by Piper Rayne
Usually I can figure out Juno, pull out a smile, but this marriage thing has erected a wall between us. Had I known I was going to lose my best friend… I shake my head. I need to remember that Juno refuses to ever cross that line.
“Can I ask you a question?” The good guy in me says not to ask. Don’t be a dick right now. But the asshole part of me says it’s time she realizes exactly what she did to us.
“What?”
The waitress slides our plates onto the table and Juno unwraps her silverware before crumbling her crackers into her soup.
“What did you think would happen when one of us got married? Or found someone serious?”
She drops her spoon into the soup.
“I mean, I tried to cross that line you put between us when we were thirteen many times. And I get it, Juno, you’re scared. And I’ve allowed you to use that excuse because I don’t know what it’s like to lose my parents so young, but at some point, you have to live your life. You don’t want to date me, but then no one else should have me?”
“I never said that. I’m happy for you. I am.” Juno’s jaw clenches. She swallows every time she lies.
“The way you’ve been acting the last six months since I got engaged says you’re not.”
She leans back and puts her hands in her lap. “I’m not used to sharing you. That’s all.”
“Exactly.” I lean forward and my voice rises so loud that two employees at the counter glance over. “So I’ll ask again, what did you think was going to happen when you were so hell-bent that we only ever remain friends?”
She balls up the napkin and throws it on the table. “I wasn’t expecting to feel so left behind, okay? I didn’t think. Is that what you want to hear?”
Now the employees are blatantly staring, as are most of the people in the diner.
She slides out of the booth. “I didn’t think I’d lose you, and I was stupid for thinking that. You have another woman in your life now. I’m second, so if you could please give me a little time to get used to that thought rather than throwing accusations at me, I’d appreciate it. It’s not like you’ve been entirely gracious when I’ve dated in the past either.”
Then she’s out. I have no energy to chase her, so I let her go, but my mind can’t help drifting back to the last time she said she felt left behind.
Seven
Colton
Thirteen years old
My mom’s sniffling echoes in my ear as her hand tightly grips mine. Everyone in Lake Starlight is holding their loved ones closer these days after the deaths of Tim and Beth Bailey. Typical small-town mentality says that something like this doesn’t happen here, but it did.
My family, along with a lot of Lake Starlight, sits across from the Bailey kids and their grandma at the burial plot. Some people chose only to attend the church service.
The woman behind me whispers to her husband that Denver’s missing. I noticed that too, but more because they left the chair between Juno and Rome empty. Whether it was planned or not, I don’t know, but they sat in birth order.
The dark sky over the cemetery feels like a sign that we’re all mourning the deaths of Tim and Beth Bailey. Their snowmobile crashed into a tree, and neither of them survived their injuries after being rushed to the hospital.
My mom hasn’t stopped crying since we got the news. Still, she and Mrs. Kelly set up a dinner delivery service to the Bailey house to make sure the kids don’t starve. Although their grandma isn’t old, she’s not young enough to care for the seven of nine children who still live at home. Which is what has everyone asking… who will raise the Bailey kids and run Bailey Timber?
Sedona scurries out of her chair and climbs into Savannah’s lap. Austin and Rome look as if they’re seconds from crying based on their trembling chins. Kingston is openly sobbing with his arm slung over Phoenix at the end of the line. I’m focused on Juno, who sits in her chair with her legs crossed and not one tear falling down her cheeks.
The double black caskets are covered in an array of pastel-colored roses with Mr. and Mrs. Bailey’s wedding picture on an easel between them. The preacher continues his speech about grief and how we can honor them through our memories. Austin leans forward, resting his forearms on his thighs, and I watch intently to see if he’s finally going to break.
My mom squeezes my hand tighter and a howling sound escapes her as the preacher finally finishes his speech about how the Baileys will be watching us like angels and that they couldn’t live on this Earth without each other, so God took them together. Then he excuses us and says the family would like some private time.
A lady from the church hands each kid two roses of a different color.
All the guests walk down the steep hill, but I keep looking over my shoulder to check on Juno.
My mom stops to talk to Mrs. Johnson, carrying on about how sad it is and asking if anyone has heard whether their grandma will raise them. Austin’s due to graduate from college in May and there’re rumors about him being drafted to play in the pros. Savannah’s only nineteen, but maybe she’ll return from college as well. They talk about Bailey Timber and who will run the family business. They make it all sound so hopeless, that the Bailey kids have nothing now.
I stray away from my parents, walking up the hill enough to get a better view of the Baileys. Liam Kelly’s leaning under a tree and I pause a few feet from him. He quickly swipes at his face when he notices me. How can a guy that big, the guy who gets into fights, cry?
We watch each kid put a rose on each casket. Savannah gently lays hers down while Rome tosses his in. Then they join hands and circle the caskets with their grandma and the preacher. We can’t hear what is said, but all their heads bow, and when they rise, all of them are crying. Well, all of them except Juno. Austin swipes his tears with his palm, looking around at his siblings as though he needs to remain tough being the oldest.
“They’ll need us, you know?” Liam says. “We have to be the best damn friends they could ever have.”
