by E. M. Moore
16
Reid keeps his distance from me the rest of the week. Not physically. Never that. He still shows up at my house every morning to make sure I’m dressed and decent for school, and I don’t give him a hard time. He hasn’t once dropped my ass in the shower again or had to pick out my clothes. My parents sit back, drinking coffee with him every morning until I come out of my room. He had a point about making their lives more difficult. I’m not fucking telling him that to his face, but I can admit I’m being a brat. Hell, I feel it in the moment I do it, but I just can’t stop myself.
On Friday, he shows up in a suit and tie. It’s homecoming. There will be a pep rally in the gym during school, a dance tonight, then the big game tomorrow against SHH’s archrivals—the Red Raiders. Actually, they’re just the closest town to us, which in and of itself makes us enemies, I guess. However they got to be our homecoming foes, they’re still going down. Spring Hill has a streak to uphold.
My mom gets misty-eyed when we leave for school. She even makes us stand next to each other so she can take a picture. I stand there awkwardly, and Reid does, too. In this moment, it kind of does feel like she’s replacing Brady with Reid. As soon as she’s done taking the picture, we both step away from one another as quick as we can. The awkwardness doesn’t stop there though. It gathers around us like BO, staying pungent in the air until I want to choke on it. He hasn’t said one word to me in the car during our trips to school other than, “Is this station okay?” or “Are you too cold?” He certainly doesn’t bring up what happened on Monday with me even though things between him and Lex are fine now.
This morning is a different story. We’re about halfway to school when something in the air shifts. He twists in his seat, which usually wouldn’t draw my attention, but I swear I can feel his eyes on me too. It makes my hair stand on end. I’m aware there’s going to be a huge divide, namely Brady’s death, between Reid and I for the rest of forever. I can admit that I was stupid to push my brother’s friends away. Maybe because I was their friend too. Just because they were always classified as “Brady’s friends” didn’t mean I wasn’t always around them or included in everything they did.
I hear Reid half muttering to himself when he finally says, “Briar…” More twisting in his seat like he can’t quite get comfortable. I don’t know if he can’t think of what words he wants to say or if he’s just uncomfortable in general now around me. “I want you to come to the game tomorrow.” He swallows. “Will you?”
I raise my eyebrow at that before I look over at him. He actually asked. He didn’t just show up and demand it of me.
He lets out a breath that erases some of the tension in the car. “I was talking about it with your parents. They don’t know if they’re ready yet, but I’d really like you to be there. We’re going to dedicate the game to Brady, so I thought you might want to see that.”
My stomach drops. “Oh.” I hadn’t quite expected that though I don’t know why. Of course they would want to pay some sort of homage to him.
“Nothing over the top. I promise.”
Considering just Brady’s name makes me sad right now, I can’t imagine what something “over the top” would do.
Now I’m the one squirming in my seat. The shorts I’m wearing feel like they’re riding up my ass even though they come below dress code level, so that’s definitely not it. My skin just feels itchy like we shouldn’t be having this conversation. I close my eyes and count to five. Even though my first reaction is to shy away from this conversation, I know I have to have it and many more just like it because Brady isn’t here, and he isn’t coming back.
I need to get comfortable with the uncomfortable.
“Yeah,” I force out through the closing of my throat. “I’ll come.”
Reid expels a breath from his chest that sounds as if he’s been holding it in for ages. We don’t talk the rest of the way to the school, just that, but already things feel a little lighter between us. When we pull into the parking lot, Jules is there waiting for us. Well, not really for us, she’s actually waiting there for me. I filled her in on everything that went down with Lex and Reid. Well, most everything. I kept some of the sexy stuff to myself, but not all of it. She knows now that Lex and I were having a fling or whatever it was, and she knows Reid flipped his shit over it. She was kind of shocked by everything at first, but she’s pretty sure I have a decision to make. She thinks both Lex and Reid like me. Like, really like me. Not just want to jump my bones, or make sure I’m okay because I’m their dead best friend’s sister.
