Chapter 45
Josephine
“Easy. A little slower, Hot Girl.”
With a grimace, I check the rear-view mirror again.
“Slower isn’t really an option. There’s a pickup truck riding my ass,” I explain.
Locke turns around in the passenger seat, searching for the offender.
Although I’m not sure “offender” is the appropriate term, since I’m the one driving fifteen under the posted speed limit down a residential street lined with dilapidated homes. If the roles were reversed, I’d be riding my ass, too.
When he rights himself, he turns up the music, blasting “Happy” by Pharrell at full volume.
I look over at him and can’t help but grin. He’s so damn adorable.
When he watches me in return, his expression transforms into an unexpectedly soft smile with a hint of self-consciousness. He invited me along today and is sharing a sacred part of himself with me now. I don’t take that for granted.
He goes back to scanning our surroundings, and a second later, he whips his head in my direction. Once again, the wide, easy smile I know and love takes over his entire face as he points out the windshield.
Past his finger, two little boys, similar in size, race out of the front door of a double-wide and book it down a dirt driveway until they’re skidding to a halt next to my car.
Locke already has his window rolled down and is holding up his hand so the kids freeze and don’t run into the road. The truck that was riding my tail passes, thankfully, then Locke waves the kids over to his side.
He greets them and offers them knuckles. “Trey, Trenton. You got first! Good work, boys. You wanna help me gather up the team?”
Up close, it’s clear the boys are related, but at least a few years apart. With bright smiles and bobbing heads, they agree and start heckling each other about who can get down to the field faster as they claim opposite sides of the road and take off.
“Next street over,” Locke directs, pointing to where he wants me to drive.
He turns down the music as I make my way there. This street is more of an alleyway, and there are already a few kids watching us eagerly on approach.
“Same thing?” I ask, leaning over to increase the volume again.
“Nope,” he replies, tipping his chin. “I see a few of my kids already out on this street.”
His kids—my heart.
“They know to wait until we’re in front of their house, but they’ll come running as soon as I give them the all-clear.”
“How did you come up with this system?” I muse, amazed at the patience of the little girl with lopsided pigtails who can’t be more than six or seven years old.
She’s hovering on the last step of a rotted wooden deck attached to the front of the house, surrounded by grass that’s as high as her knees.
She waits, bouncing on the balls of her feet with such ferocity it looks like she has to go to the bathroom.
“Here?” I ask. Locke nods and waits for me to come to a stop before he waves her over.
“Rosie Posie! Hi, princess.” He offers her knuckles just like the boys. “You’re my team lead for this street, okay? Make your brothers help, but tell them I said you’re in charge.”
She’s wearing a toothy grin when she spins on her heel and screams, “Jimmy! Josh!” like a banshee as she heads back to the double-wide she must call home.
“Princess?” I tease, putting the car in drive and coasting down the road to the next section of houses.
“Ah, are you jealous, Hot Girl?” Locke smirks, raising his pierced brow for emphasis.
I return the gesture and shake my head. “Not jealous. Mostly impressed. And more than a little curious. You do this every week?”
“We take turns.” He points straight ahead to guide me farther along the street. “Me and the boys. A few of the other guys on the team volunteer, too. Only a select few I know I can trust, though. With the way the schedule works out, I’m out here about once a month.”
“So it’s different days and times each week?”
“No, never. We pick a day and time for the whole year and stick to it,” he contends. “We haven’t canceled in the four years since we started the program.”
Halting at a four-way stop, I survey him, curious. “Why bother going through the streets like this, then?”
Locke scowls, looking all directions before nodding me forward. “Slower on this one,” he directs with a nod of his head. He’s typically laid-back and more than easy-going. I’ve never seen him as purposeful about anything as he is about the task at hand.
“We have to be consistent. These aren’t the kids whose parents sign them up for sports and camps.
They’re the ones who don’t even make it to school some days because of lack of transportation or just negligent parents.
It can’t be on the kids to keep track of when we practice.
Most of them are too young to have phones, and there’s no one at home reminding them to head to the field.
It’s simple,” he sweeps his hand around the car and up and down the street, “but it works.”
“Typically, by the time we’ve made it down every street, word has spread enough that they’re all waiting at the park when we get there.”
“And how many kids usually show up?”
“Fifteen or twenty. Sometimes more. Seven or eight usually want to play.”
“Less than half?” I challenge.
Locke hums patiently, waving to an older woman sitting on a front porch in an aluminum-frame lawn chair.
“Everyone who shows up gets a bagged lunch, plus another bagged meal to take home.”
That I knew. Mrs. Lansbury, Decker, and Kylian prepared all the food this morning in an assembly-line of sorts. They worked quickly and with such precision it was obvious they’d done it before.
“All the kids have to do is show up. All I want them to have to do is show up,” he emphasizes. “When they do, they know they’ll have something to eat and that a safe adult is waiting. That’s more than what some of them can expect on their best days.”
Understanding and heartache wash over me in waves.
That was me once. Home alone for days at a time.
