So Scarlett took Cameron in, the way she’d taken me in all those years ago. And Cameron grew on me as well; his low, quiet voice, his all-black ensembles, his strange, jittery laugh. I had nothing in common with Cameron Newton except for the one thing that counted: Scarlett. And that, alone, was enough to make us friends.

My mother still wasn’t happy about Macon. There were things he did that she couldn’t pin on him directly, but she was suspicious, Like the calls he made to me every night: when I didn’t answer he either hung up or wouldn’t leave a message. Sometimes he called late at night, the phone seeming to ring incredibly loud, just once, before I could grab it. Often she’d pick it up, and I could hear her, half-asleep, breathing on the other end.

“I got it,” I’d say, and she’d slam it down. Macon would laugh, and I’d huddle deeper under the covers, and whisper so she couldn’t hear.

“Your mom hates me,” he’d say. He seemed to enjoy it.

“She doesn’t even know you.”

“Ah,” he’d say, and I could feel him grinning on the other end. “And to know me, as you have discovered, is to love me.”

Because of this, and other frustrations, she started making new rules.

“No phone calls after ten-thirty,” she said one morning, over her coffee cup. “Your friends should know better.”

“I can’t stop them from calling,” I said.

“Tell them you’ll get your phone taken away,” she said curtly. “Okay?”

“Okay.” But of course the calls didn’t stop. I never was able to fully fall asleep, with one hand always on the phone. All this just to say good night to Macon, from wherever he was.

There were other things, too. Some nights, when Macon knew I couldn’t see him, he’d drive by and just beep or sit idling at the stop sign across from my window. I knew he was waiting for me, but I could never go. I knew he knew that, too. But he still came. And waited.

So I’d just lie there, smiling to myself, goofily secure in the knowledge that he was thinking about me for those few rumbling minutes before he hit the gas and screeched away. This always brought on the light at the Harpers’ next door, and Mr. Harper, neighborhood watch chairman, standing on his porch, glaring down the street. I don’t know why Macon did it; he knew I was on thin ice anyway, that my parents were strict, a concept he clearly could not understand. Every time I heard a beep or a squealing of tires, I felt that same pull in my stomach, half exhilaration, half dread. And always my mother would look up from her book, her paper, her plate and look at me as if it was me behind that wheel, me hitting the gas, me terrorizing the neighbors.

Because of this, I had to devise new ways for him to pick me up. I’d leave the house most weekend nights, bound for Scarlett’s, and cut through the woods behind her pool to meet him on Spruce Street. And from there, we went everywhere and anywhere. Slowly, I was beginning to see bits and pieces of the rest of his life.

One night, after a few hours of driving around, we pulled into a parking lot at the bottom of a huge hill. It faced a tall apartment building lit up with row after row of bright lights. The highest floor was all windows, and I could see people moving around, holding wine glasses and laughing, like a party on top of the world.

“What’s this?” I said as we got out of the car and climbed the hill, then a winding flight of stairs with a thick iron rail.

“This,” Macon said as we came to a row of glass doors, and a lobby with cream-colored walls and a huge chandelier, “is home.”

“Home?” He held the door for me. When I stepped inside, the first thing I smelled was lilacs, just like the perfume my mother wore on special occasions. I looked at my watch: 11:06. I had fifty-four minutes to curfew.

Macon led the way to the elevator, hitting a triangle-shaped button with the back of his hand. The door slid open with a soft beep. The elevator was carpeted in deep green pile and even had a little bench against the far wall if you got tired of standing. He hit the button for P and we started moving.

“You live in the penthouse?” I turned in a circle, watching myself in the four mirrored walls.

“Yep,” he said, his eyes on the numbers over my head. “My mother’s into power trips.” This was the first time he’d talked about her, ever. All I knew about was what I’d heard, years ago, when she’d lived in our neighborhood. She sold real estate and had been married at least three times, the last to a developer of steak houses.

“This is amazing,” I said. “This elevator is nicer than my whole house.” The beep sounded again as the doors slid open, onto another, smaller lobby. As we got out I saw, through a slightly open door, people moving, mingling, and voices mixed with the clinking of glasses and piano music.

“Down here,” Macon said, leading me around a corner to what looked like a linen closet or maid’s room. He pulled a keychain out of his pocket, unlocked it, and reached in to turn on a light. Then he stood there, holding it, waiting for me. “Well, come on,” he said, reaching over to snap me on the side in the one spot where I was absolutely the most ticklish, “we haven’t got all night.”

The room itself was pretty small, painted a light sky blue; there was a single bed, neatly made, and a dresser and desk that looked brand-new. Beyond another door on the opposite wall, I could hear someone playing the piano. On a chair, at the end of the bed, there was a TV with something taped to the screen.