husband buys. You can either accept that, or you can sit here until they decide they’re done with you, and you’ll be on the street. Your call.”
He stared at her, then said. “Organic cereal sounds bad.”
“They are. They taste like cardboard, but they’re healthy and apparently that’s important to my husband. So I let him buy them.”
“Chicken parm sounds good.”
“It is very good but we don’t eat it that often,” she said, then added, “Unfortunately.”
Ilya furrowed his brows, as if thinking how he could best annoy Yuna. “I curse.”
“So do I,” Yuna answered casually.
“I smoke.”
“Not in my house.”
This kid, Yuna thought. Will either be a happy surprise for my family, or the object of our destruction.
“I am not a good guest,” Ilya said, looking away to avoid meeting her gaze.
Yuna stood and picked up the file, then put it in her briefcase. “I’m not asking you to be a good guest.” She sighed.
“Then what are you asking?”
“For you to get your bag. Because I’m tired and want to go home.”
Ilya stood up immediately and grabbed his duffel bag from the floor. But though he didn’t move right away, the attitude disappeared for a moment. And Yuna’s motherly heart clenched. Because it was only enough to barely see a hint of the exhausted boy underneath the hard exterior.
“You have a family?” he asked. “More than husband?”
“Yes.”
“Do they know?” His voice was a little quieter now.
“Not yet,” she said and smiled.
He gave her a short, loud laugh. “Great. This will be exciting.”
“They’ll live. I’m sure.”
Ilya raised a curious eyebrow to her. “Are you really sure?”
“No,” Yuna answered. “But I’m safe to say that I’m often – well, usually, actually – right.”
That made Ilya smile, just a little. It was a crooked little smile that made him look even more boyish and completely out of place in that terrible, cold room. He hauled his duffel bag over his shoulder. “What are you waiting for? Let’s go, movie lawyer.”
***
David opened the door at the same time that Yuna pulled her keys out of her briefcase. He was barefoot, wearing his washed out McGill t-shirt that Yuna absolutely loved because it reminded her of when they met. He looked first at Yuna, then at Ilya, then at Ilya’s duffel bag, then back at Yuna again.
”Hi,” David said to Ilya.
Ilya looked at him with suspicion, glancing back at Yuna with unease, like he had expected her to be scolded or yelled at. But David did none of those things, just opened the door and smiled.
”I’m David,” he said and stepped aside.
Ilya hesitated a second and looked at Yuna again, as if asking for permission. Yuna nodded to let him know that it was okay.
”Ilya,” Ilya said.
”Come in,” David answered casually. And Yuna loved him a little bit more in that moment, if it was even possible.
The second Ilya stepped in, it was as if he regretted it in an instant. He glanced at his own shoes and the contrast between them and the Moroccan tile floor of the hallway in the Hollander’s house. He held his duffel strap tight, then took off his shoes and placed them neatly next to the other ones. And David noticed because of course he did. He always noticed.
”I was going to grab myself some late night snacks, are you hungry?” David asked Ilya.
”I am fine,” Ilya said between clenched teeth, looking around at the paintings, the ceilings, the chandelier they inherited from David’s mother.
They walked into the kitchen and David brought out leftovers from the fridge. ”We have pasta, chicken parm, rice, leftover salmon, tofu curry -”
”Chicken parm. I heard someone say that was tasty,” Ilya said, looking in Yuna’s direction, then sat down by the kitchen marble. In the corner of her eye, Yuna saw him idly stroke the marble, raising his eyebrows.
”Good choice,” David said and brought out plates from their cabinet. ”It’s very tasty. You want some tofu, honey?”
”I can take tofu, if Mrs Hollander wants chicken parm,” Ilya said hastily. ”Is fine.”
Yuna took out three glasses from their cupboard, then two cans of sparkling water from the fridge. ”First of all, it’s Yuna, and I love tofu,” she said, then opened the can and filled her glass. ”What flavor do you want?”
”There are more than one? Is fine, whatever you have,” Ilya answered.
”I like grapefruit,” Yuna said and brought out another can of grapefruit-flavored seltzer. ”Is Shane asleep?”
”Yes,” David answered and put a plate loaded with chicken parm in the microwave. ”He’s got his morning drills.”
”At six?”
”Five-thirty, even, I think,” David said, smiled and rolled his eyes.
Ilya leaned his elbows on the kitchen island, tapping on the seltzer cap. ”Who is Shane?” He asked.
”Oh, Yuna didn’t tell you?” David said as he opened the microwave just before it dinged. ”Shane’s our son, he’s about your age, I think. Wait, how old are you?” He put down the plate in front of Ilya.
”Seventeen,” Ilya said as he shoved the first fork of food into his mouth, then groaned and did a little shimmy.
David looked at Yuna with a sad smile. There was so much in that smile.
”Shane’s a sweet kid, he doesn’t mind sharing space,” Yuna said.
David coughed. ”No. Not at all.”
Ilya spun around, his gaze darting between Yuna and David. ”He does not know I am here, no?”
”He is asleep. We’ll tell him in the morning,” David assured him. ”Shane likes his routines, but there will be no problems. Like I said; he’s a good kid.”
Yuna decided to change the subject. She would have to get up early on her day off to give her very rigid, routine-driven son, a heads up. ”Ilya, you’ll sleep in the pool house tonight.”
Ilya looked between them. ”You have house for your pool?” He asked.
David smiled. ”Technically it’s a guest house by the pool, I’d say.”
”So yes.”
”Yes, we have a house for our pool. That would be correct,” David answered.
”There are towels in the cabinet. And David will find you something clean to wear after you have a shower.”
”I have clothes,” Ilya said.
Yuna was too tired for this bickering, but she understood why he did it. ”Okay. Can I wash them for you?”
