Chapter 23
We ended up staying at the beach for only a little while, since the breeze off the water was so cold. After chatting a bit in the car, we took the long way to Brentwood. The spot we picked to watch the sunrise was definitely fitting, since it was the first place we met.
Lookout Ledge was beautiful in the dark.
Though almost all of the houses in its view had their lights off, I could still see the few high-rises of Brentwood beyond the trees.
They looked magical, even with the light pollution they gave off.
We were far enough away from it all, though, to have a clearer view of the stars, and for a while, Hudson and I tried in vain to find any constellations we knew.
Once that had taken up our attention—and once my eyes had started getting sleepy—we broke out a can of energy drink each.
Hudson had laid out a blanket from Derrick’s car over the stone ledge so our butts wouldn’t freeze, and we faced each other. He crossed his legs and leaned an elbow on his knee now, thinking. “Never have I ever painted my nails.”
I smiled down at my nail polish. Tee had given me a bottle of polish remover before I left, since I wouldn’t be able to have it tomorrow—Mom would no doubt notice and demand to know when I’d had the time to paint my nails.
The mauve polish clung to my nails, and I savored every angle that I could.
“That was boring,” I said, taking a drink from my can, smacking my lips at the overly sweet taste. “Never have I ever…punched someone.”
Hudson tipped his can back. “Never have I ever kneed someone.”
Smirking, I drank. Despite an energy drinks, Hudson’s blinks were getting slower and slower as he looked at me, and my heart did a strange flutter. “You can lie down if you want,” I told him. “An all-nighter is written on my list, not yours.”
“You don’t know that. I could’ve written it down.”
I leaned closer to him. “I don’t know. You haven’t told me any on yours. I don’t even know if you have a list or not.”
He tilted his head, and for a moment, I thought he was going to confess one of them to me. It was like seeing inside his house—pulling back the curtain, finding out what stirred around in his head. What he wanted to do but hadn’t done yet.
“What’s next on yours?” he asked instead of answering.
“Try coffee, which I feel like I’ll let an energy drink count.” I tipped my can. “And then I think after that, it’s skip a class and…cut my hair.”
Hudson’s gaze trailed along my hair slowly. “Do you think you’ll do that? Cut your hair?”
I reached around and threaded my fingers through my loose locks, feeling the small tangles and the waves in it.
The weight of it, even loose, was still enough to pull on my scalp uncomfortably.
The fine line I’d walked all along would have a hole blown into it if I did the last one. Cut my hair. “I don’t know.”
“There’s no time limit on this, you know. No one said you have to do all the tasks in two weeks.”
“Our deal,” I reminded him. “We agreed to be friends for a month. You could decide to drop boring ol’ Gemma Settler at the end of the month, and I’ll have no one to check things off with.”
I said it with enough sarcasm that it made Hudson roll his eyes, but I didn’t really believe that, though.
It wasn’t that I had a set amount of time, but once I got started, I hadn’t wanted to stop.
I’d gotten a taste of that freedom, that new feeling, and I kept wanting more.
And besides, they were excuses to spend time outside my house, with new friends. With Hudson.
I thought back to two weeks ago, the first time I bumped into him in the hallway. “Do you think I’ve grown it?” I asked, swiveling to drape my legs over the stone ledge. “My backbone, I mean.”
“Is that why you’re doing all this?” Hudson regarded me with a curious but quiet expression, trying to decipher what I meant before I said it. “Sneaking out, pulling an all-nighter—the whole rebellion list. Is it because of the Most Likely To list, or…is it because of what I said?”
“I wouldn’t say it’s because of either one of those things.
” I stared beyond the ledge, at the tops of the trees that waved in the wind.
The sight was a lot more ominous than it had been on my birthday, the last time I sat here.
Except with Hudson at my side, I didn’t mind the dark at all.
“At least, not exclusively. It’s more like they were each a part of the catalyst.”
Hudson turned too, which brought his body closer to mine. Our hands were nearly touching on the blanket.
“Landon and I, our whole lives, have lived under my parents’ thumbs.
He gets more freedom than I do. Maybe it’s because he’s older, maybe it’s because he’s a boy, but I think…
I think they think I’m easier than him. Quieter.
More…moldable.” I bit my lip, picturing my parents’ expressions.
“I’m sixteen years old, and I don’t really know who I am. That’s kind of sad, isn’t it?”
