It was only the eyes that were different, that were so obviously his father’s, I was stunned not one person had guessed the right answer.
Or maybe they had, and they were too afraid to say it out loud.
“Order up,” Reg said quietly, sliding RJ’s plate across the stainless steel counter.
“Thanks,” I mumbled gratefully.
Grabbing RJ’s healthy choice, I headed back to the dining room and found him turned around on his stool engaging Mick in reluctant conversation. RJ didn’t have much patience for Mick and his antics, another reason I respected RJ so much.
Usually, anyway.
“I haven’t heard anything about that,” RJ was saying.
“Heard it myself,” Mick insisted, nodding so quickly his double chin trembled with the effort. “Saw Darcy this morning. Said he was coming home by the end of the week.”
I accidentally dropped RJ’s plate, saving it only to have it clatter on the counter. He gave me a raised bushy eyebrow at my uncharacteristic clumsiness but nodded gratefully.
“I thought Levi Cole washed his hands of this town.”
“Rich wants him to take over the farm,” Mick added, a gleam of triumph in his eye for knowing something RJ didn’t. “With Logan gone, the responsibility of the farm goes to Levi.”
RJ tsked at the mention of the late, great Logan Cole, Clark City’s once golden boy.
I sucked in a sharp breath at the pain of listening to both of the brother’s names. Seven years after high school, I hadn’t had to hear about either of them in a good while. Sure, occasionally someone would speak of Logan with the kind of hushed reverence he deserved. And even more often someone would mention Levi. If it was the older generation they were more than likely recounting awful behavior of yesteryear. And if it was someone my age, it was usually with the awed jealousy of never being as cool or as cruel or as rich.
The Cole brothers had once ruled this town. High school superstars and heirs to the largest agricultural conglomerate in all of Nebraska, Cole Family Farms, they were legends in this little town.
Logan, the eldest brother, had once held my heart in his hands. Albeit he didn’t know he did. But he had. I’d loved him once upon a time. Or I had convinced myself I loved him anyway.
And then he’d gone and gotten himself killed in unfriendly fire somewhere in the desert. His death had rocked our town and devastated his family. I had been utterly crushed by the news. Not necessarily because I thought I loved him, although there was some of that. Most of my grief centered around fear though. Fear, and sharp but temporary pain.
The news was hard to swallow. He was a friend of mine once upon a time. He was a great guy. And his death had destroyed his family. I couldn’t help but mourn on their behalf. Yes, I missed him. And yes, his death had a giant impact on my life. But my heart truly broke for the mother that lost her son, for the father that lost his eldest boy… for the younger brother that lost his hero. I mourned most of all for Levi.
Levi was Logan’s younger brother, and at one time, my arch nemesis. While Logan was two years older than me, Levi was almost exactly my age. Our birthdays were only three days apart. A fact I’d had to face every year at school when he was celebrated as the celebrity he was, and I was forgotten about completely only days later.
That wasn’t why I hated him. During high school and after and even now, I preferred my invisibility. But it wasn’t just our birthdays that competed back then. Levi and I found ways to rival each other in absolutely every way. If he said the sky was blue, I argued that it was more light purple. If I said that it was raining outside, he declared that it was only sprinkling and I was being dramatic. When we were in high school, it didn’t matter what it was, we fought over everything.
We were even headed to rivaling colleges once upon a time. I was sure our scholastic contention would have only continued—at least in my own imagination. But the summer after graduation had changed everything.
After finding out I was pregnant, college was no longer an option for me. And Logan had died. Levi’s best friend and only brother had been unfairly taken from him. That fall, Levi left for college and he never returned. And I had never left. I’d stayed exactly where I’d always been.
I didn’t know where he’d gone or why he’d never come back, not even for a family holiday. Rumors floated around town of course. People were always whispering about his absence, the lost son of the town’s foremost family. But I couldn’t stomach listening to them. They were too painful. Too… reminiscent of everything I’d lost. I tuned out or ignored everything about him. I avoided him on all social media. And I banished him from my thoughts. It was as if he’d died with Logan. And for the most part, I’d been okay with his absence—even if the circumstances surrounding him staying away were tragic.
Maybe especially because of the horror that had happened.
It seemed unfair to rival someone who had lost so much.
And in a way, I’d lost enough as well. Maybe not a loved one. But I’d given up my plans, my future… my hopes and dreams and goals. I wasn’t a worthy opponent anymore. I was a shell of the girl I used to be. Just a ghost. Levi and I wouldn’t have anything to fight over anymore even if we happened to be in the same world again.
Not that it mattered now. If Levi Cole was really returning to Clark City, Nebraska, then I was going to go out of my way to make sure we never ever ran into each other.
Our high school competition was in the distant past. There would be no reason to see each other now. Or speak to each other. Or even look at each other.
So that was that.
2
Playdate Problems
