Allyson In Between ✔︎

Chapter Nine

|photo by Cottonbro from Pexels|

Summerfield Virginia is not a small town. I looked it up on the Internet. There are almost sixty thousand people living here. But the shopping center Noah drives me to has that small town feel. All the stores look like quaint colonial row houses. Except for Moby's Homemade Ice Cream, which is housed in a cottage with yellow and white awnings and a shamrock green door. I stop for half a moment at the foot of the brick staircase—more out of habit than actual intimidation because these steps are shallow and approachable.

Noah notices my hesitation, and his smile is identical to the one he gave me at Faircrest after he said he was familiar with the "nervous-talking thing." So. I guess he knows about my embarrassing little phobia.

Inside, the shamrock theme dominates. Noah finds a booth in the back and we slide onto the glittery-green vinyl seats—him on one side, me on the other. He plucks a menu out of the chrome...menu-holder thing and lays it open in front of me, tapping a finger above the words Milkshakes and Malts. "You usually get a medium vanilla," he says. 

I nod and make a point of ignoring the ever-increasing tightness in my chest.

It's hot out, but a little overcast: the perfect kind of day to walk around a "shopping village" with an ice cream cone. And most of Moby's customers are doing just that—coming in and going right back out. So the youngish waitress approaches our table right away. "Long time no see," she says, looking from me to Noah and back again.

Her warm smile makes it pretty obvious that she knows who I am—and that she has no idea I can't return the favor.

"It's been a busy summer," Noah says.

"Boy don't I know it," she agrees, waving her order pad at the long line in front of the take-out counter. "You kids having the usual?"

The phrase "you kids" prompts me to take a closer look at her face—which is not as young as I first thought. She's not high-school age. So she probably doesn't know-me know me.

"Ally?" Noah's arched eyebrows repeat the question. Do I want my usual—a medium vanilla milkshake?

"Yes," I tell the waitress. "Please."

Noah produces the movie-theatre-sized box of Raisinets he extracted from his glove box as we were getting out of the car. The candy rattles as he displays it, standing on end in the center of our table. Our waitress winks before she turns away. Apparently she's familiar with our ritual.

"Have you thought anymore about school?" he asks. "About me showing you around, I mean. It might help you make a decision."

Whoa, that reminds me. Last night I dreamed I was standing in the front of a classroom. Science, I guess, because there were lit Bunsen burners on every desk. The teacher was a shorter, hairier version of Dr. Dabney and he was smoking a pipe, but not the grandfatherly kind. His was alien and strange—like something you might see in a Star Wars movie. He pointed a stubby finger and this plastic model of the human brain appeared out of nowhere. It was disturbingly realistic, except that it was the size of a beach ball. The doctor didn't say anything, but I knew he wanted me to identify the lobes—and I could. I could see the words in my head: Frontal, Parietal, Occipital, Temporal. But they wouldn't come out of my mouth. Dr. Dabney gave me a look I've never seen on his face in real life, because as far as I know, he's never been disappointed in me. And then he asked me to write my name on the board, and I totally blanked. I had no idea who I was.

"Or not," Noah says. "I'm not trying to like, pressure you or anything." He takes a breath, like he's getting ready to say something else but then his lips press together and that patch of worry-wrinkles burrows in above his eyebrows.