I nod. “I know.”
The Bailey kids break apart, and Savannah walks down the hill first, Sedona and Phoenix on either side of her and holding her hands. Brooklyn follows, patting her face with a Kleenex while Austin and Rome are behind her. Then Juno and Kingston bring up the rear. Her arm is around her younger brother, who looks as if he’s barely hanging on as he glances back over his shoulder at the caskets. As they get halfway down the hill, Kingston runs back up and lays himself over his mother’s casket.
It feels as though it all happens in slow motion. Juno calling out to Austin. Austin stopping and looking back. His quick jog back up the hill. As soon as he picks up Kingston and holds him, the moms still lingering around whimper. Kingston hits Austin with his fists to try to get down. I look around and see everyone watching the scene unfold. It’s heartbreaking that the Bailey kids have to live through this with a spotlight on them.
“Well, shit,” Liam says, his chin falling to his chest.
Austin holds Kingston and sets him on a bench that faces the caskets as Savannah organizes the rest of the kids into the awaiting cars.
As if that’s the cue for all the gawking bystanders, Liam and I get called over by our parents. On my way to my parents’ car, I watch Juno stare one more time at her brothers on the top of the hill before she slides into the back seat of the car. Still not one tear.
Although there aren’t a lot of words shared between Liam and I, we share the same goal—be there for the Bailey kids from this day forward.
An hour later, we’re at the Bailey house. My mom is in the kitchen, distracting herself by refilling serving platters and cleaning. Mrs. Kelly is there too, but every time I go in the kitchen, she’s staring out the window, washing a dish.
I’ve looked everywhere for Juno since I got here and nothing.
Denver finally showed up, and he’s playing basketball in the driveway with Rome and Liam. Kingston is pretty much following Austin around, and Phoenix and Sedona are playing games
in the basement with the other kids. Brooklyn is with her group of friends on the back porch while Savannah makes the rounds and talks to each of the guests, reassuring everyone that they are fine, and it will all work out.
When I walk around their house and spot the treehouse, I could hit myself in the forehead. The treehouse is where Juno hides when she wants to be alone. That summer when the family joke was that Juno wasn’t a real Bailey because of her red hair, she ran off in the middle of a barbeque and hid up there. Mrs. Bailey followed and got her to come back down an hour later.
“Juno,” I say, calling up. The ladder has been taken up, which is a dead giveaway that she’s up there.
Nothing but silence.
“I know you’re up there. Come on.”
Still nothing, so I look at my khaki pants and button-down shirt. My mom will be pissed if I ruin them, but what choice do I have? I scale the tree and climb in through a window.
“Colton.” She sounds upset, but she doesn’t tell me to leave. Her black shoes lay haphazardly in the corner as though she flung them off the minute she got up here.
“Have you eaten?” I should’ve brought her food.
“Not hungry.” She stares at the picture of her Aunt Etta while she bounces a ball across the small space. Ever since the talk with her mom, that picture has hung in the treehouse. Along with astrology books and books on reading palms and other crap that doesn’t interest me.
“Do you need anything?” I ask.
She looks up from bouncing her small ball. “What did you think about our kiss?”
That’s not the question I thought would come out of her mouth. I’ve guiltily thought about the kiss the past few days. Hell, I’ve even envisioned more happened between us.
“It was nice,” I say.
“Nice?” She obviously doesn’t like me using that word. “You don’t say nice to describe a kiss, Colton.”
I shrug. “I liked it.”
“Me too.” She goes back to bouncing her ball. “But it can never happen again.”
I’m nodding until I register her words, then I stop. “What? Why?”
She tosses me the ball and I catch it before throwing it back to her. “Do you remember how close Savannah was to Jeremy Crandle? They were inseparable. I overheard her talking to her friends on the phone last year and she told them that she finally kissed him. That was it—Jeremy Crandle was never seen again.”
“Doesn’t he live in New York or something?” There were a lot of rumors about Jeremy Crandle. Maybe Savannah wasn’t his type only because she was a girl.
“Exactly. So me and you? Friends forever and never more. Okay?” She grabs the ball and tucks it into the skirt of her dress.
“Did you not like the kiss?” I ask. She can tell me. I might ask her to be my practice buddy, but I want her to tell me before I play another game of Spin the Bottle.
Her cheeks flush like they did that night in her basement. “I did, but I can’t bear to lose someone else.” A tear slips from one eye then another.
“But I…” Another tear falls and I stop talking.
The moment I’ve been waiting for is happening and I’m alone with no one else to comfort her. I look through the window and no one is in the backyard. I slide closer to her and put my arm around her shoulders.
She buries her head into my neck, her fingernails clawing at my shirt as if a black bear is ready to attack us. “They left me. How could they leave me?”
I hold her while her tears soak my shirt.
As the sun sets and the air gets cooler, Grandma Dori yells from the bottom of the tree. “Juno!”
Juno straightens her back, swipes her tears away, and puts on an act. “Yes, Grandma?”
“Come eat now, you’ve been up there long enough.”
