Megan Hart - Switch

because of his prowess on the footbal field. If he knew me

it was maybe because I was one of the girls every boy

it was maybe because I was one of the girls every boy

knew, or maybe just because we'd been in the same

school since we were five. We didn't say hi when we

passed in the hals, but he was never mean to me the way

some of the boys could be. Austin never caled me names

or made crude invitations.

In the fal of our senior year, Austin went down under a

pile of boys pumped up with testosterone and fury. We

won the homecoming game, but instead of riding in Chrissy

Fisher's dad's 1966 Impala convertible, Austin took a red-

lights-flashing ambulance to the Hershey Medical Center.

He recovered, nothing miraculous about it. His body,

bones broken and skin torn, healed. Nobody ever said

he'd never play footbal again. Austin simply never did.

Nor basketbal, either, and in the spring, not basebal. By

then his chances of going to anything other than community

colege had vanished along with the scholarship offers, but

if he ever cared he wasn't getting a ful ride to Penn State,

he never said so to me.

And by then, he would have. By the time our senior year

ended, Austin told me everything.

We were an odd couple, but nobody shunned us for it. I

We were an odd couple, but nobody shunned us for it. I

didn't hear whispers in the hals. No jealous cheerleaders

tried to pul out my dyed-black hair, and no slick rich

jocks tried to convince him he was better off without me.

We didn't go to the prom, but only because we decided to

stay home and watch soft porn and fuck, instead.

When I told my mom we were going to get married, she

hugged me and wept. Her bely poked between us—she

was pregnant with Arthur, then. If she suspected I wanted

to marry Austin as much so I could move out of the house

as for passion, she didn't say anything.

When we told his parents, his dad said nothing and his

mother's eyes dropped to my waistband. She didn't ask

me if I was pregnant, and she must have been surprised as

the months of our marriage passed and my bely stayed

flat, but no matter how she might have felt about the

prospect of me as a daughter-in-law, the idea of a bastard

grandchild must've been worse.

I wore a thrift-store wedding dress and Austin wore a suit

of his dad's we'd paid the dry cleaner to take in. In

pictures, my thick black eyeliner and my spiked black hair

make me look pale, wan. Tired. Scared, even.

The truth is, I was happy.

We both were, I like to think. At least at first. Austin went

to work for his dad's construction business, and I kept up

work at my mom's shop. My granddad had died and it

was hers, ful-time, and now that she had Arty, she

couldn't spend as much time with it, so I managed the

shop.

We were happy.

And then, we weren't.

Chapter 07

When I was younger, the prospect of Sunday dinner at my

dad's had so excited me or stressed me out I'd vomit.

Never at my father's house—even when I was little I knew

Stela wouldn't approve of a puking kid. I didn't puke

anymore, but I'd never managed to get rid of the knots in

my stomach, either.

I popped an antacid tablet now as I sat in my not-

expensive-enough-to-be-impressive car in their half-circle

driveway of stamped concrete. This was the fourth new

house my father'd had in the past seventeen years of life

with his second family. Before that he'd lived in a stately

Georgian-style half mansion with his first family. He'd

never lived with my mother.

Birth-order studies claim that an age difference of six or

more years between siblings complicates the normal

oldest, middle and youngest personality traits by also

making each child an only. That's why, though I have five

half siblings and an uncle who's more like a brother, I'm an

only child. I've tried identifying with being the middle kid—

but what it comes down to, in the end, is I'm not.

The door opened and Jeremy and Tyler ran out. They

both favor my dad, too. Al of us look more like siblings

than we were raised to be. I was fourteen when Jeremy

was born, sixteen for Tyler. They're more like nephews or

cousins than brothers. I'm not sure what they think of me,

just that they're always glad to see me and aside from the

fact they're spoiled brats who could use a good spanking

now and then, I'm usualy glad to see them, too.

"Hey, Paige." Jeremy at twelve no longer ran to clutch at

my legs. He settled for a half wave with limp fingers.

Tyler, ten, was nearly as tal as me but squeezed me

anyway. "Paige, c'mon, we're going to play Pictionary.

Grandma and Grandpa are here already. So's Nanny and

Poppa."

"And Gretchen and Steve, too, I see." I pointed to the two minivans that belonged to my dad's kids with his first wife.

"Everyone's here," Jeremy said somewhat sourly, and I

gave him a glance. He'd always been a pretty upbeat kid.

Today he scowled, blond eyebrows pinching tight over the

smaler version of our father's nose.

I leaned back into my car to grab the gift, then locked my

car. It was unlikely anything would happen to it parked in

my dad's driveway, but it was habit. "Come. Let's go in."

I slung an arm around Tyler's neck and listened to him

babble on about school, soccer, the new game system

he'd found under the Christmas tree. He had never known

Santa to disappoint him. I'd stopped trying not to be

envious of that, even though I no longer believed in Santa

Claus.

Inside, Jeremy slunk to a chair in the corner and sat with

crossed arms, the scowl stil in place. Tyler abandoned me

to round up pens for the game. That left me to the socialy

torturous task of making nice with Stela's parents, Nanny

and Poppa.

