Boys Like You

by Juliana Stone

  But I was shaking my head, suddenly so terrified my legs nearly buckled.

  “You need to do this, Nathan, and when it’s done, whatever happens, I’ll be here for you.”

  I reached for her and she came, sliding her arms around my waist so that I could hold her for as long as she would let me.

  It was enough. Touching her was enough.

  In that moment, I felt like I could do anything.

  I brushed my lips against her forehead and leaned close to her ear. “I love you.”

  Her hands clasped mine. “Ditto.”

  And then she was gone.

  “She’s special, that one,” Mike said softly.

  I nodded and turned, making no effort to hide the pain and remorse and anything else that was inside me.

  “Mr. Lewis,” I said, but he interrupted me.

  “It’s Mike. It’s always been Mike.”

  I had to clear my throat several times before I could speak again. I felt tears pricking the corners of my eyes, and it took everything inside me to keep them away. In the end, it didn’t matter, and I scrubbed at my eyes and exhaled loudly.

  I couldn’t remember a time when my body wasn’t tight. Couldn’t remember a time when there wasn’t pain. Sure, I knew it was back there—back before that night—but as I stood in front of Trevor’s dad, I thought that I would never remember what it was like before then, no matter how hard I tried.

  “How is he?” I asked carefully, forcing the words out one at a time.

  I held my breath, afraid I’d been too late and that my worst nightmare was about to become a reality.

  Mike clasped me on the shoulders but I still couldn’t look up at him. I was too afraid. Too much of a coward. I felt his forgiveness. Felt it wrap around me like a spider’s web, and yet…

  I still couldn’t shake the feeling that I didn’t deserve it and I wasn’t strong enough to face this reality if Trevor wasn’t going to be in it.

  So I stared at my muddied boots and prayed like I’ve never prayed before.

  “He’s still with us.”

  The air whooshed out of me so quickly that if Mike’s hands hadn’t have been on me, I would have fallen on my ass.

  “I brought his guitar, you know. Thought maybe music would help him fight this infection. Maybe music would bring him back, but…” He sucked in a breath and paused.

  Slowly I looked up. “But?”

  A sad smile touched his mouth. “I suck, remember? I only know a couple of chords, and G and C don’t really cut it.”

  His smile widened and then he laughed. He laughed so hard that his body shook and his fingers dug into my shoulders painfully. I wasn’t sure if he was going crazy or if he was just so tired he didn’t know what he was doing.

  He stopped abruptly and squared his shoulders. “I’m sorry, for the way I was after the accident. It was wrong to put all the blame on you and I…I have no excuse other than I was in a goddamn black hole and I needed someone to hit. It was you.” He cleared his throat. “There was only you.”

  “It’s okay,” I said quietly.

  And it was.

  “Would you play for him? I mean, I think it might help. Maybe spark something inside him.”

  I couldn’t answer. There was no way I was getting any words out. But I nodded. I nodded like a goddamn bobble head and followed Mike Lewis back down the hall.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Monroe

  I was dreaming about Malcolm. It was summer. Hot and humid with air so thick you could practically see it.

  It was the kind of day when the pavement burned right through your sandals. The kind of day you’d spend hours running through the sprinklers at the water park. It was the kind of day when everything is slow and lethargic.

  It was the kind of day when bad things happened.

  I’d had this dream before, and it always ended the same. I lost Malcolm, there in the shadows, the deep ones that the sun didn’t seem able to find.

  I lost him, and usually I heard him crying for me. For Mom. For Dad.

  The sound drove me insane, but this time…this time there was no crying. For a while, there was nothing—I knew he was gone but there was just nothing.

  Then I heard his laughter riding the air like bubbles falling over a waterfall. They were light, dancing in the air. Clear, round sparkles that filled my chest until I couldn’t breathe.

  “Malcolm,” I whispered, afraid that the sound would go away. God, I didn’t ever want it to go away.

  But it did.

  His giggles faded until I couldn’t hear them anymore, and no matter how much I tried to find them…to find that slice of time where he existed, I lost him.

  I lost him in the sunlight and the water and the endless heat.

  ***

  I woke abruptly and lay in my bed for a good ten minutes, just remembering how he sounded. How he smelled. How he felt.

  My skin was drenched in sweat, and I was still in the clothes I’d worn the day before. My hair looked like it hadn’t been combed for days, and I groaned. Ugh. I needed a shower.

  Sunlight poured into my room, and the clock on the dresser across from me told me that it was nearly noon. I grabbed my cell but there were no messages from Nathan. I guess that was a good thing. In this case, no news was good news.

  The hot water felt like heaven, but the restlessness in me had me showering as if I was running a race, and less than ten minutes later, I was trudging down the stairs, wet hair leaving streaks down my green sundress as I took them two at a time.

  Eager to get back to the hospital and Nathan, I rounded the bottom step but froze when I heard voices from Gram’s kitchen.

  For a second, I wanted to run back upstairs and turn back the clock, because I knew that, for me, summer was almost over.

  And that meant no more Nathan.

  Pain twisted inside my chest at the thought of what Labor Day weekend meant, but I forced myself to take those steps until I leaned against the doorframe and watched Gram chatting with my mother.

