“Oh, thanks? That’s…nice of you.” She extended an arm to take the soda and the cuff on her wrist inched up a fraction from the movement. A huge black bruise peeked out from underneath.
“Holy hell,” I whispered as my stomach sank. “What is that?”
“Nothing. Just fell off my bike the other day.” She quickly covered her wrist and spun on a toe, ready to dart away. Luckily, the door didn’t open any more easily than it shut.
“Nora, come on. Don’t hide from me.”
“I’m not hiding. I haven’t been feeling great, but as soon as I get better, I’ll be back at the creek. Thanks for stopping by.” She finally got the door open, but if I let her escape, there was a good possibility I’d never get her back.
“Wait,” I said, grabbing the back of her hoodie.
Her whole body winced, and a cry she couldn’t muffle tore from her mouth.
Oh, God. How many other bruises was she hiding under that thing?
I immediately let her go and begged, “Please just talk to me.”
She looked down, a curtain of brown hair covering her pink cheeks. It was a dead giveaway that she was about to lie. “There’s nothing to talk about, Cam. Just drop it.”
“Did your dad do that to you? I know he puts his hands on you, Nora. You don’t have to lie to me.”
Tears hit her eyes, but then she laughed, loud and heartbreaking. “That’s bullshit! I have to lie to everyone. About everything. My entire fucking life is a lie. I’m not even sure I know how to tell the truth anymore.”
I stabbed a finger at my chest. “You don’t lie to me.”
She barked another sad laugh. “Are you sure about that?”
“Nora, you told me my shoes were stupid the first time we met, and once, you spent an entire afternoon talking about my ugly swim trunks. I’m pretty sure you don’t pull punches where I’m concerned. And if you have lied to me, I don’t care. We’re true friends, remember? That means having each other’s back no matter what. You can trust me.”
“I can’t trust anyone!” she screamed so loud her face vibrated, and the sheer act of that alone shifted her hoodie, revealing bruises on her neck, dark blue and purple with a hollow center as though she’d been bitten.
A wave of adrenaline flooded my veins. “Yes, you can!” I yelled right back. “I’m standing right here. I know about your dad. I saw him in action.”
Her chest heaved with unshed emotion, but her fire momentarily quelled. “What?”
“I followed you home one day after we first met. He was screaming and cussing. He pushed you down before punching your brother. Then that piece of shit said it was your fault your mom left, and you know what, Nora, I never mentioned one single word of that to anyone, but only because you never showed up with bruises. And trust me, I didn’t even like swimming in the creek that much, but there’s not much you can hide in a bathing suit.” I swung a finger at her wrist. “This is different.” I pointed at her neck. “That sure as hell is different. If he did that to you, then—”
“Then what? What are you going to do about it, Cam?”
I clamped my mouth shut. Now, that I didn’t have the answer to. But I couldn’t turn a blind eye and ignore it like every other person in her life. “I don’t know. But if you would just talk to me, I could at least try. I’ll listen. You might not realize it, but there’s not much I wouldn’t do for you. And if that means sitting here on your porch and having a man-to-man with your dad myself, then so be it.” Right smack in the middle of her front porch, I sat down. I turned and leaned against the brick, kicking my leg out in front of me, all the while hoping my parents wouldn’t be casket shopping by the end of the night.
“Okay, he’s due back any minute. Suit yourself.”
I swallowed hard. “Thanks. I will.”
“Fair warning, he and his girlfriend broke up, so he’s probably drunk and looking for a fight.”
Shit. “Fine by me.”
“Did I ever tell you about the time he spent the night in jail for dislocating a man’s arm during a bar fight?”
No. She had not. Fuck. “I’ll take my chances.”
She let out a groan. “Cam, stop being ridiculous and go home.”
“I’m not leaving. He can’t treat you like this and expect to get away with it. Your dad and I are going to have a conversation about those bruises. Honestly, we should have had it last year. So it’s long overdue.”
