“And he seems perfectly comfortable helping you with said baggage—when you’ll let him, that is.”
“It’s hard to rely on people.”
“It’s harder to do it on your own.”
I sighed.
“You trust him, right?”
“Yes.” That wasn’t even a question.
“Then trust that he’ll be receptive to whatever you feel like saying. Trust that he has grown up since high school. Otherwise, your friendship might be irreparably altered.” She shrugged. “You don’t know until you find out, right?”
“Right,” I said. I paused the movie we weren’t even watching to grab more snacks from the kitchen. It didn’t make sense, that I was so tired but filled with this restlessness I couldn’t tame. Maybe it was that pesky L word being tossed around like a volleyball, but I felt a bit hollow. And maybe I just needed some greasy snacks to fill the void.
But I only made it a handful of steps when I heard a noise in the backyard.
It was nine o’clock. Aunt Isabel’s backyard backed up to some woods; there was no reason for anyone to be in our backyard unless they had nefarious plans.
“Did you hear that?” I asked Hollis in a sharp whisper as my heart rate spiked.
“Someone’s out there.” Hollis got up off the couch and joined me at the back door. “Grab the baseball bat,” she directed when I froze with my hand on the doorknob. Behind the back door, between the wall and a bookcase was a metal baseball bat that my aunt had hidden years earlier, when we were all much younger.
Hollis pressed her head against the door. “Whoever it is, they’re laughing.”
“Laughing?” Driven by a bravery I hadn’t known I had, I opened the door, armed with the baseball bat. “What the…” Jade was in the yard, illuminated by the flood lights that had turned on from her movement. She froze.
“Jade?” I asked. I took her in as the fear that had been coursing through my veins faded into shock upon seeing my sister. She was wearing skin-tight black jeans, a leather jacket, and her face was perfectly made up. Her bold red lips fell open. “What are you doing?” This didn’t look like someone getting ready for bed, at all.
“Nothing.”
“Why aren’t you in your room? How did you get outside?”
“I…”
“Get back inside,” I said.
“I can’t.”
“Yes, you can.”
“He’s waiting for me down the road.”
“Who?”
“My boyfriend.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “Why didn’t he come to the front door?”
Jade crossed her arms, mirroring my pose. “Because you wouldn’t let me go with him.”
That sounded ominous. Hollis slunk away from the door. “So your solution was to sneak out?” I stepped out on the back stoop and peered up, where her window was. “You climbed out of your window?”
“Yeah.” Jade looked at her phone and then back at me.
“You could’ve broken your neck.”
She scoffed. “Oh, please. I just climbed to the roof over the garage and got down that way. It’s not a far drop; I’ve done it plenty of times.”
“Plenty of times?” I was trying to decide just how upset to be. “Call your boyfriend, have him come over to the house.”
“No.” Jade locked her phone and shoved it in her back pocket. “No way.”
“Then go back to your room.”
“Why?”
“If you can’t even bring him around so we can meet him, then you don’t need to go off with him. I didn’t even know you had a boyfriend until Rose told me.”
“Yeah. And Auntie knows.” She sniffed.
“Has Auntie met him?”
Jade scowled. “No. You know she wouldn’t approve.”
“I heard she put you on birth control, but she didn’t insist on meeting your boyfriend?”
“No. Because I told her no. Like I’m telling you now.”
“And I’m telling you that you can’t go out. Not with someone we can’t even meet. Seriously, Jade?”
“If you met him, that wouldn’t make you immediately comfortable with me going out with him anyway.”
“That sounds promising.” I stepped beside and motioned for her to go inside.
After a moment, she set her jaw and went into the house. But the war was far from over, I could see it in her eyes.
“How old is this guy?”
Jade glanced sideways at Hollis, apparently noticing her for the first time. “Twenty.”
It was only four years, I told myself. But twenty meant someone not in high school was dating my sister who was still a sophomore. “College kid?”
