“Hello?”

“Mac?”

“Hey, Dante, what’s up?” Mackenzie held the phone between her shoulder and ear so she could continue clipping her nails. Click, click, click. The tiny white crescents fell into the trash. “You all ready for tomorrow?”

“Baby, you know it!” Dante shushed someone in the background. “Mac, why don’t you join us? C’mon.”

“I already told you I want to be fresh in the morning and don’t want to stay up late.” Mackenzie’s stomach growled. Barb was cooking dinner—the first time since her promotion—and the whole house smelled buttery.

“We’ll just get a quick bite and split,” Dante said, and then to whoever was with him, “Shh! I will!”

“Who’s that, D? You will what?”

Dante whispered into the phone, “Can’t you just meet us here? It’s supposed to be a surprise, so just show up for a little bit and then you can go get your beauty rest.” His voice sounded hollow and Mac knew he must have been cupping his hand over the phone. In a normal, but slightly too loud voice he said, “Okay, so you’ll come? Great. See you in a few.”

Mac put the phone back down and frowned. A minute later it rang again.

“Sorry, baby, we’re at my house. Be here or be square. Or be there and be—oh, you know what I mean,” Dante said, then whispered, “And don’t forget to act surprised,” and hung up again.

Mackenzie ran to her room and pulled on her a pale blue sweater, tossed her hair back and forth a few times to fluff it, and went into the kitchen. “Barb? I’m running over to Dante’s, okay?”

Barb was in the middle of pouring a cup of cream into a pot of melting butter. “Sure thing. You’re dad’s flight was canceled so it’s just us tonight anyway. But really, shouldn’t you get to bed early?” Then she turned and smiled at Mackenzie. “I guess you’re old enough to know what’s best for yourself. You’ll be on your own for the trip, and I won’t be able to mother you then, will I?”

Mac smiled back. It was funny that Barb’s perspective was that she mothered her, period. When Mackenzie thought of Barb, she didn’t think, or feel, ‘Mom’. After all, she didn’t marry her dad until Mac was eleven, although she had always been grateful since it was after he had a wife that her dad stopped his visits.

But apparently Barb felt motherly toward her, which had never occurred to Mackenzie. For the first time, Mac considered what it must’ve been like for Barb to get married, suddenly become the stepmother of someone else’s pre-teen, and then having your own real daughter. It must be hard to be the parent of a kid who wasn’t yours. Maybe she even felt guilty because she loved Lily and not her. But mothering her? It was an entirely new way to look at their relationship. Like leaving your own house and looking in the window, instead of looking out.

Seeing the concoction on the stove, Mackenzie smiled and said, “Yeah, and judging from the health food you’re cooking up for tonight, maybe I’ll grab a quick bite with them, while I’m at it.”

When Mac got to Dante’s, she heard hushed yelling and rushed movement as she rang the bell. Dante opened the door before she lifted her finger from the button. He had a big goofy grin on his face. He mouthed, “Act surprised!”

“SURPRISE!” Frankie jumped out of the hall closet just as Charlie walked in from the kitchen, eating a piece of cake.

“Yeah, surprise,” he said through a mouthful.

“Uch!” Frankie made a disgusted sound and frowned. “Charlie, you are like, be-yond.”

Dante turned to see what the fuss was about. “That’s not even your cake.”

Charlie managed to look slightly sorry. “I couldn’t help it. I was starving. She took too long to get here.”

Mac was surprised. She never expected this.

“It’s no biggie,” Dante said, guiding her into the kitchen. “Just a small party. Teensy, actually. Itsy bitsy.”

“Like the spider,” Charlie said. Dante stuck his tongue at him. Charlie harrumphed back and peeked out the window. “Well, turns out it might be slightly larger than bitsy,” he said. “I kind of mentioned it to a couple of people.”

Dante looked horrified. “You what? This is just for us. You’re barely here on a pass, Charlie. Besides, my parents are gone.”

Charlie gave him a look that said that’s the whole point.

The doorbell rang. Charlie went to answer it, but Dante planted his outstretched hand in the middle of Charlie’s chest and stopped him mid-stride. “My house.”

It was two girls from the middle school. They giggled when Dante opened the door. “We heard there was a big party here tonight,” one girl said.

“You heard wrong,” Dante replied, and closed the door. Turning to Charlie, he said, “Tell the same thing to every person that rings that bell, you hear me? Frankie and I are going upstairs to give Mac the thing.” He glared at Charlie, daring him to ruin that surprise, too.

The three of them started making their way up to Dante’s room. He lived in a big Victorian farmhouse that had a finished attic. Dante had taken it over for his room and was the perfect hideaway, even thought it was four steep flights up.

Winded, Frankie said, “No wonder you’ve got such excellent endurance. I should’ve come here and run these stairs to get in shape for the trip.”

“I know, but it’s totally worth it. I can blast my music, and never get ‘turn down that noise!’”

Frankie snorted. “I have no idea what that would be like. Dude, I can’t listen to anything without them doing this,” she said, twisting her hand as though it were turning an invisible knob. She cranked the imaginary dial around and around until she stopped, held it in front of her, and said, “Oops. I broke it off.”

The last flight of stairs led to a small sitting room. “This is awesome, D,” Frankie said, looking around. “Whoa, you have your own living room. Do you like, sleep in here?”