Ilya furrowed his brows. ”I don’t need charity,” he said, almost a question.
”I know you don’t. It was just a question, and I didn’t offer charity,” Yuna said, ”I offered fresh towels and then I just wanted to see if you needed some clean socks for tomorrow.”
David looked down to hide a smile, while Ilya narrowed his eyes as if trying to decide if he disliked her and was about to hit her with another sassy comment, or if he respected her. Either way, Yuna was used to both looks. Judges gave them to her often.
”Clean socks would be nice. Thank you,” Ilya said quietly and looked down at the floor.
When they finished eating, David led them out the patio doors to the pool area. The glowing lamps in the water lit up the yard, casting flickering blue waves on the white stone walls of the pool house. A row of hedges separated their yard from the Landrys’ property next door, though not well enough to stop childhood Shane and Rose crawling through it.
Ilya stopped on the patio when David unlocked the door to the pool house, as if realizing there would be no turning back once he stepped inside.
”Bathroom’s through there. The sheets are clean and there should be spare toothbrushes under the sink,” David said.
Ilya looked around the room, at the bed, the couch, the little bowl of smooth round stones Shane had collected on the beach as a kid.
”Get some sleep. Do not smoke in my pool house,” Yuna said, looking pointedly at the ragged boy and the contrast between his dirty jeans and the white, fluffy carpet.
”I can open the window?”
”No.”
”Okay, movie lawyer. No smoking in pool house.” Ilya said, then smirked.
Yuna leaned against the doorframe. ”Sleep tight. We’ll talk in the morning.”
”Yes. Good night.”
Just as Yuna and David were about to leave and close the door, Ilya turned around. ”Thank you, Yuna. And David,” he said with a tight smile.
As they crossed the yard back to the house, Yuna saw Ilya through the window of the pool house. He was sitting on the edge of the bed, bouncing and looking around the room.
She and David walked back over the patio and into the house. Inside, David locked the glass door behind them.
”You okay?” He asked
”No,” Yuna answered.
”Wine?”
”Yes please.”
David took down two glasses from the cabinet.
Yuna leaned over the kitchen island and pressed the heels of her hands into the eyes. Her body felt heavy now that she had stopped moving and started relaxing. Her feet hurt. Her head hurt. Her heart hurt too, somehow.
David poured the wine and slid a glass toward her. ”How bad is it?”
”Bad.”
”Does he have any family?” David asked.
”Both his father and brother were arrested today,” she said, then sighed. ”The charges will probably mean prison for both of them.”
”Mother?”
”Dead. I think she killed herself.”
David’s face changed. ”Oh, shit.”
”Yeah, shit. To say the least. There’s no stable school record, no extended family, no placement lined up. No money that I can see. I don’t know how much of a problem his immigration history will cause, I need to check that more, but he’s very close to ending up on the street.”
David looked toward the backyard.
”Shane is going to have a lot of questions.”
”We will tell him enough,” David said.
”What about the rest?”
David nodded and sighed. ”The rest is Ilya’s to tell or not to tell.”
Yuna was amazed that her husband considered the integrity of a boy that might as well be a criminal.
”What about tomorrow?” David asked.
”Tomorrow,” she said, ”we tell Shane what he needs to know, then we figure out how much trouble I invited into our backyard.”
”Maybe not only trouble. Come on, honey, let’s go to bed. You must be exhausted.” David gently rubbed her shoulder. ”I’ll give you a foot massage.”
***
The first sound Ilya heard in the morning was a steady, hollow clacking sound.
Clack.
Clack clack.
Clack clack ping.
The sound came again with rhythmic succession. He knew that sound as if it was printed into his bone marrow. It was a puck shot toward something. Clack. Ping. That was a goalpost.
Clack clack. Fast shots, made with annoyance. Irritation, even.
Ilya opened one eye and for a second he had no idea where he was, but he felt rested. He didn’t remember the last time he’d slept this well. He sighed as he stretched out his long limbs under the fluffy duvet, then rolled over and pressed his face into the pillow. They were amazingly soft and the sheets were almost crispy – and they smelled like detergent. Real detergent, not cigarette smoke and hand soap.
Pale white light shone in through the thin fabric of the curtains, and he heard the chirping of birds.
Clack ping.
Ilya sat up. His whole body hurt. Not badly. Just a familiar ache of staying too tense for too long. His lip stung when he ran his tongue over it. He looked around the pool house in daylight and it was even worse than at night. At night it had felt surreal, but in the daylight it almost hurt his eyes how white and pretty and fancy it was. A bowl of seashells and little books on a shelf. There were abstract paintings on the walls and a blanket that probably cost more than his old skates was slung over the couch.
Clack. Clack clack. Ping.
”What the fuck,” Ilya muttered.
He found his cigarettes in the front pocket of his duffel bag, along with a pair of grey sweatpants and a t-shirt that was mostly clean but a little short. He got dressed and went outside.
The morning air hit him – humid, but not too warm. The sky was pale blue, almost white.
The hedges were perfectly trimmed and the pool was perfectly turquoise. All the properties looked the same, like they’d been copied and pasted from a computer game. Beyond the yard, palm trees swayed in the breeze. He couldn’t see the beach from here, but the ocean glimmered on the edge of the horizon. It was so beautiful. So perfect.
Ilya hated it instantly.
He also wanted, very badly, to keep looking.
The clacking sound came from the driveway. He followed the stone path around the side of the house, cigarette between his lips, lighter cupped in one hand.
And there he was. Shane Hollander, presumably. He stood on the smooth concrete driveway in short athletic shorts, sneakers and a faded practice shirt. He was tall and lean, but not as tall as Ilya. His movements were controlled, well-calculated. Ilya found himself mesmerized by the way the muscles moved under the skin of his forearms, and the way his black hair was damp and plastered on his forehead.
