by Rebel Hart
My mom was an angel who intentionally took a job that didn’t start until six in the afternoon so that she could always be home when I got home from school and have dinner with me. Despite the fact that she wouldn’t get home until close to three in the morning, she would still set her alarm for six o’clock so that she could wake me up, have breakfast with me, and see me off to school, and then she would go back to sleep after that.
I sat up and kicked my legs over the edge of my bed. “Um, no real reason. Just can’t sleep. How was work?” She leaned against the doorframe, and I could see how exhausted she was in the bags under her eyes and the loose curls from the ponytail her red hair was in. “Sorry, Ma. You’re tired. Go to bed.”
“It’s okay, baby,” she said with a smile. “I lost four years getting to speak with you. I’m not gonna give up a second of it now because I’m a little sleepy. I’ll get my rest.”
Every time I had to face the fact that these past few years had weighed heavily on my mom, I hated myself all over again. It’d caused her so much pain, but I still couldn’t bring myself to regret the decision that I’d made. Who knows how things might have turned out if I hadn’t taken matters into my own hands? I did what I did for someone I loved. I just hated that I hurt someone else I loved so much with what I had to do.
“Well, give me the sixty-second update. I probably should at least be trying to sleep,” I said, and we exchanged tired smiles.
“Work is always just that—work. Never gets old cleaning up for people who have probably never cleaned a single day in their whole life,” she said. “Today, I actually had a woman ask me where we keep the bleach. She wanted to know where we, the housekeepers, keep the cleaning supplies in her home.”
I thought about Nathan and could pretty much conclude that he would have no idea where any cleaning supplies were in his house. “That sounds about right.”
“Nothing out of the ordinary tonight, though. The last few houses are always the worst because we’re cleaning these mansions, and the families sleep straight through it. They’re so far from the parts of the houses we’re cleaning that they can’t hear the vacuums, talking, any of it. Can you imagine?”
There was an awkward silence between us, likely born of the fact that I had spent a year living that way. I didn’t approach the topic, though, and neither did she.
“Anyway,” she continued, “it was work. I’m glad to be home.”
“Welcome home,” I said.
She smiled, walked into the room, and kissed me on my forehead, then turned around and walked out. The bathroom door clicked shut a few seconds later, and the sink started going, letting me know she was washing up for bed. I was just about to lean back in bed and actually make another attempt at falling asleep when my phone buzzed on my nightstand. I picked it up, and my heart jumped.
It was a text from Cherri.
I don’t suppose you’re awake?
I didn’t even waste my time texting back. I hit the little camera to Facetime her, and a few seconds later, Cherri’s face appeared on the live video stream. It instantly relaxed me, and at that moment, I got twice as tired as I had been.
“Hey,” I greeted.
She grinned. “Hi. Sorry to bug you so late.”
I shook my head. “I don’t think you could ever bug me.” I leaned back in my bed and held the phone above my head. “So how was your date?”
She frowned. “Ugh, dates with Nathan are never all that fun. He just talks about himself and The Royal Court. They take too long.”
I snickered, glad I risked asking. It was so worth the response I got. “All of your dates are like that? Then why are you with him?”
“Now you’re starting to sound like Avery,” Cherri replied, and I logged that information of a definite alleyway. “I don’t know. We’ve been together for so long. It just feels strange, thinking about not being with him.”
That was a little more disheartening than I was hoping for. “Still, you deserve to be happy. Wouldn’t starting over be worth it to find someone that you’re more compatible with?”
She rolled her eyes. “Have you been talking to Avery?”
“No, but based on what you’re saying, I think I’m gonna start.”
Cherri laughed. Her gaze settled on me, and then a warm smile crept across her face. “Yeah. It might be worth it.” She looked away from the screen, flashing a coy but enticing expression. All I could do was smile. When she looked back, I laughed. “What?” she squealed.
“Nothing. So tell me about this big pep rally. Is it true Nathan’s dad comes?” I asked.
