Falling for the Girl Next Door

by Tera Lynn Childs

  She was the opposite. Sloane was the best thing in his life, she was the light at the end of the tunnel that made him want to get the hell out of the tunnel so he could be the boyfriend she deserved. He was prepared to walk out of that office and never return if she even suggested anything bad about Sloane.

  When Maggie finally spoke, her eyes were full of sympathy.

  “What makes you think you’re broken?”

  He was so surprised by her question that his jaw actually dropped. “What?”

  “You said you ended things with Sloane until you got yourself fixed,” she said. “Do you really think you’re broken?”

  “That’s why I’m here, isn’t it?”

  “I think you’re here to talk. And to determine whether you have an addiction.” She gave him a questioning smile. “I think we can both agree that you have, at the very least, a tendency to abuse alcohol.”

  He huffed out a sharp laugh. That was an understatement.

  “But even if we were to assume that you are, in fact, an alcoholic, that doesn’t mean you’re broken.” She gave him a questioning smile. “You may have a problem, but you are not the problem. You are not defined by your drinking any more than I am by my knitting.”

  Tru considered her words. It made a surprising amount of sense. From the moment he realized he had a legitimate drinking problem—addiction or not—he had viewed himself only through that lens. And any filmmaker knew that a change of lens could mean an entire change of mood, theme, and focus.

  He had been limiting his vision of himself to the thing he knew was the most shameful.

  He had shamed himself.

  “I’m not broken?” He hadn’t meant it to come out as a question.

  Maggie shook her head. “You’re a teenager with a problem. Trust me, if every last one of those was broken, none of us would ever make it to adulthood.”

  “I’m not broken,” he said, this time with more certainty.

  “Given that revelation,” Maggie said, scribbling furiously on her legal pad, “what do you think about your relationship with Sloane now?”

  Tru thought back over the course of the last few months, since the moment he first climbed onto the roof and met Sloane Whitaker.

  He hadn’t always been at his best, but since Sloane was around, he wanted to be better. She was one of his main motivations for actually facing his drinking problem. She was the first thought he had in the morning and the last thought he had at night.

  When they were together, everything felt…better. Brighter. Like anything was possible.

  She made him feel like he might actually be able to be the guy she deserved.

  She made him feel like he could conquer this problem. Like he could conquer the world.

  Tru felt as though an elephant had been lifted from his chest. He could breathe again. He had been so confined by his focus on his drinking problem, the fear that it was an addiction, that he had let it consume him. He had let it become him.

  Now that his lungs were filling with the fresh air of an enlightened mind, he saw everything clearly.

  “Sloane makes me strong,” he told Maggie. “She’s the reason I want to get better.”

  Maggie nodded at him, her eyebrows raised in silent question.

  “I shouldn’t have pushed her away. Not when I need her the most,” he said. “Getting through this will be easier with her at my side.”

  Tru pushed to his feet.

  Maggie grinned at him. “Well, I think this has been a very productive session.”

  “I have to go,” he blurted.

  “I’ll see you after the holidays,” Maggie called out as he raced out of her office.

  …

  With tomorrow’s meal all planned out and the groceries either packed away in the fridge or sitting out on the counter, I retreat to my room while Mom takes Dylan to see some disgusting horror movie that I’m pretty sure no eleven-year-old boy should watch. But Dyl has a lot of built-up Mom guilt to work and so she agreed.

  Dad has too much work to do, and so I’m on my own. I’m actually okay with that. With all the thoughts about Mom and Dad and the big D racing through my mind, I need to do something to distract myself.

  With my tablet braced on my knees, I start working up some initial ideas for the next issue of Graphic Grrl. She always sweeps me away from reality.

  She’s gotten away from the cyborg spiders, but now she’s trapped by Engineering Boy, with no obvious means of getting out alive. As I sketch, I let my mind wander to possible ways she can escape this scenario.

  I’ve just roughed out the first cel when I hear a tapping at my window.

  I’m not surprised when I see Tru’s face looking in at me.

  I grab my hoodie and climb outside with him.

  “Hey,” I say, so relieved to see him. “What’s up?”

  Instead of answering, he cups my face with his hand and presses a kiss to my lips. I sink into him, into this sensation of melting that I’ve missed so much.

  When he finally pulls back, I feel slightly dazed.

  I so needed that.

  I can’t stop the tears that fill my eyes. It’s like I’ve been holding it together all day, but now that he’s here it just all flows out.

  “What’s wrong?” he asks, his voice full of concern.

  I bite my lips and shake my head, afraid if I start speaking I will completely fall apart.

  “What?” he asks again. He cups my cheek with his palm. “Sloane, baby, you’re scaring me.”

  Pulling myself together, I close my eyes as I say the words. “Dylan thinks our parents are getting a divorce.”

  “Do you think he’s right?”

  I shrug helplessly. “He says Dad has a girlfriend.”

  Tru mutters a curse.

  “It’s all my fault.” I force my eyes open and look up into his face. “If Mom and I hadn’t moved here—”

  “No,” Tru says before I can finish. “There’s no way.”