  Instead of her usual business clothes—Mom was a lawyer in Manhattan—she was dressed in a simple white T-shirt and a pair of blue-and-white plaid shorts. Her golden hair, normally kept in a sleek, straight cut to her jaw, touched the tops of her shoulders. She’d left it natural, and the waves looked incredible on her.

  She was still too skinny, but it was nice to see her looking relaxed. Kind of normal. I suppose it was all we could hope for.

  Kind of normal.

  Dad leaned against the counter by the sink, watching his mother—Gram—as she talked up Mom. He was casual too, wearing an old pair of jeans and a Rolling Stones T-shirt. There was a lot more gray in his hair, and he had lost weight as well, but he looked good.

  They both looked good, all things considered.

  Just then, my dad glanced up and my heart turned over as he stared at me in silence, Gram and Mom still talked softly, unaware that I was there.

  In that moment, I saw the love, the pain, the anguish, and the question…was I better?

  Was I?

  Were they?

  For so long, he’d acted as if our small, battered family had already moved on. As if the tragedy that had happened to Malcolm had been dealt with—wrapped up in an ugly box and put into storage. It used to piss me off so much. How could he not wallow in the pain? Pain is what made us remember.

  But I think I kind of got it now. It was how he’d been trying to deal with the fact that his son was gone, and even though his daughter was still around, she’d pretty much taken a vacation. I had been nothing after Malcolm died.

  Just skin over a bunch of bones with no heart and no soul.

  I’d been so wrapped up in my own pain that I hadn’t once considered my parents didn’t know how to deal with theirs.

  I’d thoug
ht that Dad’s apathy and Mom’s need to overcompensate in everything was their way of dealing with me. But it wasn’t. God, it wasn’t at all. It was them falling away and trying to deal with their own pain.

  The thing was?

  We were still here. My mom. My dad. My gram.

  Me.

  I was still here.

  I thought of the dream I’d had less than an hour ago, and I realized something. Even though Malcolm was dead, he wasn’t gone. Not really.

  He existed inside each and every one of us, in that one place where he’d never left. That one piece of my soul that hadn’t faded to black like the rest of me.

  Malcolm had never really left us; it was me who had gone away. Me who had crawled deep inside myself because I wasn’t strong enough to deal with everything. But Malcolm? He was still here with us.

  I saw his hazel eyes reflected in my dad’s. I saw his gentle, curious smile appear on my mom’s face as she nodded at something Gram was saying.

  Malcolm would always be here.

  My feet started moving before I even knew what I was going to do and I didn’t stop until his arms encircled me. Until I was breathing in that scent that was all Dad—part soap and musky cologne and just…just Dad.

  When was the last time I’d let him touch me? The last time I’d given him a hug or a kiss? I couldn’t remember, and I thought that, that alone was tragic. He used to be my king, back when I was little, and when had all of that fallen away?

  Finally his hands slipped away and I took a step back, my gaze sliding from him to Mom.

  “I missed you guys.”

  Mom didn’t look like she knew what to say, and I could see tears sparkling around the corners of her eyes. She still sat at the table with Gram, who squeezed her hand and slowly rose.

  “Monroe, why don’t you grab the iced tea off the counter and pour us each a glass?”

  “Sure, Gram.”

  I bent low and kissed my mom’s cheek, but then quickly crossed the kitchen before she said anything. Our relationship had always been more complicated, and things were still fragile.

  But the road back to good, though fragile, wasn’t one I was scared of anymore.

  I poured four iced teas and leaned against the counter sipping mine while Gram served peach cobbler. I hadn’t had breakfast yet, but the thought of food—any kind of food—made my stomach turn.

  “Nathan hasn’t called, has he?” I finally asked when I couldn’t stand it anymore. My cell still showed no calls or text messages, and I thought maybe he’d called the house.

  Gram shook her head. “No, dear. I haven’t heard anything.”

  “Who’s Nathan?” Dad asked, sitting a little straighter in his chair as he fingered his glass.

  The boy that I love.

  Just then, a loud rap sounded on the back door that Nate always used and my heart nearly beat out of my chest as I watched it slowly open.

  Nathan strode into the kitchen, his tall, lean form still in the wrinkled, dirty clothes he’d worn the day before. He hadn’t shaved in a few days, and his jaw was shadowed while his hair was a wild mess—a hot, sexy, wild mess that haloed his head in burnished waves.

  Burnished waves that I wanted to touch.

  He pulled up short and my heart turned over when I saw how tired he looked.

  “Hey,” I said softly.

  He held my gaze for several, long seconds and then attempted a smile. “Hey.” Shoving his hands into the front of his jeans, he slowly looked around the room.

  “Nathan,” Gram interrupted, “you look exhausted. Have you eaten?”

  He shook his head. “I’m not really hungry, thanks, Mrs. Blackwell.”

  He glanced around the room and cleared his throat. “I didn’t know you had company.” And then he turned. “I should go.”

  I sprang forward. “Nathan, no. Wait.”