Again, she rolled her eyes. “Oh, yeah. Connor will probably be hanging around all day tomorrow. He hands out these coupons for anyone who displays really good school pride. Everyone who earns one can enter them in a raffle during the pep rally. He gives away something different every year. Last year it was a car.”
My jaw dropped. “He gave away a whole car? To some random student for wearing green and gold?”
She chuckled. “Fucking, yeah. Can you believe that shit?”
I chuckled at her sudden pirate language. “Oh, hey. There’s the Cherri I know.”
She put a hand over her mouth. “Sorry.”
“Why are you sorry?” I asked.
She tilted her head to the side. “Nathan says swearing is unladylike.”
“Oh, and does he make you wear corsets as well?”
Cherri laughed. “He probably would if he didn’t know I’d punch him in the dick for trying.”
“Will you go to the dance after the football game?” I questioned, hoping for an opportunity to see Cherri all done up in her best party attire.
“No,” she replied. “Nathan always hosts a birthday party after the game and invites the whole school.”
Everyone but me. I wouldn’t be caught dead going anywhere near Nathan’s house. “Oh. Sounds interesting.”
“Eh, I guess,” Cherri replied. She didn’t seem impressed.
Cherri laid back on her pillow, and with us both laying down, it was only a matter of minutes before we’d both fallen asleep. If my mom hadn’t noticed that I wasn’t yet awake and out of bed when she came to wake me up like she so often did, we might have both overslept. My mom woke me, and I woke Cherri, then after saying goodbye, we were off to get ready for the day.
My wardrobe was not very colorful. I preferred muted tones that didn’t have me standing out a whole lot, but unfortunately for me, Postings Proper High School’s school colors were bright green and gold. After complaining to Sicily that I didn’t have much in the required color palette, he convinced me that just wearing green of any kind would be fine, and he’d spray my hair gold. I did have an army green shirt, so I put that on, along with a pair of black sweatpants and my same pair of black boots. I begrudgingly sat while Sicily sprayed my auburn hair gold in the boys’ bathroom once I got to school.
“This is stupid,” I growled, looking myself over in the mirror.
“It’s fine,” Sicily replied quickly. Unlike me, he was dressed head to toe in green and gold, and he even had a school hat on. “Trust me. With some of the people out there, they’ll barely notice ya.”
“That’s been my hope since I got here, and it hasn’t happened yet.”
We left the bathroom and parted ways, off to our first class of the day, but it was just a snippet compared to normal. Thanks to the pep rally happening later in the day, all of the classes had been shortened from their typical hour back to just twenty minutes. The teacher didn’t make too valid an attempt to keep the students focused on the class, and eventually, they just let everyone talk until the bell rang.
It wasn’t until after my third class that I got my first glimpse of my dad, slinking his way around the halls. He looked almost exactly like Nathan, except his brown hair was already showing gray. He was rocking the salt and pepper look with a goatee, too, and he was wearing a gold shirt with a bright green vest over it. His pants were black with little green and gold dragons on
them, the school’s mascot. He had a booklet of coupons in his hands and was ripping them off the booklet and handing them out to particularly flamboyant students as he passed them. I made sure to keep a large group of students between myself and my dad at all times, and I had somehow managed to successfully duck him until all the students were loading out of the gym after the pep rally.
“You okay, man?” Sicily asked as I walked behind the crowd of students surrounding the girl who’d won a cruise for her school spirit. “You seem a little jumpy.”
“I’m fine,” I replied. “I just—”
A hand curled around my arm. My heart sank because I was almost home free. I turned around and wasn’t surprised to see that my dad was on the other end of the arm that was gripping me.
“Hello,” he greeted.
“Whoa, do you know Connor or something?” Sicily asked, and to my disdain, several other students had stopped and started staring as well.
“No, I don’t. Can you get some of these people to move along for me?” I asked.
