I gasped, meeting his eyes. “What? When?”
He smiled. “Middle of sophomore year. I was halfway out your brother’s window. He was in the shower, and I’d almost made it. She walked in and let out a quiet tsk.”
“Oh my god, seriously?”
“I thought for sure she was gonna kill me. Or your brother. Or both of us.” He nodded. “She just looked at me and crossed her arms. Then she asked me if I wanted breakfast. I told her I had to get homebefore my dad woke up. She said, next time use the front door, and if he hit me again, she’d call CPS.”
My mouth fell open of its own accord. “No way.”
“Yep. But by then, I had two inches on my dad, and ever since I’d been sleeping at your place, he hadn’t had the opportunity to strike anyway.”
I bit my lip. “But you stayed after that. Practically every night.”
“Yeah. Your mom told me to.”
“Oh my god, she never said a word,” I breathed out.
“I asked her not to.” He gave me a squeeze. “Billy and I met Hatch soon after that and we started working in his shop, do you remember that?”
I nodded.
“I paid your mom a little bit of money for food and shit, and she let me stay.”
“I noticed we started to get name-brand ketchup junior year. I just thought she got a raise.”
“She might have,” he said. “I can’t imagine my forty bucks a month made much of a difference, though.”
I gasped again. “That would have been a ton to you, though. You really paid her that much?”
“Yeah. She saved all of it and gave it back to me when I graduated.”
“Mymotherdid that?”
“Yeah, honey, your mom did that. It was a few grand. A million bucks to me back then.”
“God, she was such a bitch to Grace,” I hissed.
“Flea told me. But you gotta remember, she didn’t meet Betty until we were all out of the house and that bitch was crazy. It took a minute for your mom to realize it but once she kicked her to the curb, she figured it out, right?”
I nodded. “Yeah, she loves Grace now.”
“I think she always did,” he said. “Betty was the one that was jealous.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“She was always comin’ onto Billy.”
“Shewasn’t!”
“She totally was.” He gave me another squeeze and I leaned against him, forgetting my resolve to keep my distance from him.
“Bad Betty,” I bit out.
“Indeed,” he agreed. “But when your brother had that come to Jesus convo with your mom, I think she realized how much influence Betty had been havin’ over the years. He also told her about the shit that had been goin’ down with her so-called best friend.”
“Oh my god,” I breathed out. “I can’t believe you know more than me.”
He shrugged. “Flea and I wanted to keep a lot of it from you… we just didn’t feel it was stuff you needed to know.”