“Yeah. I met him at a party.” At my look, Jade gave me one of her own. “Oh, come on, like you weren’t sneaking out and going to parties when you were my age.”
“I went to parties, yes, but I didn’t sneak off. I definitely didn’t climb out my window to meet with some older guy.”
“He’s not that much older,” Jade argued and angrily ripped her jacket off. “God, you’re such a fucking buzzkill.”
Pick your battles, I reminded myself. Now was not the time to police her language. “How often do you do this?” I asked, suddenly feeling suspicious. I looked up at the ceiling, listening to the blare of her music and it hit me before she could answer. “You don’t turn your music up because you need it to sleep. You turn it up so we can’t hear you leave and return, right?”
Jade didn’t nod or speak to confirm my thoughts. The glare in her eyes told me my answer.
“Jade, you are sixteen years old. You don’t even have a license. You shouldn’t be out at parties when we don’t even know where you are.”
“I don’t need a license when I get a ride.”
“You’re missing the point.”
“No, I don’t think I am.” Jade slammed a cabinet above the sink, rattling all the dishes inside. “You keep thinking you’re our mom or something, when you’re supposed to just be my sister. Is that so hard?”
“Even as just your sister, I’m worried about you sneaking off to meet a guy we don’t even know—a guy who is older and more mature in the ways that you’re not.”
“It’s really not that big of a difference.”
“Well, I would hope he’s paying his own bills, unlike you. And I’m sure he’s not sneaking out to meet you. So, yes, there is a big difference. And I doubt he has to lie to anyone about where he’s going—like you lied to me about going to bed.”
Jade looked at Hollis again and then back at me. Too late, I realized I should’ve had this conversation with my sister privately. But I was so in shock from seeing Jade fully dressed in the backyard that I hadn’t stopped to consider our surroundings. “I don’t know what to do here, Jade. If I send you to your room, what’s stopping you from sneaking out?”
I didn’t know how to do this. Did I take her phone away? Did I ground her? I did the only thing I could think, something that was probably not the best choice, but it was the only one I could decide on. “If you sneak out again, I’m going to call Aunt Isabel and you can bet she’s going to cancel your phone and probably ground you as soon as she gets home.” Why did it make me feel like a tattle tale? Why didn’t I feel unequivocally right about this?
“You’re such a BITCH!” Jade screamed, slamming the cabinet again—this time hard enough that a mug fell out and landed on the counter, exploding into dozens of pieces. Jade just gawked at it. It was one of the ones our aunt had made at her pottery class—something I couldn’t replace.
Furious, I moved to the sink and started picking up the shards that seemed everywhere. I was too tired for this, too sick of fighting. My hands shook from it, and I was all out of patience. “I don’t know how Auntie deals with you sometimes,” I said and then closed my eyes, bracing my hands on the sink. I shouldn’t have said that. I couldn’t look at her, I was so ashamed.
My entire body stiffened at Jade’s ensuing silenc
e. I was already apologizing in my head, thinking of ways I could smooth this over when I turned to her, broken pieces of the mug in my hands. “I’m sorry,” I said, seconds too late.
Jade’s eyes were shining—with anger, with contempt. I flinched, as if she’d dealt a blow already. “She deals with me because she wants to.”
I opened my mouth to reply, but she barreled on, coming right up to my face, in my space. Despite our age difference, we were the same height; eye-to-eye.
“You deal with me because you have to. As soon as you turned eighteen, you were out of here. And then, the same for Violet. Once both of you were eighteen, we became problems to you. Not sisters.”
“You’ve always been my sister.” I swallowed, feeling like she’d struck me. “I am hard on you sometimes, but only because I don’t want Aunt Isabel to have to bear the brunt of the burden.”
“Oh, so now I’m a burden.”
