Sophomore Year
Fall
Autumn
Ezra sits in his old beater, the engine off. Didn’t he leave ten minutes ago?
I walk towards Dad’s truck, parked in the big lot on the Linus Tree Farm, right next to the black car with a red door—that thing Ezra calls a car.
Ezra Bennett’s cute. I knew who he was from school, but we weren’t friends. We never hung out until he started working on the farm. He started two weeks after me, which of course makes me the expert. And I am happy to answer all of his questions.
Why wouldn't I be? Like I said, he's cute. And nice. And while until this point in life, I've known almost nothing about him—except for the fact that he had a nice face—I like him now. We've talked and he's kind. Like my dad. He's funny too.
I walk over to my truck door, but instead of climbing inside, I knock on his passenger window. His car must be as old as mine because he leans over and twists the lever to manually unroll the window.
“Car trouble? ”
“Yeah,” he says. “I can’t get it to start.” He huffs out a frustrated breath. I should tell him to call his parents to pick him up. I’ve got a hardship—one that Dad had to pull some strings for the city to grant to me. I don’t turn sixteen for another four months. With my hardship license, I can drive to work and back—nowhere else, and I’m not allowed to have anyone under the age of eighteen in the vehicle with me.
But then… Ezra Bennett is really cute.
“I can take you home.”
His brows knit. Does he know about my hardship? Is he a stickler for the rules? “You don’t mind?” he says.
My heart flutters at his words—it’s a strange feeling, a giddy feeling, one that my body isn’t used to. “Not at all.”
“I’m on Birch Street,” he says, climbing into my cab.
“I know where that is.” It’s a small town. I pretty much know every street in Love.
We pull away from the farm, but two minutes into our drive, Ezra is still quiet. I think of the conversation Dad and I had last night and fill up the silence.
“Where do you want to go to college?”
“Um. I don’t know.” I can feel him looking at me, but I keep my eyes on the road. Dad would kill me if I got picked up driving with a minor.
“What do you want to be?” I ask.
“What do you mean?” Ezra’s not exactly making conversation easy. But then, he’s been easy enough to talk to while we work. Maybe these questions are difficult. Mom says not everyone knows like I do.
“You know, when you grow up.”
“Oh. Um. I like drawing. And building. But I don’t know. I—I’m not sure about college.”
"Ezra!" I give him one glance, all my passion coming out in just his name. "You have to go to college. That's where life begins. "
“It is?” There’s humor in his voice, but a question too. Maybe his parents aren’t hounding him to develop his talents and work hard like mine always are.
“Yes! You get to go anywhere . Be anything. And no one else can tell you what to do. There’s a lot more out there than this little town. You know?”
“Huh.” It’s more of a grunt than a word—one that says maybe he doesn’t know.
“You don’t want to stay here forever, do you?” I can’t imagine anyone wanting to stay in Love their whole lives. It’s been a nice place to grow up and all, but there’s a great big world out there.
“ No ,” he says, at last giving me a definite answer. “But I won’t have money for college.”
“That’s what student loans are for.” I sigh. I have a bank account that Mom and Dad have been feeding for years. But they can’t send me all on their own. “That’s why we’re working too,” I tell him. “You have to save all of your money. Every bit.”
“Every bit? Didn’t you buy three Snickers bars from the shop today?” He laughs under his breath.
I do too—because I did. I couldn’t help it. I was starving. “Well, sometimes there are emergencies. Again—student loans are there for a reason.”
“You think someone would loan me money?” He sounds so unsure.
“Sure,” I tell him. “Why wouldn’t they?”
He thinks for a minute. “I think I would like college.”
“You would!” I say as if I know.
Ezra laughs. I am a little overzealous.
“You’re so sure,” he says.
My cousin Holly told me all about college life at our last family reunion. And ever since, I’ve been saving every dime, helping Mom and Dad feed that account—okay, most of my dimes. A few dimes are reserved for candy bars.
Dad says education is important. It gives you knowledge about the world and the people around you, and that knowledge helps you to make both better.
"I am sure. Promise me you'll go to college, Ezra," I say as if my own life depends on it. But then, I mean it, it's more important than he realizes.
He clears his throat. “I promise I’ll think about it.”
“Besides, all parents want their kids to go to school. It makes them proud and gives them a reason to brag about us. I would guess your parents have a savings account for you, just like mine do. Maybe they just haven’t told you about it.”
“You’d be wrong,” he says—another very sure answer.
I glance at him one more time, but he’s staring out the window. “Which house?” I say, turning onto Birch.
Ezra stirs in his seat. “Uh, you can stop here, Autumn. Right here.”
I lurch the truck to a stop and shift into park.
“Thanks for the ride. Thanks a lot.” He opens up the door but turns back. “And the talk. I’ll think about college.”
I smile. “Good. You promised.”
Ezra exits the car and though he smiles and waves goodbye, I wait. The house in front of us is dark and I want to make sure he can get inside.
But he doesn’t walk up to the dark blue house. He crosses the street and walks two houses up to where a man sits outside in a lawn chair in the nothing-but-dirt yard. There’s a grimace on his face and a shotgun leaning against the chair he sits on. A shotgun? In the front yard? Who is this guy?
My heart drops into my stomach. This man isn’t a good person. I can see it just by looking at him. Am I really leaving Ezra here? My mom would scold my quick judgments. But I can see he’s mean—the kind of mean you don’t just leave a friend with.
At least, I think Ezra and I are friends now.
I roll my driver's side window down just a couple of inches, just enough to hear what he's saying to Ezra, just enough to call Ezra back if I need to.
The man is telling him something. His mouth is moving and as my window opens up, his words float into my space.
“—late again!”
I jump at his cruel tone. If Ezra’s late, it’s just by a few minutes. I brought him right home.
“I told you I had to work today,” Ezra says, stopping in front of the man.
“And I told you to be home when I’m hungry.”
Ezra glances back at me and stands a little taller. I hope my eyes tell him to come back. Come back if you need to, Ezra.
“I know, Dad. I had to work.”
Dad ? Dads aren’t supposed to be like that.
I blink and swallow and try to make sense of what I’m seeing. The man frowning and yelling and sitting next to a gun in the middle of his yard is Ezra’s father .
His father.
Another truth hits me just as hard: there is no way on earth that a man like that is saving money for Ezra to go to college.