The Beau & The Belle Read online

  “Doesn’t his baseball practice start at 5:00?” she asks.

  “Yes!” I exclaim, sprinting wildly. My backpack flails violently, swinging from one side of my body to the other. I grip onto the straps and hold on for dear life.

  Rose sighs and starts to run beside me. “This is stupid! He doesn’t even know you exist!”

  “Not true! Last week, he responded when I messaged him!”

  “What’d he say?” she asks, panting beside me.

  “‘Sup?’”

  “And then what happened?”

  “I said ‘nm, you?’ and he didn’t respond. He was probably busy, or his dial-up lost connection!”

  She groans as we turn the corner onto my street. I’m so close. I think I can make it in time. He usually doesn’t leave for practice until around 4:40. I know this not because I’m creepy, but because I’m…observant.

  Every day follows the same pattern. I rush home from school and sign on to instant messenger praying Preston will message me first. He goes to St. Thomas, the all-boys school that partners with ours. Every girl in my school knows who he is, and every girl in my school is probably praying he’ll message with her today as well. Rose thinks it’s silly that I even bother trying to compete with the rest of them for his attention, but I can’t explain it. He’s just so, so…cute. Tall and tan with shaggy blond hair he usually covers under a baseball cap, he looks like one of the Abercrombie & Fitch models they put on the side of the bags. I hoard them in my closet.

  Rose reaches out and grabs my hand, yanking me to a stop in front of my house. We’re both out of breath. It’s the backpacks—private school educations weigh a lot.

  “If he is online, do not message him first,” she says, leveling her light brown eyes on me. “Make him come to you.”

  I wish I had half of Rose’s confidence. She’s beautiful, dark with long inky hair that reaches the middle of her back. Her eyes are almond-shaped and her lips are full. Even worse, she’s never had a pimple a day in her life. In a blockbuster film, she would be cast as the leading lady and I would fill in as her petite, spunky sidekick. She would be a love interest; I would be a laugh track.

  I nod, repeating her phrase, “Make him come to me.”

  Then I wave goodbye, promising to fill her in on all the details as I unlatch the gate and run up the path to my front door.

  If I weren’t so preoccupied, I would have picked up on the voices chatting in the formal living room. Instead, I kick off my shoes, toss my backpack near the umbrella stand, and bolt toward the stairs.

  “Lauren! There you are!”

  My head whips to the side, my feet freeze, and I slide across the front foyer in my socks à la Tom Cruise in Risky Business. When I come to a stop, my attention snags on the man sitting across from my parents. He pushes off his knees and stands, presumably to shake my hand, and my lungs tighten as if squeezed by a boa constrictor. I make a little noise—an audible oof—and his eyes narrow curiously, a subtle hint that he’s heard me.

  He’s in his mid-twenties and dressed in a suit, but he’s lost the jacket. His white shirt is rolled to his elbows, contrasting with the formality of his black tie, which is pinned to his shirt with a silver bar. He rounds the side of the couch toward me and my parents are saying his name in introduction—Beau Fortier—but I’m focused on his broad shoulders and chest that taper to a trim waist. I have to tilt my head back as he steps close and I think I’m supposed to introduce myself, but my parents are doing it for me, like I’m a child.

  “This is our little girl,” my dad says, proud.

  Though I hate the term of endearment, compared to this man, I am just a little girl.

  “Lauren LeBlanc,” I correct the moment before his hand takes mine in a firm grasp.

  Up. Down. Up. Down. My hand is limp. Beau is the one doing the shaking, and I’m just along for the ride.

  “We call her Lou,” my mom supplies from behind him. If I were closer, I’d jab her in the ribs.

  Beau smiles politely, still staring down at me.

  He has classical features—strong jaw, straight nose, piercing eyes—and his full lips balance it all, leaving me wondering if he’s handsome or beautiful, intimidating or inviting. His raven hair is trimmed short, parted to the right. His eyes are arresting—gunmetal blue, sharp and glacial.

  “Lou, why are you so out of breath?” my mom asks with a laugh.

  “I ran home.”