“Not you. Not just you. All four of us—Mom and Dad dumped us off on Aunt Isabel when you were too young to even remember. And she handled it, raising us all and sacrificing having her own family for us. She has sacrificed, Jade. And I don’t expect you to understand the depth of that sacrifice, but would it kill you to make her life a little easier sometimes?” I moved to the trashcan and dropped the broken pieces of the irreplaceable mug into it.
“You don’t know what I’m like when it’s just me and Auntie. You don’t even know me anymore. You moved out five years ago. You can’t act like you know how I treat our aunt when you’re not ever here. Because you’re not here. You’re there for strangers—like at the shelter—more than you are for me. Unless I’m causing a problem.”
She wasn’t wrong. And that was what gutted me the most. I was failing my sisters.
“Call Auntie, tell her I snuck out. I don’t care. You don’t have any right to be mad at me for lying to you. Because you’re the biggest liar out of all of us.”
I wouldn’t have taken much stock in her statement were it not for the way her eyes narrowed at me, like she knew something that I didn’t know about.
“Yeah. Exactly. Don’t preach to me about lying. You’re just lucky that I was the only one caught in a lie tonight.” And with that, she stomped back up to her bedroom, slamming her door hard enough to rattle the whole house.
“That was…” Hollis began after a moment, moving to pick up the shattered pieces I’d abandoned.
“I’m sorry, Hols,” I said. “I shouldn’t have had that discussion in front of you. It probably embarrassed her.”
“Yeah, yikes.” She grabbed the dustpan under the sink and swept up the remains of the mug. “You don’t need to say sorry to me though. And I don’t think you need to say sorry to Jade either, right now. She needs to cool off.” She picked up our glasses from the coffee table and the remains of the snacks I’d made.
“She called me a liar,” I said, washing the mug dust from my hands. “She’s not wrong. But I wonder what she thinks I’m lying about.” It made me sick in the pit of my stomach.
“I don’t know that you should ask her right now. She’s upset and embarrassed and she might just be calling you a liar for something you don’t even know you did. She’ll cool off.”
“Hopefully she cools off sooner than later. My aunt comes home a week from Monday.”
“I don’t have any advice for you. I don’t know how I would’ve reacted if I were you. But speaking as a little sister myself, I know what it’s like to be ignored by mine. And I’d much rather have a sister who cares as much as you do. Even if I’m embarrassed.”
“Yeah, well, unfortunately my sister doesn’t know what it’s like to not have a sister up her ass all the time. And I can’t freeze her out.”
“Maybe you both need space from each other this weekend.”
“She and Rose are going to their friend’s house tomorrow, for Memorial weekend. They’re going camping.”
“She might sneak out to meet her boyfriend,” Hollis said gently. “Are you going to be okay knowing it’s a possibility?”
I shrugged. “I don’t have control over it one way or another. I will be at the cabin Sunday night and they won’t be home until sometime next week.”
“Maybe you can talk to Keane about things.”
“I feel like that’s just one more stress on my mind.”
“So, think of how much less stressed you’ll feel once you lay your cards out, and have a real conversation with him. Then you’ll only have your job and your sisters to worry about.”
I laughed. “Only.” I walked her to the door after she grabbed her things, and she stopped to give me a hug.
“You look wrecked. Take some melatonin and pass out.”
“That sounds like a good idea.” I smiled but knew it didn’t quite reach my eyes. Navy was right when she said I was fraying at the ends. That was exactly how I felt. And I didn’t know how to pull it back together.
“And Navy? You need to cut yourself some slack, you know? You are doing the best you can right now.”
But my best wasn’t enough.
19
KEANE
Tori jumped out of her car, donning sunglasses and holding bottles of champagne in each hand. “Who’s ready to partaaaaay?” she cheered, à la Kristen Wiig in Bridesmaids. She sidled up to the porch, giving me an air kiss on the cheek and stepped across the threshold like she’d been to the cabin a hundred times. “Whoa. This is a flashback to the sixties.”
“Yeah.” I wasn’t offended. The place was in desperate need of an update, so her comment wasn’t surprising.