“Oh, good Lord,” she huffed. “Fine, have it your way. Thanks for the Coke.”
I reached into my back pocket and retrieved a slightly smooshed and melted Snickers. “I got you a candy bar too.”
She plucked it from my fingers. “Thanks. See you at the funeral home.”
“Bring a book. I'm not gonna be there for about eighty years.”
She slammed the door behind her.
The odds were not in my favor if her dad did come home, but if I left, I would be just like everyone else in her life.
Last summer, Nora might have wanted a proper goodbye and promises that I’d always come back—and all the closure and security that came with them. I’d failed her in spectacular fashion all because I couldn’t keep my temper in check.
But that day, sitting on her porch, I was the only person even quasi-brave enough to stand up to her dad. She needed that more than anything else I could ever give her.
“Why are you still sitting there?” I whispered at the window. From my vantage point, hidden behind the piece of plywood Ramsey had used to secure the window, I couldn’t see all of Camden, just his sneakers crossed at the ankle.
It had been an hour since he’d sat down declaring his intentions to have a “man-to-man” with Dad. Which, let’s be honest, was laughable. My father didn’t understand the concept of having a real conversation unless it involved shouting at the bartender for another drink.
Despite what I’d told Camden—luckily for all of us—my dad wouldn’t be home anytime soon. Based on the shouting the night before, he had, in fact, broken up with his girlfriend, but it just meant he was on the prowl again. Last time this happened, he didn’t come home for six days.
I’d considered telling Camden this information at the thirty-minute mark, but deep down, I was waiting on pins and needles to see how long he’d last before giving up and going home.
God knew I could use the support. The last few days had been a nightmare of emotions I couldn’t wake up from.
I tried to pretend.
I tried to forget.
I dissected what Josh had done to me, stripping it down to the most basic feelings and shoving them into all their disgusting drawers.
But nothing worked.
Physically, I ached head to toe. New bruises appeared every day, and the splinters I couldn’t reach in my back had become red and swollen. All that I could take.
I was no stranger to pain. My body would eventually heal. In a few days, when the bruises faded, I could ask Thea for help, making up some excuse for how the splinters had gotten there. Then, not too long after that, a day would come when there wouldn’t be a single trace of what Josh had done to me at all.
Nobody would ever know but me.
There was no magical remedy for the festering wound he’d left inside my soul though. The pieces he’d ruined inside me would never heal or even scab over. Guilt and filth devoured me every waking moment, but when I slept, the nightmares were worse. So the last two days had been spent in purgatory, staring off into space and crying.
And then there was Camden with his Coke and Snickers.
Sweet, innocent, oblivious Camden.
I’d wanted to throw up when he’d told me he’d followed me home last summer and seen my dad in all his drunken glory. My time at the creek with Camden was my safe space. He didn’t know about the hell at home. The fact that Ramsey and I were practically raising ourselves. Or the constant struggle to keep our ugly lives a secret.
All he knew was what I’d told him. For the same reasons I hadn’t shar
ed Camden with the people in my life, I hadn’t wanted to share my world with Camden, either.
But he knew. He had always known.
And still, he’d come back.
Another hour passed with him sitting on the porch. He’d gotten up at one point and walked away. The disappointment of watching him leave was almost as intense as the relief that he was finally gone. The warmth filling my hollow chest and the tears that stung my eyes when I realized he’d only gone to the hose on the side of the house for a drink of water were the most telling emotions of all.
When a thunderstorm rolled in at the four-hour mark, I was positive he’d finally leave. He didn’t like to get his clothes wet at the creek and always wrapped himself up in his towel like a mummy. While thunder rattled the windows, the sky dumped buckets of rain, and the angry wind pelted him, he stayed.
It made me the worst friend in the world, but I sat inside, dry and warm, watching out the window in absolute awe that he cared enough to be sitting there. The broken and ugly parts of me were desperate to see how far he’d go—or, more accurately, what I was truly worth to Freaking Camden Cole.
