Dead Ends by Erin Jade Lange Page B

either.”
    She met my eyes and squeezed my hands as if afraid I would pull away. “Are you sure?”
    I held her gaze. “I’m sure.”
    As Mom wrapped her arms around my neck, I added to myself:
Sure if I ever do find him, I will beat him until even
he
doesn’t know his name.

Chapter 12
    After a couple of weeks of Billy tagging along to and from school, I’d forgotten to be embarrassed being seen with him—forgotten to notice other people noticing us. The only times I remembered we might look strange walking side by side were once when I heard a rumor that Billy must be my little brother and whenever Nina Sinclair gave me that weepy “aren’t-you-sweet” smile. I pretty much stopped talking to her after a few of those.
    Our walks were mostly a tug-of-war between Billy trying to get me to decipher codes from the atlas and me trying to give Billy bonus fighting lessons. I knew I let Billy down whenever I couldn’t figure out his dad’s cryptic messages, so I tried to make up for it with the extra-credit fight-club stuff. I’d been teaching him to stand a little taller and firmer, to get a good stance for leg swipes. He’d managed to knock me off my feet afew times, and I noticed he wasn’t hunching so much now when he walked.
    We were practicing those leg swipes on one of our walks home when a flash of white ahead of us caught my eye.
    â€œHey, Billy D., isn’t that your girlfriend?”
    Billy followed my line of sight, then ran ahead, arm straight out in front of him, waving like a maniac. “Seely! Seely!”
    Seely skidded to a stop and used the back wheels of her skateboard to do a 180-degree spin. “Hey! Billy D., right?”
    â€œRight!” Billy made a fist and did a little elbow tuck like he was celebrating a victory. “You remember me.”
    â€œSure I remember you, little dude.”
    â€œI’m not little,” Billy corrected. “I’m—I’m big enough to ride your skateboard.”
    Seely tapped the end of the board with her toe to make it pop into the air. She caught it one-handed without taking her eyes off Billy. “That’s right. I said you could ride it if we met again.”
    â€œYeah, ’cause we’re friends now.”
    I caught up to the two of them and shrugged over Billy’s shoulder at Seely. She
had
promised.
    She hesitated only a second before plastering on a big smile and passing the board to Billy. “Okay, friend, let’s see if you can stand up on it first.”
    â€œYes!” Billy dropped his heavy pack right there in the street and stepped onto the board. Seely steadied him with two hands, then one, then let him fly around on his own. I noticed he was using his fighting stance to keep balanced. Seely and I both saton the curb to watch Billy, impressed and—speaking for myself—a little proud.
    â€œHe’s pretty good,” Seely said.
    I snorted. “Not like riding a skateboard is very hard.”
    â€œIt is for some people,” she said.
    I glared sideways at Seely. “If you mean people like Billy D., you’re wrong. He can stand on a piece of wood as good as anybody.”
    â€œI didn’t mean
people like Billy D
. I just meant
people.
It’s not as easy as you think.”
    My arms relaxed at my sides, and I looked away so Seely wouldn’t see the little smile of relief that slipped onto my lips before I could stop it.
    â€œWhy do you ride a board, anyway?” I scoffed. “Didn’t you say your dad owns a motorcycle shop or something? Why don’t you have wheels?”
    Seely pointed to the street, under Billy’s feet. “I’ve got four of ’em.”
    She winked as Billy slid by and laughed at her comment.
    â€œAnyway,” she went on, “I have to
earn
the big wheels. I’m logging hours at the shop for my dad. He had to lay a bunch of people off when the shop started losing