Wrong in All the Right Ways Read online

  “You performed at the dance benefit concert last year, right?” she says, pulling me out of my mental rant. “The one that helped raise money to save the Cedar Pointe Dance studio?”

  “Yeah.” Finally, someone notices me. Maybe I’m not so invisible after all. “I’m Emma Ellenb—”

  “I know who you are. I wanted to invite you to try out for the dance team in two weeks. That lyrical routine you did last year was mind-blowing. We could really use your skills.”

  Her compliment catches me off guard. Before the dance benefit, my feet hadn’t touched center stage in years, but when my parents signed me up to perform in it—“You need to pay your respects to CPD. They taught you everything you know!”—I had to throw something together last minute. “Really? You … you think I’m good?”

  “Definitely.” She lifts her phone, which is acting as a makeshift paperweight, off the stack of papers and slides one of them to me. The highlighter-yellow color of the flyer makes me squint as I read the information about the tryouts. “I hope to see you there.”

  * * *

  “Dance team? I thought you were going to give tennis another shot this year?” my mother says when I call her at the end of the school day. She lowers her voice, and I expect she’s trying to hide it from my dad, who is probably close by. “You know your dad’s not going to be too happy with you switching it up again.” The disappointment in her voice almost tears me up inside. My mom and dad like to think they know what’s best for me, and my divergence from their plan isn’t going to sit well with them.

  “I know.” I can see my dad now: stretching out his tie and unbuttoning the top button on the collar of his shirt as he turns red with anger.

  “I’m not going to tell your father. I’m leaving that up to you. But if I were you, I’d do it sooner rather than later.”

  “How about this: if I make the team, I’ll tell him.”

  She goes silent on the line for a moment, and I imagine her weighing the options in her head. “Fine. But again, you have to tell him. I’m not getting in the middle of this. You know how he is.”

  I feel my stomach knot and twist as I think about telling him. He’s not exactly going to be delighted when I do, and so I’m going to have to make sure he’s in a semi-good mood when I fess up.

  “And I still expect you to stay on top of your grades. I expect nothing less than what you’re giving right now.”

  Of course you do. “I will. I promise.”

  “I didn’t think you liked school enough to want to join a spirit team of any kind. But if it’s something you really want to do, I’m behind you all the way.”

  I love how empowering my mom is. Whenever I want to pursue something, she always hears me out. Once, when I was ten and wanted to learn how to play the guitar, she bought me one of the most expensive ones and paid for a year’s worth of lessons. I quit after two classes, but that’s beside the point. The point is, she has always been willing to invest in my dreams, no matter how pipe-dreamy or irrational they may seem.

  But my dad is the complete opposite. He hates that I switch activities so much, and he has no problem showing it. I’ve started and quit too many things—softball, guitar, gymnastics, soccer, tap and jazz dancing, ballet, and now tennis—for him to just sit back and accept it. The way I see it, he should be happy that I’m actually getting out to do something, instead of sitting on my ass all day, watching Netflix. But of course, he doesn’t take that into account.

  “I’m on my way to pick up Matthew from school, but I just wanted to call and run that by you.”

  “Okay, honey.” I can hear a muffled sound in the background; it’s someone talking, but I can’t tell if it’s a woman or a man, an adult or a kid. Is that my new brother or sister? Or is that just Dad? “That’s the social worker,” she says, answering the question before I can ask it. “We’re going to be here for maybe another hour or so. There’s a ton of paperwork that we have to read through and sign, but we should be nearing the end of it all pretty soon.”

  “Is everything okay?” I ask as I pull up to Matthew’s school.

  “Everything is fine, Emma. We’ll be home with Dylan in about an hour.” I can hear her smiling through the phone. “You’re gonna love him.” Dylan, I repeat in my head. So it’s a boy. I guess I’m okay with that. This means that I’ll still reside as the only princess in the Ellenburg residence.

  A ton of questions that I want to ask her pulse through my mind, but I decide to keep them to myself. I don’t want to ruin the surprise. “I’ll see you soon, Mom.”

