Page 16 of Shelter
The stain faded under the pressure of my scrubbing, and I re-wet the cloth a few times to keep at it. Of course, it was still visible, especially around the edges of the stain, but I hoped the baking soda and vinegar would take care of that.
I got to work on the smaller stain the same way, and about halfway through it, I sensed that Cole was watching me. Not watching me remove the stain. But watchingme.
I peered up at him from beneath my frowning brows. “Why are you staring at me like that?”
Cole blinked, looking as if I’d startled him. Then he scowled. “What else am I supposed to look at? We’re in a bathroom.”
I didn’t have an answer for this, so I opened the bottle of vinegar and dabbed a little of onto my cloth. I made sure each stain was soaked through with vinegar before I stepped back and let the strong-smelling liquid do its thing.
“Now for the hard part,” I murmured.
Cole frowned. “What’s that?”
“Waiting.”
Cole blinked again. His mouth might have twitched. I sat on the edge of the tub while he leaned against the counter. I heard him draw in and release a breath. When he spoke, I almost jumped.
“Why are you helping me?”
My shoulders jolted at his question. Looking up at him, I realized I could only meet his eyes for a second.
WhywasI helping him?
Cole Whitehurst was no longer the meanest kid I knew. Some girls in my fifth-grade class, like Anna Grace Hillborn, were a lot meaner to me and everyone else than Cole had been. Still, Cole was not a nice person, and we’d never been friends.
But hearing what I’d heard from under the dining table and then seeing the blood on his shirt, the cut on his lip, and the tears in his eyes had made me feel as if I’d swallowed a box of rocks. And knowing that his own daddy had done that to him felt like I’d washed those rocks down with a lead milkshake.
“Do you feel sorry for me?” The words bit, and I looked up into angry eyes.
“No,” I denied. But I did feel bad for him. Was feeling bad that something rotten had happened to someone the same thing as feeling sorry for them? And I didn’t just feel bad for him.No oneshould be hit that way. Sure, Mama used to spank me when I didn’t mind her, back when I was smaller. (Nowadays, she relied on giving me extra chores or grounding me, and frankly, I would have preferred a quick swat on the legs and the immediate absolution that followed over losing my TV privileges for a week or having my bike taken away.)
But what Mr. Whitehurst had done was nothing like that. He was a grown man — a big man — and he’d used his strength to make his son bleed. That had to be wrong.
And worse than that, I had a feeling in my rock-and-lead-filled gut that the scene I’d witnessed was not a first. If anything, Cole’s asking me if I felt sorry for him was proof of that.
To me, that meant Cole, as much as Idid notlike him, needed help.
He was still looking at me as if he was waiting for an answer, so I shrugged. “Maybe I’m just a good person.”
Cole’s eyes became slits as though he doubted that. I ignored his sour look and stood to check the stains. The vinegar had made them all but vanish, so I picked up the box of baking soda and tapped some out onto the cloth. I ran a trickle of water from the faucet onto it and made a paste. Then I rubbed the paste into the stains.
Cole kept watching me as though I confused him. I was about tell him to quit staring when I heard the front door shut. My eyes bugged full tilt, and I shot my index finger up to my lips as a sign for Cole to stay quiet. His eyes mirrored mine, and he nodded.
Seconds later, Mama opened my bedroom door, and I pushed past Cole and quickly flushed the toilet.
“Goodnight, Elise!” Mama called over the noise.
To keep up my ruse, I turned on the taps as though I were washing my hands. “‘Night, Mama!” I called back. Then I held my breath and listened for her to close the door. I didn’t think she’d be able to hear us behind two closed doors, so when the soft thud carried through the room, I let out my breath.
And Cole Whitehurst smiled. He crossed his arms over his chest and smirked. “Does a good person lie to her mother?”
More than anything, I wanted to wad up that wet cloth and throw it in his face. But I didn’t. His lip had stopped bleeding, but it was still an angry-looking cut. Lobbing a rag into his face would probably hurt. And it also wouldn’t help my claim of being a good person.
So instead of responding to his sassy remark, I just went back to work on his shirt. The stain was almost completely gone, and whatever traces remained didn’t look like blood. It could have been from the chocolate cake or the punch. Or even the pork roast.
None of which Cole had eaten, of course.
“You never told me why you didn’t want to be at the party,” I murmured, wiping up the last of the baking soda.