  I was at his side in an instant, my hands reaching for him. Needing him. And when I slid my arms around his waist, I felt his muscles release and he sagged against me.

  It was as if we were the only two people in the room. Heck, in the entire universe. He was all I was aware of and I glanced up at him, eyes searching, needing to know.

  And like we were a part of each other, I didn’t have to ask.

  “He made it through the night and they think…” Nathan blew out a long breath. “They think that he’s going to beat the infection.”

  “Oh my God, Nate.”

  “I know,” he murmured into my hair. “He’s still not out of the woods, but the doctor seems hopeful. I had to see you before I went home. Came straight here. I just had to…hold you.”

  A throat cleared behind us and Nathan shifted a bit, smiling down at me as he raised his eyebrows.

  “Those your folks?”

  I nodded. “Yeah.”

  “I guess I don’t exactly look presentable.”

  “You look perfect,” I answered and then nudged him with my hip. “Even though you look like crap.” I paused. “Would you like to meet them?”

  He tucked a piece of my hair behind my ears and stood back, and I don’t think my heart could feel any more full. It was full of life. Full of love and family.

  It was full of Nathan.

  “Sure.”

  “Okay,” I teased. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.” My hand slid down to his and I tugged him forward.

  “Warn me?”

  I nodded. “Yep. Both of my parents are lawyers and they kind of, you know, like to ask a lot of questions.”

  “Good to know,” he said softly. “Let’s do this.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Nathan

  Labor Day weekend. Where the hell did you come from?

  Man, it didn’t seem that long ago when summer felt as if it was as long as a school year. Back then, my life had been divided into two things. School. And summer. And in my young little mind, each was like a season, as long as each other.

  When I was in elementary school, I hated Labor Day weekend because it meant no more lazy summer days spent out at my grandparents’ place. No more afternoons in the pond at Baker’s Landing, fishing or frogging. It was back to the classroom, and who the heck wanted to spend every day inside?

  Not me. I’d rather be exploring, pretending to be the meanest pirate this side of the Mississippi.

  But as I got older, went through middle school and then into high school, things changed. Traditions formed, and Labor Day weekend became a three-day celebration of not only the end of summer, but the beginning of another school year.

  There was the annual football game. Fathers against sons.

  And then there was the annual blowout bush party, held at a different location each year. It was a music- and booze-fueled night of mayhem, good times, and making memories.

  This year, my senior year, would have been epic. Would have being the choice words.

  Trevor was still in the hospital, and though his body had responded to the drugs and he’d fought off the infection that had basically shut down his organs, he was still in a coma. Still existing somewhere other than here, and I had no idea if he was gonna make it.

  He wouldn’t be starting senior year with me. Wouldn’t be catching my throws on the football field or gigging at local clubs. And tomorrow…shit, tomorrow Monroe was flying home to New York City.

  “Everets, your arm is looking damn good!”

  I turned as my coach, Mr. Forster, jogged over from the other side of the field. We’d just finished playing against the fathers and I had thrown for a win by twenty-one points. Wasn’t hard to do. They had a few players with some legs—my dad was one of them—but for the most part, they were a bunch of overweight, middle-aged guys who were already searching for the beer tent.

  Coach Forster knocked his hat back and planted his hands on his hips.
“Should be a good year.”

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  Truthfully, I wasn’t all that interested in playing ball. Wasn’t all that interested in much, but I’d made a promise to Monroe and I planned on keeping it. I had to be positive for her. Positive for myself.

  “We’ll miss Trevor for sure, but I’ve got my eye on that young Caleb Obinksky.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Sure.”

  I didn’t give a shit about Caleb Obinksky. Where the hell was Monroe?

  “Look, coach, I gotta go. Hit the showers.”

  Mr. Forster grinned, slapped me on the back, and then paused to shake my hand. “I just want to say that all that stuff…” He cleared his throat.

  “Stuff?”

  “The stuff with Trevor. It’s in the past. New year. New outlook.”

  I didn’t know what to say, because his analysis of the situation was so far off my grid that I couldn’t see it. He wanted a winning season.

  I just wanted to get by.

  And I didn’t ever want to forget what happened that night, because to forget meant that it could happen again. And I was never going to be so goddamn selfish and stupid. Never.

  “Sure. Okay.”

  I pushed past him, my gaze roaming over the field until I saw that familiar dark head. She was chatting with Brent and a few others, her parents several feet away with her grandmother.

  I jogged across the field, my eyes only on her, and I lifted my chin when she looked up. My heart did that strange flipping thing—was I ever going to get used to it? And I pushed Brent out of the way so that I could get to her.

  “Hey! What the fu—” Brent stalled when Mrs. Blackwell arched an eyebrow, and he punched me in the arm. “You could have asked me to move, douche bag.”

  “Whatever.”

  I bent down and kissed her nose, inhaling that summery scent that was all Monroe. My forehead rested on hers, and I hoped she didn’t mind that I was filthy and sweaty because I didn’t want to move.

  “Hey,” I said.

  She laughed and slid her hands up my arms until they hit my shoulders. “You’re really good, Nate. Wow. I mean, I knew you would be, but I couldn’t take my eyes off you.”