"Dexter," Delia called. "Wait up!"

The tall, lean boy turned his head in the direction of Delia's voice. "Delia?"

"Yes." She caught up to him. "You might not want to cross the street right now."

"Oh," he muttered, blushing. "Thanks. I don't hear any cars passing though."

"No. There's construction though. It would be unfortunate if you were to fall in a hole or get run over by an earth mover."

Grinning as she held his arm in her hand to gently guide him, Dexter said, "It would be kinda funny though."

"That's true."

"So what are you doing this lovely Tuesday evening?" he asked her conversationally.

"I just bought a new book. Step up." She waited while he cautiously stepped up onto the curb. "I should be studying for an English test, but I doubt I'll get around to it. I usually don't."

"You're smart enough that you don't need to study," he told her.

"I'm not doing very well in geography."

"Hey, you could always get by on your looks. The world never tires of pretty faces."

She laughed, and he felt triumphant. Delia's laughter was rare and hard to get out of her. "Dexter, do I have to remind you that you're blind? I could be hideous and you'd never know."

"You could never be hideous, Delia, no matter what you look like. Take it from me, I know beauty when I see it."

"But you can't see."

"Exactly." He smiled sadly. "Anyway, everyone tells me that you're way too pretty to be cooped up in a town like Castle Rock."

"Yes, and that's probably the only nice thing anyone has to say about me," she said. She was not looking for pity. She was being truthful.

"Yeah, Delia, there's some unkind stuff people have to say about you," he said honestly. "If you don't want people thinking you're a bitch, then don't act like one."

"Hey, I've always been nice to you," she said defensively.

"I know. I never said I thought you were a bitch. Remember? I'm the one that said you were beautiful." A carefree smile was touching his somewhat vacant face. "Judging by the sound of the Shirelle's blasting and an off key voice singing, I'd say I'm just about home?"

"Yes." She grinned. "I'd shoot my sister if she sang that bad. I don't know how you live with Andie."

"Me neither," he laughed. "Do you want to come in for a bit?"

"Um…" Delia considered for a moment. "Your sister doesn't want me around."

"She's not the one inviting you over. I am."

She looked up at him, studying his face. Like his sister, he was good looking, but he didn't have that happy-go-lucky innocent look on his face that she always had. Instead, he was curious and alert, a little skeptical, but always approachable. Delia wondered why on Earth Dexter wanted to voluntarily spend time with her.

"Yes," she replied at last. "As long as you don't let Andie try to murder me."

Abby was nursing a root beer, while Gordie was gobbling a milkshake and an order of fries at the Weiss' restaurant.

"I am going into math overload," Abby was telling him. "It's all these stupid numbers that have absolutely no applicability and it's driving me nuts! I mean, if they insist upon shoving equations down my throat, they should at least make them challenging. Frick! I can't stop thinking about math! I keep counting everything! And it's like 'what's your name?' and I'm like 'Pi times r squared to the cubed root' and you can't tell me that that's healthy."

Gordie laughed, some of his milkshake dribbling down his chin. Still laughing, he wiped his mouth with a napkin. When Abby got into her rant modes, it was hard to understand her, but the zeal with which she bitched with always made him laugh. "That's what you get for taking honour's math."

"Grr. I know."

"Maybe you'll get stupid. There's always hope."

"Hope?" she scoffed and began to giggle. "I'm blowing chunks of hope."

He leaned back in his seat, laughing appreciatively. "Jeez, I love you, Abby."

She raised an eyebrow. "I just said a sentence that involved the words 'blowing chunks' and you're telling me you love me?"

"Yup. Want a French fry?"

"No." Abby, who was one of the smartest people he knew even though she thought of her academic ability as a burden, looked genuinely confused. "Why did you say that?"

"Um, because I do?"

"Well that was mean! You totally took me by surprise and now I'm all flustered!"

"Sorry. I was just looking at you, and listening to you laugh, and it kinda got to me." He shrugged. "Just because I said it doesn't mean you have to."

"Gordie! I love you, but I never said it because I didn't want to scare you away!"

"Well then." Gordie grinned, and slid into her side of the booth, stretching his arm around her shoulders. "I think this was a very successful evening snack, wouldn't you say?"

"I'll say. I'll eat some of your fries now."

"TABITHA!"

Tabitha turned up her music. Jay and the Americans had just started singing "This Magic Moment" and she loved that song. It reminded her of Vern. Plus, she had a crucial French test the next day and she was cramming.

"TABITHA DAWN ST. PETER! ARE YOU JUST IGNORING ME?"

Grinning, she yelled back rather gleefully, "I'M TRYING TO!"

There was a knock on her door. She stuck her pencil behind her ear and jumped up to let her mom in.

It wasn't her mother, however; it was Vern. "Hi."

"Yes!" she said by way of greeting. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"

"I got bored, and I thought maybe you'd like to go for a drive or something."

She grimaced. "I can't, sorry…I have a huge French test tomorrow…you could keep me company though if you like. Although I don't think that that would cure your boredom problem."