She bounced on the middle seat of the couch. “Damn. Bet this couch has seen more ass than Casanova.”
“That’s… probably true.”
“I dig it. It’s funky.” She propped her feet up on the coffee table and kicked back. “Where’s everyone else?”
“Navy is on her way. She’s bringing wings and chips. The stove stopped working a couple days ago, so Violet and I have been surviving on microwaved meals and cereal.”
“Violet?” She tipped the sunglasses down her nose. “Your newest lady friend?”
The thought revolted me. She was more my little sister than romantic interest. Gross. I’d known her forever; I never would have looked at her like that.
Except, I had known Navy since we were kids and I still went there with her. I sure didn’t think of Navy like a sister. Fuck.
“No,” I said, taking the bottles of wine from her and putting them in the pathetically empty fridge. I’d have to do something about that, just because I lived like a bachelor didn’t mean that Violet should have to, too. “She’s Navy’s little sister.”
“How little are we talking?”
“She’s twenty. So, young, but not a kid.”
“That’s good, because I’m not on babysitting duty tonight.” She linked her fingers behind her head and stared out the large picture window that gazed out over the lake. “Pretty sweet spot you’ve got out here, bud.”
“It’s quiet.” I stood at the window, looking out over the lake. A few kids splashed and squealed across the way from us, but otherwise it was relatively quiet for a weekend. “Asa’s building his spot just over there.” I pointed out the giant concrete pad about a hundred yards from the cabin.
“Where’s he at?” she asked, standing and peering out the window.
“He’s home. He doesn’t stay nights out here, not until his cabin is built at least. Mine is too loud for him to consider staying here.” I knocked on the drywall that separated the living room from the bedrooms.
“I bet this place gets noisy in the summer. How’s he gonna block out sound?”
“It does get noisy here, but we’re applying damping compound between two sheets of drywall and we purchased insulation specifically made for soundproofing to help.”
“I love how you say that like I know what damping compound is.”
“Yeah,” I laughed. “I forget sometimes. My days have been filled with figuring this shit out
.”
“It’s good. You look good. Tired, yeah, but you look happy.”
“Do I?” I scratched my chin. “I guess hard labor wears well on me.”
“I bet it wears really well on Asa.” She sent a low whistle through the air. “Is he still hot as fuck?”
“Why are you asking me?” In high school, I might have been hurt by Tori talking about my brother like this. But since we’d become good friends, I just didn’t care. Except it was kind of gross, being that he was my brother. I’d once been soft for Tori, but now those feelings felt like they’d belonged to a different person.
“You see him all the time. Come on, you can objectively say whether or not he’s a hottie mctottie.” Tori went to the duffel bag she’d deposited by the door and started rifling through it until she produced a small bakery box. “Fuck, it’s smooshed.”
“What is that?”
Tori stood and walked toward me; the bakery box held in front of her. “Was supposed to be a ‘congrats, you’re becoming a real adult’ cake, but it looks like someone sat on it now.”
I laughed as I took in the frosting splattered over the plastic screen that covered it. “Well? Did you sit on it?”
“No,” she said. “I don’t think so, at least.” She frowned as we looked down at the cake. “Well, I suppose it can be an ugly cake and still taste delicious, right? You got spoons in here, or do we need to eat with our hands like a couple of cavemen?”
“I’m not sure I’m that civilized,” I said, pulling out a drawer and picking up two spoons from inside of it.
Tori dropped the cake onto the table and pulled up a chair. “I’m starving,” she said, like the ‘a’ in starving was three syllables long. “Did you know this little town doesn’t have a single drive-through?”
“I did know that, yes. Cheers,” I said, clinking spoons with her before taking a scoop of something that smelled like chocolate and tasted like sin. “What the hell is this?”
“Fuck if I know. There was a cake in the bakery section that looked good and I asked the lady to write the message on it.”
One Big Mistake: a friends to lovers rom-com Page 20