I can’t even think about any of that right now. As far as I’m aware, Lex is the only one who has feelings like that for me. And despite the fact that he’s told me, he hasn’t acted much differently. I don’t know how long that will last. He’s caring and a sweetheart, so he’ll probably give me all the time I need to figure things out. That sounds just like something Lexington Jones the Third would do.
Unlike Reid Parker.
This whole week has been insanity. I’m reminded of that when a bunch of guys who are completely decked out in our school colors jump all over Reid in the parking lot, growling like warriors. They have a semi mosh pit thing going on until Reid emerges from it, his tie askew and his hair all over the place. He looks over to find me. Jules and I haven’t waited for him, but he watches me with hawk eyes until I’m in the building.
“Still no communication?” Jules asks.
“Not much. Though, he did ask me to go to the football game tomorrow?”
Jules’ eyebrows raise, eyes widening into saucers. “The homecoming game? The game?”
“Oh, is that what game it is?” I deadpan. “I wouldn’t know it from all the shit hanging up in the halls.” I tear a streamer down from the ceiling as we walk by and wrap it around Jules like a scarf.
She shakes her head. “No, it’s just—” She stops in the hallway, making me turn toward her. “Usually when a football player asks a girl to come to the homecoming game, it’s a big deal.”
“Ha,” I choke out. The sound more of disbelief than of amusement.
“I’m serious,” Jules says. She holds onto her books more tightly as she stares at me.
“In case you haven’t noticed,” I tell my friend. “Reid’s still dating the bitch supreme of SHH. I saw them kiss the other day.” I did, too, and my gut twisted at the sight. I mean, I usually want to throw up when I see Sasha, but this was different. She laid an ardent kiss on him, and honestly, it was hard to tell if he was kissing her back, or if she was just all over him. They haven’t been talking much. That I know of anyway.
Not that I’ve been paying attention or anything.
“She’s an evil bitch.” Jules says. “How long was that going to last anyway?”
I laugh, then we both laugh. The look in my eyes is—I’m sure—screaming about the fact that they’ve been with each other since middle school. That’s a hell of a long time. And weird. Especially for the head jock and cheerleader of the school. Like, they have to be good at everything else and be in a long-term relationship with each other? So not fair.
I see Jules’s gaze wander off. She taps her fingers against her books, her frown lines deepening into her forehead. Today’s going to be a hard day for the both of us. And tomorrow. I walk forward and grab her hand. “Well, will you go to the game with me then? If either one of us cry, we won’t have to ask the other why. Or if we don’t talk, it won’t be weird. Or if we just tell stories about Brady the whole time, we—”
“Yes,” Jules says, interrupting every reasoning I could think of to try to get her to go to the big game. “This doesn’t change the fact that Reid Parker asked you to go to his homecoming game though.”
I shrug. I think Jules’s grief have taken over parts of her body. She wants to find happily ever after’s everywhere she looks just like she and Brady had. “You’re off your rocker.”
“I guess we’ll see, won’t we?”
I guess so…
The pep
rally is an epic disaster.
Not for the football team, the school, or the cheerleaders. Unfortunately, Sasha didn’t trip and ruin her face during one of the routines. It wasn’t that at all. It was just everything combined. Jules and I sat next to one another, squeezing the life out of one another’s hands like we were both about to get shots in the arm and needed the other’s support.
When Reid is asked to say a few words about the game, her fingernails dig into me. He gets the crowd up and on their feet with all the “annihilate the Red Raiders” talk, but at the end, he looks up to the gym ceiling and points to the sky. “This is for you, buddy.” And I swear Reid has the GPS coordinates to wherever I am in the room because his eyes find mine and linger there until he’s swept away into a heap of bro hugs.
