“How old is he?” Perv asked.
“An artifact,” Gemma said. “Thirteen. But still really healthy,” she added quickly, because she had a superstition about referring to Rufus’s age. He’d arrived as a puppy when she was three years old. She had no memories that didn’t include him.
“I probably smell like Quick-Mart hot dogs,” Perv said. He must have changed after work, because instead of his crappy collared shirt he was actually dressed nicely, in a white button-down that showed off skin that was half tan and half just freckly, plus a pair of faded chino shorts and old Chuck Taylors. She realized she was wearing an old Hannah Montana T-shirt—ironically, of course, but he wouldn’t know that—and crossed her arms over her chest.
“What are you doing here?” she asked.
“You forgot your change,” he said, digging into one pocket and producing a few crumpled bills and some loose change. “There you go. Three dollars and twenty-seven cents.”
She stared at him. “You drove to my house to give me three dollars?”
“And twenty-seven cents,” he repeated, smiling broadly. “Besides, I wanted to see where you live. I heard your house was kind of awesome.” He craned his neck, looking beyond her into the house. “Oh, man. Is that a chandelier? I thought chandeliers were for hotels and Las Vegas casinos. And maybe Mexican drug lords.”
“Are you serious?” Gemma had maybe spoken three words to Perv in her whole life before their exchange in the Quick-Mart—most recently no, when he’d turned around in bio and asked whether she knew that in sea horses, only the male carried the eggs.
“Sorry.” Perv rubbed a hand over his hair, making it stick up, flame-like. “Sometimes my mouth says things without checking in with my brain first.”
“Yeah, I get that,” Gemma said. “Mexican drug lords?” Perv shrugged. He seemed to be waiting for something, but she had no idea what. He was the first boy who’d ever come over to see her—not that he was there to see her, really—and she was suddenly mortified. She wanted Perv to leave, but didn’t know how to ask without seeming mean. After all, he’d just done her a favor. And he was nice, even if he did steal girls’ underwear. And possibly, you know, have a sex chamber in his basement, as April had once theorized when she caught Perv staring at Gemma in the cafeteria.
“So can I?” Perv asked, after looking at her patiently for a bit.
“Can you what?”
He blinked. “Come in and see where you live.”
She didn’t want to say yes but couldn’t think of a way to refuse. So she shuffled backward, taking Rufus by the collar. “Okay,” she said. “I mean, if you really want.”
Perv took a step forward and then hesitated. “You sure that thing doesn’t like the taste of human flesh?” He pointed at Rufus.
She rolled her eyes. “Please. He’s a grumpy old man. He likes to make a lot of noise, especially around people he doesn’t—” She broke off suddenly. She’d just remembered that Rufus, who still barked as if the world was ending whenever a stranger came to the door, hadn’t made a sound when the man had approached her in the parking lot, at least not until Gemma shouted. He’d even wagged his tail. Almost as if . . .
Almost as if he recognized the man, knew him from somewhere.
She was gripped, then, by a terrible feeling: that something was coming. Something she couldn’t understand. The man, Haven, her father—all of it was tangled up together, and she, Gemma, was at the center of the mess, the heart of the shitstorm.
Head shit.
Perv was still prattling on, oblivious. “Damn. Is that your mom in the oil painting?”
“It’s a watercolor,” Gemma said automatically.
“Wow. Cool. Your mom’s kind of hot. Is that weird?”
“Yes.” Gemma’s head hurt. “Listen, I’m really sorry. But I’m kinda not feeling great. It’s not really a good time for me. . . .”
But he didn’t seem to hear. He’d just spotted the bathroom off the foyer. “Holy shit. Is that a TV? Right next to the toilet?” He disappeared, although she could still hear him talking, his voice tinny and distorted by the tile. He reemerged a second later, midsentence. “. . . snorkel in that bathtub. It’s like the spring break of shower models.”
Gemma took a deep breath. “Has anyone ever told you that you talk a lot?”
“All the time,” Perv said, grinning. “It’s kind of my trademark. So, what else you got? A hidden bowling alley? An indoor pool?”
“No bowling alley,” she said. She was tempted to add: And the pool’s out back. But that would only encourage him. “Listen, seriously, can we rain check on the tour?” She said it knowing a rain check was unlikely. It wasn’t as if she and Perv were friends. Sure, he’d always been nice to her—he never laughed when someone whispered about one of her scars, for example, or called her Frankenstein—but he was pretty much nice to everybody. He was probably one of those do-gooder, Save-the-Manatees types. Maybe he thought being nice to Gemma would win him karmic brownie points.
“Sure,” he said. He did a semi-decent job of concealing his disappointment. “I should get home anyway. I’m leaving for Florida tomorrow, and my mom’s acting like I’m heading off to war. I swear, there may be a twelve-salute send-off.”
Florida. The word set off little sparks in Gemma’s mind. “Where in Florida?” she asked, trying to sound casual.