Like their daughter, they weren't bad people. They'd never

gone out of their way to be cruel. I wasn't Cinderela. And

I understood, now, what it must have been like to try to

find a place in their hearts for their new son-in-law's

children, and how awkward it must have felt. A hastily

wrapped Jumbo Book of Puzzles and a prewrapped box

of knit mittens would always fal short in comparison to

exquisitely wrapped packages in shiny foil paper with

exquisitely wrapped packages in shiny foil paper with

matching bows, the contents new clothes or toys. I

understood. Spending Christmas at my dad's had been last

minute, haphazardly planned and rare. At least Nanny and

Poppa had made an effort.

It seemed easier for them now that I was a grown-up,

though it was more difficult for me. As a kid it had never

occurred to me they wouldn't like me. Now I was

convinced they didn't.

"Helo, Paige," George, also known as Poppa, said. "How nice of you to come."

He meant wel, but the unspoken insinuation of surprise

made me bite my tongue against the shout of "Of course I

came! She's my father's wife!"

But, like Stela herself, I could never hope to impress

them. I just wanted not to prove them right. So instead of

shouting, I smiled.

"How are you?" I couldn't cal him George, Mr. Smith

sounded absurd, and I would never cal him Poppa.

I'd been asking out of politeness, but he told me exactly

how he was. For fifteen minutes. And I listened, nodding

how he was. For fifteen minutes. And I listened, nodding

and murmuring in appropriate places, as though I cared. I

didn't know half the people he mentioned, but he acted as

if he thought I should. He never asked me about myself,

which was fine, because then I didn't have to answer.

Finaly, the game of Pictionary got under way. Gretchen's

husband, Peter, begged off, volunteering to take care of

Hunter, their three-year-old son. Steve and his vastly

pregnant wife, Kely, played, though, as did my dad and

Stela, al the grandparents and Tyler. And me. Jeremy had

disappeared. We split into teams, boys against girls.

"I'l sit out," I said when we'd counted up the teams to find the girls' side had an extra player.

"Oh, no, Paige, are you sure?" Stela protested, but not

too hard. She liked things even and square.

"Sure. Not a problem. I'l go check on dinner, if you

want."

Okay, so maybe I'd cast myself in the Cinderela role. Just

a little. But it was a relief to get into the kitchen and set out

platters of vegetables and dip, cheese and crackers.

Decorative breads and soft cheeses with pretty spreaders

Decorative breads and soft cheeses with pretty spreaders

that matched the platter. Stela loved to have parties.

I found the cold-cut platters in the garage fridge and

brought them into the kitchen to put them out on the table,

which was serving as a buffet. I startled Jeremy when I

came back in, and he whirled, can of soda in hand, from

the open fridge.

From the living room, the sound of laughter wafted. I set

the platter of meat on the table. Jeremy and I stared each

other down.

"You're not supposed to be drinking that before dinner," I told him.

"I know." His chin lifted. He hadn't yet cracked the top.

"I'm not going to tel you on you, kiddo." I turned to the

table and took off the platter's plastic lid so I could get rid

of the fake greenery around the edges. I knew how to

make things pretty.

"Don't cal me kiddo," he said.

I expected him to slink away with his stolen prize, but he

didn't. When I turned to look at him, he was stil playing

didn't. When I turned to look at him, he was stil playing

with the can, shifting it from one hand to the other.

"Something up?" I moved past him to the big, mostly

empty pantry, to pul out the fancy plastic plates and

plastic-ware, the matching napkins.

"No." Jeremy shrugged and disappeared up the back

stairs.

After that, the party realy started.

It was easier for me with more people there. Stela's

friends knew who I was, of course, and avoided talking to

me so they didn't have to deal with the awkwardness of

how to address their friend's husband's ilegitimate

daughter. My dad's friends knew me, too, but had fewer

inhibitions for some reason. Maybe because I'd known

them longer, or because they had no conflict of loyalty.

Some of them didn't like Stela much, and maybe that was

part of it, too.

Of my father's other kids, I saw very little. Gretchen, Steve

and I had never been close, even though it wasn't my

mother who'd finaly won our dad away from their mom.

Of course, their spouses weren't sure what to make of me,

Of course, their spouses weren't sure what to make of me,

either, and it was easier for us to be superficialy polite

without trying to get to know each other. Their children

were and would be my nieces and nephews, but I doubted

they'd ever think of me as an aunt.

"Paige DeMarco, how the hel are you?" Denny's one of

my dad's oldest friends. Fishing and drinking buddies,

they'd known each other since high school. He'd known

my mom, too.

"Hey, Denny. Long time no see."

"Yeah, and you a big-city girl now, too. How's it going?"

Denny gave me a one-armed hug.

"It's going great." It wasn't an entire lie. Most of my life was going great.

"Yeah?" He tossed back the dregs of his iced tea. I

guessed he was hankering for a beer, but Stela wasn't

serving booze. Not that I blamed her. Alcohol always

made a different kind of party. "Where you living at? Your

dad said someplace along the river?"

"Riverview Manor."

There was no denying the pride sweling inside me at

Denny's impressed whistle. "Nice digs. And your job?

You're not stil working with your mom, are you?"