by Callie James
Every time I’d watched her in seventh period, I’d wondered what she’d be like to kiss or anything else. I’d wondered if her hair felt as soft as it looked, and it did. I’d assumed she’d have more flaws close up, and she didn’t. I’d also known I’d get sick of her perky personality within minutes, and I hadn’t. And like every other guy, I’d fantasized the sex would be a twelve on a scale of ten, but it no longer mattered. I liked her. That constant optimism and charitable nature. The way she kissed me. The way she looked at me.
God, the way she looked at me.
Most people stared at me as though I were a felony waiting to happen. Students at Ridgeview scattered like cockroaches whenever I approached.
Peyton never had, so it shouldn’t have surprised me when she texted Sunday asking if we could do lunch this week to study for the Mansfield test.
Like she needed to ask.
Most nights I crashed at the gym, except on nights when Mamá worked a twelve-hour shift at the hospital, seven to seven. Vanna suffered from chronic nightmares and couldn’t sleep alone at the house, so I made a point to drive home the nights when Ma couldn’t be there. Even after an intense night of training, the lulling, forty-five minute drive would calm me enough to do homework, and after an hour or two of that, I could finally go to sleep.
But I had energy to burn Sunday night. My anxiety only increased when I pulled in to see Ma’s white Corolla parked in the driveway.
God, not again.
I barely parked. Used one porch step out of six as I scrambled to the front door. Vanna had secured both dead bolts, which forced me to calm down long enough to get in the front door. I found my sister on the couch, looking up from her drawing pad as the TV’s flickering light cast shadows across her worried expression. “I doubt she’s asleep,” she said. “It was a bad one.”
Scowling hard enough to make my forehead ache, I pivoted without a word and headed down the dark hallway toward Ma’s room.
I knocked softly.
“Samuel?”
She must have heard the Impala. “Yeah.”
“Come in, mijo.”
Pushing the door open, I knew better than to flip the light switch and navigated the dark instead. Once I reached the lamp in the farthest corner, I pushed the button, illuminating the room with enough soft light for me to see her stretched on top of the bed, forearm thrown over her eyes.
“¿Qué hora es?” she murmured.
“Almost midnight.” She hadn’t removed her scrubs or shoes. “This one must have hit fast.”
“Why do you say that?”
“You didn’t bother to change.”
“Mhm.” She moved her arm and the wet washcloth, and squinted at me with those unique hazel eyes, identical to my sister’s. I got Ma’s hair color, although the chocolate mass she usually wore in a knot no longer had the shine from several years ago. It didn’t take more than a glance at her strained eyes and the tiny lines etched around her mouth to know her medication hadn’t touched the pain. She smiled anyway. “Savanna said you had a date last night.”
Apparently, my usually quiet sister couldn’t keep her mouth shut. “Sí.”
“And you’re going out again next weekend? The same girl?”
“Sí, Mamá.” Her curious grin made heat seep into my cheeks and I quickly grabbed the cloth out of her hand to rinse it in a bowl of cool water Vanna left on the nightstand. My old-fashioned mamá had wanted me to meet a nice girl since I’d turned sixteen. Folding and handing her the washcloth, I was determined to turn the subject back to her health. “Usted necesita dejar de trabajar tanto.”
She frowned. “I don’t work any harder than the other nurses.”
“Maybe. But you’re working more than your usual three, twelve-hour shifts. You worked four extra days last month. Two this month. Just stop, Ma. Please. Why do you think I have two jobs?”
“That’s the point. You shouldn’t have to work so hard. A fulltime student holding down two jobs? That schedule will catch up with you, mijo.”
“I’m nineteen and have the stamina and energy of a professional fighter,” I said. “You don’t. You can’t run yourself into the ground like you did in your twenties, Ma.”
She rolled her eyes—her usual response to the truth about her health. “I’m fine, Samuel. You worry too much.”