Sicily nodded. “I got ya, buddy.” He turned around and started clapping at the crowd. “All right, all right. Nothin’ to see here. Let’s move it, people.”
With Sicily distracting the group, I led my dad around the corner and away from watchful eyes. When we were there, he held out his arms wide toward me. “Hello, son. How about a hug for your old man?”
“If you try and hug me, I’ll punch you in the face,” I replied.
Connor didn’t seem intimidated, only laughed. “My, aren’t we seedy? Prison wasn’t good to you.”
“Shocking,” I grumbled back.
Connor reached into his back pocket and pulled out a gold envelope with green writing scrawled across the front in an elegant script that said, “You are cordially invited…” He held it out to me. “Here you are. An invitation to your brother’s birthday. He’d want his brother there.”
I snatched the envelope purely for the joy I would get in setting it on fire later. “I wouldn’t—”
Connor looked over my shoulder. “Oh, hello, dear.”
“Hello, Mr. Loche,” Cherri’s voice called back, and my heart started racing. She walked until she was standing next to me, and in my attempts to dodge my dad, I’d also avoided seeing Cherri prior to that moment. She looked delectable in a pair of tight green skinny jeans and a gold sequined shirt with her hair up in pigtails, one sprayed green, and the other gold. “Nathan is looking for you.”
“Well, I should go find him.” He took one final look at me, smiled, and then walked between Cherri and me toward the amassed students.
Cherri looked down at the invitation in my hand. “Did you just get a personal invite?”
“I guess so,” I said.
She gasped. “I wonder if Nathan’s considering you for The Royal Court?”
“Like I’d accept,” I grumbled back.
“I’d be shocked if you did,” she replied. “Still, you should go.” She grinned up at me. “We’ll find a corner and hang out.”
That did sound nice, but being back at my dad’s house gave me hives just to think about. When I thought about explaining to Cherri, or anyone for that matter, why I turned down a personal invite to the party of the year, that gave me more hives. With my skin crawling and only Cherri’s sweet smile to give me confidence, I smiled back at her.
“Okay,” I replied finally. “I’ll go.”
12
Deon
I was glad that my mom had Friday night off because I was able to bring Sicily over for the first time and introduce them. She’d heard me mention a friend several times but hadn’t yet seen him with her own two eyes, and I could sense she was beginning to think he wasn’t real.
“Mom?”
“Hang on, sweetie! I’m just putting some clothes away.”
It occurred to me as Sicily and I sat down at the table in the kitchen that I’d very rarely brought friends over before. Most of the guys in my neighborhood and I would just hang out outside, and Cherri had never been inside my home. Apart from some isolated experiences when I was much younger, I’d never really brought a friend home.
No wonder my mom thought Sicily was fake.
“Can I get you something to drink?” I finally asked Sicily. “Water, juice, or I do think we have some soda in here.”
“I’ll have some water, man. Thanks!” Sicily replied. I got him and myself both a glass of water with ice and then sat down across from him. “So, uh… You gonna tell me what Connor Loche wanted to talk with you about today?”
“What?” My head whipped over. My mom had just walked into the kitchen, and her eyes were wide and terrified as she spoke. “You spoke with Connor today?”
“Yeah,” I replied, not yet having shared my full story with Sicily. “I told Sicily that I don’t know him or why he singled me out.”
My mom looked back at me in nervous silence for a few seconds before nodding. “Oh, I thought maybe something special had happened.” She stepped further into the kitchen and held out a hand toward Sicily. “Hello. I’m Ciara.”
Sicily stood up from his chair, took my mom’s hand, and shook it. “Hello, ma’am. My name’s Tank. Weird one, I know. Got it from my old man. All my friends call me Sicily.”
She grinned. “Nice to meet you, Sicily. Will you be staying for dinner?”
“Actually, Mom,” I said, “I’ll be out for dinner. Got invited to a party tonight. Sicily’s gonna drive. So I just came to drop your car.”
“Oh?” Her courteous grin grew into a natural, bright one. “I’m very excited to hear that, sweetheart.”
