14. Jayden
14
JAYDEN
“Hey, can you help me take this stuff upstairs?” I asked Tori, indicating a stack of old boxes and a large burlap sack on top. It was Sunday afternoon. We’d put in a couple of hours down in the basement for three days in a row now.
“Sure.” Tori hopped off a metal stool and set down a rose-colored vase she’d just wiped clean. She followed me over to the stack by the stairs. “This stuff?”
“No, just grab the trash bag. I can handle this.” I hefted the boxes up, letting the burlap sack press against my chest so it wouldn’t slide off. Once I reached the top of the stairs, I deposited everything just inside the entrance to the living room.
Tori set the trash bag down and surveyed the boxes. “Where does that stuff go?”
“Who cares? Guess what I found?”
She smiled, perhaps in response to my playful tone. “What?”
I gave her a mock frown. “You’re not a very good guesser. But I’ll give you a hint. It’s a magical device that will transport us far away from bickering stepbrothers.”
“I like this thing already.” She grinned. “What is it?”
I flipped the large sack over, grimacing from the cloud of dust that launched into the air. Then I smoothed out the label on the bag. The print was faded but readable.
She sucked in a quick breath of air. “Do you think it still works?”
“Only one way to find out.”
Twenty minutes later, we were out in the woods behind the house, examining the results of our labor.
“Um… how do we get on it?” Tori asked.
I surveyed the hammock we’d strung between two trees. It was an old-school kind—just a crisscross of thick rope, held together by two wooden spreader bars. The wood was rough and grayed, but it still felt strong enough. Some of the ropes were stiff with age, but overall, they were in surprisingly good shape. “Very carefully.”
Tori giggled. “I was hoping for a more detailed plan.”
“Okay…” I thought for a minute. “How about I hold it steady, and you climb on? And then if you don’t get dumped on your ass, I’ll try to get on, too.”
She shook her head sternly. “That’s a terrible plan.” Her soft lips were curved in a smile, though.
“We could always just go back down to the basement,” I threatened.
“Never mind, it’s a great plan.” Tori gave me a wry look. “Let’s never go back there.”
Except for the fact that the house was sorely lacking in bedrooms, I agreed with her. “It’s like living with a couple who have broken up but have to live together until their lease runs out.”
“Exactly. Except they own the home.” Her forehead wrinkled, and guilt crossed her face.
“Come on, let’s try this,” I said before she could start in again on how she shouldn’t stay here. I moved to one end of the hammock, gesturing for her to stand by the middle. Then I grasped the wooden bar in two different spots and held it as steady as I could.
Tentatively, Tori lowered herself down, the ropes shifting as she perched on the edge. When it didn’t immediately buck her off, she smiled at me and scooted back a few inches—and immediately toppled over backwards. Hastily, I let go of the crossbar and reached for her, managing to grab one thigh and one wrist.
Carefully, I pulled her up until she was back on her feet. My hands were still on her arms, and it dawned on me how often I’d touched her lately. On Friday, when she tumbled off the bathroom counter. The scalp massage before that. Maybe that kind of thing went with the territory for roommates, but I couldn’t remember being in that close contact with Lucas or Kyle.
“Well that didn’t work,” she said, sounding a bit shaky. Then she managed a smile for me. “Thank you. That’s twice this weekend that you’ve caught me.”
“Want to go for three times?” I grinned at her, but I was only half kidding. She was light and easy to carry. I’d liked the way she’d felt cradled to my chest last time.
“No thank you. What’s our next strategy?”
Honestly, I had no clue, but I needed to come up with one because the alternative was to head back to the basement. And I’d about had my fill of hanging out in a cluttered claustrophobic basement with two stepbrothers who were constantly bickering.
For better or for worse, Kyle had emerged from his room a little before eleven yesterday morning and came down to join us. That was a good thing because he was strong and a hard worker when he chose to be. But it was a bad thing because he and Lucas kept circling each other like cats in an alleyway.
It didn't help that Kyle took every opportunity to show off for Tori. Moving heavy furniture by himself. Carrying tall stacks of boxes up the stairs. And of course, going shirtless. I couldn't quite tell if all that was because he liked Tori, because he wanted to piss Lucas off, or just because he automatically behaved that way around a pretty woman. We’d gone to the same high school for four years, so that last part was a definite possibility.