Hour five, I paced, gnawing on my fingernails and getting frustrated. This was just ridiculous. What the hell was he doing? He was soaking wet, and despite it being a million degrees outside, every time the wind blew hard enough, he’d shiver. Why wasn’t he giving up? He must have been bored and hungry. He’d been sitting there so long I bet his butt was asleep too.
He’d made his point. He cared. Okay, great. Caring didn’t equal trust though.
Did it?
“You’re gonna wear a hole in your floor if you keep pacing like that!” he shouted from the other side of the door.
I froze and squeezed my eyes shut. Of course he heard me. It wouldn’t have been my life if he hadn’t. “Go home, Camden!”
“You still got those bruises? Then I’m not going anywhere. Because if you have those now, it’s gonna get worse one day. And it might be during the school year when I’m not here to sit on your porch for the next eighty days if need be. I know you’ve got your brother, but it’s never a bad thing to have a friend watching your back too.”
I walked to the door and dropped my forehead against it. “Why are you doing this? You’ve only been back, like, three days.”
“What’s that got to do with anything? You might have hated me while I was gone, but you were always my best friend.”
A shrill You barely even know me! hung on the tip of my tongue. I guessed that wasn’t true anymore, was it? Camden Cole knew me in ways no one else ever had.
But he didn’t know it all. He didn’t know about our dirty house or how only one of the toilets worked but only half the time. He didn’t know I had to hide food from my dad or how on more than one occasion he’d passed out with a cigarette in his mouth, so I slept with an expired fire extinguisher under my bed.
People made assumptions based on how we looked and where we lived, but nobody truly understood Ramsey and me.
Ramsey had chosen to let Thea into our hell. She knew all the secret little details of how we survived, but I’d always been of the mind that letting someone in would only run them off.
Maybe that was exactly what I needed to do to Camden—run him off before he had the chance to realize, friend or not, I wasn’t worth staying for anyway.
Snatching the door open wide, I stood on the curled linoleum revealing the concrete slab of our entryway and let out an aggravated groan. “Just come in already.”
“Well, when you say it all sweet like that…” He stood up with a grimace and shook out his legs. “Ah. Ah. Ah. Pins and needles. Pins and needles.”
“That’s what you get for sitting out there all day. After that storm, you’ll be lucky if you don’t catch pneumonia too.” My anxious stomach knotted as he lumbered toward me. I’d never invited anyone into our house before. The point of this was to show Camden the real me and run him off, but I couldn’t help but be embarrassed all the same.
“I don’t catch pneumonia, Nora. Pneumonia catches me.”
I scoffed and perched a hand on my hip in the rickety doorway. “Then you better get in here. I’ve played tag with you before. Trust me—you aren’t that hard to catch.”
“That was before I carried the Alberton Middle School track team to an eighth-place participation ribbon at the city meet. There were only eight teams and I carried the water more than anything to do with running, but you’re talking to a track star now, Nora. Time to show some respect.”
I would have laughed if I hadn’t been holding my breath when he strutted inside. He stopped abruptly at the edge of the carpet. Frankly, it only resembled carpet in the sense that it had a few fibers left between the bald patches.
This was it. This was the moment when he looked around, realized the filth in my life wasn’t limited to our house, and took off.
It was for the best, really.
He’ll bolt any second now.
He didn’t need a friend like me dragging him down.
Yep. Soon he’ll be long gone.
“If you want to leave—”
He looked at me, those damn blue eyes boring into my soul. “Any chance I can borrow a towel? I’m gonna soak the floor if I walk on it in these wet clothes.”
I stared at him for a beat, searching his face for any sign of disgust or sarcasm. I couldn’t have blamed him; I cringed every time I walked through the door too. But Ramsey and I had long since given up on trying to be my father’s maids. It didn’t matter how many times we attempted to make things look presentable, we were always just one drunken night away from my dad ruining it.
Camden stared at me, waiting for a response, but all I wanted to do was cry.
There was no criticism. No pity. No repulsion.
