"She's in the show," he neither confirms nor denies his plans.
It's been two years since Dallas moved in, and every girl in town wants to get in his bed, but he has no interest. The only one he's ever talked to is Madison, and I think the draw is that she's not from town. She's here for a few days, and then she's gone, always on the road. I get it. I'm the same way. I don't care to lead someone on, and spending more than one night with someone gets messy.
"A few of the girls want to go out on the Bourbon Trail after the show." His voice trails off with innuendo. Basically, if I go, it's a sure thing my night will have a happy ending.
The problem is, my night is already fucked. There's no way I'll enjoy a second of going out. Not after seeing Warrick Fairfield today, and especially not after my father's cryptic responses. If anything, the girl I try to forget as much as I hold onto is fresh in my mind. Except, this time, I'm not going to sit here and stew on it.
"Nah, I got somewhere I got to be. Maybe next time," I say, swiping my keys off the counter. Time to go dig up another memory.
Of all the cruel jokes the universe could play, ours has to be the worst. Loving someone who hates you. I used to lie awake, trying to figure out when it started. Was it before the fighting or because of it? Did I fall in the middle of one of our wars, or did I love her first and only learned to fight because it was the only way she’d look at me at all?
I know this infatuation I have borders on obsession. I'd provoke her just to see that flash in her eyes, to have her full attention on me, even if it was rage. Better her anger than her indifference. Better to matter as her enemy than not matter at all, because that was always my goal. Ever since the day a fearless little girl stood up to two class clowns on the playground and proved that appearances didn’t matter, confidence mattered. I knew I wanted her as a friend, and damn it, she offered me as much. In a way, she started it all. She offered to be my friend even when doing so could get her in trouble. Maybe it’s pathetic how much I’ve held on to that.
The milkshake she threw on me on the first day of freshman year probably should have been my sign to let it go, to let her go, but if anything, it might have been the exact moment I knew I was in trouble."I hope you hate strawberries."I was speechless, and for as much as I didn’t understand what had happened, what had changed to make her hate me so much during all those years we spent apart, all I could think was how beautiful she was. How much I wanted to kiss her. How completely screwed I was. What kind of person falls in love with someone in the middle of having a milkshake poured down their chest? What does that say about me? That I'm so desperate, so broken, that I'll take whatever scraps of attention she throws my way and call it love?
How pathetic is it that I became a scholar of someone who couldn’t stand me? I memorized her tells, her patterns, the way her jaw clenched before she delivered a killing blow. I knew her through our wars better than most people knew their friends. And I told myself it was a strategy, that I was just trying to win our battles. But I was lying. I was studying her because I was desperate for any way to know her.
That's why I'm sitting outside her place now, still desperate, still waiting, as rain hammers against my windshield in sheets.
"Come on," I mutter to the sky, watching the rain. Just a break, just enough to cross the street without arriving at her door looking like a wet dog. I check my phone: 7:43 p.m. At least she should be home this time when I ring the doorbell.
The building door bursts open, catching my attention, and I sit straight up in my seat. It's her. Reaching for the door handle, I'm out in the rain, ready to get soaked, when a black sedan appears from nowhere, pulling right in front of her. I freeze halfway out of my car, one foot on the wet pavement.
The driver's door opens. A man steps out, tall in a tailored suit under a designer raincoat. He walks around to Asha with the umbrella, holding it over her like she's something precious, as I blink drops of water off my eyelashes. Then, opening the passenger door, he hugs her—and not like a friend, like someone who knows her intimately, like someone who's done it a thousand times before.
Asha laughs at something he says before ducking into the car. The sedan pulls away, and I stand in the street, rain plastering my shirt to my skin, watching until they disappear around the corner.
It's been hours, and the concrete steps are cold and unforgiving beneath me. The rain stopped, but I'm still wet, still waiting, refusing to let another year go by where we don't talk. However, she's not coming back—at least not tonight. Ipull myself up from the steps, legs stiff, clothes heavy with rain. The street is empty now, just pools of water reflecting the streetlights. I look one more time toward the corner where the sedan disappeared, and something in my chest finally unclenches. Not relief. Not quite peace. Just...exhaustion. The kind that comes from holding on too long to something that was never mine to hold.
I head toward my truck, each step feeling lighter than the last.
My phone buzzes in my pocket, and I stop walking as my hand hovers over it, caught between seeing who it is and letting it ring. She doesn't know I'm here. She never asked me to wait, and for the first time in years, the ghost of hope that's had me in a chokehold for more years than I can count is gone. It buzzes again, and I close my eyes, but I keep walking.
For now.
FOUR YEARS LATER
TRIGGER
"Okay, check this out," Dallas says, his voice piqued with genuine curiosity. "Remember the plot lines I was pointing out on our ride, how they cross Bristol Creek?" I stop brushing Knickers to look at the video he took from the drone. "See, not only do they cross, but the patterns are the exact same on both sides. That suggests they were planted by the same person."
There's no generational feud. It was all flowers and peace before Maya married Warrick.A conversation I had with my father pushes through as I try to make sense of the aerial view that suggests our land was once shared.
"Can you tell what kind of crop was once planted there? Is it possible there were once flowers here?"
"Flowers?" He furrows his brow, and the sliver of excitement I had fades. "It's possible."
"Can you send me those images?"
He pulls out the SD card. "Here, just give this back to me when you're done. I'm going back over there tomorrow to take soil samples. I need to determine a good place to expand the wheat field."
I thin my lips. My father's small batch bourbon is definitely no longer a hobby. I don't care that the man wants to make bourbon. We only live once, so do what makes you happy. I just wish he'd let me do what I want. I've never understood why he's so opposed to letting me start a herd. Dallas already said he'd help me get it off the ground, plus his friend Fisher is staying with us now. He's our intermediary between tracks and buyers for our horses, but he likes to get his hands dirty too.
"Well"—I squeeze his shoulder—"if the soil is no longer ripe for planting, I guess I'll just have to zone it for grazing."
He laughs before saying, "I can't tell if the idea is growing on him or if he's just flat out ignoring you. Has he ever said why he's so against it?" Dallas asks as we walk down the center of the barn, checking stalls.
"He hasn't told me, but I figured it out," I say, locking one of the stalls.
