“The frog?” I ask.
“That was one of many. I played it off to Skylar like it wasn’t a big deal. We still laugh about it. It’s a defense mechanism, I guess. Making jokes.”
“So you never got help?” My voice cracks at the last word.
“Not until later. I started seeing a counselor in college, who then referred me to a therapist. But before that, I found ways to cope. Silly little things like playing board games seemed to calm me down and ground me.”
“And the watch?”
He laughs softly. “You know about that?”
“You had it after Craig…” My voice trails off. “And you mentioned it in the pool house.” Guilt creeps up my spine. I made him anxious that night when I didn’t respond to him. “I’m sorry, by the way. That I made you worry.”
He shakes his head. “You didn’t know.” Reaching out, he brushes a strand of hair from my face. “Theo gave me the pocket watch on my graduation day. It had been handed down for generations in his family. Something about the smooth metal calms me. I still keep it in my pocket most days.”
I melt further into him, but we don’t speak again. He holds me, keeping our combined pain from spilling out, as the world goes hazy and I drift off to sleep.
32
ALLIE
I wakeup warm with something hard pressing against my back. I stir, and Ashton mumbles behind me, “Just ignore it. It’ll go away.”
I’m about to laugh and suggest we don’t have to ignore it when I hear that godawful rooster crowing in the distance.
“You have to be kidding me,” I yell, shoving a pillow over my face.
Ashton laughs. “I knew he was annoying, but I never realized Juniper would be this much of acockblock.”
I peek my eye out from underneath the pillow. “For the sake of ever having sex with you again, I’m going to pretend you didn’t just say that.”
“Do whatever you gotta do, Chaos.” My heart soars at the nickname. I never thought I would be the type to swoon over a silly pet name, but I love it when he calls me that. I noticed recently that he doesn’t call me Alexandra anymore. I started not to mind it as much, especially coming from him, but there’s still a tiny piece of my heart that breaks at the sound of it.
“Hey, I want to take you somewhere,” Ashton breaks through my thoughts. “Do you think your mom would mind hanging outhere today? I have a really good security system.” It’s Saturday, so we don’t have to go into work. I had planned on taking my mom back to my house, but I guess a few hours wouldn’t hurt.
“Sure,” I say. “I’ll ask her, but she’ll probably be okay with that.”
She’s more than okay with it, as it turns out. She practically shoves me out the door while winking at me. My mother has never wanted me to give up on the notion of love before I even had a chance to experience it. I know she feels responsible for my resistance to being in a relationship, and she hates that she set such a bad example for me. I get it. The love of her life left her alone with a baby and no one to help her. When she finally allowed herself to let a man in again, she was starved for affection.
I give her a small smile and make her promise to call me if she feels unsafe, even for a second.
Ashton doesn’t tell me where we’re going, but he keeps his hand on my thigh for the entire ride. I’m still wearing his shirt from last night, and I borrowed a pair of leggings I had packed for my mom. We sit in comfortable silence as the trees blur together on the side of the highway. It looks like we’re headed to Baybridge, and I can’t help but remember this same ride months ago when the silence wasn’t so comfortable.
He picks up his phone and hands it to me. “Put on whatever you want.” His smile is easy, and God, I could get used to seeing it every day.
I pull up the music app and search for the song I most feel like listening to. The first bars of “Story of My Life” by Social Distortion come pouring out of the speakers, filling my soul. This song always does.
“My dad was into this music,” I blurt out.
Ashton tilts his head to the side, raising his eyebrows.
“You asked me how I got into punk rock. That day we drove to the Baybridge Inn together,” I explain, leaning my head backto look up at the sky through the sunroof. “Apparently I cried a lot when I was a baby, and somehow my parents figured out that when my dad played his music, I would calm down. Even after he left, my mom would still play it for me.”
Ashton smiles, and I’m glad he thinks of it as a good memory. I may hate my father for leaving us, but I’ve always secretly liked that we share a love of the same music. “It’s the only thing I've ever really known about him.”
His smile dims, a sadness shining in his eyes that wasn’t there before, and I’m not sure what to make of it. “Thanks for telling me,” he says before I get a chance to analyze it any further.
“Yeah, well, don’t get too used to it.”