He was moving a puck around a line of orange cones in natural, fluid motions. Every shift of the blade was clean, every step with his feet swift and fast.
Ilya stopped walking and just watched as Shane hit puck after puck into the goal. Forehand – clack. Forehand again – clack. Top corner. Backhand – ping. Miss. Backhand again – ping. Another miss.
Shane swore silently to himself, not noticing that Ilya was watching him.
Ilya felt something small twist in his chest. It had been so long since he touched a hockey stick.
Click.
Click click.
Click click.
Stupid fucking lighter, Ilya thought, then shook the lighter in his palm.
Click.
Blyat.
“You shouldn’t smoke here,” Shane said without looking up. His voice was calm and his attention was still deeply focused on the stick in his hand and the pucks in front of him.
Click. Finally. A light flickered and Ilya lit his cigarette, taking a long drag.
Shane kept working through the big pile of pucks. Forehand. Clack. “My mom hates smoking.”
“Your mom has many opinions.”
”She’s often right, though,” Shane said as he reset again, dragging the puck to the left, then right, picked it up with the blade, and sent it into the net. Clack. Then, finally, he seemed to register his company. Or the fact that there was another person in his driveway, smoking.
When Shane shifted his gaze to Ilya, it was with a questioning frown on his face. Ilya noticed that Shane’s neck was glistening with sweat, and that the collar of his t-shirt was damp from it. He had a bunch of freckles scattered over the bridge of his nose and cheeks, and Ilya instantly knew that he liked them.
“You have a weak backhand,” Ilya said.
“No I don’t.” Shane blinked once when he realized that he didn’t recognize Ilya. “Who are you?”
Ilya took another drag from his cigarette. “Whoever you want me to be.”
Shane raised his eyebrows as he looked at Ilya’s bare feet on the ground, then frowned slightly and turned his focus back on his pile of pucks. “The fuck is that supposed to mean?” he asked, and shot Ilya a swift glance.
Ilya just shrugged in return.
“Why are you in my driveway?” Shane looked past him toward the backyard, then toward the house, then back at Ilya again. “Did Rose bring you?”
“No.”
Shane’s gaze moved to Ilya again, his dark eyes examining Ilya’s wrinkled t-shirt, old sweatpants, split lip, and cigarette. Ilya did not like being examined. “Stop looking at me like that,” Ilya said.
“Like what? I wasn’t. And I don’t have a weak backhand.”
The atmosphere between them turned chilly despite the sunny, humid morning. Shane looked like he wanted to argue, so Ilya thought that maybe he should let Shane argue a bit. He didn’t know what Shane saw when he looked at him, but he was used to people seeing him as trouble. Poor. And then when he opened his mouth: foreign. Criminal-adjacent.
“Yes you were. And yes, you do. It is sloppy,” Ilya said, then regretted it as soon as the words left his tongue. Ilya should have shut up - he knew that instantly when he saw the sour look on Shane’s face. He meant it as nothing, a little jab maybe. Sometimes he said and did things faster than his brain intended.
Shane opened his mouth and was just about to say something when they heard a voice from the other side of the house. “Shane, are you outside?” And soon David’s head peeked out from around the corner, “Oh,” David said. “Good. You’ve met.”
”No,” Shane said.
”Sort of,” Ilya said at the same time. ”So you did not know.”
”Know what?” Shane asked, his lips pursed.
”You were asleep when Mom came home,” David said. ”We were going to talk to you this morning, but we didn’t think Ilya would wake up before us and do it himself.”
”Was hard to sleep,” Ilya said and took a drag from his cigarette. ”Very noisy.”
”Put that out,” David said sternly. Ilya crouched down and crushed the cigarette butt carefully against the ground, before picking it up and putting it in the trash bin.
”So, here’s the thing. Ilya will be staying with us for a little while, and will be living in the pool house. Come on, let’s go inside and have breakfast and we can talk more about it.”
Shane looked at the pulse watch on his wrist, then back up at his dad. ”I still have 30 more minutes of drills. I’ll come inside after that.”
David walked in through the front door and left the two of them alone again.
”You schedule your shooting drills at home?”
”Yes. Why?”
Ilya grinned. ”No why. I was just curious.” Ilya definitely wondered why.
Ilya noticed that Shane seemed to consider the question Ilya asked, as if he’d never been asked something even remotely close to that before. ”I like to schedule things,” Shane added. ”You play hockey?”
Ilya’s grin disappeared. ”No.”
”Why?” Shane asked casually.
”What do you mean why?”
”Well you seem to think you know enough to have the audacity to provide unsolicited feedback,” Shane snapped.
Sassy, Ilya thought. He had not expected that, so he just smiled and followed David inside.
***
Ilya washed his hands in the kitchen sink, feeling a little lost in the ginormous kitchen. The stove had eight burners, and in the corner of the pale stone counter stood a real espresso machine. Sunlight poured through the glass door that led to the patio and pool area. Ilya thought that this was what heaven must be like, and imagined himself on a floating flamingo in the pool, a drink in one hand and a pair of boobs in the other. Or something.
David came into the kitchen, wearing a hoodie and reading glasses, a copy of The New Yorker in his hand. Why The New Yorker, Ilya thought. We are in California.
”Do you like scrambled eggs?” David asked, and brought out the egg carton from the fridge, together with a bottle of orange juice. The fancy kind, Ilya noticed, with pulp and all, and not from concentrate.
”Yes, eggs are fine,” Ilya said. ”Can I help?”
”Do you want to make them? You know how to do it?”