Dante pointed to a door behind a column in the back of the room. “That’s my bedroom. This,” he said, with a sweep of his arm, “is where I entertain my guests.”

Frankie smiled and turned to Dante, and gave him a little shoulder shove. “You are too school for cool, D.”

They sat on the purple shag rug, and leaned against the little sofa he’d lugged up there from the Salvation Army and reupholstered with duct tape.

In front of them was a mini pillow fort. Three green pillows leaned on each other in teepee fashion, and an old teddy bear lay face down over the top. With a great flourish, Dante whipped away the bear to reveal a brown, cardboard shipping box. Frankie handed the gift to Mac. She squinted at the tiny words written all over it.

“Frankie, this is you, right? You’re the only one I know with handwriting in like a size six font.”

“Yeah, well,” Frankie said, “we all wrote it, I’m just the one who took the dictation.”

Mac read aloud, “To our fearless fearsome leader, Mackenzie ‘Skater’ Douglas—thanks for kicking our butts. This trip will be beyond awesome.” Mac squinted to read the last line because someone had scribbled over it. “Even though…even though Chaz is coming too? Is that what that says?” Frankie explained that Charlie had seen it and tried to cross it out.

“Open it,” Frankie said. “I want to go down and have a piece of that cake before Charlie eats any more of it. It’s shaped—well, it was shaped like a bike. I think he ate the entire rear wheel.”

Mac took a pen off the coffee table and popped the tape that held the carton closed. When she lifted the flaps of the box, she gasped. It was the helmet she’d wanted, but couldn’t afford after spending every last dime on her RC. Her old helmet was okay, but it didn’t match her new wheels.

“You guys, this is amazing. Thank you so, so much.” She took it out of the box and after adjusting the straps, put it on. She walked around the room like a model. “I love it. How’s it look?”

“Brava! That color is so you,” Dante said, and lifted his hands to applaud Mac while she took exaggerated bows.

“I guess I should go downstairs and thank Charlie. It is from him, too, right?”

As they got to the landing on the second floor, they heard the music. Nearing the ground floor, they couldn’t hear anything else, and it was so crowded it was almost impossible to move off the stairs. Dante was furious and dug through the crush, looking for Charlie. The girls tried to follow, but there were so many people blocking their way they just stayed where they were, checking out the scene from over the banister. Someone yelled, “Diet Coke?” and handed Frankie two red plastic cups. She handed one to Mac, who took a sip and made a face.

“What?” Frankie hollered over the music.

“It’s not just Coke.” Mac sniffed the cup.

Frankie sniffed hers. And took a sip. “What is that, rum? Oh my God, Dante is going to freak!”

“When are his parents getting home?”

“You mean from France? They thought Dante was leaving today and couldn’t change their flight.”

Mac looked down at her drink. I deserve to loosen up a little. Have a good time. Do I always have to be so uptight? I’m going to do exactly that: loosen up and have a good time, just like a normal teenager. She held her breath and downed the entire cup.

The rum made a beeline through Mac’s empty stomach, straight to her head. Fifteen minutes later, rushing home to get a good night’s sleep didn’t seem so urgent. After all, they were on the bus to Providence the first day anyway. She didn’t have to be ready to ride until the day after tomorrow.

Charlie shoved his way up the stairs and appeared in front of Mac and Frankie. He said, “Hide me—Dante’s on a rampage!” and tunneled through the crowd to cower on the other side of them.

“How could you?” Mac yelled over the music. “You do realize this house will have to be clean before we leave?”

“And Dude? You’re helping or you’ll wish you weren’t stuck on a trip with all of us, because we will so rag your ass,” Frankie added.

“‘Yeah, yeah,” he said, waving a hand at them, and then stopped, mid-air, and stared at the front door. “Whoa.”

Mac followed Charlie’s gaze. There was Grady, walking into the party. With Sophie. She stood in front of him in a low cut, skin-tight top, laughing at something he had just whispered to her. Grady guided her through the crowd, a protective hand on her shoulder.

“Now why would Grady want to be Sophie’s boyfriend when he could have a much classier piece like you?” Charlie glanced at Mackenzie, who hadn’t taken her eyes off the couple. “Oh, right,” he said, “you can look but you better not touch. Guess he wanted to touch, huh?”

Mac hadn’t moved, and stood frozen, watching them tilt their heads toward each other and laugh again at some shared secret.

“You heard about the wedding?” they heard someone say behind them.

Frankie looked at Mac. “Guess the secret’s not so secret.”

“Yeah, right, they’re getting married,” Charlie said.

Frankie poked him in the ribs and Charlie flinched. “Not them, dork. Their parents.”

“Everyone knows,” Frankie said.

“Their parents are getting married?” Charlie asked.

“I guess everyone doesn’t know,” Frankie answered.

Mac finally broke out of her trance. “He’s not being boyfriend-ish, he’s being brotherly.”

Charlie scoffed. “Uh, right, Mac. Brotherly.”

From the landing they had a bird’s eye view as Grady and Sophie made their way through the crowd and passed below the staircase. They watched as Grady slipped his hand from Sophie’s shoulder down to her rear, and gave her a little squeeze. Sophie jumped and slapped Grady’s hand away, batting her eyes at him, smiling.

“Gee, I don’t know, Skater. I never show my sister any of that ass-grabbing-while-at-a-party action. On the other hand, if I were screwing my sister, maybe I would.”