Chapter 2
CHAPTER 2
ATLAS
“ P lease don’t be mad,” I murmur, reaching across the center console for Scarlet’s hand.
Much to my surprise, she allows me to interlace our fingers.
She’s been giving me the silent treatment and glaring like a pissed-off alley cat ever since she came back to my room to find me with my nose buried in Nora’s diary, instead of coming straight out to her after getting ready.
“I just don’t get it, Atlas.” She strokes her thumb over my knuckle.
“First you forgot we even had plans, and then after being reminded, you still blew me off to read your sister’s diary.”
Not my fucking sister, I think to myself, knowing better than to say it out loud.
I’m trying to shove the worms back into the damn can, not open it from both ends.
“I’m not trying to be rude,” she continues, “but like, it’s kind of weird, don’t you think?”
“Weird how?” I ask, turning into The Creek’s parking lot.
Although, if I’m being honest, I’m not entirely sure I want to hear her answer.
“Seriously?” She yanks her hand out of my grip.
“You don’t see anything weird or creepy about a grown-ass man reading his little sister’s diary?”
I heave out a breath and throw my truck into park.
“First of all, Nora’s not my sister. My dad married her mom?—”
“Fine, she’s your stepsister ,” Scarlet growls, cutting me off.
“That’s still family.”
Anger simmers beneath my ribs, but I swallow down the urge to lash out, and continue evenly.
“Second, I barely even know Nora. Hell, I’ve probably only been around her a handful of times in the years our parents were married. Third, it’s not that I care about what’s in her diary, it’s that she left it for me, with a note begging me to read it. Begging me, Scar. You’re over here making me out to be some kind of fucking pedophile, and that’s fucked up, big time fucked up. Not to mention, you know Dad’s been MIA and I’m worried about both of them. So, excuse-the-fuck-out-of-me for latching onto any clue I can.”
“You’re right, I’m sorry.” Scarlet looks away, shame coloring her cheeks.
“I guess I was just jealous you forgot about me.”
Leaning over the console, I run my knuckles under her chin, drawing her gaze back my way.
“No need to be jealous, Scar. You know you’re my girl.”
The words sour on my tongue the second I form them, because Scarlet and I both know she’s not my girl a hell of a lot more than she is.
I mean, shit, it wasn’t even an hour ago that I was thinking we should take a break again.
“You mean it?” she asks, blinking up at me through thick, sooty lashes.
I really don’t…
The realization smacks me across the face with the force of a two-by-four, but I’m not trying to spend the night fighting, so instead I force my lips up into a grin and nod.
“You know it. Now let’s go find Ellis and order some drinks.”
We both open our doors at the same time—I used to try to open Scarlet’s for her, but after about the second or third time, she let me know she could get her own damn door—and meet in front of my truck.
“Are you actually gonna dance with me?” Scarlet asks, stepping ahead of me to get to the door.
I ball my hands into fists at my sides and let her hold it open for me.
It’s not that I’m against women doing things for themselves, it’s just one of the many things my mama ingrained in me before she passed away.
Swear to God, some days, I can still hear her voice as clear as day telling me hold that door or a gentleman walks on the outside of the sidewalk to place himself between his companion and harm.
But Scarlet’s as headstrong as an ox, and I know damn well I’m better off respecting her feelings than pushing my own on her.
The second we enter the dimly lit bar Scarlet’s hips begin to sway in perfect time with the music pulsing through the speakers.
I follow behind her as she weaves her way through the crowd in search of Ellis.
I’m not sure who’s playing tonight, but whoever they are, they have a hell of a following, because there are people wall to fucking wall in here.
I scan the bar and by sheer luck I spot him and his date cozied up together in a booth on the far wall.
With the way he’s leaning in close and whispering in her ear, I’m half-tempted to leave them to it.
But Scarlet spots them, too, and takes off in their direction before I can suggest giving them some space.
“Well, well, well,” Scarlet chides as she approaches their table.
“Isn’t this… intimate. ” She’s always been a bit weird whenever Ellis dates, and maybe that should bother me, but it doesn’t.
You’re not invested enough to care…
Revelations are hitting me left and right tonight, or maybe I’m finally admitting what I’ve always known.
Either way, I’m going to need a drink or two to survive the night.
Ellis straightens in the booth, wrapping a protective arm around his date in the process.
“’Sup, man?” He lifts his chin in greeting as I slide into the opposite side of the booth.
“Not a whole lot,” I say, causing Scarlet to scoff.
Girl holds a grudge like no one else I’ve ever known—except for my dad, maybe—but if I start thinking about him, I’m going to start thinking about Nora, and then the night will for sure end in a fight.
