Fresh meat.
“I like you, Carson, so I’m giving you first dibs on the community gear,” Violet said as she pulled four large plastic storage bins out of the hall closet. “You’re lucky, because some of this shit smells like a corpse. You don’t want to get stuck with Betty Spaghetti’s old wrist guards, trust me.”
She loaned me her old skates, which are half a size too big, the toes held together with what I think used to be hot-pink duct tape but is scraped all to hell. Violet told me search eBay for a better secondhand pair, but these will get me through my first couple of practices. She shoved the skates, knee pads, elbow pads, wrist guards, and a helmet into an old army duffel, instructed me to pick up a mouth guard at the nearest sporting goods store, and sent me on my way.
The bag is unwieldy and bangs into my thigh as I walk, but already I love it.
I drive the forty minutes back to Cardinal Springs with the bag—which, despite promises that it contains gear that’s on the newer side, smells musty—on my passenger seat like precious cargo.
I turn my music up loud, singing along and whizzing down the dark rural highway, imagining myself throwing my hips into skaters, sprinting with my head down and my heart pounding. When I pull into my driveway, I haul the bag out of the car and relish the feel of its weight on my shoulder. I’m half tempted to gear up right here on the front stoop and skate up and down my darkened street.
But just as I’m about to unzip the bag, a yawn overtakes me, and I remember that it’s nearly one in the morning. It’s only the beginning of summer, and my body is still hanging on to teacher time—bed by ten, up by six. Hopefully this late night will be thecatalyst I need to break that cycle for the next couple of months so I can have a fun summer break.
I grip the bag and grin, my heart still fluttering with anticipation even as my body tries to remind me that it’s time for bed. And when I unlock the front door, I use my hip to shove it open, imagining what it’ll feel like when I’m on skates, hitting an actual body. Never in my life have I considered hitting another person, but suddenly it’s all I can think about. That flyer Violet gave me asked if I was interested in hitting a bitch, and I’m shocked to find out that the answer is an unequivocalyes.
And I’ll start with this damn front door.
CHAPTER 11
DAN
The soundtrack to my nights is the squeak of the screws in this ancient futon. Every time I roll over, it wails beneath me.
And I roll over a lot.
I’ve never been a very good sleeper. It started when I was a kid. One night when I was six, my mom left for the hospital, in labor with my baby sister, and she never came back. I said this to a therapist once while describing my sleep problems, and she gave me a look that said,You see it, right?
I never went back.
Some people can’t sleep because their minds won’t stop working or because their bodies hurt. I just…can’t. Have never been able to. And it’s never been too much of a problem for me. My body seems to function fine on what sleep I’m able to eke out, and I’ve always just used my late nights and early mornings to my advantage. All that studying got me the hell out of Cardinal Springs. It took me to Princeton, then to Harvard for my MBA. It took me to New York and some of the most prestigious investment banks in the world.
But now I’m stuck in this tiny room with floral wallpaper,listening to squeaking furniture and screaming crickets, with nothing to distract me.
Nothing but the memories of Marcel prepping me for my deposition and my conversation with Archer telling me I need a friend.
My older brother telling me I need a friend…fuck, it makes me feel like I’m back in high school. And that didn’t go so well for me the first time. The few guys I hung out with back then all did like me and got the hell out. The guys who are still here probably shoved me into a locker fifteen years ago.
But I can’t totally blame Cardinal Springs. I haven’t had real friends in who knows how long. Who has time for friends? When I still had a job and a life, my time was spent in the office and my social time was spent at happy hours and networking events, which I went to only because I needed to in order to succeed. I’m only still in touch with Jameson, my college roommate, because he takes a semper fi approach to friendship: leave no bro behind. At Princeton, he dragged me out to dinners and parties; when I was at Harvard, he texted regularly, asking for updates on my life; in New York, he forced me across the bridge to Brooklyn once a month for dinner with him and Marcel.
And thank god for that—if he hadn’t, I don’t know if I’d have a lawyer now. Hell, I’d probably already be in prison for something I didn’t do if I hadn’t let Jameson drag me out of my introvert hole.
I guess Archer’s right. I do need a friend.And not one who’s eight hundred miles away or involved in my defense or hoping to pierce my dick.
If only I knew where the fuck to find one.
The front door slams, followed by a heavy thud. I lie in bed, staring up at the ceiling, on the mattress that feels like it’s made of gravel. I remember that therapist’s face, begging me to connect the obvious dots.
I’ve been avoiding Carson ever since that morning in the kitchenwhen I damn near threw myself at her, as if what she needed was me. But every time I see her—every time I catch a glimpse of her in her little pajama shorts, her thick strawberry-blond hair piled up into a messy bun, the lines of her pillow still on her face—all I can think of is her talking about how badly she wants to be pleased.
And how much I want to please her.
But she doesn’t need that from me. Nobody needs me, not in the state I’m in these days.
Maybe I need her, though.
I climb out of bed and pull on a pair of sweats, then pad down the hall. I find Carson leaning against the front door in a pair of cutoffs and a pink tank top, her eyes closed and a wild smile on her face. An enormous army-green duffel bag that looks like an emo teen attacked it with a Sharpie is resting at her feet.
There’s something electric about her, something I’ve never seen before. She’s standing up straight, a glow in her cheeks, like she could take on whatever might come through that door. Has she been out on a date? Has someone finally pleased her the way she deserves? The thought makes my blood hot. All at once, I discover a hole in my “stay away form her” plan—it means I have no idea where she’s been or who she’s been with. I can’t decide which possibility I hate more: another asshole treating her poorly and stranding her somewhere, or a guy actually taking her to bed and making her smile like that.