“At least quit skipping meals. The doctor said to get your body on a regular schedule with food and sleep. That the migraines would decrease.” I was sick of repeating myself. “You’re a nurse. I don’t understand how you can ignore the symptoms of strain—” My voice disappeared, hoarse with emotion.
“Quite worrying, mijo.” She gave me one of her reassuring smiles. “Now tell me more about this girl. Savanna told me you helped her brother,” she said, a renewed sparkle in her eyes. “Her name is Peyton?”
I wanted to be mad at Vanna for opening her trap about Peyton, but neither of us could stand to see Ma in pain. My sister would say anything to keep her distracted from it, and so would I. “Sí.”
“Such a pretty name. Did you know he was her brother when you helped him?”
I had no plans to relay that sordid story. “Sí, but that’s not why I did it.”
“¿Por qué?” she whispered.
I hadn’t been sure myself until she asked. Ma was the one person I had difficulty lying to, especially now that it was just the three of us. “Because I couldn’t just sit there and listen to it. I had to do something.”
She smiled. Nodded. “Sometimes, Samuel … you’re so much like him.” Her chin trembled.
I stepped closer to the bed. “Dios mío, Ma. Don’t start crying. ¿Qué pasa?”
“I can’t help it. Your papá,” she said, her voice shaking. “He said the same thing … oh, countless times. You remember what kind of man he was. Un buen hombre.” We shared a smile. “I’m sure she was grateful. Did she thank you?”
“Something like that. She offered to help me pass a British Authors review.”
“Your favorite class.” She grinned. “And the romance began there?”
“No, that was pretty much it.”
“Liar. You’re dating her now. Admit it.” She patted the bedcover next to her. “Come. Sit. Háblame de ella. We rarely get a chance to talk anymore, much less about a girl.”
I sat next to her, willing to do anything to make her well. “What do you want to know?”
“Mijo, you’ve never brought a girl home for me to meet. I want to know everything, of course.”
My face heated. “It’s private.”
“You think everything is private.” She winced and pressed her fingers against her scalp. I forced myself not to overreact. “So she’s pretty and popular,” she said. “And you act awkward around her, which can only mean you like her.”
Vanna. “I hadn’t realized I was being awkward.” Definitely time to change the subject. “Can I get you something else? Ibuprofen?”
“No, I’ll be fine soon.” Closing her eyes, she settled into the pillow a little easier and folded the cool cloth neatly over her eyes. “Mm. That’s better. Now tell me more. She has red hair?”
“Copper.” I sighed to think about it. “It …changes in the summer.” I was talking too much. “But yeah. Red.”
“She sounds preciosa, mijo.”
“She’s okay.”
“Mhm. You noticed all that detail about a girl’s hair.” She laughed and grabbed her scalp again. “You’re already falling for her. I can hear it in your voice.”
“Ma.”
“It’s a sign.”
“It’s not a sign.”
“Does she have green eyes?”
“Blue,” I said, telling her too much. I sighed. “And yes, she’s pretty and smart and nice to everyone. We have practically nothing in common.”
“What are you talking about? You’re handsome and smart. You used to get good grades when your papá was alive and things weren’t …the way they are. You love your family and you have several good
friends. How is she nothing like you?”
“For one, she hates fighting. Anything to do with it, actually.”
Her smile faded. “I hated fighting, too, Samuel. But I still married your father, who was a retired boxer and a police officer. She’ll overlook it if she grows to genuinely care about you.”
“That’s a big if.” My stomach growled audibly. The perfect cue to drop the subject. “I should check on Vanna. You know how worried she gets when you’re sick.”
She nodded. “I’m glad for you. It has a nice ring to it.”
“What?”
“Sam and Peyton,” she murmured. “Yes. I like it. And I want to hear more about her when it doesn’t hurt so much to listen.”
Frowning, I stood and pulled her shoes off her feet, dropping them next to the bed.
“Thank you,” she whispered. “Goodnight, mijo.”
To see her this fragile made me miss Papá more than ever. He’d never have let this happen to her. It would have broken his heart to see her fall apart, emotionally and physically, without him. I guess that’s what happened to childhood sweethearts when things didn’t end happily ever after.