Ellis’s eyes flit between us, but with a subtle shake of my head, he lets it go.
“I’d like y’all to meet Callie. Cal, this is my roommate, Atlas, and his girl Scarlet.”
“It’s nice to meet you. Heard a lot about you,” I tell her while Scarlet plays on her phone, ignoring all of us.
Callie’s cheeks turn a deep shade of pink.
“It’s nice to meet y’all, too.”
I nudge Scarlet with my elbow, not even trying to keep up with her mood swings.
If I didn’t know better, I’d think my girlfriend had a thing for my best friend.
But she can barely stand him most days.
Still, no reason for her to be rude, especially when she’s the one who dragged us out here for a double date.
For a second, I worry she’s not going to put her phone away, but after she finishes typing something out, she sighs and locks the screen before sliding the slim device back into her purse.
“Sorry about that,” she says, not sounding the least bit sorry.
“So, tell me, Sarah, how did y’all meet?”
“Her name’s Callie,” Ellis and I correct her in tandem, but Scarlet just smiles and murmurs another feigned apology.
“Well, it’s actually a pretty funny story.” Callie smiles up at my best friend, and I’ve got to admit, the way she doesn’t even falter a little in the face of Scarlet’s cattiness impresses me.
“I was driving down the older part of Driftwood Way—you know, where it’s only a single lane of traffic?—and he was coming from the other way, so I tried moving over to make room for his beast of a truck and I got stuck in the mud!”
Ellis laughs.
“My beast came in handy, though, didn’t it?”
“Your winch did, anyway,” she quips, reaching for her drink.
“Isn’t that charming.” The strain in Scarlet’s voice steals my focus away from the happy couple.
She’s usually pretty pleasant—even around Ellis—but tonight she’s all poison, and I’m not really sure why.
“Why don’t you go and grab us a pitcher and ask for them to start us a tab?” I ask, trying to get this night back on track.
“I could definitely use a damn drink.” She stands from the table and stalks off toward the bar without so much as a backward glance.
“Who in the hell pissed in her Cheerios?” Ellis asks as soon as she’s gone.
“I think I did,” I admit, running my hands through my hair.
“I know she’s a spitfire, but tonight she’s more like a fucking bonfire doused in gasoline.”
Callie props her elbows on the table, balancing her chin on her fists.
“I just figured she didn’t like me.”
Ellis laughs.
“I don’t think Scar likes anyone.”
I nearly laugh, but swallow the sound back before it can escape.
I’m already on thin ice with her, and despite being unsure about the future of our relationship, I can’t stand by and let him talk shit.
“She’s not that bad. Honestly. Scarlet’s typically pretty nice, if a little high-strung. Our night got off to a bad start because I forgot we had plans.”
“In the doghouse, huh?” Ellis laughs, his eyes crinkling in the corners.
“Woof!”
My best friend is a complete and total jackass.
“Shut up.”
“No, seriously, what’d you do?”
“Well…” I glance toward the bar and see there’s still a few patrons ahead of Scarlet.
“I found Nora’s diary in our mailbox, and?—”
“I’m sorry, what?” Ellis cuts me off.
“Why in the hell would your little sister’s diary be in our mailbox?”
“She’s not my sister,” I mutter, pinching the bridge of my nose.
“And I haven’t figured out the why yet, but she left a sticky note on it asking me to please read it.”
“And you’re actually doing it?” Ellis’s whole face screws up.
“Like, you’re reading all about her little teenage crushes and shit?”
Callie cuts her eyes at Ellis and then to me.
“Yes, because that’s all girls are capable of, right?”
“Hey, whoa!” He holds his hands up, backtracking.
“I didn’t mean anything by it. It’s just… weird.”
“Yeah, well, Scar thinks so, too.” I shift my shoulders, trying to shake off my growing frustrations.
“But with how Dad’s been acting, I need all the help I can get.”
Ellis looks thoughtful as he takes a sip of his drink.
“Still haven’t heard from him?” he asks, after he swallows.
“Nope. He’s been off since Grace died, like more so than usual, and now…” I trail off as I try to find the right words.
“He’s not exactly a warm guy on the best of days, and on the worst, he’s an outright asshole, and Nora’s so small and her mom was all she had, and I guess I’m just… fuck. ” I sigh, unable to articulate my concern.
“You’re worried, man, and that’s okay.”
“Yeah, I am. I just can’t shake the feeling that something’s wrong. I was actually going to ask if you could do a welfare check?”
“Yeah, of course.”