Slicing open my hand on jagged aluminum when I was too young to use a can opener on my own but desperate to get to what was inside.
I was never physically abused or assaulted at home, but the neglect can be just as painful as a physical blow.
I let his words marinate in my mind. Here we are, living in a literal mansion, while there are so many kids in unsafe homes, just trying to survive. My heart hurts for Locke and for the little boy he was; he had to learn these lessons himself.
“Did you grow up around here?” I ask. I don’t want to open old wounds, but I’m more than a little curious about his life before he came to live with Brenda and Gary and eventually met the guys.
“Not in this neighborhood, but in one like it. We lived closer to the coast.”
Worrying my lip, I push my luck. “How old were you when you went into the system?”
“Seven.”
He lets the one-word answer linger between us, sighs, then continues.
“We were playing dodgeball in gym class. I took a hard ball to the gut and promptly collapsed. Then when I got to the nurse’s office…”
“Duty to report,” I surmise.
It’s a very real fear and one I also dealt with as a child.
Avoiding the people and situations that may draw extra attention to myself became second nature from a young age.
Avoiding the system was my primary goal for so long.
Plenty of kids have good experiences in foster care.
Some don’t, though, and a child’s baser instincts are often set to prefer the devil they know versus the devil they don’t.
Locke nods, his expression grim. “Thank god, too.”
Oh. I wasn’t expecting that.
“I had internal bleeding from the beating I took the night before.”
Shit on a crumbly cracker. I grip the steering wheel and bite on my inner cheek to fight back tears as emotion overwhelms my senses.
“By the time I was discharged from the hospital, it was official. I was taken straight to my first foster home.”
My mind conjures up the image of a young Nicky, hurting both physically and emotionally in ways I can’t begin to fathom.
I was in no position to help anyone but myself all those years ago, but I find myself wishing I could go back in time and help him somehow.
I want nothing more than to wipe away his pain and replace it with all the love he deserves.
He drops a hand to my knee and squeezes, pulling me from my spiraling thoughts.
Melancholy fills the space between us as we finish the route.
I like that he doesn’t try to gloss over his truth.
He doesn’t sugarcoat the past, but he doesn’t dwell on it, either.
His tenacity is admirable. The way he rarely lets things rattle him is a skill I’d love to learn.
The last road on our route ends at a parking lot in the middle of several fields, so I peek over, waiting for instruction.
“Left up here,” he points with a tatted finger. “Park next to that equipment shed.”
I pull into the closest spot, put the car and park, and unbuckle. Before I can pull open the door handle, Locke grasps my wrist.
“Hold up, Hot Girl. I got you something.”
He holds out a plastic shopping bag from a local business.
“You don’t have to wear it now if you don’t want to… I just wanted you to have the option.”
I snatch the bag out of his hands. “Is that what I think it is?” My giddiness peaks when he just smiles and cocks one brow in response.
Tearing into the bag, I let out a squeal. The slinky bright red fabric is an instant giveaway.
Grinning, I lean over and kiss him, then pull the jersey all the way out of the bag. This is the first time a guy has ever gifted me his jersey, aside from Greedy’s duplicitous offering, and if the warmth growing in my belly is any indication, I like the whole concept very much.
“Wait…”
I hold up the shirt, confused, as I process what I’m seeing.
It’s emblazoned with a big number 9. But the name above it doesn’t belong to him…
Locke tucks a strand of hair behind my ear, then caresses my jaw with the backs of his knuckles. “I know better than most that the name you’re born with means nothing. More than that… sometimes it’s a name you’d rather forget.”
I blink at him, hit with an emotion so strong it leaves an ache gripping my chest.
“I want you to wear my number,” he explains.
“But I put Meyer on the back because you fought like hell to become the person you are today. I want you to know that I see you, Joey. You’re so beautiful and strong, and you’ve had to survive and overcome so much.
I’d be honored if you’d wear number nine for me, but I want you to be represented, too.
I see the life you’re working hard to create for yourself, and I want to be part of it. ”
“Nicky.” I press my palms to his face and pour every emotion threatening to spill out in the tears welling behind my eyes into the kiss I plant on his lips.
Pulling back, I give him one last peck, then adjust so I can look him in the eyes.
“I love you.”
He tries to shake his head, but I press more firmly on both sides of his jaw, refusing to let him shrug off my confession.
“I love you,” I repeat. “I love who you are. I love who I am with you and how you make me want to be the best version of me. I’m in love with you.”
Gnawing on his bottom lip, he searches my face, his eyes filling with tears that mirror mine.
“Yeah?”
I nod, sniffling back the emotion threatening to overwhelm me.
“Yeah,” I whisper, kissing him again. “I love you, Nicky,” I vow against his lips. “And I love this jersey,” I assure him. “Thank you.”
“I love you, too, Josephine Meyer. I see you. And I can’t wait to watch you ride me wearing nothing but this jersey,” he taunts, twisting the fabric in his fist and stealing one last kiss across the center console.
“In your dreams, Emo Boy.”
He scoffs. “I think you mean in my bed tonight, Hot Girl.”