  Matthew’s school reminds me of some of the best times in my life. In elementary school, I used to have a lot of friends. Back then it was easy. Nobody was competing to be the best athlete or the prettiest or the smartest. All you had to do was be yourself, and people liked you for that. I would give anything to return to that time.

  When he sees me enter his classroom, Matthew runs up and gives me the biggest hug that he can. He’s in a room full of parents trying to ask how their kid’s day went, and it must be nice for him to finally see a familiar face. I don’t want a conversation with his teacher like everyone else coming through the door; I just came to grab him and go. I’m tempted to tell him about our new brother, but I’m not sure how much he knows, so I choose to wait until he brings it up first.

  “Where’s Mom and Dad?” he asks as I strap him into his booster seat. He was a premature baby and has always been smaller than other kids his age. It wasn’t until I saw his classmates that I realized how much smaller.

  “They’re out running errands.”

  “Does ‘errands’ mean picking up our new brother or sister?” He must see my eyes widen, because he quickly tacks on a reason for how he knows what’s going on. “I heard you guys talking about that this morning, and Dad told me things would start happening soon. So is today the day?”

  “That’s not exactly ‘errands,’ I guess. But yes, they told me that they’re going to be home soon, and that’s when we’ll get to meet him. Or her,” I throw in to keep the gender a mystery to him. “So, are you ready to meet the newest member of our family?” He gives me a goofy grin, as if to say, Hell, yeah, in kid language, and then spends the entire ride home bombarding me with his thoughts on how our new sibling is going to look and act.

  “It’s definitely going to be a boy. I can feel it.”

  I have to choke back my grin as he speaks. He’s going to be convinced he’s psychic when he finds out that we really are fostering a boy.

  “I think he’s going to have brown hair and brown eyes, just like me,” he says. “And he’s going to love playing hide-and-seek with me, too.”

  His excitement for our new brother is contagious, and before I know it, I’m giddy, too. But even that moment doesn’t last. After a while, my resentment resurfaces, as if it never left my heart to begin with.

  We head home, but the idea that I’m going to be a big sister again doesn’t officially hit me until I hear my dad jingle his keys outside the front door. I set my homework aside and flex my fingers to get the feeling back into them. I don’t want this new kid to think we’re slobs, so I fluff and karate-chop the top of each pillow that I was sitting on. That’s the way Mom likes to fix them; she says it makes them look like they belong on a spread in a furniture magazine.

  My dad once told me that there’s a thin line between love and hate, and sides are chosen when two people meet for the first time. The crossing of two paths, he called it. “The first interaction is what people will remember most about you, and it will be the basis of your relationship with them,” he said in a serious tone. In about ten seconds, my path and the path of my future foster brother will collide, and all I can think is I hope he likes me, and I hope I like him.

  When I see the door handle start to turn, I feel time stand still. Like, for a moment, I’m frozen in space and I can choose whether I really want to go through with this, or run and hide under my bed. But that would be cowardly, and I don’t want this
kid to feel anything but welcomed.

  Matthew and I stand in front of the sofa closest to the door and wait. First, our parents walk in, drawing out the anticipation. There is a sparkle in my mom’s blue eyes and a grin across my dad’s face. “Hey, guys. This is Dylan,” he says as he extends his hand toward the door.

  I expect to see a rambunctious eight- or nine-year-old race through the door, grinning from ear to ear, but instead, a teenage boy walks in—a very cute teenage boy, I might add. I fold my arms across my chest and wait for him to speak, but he doesn’t say a word. He just keeps shifting his weight from one foot to the other as he looks us up and down.

  Plot twist.

  chapter 2

  THIS ISN’T REAL. This can’t be real, I repeat in my head as I pinch myself. There is no way that my parents have brought a teenage boy—again, a very cute teenage boy—to live under the same roof as me. There’s just no way.

  I squeeze and squeeze until the skin just above my elbow glows a deep shade of pink, but nothing happens. The image of Dylan standing next to my parents doesn’t fade into darkness. It stays there. This is not a dream.