The cheerleaders get up and perform another routine before the principal moves back in front of the mic. He talks to us about the behavior that’s expected of us at the game tomorrow and then dismisses the school. It’s a madhouse to get to one of the gym doors right now, so Jules and I stay seated, our hands still wrapped tightly around one another.
Tears have gathered in the corners of Jules’s eyes. “I wonder when this pain will stop.”
“Probably never,” I tell her, saying it optimistically, tacking on a tight smile to the end.
“Yeah, you’re right,” she says. “Not that I want it to,” she quickly adds on. “It’s just, you know, I don’t know how much heartbreak I can take.”
And that’s what I love about Jules. Right there. She knows exactly what I’m feeling, and I don’t even have to say it out loud. I pull her to me and give her a hug. “It’ll fade,” I tell her. “It’ll always rise up, but it won’t always be hovering at the surface.” I use the words Ms. Lyons has been telling me. “Eventually, you’ll find someone again. A prince, probably, because you’re definitely princess material. You’ll move to some exotic country where you’ll rule the land and you’ll only think about Brady on his birthday.”
“Or when I watch football,” she says, sniffling.
“They won’t have football in this magical kingdom.”
She half laughs into my shoulder, tugging me to her for dear life. “Fine. Then every time I see the stars.”
I close my eyes tight together. Jules told me all about her and Brady’s first date, camping out under the stars. “That I can’t do anything about. The stars will always be out, whether we want them to be or not.”
“It’s okay,” she says. “I think I’ll like staring up at them and remembering him no matter where I’m at.” She pulls away from me and wipes at her eyes. Again, she says exactly what I’m thinking. “Now, if only I had a dollar for every time I’ve cried in school this year. I’d be rich enough to be my own princess.”
“I fucking love you,” I tell her.
“I fucking love you too.”
“Hey now,” Cade says, approaching cautiously, but with a shit-eating grin on his face. “If there’s going to be some loving going on between you two, I want in on it.”
The top buttons on his pressed shirt are undone and his tie is stuffed into the back pocket of his nice dress pants. He actually looks like he could’ve just gotten done with a threesome. “Eat dirt, Farmer,” I say, then smile to myself because that actually made sense. Farmer. Dirt. Get it?
He shakes his head at me, then gets serious for a moment. “You two planning on going to the dance tonight?”
I groan inwardly. Last year, I was so excited to go to this dance. I wanted Peter to ask me, and when he didn’t, Lex and Cade danced with me all night just to make up for it. Reid was too busy with Sasha and Jules and Brady were all over one another, so it was just us three.
“I see that look on your face,” Cade says, drilling me with his panty-melting smile. “Don’t act like we didn’t have a great time last year.”
Jules sits up straighter and makes her shoulders go back. “Yes. Yes, we’re going. We’ll meet you guys there tonight.”
“Really?” Cade asks, his eyebrows practically in his hair line. I understand his reaction because I’m looking at Jules the same way. Just, why? Why would we go?
“Definitely,” she says, eyes flaring. She pulls me to my feet and down the bleachers, leaving Cade there with the same look still on his face. She yanks me right out the main doors and to her car. “Okay, we need dresses. Makeup. Shoes. Hair.”
“Have you lost your freaking mind?”
She laughs, then pumps my hand a couple of times. “I think—I think your brother would want us to go, Briar. Let’s just go have a great time. I’m serious. We can do this. Especially on the backs of retail therapy. Come on, we don’t have much time.”
I shake my head at Jules as she climbs behind the wheel. We may have been forced together based on the fact that she dated my brother, but I’m not sure I could’ve picked out a better best friend myself.
Images of Reid, Lex, and Cade pop up, and my stomach twists in a high school crush kind of way. I have to grip the handle to the car door hard as realization sinks in. Brady left me with an amazing support group. I didn’t pick any of these people for my life, but they’re here anyway. And I’m right, I couldn’t have chosen better for myself if I tried.