”I always make breakfast, sometimes eggs, sometimes other things.” What he didn’t say was that he’d made his own breakfast since he was eleven, and that he didn’t remember the last time someone else made breakfast for him. There had been times, when his father hadn’t paid the utilities bill, when he’d had milk and cereal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for an entire week straight.
“I told you no smoking,” Yuna said and poked a finger on Ilya's forehead, “you’re not charming your way out of the no smoking rule.”
“I am charming?” Ilya asked with a smile.
“No.”
They jabbed back and forth, and Ilya promised not to smoke (in their yard, but he made sure not to promise anything about not smoking at all). After that, he rapidly got to experience what he assumed must be teasing as some form of language spoken in the Hollander family. He noticed there was no pushing down in the way Yuna gently mocked Ilya’s six cubes of sugar in his coffee.
When Ilya had added spinach and tomatoes, and finished stirring the eggs on the stove, Shane strolled into the kitchen wearing a fresh set of clothing. His face was flushed from the shower, and he walked straight to the fridge and brought out two containers with fresh strawberries and blueberries. Then Shane proceeded to bring out a box of cereal from the pantry and Ilya gagged, silently, in his head. It was obvious from the box alone that the cereal was terrible.
“So,” Shane said, popping a strawberry into his mouth. “Care to explain what’s going on and why there’s a stranger living in our pool house?”
Yuna set her mug down and let out a breath, and was just about to say something when Ilya decided to take matters into his own hands.
“My father was arrested,” he said before Yuna could begin. “My brother too. Very dramatic. Your mother is a lawyer. She felt bad and let me sleep in your pool house. Not very dramatic. You are caught up.”
The room went silent, except for the scraping sound of the spatula in the pan when Ilya loaded eggs onto four plates, and when Ilya shifted his gaze, he noticed that Shane was looking at him. Not at his lip this time, and not at his clothes either.
“I’m sorry,” Shane said, his brows furrowed.
Ilya hated that. Hated the implied pity in Shane’s words, even though Shane did not make it sound like pity. Somehow, that made it worse. He noticed how his grip on the fork in his hand got tighter, and leaned back in his chair. “Why? Did you arrest them?”
“No, obviously I didn’t.”
“Then stupid thing to say,” Ilya said and shoved a forkful of eggs into his mouth to stop himself from insulting Shane in his own house.
“Ilya,” Yuna said.
“What I meant was – it must suck major ass that they did whatever they did and put you in this situation. I’m not pitying you, if you think that,” Shane said steadily and poured blueberries into a bowl, then added the cereal. Ilya thought it looked like little pieces of cardboard. Terrible. “So, yeah.”
“Shane,” Yuna said. “Language – please.”
Shane did not look angry, but his voice was stern. That was strange, Ilya thought, because most people got angry when Ilya pushed. Or they got nervous. But Shane talked like he was simply stating facts.
“Here’s what you need to know, Shane,” Yuna said, then took a big gulp from her mug of coffee. “Ilya is staying here temporarily while I assess the situation. No one is asking Ilya to tell or explain anything he doesn’t want to explain. During the day today, I will try to figure out school, and the next steps over the next few days will be the other legal issues. Okay?”
Shane nodded. “Are there safety concerns?”
Ilya barked a laugh. “Wow.”
“What?” Shane asked and looked at him, “It’s a perfectly reasonable question.”
“How nice of you to think so highly of me,” Ilya answered, taking another sip of his slightly too hot coffee. “You think I will bring gang to your nice driveway?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Okay, sure.” Ilya rolled his eyes. “So you did not think it.”
“No,” Shane said sternly. “I was wondering whether anyone might come looking for you.”
That made Ilya shut up. Because yes. Maybe. Probably not. Maybe Alexei owed someone money. Maybe his father did. His father often owed people money and they often came to their house, looking for that money.
Yuna answered for him. “We don’t know yet.”
“Okay,” Shane answered.
“Okay? What do you mean okay?” Ilya frowned.
“What else should I say?” Shane looked genuinely confused.
“I don’t know. More panic, maybe.”
For a while the only sounds were the crunching of toast and the scraping of forks against plates. Ilya felt his insides go more and more rigid.
Then Shane said, “What school did you go to?”
Ilya continued eating. “Many. Latest one was public school in Santa Ana.”
“Are you on track to graduate?”
“Shane,” Yuna said.
“What? That matters, doesn’t it?”
“I don’t know,” Ilya said.
Shane looked genuinely troubled by this. “How do you not know?”
“Very easy. When you stop going, they will not care after a while. They will probably think it is good you don’t attend, because then your drunk and high dad will not show up and cause…how do you say…ruckus.”
David cleared his throat and changed the subject. “Shane, I’ll drive you to your practice this afternoon.”
“Why? I can drive myself,” Shane said.
“You can,” David agreed. “But I need to pick up groceries anyway, so I can take you.”
Somehow, Ilya knew that it probably meant that they would have some kind of talk in the car. Probably about him.
***
By noon, Rose understood that something was going on at the Hollander house. Not because anyone told her, but because Shane was in the driveway again, shooting pucks rapidly. Rose often woke up from Shane’s morning drills, especially when she’d forgotten to close her bedroom window. It wasn’t very fun to wake up to the sound of slapshots on weekends, but it was pretty useful on school days. It was pretty funny, actually, she thought. If all the clocks in her house stopped working, she would probably still know what time it was, because Shane’s routines were very consistent, to say the least. Rose probably knew Shane’s daily schedule by heart, if she examined it more closely. But the thing was, Shane never did two drills on the same day, so something was definitely up. The shots also looked kind of…furious.
