by Patty Blount
The twins froze in place, and Dave mopped up the spill.
“Hi, girls. Breakfast? Coffee?” Kelly hurried in, wearing jeans, sneakers, and a hoodie with her hair pulled up in a ponytail. Nicole wouldn’t be caught dead with her hair in a ponytail, but Bailey thought it was sweet and practical. And besides, there was no way Kelly Gallagher looked old enough to have all these kids anyway, so it didn’t matter.
“Megan, sit down.” Dave held out a chair.
With her mouth in a tight line, Meg took the chair he offered. She shot Bailey a “help me” look, but Bailey could only shrug.
“Megan, the next time you hurt yourself while you’re home alone, you are to call this house immediately. Understood, young lady?”
Wow. Bailey shuddered in sympathy for Meg when her mouth fell open and her eyes popped, but Mr. Gallagher wasn’t done.
“I don’t care if it’s a paper cut or a broken nail. If you’re hurt, you call us. You do not tie a towel around a gaping wound and wait for it to stop bleeding, and you damn well do not try to walk to the hospital by yourself in the dark. Are we clear?”
With her eyes pinned to Mr. Gallagher, Meg nodded. Bailey swallowed a giggle. She’d never seen Meg so…so…so stunned before. Who knew it would be so much fun?
“And another thing, Chase tells me you lost your job. Since he’s abandoning us for lacrosse,” Mr. Gallagher said with a glare at Chase, “I need help at the store. You can start after school until the stitches come out. Then I’ll need you at dawn on Saturdays. It pays ten dollars an hour.”
“Hon, you’re scaring the girl,” Mrs. Gallagher said.
“Yeah, well, it takes a village and all that—” he retorted and then searched for Chase. “Chase! Get your girlfriend some juice.”
Bailey almost forgot Chase was there. She followed Mr. Gallagher’s gaze and found Chase hiding behind one of the twins, eating cereal out of the box. His head shot up. “She’s not—”
But with one look from his dad, Chase snapped his teeth together, opened a cabinet for a glass, and poured Meg some orange juice, which was some kind of code for the twins to unfreeze and return to their breakfast battles. Chase poured cereal for himself. Mrs. Gallagher started the lunch-making assembly line. It was total chaos, and Bailey wanted the Gallaghers to adopt her. For a moment, she indulged herself, imagining how her dad would have handled Meg’s injury. Of course, Meg would have called her. They’d have rushed right over, driven her to the hospital. Meg would have slept at her place.
“You get that yard cleaned up?” Mr. Gallagher asked Chase, putting a pin in Bailey’s little thought bubble.
Chase stiffened and turned his furious face to Bailey. She shrank under the glare he shot her. “Yeah, it’s clean.”
Mr. Gallagher nodded. “Good. That’s one less thing for Megan to worry about today.”
That got Meg’s attention. “I’m sorry…what?”
“Dad, I didn’t—”
“Don’t worry about it, Megan. Your place was toilet-papered last night, but Chase took care of it.”
Meg raised her glass and glared at Bailey over the rim for a moment and drained it all in a single gulp. “Thanks for everything, Mr. Gallagher. I promise I’ll call if I get hurt.” She stood up and took one step toward the kitchen door before Mr. Gallagher stopped her in her tracks.
“Hold it. Where do you think you’re going?”
“To school,” Meg said it like she was talking to one of the twins.
“Not by bus. Give me ten minutes and I’ll drive you guys. Or Chase will drive, and we’ll sit with white knuckles—”
“Dad!”
“Kidding.” Mr. Gallagher held up both hands and grinned. “Finish that. We’ll meet you outside.” He and Chase headed out to the car.
“Time for the bus!” Mrs. Gallagher called out, and two of Chase’s brothers scrambled for jackets, backpacks, and lunch bags, while the twins ran to the window to wave good-bye. Five minutes later, there was total silence in the kitchen. Mrs. Gallagher sank into a chair with a loud groan. “Sorry, girls. I’d like to say it isn’t always so insane around here, but that would be total fiction. How’s your hand, Meg?”
