“Look what came today,” she said with a sing-song drawl. “I wanted to open it with you.”
I turned my body toward her, watching intently as she drew in a long, slow breath and tore at the white paper. She yanked out a single page, and my heart fell as I watched her eyes well up as she read it. I readied myself with an apology and a few words of encouragement until she finally spoke up.
“I got in.”
“What?” I should’ve been happy for her. And I was. But her words were a bullet to our future, sealing our destiny, at least for the foreseeable future. “That’s great.”
“They’re giving me a full ride. An academic scholarship, Beau.” She wiped her eyes and pressed the letter across her heart as she smiled big.
I leaned across the truck and kissed her lips, tasting the happy tears that streaked her cheeks and fell onto her pretty lips. Cool and salty, it was a taste I would never quite be able to forget.
“You know what this means, right?” she asked, looking up at me as if she needed my permission to pursue the best damn thing that’d ever happened to her.
“I know,” I said. “It means we just have the summer.”
“I want to spend every single day with you,” she said. “Up until the very end. Before I leave.”
I nodded. All relationships were a gamble, but putting a time stamp on the best thing that had ever happened to me stung like nothing else. “I’m happy for you, Kota. I really am.”
I glanced into the soft blue eyes I’d grown dangerously in love with over the course of the last few years, never forgetting the first time I saw her at school. Helping one of the disabled kids after they spilled the contents of their backpack all over the floor of a busy hallway, she was the only person kind enough to stop what she was doing and assist the flustered and embarrassed guy.
And then I saw her the following week as I walked past a classroom. She was seated in the front row, nibbling on the eraser of her yellow pencil and listening intently as the teacher droned on and on about Shakespeare’s Hamlet.
But the week after that, when I saw her smile for the first time as she laughed about something with her friend, I was a goner. She had a grin that lit up her whole face and sent my heart into an uncontrollable state of arrhythmia. I’d made the rookie mistake of telling my best friend I thought she was hot, and in true high school fashion, he purposely pushed me into her in the hall.
“There’s a community college near UK,” Dakota said. “If that’s something you might want to consider someday?”
I shook my head. She and I both knew academics were never my strong suit, and in my family, it had always been a given that the farm would someday be mine to run. I was two grades older than Dakota, and staying put in Darlington after high school was a no-brainer. I had a good job waiting for me and a pretty girl who made it damn near impossible to want to leave.
“We can try to do the long distance thing if you want? It’s only a couple hours from here. Long distance might not be so bad.” She shrugged a shoulder, her eyes waiting for my response, as if she wanted me to make the decision for her. Dakota was a pretty girl who’d blossomed into a level of ridiculously stunning beauty, and the thought of her turning heads on campus that fall sent my blood into an instant boil. I couldn’t sit back home in Darlington, working on my father’s farm and wondering if she was being asked on dates left and right by frat boys with ulterior motives.
“You know we’d crash and burn by Christmas,” I said, giving an apologetic huff. “We’ll just have to put things on pause.”
She leaned toward me and pressed her honey-sweet lips against mine once more. She was so excited about her letter that I doubted she could fully appreciate that it was going to be one of our last carefree kisses. “What are you going to do back home while I’m gone?”
I pursed my lips, staring over the dash. “Play music and work the farm. What I’ve always done. Got some gigs booked at some county fairs this summer. Who knows, maybe something’ll come out of those.”
“Come with me,” she said, her eyes sparkling and fearful all at the same time. “I don’t think I can do this alone. Without you.”
“Don’t say that.” I shook my head. “You got a full ride scholarship, Dakota. You’re going to make something of yourself and get the hell out of Darlington just like you always wanted. And I’ll be waiting right here for you when you get back.”
Her home life hadn’t always been that great, and the kids at school hadn’t always taken kindly to her on account of her living in a trailer and wearing faded old clothes that barely fit half the time. But damn if she wasn’t still the prettiest, smartest, kindest girl in all of Darlington. I knew she was going places in life, and I’d have been damned if I even considered holding her back. Dakota couldn’t help being driven and intelligent and ambitious anymore than Ivy could help being so damn optimistic all the time.