Love was such bullshit.
Leaning over, I kissed her forehead. “Te quiero, Mamá,” I whispered. “Mejorate.” I pulled the quilt to her elbows and turned off the light.
“I love you, too, mijo,” she whispered. “And quit worrying about me. I’ll see you in the morning.”
Vanna didn’t turn from the television as I passed her on my way to the kitchen.
“She better yet?” she asked, sounding like she had a cold.
“Not really. But she’s well enough to talk. That’s a plus.” I’d busted my ass tonight and my stomach growled noisily again by the time I hit the refrigerator. After making a turkey sandwich and getting comfortable at the dining table, I noticed Vanna had a Kleenex shoved against her nose.
I noticed then her puffy, red eyes.
I stopped eating and swallowed the half-chewed bite that tore like sawdust down my throat. Vanna never cried, even when she worried about our mamá. My chest constricted as a panicky, protectiveness from years ago swelled inside me, and ignoring the adrenaline pounding through my limbs was like trying to ignore a gun pointed at my head. “What?”
She hit pause and waved a Kleenex at the TV. “It’s this damn show.”
I grunted in disbelief. “A show? You’re crying over a show?” I didn’t know why I was mad. She hadn’t meant to scare the hell out of me.
“It’s a bunch of DVDs Louisa gave me to watch.”
Her best friend from the old neighborhood, Louisa, was a complete airhead. I couldn’t believe the girl was into anything deep, much less something profound enough to make my hardass sister cry. “What show?”
She blew her nose into a tissue. “Naruto.”
“What the hell is a Naruto?”
“A show.”
I sighed. Curiosity would kill me if I didn’t check it out. Picking up my sandwich and apple, I joined her on the couch. She’d stopped the frame on a blond, spiky-haired kid wearing a blue thing around his forehead. “I thought you outgrew cartoons.”
“Do you have any idea how popular this anime is?”
“Vanna. It’s a damn cartoon. You’re crying over a cartoon.”
“Oh kiss my ass,” she said, glaring at me. “I’m not crying. I’m … misty-eyed.”
Her swollen, bloodshot eyes and the red tip of her nose were proof she’d been bawling her fool head off. “Whatever you say, Rudolph.”
Her eyes crossed to look at her nose. “I’ll have you know I’ve been watching this show for two months.” She wiped at the thick, black eye liner and mascara under her eyelashes. “If you didn’t race to your room whenever you stayed here, you’d know that. And quit calling it a cartoon.”
“I have classes to pass, Vanna, in case you forgot. Besides, working on homework puts me to sleep.”
“I’ll bet. Hey, can I get an online subscription? It’s seven bucks a month or something. All the anime you can stand. I could watch it on the laptop in my room and you wouldn’t have to see my face when you come home.”
“Hallelujah.”
“Really?” She grinned, not at all slighted. “I can get it?”
“Maybe.” I shrugged. “Depends.”
“On what?”
“If it’s seven bucks a month, or something.”
She grinned, a rare occurrence these days. Made me like the show already.
“I can’t believe you’re finally watching something other than news.” I said. Vanna usually had her fingers glued to her laptop, perusing headlines and looking for the next big political issue to post on her blog. If she wasn’t in the throes of some heated debate there, she drew caricatures for a political satire cartoon series she wrote for the same blog. She had a huge following, so she took it seriously as if it were a job. My sister was a pain in the ass, but anyone with eyes could see she’d do something mega important with her life someday.
Unlike her big brother.
She studied my half-smile. “It’s not the sports channel, but if you don’t have homework tonight, we could watch it. If you want. I wouldn’t mind.”
I’d started working two jobs at sixteen. Between those jobs, homework, and all the repairs that came with owning a piece-of-crap house, Vanna and I rarely ate together anymore, much less vegged out to watch a show. She missed the old neighborhood and the friends we left behind. Some days it felt like I was all she had, and my sister’s eager expression made the guilt heavier. “I guess I could catch a couple episodes.”