“Coming.” She hurriedly puts her shoes back on, struggling with the small buckle until I finally take over and do it for her. “Friends forever, right?”
I nod and she smiles, tossing the ladder through the opening and climbing down from the treehouse.
Once she’s gone, I whisper, “But what if I like you more than a friend?”
Eight
Juno
On Saturday evening, I walk out of my room and find Kingston sitting on the couch, gaming. Since it’s spring and he works as a smoke jumper, in a few weeks, he’ll probably be gone more than he’s home.
He looks me up and down with raised eyebrows. “Where are you going?”
“I have a date.” I walk over to my purse and shove my lipstick into the clutch.
Brooklyn has the perfect crossbody purse to go with my outfit, but I didn’t call her to borrow it because I haven’t told anyone I’m going on a date. Mostly because they’ll look at me like Kingston is right now. That look that says, “What the hell are you doing, Juno?”
“Not with Colton?” He’s turned back to his game now, his thumbs pressing buttons a million times in a row. Obviously, from the shorts and shirt he’s wearing, he’s not planning on going out tonight.
“I assume Colton is going out with his soon-to-be wife.” I slide into the kitchen, needing to get rid of the nerves that won’t stop making me feel as though my salad from lunch wants to come back up. I haven’t been on an actual date in a long time. Trey wasn’t a date; he was a hook-up. A mistake, really, because I didn’t think I’d have to see him in Lake Starlight as much as I do.
I crack open a beer and come back into the room.
“You haven’t shut that down yet? I thought maybe you guys figured your shit out the night of the baby shower.” His eyes stay fixed on whatever war game he’s playing.
“I wouldn’t sleep with someone who’s getting married.” I act offended, but the truth is I would have, and I can’t get over what a horrible person I am for that.
He tosses the controller next to him on the couch. “Fuck. I’m dead.”
Standing, he disappears into the kitchen and, from the sound of it, gets himself a beer.
He sits back down and stares at me. “So who’s the new guy?”
That’s the Kingston we all know and love. He never digs too deep into any of our business. Just prods our shells gently in case we feel like opening up and talking. Sometimes I think he doesn’t push because he doesn’t want the questions poised back at him.
“A guy who came in to be matched,” I say.
“I thought rule number one was not to date the clients?” He tips back his beer, then grins.
“Well, I’m amending that rule for when you feel sorry for yourself and a guy seems pretty smitten with you. I need to move on with my life. I mean…” Sometimes Kingston is so easygoing, he makes it too comfortable to unload on him.
“I’m not quite sure you understand that you’re not hiding your feelings for Colton from anyone. Maybe they’re new to you, but all of us have always known.”
I throw the beer cap at him and he catches it flawlessly. Too bad he couldn’t have continued with baseball and gone pro like Austin wanted him to do instead of endangering his life every smoke jumping season as though he doesn’t care whether he lives or dies.
“What happened to my brother who doesn’t want to talk about shit? You just threw two axes my way. You trying to open me up?”
He chuckles and sets his beer on the table, lifting his phone from the table. “I like Colton and I think you’re making a huge mistake by letting him marry that French chick.”
“Her name is Brigette.”
“Her name should be stuck in the middle. She probably has no idea what she’s in the middle of between you two. It’s always been you and Colton. Hell, he taught me how to shave. Remember that?”
I laugh because I remember when Colton offered without me even asking. Austin was so busy raising all of us and the twins were causing trouble somewhere and Kingston was being made fun of about his barely-there mustache. “I do.”
“I still managed to cut myself five times.”
“Maybe he wasn’t that good of a teacher.”
“Are you attending psychology classes in your free time?”
He shakes his head and picks up his phone. “Nah, but I have a lot of time for self-examination in my job. I think I’m growing up even though you guys still think of me as some ten-year-old.”
I finish my beer as the buzzer of our door rings.
Kingston stands. “I got this.”
“You’re going to act like the overprotective brother?” I follow him to the door.
“For Colton’s sake. Yes.” He presses the buzzer with a, “What?”
I roll my eyes.
Kingston presses the button to let in my date. I forgot I had wanted to ask Kingston something else. I thought of a way to salvage my business since I’m now going on a date with my only potential client.
“Hey, I was thinking that to drum up some business, maybe I’d host a speed dating night up in Anchorage. Try to get some more business there.”
“Lame,” Kingston says.
“Lame? What’s lame about that?”
“Because we’re not in the eighties anymore. No one wants to go to a bar and be forced to talk to someone they don’t like for five minutes.”
The knock on the door makes the nerves in my stomach rumble.
“I’ll think of something though,” Kingston says, straightening his back and puffing out his chest.
He opens the door. Jason stands there looking a lot like he did the day he came into my office, except his jeans aren’t as worn, and instead of a T-shirt, he’s wearing a button-down with the arms rolled up to his elbows.
“You want to date my sister?” Kington asks.
I mouth “sorry” behind his back.
“I’m Jason.” He puts out his hand.
Kingston shakes it. I should tell my brother he’s not very intimidating without his smoke jumper outfit.
“Kingston. Juno’s brother.” He steps aside and Jason walks in.