His easy agreeance instantly has me feeling ten pounds lighter.
“Thanks, man.” I hold my fist out toward him, and he bumps his knuckles to mine.
“It’s what friends are for.”
I turn to Callie, feeling slightly embarrassed, having just spilled all of that in front of a virtual stranger.
“Sorry about that…”
She smiles and knocks her shoulder into Ellis’s.
“No apology needed. Promise.”
Ellis quirks his brows at me and then leans down to press a kiss to Callie’s temple.
“She’s a good one, man.”
“Seems like it.”
“Aw, am I interrupting a moment?” Scarlet asks, thrusting the pitcher down onto the table.
A little beer splashes over the side, but Callie grabs a napkin and sops it up before I can.
“Just catching up,” I tell her, pouring myself a glass.
“Catching up?” She blinks and then laughs humorlessly.
“You live together, what is there to catch up on?”
“Scarlet—” I start, but the sound of a loud guitar riff cuts me off, stopping our fight before it can even start as the band takes the stage.
“I’m so excited!” Callie shimmies in her seat.
“I’ve heard they’re so good. C’mon, El, let’s dance.”
He slides out of the booth and extends a hand to her, which she readily grabs, and together they head out onto the packed dance floor.
Scarlet still looks sour, but maybe once the music starts and she’s had a few drinks, she’ll forget all about being upset with me.
I top off her drink as the band’s frontman addresses the crowd.
“What’s up, Fortune, Georgia? We’re Iron Resurrection, and we’re fucking stoked to be here tonight!”
The bar erupts into cheers, as the drummer counts them off, launching straight into their first song.
“Don’t be mad, Scar.” I damn near have to shout for her to hear me.
She turns to face me, hurt and fury all over her face.
“I heard you, you know?”
“Heard me what?” I rack my brain trying to think of what she could be talking about, because unless she can hear my innermost thoughts, I can’t imagine what she could have heard to have her this pissed off.
I swear, this whole fucking night feels like one step forward and two back.
“Talking about Nora and how worried you are about her because she’s so soft and delicate.”
“What?” I cock my head to the side, trying and failing to get a good read on the situation.
“You’re mad that I’m worried about my stepsister?”
“I just think it’s interesting that she’s all you’ve been able to think about tonight. Like, what the fuck, Atlas?”
I down the rest of my beer, trying like hell to keep my cool.
But Scarlet almost seems hungry for a fight.
“I’m struggling here, Scar. Help me out.”
“If we fucked tonight, would you think about her then too? Would you call her name out when you came?”
“What in the actual hell is wrong with you?” I ask, horrified by what she’s implying.
“I’m just saying you seem a little too concerned.”
“Get up,” I growl, already moving forward.
Scarlet scrambles out of the booth and I stalk past her, heading toward the bar without sparing her so much as a second glance.
“Atlas! Wait!” she hollers after me, but I keep on, determined to settle our tab and leave.
This whole night has been a dumpster fire, start to finish.
“Another round?” the bartender asks.
“Cash me out.” I pull out my wallet and pass him my card.
I feel someone tug on my shirt as I sign the bill, and I turn to find Scarlet behind me, her eyes wet with tears.
“Please, Atlas, I didn’t mean?—”
“Mean it or not, you said it. You’ve been itching for a fight all night, so you went low to get a reaction out of me.”
She sucks her wobbling lower lip between her teeth and glances down at the sticky bar floor.
“I can give you a ride home or you can call an Uber. Either way, I’m out.”
“You don’t mean that,” she whispers, looking up at me from beneath damp lashes.
“I really do.” I slide my phone out of my pocket, tap open the rideshare app, and tilt my screen toward her.
“Now, what’ll it be?”
Right before my eyes, her melancholy and regret morphs into anger.
“You’re a real piece of work, Atlas Wallace!” she shouts, garnering us more than a few stares before turning and storming off.
“Guess she’ll find her own way home,” I mutter, closing out of the app and opening my text thread with Ellis.
Me
Heading home. Pissed Scarlet off, nuclear level.
Keep an eye out?
Miraculously, he texts me back instantly.
Ellis
10-4. Eyes on her now at the table.
Drive safe.
With that settled, I slide my phone back into my pocket and head for my truck.
This whole night’s been shit, and the only thing that sounds remotely appealing is climbing into my bed and conking out until morning.
The drive home feels longer than usual, and by the time I make it through the front door and into my room, I’m exhausted.
After brushing my teeth, I strip down to my boxers and all but collapse onto my bed.
My eyelids are already heavy as I slip beneath the covers, but as I slide my arm beneath my pillow for support, my fingers brush against something hard.