“Um…okay, I guess.”
“Does it hurt?”
Meg shrugged. “A little.”
“Here. Take these.” She stood, grabbed a bottle of Tylenol from the cabinet over the sink, and opened it for Meg. “Oh, girls, I’m sorry. You must be hungry, especially you, Meg! You were sleeping like a baby when Chase carried you up the stairs.”
Bailey smirked when Meg’s face went pink. “I’m good. Chase made me cereal around midnight.”
“I had Pop-Tarts,” Bailey added, earning another glare from Meg, which was funny because Mrs. Gallagher was staring at Meg while Meg was busy staring at Bailey and never saw the little smile on Mrs. Gallagher’s lips or the way her eyes went misty.
“I’m glad Chase took good care of you, Meg. Did he tell you dinner on Sundays at three o’clock?”
Meg’s face froze in place for a few seconds, and Bailey thought she heard a strangled “Help!” squeak out of her mouth but couldn’t be sure because she wasn’t even sure Meg was actually speaking to her, so she ignored it. But Mrs. Gallagher waited patiently for Meg to say something, so Meg finally gulped and shook her head.
“Um…no, he didn’t mention that. Thanks, but I won’t—”
“Of course you will! You’re Chase’s girlfriend, so that means you’ll have dinner with us. We have big, noisy, messy family dinners here every Sunday. His grandparents are dying to meet you, not to mention the godparents and cousins.”
Bailey hid her grin when Meg’s face went from pink back to paper white while she swayed a little on her feet and wished she could pull up one of the chairs at the table and watch the drama unfold. But Meg stunned her.
“No, I’m not his girlfriend, Mrs. Gallagher. I’m not anybody’s girlfriend, and I really have to get to school. Please thank everybody for taking care of me last night.” She turned and left the kitchen, leaving Mrs. Gallagher twisting her hands.
“Bailey.” Chase’s mother turned to her with fire in her eyes. “Did I miss something here? The way those two watch each other, there’s definitely something there, right? I’m not just getting old and seeing things?”
Bailey laughed. “No, you are definitely not old. Chase is crazy about Meg, and she’s just as crazy about him. She just won’t admit it.”
“Oh, boy.” Mrs. Gallagher covered her face with her hands and sighed. “Poor Chase.”
Bailey nodded. Poor Chase. Poor Meg. And poor her! Surrounded by all this love nobody wanted—nobody but her. She’d kill to have someone adore her. She stared at her hand, wondered just for a second how much it would hurt if she slashed it. A horn honking outside jolted Bailey from her crazy thoughts. She called a hasty good-bye to Mrs. Gallagher and caught up to her friends in Chase’s driveway, climbing into the backseat next to a barefoot Meg.
“Ewww, what’s this?” Bailey held up a brown-stained towel.
“Um…blood.”
Bailey dropped the towel and took Meg’s kicks. “Give me your foot.”
Meg dutifully lifted her feet while Bailey put on her shoes but said nothing. Chase was also unnaturally quiet. Bailey sat back and watched while Chase adjusted the mirrors and reversed out of the driveway. The drive to school was silent and tense, and it took Bailey the entire trip to figure out why.
Chase was giving up.
Chapter 31
Meg
Meg’s hand burned with the fury of a dozen sunburns.
When they were twelve, Bailey thought it would be fun to slather baby oil all over their bodies and bake in the sun. It wasn’t. For two days, Meg couldn’t get dressed. For three days after that, she looked like a snake that couldn’t figure out how the shedding process worked.
She stared at the bandage on her hand. Ten days before the stitches could come out, the doctor had said. She winced and hoped she could survive this burning for nine more days. With her head down and her hand cradled against her chest, she slipped through the corridors. Nobody threw underwear at her, so the day would have been better than yesterday, except for one thing.
Chase.
She’d divulged way too much information and she needed to regroup. It would be easy to blame the trauma of getting hurt or the drama that had led up to her injury or even the meds they’d given her in the hospital. Who knows? Maybe all those things were to blame—at least in part. But the truth was that Chase was way too easy to talk to.
