by Hughes, Maya
If I was missing something, I couldn’t see it.
14
Jules
We made it out the other side of the weekend unscathed. Well, Berk did. Every time my mom ‘needed a word’ I braced myself to feel a few inches smaller.
“Your sister wanted you as a bridesmaid, but we may have to take you out of the pictures if you don’t lose some weight before then.”
“You’re lucky he’s even here with you. Why would you try to outrun him? Don’t you know men like to feel powerful. Not have a woman try to show them up.”
“Please go take a shower before everyone assumes you’re sweating because of the heat.”
“Where did you get those clothes, Julia? It’s a wonder he saw anything in you at all.”
I’d been seconds from screaming the truth right in her face, but that would’ve been worse. That I’d lied about being with Berk—oh, sorry, Berkley—would only be another example of how I suck and no one like him would ever want to be with someone like me. At least once we left, I’d have no trouble floating the lie that he’d broken up with me.
I zipped up my bag in our room, but Berk wouldn’t let me haul it out to the bus. He grabbed it, picking it up like it was nothing.
The ride back to the city would be quieter than the one up. Early mornings were not the thing for this set, so out of the three shuttles they’d run from Kelland Estate, I made sure Berk and I were on the first.
I took the inside seat this time, needing Berk’s buffer between me and anyone else who’d decided on an early morning departure. As we pulled down the gravel driveway the shuttle’s leather seats weren’t even halfway full, but Berk didn’t move rows.
The storm clouds were back, rain drumming on the window I rested my head on. The hoodie Berk had let me borrow smelled like him and swam on me, which made it perfect for sinking into.
“What do you have planned before classes start?”
“Stress baking as I try to get everything ready.”
“Let me get in on some of that.” He unravelled his headphones from around his phone and stuck a twizzler into his mouth. He had a Mary Poppins-sized portion stashed somewhere.
I shoved at his shoulder and he barely moved; it was like jamming my hand into a brick wall. “You’re not supposed to bask in my stress.”
“How can I not when your delicious treats are what I get because of it? I’m tempted to stand outside your bedroom banging pots and pans to keep you bleary-eyed and baking.”
“Then I’ll sick Elle on you and you know Nix’ll back her up.”
“Playing hardball, I see. He invited us all over to watch Reece’s game this week. I think he’s just happy he’s not doing two-a-day practices and about to head out on the road for the season. Can’t believe he passed on the paycheck, though.”
“Some things are more important than money.”
“Says the person who always had it.” He looked at me with a small grin. The butterflies in my stomach were like a herd. A flock? Whatever the hell a group of butterflies was called, and that was bad, bad news. Berk was so many things, but my new boyfriend wasn’t at the top of that list. He had my new heartbreak written all over him, and I’d been there already. Standing inside my front door as he ordered a cake for Alexis. I still didn’t know the deal with her and I wasn’t going to put my heart on the line to find out.
“Touché.”
He held out an earbud to me. “Have you heard the latest James Arthur album?”
“You’ve got a killer ear. Lay it on me.”
“I like listening to new stuff, so I’m always rediscovering things I’ve forgotten about.” He held out the bud to me.
My fingers itched to grab it and let my skin brush against his, accidentally-on-purpose, but this was the time to put that friend barrier firmly back in place. He’s not thinking about you like that. Don’t mistake his kindness, or even a semi-drunk almost-kiss, for anything more than it is.
“I’m not feeling too hot. I’m going to sleep.” I stared down at the floor between our feet.
“Was it the eggs? I don’t know how you eat them so runny.”
“No, it’s probably just nerves. I’ll sleep it off.”
Concern wrinkled his brow and he ran his hand quickly over my thigh.
It was like a Pavlovian response. I’d need to change my underwear as soon as we got back to the house.
“Don’t worry about me. Sleep, Frenchie.” He pulled the hood up higher on my head.
A weak smile was all I could muster before I leaned back against my seat, wedging my head against the window. All the touches and quiet moments almost made it feel like we were a couple, but I’d learned never to read too far into things.
Guys don’t see me that way. The one time I thought a guy did, I’d wound up wanting to bury myself under my high school until graduation. As a member of the stage crew, I was allowed to go on the theater club’s weekend visit to a Broadway show back in high school.
Dexter, the cutest guy in drama club, had ended up sitting next to me. We roamed NYC together before the show and grabbed food together. I was so giddy, I was seconds away from floating off like one of the Thanksgiving Day parade balloons. And when he said he needed to talk and told me all about the girl he really liked but was afraid to talk to, I was probably beaming like a spotlight as I inched closer to him.
Maybe he saw the crazy look in my eye or the way my smile changed, but his smile dropped, plummeted straight off his face. “Oh, you don’t think I’m talking about you, do you? I meant your sister.”
After the way I’d held it together in front of him, I’d deserved to be the lead in the school play. “Of course, who else would you be talking about?” Not a strain in my voice, not a quaver, although inside, I was crawling into a pit of despair.
Nope, not making the mistake of confusing flirting and niceness with him wanting something more from me again. We’d roll back onto campus and things would be back as they should be. No more laying in bed beside Berk. And no more almost-kisses. No more pretending.