She’d probably be less enthused if she knew whose house the party was at, so I decided to keep that information to myself. “Yeah, so I may be a little late coming home, but I promise not to—”
She waved her hands through the air. “Sweetheart, I trust you. Go. Have fun.”
I smiled, glad that, for once, my mom was happy with the way things were with me. “I will. Thanks, Mom.”
After enjoying a few more minutes of casual conversation with my mom and washing the ridiculous spray out of my hair, Sicily and I headed out for the Loche’s estate. Though I tended not to trust anyone else with my fate, I was okay letting Sicily drive because it didn’t make me comfortable bringing my mom’s car anywhere near the Loches. If push came to shove and I needed to get out quickly without Sicily, I could just walk until I was far enough away and then call my mom for a ride. At that point, I’d probably have to reveal where I was, to begin with, but that was a smaller sacrifice by comparison if I found I had to get out of dodge.
The estate was somehow larger than I remembered it. The gates were open, and hired officers directed people into a parking lot. There was a sea of students loading out of vehicles and excitedly making their ways toward the party, which appeared to be down the hill at a smaller but still grand version of the Loches house. A pathway lined with black and white balloons and tea lights led the way past the main house and down to the smaller one, where booming music could already be heard.
“What’s that?” I asked. “A whole house just for parties?”
“That’s Nathan’s house,” Sicily said.
A whole train could have hit me and left me less shocked than that statement. “His house?”
“Yeah. He lives separate from his parents, and his birthday party is hosted at his house every year. It looks small compared to this thing.” Sicily waved his hand in the direction of the main estate house. “But it’s actually huge. Still, like, four times the size of my house.”
It shouldn’t have surprised me that Connor and Alicia would have a whole house built for their precious child, but it did. Giving him that level of freedom was just a bad idea. Then again, they thought that the world began and ended with him, so they probably believed he was beyond capable.
We walked down the path and eventually reached the house, which was packed with people both inside and out. In Maine, late September can be a bit chilly, but p
eople didn’t seem to mind as they hung out around the property, some of them even jumping into the massive, Olympic-sized pool about halfway between the main house and Nathan’s smaller house. To the right, a huge bonfire roared, and people hung out around it, drinking, eating, dancing, and laughing.
A few students greeted Sicily, and though at first the attention we drew didn’t make me very happy, Cherri’s head poked out from one of the rooms, and then she beelined straight for us. She looked unbelievable in a black cocktail dress with her hair out of its earlier pigtails and flowing down her shoulders.
“You made it!” she yelled over the music.
“We did!” Sicily replied, and I side-eyed him because she wasn’t talking to him, but that didn’t make it less amusing. “How are ya?”
Cherri was never the type to be mean, so even though she probably couldn’t give two shits about Sicily, she folded her arms behind her back and said, “I’m good. How are you?”
“Good. Listen, where’s the grub?” he asked.
She motioned off in a direction a bit behind us and to Sicily’s left. “The kitchen. There’s a full spread. Go crazy.”
Sicily tapped my arm and then rushed off, which I was glad for. Cherri’s cheeks had developed a light pink hue, and she nodded her head back behind me. “So, hey. Wanna find a spot to talk? I know all the good nooks and crannies.”
Finding nooks and crannies with Cherri was exactly the kind of thing I was interested in. “Yeah.”
She turned around, and I followed her through the foyer of the house and out through a pair of sliding glass doors that led to another smaller pool in the back of the house. Not as many people were out there, but there were still enough people that no one seemed to be paying us much mind. I could see that all the members of The Royal Court, apart from Nathan and Brayden, were hanging out somewhere out there. Cherri led me past the pool, out through a gate, and down a path to an isolated gazebo way in the back of the property. It was totally isolated, and the roars of the party were a muted, distant rumble. The pitched roof was lined with white lights, and the gazebo had a modern firepit in the middle and couches on all four sides.