Luke had been in the process of unfolding the stack of papers but when he heard what it was, he stopped. "You were carrying it around in your pocket?"

I nodded and tried to smile, but failed miserably.

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His eyes moved to the sheets still folded in his fingers.

"Did a lot of people reply, then?" He slowly moved his fingers over the still-folded sheets.

I took the papers gently from his hands. "It's the biggest response since I wrote an editorial about getting a fire station built in town." I unfolded the notes and Luke's gaze suddenly strayed. He couldn't look at the results, so I said, "They loved you."

He came back. "Really?"

I grinned, a true grin this time, at his expression of complete disbelief. He snatched the papers out of my hand and read through each comment. His face moved from incredulous to ill to ecstatic in only moments. Then he crushed the comments in his fist and looked at me.

"They really did like it," he whispered. I bit my lip. "I know."

"They liked me, Carrie." I think he had to repeat the words to believe them. And when it soaked in, he suddenly looked like he could grab me and pull me toward him to wrap his arms around me and bury his face in my hair. But then he looked down at the stack of replies without touching me.

"This can't be real." He slapped the critiques gently against his thigh and turned to me. "Thank you," he said quietly.

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131

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Chapter Ten

It was after that first kiss I decided to start keeping a diary—this very book, in fact. I called it a journal, though, since I thought diaries were for sissy girls who only wrote about what boy they had a crush on that week. I didn't plan on writing just about my crush alone. Yeah, that was probably the biggest reason I wanted one but it seemed that so many things were changing around me. I knew I would look back on this year one day and try to remember the exact smells and the exact color of things I was currently experiencing. And I knew they were things I didn't want to forget. I know, I know. I should've already started a journal by that point. Sixteen, almost seventeen, seemed old for someone like me to begin such a task. But I never thought I had an exciting life...not until Luke Carter deemed me interesting enough to kiss.

So I decided I needed a notebook. Yes, I spent most of my time writing and had plenty of notebooks. But I wanted a new one, something fresh and clean that had never been written in before. I knew there was no way I'd find one in my room. I wrote so much every notebook I owned was already half filled with scribbles.

So I decided to ransack Marty's old room. I don't think I ever saw him do over an hour's worth of homework so I knew he had to have dozens of brand new, spotless notebooks. His room was half empty. His clothes, posters, and even the pillows off his bed were gone. But other things remained. 132

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He'd actually won first place at the science fair one year. He'd invented a new kind of water bomb and his demonstration of it had been outstanding. His trophy for that was still sitting on his dresser along with some loose change from which I pocketed the quarters and dimes. I started searching under his bed. Marty kept old school things there like yearbooks and past report cards. Mom had everything stored in a Rubbermaid container. I shimmied down on my hands and knees and reached for the box. The dust almost choked me when I pulled it out. And I knew then that Mom had kept his room sacred, not stepping foot into his personal domain since he'd left.

Waving away the dust cloud so I could see, I opened the box and sorted through it. It smelled musty and stale. I found a picture he'd drawn when he was in kindergarten. The paper was yellowed and ragged at the corners. The drawing showed Mom and Dad and Marty standing in a row and holding hands. Mom had a fat stomach so she must've been pregnant with me. At the top, in the worst handwriting I'd ever seen, Marty had written, "I love Mommy. I love Daddy. I love baby."

I sighed. Too bad Marty hadn't stayed that sweet over the years.

I shoved the drawing back into the pile and sifted some more. No notebook. Growing more and more restless, I pushed the box back under the bed and stood up, wiping my knees with my hands.

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The closet was the next place to look. I pulled the string for the light and once again a dust cloud enveloped me. It made the confining closet look dim and hazy. I had to stand on tiptoes to peek at the top shelf. As I did, I bumped into some clothes still hanging there. It rustled up a smell I associated with my brother. And for the briefest of moments I missed him. That was something I would never tell a living soul. But the smell of Marty reminded me of when we were younger and he would sometimes let me ride in the front seat when we went with Dad to test drive a car. And it reminded me of when we went grasshopper hunting together. Marty let me hold the jar while he caught the grasshoppers, which was fine with me because I had no desire to touch the creepy-crawly critters. But it had made me feel important to hold that jar for my big brother. Of course, then Marty would torture the poor thing by pulling its legs off one by one, and I'd go running to Mom, bawling. But standing there, in his closet, made me miss those old days.

It also reminded me of how so many things had changed. Marty had moved out, and someday I would too. We weren't foolish little kids anymore, pulling off grasshopper legs. I sighed. It was almost depressing to think about growing up. But then I spotted what looked like a notebook stuck under a shoebox. More determined than ever to preserve my memories of fair youth, I shoved the clothes aside and peered over them to get a look at what was on his closet shelf. Sure enough, there was a plain, three-holed notebook wedged under everything.

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I tugged on it, trying to shimmy it out from under the shoebox. But when I pulled it free the shoebox came as well. My fingers clamped desperately around the notebook as the contents of the box that had been on top of it spilled out and onto me. I ducked, wrapping my hands over my head to cushion the blow. Objects fell around me, bumping and scraping against my arms and fingers before crashing in a heap at my feet. The notebook had acted as an umbrella throughout the ordeal, protecting my noggin from harm. I stood there, half paralyzed for a second, until everything settled on the carpet. Then I checked myself for damages. I fared the collision OK. There were a few stinging scrapes on my arms, but the skin wasn't bleeding or broken. I looked at the floor. The shoebox, empty now, lay propped against my shoe, and old fireworks littered the floor around my feet. I bent down and picked up a bundle of sparklers and a string of cracker jacks fell from my hair, landing on a stick of roman candles.

For a moment, I could only stare. There were fireworks everywhere.

I wondered how old they were and if they were still good. Marty loved the Fourth of July. It was the only time of year he didn't get into trouble for blowing something up. And he always went crazy buying every kind of firework he could find. I swear he used to save his money all year just for the Fourth of July. I had to admit I loved the season too. I don't think I had one bad memory of Independence Day. Maybe it was the hot summer sun, the smell of freshly cut grass, the taste of homemade ice cream, or the fact that I didn't have to 135