  I say it like it’s obvious and boring. Duh, I ran home. Duh, who doesn’t go for a jog in a plaid skirt with a 30-pound backpack? I try to look as relaxed as possible while panting at the feet of this handsome stranger with the face of a war hero. Beau releases my hand, turning back to my parents. I press my hand to my heart and realize it’s still hammering in my chest, now more than ever.

  Who are you?

  Who are you?

  Who are you?

  My brain begs to know—just out of harmless curiosity, of course.

  “Beau is thinking about renting our apartment,” my mom fills in as if she can hear my pleading thoughts.

  My eyes go wide with wonder.

  He would live on our property?!

  “Actually, I’m ready to sign the lease today,” he says with a strong voice. Boys my age sound like chipmunks in comparison.

  My mom laughs. “Tell you what, give us a minute to talk and get the paperwork in order. In the meantime, why don’t you head out back with Lauren and let her show you around the apartment.”

  They want me to give him a tour.

  I swallow and play it cool. “It’s just right through here.”

  I walk through the dining room and the kitchen and he follows after me, his dress shoes clapping against our hardwood floors. I wish I’d kept my shoes on. My socked feet feel silly now, as if I need one more thing drawing attention to how young I am. At the back door, I slide into my dad’s loafers waiting by the rug, too lazy to hunt down a pair of my own shoes. When I glance over to Beau from beneath my lashes, I swear he’s wearing an amused expression. I yank open the back door and he’s quick to reach out and hold it for me so I have to duck under his arm to step outside. A gentleman, I tell myself in awe. Most guys I know only hold the door open if they’re planning on tripping you. I smile in thanks and heave a sigh of relief once we’re outside, both because we’re out of earshot of my parents and because out here, Beau doesn’t seem quite so suffocating.

  What is it about age that makes youth feel self-conscious? I try to tell myself to relax as I focus on the manicured path in front of me.

  Finally, he breaks the silence.

  “You go to McGehee?” he asks.

  I nod enthusiastically, somehow impressed that he knows something about me. “How’d you know?”

  “Well, your parents told me, but I think I might’ve been able to guess.” He gestures toward my uniform.

  Oh, right—I’m still wearing my plaid skirt and white polo with the school logo. My wild, curly hair is coiled up in a ballerina bun and I have a matching plaid headband holding back the flyaways, though if history is any indication, it’s probably lying down on the job. I resist the urge to reach up and feel for chaos. There’s no sense in worrying about how I look now; he’s already seen me.

  “I have to wear a uniform too,” he says, as if wanting to make me feel better.

  I glance back over his suit. The fitted pants stretch over his muscular thighs as he walks. Don’t look there, you idiot! I turn back to the path that leads from the house toward the apartment. “For your job?”

  “Law school.”

  So he is a lot older.

  “I’m a junior,” I say, as if to emphasize that I’m on my way out of high school. “I’m looking at colleges.”

  “That’s exciting,” he says, and I’m surprised to find that he doesn’t sound like he’s patronizing me. “Your parents mentioned something about grad school too.”

  “Jeez, would they let me get into college first? They’re already pushing me
to go Ivy, Wellesley probably.”

  The right side of his mouth hitches up, like my answer pleases him somehow—either that or it annoys him. I can’t tell.

  “You should,” he says. “Not everyone gets that option.”

  We stop in front of the apartment and I turn back to face the house, trying to see our back yard through a stranger’s eyes. It’s green, lush, and overgrown. My mom spends Saturdays gardening, a hobby she used to make me suffer through right along with her until I accidently watered her rosebushes with some herbicide instead of fertilizer. Now we both agree she’s better off solo.

  Beside the gardens, there’s a pool with blue and white striped lounge chairs lining one side. On weekends, Rose and I live there, reading until my mom insists we have to come inside for dinner.

  “That’s the garden and the pool, obviously,” I say, waving in front of us before moving my hand to the other side of the back yard. “And there’s a grill and outdoor kitchen over there. My parents probably wouldn’t care if you used it, as long as you cleaned up afterward. Good luck trying to figure it out though. I tried to use it once to roast hot dogs and nearly singed my eyebrows off.”