  “But—”

  “It’s not your fault. Marriages don’t end because couples are separated for a few months. If your parents are having problems, they were having them before you left.”

  I want to believe him. More than almost anything in the world I want to believe him. But the facts are the facts. Mom and I moved here, and now she and Dad are maybe—probably—getting a divorce. Those two things have to be related.

  “Take me,” Tru says.

  I blink up at him. “What?”

  “To dinner tomorrow night,” he repeats. “Take me instead of Finn.”

  I shake my head. “Are you joking?”

  “I want to be there for you,” he says. “I want to be there with you.”

  Emotions start boiling through me. Confusion. Shock. Anger. After everything I’ve been through since that night in the gazebo, after everything I’ve been through today, and he thinks we can just go back to normal? Just like that?

  “You said you wanted to do this alone.”

  He runs a hand through his hair. “I was wrong.”

  “What changed your mind?”

  “I just came from a session with Maggie,” he says. “She made me realize you’re the reason I want to get better. You make me stronger, Sloane. I shouldn’t have pushed you away.” He reaches down and takes my hand. “I should have pulled you closer.”

  I stare down at our joined hands for several seconds before I finally answer.

  “I can’t.”

  He looks like I sucker-punched him. “What?”

  “I can’t take you to the dinner.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I already told my mom about Finn,” I explain. “I already told my dad about him.”

  “So tell them you changed your mind,” he suggests. “It happens.”

  Can he really not see why I can’t?

  All the emotions I have been bottling up about our so-called break swirl together with the possibility of my parents’ failing marriage. It’s an explosive com
bination.

  “Could you be more selfish?”

  He jerks back like I slapped him.

  “Did you miss the part where my family is falling apart?”

  “That’s why I want to be at your side,” he argues.

  “I thought this dinner was about convincing my Dad to move,” I say, my voice shaking. “Now it’s about convincing him to keep our family together.”

  “I get that, but I don’t think—”

  “No,” I snap. “You don’t. You’re only thinking about yourself.”

  “That’s not fair.”

  “You know what’s not fair?” I push to my feet. “Is you thinking I needed to be protected from your drinking problem.”

  He stands up. “Sloane—”

  “I’m stronger than you think I am, Tru Dorsey.”

  He looks at me, his eyes cloudy with an emotion I can’t read. “You are the strongest person I know.”

  “Yeah, well, I don’t think I’m strong enough for this.” My hands shake with rage and pain. “This dinner might be my only chance to keep my family from splintering in two. So no, I’m not going to pull a last-minute change and tell my dad I’m dating the screw-up neighbor boy.”

  He just stands there, staring at me.

  If he doesn’t understand, then I don’t know what else I can say. So I don’t. Turning away from him, I climb back through my window.

  The fates must be taking an enormous amount of pleasure in screwing with my life right now. I only hope that this is as bad as it’s going to get.

  Chapter Sixteen

  “Ah-hem.”

  I freeze with my leg halfway back through my bedroom window.

  Shit, shit, shit.

  Of all the nights to get caught climbing in or out of my room, it has to be on the one night when absolutely nothing happened? Life is so unfair.

  “Do you spend every night sneaking around on rooftops?”

  I gasp. “Dylan?”

  I fall the rest of the way inside.

  When I pick myself back up on my feet, I thrust my hands on my hips in my best angry big sister stance and glare at him. He has dragged my chair away from my desk, positioning it to face the window.

  “What are you doing in here?” I whisper-yell. “Aren’t you and Mom supposed to be at a movie? And I thought you were going to sleep on the couch tonight.”

  He spins around in the chair, holding his legs stretched out like a kid on a merry-go-round.

  “You didn’t answer my question,” he says.

  “You didn’t answer mine.”

  “We’re back.” He shrugs, planting his feet on the floor to stop the spin. “I heard a noise.”

  “Well, I’m inside safe and sound,” I tell him. “You can toddle off to bed now.”

  I’m not sure what toddling off actually means, but it sounds parental.

  He stares at me for a really long time before leaning back in the chair. “I can’t believe you actually have time to draw Graphic Grrl if you’re always sneaking out at night.”

  I roll my eyes. “I’m not always—”

  I freeze as the realization of what he said actually penetrates.

  “What did you say?” I whisper.

  He smiles as he looks at me. “I said I can’t believe you actually—”

  “I heard you!”

  My first thought is that Engineering Boy changed his mind and went ahead with his devious plan to reveal my true identity. But then I take note of the self-satisfied smirk on Dylan’s face.

  The smirk I only see when he thinks he’s pulled one over on me.

  “No,” I gasp.

  His smirk only deepens. “Oh yes.”

  “You?” I demand. I stomp across the room and jab a finger into his chest. “You are Engineering Boy.”

  “Guilty,” he says with no remorse whatsoever.

  “What? When? How?”

  “It was a matter of simple deduction,” he says. “A simple web-search algorithm, cross-referenced with some personal data and—”

  “Please,” I cry. “No more geek-speak.”

  “Also,” he says, a bright flush creeping over his cheeks, “I found one of your old thumb drives in a kitchen drawer. It had all the Graphic Grrl source files.”

