by Ali Dean
Dad’s expression now was one I could decipher, finally. He looked sympathetic. “Sweetie, I’m sorry, but you’re safer not knowing everything.”
My eyes burned and my hand went to my stomach, attempting to soothe the clawing sensation going on inside of me.
“Why?” I croaked out.
“The Malones are dangerous. I’m protecting you. We’re protecting you.” Dad sounded as if he was trying to convince himself of this, not me.
I stood up then. Suddenly, I was desperate to get out of there. “You guys can do whatever it is you do when you meet up. I’m leaving.”
Before I could take a single step toward the door, everyone stood up. Cruz’s chair crashed to the ground and I stopped, sighed. “I’m going to Pops and Mimi’s. I’ll take an Uber.”
I had a key to my grandparents’ place. It was a few blocks from our house. I didn’t want to stay at a hotel with Dad, or Cruz, or in some weird place like the old warehouse. How many secret hangouts did the guys have, anyway? And how close were they with my dad?
I took a deep breath when I got up the stairs, but before I made it to the end of the hall, I heard jogging footsteps behind me. Cruz.
“I’ll take you. You’re not waiting for an Uber up here alone or getting a ride from a stranger so late at night.”
I couldn’t decide whether to slap him, laugh, or ignore him. It was so absurd. He wasn’t my father; he wasn’t even my boyfriend, not really. Until a few days ago, Cruz had barely spoken a few words to me in the past three years. It was ridiculous. But the truth was, I still wanted to ride with him. A flame of fury and hurt whipped at my insides, threatening to fill the empty numbness that was the only thing keeping me from breaking down. Or screaming. Or sobbing. I felt really unstable right now.
“Fine,” I said.
We didn’t speak the entire way back to Pops and Mimi’s place. I took the time to push everything out and think of nothing. I was so exhausted; it was easy to settle into a trance as I watched the trees pass by. Cruz started to get off the bike after me when we parked, but I stopped him with a hand to his shoulder. “Don’t.”
He didn’t call after me, even as I felt his eyes on me all the way to the door. It was a full minute after I was inside before I heard the engine start up and he drove away.
Chapter Eleven
Dad was at the breakfast table the next morning. He greeted me with his usual, “Morning sweetie,” and pushed a coffee cake my way. Not just any coffee cake, but one from Button Bottom Bakery. It was my favorite and seeing it made my insides twist. This couldn’t be fixed by coffee cake, and he knew it.
Mimi had already left for her shift at Defiance Falls Hospital, where she worked as an ER nurse. Come to think of it, she might have heard something about the suicide on Wednesday morning too. Her shifts were seven to seven on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Pops was the fire chief in Defiance Falls and I couldn’t keep track of his hours. He was on and off for long periods of time. At the moment, he was sitting at the table with us.
Pops didn’t ask me why I’d crashed at their place last night, or why Dad was here this morning with Button Bottom coffee cake. Maybe he’d already talked things out with Dad, but I doubted it.
When Dad didn’t say anything about the night before, I took his lead. It was a minor consolation, knowing I wasn’t the only one in the dark.
Pops was oblivious to the tension, or at least pretended to be. “Robbie Mills gave me tickets to UMass’s opening game tonight. Just two. You want them, Hazel?” Pops asked me.
“You don’t want to go?”
“I’ll go with you, if you’d like, but I thought you’d rather go with one of your friends,” Pops explained, as if his assumption made perfect sense. It did make sense, if he had made the offer to one of my cousins.
The coffee cake felt dry in my mouth. The truth was, I didn’t have anyone I wanted to go with. I didn’t have a go-to gal pal or entourage of friends like most girls my age. It was my own doing, but not entirely by choice. I’d never found anyone I clicked with enough to be best friends forever. Didn’t want that pressure to be a part of whatever that kind of friendship required.
Well, I hadn’t since the guys. They’d felt right, like my tribe, and no one else had felt that way since. Until they gave me a glimpse of it again this week, at the beach, at that warehouse. Of course, I knew it wasn’t real, and the rest of the night proved it. The fantasy had blown up in my face.