  “This is Emma,” my dad begins as he leads him toward me. “You guys are around the same age, and you’ll be going to the same school now.” He fails to mention that I skipped two years of school and won’t be in the same grade as him, but I figure it’s so that Dylan doesn’t feel insecure.

  “Nice to meet you, Emma,” he says in a voice that’s not too high and not too low. “I’m Dylan. Dylan McAndrews.” The corners of his mouth twitch upward for a split second, and his dimples flash across his cheeks so fast that I would have missed it if I had blinked. I’m glad I didn’t blink.

  “It’s nice to meet you, too, Dylan.” I extend my hand to give his hand a shake, but he catches me a little off guard when he pulls me into a hug. Leaning in, I catch a whiff of his soapy scent. It’s so potent as I inhale that I can visualize the manly scented suds on his tan body. As we embrace, I feel my parents’ eyes on us. I was the one who showed the most discomfort with the entire fostering process, and now that he’s here, I’m sure they’re trying to see how I’m taking it. Their facial expressions don’t change, so I’m guessing that they approve of this awkward welcome hug.

  “This little guy down here is Matthew. Go ahead, Matt. Say hi.” My dad is trying his hardest not to make this awkward for us, but from the way Dylan keeps fidgeting and cracking his knuckles, I can tell that my dad is failing miserably. Dylan’s hardly meeting any of our gazes, and when he does, it’s so brief that I start to wonder if it’s because we’re not as disarming as I think we are.

  “I have one question and one question only,” Matthew says, wagging a finger in Dylan’s direction.

  “What’s that?”

  “Do you like to play hide-and-seek?”

  “I love hide-and-seek. We can play after I’m settled in. Okay, buddy?” He extends his pinky finger toward Matthew, who nods his head feverishly and then looks at me.

  “I think I’m gonna like him,” he tries to whisper, though everyone can hear him. “He already knows our secret sign for promises, and I didn’t even have to teach him.” When Matthew was four, I taught him how to make a pinky promise. I said that no one else in the world knew about it, or how to do it. I guess he still believes that.

  Matthew hooks his tiny pinky finger around Dylan’s, and that’s when I see it. A full smile emerges across Dylan’s face, and in an instant, I can tell that he feels like one of us. Like he belongs.

  “Daniel and I are gonna grab your bags out of the car for you. You guys,” my mom says, turning to Matthew and me, “should show him around the house.”

  We speed through a tour, showing him the basics: the garage—which we never use because it’s cluttered with dusty family photos, trophies, and other memorabilia—the kitchen, the bathrooms, the bedrooms, the office, and the living room area. Along the way, Matthew tries to show him where all of the best hiding places are. He points out the nooks and crannies that can drag a game of hide-and-seek on for hours.

  “I don’t want you to think I’m cheating because I’ve lived here all my life,” he says, giggling.

  “Good looking out, Matt.”

  Matt? Dylan has been here for less than an hour, and he’s already using our nickname with Matthew. Are they that close already? Out of the corner of my eye, I see them bump fists, and I feel my stomach twist and knot with discomfort. Matthew’s only seven, and he already has better social skills than I do.

  “I’m going to go pick out my pajamas for bed,” Matthew says as we prepare to descend the stairs. “Wait for me.”

  As I stand along the railing, I try to think of something good to say to Dylan. So, how are you doing this evening? Do you like everything so far? Do you need me to get you anything? Everything I come up with sounds as if we are running a bed-and-breakfast and he’s a guest for the weekend rather than my new brother, so I give up on conversation starters and just look up at him and smile.

  When I raise my eyes, I see that he’s already looking at me. But the second our eyes meet, he looks away. I take it he’s embarrassed that I caught him gawking.

  “You guys have an amazing house,” he says, now staring at the floor.

  “Well, it’s yours, too. Seeing as you’re technically part of this household now.”

  “I guess you’re right.” Another awkward silence fills the gap in our conversation, and I feel obligated to keep it going—I don’t want him to think that I’m callous or socially inept—but as I open my mouth to speak, so does Dylan. “I hope you don’t feel threatened by me. I’m not here to step on your toes.” As he says the word toes, I see his gaze travel over my feet, and his eyebrows scrunch up in disgust.

