“You’ve seriously never seen one of those before,” I said. “How is that possible?”
He shrugged. “Two guys living together for ten years without a mom or sister. You do the math.”
“You had a mom!” Caro called out from the bathroom. I could tell from her voice that she was applying mascara now, blithe and oblivious to Oliver’s small wince. “You just didn’t know where she was!”
Time to intervene.
“Can I borrow that after you?” I yelled to her, examining my nail polish.
“My mascara?”
“Yeah!”
“You’re not supposed to share eye makeup! What if I have pinkeye?”
“It’d be an honor to share pinkeye with you, Caro.”
The tube came flying out of the bathroom a few seconds later.
“Thank you!”
Finally, after Caro had finished her eye makeup and I found a shirt in her dresser (folded as neatly as an envelope, of course), we were ready to go. “What about me?” Oliver teased, holding out his arms. “Now I’m really self-conscious about how straight my eyelashes are.”
I tugged at his shirt and rolled my eyes as we left behind the half-Pollock, half-Mondrian bedroom. “Embrace your uniqueness,” I told him. “And watch out for those shoes.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The thing with Drew’s house is that it’s sort of ridiculous.
It’s in Canyon Crest, which is this really nice neighborhood set on a hill a few miles away from my and Oliver’s neighborhood. My dad’s theory is that they set it on a hill so that no matter where you are in our town, you can see the mansions, which sounds about right to me. “We enjoy watching the serfs,” Drew said when I floated that theory past him, and I’ve known Drew long enough to recognize the sarcasm in his voice.
I can’t say that’s not how other Canyon Crest residents actually feel, though.
We drove past Drew’s driveway, which was U-shaped and long, and Oliver glanced up at the Tudor-style windows that seemed to be glaring down at us. “I feel like I should be remembering this,” he said.
“You don’t?” I asked.
“Nope.” He shook his head as he looked out at the neighborhood.
“Where are you going?” Caro asked from the backseat, where she was struggling to buckle her open-toed high-heeled sandals.
“I’m not going to park my car in the driveway!” I told her. “What if my parents drive by and see it? Or friends of my parents?”
“You live your life like you’re under surveillance,” Caro muttered, now propping her foot up on the passenger seat.
“Those look painful,” Oliver commented, trying to avoid Caro digging her heel into his shoulder. “Why does everything you do look like it hurts?”
“Because!” Caro huffed with a final shove. “You guys want us to look natural and there’s nothing natural about looking natural.”
I could see the confusion cross Oliver’s face and stifled my own smile.
“Those shoes don’t look natural,” Oliver pointed out.
“Yes, but they’re three-inch heels, which make me look like I’m an average height of five five. See?” she explained. “Natural.”
“Why do you want to be average?” I asked her, scanning the street around the corner for a place to park. I wasn’t the only person who had had that brilliant idea, apparently. I recognized more than a few cars from the school parking lot.
“I said natural, not average.”
Oliver and I exchanged glances, both of us trying to hide our amusement.
“How far away are we?” Caro looked out the window as I parallel parked the minivan. (Which, might I add, is not easy to do, considering that the trunk is big enough to hold a few surfboards.) “Do I have to hike in these spikes?”
“Naturally,” Oliver said, earning himself a gentle shoulder shove from Caro.
“But it’s dark and there’s gravel! What if I trip?”
“Just act natural,” I told her, and Oliver cracked up as we both climbed out of the car. “Here,” he said, bending down a little. “Climb on.”
Caro looked wary, but jumped up on his back and wrapped her arms around Oliver’s neck. “This is both super weird and really helpful,” she said, trying to pull down her skirt in the back so that she wouldn’t flash half of Canyon Crest.
“You’re welcome,” Oliver said. “Can you, um, loosen your grip a little, though? My neck.” He coughed and winced.
“Oh, sorry, sorry.” Caro readjusted herself, then looked down at me and grinned. “You look so little from up here.”
“You’re, like, six inches away from me,” I pointed out as the three of us (well, two and a passenger) trekked it toward Drew’s house. The last time we had all gone to Drew’s house, it had been for Drew’s fifth birthday party, but I could still picture Oliver, Caro, and I trudging up the driveway, gifts in hand.
“It’s a dramatic change,” Caro told me, unaware of what I had been thinking. “You don’t understand because you’re average height.”
Oliver just hefted her higher onto his back. “Caro, your shoes. Ow.”
“Oh, sorry, sorry.” She dug her heels out of his sides. “My bad.”
We hiked up Drew’s driveway (empty, of course) and I almost slipped in the loose gravel, grabbing Caro’s ankle at the last second to steady myself and almost pulling the three of us down to the ground in the process. “If I die . . .” Caro warned.