But if they’d let me in? I could belong with them. Sure I was the only girl, but I knew they were my people.
I swallowed and took a sip of milk, delaying my answer. Normally I’d invite Dad, but I was still mad at him. “Mad” wasn’t the right word. I was hurt, even if he had good reasons for everything. But whatever, I wasn’t going to hang with him tonight, especially when a college game would just mean watching women closer to my age hit on him.
“Yeah, I’ll take the tickets.” I’d rather just go by myself. Maybe watching a game would help me with the decision ahead of me. “Thanks.”
“Of course, Pumpkin.”
I warmed a little at the nickname he still used for me.
“You haven’t been over as much to use the yard for training. Mimi misses you. She keeps making lemonade and cookies and there’s no one to eat them.”
I smiled, knowing when he said Mimi missed me, he was talking about himself too. I was still here for dinner every Sunday, but until recently, I usually came by at least two or three times a week to work on drills in their yard too. Our yard was too small for most drills. Sometimes Pops would help by feeding me balls for headers or retrieving balls from practice shots for me.
“I’m taking a break. The college scout period’s over. I’m where I need to be for college. Just trying to have fun my last year of high school.”
Pops studied me, and I felt Dad studying me too. I also wondered if that was even true anymore. Fun? Was that really what I was doing? It had seemed to be working, for a moment there, but now I wasn’t so sure.
Pops finally nodded once. “Good for you. You deserve a break. Of course, your definition of a break is still three hours of tryouts every day, just without the individual training sessions. I bet you do college essays after tryouts too,” Pops said with a wink.
I laughed while shaking my head. “You think you’re so smart, old man.”
“I’m not old. I’m probably the same age as some of your friends’ fathers.”
“Probably,” I agreed. “Old.”
Pops chuckled and shook his head right back at me. “Well, it’s good to have fun. At any age. Your dad could use that reminder sometimes too.” He shot Dad a look.
“I have fun, Dad.”
“You go to the gym to fight. I guess if that’s your fun, it’s better than nothing. I worry about you getting cancer staring at computers for fifteen hours a day. You need to interact with people sometimes, son.”
“Hey, computers are fun too, Dad. Don’t you forget it.”
“Don’t tell me you’ve named them like your mother does with the cars.”
Dad didn’t answer. He’d totally named his computers.
“Is this what I get for bringing Button Bottom coffee cake? Harassment?” Dad asked.
“It’s your daughter calling me old,” Pops retorted.
The hollowness from last night was starting to fill up with the familiarity and warmth of being with family, and I didn’t like it. It made the other feelings threaten to crash in too. I pressed my lips together, trying not to chime in and join the banter.
When the doorbell rang, I jumped up. I had to get to tryouts soon anyway, so it was a good excuse to get moving.
I thought it might be one of the neighbors. Mimi and Pops had lived on this street, in this house, for thirty-five years. Most of the neighbors had lived here for just as long, if not longer. Dad and I lived in one of the only newer homes in this part of town. But it wasn’t one of the many neighbors who regularly stopped by unannounced. Nope, it was C
ruz Donovan, who lived on the other side of town, up on a hill, with several acres of land.
I wished he wasn’t so obnoxiously handsome. It was distracting, disarming, and, if I was honest with myself, he took my breath away. Knocked it right out of my lungs like a kick to the chest.
“Hazel.” His voice cracked when he said my name, and it was then I noticed the dark circles under his eyes.
“Why do you look tired? I thought you only needed a couple hours of sleep a night?” I almost cringed at the bitterness in my tone but dammit, I was bitter. Also, I liked that he was here. He wasn’t ghosting me. Not yet.
Cruz gave me a wry grin. “I didn’t get my three hours last night.”
I frowned, considering him. What had Cruz been doing all night? Whatever. He probably wouldn’t tell me anyway.
“Why are you here?” I asked instead.
“To take you to the house to get your soccer stuff. Then I can take you to school for tryouts.”