* * *
We got off the bus and Berk and I shared a taxi back to our street. I fidgeted with the strap of my bag at the bottom of my steps and nudged my glasses up. In another world, this would be the big moment before our kiss, but this wasn’t that kind of world.
“That was probably the craziest weekend I’ve had in a while, and I’m totally including the one where the other team was hazing their freshman with cherries and duct tape.”
I held up my hand. “I don’t even want to know. Thank you for coming. You were a life saver.”
It made it worse that my mom would never say the things she said in private in front of Berk. Way worse because she knew it was wrong. She knew that the words that launched from her mouth like poisoned darts were screwed up, but she did it anyway.
“You’ve been quiet since we got on the bus.”
“I’m tired.” Plastering that smile on my face had made my cheeks all achy.
“I get that.” He took a breath. “We never really talked about it. But about that—”
I cut him off before he could get the words out.
“And I know we were just pretending about the whole dating thing. And the greenhouse. Don’t worry about it. It was nothing. I’ve completely forgotten about it, so…”
Deflect, hide, run. That was how I handled uncomfortable situations. Run for cover if at all possible.
“Let’s just go back to how things were before and leave all that back at Kelland.”
“We don’t—”
And when all else failed, run away.
“Really. It’s okay. I’ll talk to you later. Bye.” I bolted up the steps.
“See you in class.”
Shit. Double shit. We were in class together and we were neighbors. Hiding from him wasn’t a solid long-term strategy, but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t work for right now. I rested my head against the door, closed my eyes, and dropped my bag on the floor.
“What’s up?�
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I yelped and kicked out with my best Karate Kid impersonation with my heart thundering against my ribs. “What the fuck?”
Zoe stood at the bottom of the stairs with a spoon in her mouth and a jar of peanut butter in her hand. She had her hair up in a ponytail, and pajama boxers and a bright pink tank top on.
It made me miss Elle. Times like these, she’d always been there to pick me up after my mom and sister drained me of happiness like emotional vampires.
There wasn’t a stretch mark in sight and Zoe’s healthy, glowing skin was on full display. Probably a nice bikini tan line from her summer vacation to wherever the hell she pleased.
“Is that my extra chunky peanut butter?”
“Maybe.” She looked from me to the jar. “Whoops.” Her mild look of contrition didn’t stop her from sticking another spoonful in her mouth—straight from the jar. “Sorry. It was the only thing I didn’t feel like a dick for eating.”
“What are you doing here?” I grabbed the strap of my bag.
“I live here, remember?”
“Do you remember, would be the better question.”
“You got me there. Why the sadness? You’re about to make me cry.”
“No sadness, I’m fine. It’s been a long weekend and I need to crash before tomorrow.”
She hooked her arm through mine and stopped me from walking upstairs. “Just pretend that I’m…” Elle’s name had escaped her. I could practically hear the gears churning and sparks starting as she dredged her memory for our former roommate whom she’d met twice.
“Elle.”
“Yes!” She patted me on the arm and tugged me down to sit on the bottom step.
“You’re really weird, you know that, right?”
“Mhmm.” She hummed through another spoonful of peanut butter.
“And you owe me a jar of peanut butter.” If only I could be that assertive with my mom, or hell, even Laura. Every time Mom said something, a reply shot to the front of my mouth, crushing my dreams of the loving family I’d always wanted and hoped I might reclaim a sliver of someday if I did everything exactly how she wanted.
“And you’re sad again.”
“Family stuff.”
“I hear you. Mom? Dad? Siblings?”
“Mom and sister.”
“Mean girls.” It was a statement, not even a question.
“Kind of.” I tilted my head and looked over at her.
“Here’s what I know about them. If you stand up to them and show them you’re not going to let them walk all over you? They usually back down.”
“I don’t think it works like that with parents.”
“Can’t hurt.”
A thud from upstairs shook the floor. “Babe, there’s only pomegranate-scented body wash,” a distinctly male voice called out from upstairs and a guy strolled to the top of the steps with my blue, extra wide towel wrapped around his waist.
I looked from him to her.
“And I owe you some body wash and a new towel.” She tapped the spoon against her bottom lip. “We kind of got booted out of Jaxon’s place, so we figured we’d crash here. I hope that’s okay with you.”
“It’s not like you don’t pay rent.” I shrugged and got up from the step.
“You won’t even know we’re here.”
“Babe, there’s a stripper pole in this other room! Can we swap?”
“No!” we shouted at the same time.
Dragging my bag into my room, I skirted around the half-naked man standing at the top of the steps. He definitely fit the Zoe-boyfriend-of-the-month-or-possibly-semester mold.
Rippling muscles crafted over hours at the gym making sure he didn’t miss leg day, a legacy admission to the college with grades that would make any regular student lose their shit, and a cocky swagger that would go along with his Fortune 500 job weeks after graduation.
He threw me a chin tilt ‘sup’ before I disappeared into my room.
I unpacked and printed out my syllabi for all my classes, including a wonderfully aggressive one for Buchanan’s class. The one I’d be sharing with Berk.