Nora’s diary.
And just like that, I’m wide awake and flipping to where I left off.
DIARY ENTRY, AGE 13
Dear Diary,
It’s almost my birthday, and Mama keeps asking me what I want and I keep telling her I don’t know and she keeps getting frustrated and saying they don’t sell that at the store.
But, Diary, the problem is, they don’t sell what I want…
Unless you can bring people back from the dead for real and I just don’t know it.
My best friends—well, former best friends—told me I needed to get over my dad dying because no one likes sad girls.
But how? How am I supposed to just get over it?
It’s only been six months since he passed.
Six months that somehow feel like the blink of an eye and an eternity all at the same time.
But I can’t just tell Mama all of that, because she’s been smiling recently.
And for a while there, I didn’t think I’d ever see her smile again.
So, I’ll just keep my mouth shut and make up something that I want so that she can feel like things are the way they should be.
And so she’ll think I’m “healing.”
Because I know she feels guilty.
Which is kind of dumb because she didn’t do anything.
It’s not like she killed him.
But like Ms. Maggie (that’s my therapist) says, grief isn’t always logical.
In fact, she says that sometimes grief is downright sneaky.
That you can be fine and then all of a sudden sobbing and then raging at the unfairness of it all in a single breath.
I guess she’s right, too, because I’ve done just that.
Like, even silly little things will make me so mad that I just blow up.
I know it worries Mama (clearly, since I’m seeing a shrink every week—luckily, she doesn’t work for the same place Mama does, because that would be weird) but she mostly just tells me to write down how I’m feeling.
Over and over, she tells me to put my pain to paper and to give it away.
But sometimes I worry that if I keep writing it all down that I’ll forget.
Not my dad—I’ll always remember him, Diary, because he’s the best man I’ve ever known.
No, I worry I’ll forget how sad I am without him.
I worry that one day I’ll smile like nothing ever happened…
like he was never here.
Deep down, I know he would want me to be happy and to smile, but here’s that illogical grief creeping in again, like it always does, wrapping itself around me like a heavy blanket, making sure I stay a sad girl—the kind of girl Kelsey and Eliza say no one likes.
But maybe that’s my lot in life.
To be the sad girl without a dad who dreads her birthday and smiling.
Or maybe today was just a lot and I needed to vent.
Who knows. I guess time will tell.
Sadly, Nora
DIARY ENTRY, AGE 14
Dear Diary,
Today’s the big day.
As of 4:45 this afternoon, I’m officially fourteen.
Mom started the day with waffles and bacon, like always, but where Dad always made perfect bacon, hers was burned.
I mean it, too—it literally looked like strips of a tire.
But I ate every charred bite with a fake smile on my face because she’s been sad again.
We’re both sad girls now, except today I have to pretend to be happy.
Which sucks, because I’m anything but.
Mama insisted on throwing me a party last night, and she double insisted on me inviting pretty much my whole grade.
She said fourteen was a special year (I don’t know what’s so special about it) and so she booked the skating rink and bought a bunch of pizzas and cake.
Surprise, surprise… No one came.
Mama kept asking if I handed the invites out (I did) and I kept asking if she had the date and time right (she did), which really sucks because it means Kelsey and Eliza were right after all.
No one likes sad girls.
No one likes me.
I somehow went from being in the cool crowd to the weird loner who eats lunch in the library.
I guess this is what Mama meant when she said teenagers were fickle.
Although, I’m pretty sure that’s just a nice way of saying shallow assholes.
Then again, I barely like me at this point, so maybe Kelsey and Eliza are actually onto something.
All I do is cry and read and listen to all of Dad’s favorite songs.
Mama says I’m suffering from depression, and Ms. Maggie agrees.
They think I need to be medicated, like some freaking happy pill can take away the ache of losing him.
But the thought of the pain ever really easing only makes me hold onto it that much more, because won’t being happy again mean that I’ve forgotten him?
Mama says it’s not healthy to carry around this kind of hurt, but I say she’s a hypocrite because she carries it around, too.
She just hides it with concealer, lipstick, and brittle smiles.
I guess I should tell you about my birthday gift.
I ended up telling Mama I wanted a gift card to the local bookstore.
She bought me and loaded it with a hundred dollars.
She also bought me some nice pens (I’m using one now) and a framed picture of Dad and me from my thirteenth birthday.
We’re both making silly faces in the picture, and I cried like a baby when I saw it.
So, even though I’m apparently a giant loser with no friends, it was still a pretty good birthday…
as good as it could be, anyway. Numbly, Nora