I looked at my watch. “We have an hour. It only takes ten minutes to get to the school. And I can walk to the house in five.”
Cruz stepped closer then, reached for me but then dropped his hand before making contact. “That was all just an excuse to see you. Check on you. Make sure you’re okay. Talk, if you want. Maybe we can go to Button Bottom Bakery. Do you still love their coffee cake?”
I had to laugh at that. “I feel like I have two fathers right now. Three if you count Pops.”
Cruz scoffed. “I can assure you, I do not have fatherly feelings toward you.”
Cruz took a step back as his eyes darted over my shoulder. “Mr. Ross, how are you?” He was so good at being formal, polite. I knew it was Pops before turning around. After last night, this felt too formal for my dad.
“Cruz Donovan,” Pops boomed. “You here looking for the twins?”
My eyes swung back and forth between them. Did Cruz still come over here? With Bodhi and Emmett? I swallowed down the lump that lodged in my throat.
“No, sir. I’m here for your granddaughter. I dropped her off last night and thought she might want a ride to soccer.”
Sir? I’d never heard Cruz call anyone sir. Not even that one time at a soccer tournament in eighth grade when one of the coaches caught us sneaking into the hotel pool after curfew.
“You dropped her off here? Why not at her place?”
I narrowed my eyes at Pops, wondering why he was directing the question at Cruz instead of me.
“Her dad wasn’t home and she didn’t want to be alone,” Cruz said easily. I gaped at him. The explanation didn’t make a whole lot of sense, since I stayed home alone regularly.
Pops patted my shoulder. “Your dad did say it was a longer work trip than usual. You know you’re always welcome here, Pumpkin.”
Okay, then. Is this how it worked? The little half-truths if not outright lies? Which side was I on anyway? I felt like I was right in the middle. No-man’s land.
“Thanks Pops. I’ve got to head out. Get ready for soccer. Thanks for the tickets. Are they at will call?”
“I’ll email them to you. I bet Cruz here would love to join you,” he said.
And now I was gaping at Pops. Was he trying to set me up? I elbowed him. “Doubt it.” Everyone knew Cruz was going to Harvard. That didn’t mean he wouldn’t watch another team play, but I’m sure he had better things to do.
“Tickets to what?” Cruz asked.
“UMass’s opening game. Against Connecticut.”
“Yeah, I’d love to go with you. What time?”
“Seven.” I tried not to bite out the answer, but it came out sharp and I heard Pops chuckling as we walked down the steps. I glanced behind me to wave goodbye but instead shot him a glare. I needed space. From everyone.
Chapter Twelve
Cruz didn’t give me space. In fact, he specifically said, “I know you want space, but you’re not getting it. We’re talking.”
It was all such a contradiction of emotions with him. I was grateful and annoyed with him for being here; frustrated and eased by his presence; angry with him and needing his reassurance and comfort all at once.
He took us right to the bakery. “Dad already brought coffee cake this morning, but I’ll get another slice.” It was a double coffee cake kind of morning for sure.
Once we were settled at a table I brought my eyes to Cruz’s. “Okay, what do you want to talk about?”
“You can’t shut us out, Hazel. It’s not an option, so don’t even think about it.”
Once again, there was the urge to both smile and punch him in the face. “Cruz, do you really think now is a good time to be making demands? Sometimes you can be so smart but other times you can be clueless.”
He lifted one side of his mouth, fighting a smile. “I’m never clueless, Hazel Ross.”
“Yeah, okay.” I dismissed him with an eye roll.
He waited for me to look at him and when I did he wasn’t giving me a playful expression. Nope, it was somber.
“I know that you close people out when shit gets real. I know that you cope by avoiding. But I won’t let you do that with me or the guys. You and your dad have to do it your way, I guess, that’s not my job. But I’m not letting you go again, Hazel, so get used to it.”
Before I could process the rest of his annoying psychoanalysis I zeroed in on the last sentence. “Again? Again?” I pointed a finger at him and leaned forward, lowering my voice to avoid making a scene. “What the hell are you talking about now, Cruz?”