17
I don’t know how we pull it off, but we do. Jules and I look fucking fantastic. Newly purchased dresses, shoes we had in our own closets, and we decided to do each other’s hair and makeup because we were running out of time, but by the time we head out into my living room after getting all glammed up, we look seriously hot.
When we walk out, my mother does a double take. “Whoa, you two. You look great.” For the second time today, she insists on taking a picture, so Jules and I hug each other on the same wall Mom took Reid’s and my picture this morning. Though, this picture is way less awkward. “Have fun,” my mom calls out to us on our way out the door.
A niggle of excitement starts to spark in my lower stomach. It’s been a long time since I’ve been excited about anything, but I can’t help myself. Remembering how Lex and Cade treated me last year makes me want to go this year despite the fact that I’ll probably be missing my brother more than anything. Maybe I can spin it and remember how much fun we had last year instead of thinking about losing him.
Jules parks in the parking lot as a bunch of students make their way into the school in droves. It looks like we got here just in time for the dance to start. We link arms and walk in. The gym is bright with purple and yellow streamers and balloons. In the center of the gym stands the football team. They’ve gathered together in a cluster, all of them still wearing their suits from school today and flanked by our school colors. They look like a posh pack of athletes, easy enough to distinguish from the rest of the male classmates who’ve decided to go a little less fancy for this dance.
Reid is in the center of everything. It might be his height that makes him stick out initially, but he just has a way about him, like hot guy sonar that immediately draws attention. Of course, after I see him, my stomach twists because there’s a Grade A Bitch hanging off his arm, smiling and laughing like nothing happened between them at the party the other day.
My teeth immediately grind together. He’s an asshole. Seeing him with her makes me feel like a toy he’s been playing with on the side. Sure, he doesn’t really have anything to defend himself for. We didn’t actually take it too far, but there were definite moments of connection. There’s something here. And the way he got so fucking jealous over Lex liking me?
I tried to talk myself out of the fact that Reid Parker might have a thing for me, but maybe part of me hopes he does. From the way I feel right now, I can tell I secretly held a candle for him, which just makes me feel so fucking stupid because the sight in front of me screams the opposite.
I hesitate while Jules keeps walking. My elbow around hers makes her stop. She follows my gaze and frowns. When she turns back to me, her face drops. “I knew you liked him, Briar. You should stop trying to fool yourself and go after
what you want.”
I shake my head. “Yeah, and risk being torn down again by the most popular guy at school? I don’t think so. I have enough on my plate to worry about this year.”
Jules looks me straight in the face, eyes commanding my attention. “You know Reid’s a good guy.” The look I give her tells her I’m not so sure of that, but she keeps talking anyway. “Think about how much we’re suffering. Don’t you think he’s probably suffering, too? He’s probably confused and lost, and Sasha is just there. She always has been. Old habits are hard to give up.”
Earlier, my subconscious reminded me that Reid’s birthday is tomorrow. I wasn’t allowed to go out with my brother and the guys for his annual party before. Now that it’s coupled with the football game, I’m sure they’ll be doing some major partying after the game tomorrow, especially if they win. It’s weird that no one’s mentioned his birthday yet though. Then again, their practices have been crazy difficult to prepare for the important game. They are missing one of their most important players after all.
My eyes flick over the rest of the people surrounding Reid. Lex is there, of course. He’s looking especially sharp and swaying side to side with the music. As far as Cade goes, he always just has this swagger that draws people in. I must’ve repressed the idea of my brother’s best friends being so freaking hot out of respect for my brother. It isn’t as if I never noticed how good looking they were, but I knew there could never be anything between us, so I shoved it down until I only saw them as good friends. And yes, maybe I have—and had—a sort of brotherly affection for them too.
Those three guys would do anything for me. I know that now more than ever. I may not agree with their tactics, especially Reid with his caveman type style of “just do what I say, or I’ll make you do what I say”, but that’s just the way he is. And now, standing back from all that, I have to admit that it’s a little hot. In a way. A weird way, possibly.