She stood at her bedroom window with a Diet Coke in one hand and her phone in the other, pretending she was not spying. The blinds to the pool house, which had been open for most of Rose’s life, were shut. She wanted to text Sveta about it, but didn’t feel like being questioned about Hayden again. Her Diet Coke had gone warm but she drank it anyway, because going downstairs required leaving her bedroom window, and if she left her bedroom window, she might miss something next door. Which was insane. She knew it was insane. She was not usually this nosy.
That was a lie. She was absolutely usually this nosy. But this was different.
For most of Rose’s life, the Hollander house had been less like a separate house, and more like a home away from home. She knew the sound of their front gate, which stones that were loose on the path leading to their front door, the spot in the hedge where she and Shane used to crawl through until Yuna told them to use another spot where they wouldn’t walk through David’s newly planted freesias. She knew David’s habit of watering plants barefoot at seven in the morning. She knew Shane’s driveway drills by sound alone.
Clack, clack, pause, scrape, clack, ping.
Starting when they were twelve or thirteen, she could tell if he was annoyed just from the rhythm of his stickhandling. And right now, it seemed like Shane was pretty damn annoyed. She wondered whether it was related to the boy Yuna brought home last night.
He also looked confused, and Rose knew Shane’s confused face. It was not a face he made when he did not understand something, because Shane almost always understood things. It was more of a face he made when reality had failed to follow his carefully thought out plan and arranged itself in a different way. It was a face he made when he wanted to file a complaint with whoever was responsible.
She used to ask him if he wanted the set route or for her to help him think out alternative plans, when his failed. They rarely failed, but when they did, she was there for him. Because they used to be best friends.
Then high school happened. Rose got prettier. Shane got quieter. People started deciding who everyone was. Rose became the girl who got invited everywhere, and Shane became the hockey genius everybody thought was odd but still destined for greatness. They still lived next door to each other. They still waved from their driveways and said hi at school and stood beside each other in the occasional family photo when Yuna and David hosted something her dad and Cliff’s mom attended.
But they were not really friends anymore.
The pool house blinds moved, and a face appeared between them. For a fraction of a second, their eyes met, and Rose ducked immediately.
Rose’s phone buzzed.
Hayden: Party tonight at Dallas’s. Wear the blue dress.
Wear the blue dress.
Not ‘do you want to come?’ Not ‘are you okay’? Not even ‘did you find your keys?’ She hadn’t, by the way, but Cliff was home by the time Hayden dropped her off this morning.
Just, wear the blue dress, like she was some kind of accessory he liked to be seen with.
She typed a response.
Rose: Maybe.
She deleted it.
Rose: No.
She deleted that, too, and texted Svetlana instead.
Rose: Wanna come over and chill by the pool? Bring food.
It didn’t take long for Svetlana to answer.
Sveta: You have food.
Rose: We have ingredients, it’s not the same as food.
Sveta: Spoiled.
Rose: No, starving.
Sveta: Dramatic.
Rose: Correct. Bring coffee too.
Sveta: Sorry, I’m kinda busy.
Rose: But I need your spying skills. Last night, Yuna came home with a random guy, and it looks like he moved into Shane Hollander’s poolhouse.
Sveta: Give me 30 min. See you soon.
Svetlana arrived forty minutes later with two iced coffees, croissants, and a giant bag of strawberries. She wore a long, black caftan in a silky transparent material, and sunglasses, which suggested that she was either hungover or chased by the police. Considering Svetlana, it could probably be both. But she looked just as good as she always did.
“You look terrible,” Sveta said.
“You look like you’ve just got away with murdering your very old and rich husband.”
“Thank you,” Sveta said and walked past Rose and into the house.
“It was not a compliment.”
“Yes it was, you said I looked like someone who could get away with murder.”
They went outside to the pool and settled into the lounge chairs.
Rose sipped her coffee. Almond milk. Sweetener, not sugar. Correct ice to coffee ratio. She loved Svetlana for that.
The door to the poolhouse opened again and the boy from last night stepped out. In the daylight, cleaned up, he looked younger. Not innocent. Definitely not innocent. But more innocent than in the dark. And close to their age.
He crossed the patio and crouched by the pool, trailing his fingers through the water, then stood up again.
“Who do you think he is?” Rose asked Sveta. “Shane sounded like, so mad, when he was doing puck drills this morning.”
“How do you know Shane was mad? Did you talk?”
“No. But I could hear it. His shots sounded mad.”
Sveta lowered her sunglasses and loooked at Rose. “His shots?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re unbelievable.”
“What?” Rose asked. “Why? I’ve heard those drills every day since the Hollanders moved here from Canada. They sound angry the days before we have finals, and calm afterwards. They sound frustrated after the hockey team loses a game, and satisfied after they win.”
Svetlana didn’t answer that, just huffed a small laugh and shook her head.
“I wonder if it has to do with Yuna’s job,” Sveta said absently and took a bite from her croissant. “She’s a lawyer, right?”
Rose ate a strawberry. She would not eat the croissant, she decided. Especially not if she was going to wear the blue dress. Which she wasn’t, but in case.
“Yeah,” Rose said. “Some charity case, probably.”
Svetlana looked out at the Hollander backyard. “A hot charity case, if you ask me.”
Rose hadn’t really thought about what he looked like, but she guessed Sveta had a point. She could see that he was attractive.
***
Shane was quiet in the car. Not because it was unusual, but because it was a different kind of quiet than usual. David could tell. His son had several kinds of silence. Focused silence, tired silence, overstimulated silence, irritated silence. This was a silence he did not recognize.
“What’s on your mind, Shane?”
“You always drive me to practice when you want to talk about…stuff. It’s very transparent, you know.”
David always felt so in awe of his son’s ability to read people. They drove by shining cars, gated entries, and women in tennis skirts in silence.