He’d asked her why she didn’t want him. And she’d told him the truth. Just blurted it right out. She didn’t want anyone, especially him, to feel like he had to love her. Oh, sure, at first, he’d scoffed and tried to laugh it off, but she wouldn’t let him. He’d wanted the truth and he’d deserved it.
So she gave it to him. She told him how her parents never really wanted kids. How tight money was—and still is—since she’d been born. How it was her fault her dad died. Her fault that her mom worked twenty out of twenty-four hours, collapsed in bed, and then got up to do it all over again. She’d told him it was her responsibility to grow up as fast as she could, get out on her own, take care of herself.
He’d tried to hand her all the reassurances and promises he thought would solve everything, but she’d heard them before, heard them every time, every single time her parents had the same fight. She fell asleep with him still trying to talk her into believing him. Or believing in him.
Either way, she’d let him down.
He was different today. Around her, around Bailey, around everyone. It was obvious the truth changed him. She tried to justify it, but she couldn’t. So then she tried to forget.
She answered the few people who expressed interest, even though they disguised it as concern. By lunch, the medicine Kelly Gallagher had given her had worn off, and the burning in her hand worsened to a steady flare. She sat at an empty table with a turkey sandwich, one of the few things she could eat with one hand. She had a bottle of water but couldn’t open the cap, so it sat on her tray while she thought about her home test for the Cooper Union. With her left hand injured, now was as good a time as any to begin work on her ink project. India ink or stylus? She clicked her plain old ball-point pen and doodled on a notebook page, the turkey sandwich forgotten, until a shadow passed through her light.
She glanced up at Chase. Without a word, he took the bottle of water, unscrewed the cap, and handed it back to her. Then he turned to leave.
“Chase, wait.”
He turned back, shot out one hip, impatience sizzling.
“What happened last night? Your dad said my house got trashed?”
Chase’s jaw tightened, and he jerked his chin at something behind Meg. “Ask her.”
She glanced over her shoulder.
“Hi, Meg! How’s your hand feeling?” Bailey sang.
Meg glared. “It hurts.” Duh.
Bailey’s sunny smile faded. “Yeah, do we need to…um, clean it, put medicine on it, or something?”
Meg nearly laughed. Bailey almost hurled when she got her ears pierced. If she saw the angry black line of sutures across Meg’s hand, she’d probably fall to the floor in a dead faint. “Thanks, but I can manage.”
Bailey sat uninvited at Meg’s table and Meg supposed that was because in Bailey’s eyes, things between them were once again smooth. That things were not smooth in Meg’s eyes usually didn’t occur to Bailey unless she pointed it out.
“What happened at my house last night?”
Bailey forehead crinkled, and she looked ashamed for a moment. “A bunch of people toilet-papered your front yard. But I didn’t put them up to it, I swear!”
Not directly, Meg thought.
“After you and Chase cleaned up, what did you do?”
Bailey shrugged. “I went home, posted what happened to you on Facebook, and told everyone to leave you alone.”
Meg’s eyebrows shot up. “Thank you so much for calling off your troops.”
“Oh, Meg, they’re not my troops, and I didn’t call anybody off just like I didn’t put them up to it in the first place.”
“You did, Bailey. You did as soon as you told my secret.”
Bailey’s wide eyes fixed on hers and she pouted. “Only because you told one of mine first.”
“I didn’t,” Meg insisted. “I never told anybody, not even Chase, any of your secrets. I didn’t talk about you throwing up. I didn’t talk about that poem you stuck in Jordan’s locker, and I didn’t even mention what almost happened with Mr. Milner back in ninth grade.” Meg’s dark eyes flashed.
Bailey’s eyes went wide, and she whipped her head around, looking for eavesdroppers. “Shit, Meg, will you shut up?”
“Why should I? If you’re gonna punish me for things I didn’t do, I may as well as—you know—actually do them.”