I stared at my closed blinds like I might suddenly gain X-ray vision and be able to look straight into Berk’s room. The room that was the reason my blinds had been closed for the past three years. Because I shouldn’t be staring into his bedroom dreaming about him. In big bold letters hanging right over my head like a comic book caption, that was how you spelled heartbreak.
15
Berk
It was nothing. I’ve completely forgotten about it. Jules’ words were ringing in my ears days after I’d stood at the bottom of the steps to her place, seconds away from making that almost-kiss a distant memory wiped away by my growing hunger for her.
But then she’d put me in my place. She was a rich girl who could do whatever the hell she wanted. Just because I was a starting Trojan at Fulton U didn’t mean she gave a crap about all that. And while almost everyone over the weekend had been assholes, there were probably guys on her level who weren’t like her sister’s friends wanting to take Jules out on fancy dates.
Places I wouldn’t be allowed without showing them my bank account—well, maybe in a year. Walking backward across the street, I looked at her house. Why did she live in such a craptastic house? With the money her family had, she could’ve stayed in one of the swanky houses right across the street from campus.
Tomorrow, we had class together. Excitement coursed through my veins. The same kind I got before one of my games. Tomorrow, I wouldn’t be the dude who “happened” to be outside at the exact same time she was coming home, or used cookies as an excuse to hang out. Who does that? Me, apparently, I can’t help myself.
In a matter of days, Jules had gone from someone I looked forward to seeing every day, to someone I needed to see. I needed to make her laugh and make sure she was okay. And I wanted her to want that of me too.
There was an awkwardness between us now and I hated every second of it. But I was in this for the long haul, until she told me that under no circumstances was she going to even consider dating me.
My first football game was in two days. I needed to focus. I slung my duffle over my shoulder and opened the front door. Halfway up the stairs, I froze mid-step. Flinging my bag down, I rushed back down the steps and out the front door.
Lifting the mailbox flap, I peered inside. The same blue envelope stared back at me. The crater in my chest formed again, but it was nowhere near as deep as it had been before. I looked across the street and back into the box. There was a new, white, official-looking envelope beside it with my name on it.
I didn’t even check the return address, just ripped it open. Flipping through the printed pages, I went back inside, scanning each one.
Records inquiry complete.
No known address.
No known addressee.
No forwarding address provided.
Every entry for Elizabeth Vaughn came up as another dead end.
I sat on the edge of my bed and stared at the folded sheets of paper on the floor. There was no way I could track her down on my own. I’d tried. Researching each state’s records processes, paying for them. I’d need help, but I didn’t have the money to hire someone to get it done.
That little kid who had stared at the retreating figure of his mom couldn’t let this lie. The same kid who had stared up at the ceiling every night hoping she’d show up at the door telling everyone it had been a terrible mistake—he rattled around in my head, unable to let it go. Moving on was impossible when that scared seven-year-old version of me needed his mom.
My phone sat on the bed beside me. The present my mom had carefully wrapped and tucked into my backpack when she’d left me on the screened-in porch of my dad’s house sat in the middle of my bedroom floor. The white paper with blue and red balloons had faded over the years and there were a few rips, including an especially long one where one of the kids in the group home had found it and tried to open it. I’d carefully tap
ed it back together with his blood still covering my knuckles.
If I opened the box, it would be the last gift I ever got from my mom. She never even got to see me open it. Every birthday, she’d worked hard to buy me one gift and wrap it. Sometimes it was only in newspaper, but the look on her face when I peeled back the paper always made whatever was inside extra special. It was stupid not to open it. For all I know it was a box of decade old Tastykakes, but I couldn’t bring myself to rip through that paper.
I flicked the business card from the sports agent back and forth in my hand. Jerseys were tacked to the walls from charity events the team had run. My lucky number eleven on a few. I’d have a jersey like one of those in a year from now, if I didn’t fuck up.
The card stock thwipped against my palm. Before my rational brain took over, I snatched my phone up off the bed and made the call.
In less than an hour, I had an agent. A business meeting. Five figures sitting in my bank account.
And a private investigator on the case with the full run down of everything I could remember about Evelyn Vaughn.
I’d accepted money from an agent and if anyone found out I was toast and so was the FU season. Everything I’d worked for to set myself up and make sure Alexis never had to worry about a thing could be destroyed in the blink of an eye to track down someone who might not even want to see me. Maybe she’d never bothered looking, or maybe she couldn’t find me, but Mom hadn’t tracked me down so far, and I needed to know this. I needed to find out why she’d given me up. Maybe that would help make putting down roots easier. Finally, having the stability I’d longed for.
It was monumentally stupid, but there was no going back now. It was done.
I sat against my headboard, banging my head against the wall.
Jules’ shadow moved across her bedroom window. The shades were always drawn, but her silhouette was backlit like the perfect torture device. Her arm whipped around almost like she was spinning in a circle, but was cut off by the edge of the window. I could almost see her dancing in her room, folding laundry, a dryer sheet tucked inside so it always smelled freshly washed, or pacing back and forth with flashcards to study. She was definitely that kind of person.