  I shake my head. My own brother? Not only had he figured it out, but he had gone to all those lengths to completely freak me out with the blackmail threats.

  “Why did you do it?” I ask. “Why not just ask me for the strip if you want to read it early? I am your sister, you know. I might have given you special privilege.”

  Especially since he’s the first and only member of the family to figure it out.

  He also happens to be the original inspiration for Engineering Boy. The irony is not lost on me that he chose that character for his secret alter ego.

  Dylan shrugs and recommences his chair spinning. “I dunno. I thought it would be fun.”

  “Yeah, well, I think throwing you off the roof might be fun. But look at all the restraint I’m showing.”

  He stops spinning to make sure I’m joking.

  I am. Mostly.

  “I’ve known about the divorce for a while,” he says.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  He looks up at me, and the heartache in his eyes kills me. “I don’t know. I was mad you weren’t there. That I couldn’t talk to you about it.”

  “Dude, we have phones. You can call me anytime, day or night.”

  He shrugs. “It’s not the same.”

  I have to agree with him there.

  “So I think…” he begins. And then, “I wanted to be Engineering Boy. He’s not scared of anything.”

  “Except Graphic Grrl.”

  Dylan half-smiles, and I feel like that’s a major victory.

  “If he found out his parents were getting divorced,” Dylan says, “I thought maybe he would take it out on her.”

  And now it all makes sense. “So that’s why you sent me those emails?”

  He nods.

  “You know the funny thing?” I ask, relieved that things with us are okay.

  “What?”

  “You are Engineering Boy.”

  “Seriously?” His wide-eyed look is enough to make up for some of the stress he caused.

  “Seriously. You’re my inspiration.” I make fake googly eyes at him.

  He laughs and shoves at my shoulder, and just like that everything is back to normal.

  “You know I meant it,” I tell him. “Anytime, day or night. I’m always there for you. Whatever happens with Mom and Dad, we’re a team. We’re in it together. You know that, right?”

  He nods. “Yeah, I know.”

  “Good.” I give him an evil smile. “Now get out of my room before I rethink the whole roof situation.”

  He jumps up and scurries to the door. Before he leaves, he turns back to me.

  “I think you should go public.”

  “With Graphic Grrl?” I ask. When he nods, I ask, “Why?”

  “Because she’s yours.” He gives me the kind of sappy little brother smile that has always made me forgive all the crap he pulls. “You created her, you should get the credit.”

  Then, before I can give in to the new impulse to give him a big bear hug, he’s gone. I’m left to ponder the idea that my baby brother knows about Graphic Grrl.

  And, way more importantly, that he’s known about Mom and Dad’s marriage trouble for a while now.

  I feel so beyond guilty that there aren’t words. He shouldn’t have had to deal with that on his own. He shouldn’t have to deal with that period.

  If tomorrow goes right, he won’t have to.

  I push away all the deep thoughts crowding my mind. I need to get plenty of sleep if I’m going to have any chance of pulling off the family-saving perfect dinner I have planned.

  After I get through the dinner party, then I can think about the fact that Dylan thinks I should reveal myself as Graphic Grrl’s creator. After.

 
…

  Tru fumed as he crossed his yard and headed for the back door. It was like Sloane had burst the bubble that had been lifting him up since his session with Maggie.

  It wasn’t until he was back in his room that he realized he hadn’t even been tempted to seek out the liquor cabinet. Normally, this kind of epic disappointment led him to an all-night drinking binge.

  Not this time.

  Tonight wasn’t about forgetting. Tonight was about figuring things out.

  He walked over to his bed and sat down on the end. His mind raced and he couldn’t quite get his thoughts to settle down.

  When Sloane climbed out her window, it was as if everything fell back into place. He couldn’t keep himself from pulling her close and kissing her until neither of them could think straight anymore.

  He had been so full of emotion that he just wanted to make them both forget the last week had ever even happened. He wanted to pretend like he hadn’t put their relationship on pause. Like he could undo one of the dumbest decisions he had ever made—and considering his track record with poor decision-making, that was quite a high bar.

  After she told him all about the drama with her parents and her brother, he knew he wanted to be at her side. Needed to be at her side. To be her support in her dark time in the way she had stood by and supported him in his.

  It hurt when she said no. It felt like a rejection, and coming from her, that cut deeper than any other.

  He wasn’t proud of his reaction. Angry. Indignant. Insulted that she didn’t leap at the chance to show him off as her date.

  Yeah, that sounded just as stupid in his head as it probably had on the roof.

  “Idiot,” he muttered to himself. At himself.

  He put them on a break. He suggested she take Finn instead. He didn’t think things through. He just reacted.

  Sloane’s family was falling apart, and all he thought about was himself. About his selfish desire to erase his first mistake: putting them on a break in the first place.

  How could he blame her for not wanting to completely upend her plan to get her dad to move here? And now she had even more at stake. It wasn’t just about getting her Dad and brother to Austin. It was about keeping her family from falling apart.

  Had he really asked her to risk her best chance at making that happen to appease his pride?