So no, I wasn’t too eager to leave the peaceful backyard. Partly because of the aforementioned pretty woman. “Let’s start from opposite sides and try to both sit down at the same time, like back-to-back.”
Tori tilted her head. “Okay, not a bad step one. What’s step two?”
“I’ll let you know if step one doesn’t kill us.”
Laughing softly, she moved to the other side of the hammock. I felt a little foolish facing away from her. We probably looked like we were going to walk ten paces and then turn and duel. “Ready?” I asked her. When she said yes, I counted to three.
We both sat, clutching the thick ropes until the hammock stopped swaying. Tori’s back was inches from mine. I knew that from the way her ponytail brushed against me.
“We could just stay like this,” she said, sounding amused. “Less risk of broken bones.”
“Nah, we’re braver than that. I’ll count to three again, and we’ll both swing our legs up to the right and try to lay flat, okay?”
“Okay.” She sounded somewhat doubtful this time. I counted again, and then I leaned to the left, bringing my legs up on the right. Too late, I realized that Tori was leaning the other way. She yelped as she course corrected. The hammock swung violently, but I grabbed her shoulders, easing her down next to me.
She clung to me, her body tilted toward mine until the hammock finally stopped its dizzying waves. “Guess we should’ve specified whose right we meant,” she said with a giggle.
The hammock rocked gently. I eased my arm out from between us but couldn’t find a good place to put it with our bodies so close together. Finally, I stretched it out above her. When she lifted her head, I slid it under. That worked.
But gravity kept pulling us closer. Finally, Tori placed her hand lightly on my chest to keep from falling on me. The hammock rocked gently, and I had to admit that it felt nice. Especially after the dusty confines of the basement.
“Did you fall asleep?” I asked after a few minutes of companionable silence.
“Nope. I think I could, though. It’s nice out here.”
“Yep.” But there was something I wanted to talk to her about that wasn’t as nice. “So, what’s going on with you and Kyle?”
Tori shifted uncomfortably, making the hammock sway. “I was just surprised to see him like that after the baseball game.”
“What?” I was genuinely confused.
“Just, you know, with his shirt off. It took me by surprise.”
It suddenly hit me what she was talking about. I’d forgotten I caught her checking out Kyle’s bare chest on Friday evening. A laugh escaped before I could stop it. “I meant with the tutoring,” I clarified.
“Oh.” Her face was so close to my chest that I could almost feel the heat radiating off her flushed cheeks. “Um, we worked for a couple of hours yesterday on his paper.”
“You did?”
“Yeah. While you and Lucas went to the library to study.”
“Is that why you didn’t go?”
“Yes.”
For some reason, the thought of her and Kyle working here all by themselves didn’t sit well with me. But then again, neither did the fact that she had to tutor him in the first place—especially with her own grade on the line.
Tori shifted again, every little movement rubbing against me and making the hammock sway. I couldn’t tell if she wanted to talk about this more or not. Did tutors have some kind of tutor-student confidentiality?
I stared at the canopy of trees above us and the blue sky beyond that. Lately, things at this house had felt like a minefield. Lucas was pissed off all the time. Kyle seemed hellbent on antagonizing him. Tori was caught in the middle, which wasn’t what I wanted for her. But, well, I was kind of stuck there, too.
So yeah, this living arrangement was going great so far—but at least she wasn’t living with her creepy ex-roommate. Just a couple of dudes who couldn’t seem to move past high school.
I shook my head, still lost in thought. Tori clearly had the worst luck in roommates—except with me. I made a vow to shield her from the worst of the stepbrothers’ animosity.
She tilted her head up, and her silky hair slid across my arm. “What is it with those two?” Clearly, she’d been thinking along the same lines I had. “It can’t just be because of their parents’ marriage, right? I know stepsiblings don’t always get along, but this seems extreme.”
I sighed, not surprised she asked. Trouble was, it wasn’t my story to tell—it was Lucas’s. But maybe I could share a little about the parts I’d experienced firsthand. After all, I’d known Kyle as long as Lucas had.
“They didn’t like each other in high school, even before their parents met. And then it all happened so quickly, and suddenly they’re living together, and that made it worse. I’m sure you can guess that Kyle was popular, a star athlete, and guys like that aren’t known for how they treat people lower down on the food chain. But a lot of guys that age were self-centered jerks. I myself wasn’t the exemplary man that you’ve come to know and love.”