“You ditched us, all of us, when high school started.”
“You broke up with me!”
“I had to. I told you at the time it wasn’t forever. I was barely fifteen. I asked you to be patient. Instead, you stopped hanging out with any of us. We never saw you.”
I shook my head. “Unbelievable.”
“Excuse me?”
“You’re unbelievable.”
“I know you didn’t understand it, but I thought you trusted me. I need you to trust me now.”
“And I need you to leave me alone.”
I looked away, the words out before I realized I’d said them. “I didn’t mean that,” I said. “Maybe I did. Dammit, Cruz, I don’t know anything anymore. I’m lost. Can you just take me to soccer?”
“No. We’re not finished.”
Cruz grabbed my hand then under the table and brought it between his palms. “Hazel, I can forgive you for shutting us out three years ago and not waiting for me. Can you forgive me for expecting you to trust me with keeping secrets from you?”
I swallowed. This guy, he was too handsome, his looks a weapon against my heart. My soul. Especially now, when he was open, vulnerable, waiting on something from me.
“I don’t know, Cruz.” He posed it like a simple question, but it wasn’t simple at all. Not when I now had a glimpse into the magnitude of the secrets he was keeping, that they were all keeping. “It’s not just something in the past. You’re asking me to forgive you for something that’s happening now, that will keep happening over and over.”
How could I be a part of his life, friends with these guys, if I was in the dark on something that was clearly a huge part of who they were? And if these secrets had started three years ago or longer, how had it shaped them? Would I ever really know Cruz or the guys if I wasn’t brought into the circle?
“What about telling me everything?” The question spilled out and I snapped my mouth closed and shut my eyes as soon as I asked it. I didn’t want to ask that. I knew what the answer would be. And once I had it, I’d know what my answer to his question was. No, I couldn’t trust him. Not fully. Most of all, I couldn’t play along like I was part of their group, in a relationship or whatever this was with Cruz, while knowing I’d always be an outsider.
He didn’t get a chance to answer, or I didn’t let myself hear what he said.
Polly Tutino, captain of the volleyball team, called out, “Hey Cruz!” She was at our table a second later, standing right in front of
him, ignoring me. This was fine with me, though I didn’t really need the view of her butt cheeks in booty shorts five inches from my eyeballs.
“I barely saw you at your birthday party,” she complained, and reached a hand to his chest. “But I did get some nice party favors from that piñata.” Polly was not subtle in her flirtation and her giggle grated on my nerves. I was used to hearing about and witnessing firsthand girls going after Cruz. All of the guys got this attention and were the hot topic in the locker room, on the field, in the cafeteria – well, everywhere.
But I was sitting right here, and I hadn’t said “No” yet to Cruz. I was debating my next move, and whether it was worth it to embarrass Polly, who was a friendly acquaintance. I didn’t want to make an enemy, but there were times when it felt like I had one too many friendly acquaintances.
Cruz made the decision for me. “Hey Polly, I’m here with Hazel.” As he said this, he took her hand off his chest, and the deliberate movement loosened a tightness in my chest I hadn’t even realized was there.
Polly turned to me. “Oh, hi Hazel. How are tryouts going?”
“Good. Fine. You?”
“Yeah, totally good.” And then she turned back to Cruz, and the rubber band around my heart squeezed again. “So, Cruz. I heard we might be partying again at the Lake this weekend. You have my number, right? I’m free tonight.”
She started to move away but Cruz said, “Polly, I’m going out with Hazel tonight. We’re together.”
Polly stopped and looked between us, eyes widening as she did. “Oh! Ohhhh. Oh.”
Cruz nodded. “Yeah.”
I didn’t know what to do. Or say. We were together? Were we really? It seemed only a second ago we were on the precipice of breaking up before it went anywhere.
“This is big. I think we all knew you guys were, well, you know, special to each other. But no one really thought you were going to do anything about it. At least, most people didn’t think it would happen until college. You’re both going to Harvard, right?”