Page 28 of Catch a Kiwi
He still looked bemused, but he went down in the lift with us to the carpark and pointed it out. Dark blue. Clean. He said, “I washed it. Inside, too.”
“Cheers,” I said. “That’s perfect.” I shook his hand, told Delilah, “Hop in,” and we were off.
She said, the second we were out of there, “First, that guy is hot.”
“I didn’t notice. And he’s thirty.”
“I didn’t say I wanted to have sex with him. Just that he’s hot.”
“Oh,” I said. “Duly noted.” I should continue this line of chat. Distract her. Unfortunately, it was a pretty skeevy subject to discuss with an eighteen-year-old, so I didn’t.
“Second,” she said, “nowyouwon’t have a car, unless this is some very roundabout route back to where we left yours, so you can drive it back and I can drive this one. I have a license, you know.”
“You also have concussion. I’ll get a lift to work fromSummer tomorrow. She’ll have to come up to Dunedin to buy that equipment.”
“Do you think of everything?” she asked. “Like—make a plan, and execute?”
“Yes.”
“Oh. Must be nice.”
“I wouldn’t know. It’s how I’m made.” All right. Better topic.
She didn’t stay with it, of course. She said, “Explain to me how a twenty-nine-thousand-dollar car becomes a ten-thousand-dollar car.”
“You weren’t meant to see that.”
“Too bad. I saw it.” She had her arms folded again. “Explain.”
“I bought it,” I said. “Fair market value. I can sell it again.”
“For ten thousand dollars.”
“Yes.” I shot a glance at her. “I’ll have a story. Your job is to shut up about it.”
I had no idea whether she’d do it. She thought about it a minute, then said, “Summer’s not an idiot.”
“I told you. I’ll have a story.”
“It had better be a pretty good story. And, what, you think I’ll blow it and tell her? Why would I do that?”
“Your cousin would say you had an ethical obligation. I’m almost certain of that.”
“Well, yeah, butIwouldn’t say that. What’s it to me if you want to blow your money? I’d just as soon not drive another broken-down car down a hillside, you know?”
“I can imagine,” I said. “That bothering you? You should probably talk to somebody about it, if you start having nightmares.”
“I’m not going to have nightmares,” she said. “I’ve been through way worse things than this. And if you’re worried about Summer, she’sreallybeen through worse things.”
“Which you won’t tell me about.”
“Nope. But I’ll tell you one thing.”
“What’s that?”
“If you’re doing it because you think she’ll sleep with you, she won’t. She doesn’t have sexual feelings anymore. She told me.”
I thought of her legs over my thighs on the bed, the tremble I’d felt in her when I’d been smoothing antibiotic ointment over her knee. The way she’d told me she was naked under my shirt. I said, “I’ll take my chances.”