I glanced down in time to see her lips curve into a smile.
“So it’s just high school stuff? Jock versus nerd?” Then she quickly stammered, “I don’t mean Lucas was a nerd, just, you know… I’m sure he was the smart kid in school.”
I squeezed her shoulders. I knew what she meant. “He definitely was the smartest guy in school. And yeah, maybe a little nerdy.”
Tori was quiet for a minute, and then she said, “It seems like something else is going on.”
Shit. She was putting me in a tough position. Finally, I made my decision with a sigh.
“I probably shouldn’t be telling you this, but, well… it affects you and me, now, too. Because if they keep fighting, you and I may both want to go sleep in your car.”
She laughed lightly at that, but I could see in her eyes that she really wanted to know their history.
“Promise not to breathe a word of this to Kyle or Lucas?”
“Of course.”
“Lucas had a girlfriend, Natalie, all through high school. Well, they met as freshmen, and they were a couple by their sophomore year. They really seemed perfect for each other. They were always together, always laughing and smiling, and I think Lucas really believed that he’d found the person he was going to spend the rest of his life with.
“I know it’s easy to look at that kind of situation from afar and say: This is just a high school romance. It’s not going to last. You won’t marry your high school sweetheart. But I think Lucas believed he was going to.”
Tori tensed, as if bracing herself for bad news.
“The last semester of our senior year, just a month or two before graduation, Lucas grew quieter, a little more reserved. I thought it was the stress of final exams approaching, but then he told me that it felt like something was off. He was having some trouble with Natalie. They were arguing more, disagreeing about their future.” It had worried me, how down he seemed.
“And then one day, he came home from some meeting and caught Natalie coming out of Kyle’s bedroom.”
“Oh shit,” Tori said softly.
“Yeah. It was bad. Neither one of them denied it. In fact, Kyle bragged about it—about stealing Lucas’s girl—even though they didn’t stay together. Lucas was crushed. He and Kyle weren’t close before that, but now… now they’re enemies.”
“And roommates.” She sighed. “Poor Lucas. That’s awful.”
“Yeah, it was a really bad time. He was valedictorian, gave a speech at graduation, but it was like all the life had gone out of him.”
I didn’t mention that I hadn’t seen him show any interest in even looking at another woman until last year when we started the study group. With Tori.
“But wait—didn’t they live together here last year before you moved in?”
“Yeah. Their parents had already bought the house at that point, and they held on to the naive idea that it was all going to work out. I was in an apartment on the south side of campus, but from what I gathered, Kyle wasn’t here often last year. Just stopped by to get some things, maybe do some laundry. I think he and Lucas made it a point not to be here at the same time if they could possibly avoid it.”
“Kyle didn’t stay here? Where did he sleep?”
I bit back a grin. I had a funny feeling that Tori was imagining him hopping from one woman’s bed to another all year—which, actually, I wouldn’t really put past him. But that wasn’t the case as far as I knew. “Usually at that fraternity he joined.”
“But I thought freshmen couldn’t live in frat houses?”
“He’s Kyle. The rules don’t apply to him. They never have.”
I had endless examples of that, but I had already talked more than I should have. It felt disloyal to Lucas to be talking about this stuff, but god knew Tori didn’t need more roommate drama. She’d already been through a lot.
“I don’t know Kyle very well, but I’m still kind of surprised that he’d do something like that.”
The fact that Tori was surprised proved she didn’t know him well. Still, I hoped I hadn’t completely prejudiced her against Kyle—not that he didn’t deserve it, but they still needed to work together.
After a few minutes, Tori spoke again. Between the rustle of the leaves and the warm body nestled against me, I’d almost drifted off. “Thank you for telling me.” Her fingers brushed over my chest. “We probably should get back in there, right?”
“Probably.” My thumb stroked down her arm. “I don’t suppose you know how we can get off this thing without falling on our asses?”
“I was hoping you knew.” She gave a small smile. “So maybe we should stay here longer. It’s nice out here.”
It was pleasant out here—but the reason I was enjoying it so much had less to do with the nice weather and the fresh air, and more to do with her.
“Five more minutes?” I suggested
“Sounds like a plan.”