“Really?”
No mistaking it this time. She wanted me to hang out. “Sure, if you quit talking to Ma about Peyton. We went out once. It’s no big deal. Don’t get Ma all stirred up about it.”
“I beg to differ, bro. It’s a huge deal. And you went out twice. Skipping class and sushi, remember?”
Big mistake telling Vanna that. “So?”
“Oh, there’s no so about this. Peyton Greene may go out with a lot of guys, but she doesn’t date anyone. You must be blackmailing her.”
“Just drop it.”
“Tell me what dirt you have on her and I will.”
“No dirt. I’ve told you before. You don’t know her.”
“And you do? Since when do you know girls beyond screwing them?”
I wished my sister wasn’t such a tomboy and so blunt all the time. I pushed the last bite of sandwich into my mouth and examined the apple as if I hadn’t heard her.
“Wow,” she said. “Little Miss Cheerful must be as good as they say. Watch out though, I’ve heard she scratches and bites.”
I grabbed a couch pillow and smacked her in the face with it, messing up her hair, which she hated. “Don’t talk trash, Vanna. You’ll turn into one of those bitches at school who make up shit just to have something to say. The same ones who talk about you.”
She swiped her fingers through her hair, fixing it. “Are you saying you’re not out to screw her like every other guy? Because that would be a flat lie. I saw how you looked at her that day on the lawn. And in the parking lot. And in sophomore hall. I’ve got eyes you know.”
Tempted to hit her with the pillow again, I stuffed it behind my head instead, leaned back, and glared at the DVD picture, pretending her comment about every other guy wanting to screw Peyton hadn’t hit a nerve. “I mean it. Shut up about her.”
I hadn’t been that abrupt with Vanna in a while, so when the silence stretched out along with her intense stare, I had a good idea why. “Please don’t tell me you like her, Samuel.”
Like didn’t sum up whatever this was between me and Peyton, but I didn’t want to jinx the whole thing by labeling it. What I wanted was to ask Vanna how a girl could have straight, silky hair one day and all those amazing curls the next. It couldn’t be natural and I genuinely wanted to know. Still, I didn’t ask because my sister would never answer a question like that, would likely ask what the fuck w
as wrong with me instead, and then proceed to call me a pansy and pussy-whipped for the next fifty years.
“Oh my god,” she said, flipping sideways and giving me her full attention. “You do like her. H-holy cow. How much? When? W-why?” She rolled her eyes. “I mean. You know. Other than her body.”
Christ, she’d become a babbling idiot within seconds. “Vanna—”
“I thought you stopped partying to stay more level-headed,” she said, interrupting me. “Peyton Green is nice to everybody. You know that, right? She’s even nice to me.”
“So?”
“So I’d hate you to misinterpret good manners for real interest.”
“Jesus, Vanna,” I said, scowling, “why don’t you tell me what you really think?”
“I didn’t mean it that way.” She looked down. Back up. “Do you think she is? Interested, I mean.”
“Start the DVD.”
She fell silent and studied me for a long moment. “Okay, but come clean with me first.”
“About what?”
“You totally did her Saturday, didn’t you? She blew your doors off and now you want the second course. You’ve heard she won’t do the same guy twice, haven’t you?”
Damn that sounded awful, especially coming from a sixteen-year-old girl. When and where the hell did my sister learn to talk like one of the neighborhood gangbangers? “No.”
“No, what?”
“No, I didn’t do her.”
“Hm. She must be an actual challenge, which means once you screw her—”
“Could you at least try to sound like a girl?” I turned to her. “I can’t believe you kiss our mamá with that mouth.”
“You’d prefer I talk like Little Miss Priss Peyton, who pretends she’s innocent and sweet while working her way through the football team? Forget it. I live in the real world. Now what’s the deal?”
“No deal.” I shrugged. “She’s …different. That’s all.”
“Different,” she repeated, sounding doubtful. “Well that could mean a thousand things. Does she have any idea who you even are?”
