The Probable Future

“I’m fine with it,” Stella was quick to say. If this wasn’t a white lie, then at least it was pink, a love-tinged fib told to protect Liza. No, Stella wasn’t happy that both her parents were dating. Weren’t they supposed to be the ones who were old and sensible and she the one who went wild? But even if Stella wanted to resent Liza, it would have been difficult; Liza was simply the kind of person it was difficult to hate. But not difficult to lie to, so Stella smiled and said goodnight and thanked Liza for the cookies and watched her go out and close the door behind her.

Lie of omission, lie of a teenaged girl, lie of good-night before I climb out the window, lie of I’ll explain it all to you in the morning if you find out I haven’t slept in my bed, but of course if you never find out, then you really don’t need to know. White lie, pink lie, black-and-blue lie. It wasn’t Jimmy Stella was going to meet, but Hap Stewart, and it wasn’t all fun and games either. Hap was angry at her, annoyed that their joint science project was late because Stella had been spending so much time with Jimmy. True enough, she had taken to meeting Jimmy at the Table and Chairs up in the woods after supper, where they kissed for hours even though Stella had a hundred more pressing things to do. She called him late at night at a prescheduled time just to hear his voice. He couldn’t even pass a simple high school class—he was taking earth science for the third time, for goodness’ sakes—but each time Stella saw him standing out on the road with a handful of pebbles to throw at her window and that confused expression, as though he’d been drawn to her without reason or forethought, she thought it would be perfectly fine if Jimmy Elliot were the only person in the world, and if all she saw was his face, nothing more.

To assuage Hap, ignored and now in danger of failing science himself due to their late project, Stella had come up with a plan. They needed one more water sample, something no one else in the class had, for them to make up for their lateness with the project. Hap had been the one to suggest Hourglass Lake, then Stella had said they should sleep out there and take the sample early in the morning, first thing. She brought along her backpack and a sleeping bag flung over her good shoulder and she climbed out the window of the tea house, down the trellis that would be covered with clematis in June. She also brought along six peanut butter sandwiches to sustain them, several glass sampling vials, and a flashlight. Hap, who met her at the corner where the oak stood, contributed a tent that smelled like a damp cellar, where it had been stored for fifteen years. The night was warm and humid and mosquitoes were hatching everywhere.

“That dead horse legend is such a load of crap,” Hap said when they turned down the lane where the horse was supposed to have first spooked, carrying Charles Hathaway to his final destination. “But I heard a group of kids in the playground behind the school swearing it was true.”

“It’s total crap,” Stella agreed.

They both laughed, recalling this had been their first conversation: their agreement of what was crap.

“Fear not,” Hap said.

“I don’t intend to,” Stella told him.

One night, at dinner, Stella’s father had told her and Liza about the night he and his brother had spent at the lake when they were boys, waiting for the dead horse to rise. Matt had fallen asleep like a log, Will had said, leaving him to shiver and watch the dark water alone. Charles Hathaway, he’d announced to the murky water. I’m not afraid of you or your horse.

“People made that up in the old days,” Stella said, “when everyone was still afraid of stupid things.”

“Right.” Hap was thinking of Sooner, dead in the field, and the look on his grandfather’s face. Now whenever Hap went past the field where Sooner had been for so long, he ran, spooked by the breeze or by the clouds or by the rustling of leaves. He’d been growing a lot in the past few months and he towered over Stella. He thought she’d seem like a stranger with her hair cut short and dyed, but she was still the same.

“Sometimes when you get rid of your best feature, you find out it really wasn’t anything. Sometimes it turns out your true best feature is something else entirely.”

Stella stared at him, surprised. “Have you been talking to Juliet?”

“Juliet?” Hap said. In fact, he’d been talking to her nearly every night, late when everyone else in his household was asleep. The universe had been made out of only two things at such times: the darkness and Juliet’s voice. They hadn’t meant to keep their conversations secret from Stella, but that’s what had happened. Now, Hap was embarrassed, for reasons he couldn’t quite comprehend. He was thankful that he was slow in answering, for the time for an answer seemed to pass; they had to concentrate now so as not to stumble in the ruts.