“You can ask, if you want,” David said. “I know it’s a lot to wake up to.”
Shane looked out the window. “I don’t know what to ask.” He was quiet for a while, then added, “How long is he staying?”
“We don’t know. As I understood it, there’s a lot of legal issues your mom has to work out during the week.”
“Is he dangerous?”
David took a moment before answering. “I don’t think so.”
“That’s not the same as no,” Shane said and dragged his hands over his face.
“No,” David answered as they pulled into the parking lot of the practice rink. “I guess it’s not.”
“But mom wouldn’t bring someone home if she thought he’d hurt us.”
Sometimes David forgot, because Shane was so literal and so awkward and so capable of missing obvious emotional cues, that he also noticed details with uncanny clarity. “No, she wouldn’t.”
Shane nodded, as if reassuring himself. ”So mom is going to keep him,” Shane said, more a statement rather than a question.
“Keep him? He’s not a stray cat.”
“I know that,” Shane said flatly, then went quiet for a few seconds, thinking. “He’s kind of annoying,” Shane added. “He said I have a weak backhand.”
“Do you?”
“What?”
“Have a weak backhand?”
“No.”
“Okay, then there are no issues,” David said with a smile. “Go practice now, I’ll pick you up afterwards.”
David watched him lift his hockey bag from the back seat and walk toward the rink, then disappear inside. His brilliant, caring, and shy son.
Then David’s phone buzzed.
Yuna: We may have a problem.
David: Only one?
Yuna: Ilya’s school records are a mess. I really hope the principal will be helpful and let him enroll. We might need to do something so the placement hearing can happen sooner.
David: What do you need?
Yuna: Time.
David leaned against the backseat. In Newport, time was one of the few things money could not buy outright.
But God, people tried.
***
Practice was terrible.
Not because Shane played badly. Shane never played badly. Playing badly would at least have been interesting, because then there would have been a clear problem and a clear corrective path. Instead, he played almost normally. His passes were clean and his skating flowed like it always did. His shot accuracy was within his usual range. But he was distracted, his head somewhere else. So, almost normally was not normally.
It was the first week of ice training and their last practice before school started, and Shane really wanted to lead them to their division finals this year.
He aimed for the top left corner and snapped a powerful backhand shot. And missed.
Coach Theriault noticed that Shane was distracted. Because, of course, he noticed that.
“Something wrong, Hollander? You seem out of it,” Coach asked.
“No.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
Troy Barrett grinned, waiting by the boards with his protective net pushed up. “Maybe Hollander’s finally becoming human.”
“Biologically, I have always been human,” Shane said and shot the puck in the left-hand corner of the net. “Was that supposed to be an insult?”
“Yes,” Barrett said.
Cliff Marleau skated up too, laughed under his heavy breath, then took his helmet off. “It sounds more like you think that Shane is otherworldly,” he said, then squirted some water into his mouth.
Troy looked vaguely disappointed, as he always did when his insults to Shane didn’t hit as hard as he wanted them to.
Cliff put his helmet back on, then skated up next to Shane as they prepared for their last drill. Cliff was tall, broad-shouldered, and easygoing, with a careless confidence that Shane had always envied. Not envied like he was jealous, or something, but more that it came very natural to Cliff, as opposed to Shane, who often felt like he was acting. He was not Shane’s best friend. Shane wasn’t sure if he even had one of those anymore, but Cliff was one of the few guys on the team who treated Shane like he was just anyone. Shane liked Cliff.
“You okay?” Cliff asked.
“Yes.”
Cliff gave him a sideways look and a slightly raised brow.
Shane felt how his grip on his stick tightened. “Why does everyone keep asking me that?”
“Because you’re being extra Shane today, I guess,” Cliff answered and shrugged.
“That’s not even a category of measurement.”
“My point exactly.”
The whistle blew and Shane took off and he was absolutely not thinking about Ilya. He did not think about how Ilya had looked in their driveway, with his bare feet and cigarette. He did not think about Ilya’s split lip and smallest of smiles or the fact that he had noticed Shane’s backhand shot after not even five minutes. His thoughts, that he did not think, were very inconvenient.
And Shane did definitely not think about how he had noticed that Ilya looked at him when he thought Shane didn’t notice.
Shane caught the next pass too hard and it bounced off his blade.
Troy whooped. ”Holy shit, he can make mistakes!”
Shane swore under his helmet cage. His face felt fiery hot. This was even more inconvenient than he initially thought.
After practice, Shane stayed late to shoot. He often stayed late after practice, so no one batted an eye when he lined up twenty pucks along the blue line.
First shot. Forehand. Top right.
Second shot. Backhand. Hit the goalpost.
Fuck.
Third shot. Forehand. Top right again.
Fourth, fifth, sixth. All forehands. All perfectly placed in the net.
Seventh, eighth. Both backhands. One barely got in the net and one far above the goal.
Fucking fuck.
He tried again. Ninth, tenth. Forehand. Top left. Backhand. The shot went wide.
The fucker was right, Shane muttered. He had a weak backhand. Not weak, exactly, but significantly weaker than his forehand. And that was not acceptable.
He stood there and hated the stupid Russian – the stupid smoking Russian – for being right.
***
Ilya knew that the girls were watching him. He had noticed them the entire day, how they peeked their noses out from the window, how they glanced over when they were laying by the pool.
The blonde girl from the curb was obvious because rich girls like her were always obvious in how they thought they were invisible behind their big, expensive sunglasses. She stared like a person who collected secrets because she was bored of everything else. She had a soda can in her hand, always, the entire day. Ilya wondered how her teeth were. It was not good for your teeth to drink that much soda.
The curly haired girl seemed to look more at the blonde girl than at him. That was interesting.