"Sure it would. You could teach me something new." He crossed the room and plopped down on her bed. "Tell me something in French."

"Uh…Bonjour!"

"I knew that one."

"Je suis, tres, tres French. Oui oui? Oh, oui oui! Je suis trey intelligent et charment."

"I didn't understand a word of that."

"Me neither."

"I like this song!" Vern suddenly exclaimed. "Do you mind if I turn it up?"

"Go ahead." She watched as he got up and walked over to her record player, turning the volume up a few notches.

Ignoring the slight blush creeping across his freckled face, he went up to her, laced his fingers through hers, and they swayed together, giggling.

"This magic moment," Vern began to belt out loudly, in a voice much too deep for his range, causing Tabitha to throw her head back in laughter. "While your lips are close to mine, will last foreeeever, forever till the end of time--woahhhh woooahhh woahhhh--"

To shut him up, she pressed her lips to his. Vern decided that this was without a doubt much better than kissing her nose.

Coming back from mailing a couple of letters for his aunt, Chris spotted Teddy walking towards his house from the opposite direction. He called out, "Hey Teddy."

Taking his eyes off the ground, Teddy gave Chris a small wave. "Hey Chris."

"What are you doing?" he asked when he got closer.

"I was just going to see if your sister was home."

"My sister? You mean Delia?"

"Yeah." Teddy shrugged in that careless but fetching way of his. "I've been thinking about some of the things she said to me, and I kinda want to patch things over with her."

Chris said in a dull voice, "God, Teddy, why can't you just let her be?"

"What the hell are you talking about, Chambers? I just want to talk to her."

"She's not home," he said angrily, and walked up the driveway.

"Chris! Come on!" Teddy exclaimed exasperatedly. "This is bullshit! All I want to do is apologize to your sister and you're acting like I want to ravage her or something."

"Teddy, the kid's crazy for you, and you know that very well. She'll think you want to be with her again, and you'll take advantage of her. Don't deny it."

Teddy sighed.

Chris asked him quietly, "Why do you gotta be this way, man?"

"Fuck off."

"Why do you have to use girls like this?"

"I said fuck off!"

"Like hell I will! One of the girls you've been playing around with is my sister! With guys like you and my fuckin old man hurting her and fucking with her head, she's never going to be able to trust completely trust a guy."

"She's a great person. I've never fucked with her head--"

"You let her fall in love with you when you couldn't give a bigger shit about her, and then you fucked some girl from out of town! How is that not fucking with her head?"

"I want to make it up to her! She knows me better than I know myself, and I need someone like her!"

"That's just too fucking bad, because I'm not letting you come near her."

"What are you, her guardian?" Teddy snapped.

"I'm her brother."

"Ooh."

"Brothers are supposed to protect their sisters from assholes like you."

Teddy's swing was wild, but his fist connected with the corner of Chris' jaw. Chris staggered, cursing loudly and rubbing at his jaw. The look in his eyes was enraged, wounded, confused and betrayed all at once. In a low, infuriatingly calm tone, he said, "I'm not going to fight you on my front lawn, Teddy."

"You were the best friend I had when we were kids, Chris," Teddy said, looking close to tears for a startling moment, but the moment soon passed. He took off his thick black glasses and rubbed at his eyes. "Will you at least tell her I stopped by for her?"

"I guess so." When Teddy was walking away, his hands jammed in his pockets and his shoulders rounded, Chris called, "We're still friends, Teddy, man."

"Thanks," he muttered.

"Hi, Delia," Andie said pleasantly, coming downstairs for a glass of milk and stopping in the living room when she saw Dexter and Delia were in there.

Delia barely glanced up from the TV she was watching. "Hi."

"You're not allowed to kill Delia," Dexter announced.

"Thanks for the hot tip, Quincy," Andie said, laughing uncertainly.

"With that said, I'm going to go get some food. Anyone want anything?"

"No thank you," Delia said. She watched him as he left. Then she fixed her eyes on the TV, and did not look over as Andie took a seat on the couch next to her.

"Delia?"

"Yes?"

"You're good friends with that new girl Libby, aren't you?"

"I refuse to do you any favours."

Andie shook her head. "I don't want to ask for one. I just want to ask you to clarify something that Chris told me about her at lunch yesterday."

"Fine."

"Did her dad really molest her?"

The colour drained out of her face as she whipped around to glare at her. "Chris told you that?"

"No. But he didn't deny it."

"What kind of person are you?" Delia shouted, standing up so that she towered over Andie. "I know what you're doing, Andie. I'm manipulative myself, and I know when someone's trying to fuck me over. So your ex-boyfriend is interested in her! Maybe he even indulged upon that interest in her, so what? You have to dig up some gossip about her so that people can whisper about her and think to themselves, 'Oh my God, there goes the girl whose father made it with her, isn't that gross.' Go to hell, Andie!"

When Dexter came back with some cookies, he felt Andie brush past him, crying. "Delia?" he called to the empty room. But Delia was gone.