  “I was betrayed by the beach,” I offer as an explanation, curling my toes under. “Last summer, I stepped on some sharp shells, and they cut into my foot. One week later, I found out it was infected, and I guess my feet are still recovering from the trauma of it all.”

  “Damn,” is all he says, but I get it. My freak accident story is a little too involved to share on his first day here.

  “I know. Poor me.”

  “Poor you? More like poor me for having to look at them,” he jokes. “I think I just lost my appetite.” He chokes back a laugh, and before I know it, we are both giggling uncontrollably. “It’s okay. I’ve got plenty of scars, too.”

  I know I shouldn’t, but the words spill out before I can command them to stay put. “Let me see.”

  He checks over his shoulder—I guess to make sure Matthew isn’t around. Are they that gruesome?—and then pulls at the collar of his T-shirt to show me the heavily scarred skin just below his collarbone. He casts his eyes down as I run my fingers over the raised lines on his skin, as if he’s ashamed of the marks on his body.

  “What made you do this to yourself?” I whisper into his dark brown eyes. The room starts to spin as I imagine him taking a razor blade and slicing into his skin, and I have to hold on to the railing to keep my knees from buckling. I can’t imagine ever marking my body up with the intent of leaving scars.

  “What makes you think I did this to myself?” he spits at me. And just like that, the fire in his eyes dissolves. The guy who was clutching his stomach in a fit of giggles two minutes ago is gone.

  “I just thought—”

  “That I’m a foster kid, and so I must be messed up enough to want to cut myself, right?”

  “I didn’t mean it like that. I—”

  “I get it. You think I’m troubled and traumatized, and so you expect me to do things like this.” He releases the collar of his shirt and takes a step closer to me, making me flinch. Even the aroma of the soap I smelled on him earlier isn’t enough to calm the fright in my heart. “I’ve seen stuff that no person, let alone a kid, should ever have to witness. Horrors that I couldn’t unsee even if I tried. You don’t know my story, and you don’t know me. So I would appreciate it if you didn’t jump to conclusions,
because your assumptions are only making an ass out of you, not me.”

  My heart is beating too loud for me to think of a good comeback, and my mouth has gone dry from the mini panic attack I’m having, but somehow I still manage to whisper, “Got it.”

  “It’s my first day. Please, don’t ruin this for me,” he says, backing away from me. The hurt in his eyes is almost tangible, like the scars near his collarbone.

  “I’m sorry. For assuming, I mean.”

  “Yeah, I know.” It’s only been twenty minutes, and I’ve already gotten him to hate me. How is that possible? When Matthew rejoins us at the top of the stairs, I try to keep to myself. If I open my mouth, I’ll only make things worse.

  “And that concludes the tour,” I murmur as we make our way back to the kitchen.

  “What’s over there?” Dylan asks, pointing outside the back door. There’s no trace of a lingering rage in his voice and no flickers of fury left over from his blood boiling over, either. It’s steady, as if he didn’t just jump down my throat a minute ago.

  “Oh, that’s the pool house, where my room is,” I say, my voice cracking beneath my words. He’s acting as if the conversation we had at the top of the stairs didn’t happen, but unlike him, I don’t have the luxury of forgetting that easily. “I volunteered to give up my room when they decided to adopt you, so my parents let me have it.” His thick eyebrows furl when I say the word adopt. Surely, he must know that adoption is a possibility. If my parents have anything to do with it, he won’t stay in the system forever, but it’s not my place to tell him this. At least, not after the scolding I just got about jumping to conclusions.

  “Foster,” he corrects. “I’m not your brother yet.”

  But eventually you will be, I start to say, but I flash back to our conversation on the stairs, and decide not to.

  My parents are finishing up with his things when we complete our tour. “I don’t want you to think that I never cook, because I do.” My mom laughs. “But we figured you’d like something simple for your first day here.” She hands me two boxes of pizza, and I lead the way to the kitchen table.