He lifted two fingers in salute. The blonde one lifted her soda back, and the curly one did nothing. Then he went back into the poolhouse before any of them decided to come over.
~
Ilya was startled awake from his nap by voices in the yard. He had fallen asleep and checked the bedside clock. Three hours seemed to have flown by. He silently swore at himself, because now he knew he would have trouble sleeping later.
“My school? Tomorrow? Seriously, mom?”
The voices were not loud, and Ilya recognized them as Shane and Yuna. Looks like Shane was back from practice, he thought.
“Yes, Shane. He’s been through a lot more than you can fathom. I talked to the principal and she was willing to make an exception.”
Holy fuck, Ilya thought. The next couple of hours would probably be interesting.
***
By the evening, Newport was bathed in golden light. The sun had slipped low over the palm trees and black roofs and the white walls of the houses. Rose hated that time of the day because even ugly things looked beautiful. Like trashcans and driveways and the side of Hayden’s face when he leaned against his car door and pretended not to look at himself in the rear mirror.
She had not answered his text. He sent another anyway.
Hayden: Picking you up at 8.
And now he was outside. Rose groaned and pushed her face into her duvet cover. Svetlana was sprawled across the fluffy, white rug on Rose’s bedroom floor with a magazine she was not reading, just absentmindedly turning pages.
“Ignore him,” Sveta said as Rose got up from the bed and walked to her closet.
“I am ignoring him,” Rose answered.
She opened her wardrobe and browsed among her too many dresses and tops and tiny shorts that made her legs look longer than they were. Then she took out the blue dress. She looked good in blue and Hayden liked her blue dress.
“No you’re not.”
“Can’t you come with us, then?”
“On your coupley dinner? Fucking no thank you.”
Suddenly, they heard an engine roar, then a loud honk.
Svetlana turned slowly and gave Rose a look of pure disgust. “Did he just honk?”
“He thinks it’s cute.”
“It’s really not.” Svetlana looked at her. “Do you even want to go?”
“No,” Rose answered with a sigh.
Svetlana scoffed. “Then don’t.”
“It’s not that simple.”
“It’s exactly that simple, Rose.”
“But we always go to dinner on Sundays. It’s fine.”
“Seriously, Rose –” Svetlana started, but was swiftly interrupted.
“I said it’s fine.”
Hayden honked again.
Svetlana made an even sourer look. “If you go downstairs, I will kill him.”
“You can’t kill my boyfriend, Sveta,” Rose said and shot a glance back at her friend, who just rolled her eyes.
“I can – and I will get away with it. You said so yourself.”
Rose looked at her friend, at the sharp line of her jaw, her narrow shoulders and smooth, tan skin. The way the golden parts of her curls glittered in the lamplight, and when she caught a glimpse of the pink tip of her tongue as she licked her thumb to turn the page in the magazine, Rose’s pulse picked up a notch.
So she grabbed her purse and her golden heels. “I’ll be back in an hour or two,” she said. “Stay if you want. If you leave, you can put the spare key under the fake rock.”
“The rock that Hayden was too stupid to find even if it was just in front of him?” Svetlana said flatly, but didn’t look up. “Sure.”
Rose hated herself a little as she went downstairs.
***
Dinner at the Hollander house was not like any dinner Ilya had experienced in many years. For one thing, everyone sat at the table. Not around the TV, or on the couch, or standing in the kitchen because the chairs were broken. They all sat at the table. With plates and napkins and a bowl of salad that no one ignored. The salad even had avocado. Ilya put some on his plate before someone said anything, then quietly sat down.
Yuna finished her water, set the glass down, and looked at him. “So, I spoke to the principal of Harbor High – Shane’s school.”
“Okay,” Ilya said, even though he had heard enough of the conversation earlier to know where this was going.
Yuna rested her forearms on the table. “You start tomorrow morning. Your records are incomplete, but they can enroll you temporarily.”
“You did not –” Ilya started, but got cut off.
“The principal owed me a favor, but they really had to pull some strings to make this happen. It’s a good opportunity for you while we wait for your placement hearing.”
“Harbor,” Ilya said at looked at his plate, loaded with grilled fish, brown rice and fancy avocado salad. “Is this rich-kid school?”
David gave Ilya a mild look. “It’s a public school - and it’s a good school.”
“Why?” Ilya asked. “Why such hurry?”
Yuna took another sip of her water. “Because the longer you are unregistered at a school, the harder it becomes for you to start in one, and the more complicated the placement can become. So it’s really in your best interest.”
Shane was annoyed. Ilya was a disruption and Shane did not like disruptions. He especially didn’t like Russian – smoking – disruptions. He had spent the entirety of the afternoon after practice trying to read ahead for English. He could not concentrate on reading ahead for English. He had tried watching old practice and game footage, but found his mind drifting off again and again, becoming increasingly annoyed. Up until his father called that it was time for dinner, he had tried. He had even had the sudden, irrational thought that if he stayed in his room and ignored his father, everything would return to normal. They would eat in the kitchen without Shane and in the morning Ilya would be gone and everything would make sense again.
There would be no smoking Russian in his driveway, and no curly Russian in his kitchen, and no hot – scratch that – infuriating Russian commenting on his backhand.
Then his father called again. And Shane went to the kitchen to eat dinner, just like he did every day, except this day, his spot at the table was taken by an infuriating, smoking, Russian. Shane glared at the three people at the table but no one seemed to notice that Ilya had taken his spot. Shane sat down at a spot that was not his spot.