  He smiles then we turn for the apartment and step inside. My dad owns an architectural design firm that specializes in restoring old homes around the Garden District. For years, my parents talked about fixing this guest house up and renting it out to a Tulane or Loyola student, and last year, they finally did it. It’s small, more of a studio than anything else. There’s a bedroom combined with a living room, a bathroom, and some space he could turn into a makeshift kitchen if he wanted to. I turn to Beau, expecting him to complain that it’s not big enough.

  “My parents were talking about letting the renter use our kitchen in the main house,” I say. “Although, I hear you can do a lot with a hot plate, pancakes and…well, actually I’ve only ever seen people make pancakes with a hot plate, so I hope you like breakfast!”

  He’s mostly ignoring me at this point as he walks through the apartment and opens the door to the bathroom, the only separate room in the whole place.

  “It’s fine,” he says, assessing the space with an appreciative look as if it’s not the size of a shoebox.

  “So you’re going to take it?” I sound surprised.

  “Have your parents shown it to anyone else?”

  I shake my head, and as if on cue, their voices drift over the back garden. They come to join us in the apartment and start to discuss the logistics with Beau, facts and numbers I don’t really care about. I linger in the background, wondering what exactly I’m supposed to be doing…wondering how I can get Beau to notice me again. Hey, remember me? Your loveable, witty tour guide?

  My parents lead him out of the apartment so they can all go sign the paperwork, and I’m left behind. They’re halfway back to the house when Beau glances back at me and smiles. I realize then that he hasn’t met my eyes since we were first introduced. His blue gaze is heavy when it lands on me, rooting me in place.

  “Thank you for the tour,” he says, tipping his head.

  My heart hammers in my chest and I wave as I call out, “You too!”

  YOU TOO is what I say back to him, which makes no sense at all, but he’s already turning back to my parents and I’m left wallowing in teen angst. I replay the exchange long after he’s gone. I pull out my homework and spread it across the dining room table, thinking about what a cool reply would have been, murmuring them to myself in anger.

  “Oh, sure thing. My pleasure. Fuggedaboutit.”

  A solid No problem! would have at least made sense. I sigh and push back from the table, planning to distract myself with a snack. I’m rooting through the fruit bin in our refrigerator, trying to decide between an apple or some grapes, when my brain remembers that I forgot about Preston. PRESTON! I jerk up, smack my head on the bottom of the condiment tray, and then whip around toward the kitchen clock. It’s 5:20 PM. My heart races. My head hurts—I hit it harder than I thought I did.

  With a bag of frozen peas pressed to my temple, I bolt for the stairs. It takes ages, EONS for my computer to wake up. I ice my head and tap, tap, tap my finger on my mouse, circling it around like mad. Preston’s baseball practice has already started. It’s too late to talk to him today. I have enough homework to occupy me for hours, and I need to help my mom with dinner (otherwise we’ll be eating some form of overcooked loin). I know it’s too late. I’ve missed my opportunity for today, but that doesn’t matter because when my computer finally wakes up, there’s a chat window sitting in the center of the screen with a halo of gold light shining around it.

  OH MY GOD.

  PRESTON MESSAGED ME.

  AFBaseballGuy05: Yo, what’s up?

  So smooth. So aloof.

  In response, my away message popped up.

  XO_LoULoU_XO’s AWAY MESSAGE: BrB ScHoOl.

  I sit there wondering what my away message says about me. My alternating-caps letters hopefully convey that I am trendy. Fun. Carefree. Also, now he knows I care about school, I guess. That’s good. Maybe next time I should add a song lyric, Green Day or Pink. Something recognizable but vague, possibly “Wonderwall”.

  I wonder what our conversation could have been had I seen his message in time. Maybe he would have asked me to hang out this weekend, or asked me to be his date for the cotillion. I smile and lean back against my chair, basking in the knowledge that Preston Westcott messaged me. ME. Rose isn’t going to believe it.