Bailey’s darting eyes caught sight of a teacher bearing down on them. She held up her hands, tried to make peace. “Well, I thought you did, and I was wrong about that. And I said I was sorry.”
“Only because Ryder made you,” Meg sneered.
“No, not only. Chase did too. And I didn’t need either of them. I was already on my way over to your place on my own.”
Meg wasn’t so easily convinced. “If you’d trusted me, you wouldn’t have to apologize. I can’t believe you trusted him over me.”
“I didn’t. Not at first. I even texted you, but you ignored me.”
Meg frowned. That could have been true; she’d ignored a message that day. She huffed and crossed her arms and tried to wrap herself up in her anger. It hurt. So she sighed and gave up. “Okay. There’s only one way we’re gonna get past this.”
Bailey looked at her with a raised eyebrow.
“We need to meet Ryder. Up close and in person.”
Chapter 32
Bailey
Bailey was a bundle of raw nerves. She’d promised Meg she would not go anywhere alone with Ryder. They would meet in a public place, arrive separately, and leave separately. She promised Meg she’d insist on it and set it up for later that evening.
But that’s not what Bailey did.
Bailey texted Ryder and arranged to meet him at the food court at the mall right after school, when Meg would be happily working the counter at the Gallaghers’ bakery.
When she finally met Ryder West, it would be only the two of them, looking into each other’s eyes.
It had taken her almost all of the next period to text Ryder without getting caught by her teacher and convince him that it was time to meet. It was now exactly 3:30. Bailey stood in the food court at the mall.
Alone, though she was surrounded by a few hundred strangers. She may be going behind Meg’s back, but she wasn’t dumb enough to totally ignore her warnings. And now she’d been here for fifteen minutes already with no sign of him.
It didn’t mean anything, she tried to assure herself. She wasn’t worried, not one bit. He was probably just running late, or he’d gotten into another fight with his aunt or something. And the place was totally jammed. He could be here and how would she even know? He never did send her a picture…or post one on Facebook. His profile shots were all video game avatars.
She checked her reflection in a store window. She’d rushed home after school and changed into her cutest outfit—jeans with black boots, a skimpy sweater that showed off her belly. She paced in front of the food stands, but nobody approached her. Nobody even checked her out. She finally snagged an empty table, took out her cell, and texted Ryder.
Bailey: You here yet? I’m sitting in front of Hot Wok.
A few minutes went by before the phone buzzed.
Ryder: No, I’m
so sorry. Still at work.
Bailey tossed her phone to the table and fumed. Meg’s smart-ass voice played in her head. She tried not to listen. She told the Meg voice that Ryder couldn’t be a psycho serial killer or a sixty-year-old pervert or he’d definitely be there, chasing her through the Gap with a bloody ax or something. So there. Meg was wrong! That was something at least.
Still…he wasn’t here. He wasn’t coming. He’d blown her off again, and Gran wasn’t coming back for her for at least an hour or so. She stared at her phone, willing it to buzz.
“Hey.”
Bailey jolted back to reality and found a pair of gorgeous blue eyes looking down at her. He was here! Oh, God, he was here, and he was everything and more than she’d imagined. She’d worried, obsessed really, about letting him down easy if he wasn’t cute, which was going to be so hard since she liked him so much. But that didn’t matter now. His face, oh, it was a face she’d have dreams about. Those pouty lips and sculpted jawline. And his body! He was tall and built and he was here.
“You came,” she managed to squeak out.
The god standing in front of her looked at her like she had spinach caught in her teeth and Bailey’s little bubble of hope burst. “You’re not Ryder?”
“No, I…uh, just want your table. You done or what?”
Bailey forced a smile. “Yeah. No problem.” She stood up, turned away, and collided right into Simon.
“What are you doing here?” she snarled.
“Uh, walking,” he snapped back. He was wearing regular clothes instead of all his usual fancy designer stuff, blond hair perfect as always. Bailey moved around him, but he blocked her way.
“Where’s Caitlyn? Out getting her flea and lice treatment?”
Simon’s nostrils flared. “Where’s Meg? Out buying you a ring?”