Hudson let out a breath. “I don’t think so. Does anyone ever really know who they are?”
I turned toward him, studying his profile. “I’ve never had the chance to find out. Until now.”
“As long as you’re doing this for you. Not because of what anyone else says. Especially not me.”
I chuckled a little as I nodded. “It is for me. I promise.”
We stayed suspended like that, regarding each other in the dull light. The sky had begun to turn a strange gray color, and I wondered if that meant the sunrise would soon be on the horizon. I bit my lip in anticipation, wondering what the colors would look like as they starbursted into the trees.
“Can I ask you a personal question?” I asked eventually.
“I guess so.”
I waffled back and forth on saying anything. At first, it was because I didn’t know how to bring it up tactfully. Then it was because I was afraid to hear his answer. “Principal Oliphant said that you were arrested this summer. Is that true?”
It was almost as if he’d been expecting this question. He didn’t seem shocked at all. “I was,” Hudson said, leveling his gaze with mine. “I wondered why you hadn’t asked earlier.”
“It’s none of my business—”
“You’re out in a secluded location with someone potentially dangerous.” Hudson leaned away from me, as if his own words alarmed him. “It is your business.”
“You’re not dangerous.” But… Both Landon and Principal Oliphant had warned me off of Hudson like he was the plague.
Bad news. They’d both told me he’d been arrested, but only Principal Oliphant alluded to what it could’ve been.
Assault. It was an ugly word, a scary word, but one I couldn’t associate with Hudson no matter how hard I tried.
“Tell me what happened, then. And then I’ll make the decision whether or not to run for the hills. ”
Hudson looked down at the rings on his fingers and studied them, using the pad of his thumb to spin them around.
The nervous fidget had me turning toward the ledge, wanting to give him as much privacy as he needed.
“It was this past summer,” he said after a second.
“I got into a fight with someone outside of Allen’s Alley,” he said eventually, voice heavy.
“He called the police, and they cuffed me.”
I tried to imagine Hudson striking someone. Even as he’d stood before Wes yesterday, I couldn’t imagine it. Pulling his arm back, curling his hand into a fist, landing a punch with precision. “Did he bowl a higher score than you did?”
Hudson snorted at my attempt at humor. “He’s dating my aunt, and he’s a terrible person. Worse than Wes. We were leaving the alley and he saw us and came up to harass my cousin. It escalated, and…well. He’s the kind of guy who’ll provoke a wild animal and then shoot it when it bites him.”
I tried to imagine the scenario, and something tight coiled in my stomach. “He plays the victim.”
“Exactly.” He let out a sharp breath, spinning the ring on his index finger around. “Which is why, despite him hitting my cousin, I was the one arrested for it. That was what he wanted, though. For us to get in trouble. I get it now.”
So that was the situation behind the rumors. Because some adult thought it was a good idea to try to hit a minor, Hudson was the one who got busted for it when he was doing nothing but standing up for someone. “Your cousin…do you mean Lacey?”
“Yeah. Lacey. She’s been living with us since it happened.” He glanced over. “She was the one who was with me yesterday.”
It wasn’t even just a minor that guy had been messing with, but a girl, too? I kind of didn’t know what he was thinking—though nice, Lacey was definitely intimidating. Like the Grim Reaper side of Hudson, but without all the ice.
“Is she who’s dating Landon?”
Hudson arched an eyebrow at me. “You didn’t know that?”
“He’s been keeping it a secret from my parents, which means he’s been keeping it a secret from me.”
“That’s a weird match, isn’t it?”
“Kind of.” I looked at him closer. “Do you approve? After everything that happened?”
“I think your brother is a good person,” Hudson said, surprising me further.
He shook his head a little. “I think if I were to regret anything about that day in ninth grade, it would’ve been hitting him.
I shouldn’t have done it.” The side note dulled back as we returned to the subject at hand, both of us quieting for a moment.
Hudson stared at his splayed fingers, looking at them with an intensity that was a contrast with his slow, sleepy blinks earlier.
“And I shouldn’t have hit my aunt’s boyfriend, either.
It didn’t help my case any. People…once they decide who I am, they’ll take anything and make it fit their narrative.
Punching someone outside of a family-friendly bowling alley must mean that I’m a danger to society.
Wearing all black must mean I’m messed up in the head.
Getting into one fistfight freshman year must mean I’m a lost cause. ”