  I MOVE INTO the apartment on Saturday. It’s a quick process, one trip over from my old place. My old furniture—the modest collection I’ve scrounged together over the years—gets sold, and what’s left is a few boxes of my personal items: school stuff, worn LSAT books I can’t find the courage to part with even though I’m due to graduate from law school in the spring. It feels like if I get rid of them now, it might jinx it, so they get stuffed in the bottom of my TV stand.

  My phone buzzes in my pocket; it’s been ringing all morning. It’s my mom, wondering when I’ll be heading over. Usually at this time on Saturdays, I’m already home. She likes to cook me breakfast with all the trimmings: bacon, eggs, and pancakes with enough high-fructose syrup that I have to crash on her couch and sleep off the meal while old Saints games play in the background. I didn’t have the heart to cancel on her this week even though I need to get settled in at my apartment, not to mention I have enough coursework to keep me occupied for two weeks straight—advanced corporate law, mergers and acquisitions, negotiation theory. Saturdays are our tradition though, and I know how much my visits mean to her since my dad passed a few years back. Hell, they mean a lot to me too. Besides, I could use a stack of her pancakes right about now. My stomach has been grumbling for the past 30 minutes.

  I grab my keys from the coffee table and assess the current state of affairs: my crap is everywhere, and there are still more boxes to unpack. My jaw ticks. I can’t stand the mess. I might have lived in some bad places over the years, but I always found peace in maintaining the day-to-day neatness that I’m able to control.

  I swallow down the compulsion to stay and get everything in order, and instead I yank open the apartment door and step into the LeBlancs’ back yard. There’s a gate on the fence near my apartment, but I loop around the pool instead since my truck’s parked out front.

  I shoot my mom a quick text.

  BEAU: Headed over now.

  A flash of movement catches my attention and I glance up in time to see Lauren duck below her window on the second floor. I resist a smile. She was there watching me all morning as I carried boxes from my truck to the apartment. During my first trip, she came down in Nike shorts and a cotton tank top, flip-flops flapping. Her blonde curly hair was pulled back in a swinging ponytail, messy and girlish.

  “D’ya need any help?” she asked me with wide, expressive eyes, hazel with green flecks. It’s been said that eyes are little windows to the soul, but hers seem to offer a floor-to-ceiling view into every damn thought in her
head.

  I turned down her offer, not because I make it a point to be an asshole, but because the boxes were heavy and there’s a reason moving companies don’t hire willowy teenagers. She would just get in the way.

  She didn’t let that stop her though.

  By the time I was on my next trip, she was back out there with a glass of lemonade. I hesitated, thinking of how it’d tasted the last time I was offered a glass, but she was quick to ease my fear.

  “I tossed that hydrochloric acid my mom made. This is my signature blend. I’ve been making it since my friends and I used to sell it out on the sidewa—” She stopped short and flushed. “Never mind, just try it. It’s good, I promise!”

  Her tentative smile was enough to sway me and I took a long sip, appreciating how cold it was. Even in the morning, the temperatures were creeping up.

  My brows rose in appreciation, something she didn’t miss. Her smile widened, forcing a little dimple on her left cheek, and she rocked back on her flip-flopped feet. “See? Pretty good, right? The secret is fresh mint and ginger ale, and I’ve been tweaking the lemon-to-sugar ratio and think I finally have it right. You might think it needs to be really sweet to be good, but too much sugar and you mask the tartness. Also, it needs to be ice cold—not just cold, but nearly frozen.”

  I think she would have stood there in front of me all day, blocking my way and talking and talking and talking, but her dad stepped out on the back porch and saw us there. I froze instinctively, even though there was nothing inappropriate going on. No matter how innocent the circumstances, a father probably isn’t too keen on his daughter spending too much time hanging around an older stranger. It wasn’t mentioned during our meeting the other day, but it goes without saying: Lauren is off limits.

  “Lauren, what did I tell you earlier? Leave Beau alone.”

  Her eyes went wide and her tan cheeks turned bright red again. “Dad!”

  “Can’t you see he’s busy, kiddo?”

  She glanced down and kicked the sidewalk with the front of her flip-flop. “Just trying to offer him something other than Mom’s patented battery acid.”