“The satisfaction of knowing your best friend didn’t wind up murdered outside a sketchy motel.”
Something about the way he saidbest friendmade my chest ache. I knew we were friends. I also knew I considered him my best friend. So there was no logical reason whyhearing him say it made me want to curl up and cry. Except I was hopelessly in love with him, and he’d made it clear time and time again that I was only ever going to be a friend to him.
Flipping the lock, I turned back toward the beds with a heaving breath. Before he’d even had the chance to kick his boots off, I was in my bed, eyes shut tight to keep the tears at bay. Covers tight around my chin. Ears perked, waiting for him to settle onto his cot for the night so I could feel all my silly teenage emotions alone.
Blair
With Mom napping, the dishwasher running, and a sinking feeling I’ve forgotten to do something this morning, I say “fuck it” and head outside with my yoga mat tucked under my arm. I haven’t had the time or energy for exercise since moving back home two months ago, and I can feel it in the creak of my bones and the anxious nattering in my head. In Vancouver, I went to the gym daily and, while it didn’t magically fix my depression like all the online health gurus promised, it definitely helped. The endorphins clear my head and calm my nervous system in a way nothing has since the last time I barrel raced at eighteen.
With a flick of my wrist, I unroll the mat across the spongy grass and settle into Virasana, deeply inhaling the mountain air. Exhaling the exhaustion. Inhaling the sweet honeysuckle aroma. Exhaling my consternation.
As my breath moves my body into a table position, I close my eyes, reveling in the momentary peace. Just as I feel a soothing wave roll over me, the loud vibrations of my cell phone on the glass patio table disrupt it. I breathe intentionally, trying to tune out the noise. But it buzzes. And buzzes. And buzzes. Until I feel like I might flip the table if I have to hear it one more time.
I snatch the phone and hold it to my ear, not bothering to check the call display. “Yeah?”
“Whoa, somebody’s in a mood,” my sister, Whit, says in her obnoxiously calm voice. You’d think she’s the one in the middle of yoga practice. The voice is fake—her way of masking the fact that she’s about ten seconds from a nervous breakdown. She’s always been better than I am at suppressing impending explosions.
“Sorry. What’s up?” I sigh and roll the mat back up, chucking it on the ground before sinking down into a wooden Adirondack chair.
“I’m at my wit’s end with your nephew. He got himself suspended today for graffiti.Graffiti.On the principal’s office door, no less.”
“Was itgoodgraffiti, at least? People pay big money for that.”
The other end of the line falls completely silent. Whit clearly isn’t finding me as funny as I find myself.
“Sorry. That’s stressful. Um…I can take him while you work. I’ll have to move some things around….” My brain’s going a mile a minute trying to work out how I’ll take care of my troublesome ten-year-old nephew, give Cass a hand with Hazel, go to work, and check in on my mom throughout the day. “Yeah…I’ll tell Cass I can’t go out to the ranch, I guess.”
“Thank you, you’re a lifesaver. Do you think you could take him to grab some new sneakers, too? Sorry…I know it’s a lot to ask. I’ve just been run off my feet here, and I’ve asked Alex a thousand times, but you know how he is.”
My sister became a mom at nineteen, and a single mom at twenty. Her baby daddy, Alex, is only ever helpful when he’s single and trying desperately to get back in her pants. So if he’s not willing to buy his own kid shoes, he must have a new girlfriend.
“Of course, Whit.” I pull the elastic from my hair, set it on the table, and comb my fingers from my temple to the nape of my neck. “Has Alex tried talking to Jonas about his behavior at all?”
“What do you think? He doesn’t give enough of a shit. ‘Boys will be boys’ is his go-to phrase, which is entirely unhelpful.”
I gag directly into the phone. “If Alex wasn’t partially responsible for creating my nephew, I would despise him for that statement alone. How long is Jonas suspended for?”
Whit groans. “Two days, this time. They said if there’s another incident, he’s out for the rest of the school year.”
A breeze drifts around me, coaxing out an army of goosebumps on my bare thigh. “He won’t. He’s not stupid, he’s just…”
“A boy.”
I laugh. “Sure, I guess. Not that it gives him a pass.” I rub at my leg like I’m trying to get a stain out, hoping the friction smooths the spackling on my skin.
“Speaking of boys…how has it been seeing Denny?”
“Awkward, to say the least. He’s been acting like nothing ever happened between us, so I guess he’s over everything. Which is…nice.” Certainly eases some of the guilt I’ve carried over the years. I loved him and I never had a doubt that he loved me, but we were eighteen. We made stupid choices, and abandoned each other. I don’t know—maybe your first love is meant to hurt.
“And you’re not over it?”
“I was until I came back here. It’s a mindfuck going to the ranch all the time and…Okay, I told you he injured himself at the rodeo when I was there, right? Now I have to see him as a patient.” I groan and slump farther down into the patio chair, remembering how Mom mentioned inviting him for dinneragainthis morning. “Also, Mom won’t shut up about him since we ran into him last week.”
“She’s always had a soft spot for him….”
“Bet she’d be less than impressed with him these days. Out fucking everything with blond hair and tits.” I roll my eyes.
“Well, he is a boy.”