“You’re just going to stay here?” she asked, brows arched. “Waiting for me?”
“That’s the plan,” I said, knowing full well only idiots sold guarantees on the future. I could plan all I wanted, but I wasn’t a damn fortune-teller. “We’ll be together someday. When the time is right. That much I know.”
I couldn’t have Dakota resenting me someday for messing up her future or asking her to wash her hands of her hopes and dreams because we were too scared to be apart for a few years.
I kissed her that afternoon with the kind of fervor of a soldier going off to war, attempting to preserve in my memory everything about how she tasted and smelled and the way her soft cheek felt under the palm of my hand.
She pulled away from me, her eyes glassy, and she bit her bottom lip the way she did when she was stuck thinking about something.
“You okay?” I brushed a wisp of hair from her face and tucked it behind her ear.
“I’m scared, Beau,” she sighed, her eyes falling to the woven fabric of the bench seat. She picked at a loose strand with her fingers and tried pulling it up. “I can’t imagine my life without you. You sure you can’t come with me?”
“Baby, you’re going to be fine,” I assured her. “I can’t leave Dad without help like that. And you don’t need me distracting you from your studies.”
Her eyes floated up to mine and her lip trembled for a split second. “Can we talk on the phone every night?”
“You can call me as much as you need,” I laughed. “But I have a feeling you’ll be so busy you’ll forget all about me after the first week.”
She scooted closer to me, slipping her arm under mine and resting her cheek against my shoulder. I could’ve sworn I felt her breathe me in.
“Just don’t go looking for a Beau replacement,” I teased, though I wasn’t really joking. The thought of her looking at another man the way she looked at me twisted my insides, and picturing another man touching her the way I touched her made my blood boil with an unstoppable fury. I pressed my lips into her forehead, kissing her and branding her all at the same time.
“There isn’t any man who could ever replace you. You know that.”
“We’ll be together again,” I promised her once last time. “When the time is right.”
Chapter Ten
“Hi, Mom…” I stepped carefully across the leaning deck and showed myself into the little blue steel trailer that occupied the last lot in the Sunrise Terrace trailer court. “You home?”
“Hi, Dakota, I’m in here,” she called from down the hall.
I stepped through the living room and ambled down the short hall, passing the little bedroom I’d shared with Addison once upon a time. The door was cracked half open, and all I could see were stacked boxes and piles of random junk covering our beds and overflowing onto every square inch of the dingy brown carpet. An uncomfortable shiver passed through me as I headed straight back to Mom’s room.
“Not working today?” I asked, standing in her doorway and peering around her messy room. The musty scent of unwashed bedding filled my lungs as Mom lay in bed
under a mountain of covers with Jerry Springer playing in the background on her 20” T.V.
“Playing hooky,” she laughed as she tossed a potato chip into her mouth from a bag resting beside her. “My back hurts from filing all week. I found some Vicodin in the cupboard, so I thought I’d give myself a day off and recover.”
“Dr. Comrie isn’t going to fire you for calling in, is he?” Her flippant attitude left me with the impression that calling in sick wasn’t a big deal to her. Then again, she’d always been that way.
“He doesn’t need me.” Her eyes were glassy and vacant, her voice monotone. “He’s got his dental hygienist and dental assistants and insurance coordinator. I just file everything. All day long.”
“How’s Vince? You see him anymore?”
“Oh, God no.” She wrinkled her nose before yelling something at the T.V. as a fight ensued between two balding men fighting over a pregnant lady.
“You get your dress yet for Addison’s wedding?” I silently willed her to pay attention to me and not the T.V., but she was too tuned out. “Only two more weeks to go.”
A girl would’ve figured her mother would be more excited to see her, especially when she came home maybe twice in an entire decade. Tammy Lynn’s tuned-out exterior reminded me that she was just a shell. She’d always been a shell. She’d forever be a shell.
