by Jamie Blair
Kolton looked at me, and I looked at him. “I think we’ll pass on the party,” Kolton said, turning to Rob. “I see you enough as it is.”
“Then why is your dumb ass staying with me over break?”
Kolton picked the ball of socks up from the floor by my feet and winged it back at Rob. “I’ll be right back,” he said to me, then disappeared into the bathroom with a change of clothes.
Rob sighed, throwing the ball up in the air and catching it. “How are we going to get our boy to talk to his brother again?”
“I don’t know.” I’d been wondering that myself.
At the end of last summer, Kyle wrote me an email asking me to forgive him.
I didn’t think I could forgive him at first.
About a week after getting Kyle’s email, I knew the only way I could come to terms with what happened to me was to talk to him, so I went to the hospital to visit him. Mom and Dad thought I was crazy to go. Amy drove me. She understood my need to get face-to-face answers.
Kyle was medicated and stable. He was about to be sent home. The doctor was certain he could live a normal life. Kyle and I sat outside at a picnic table under a tree. He didn’t stop drumming his fingers on the tabletop the entire time we talked.
In the end, I forgave him.
Because he’d been taken advantage of.
Because he needed my forgiveness to heal.
Because I needed to give it to heal.
On the outside, my scars were faint lines on my cheeks. They were no harder to cover with makeup than my birthmark always had been. If I decided to, I could have cosmetic surgery.
The bathroom door opened and Kolton came out. “All set. Let’s get going.” He hoisted his duffle bag over his shoulder and whacked Rob on the back. “Give me a shout when you get there.”
Because of the traffic on the Chesapeake Bridge, we didn’t get off the highway until almost four hours later. When I made a left at the first intersection instead of right toward Sandbridge Beach and the cottage, Kolton grabbed my hand. “You turned the wrong way.”
I held on to him tight, threading my fingers between his like he might get away, jump out of the car or something. “We’re going to your mom’s apartment.” The foreclosure on their house happened last fall. “You haven’t been there yet.” He hadn’t even gone home for Christmas.
“Lauren.” He rubbed his free hand over his face, scrubbed at his forehead with the heel of his palm. “I can’t.”
“You can. Ten minutes.” I turned left again, getting closer by the second.
“I don’t want to see him. I’m not ready yet. Can’t you understand that?” He slouched down in the seat.
I pulled into a convenience store parking lot and stopped. “Of course I understand.” I pointed to my face. “Hello!” I waited for him to look at me. “The thing is, I know how much better it feels when it’s in the past. You need to talk to him to get over it, Kolton.”
He took a deep breath and groaned. “I know.” His eyes held mine for a minute. “I know,” he whispered.
“When?”
“Soon, but not this week.”
“Promise?”
He ran a hand over his head and sighed. “Promise.”
Taking his word for it, I drove us to the cottage. He lugged our bags up the steps to the door. “Are you hungry?” he asked. “I’m starving. Let’s go get pizza.”
I had other plans in mind. “Okay. Can we take a walk on the beach first? Will you die of starvation?” I leaned in and kissed him as he placed our bags on the kitchen floor.
He held me against him tight and kissed me, deeper this time. “A walk on the beach in the dark with you?” His eyebrows hitched up and down. “Count me in.”
“Good. I’ll be right back.” I darted upstairs, pretending to run to the bathroom. When I came back down, he was waiting on the patio.
We walked in the surf, hand in hand, his thumb rubbing over mine. We didn’t talk, but we didn’t have to. Since we saw each other every day, we had time for silence now.
At our dune, he climbed up first, then reached down to take my hand and pull me up into my spot. I snuggled into him. The waves crashed and rippled across the sand. The moon rode the waves, and the sea grass shushed in the breeze.
I shivered.
“Are you cold?” he asked.
I looked at him, the boy I sat here with a year ago and kissed for the first time. He smiled, knowing the shiver wasn’t from being cold.
While we kissed, I reached into my pocket and pulled out a small, medal racecar. When I put it in his hand, he parted from my lips and opened his palm.
So much had happened in the past ten months, but it was finally our time.
“You want to play Monopoly?” he asked, rolling the tiny car around in his palm.
“I want to play Monopoly,” I said, and dove for him, wrapping my arms around him and pushing him back on the sand as I kissed him.
Both of us laughed between kisses.
“You’re always getting me in trouble.” He rolled us over and ran his thumb across my birthmark and the scars on my face. “I love you, Ladybug.”
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Reviews
"Just a marvelous debut, moving and suspenseful." (starred review, Kirkus Reviews)
"Well done, Jamie Blair. You've written a unique, compelling page-turner that managed to break my heart and create a beautiful love story in the process." (Julie Cross, author of Tempest)
"This story is riveting, inspirational, and shines a light on how much better life becomes when one decides to follow her heart. Readers will appreciate the power of positive energy that radiates from the pages." (Susane Colasanti, author of All I Need, So Much Closer, and Keep Holding On)
"So what if I was exhausted? So what if I had to be up at dawn? Once I dove into Leap of Faith, nothing could stop me from turning the pages." (Sonya Sones, author of What My Mother Doesn't Know and To Be Perfectly Honest (A Novel Based on an Untrue Story))
"Compulsively readable." (School Library Journal)