Just a little confusion and a touch of impatience.
“Nora, seriously, pneumonia is catching up fast.”
All at once, I became unstuck and jogged to my room, grabbing the towel from my creek bag before returning.
“Thanks,” he said with a smile, patting himself dry and then toeing his shoes off.
I studied his gaze shifting around the living room as we walked to my bedroom together. The only thing his eyes lingered on was a baby picture of me and Ramsey that my mother had hung on the wall before she’d left.
My room was nothing fancy, but I was proud of it. The window was cloaked with hot-pink curtains I’d made myself, and a gray-and-white-striped comforter I’d found at a yard sale stretched across my double bed. A lot of my odds-and-ends arts and crafts decorated the walls, including an earring tree I’d made from an old picture frame and a piece of mesh.
As we stepped inside, he said, “Nice room.” It wasn’t a comparison to the rest of the house. Just a statement. Kind and sweet. Pure Camden Cole.
“Thanks.” I pointed to the wooden chair that sat at a small vanity in the corner. “You can sit over there. Your wet clothes won’t mess it up. You hungry?”
“I’m almost certain my stomach has eaten my backbone at this point. But yeah, I’m still starved.”
I grabbed one of the sandwiches from the cooler I kept hidden in the back of my closet so my dad couldn’t find our food. I’d made a bunch of ham and cheese in advance so I didn’t have to leave my room and chance a run-in with my brother. He would have lost his mind if he found out about Josh. My stomach rolled at the very thought of him.
Unaware, Camden was still quick to the rescue. “You have a cooler in your closet? That’s awesome. Why haven’t I ever thought to do that?”
“Yeah.” I laughed awkwardly and sat on the edge of my bed.
He scarfed down the sandwich in four bites, and I handed him what was left of the Coke he’d brought me. That was drained within a few seconds too.
I wiggled my way farther onto my mattress, crossed my legs, and searched the room for something—anything—to talk about to avoid the black-and-blue elephant in the room.
“I was offered a job babysitting thi
s summer,” I blurted.
“You were?”
Picking at the frayed hem of my sweatshirt sleeve, I shrugged, feeling a few of the splinters snag on the inside of my shirt. “It didn’t pan out though. So I’ll still be dealing worms, but maybe next year. I couldn’t get my certificate.”
His blue eyes were intently on me, paying close attention as I spoke.
“I didn’t have the money or a way to get to Thomaston to take the Red Cross test.”
I almost laughed at the confusion on his face.
“The mom and the dad are both nurses. I guess that’s why they’re so big on their babysitter being certified.”
“I didn’t even know that was a thing.” He looked down at his feet and then scratched the back of his neck. “I hate that you didn’t get a better job this summer, but truthfully, the creek wouldn’t be the same without you.”
Boy, did I know all about that. Nothing had been the same without Camden over the school year.
“Oh, well. I probably wouldn’t be any good at it anyway.”
“Watch how you talk about my friend. I bet kids would love hanging out with you. You’re patient. I’m no fool—you couldn’t care less about the books I read, but you listen. You’re reliable. I never had to worry about you not showing up. You’re funny when you want to be.” He wadded up the plastic wrap I’d had the sandwich in and tossed it at my wastepaper basket and missed. “You make a killer ham and cheese too.”
It wasn’t often people said nice things to me, let alone about me. So I was kind of speechless.
“Heck, when you grow up, you’d probably make a pretty great teacher.”
Wasn’t that a fairytale? Kids like me didn’t make it to college, but I didn’t want to say anything negative back since he was being so nice.
Kindness was in short supply in Clovert.
“Yeah, maybe I will.”
His face split into a winning smile, and after that, we just talked. For a few hours, everything was almost easy. Well, until the sleeve on my hoodie rode up, revealing yet another bruise.
His jaw got hard. “So, when’s your dad supposed to be home again?”
I closed my eyes and sighed. “It wasn’t my dad, Cam. At least not this time.”
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