“She sent me a couple. I haven’t tried them on yet.” She popped another greasy chip into her mouth and wiped her lips on the back of her hand. Dirty blonde hair hung in her face and she whipped her head to move it from her eyes. Funny how a year ago she was prancing around like Betty Crocker in her J.C. Penney twinsets and talking about baking birthday cakes. Her marriage to Vince Van Cleef may have been short-lived, but it gave me a glimpse of the mom we’d always wanted to have. But she felt forcibly awkward and as foreign as a stranger who spoke a different language. In a weird way, it was nice having the old Tammy Lynn back. Out of everything that had changed in Darlington, Tammy Lynn had remained one-hundred-percent the same.
“I was going to see if you maybe wanted to get dinner tonight,” I said. “My treat?”
I glanced around the tornado-stricken mess that was my mother’s bedroom in search of anything masculine but found nothing. Her entire life, she’d barely gone a month or two without a boyfriend of some sort. It appeared as if she were actually single. Or between relationships. Addison would get a kick out of that.
“Oh, baby, that’s very nice of you, but I can’t go out since I called in sick,” she said, swatting her hand as if my offer physically lingered in the air between us. “How’s old Beaumont doing, huh?”
She turned to face me, her eyes lighting up a bit as a devious grin captured her mouth, and I cringed as I recalled her desperate attempts to flirt with him when we were younger. He always entertained her and flirted back, and we’d laugh about it when she wasn’t around.
“He’s married now, right?” Mom said, scratching the side of her head. “Some girl named Dixie. Or maybe she was a Dixie Chick. No, maybe her name was Daisy.”
“What are you talking about? He lives up at his parents’ ranch alone.” I’d have noticed if there was any hint of a wife or girlfriend in his life.
Mom pursed her lips and stared off to her left. “I ran into Ivy last year. Or maybe the year before. I’m pretty sure she said he was getting married. Hmm. Must’ve called it off.”
She shrugged and lifted the remote as the end credits flashed across the screen.
“Hmm, what else is on,” she mumbled under her breath. She must’ve flipped through one-hundred-twenty channels before settling on a Lifetime movie about an upper class alcoholic husband who pimped out his trophy wife to pay off his gambling debts.
“Okay, Mom, I’m going to head out now. I’m in town until Saturday. Call me if you need anything.”
“Bye baby,” she said with a despondent smile, her attention still glued to the flickering T.V. screen.
Closing her door behind me, I sauntered down the sunken hallway floor and back toward the living room. Up ahead, a mountain of dirty dishes stacked ten plates high filled her single bowl sink, and a clutter of junk mail covered most of her counter. My skin crawled at the sight of disregarded filth and household clutter.
I’d cleaned that trailer a million times growing up, only to always come back and find it worse than the last time.
Resisting the urge to pick up the mess, I left the trailer court and drove to the north part of town, specifically to Cherry Street. I pulled up next to the white colonial with the Kelly green door and polished brass light fixtures. Perfectly manicured grass rested beneath the ancient oaks that shaded their large corner lot. A little white dog yipped as it skipped and played along the black iron fence that enclosed their picturesque back yard.
My heart warmed and my stomach churned in unison.
I needed to go in and say hi.
I needed to see her.
Pulling down the visor and popping open the mirror, I glanced into my eyes. The same ones she had. We were a part of each other, and though we were technically complete strangers, I loved her with every piece of me. Thoughts of Beau may have filled most of the seconds of my day, but she filled the spaces between the seconds.
A blue minivan turned down the street and pulled up next to my car, rolling the window down. “Dakota! You came!”
Rebecca’s wide mouth turned into an excited beam as she hopped a little in her seat and motioned toward her house. A second later, she rolled up her window and zoomed into the driveway of the white colonial.
She climbed out of her van and hurried around to the lift gate, pulling out brown paper bags and smiling like the happiest homemaker to ever live in Darlington, Kentucky.
“Just getting back from the store,” she said as we headed into her house. “Perfect timing. Please tell me you’re staying for dinner.”
