Eleanor & Park

‘You can’t walk me home,’ she said with her usual edge, ‘you know that, right?’

‘I know. But I can walk you partway.’

‘I don’t know …’

‘Come on,’ he said, ‘it’s dark. No one will see us.’

‘Okay,’ she said, but she put her hands in her pockets. They both walked slowly.

‘Your family is really great,’ she said after a minute. ‘Really.’

He took her arm. ‘Hey, I want to show you something.’ He pulled her into the next driveway, between a pine tree and an RV.

‘Park, this is trespassing.’

‘It’s not. My grandparents live here.’

‘What do you want to show me?’

‘Nothing, really, I just want to be alone with you for a minute.’

He pulled her to the back of the driveway, where they were almost completely hidden by a line of trees and the RV and the garage.

‘Seriously?’ she said. ‘That was so lame.’

‘I know,’ he said, turning to her. ‘Next time, I’ll just say, “Eleanor, follow me down this dark alley, I want to kiss you.”’

She didn’t roll her eyes. She took a breath, then closed her mouth. He was learning how to catch her off guard.

She pushed her hands deeper in her pockets, so he put his hands on her elbows instead. ‘Next time,’ he said, ‘I’ll just say, “Eleanor, duck behind these bushes with me, I’m going to lose my mind if I don’t kiss you.”’

She didn’t move, so he thought it was probably okay to touch her face. Her skin was as soft as it looked, white and smooth as freckled porcelain.

‘I’ll just say, “Eleanor, follow me down this rabbit hole …”’

He laid his thumb on her lips to see if she’d pull away. She didn’t. He leaned closer. He wanted to close his eyes, but he didn’t trust her not to leave him standing there.

When his lips were almost touching hers, she shook her head. Her nose rubbed against his.

‘I’ve never done this before,’ she said.

‘S’okay,’ he said.

‘It’s not, it’s going to be terrible.’

He shook his head. ‘It’s not.’

She shook her head a little more. Just a little.

‘You’re going to regret this,’ she said.

That made him laugh, so he had to wait a second before he kissed her.

It wasn’t terrible. Eleanor’s lips were soft and warm, and he could feel her pulse in her cheek. It was good that she was so nervous – because it forced him not to be. It steadied him to feel her trembling.

He pulled away before he wanted to. He hadn’t done this enough to know how to breathe.

When he pulled away, her eyes were mostly closed. His grandparents had a light on, on their front porch, and Eleanor’s face caught every bit of it. She looked like she should be married to the man in the moon.

Her face dropped after a second, and he let his hand fall to her shoulder.

‘Okay?’ he whispered.

She nodded. He pulled her closer and kissed the top her head. He tried to find her ear under all that hair.

‘Come here,’ he said, ‘I want to show you something.’

She laughed. He lifted her chin.

The second time was even less terrible. Eleanor

They walked together from his grandparents’

driveway to the alley, then Park waited there in the shadows and watched Eleanor walk home alone.

She told herself not to look back.

Richie was home, and everybody except her mom was watching TV. It wasn’t that late; Eleanor tried to act like there was nothing strange about her coming home in the dark.

‘Where have you been?’ Richie said.

‘At a friend’s house.’

‘What friend?’

‘I told you, honey,’ her mom said, stepping into the room, drying a pan. ‘Eleanor has a girlfriend in the neighborhood. Lisa.’

‘Tina,’ Eleanor said.

‘Girlfriend, huh?’ Richie said. ‘Giving up on men already?’ He thought that was pretty fu

Eleanor went into the bedroom and closed the door. She didn’t turn on the light. She climbed into bed in her street clothes, opened the curtains and wiped the condensation off the window. She couldn’t see the alley or anything moving outside.

The window fogged over again. Eleanor closed her eyes and laid her forehead against the glass.

CHAPTER 29 Eleanor

When she saw Park standing at the bus stop on Monday morning, she started giggling. Seriously, giggling like a cartoon character … when their cheeks get all red, and little hearts start popping out of their ears …

It was ridiculous. Park

When he saw Eleanor walking toward him on Monday morning, Park wanted to run to her and sweep her up in his arms. Like some guy in the soap operas his mom watched. He hung onto his backpack to hold himself back …

It was kind of wonderful. Eleanor

Park was just her height, but he seemed taller. Park

Eleanor’s eyelashes were the same color as her freckles. Eleanor

They talked about The White Album on the way to school, but just as an excuse to stare at each other’s mouths. You’d think they were lip-reading.

Maybe that’s why Park kept laughing, even when they were talking about ‘Helter Skelter’ –

which wasn’t the Beatles’ fu

CHAPTER 30 Park

‘Hey,’ Call said, taking a bite out of his Rib-aQue sandwich. ‘You should come to the basketball game with us Thursday. And don’t even try to tell me you don’t like basketball, Spud.’

‘I don’t know …’

‘Kim’s going to be there.’

Park groaned. ‘Call …’

‘Sitting next to me,’ Call said. ‘Because we’re totally going out.’

‘Wait, seriously?’ Park covered his mouth to keep a chunk of sandwich from flying out. ‘Are we talking about the same Kim?’

‘Is that so hard to believe?’ Call opened his carton of milk completely and drank out of it like a cup. ‘She wasn’t even into you, you know. She was just bored, and she thought you were mysterious and quiet – like, “still waters run deep.” I told her that sometimes still waters just run still.’

‘Thanks.’

‘But she’s totally into me now, so you can hang out with us if you want. The basketball games are a blast. They sell nachos and everything.’

‘I’ll think about it,’ Park said.

He wasn’t going to think about it. He wasn’t going anywhere without Eleanor. And she didn’t seem like the basketball game type. Eleanor

‘Hey, girl,’ DeNice said after gym class. They were in the locker room, changing back into their street clothes. ‘So I’ve been thinking, you’ve got to go to Sprite Nite with us this week. Jonesy’s got his car fixed, and he’s got this Thursday off.

We are going to do it right, right, right, all through the night, night, night.’

‘You know I’m not allowed to go out,’ Eleanor said.

‘I know that you’re not allowed to go to your boyfriend’s house either,’ DeNice said.

‘I heard that,’ Beebi said.

Eleanor should never have told them about Park’s house, but she’d been dying to tell somebody. (This was how people ended up in jail after committing the perfect crime.) ‘Keep it down,’

she said. ‘God.’

‘You should come,’ Beebi said. Her face was perfectly round, with dimples so deep that when she smiled she looked tufted, like a cushion. ‘We have so much fun. I’ll bet you’ve never even been dancing before.’

‘I don’t know …’ Eleanor said.

‘Is this about your man?’ DeNice asked. ‘Because he can come, too. He don’t take up much space.’

Beebi giggled, so Eleanor giggled, too. She couldn’t imagine Park dancing. He’d probably be really good at it, if all the Top 40 music didn’t make his ears bleed. He was good at everything.

Still … She couldn’t imagine the two of them going out with DeNice or Beebi. Or anybody.

Thinking about going out with Park, in public, was kind of like thinking about taking your hel-met off in space. Park

His mom said that if they were going to hang out every night after school, which they definitely were, they had to start doing homework.