And now, Shane watched his mother treat the boy across from him with respect. She was not the kind of woman to soften her voice or tilt her head the way some adults did when the person they talked to was uncomfortable. And Ilya was most definitely uncomfortable. Shane knew his mother was not cruel, in any way, but her kindness was practical. It might seem harsh at first, because of her directness, but that harshness filled out paperwork like a champ, intimidated judges and administrators and now, apparently, got him enrolled at his school the day before it started, and would keep that someone out of a group home as long as possible.
Shane watched Ilya swallow and his throat bob up and down, and for a brief second, there was a flicker of fright in his hazel eyes. Huh, Shane thought. Hazel. He hadn’t noticed that earlier, in their driveway. Shane noticed that he had a hard time not looking at Ilya’s eyes.
“I don’t have clothes for this school,” Ilya said, then shoved a forkful of rice into his mouth.
“There is no uniform,” Shane heard himself say. “You can wear whatever you want.”
Ilya looked at him, and when their eyes met, Shane felt his face heat as he noticed the fringed cuffs of Ilya’s hoodie. Shane looked down at his Armani jeans.
“What?” Shane asked, as if he hadn’t seen Ilya’s worn out clothes. He didn’t want Ilya to think that what he was wearing was the wrong type of clothes. But that was the thing. Ilya’s clothes were definitely wrong for Harbor. There might not be uniform, not technically, but there were certain do’s and don’ts. Shane felt stupid.
Yuna went on. “David can take you in the morning. Shane usually drives himself, but for tomorrow –”
“I can take him,” Shane said and realized that the words had left his mouth before he had fully checked them. Shane hated when that happened, because it was rare and therefore more alarming. “I mean, us.”
Ilya looked at Shane as if he had just offered to transport a live grenade in his backpack.
“You don’t have to,” Ilya said.
“I know. But we’re going to the same place. It’s the logical thing to do.” Because, Shane thought, it was the logical thing to do. They were going to the same place at the same time. It was inefficient to take two cars or have his father drive Ilya separately. This had absolutely nothing to do with anything else.
A tinge of insecurity flickered over Ilya’s face. “I can walk. Is fine. You do not have to.”
“Don’t be silly,” Shane said. “You’ll get lost.”
“I have very good – what you say – sense of locality.”
Shane sighed as he reached across the table for the bowl of lemon wedges. “There are six near-identical gated neighborhoods between here and Harbor.”
“Sounds like rich people problem.”
“It becomes your problem if you end up in the wrong one,” Shane said and squeezed some fresh lemon on his fish, then plopped the lemon wedge in his glass of water.
Ilya looked at him. “Fine.”
Shane saw Ilya’s jaw tick, and felt, absurdly, as if he’d won something. Except this win didn’t feel particularly good. And Shane loved winning.
There was a small hint of mischief in Ilya’s eyes. “So you do not have tiny cone meeting every morning?”
“Tiny cones? What do you mean?” Shane asked.
“You know what I mean.”
Shane knew what he meant. His practice cones at home were, in fact, tiny. “Yes, I do drills every morning, but I do them before breakfast.”
Ilya nodded, then kept eating in silence.
After dinner, David served store-bought pie and apologized for not making it himself, even if the pie was not a factory-made pie but made in David’s favorite organic store. Ilya ate two slices, then looked irritated when David noticed and pleased when David pretended not to. Shane ate one slice because he always ate exactly one slice during off-season, and since school didn’t start until tomorrow, it was technically still off-season.
After pie, David went to the couch to watch his favorite TV-show, and Shane loaded the dishwasher because it was his turn to load the dishwasher. Ilya brought his plate to the sink and stood there for a second.
“You can put it there,” Shane said, pointing.
“I know how a dishwasher works,” Ilya said sardonically.
“Okay. I didn’t say that you don’t.”
“You looked like you thought, maybe.”
“I didn’t.”
Ilya placed the plate in the dishwasher, but of course he placed it at the wrong place and incorrectly in the rack. Shane stared at the plate and Ilya stared at him staring.
“You want to move it,” Ilya said, with that infuriating gleam in his eye.
“No, I don’t,” Shane said and pressed his lips together.
In the corner of his eye, he noticed that Ilya’s eyes narrowed with satisfaction. In fact, Shane could feel the satisfaction as an infuriating radiation. Shane looked at him, but Ilya was already turning away, leaving the kitchen through the glass doors with an absolutely infuriating carefree stride.
Shane waited until he was gone before he fixed the plate and put it correctly in the right spot. Outside, Ilya crossed the patio and disappeared inside the poolhouse. The blinds remained open, and Shane had to force himself to look away when he saw Ilya pull his hoodie off, relieving a surprisingly muscular back for someone who seemed like a slacker. Shane looked away. He definitely didn’t look at Ilya stretching out his long limbs above his head.
~
By nine-thirty, Shane had checked his gear for Monday practice, tried to read ahead for English (again) and failed doing so (also again). As he packed his bag, he packed an extra pen because Ilya would probably not have one. Then he unpacked the extra pen. Then he packed it again. It was not for Ilya, not specifically. It was reasonable to have a spare pen because people needed pens at school. Maybe Shane would need a spare pen tomorrow, even though he had never lost a pen.
Tomorrow.
Tomorrow, Ilya would sit in his car and walk into Harbor beside him and people would talk and look and gossip, and now Shane felt a little panicked.
He sighed and turned around to grab his English book and that’s when he noticed Ilya through the poolhouse window. Between them was a wall, a patio, a pool, a lawn, another wall, but Shane still felt heat rise in him. Ilya was watching him. Shane should look away, he knew that. Looking too long was dangerous because that meant that he became visible, and visible things could be named.
But Ilya didn’t look away either.
Shane stepped up to the window and closed the blinds, then went to bed, not thinking about Ilya watching him. Not thinking about Ilya’s light hazel eyes and muscular back.