“Oh, I didn’t plan on it,” I said, trying to be polite. “I just wanted to stop by real quick and say hi. I don’t want to impose.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. You’re family,” Rebecca said.
We stepped into her kitchen, and warm, soft air enveloped me with the faint scent of vanilla and apples. Her immaculately clean and beautifully modern kitchen was like a picture from a magazine. It was a vision of sparkling gray and white marble, alabaster cabinets, a farmhouse sink, Viking appliances, and windows galore with views into their enormous backyard and sparkling in-ground pool.
“We haven’t seen you in years! We have so much catching up to do,” Rebecca said, dropping an armful of bags onto the counter in one heave.
My eyes focused on a backpack hanging from the back of a kitchen chair. Blue butterflies with pink piping and the name “MABRY” embroidered across the back. A flutter filled my empty stomach, though I willed it away as quickly as it’d appeared.
“Sam’s around here somewhere,” Rebecca said, a gallon of skim milk in one hand and a container of strawberries in the other as she stocked the faultlessly clean shelves of her refrigerator. “Gosh, it’s so good to see you.” Rebecca paused for a moment, beaming at me and taking me in all at the same time, before returning to her groceries. A hint of marionette lines wrapped the corners of her mouth and pencil-thin creases raked across her forehead. We were cousins – our mothers were sisters – but she was ten years older than me. Her mother had married well and made the kind of life choices that allowed Rebecca to follow cleanly in her footsteps without missing a beat. “Sam! Sam, come to the kitchen!”
I gripped the cool marble countertop of the island as my feet anchored to the charcoal slate tile of her kitchen floor, and I pulled in an empowering breath.
“Such a beautiful day, isn’t it?” Rebecca mused, pausing to glance outside. “Mabry’s usually out playing, but her dad’s home today. He usually makes her do her homework first before she can play. She’s got a book report due tomorrow on Beezus and Ramona. I don’t see the harm in letting her get some fresh air first. They’re only little once, r
ight?”
Her words were a stark reminder of everything I’d missed in the last ten years. A grimace threatened to claim my lips, but I quickly replaced it with something that resembled a carefree, agreeable smile.
Footsteps padded behind me, and my heart skipped a beat before galloping wildly in my chest. I slowly turned around, my nerves calming the moment I saw it was only Sam.
With hair the shade of white gold, skin like porcelain and eyelashes to match, Sam immediately wrapped me in a tight hug. “Dakota. My goodness. So great to see you. It’s been so long.”
I hugged him back, closing my eyes briefly and secretly imagining how it might feel to have him as a dad – as if I were Mabry. He hugged like one. Unapologetic. Tight. Breathing in a lungful of his aftershave mixed with the breezy scent of line-dried cotton, I released him.
“Wow, you haven’t aged a bit,” Sam said, his brown eyes washing over me. “You look really great. You know, we watch you on T.V. every Saturday.”
“No kidding?”
“Of course we do,” Rebecca chuckled. “We’re so proud of you. Sam brags about you all the time to the other doctors at the clinic. There’s even one doctor there who’s been begging for an introduction. He’s got a bit of a crush on you!”
My cheeks reddened as I humbly glanced away. “Funny.”
I’d forgotten how easy it was to be around Sam and Rebecca. Their relationship was natural and organic, and their demeanors warm and fuzzy. They were bubble gum and apple pie. Sunday school and Fourth of July parades. Bedtime stories and butterfly kisses. Grand Canyon vacations and Father’s Day barbeques.
And that’s why I picked them.
“Mama?” a lilted voice piped from across the room. “Who’s this?”
The three of us turned almost in unison, and all eyes were on the petite little thing with long satin brown hair and bright blue eyes that matched mine freckle for freckle.
“Hey, sweetheart,” Rebecca said, opening her arms wide as Mabry ran straight into them. Rebecca ruffled her hair before combing her long fingers through some little girl tangles and sweeping it out of her sweet face.
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