Chapter 8
eight
PAST
brANDON
It’s like I’ve been punched in the gut. It’s been two weeks, and Kate hasn’t replied to my texts. Nothing. And the worst part? I still can’t get her out of my head. Can’t rid myself of her pretty profile beside the water’s edge at Promontory Point.
I snap my art history book closed, and the sound booms through the silent library.
Tuck startles across the study table. His Principles of Bioenvironmental Engineering textbook is splayed beside his scribbled notes.
Julia blinks up like a blue-eyed doe over her laptop where she’s been silently obsessing over a re-design for her graphic design class.
“What’d you do that for?” Julia grumbles, and I almost laugh at the annoyed pinch in her brows.
A tiny smile kicks up the corner of Tuck’s mouth, since he enjoys getting a rise out of Julia as much as I do.
How else are we supposed to loosen up the uptight, anxious girl who marched into our fifth grade class and deemed herself in charge of us?
“Brandon,” Julia whispers, alarm growing as she reads my expression. “What’s going on?”
A haughty girl at the adjacent table turns to shush her but stops when her eyes catch mine.
Pink creeps up the girl’s cheeks. My knee-jerk reaction is to shoot a roguish smile, so I do before following it with a curt nod before turning away.
I open my textbook with a sigh and try to remember which page I was on.
“Yeah, what’s with you?” Tuck leans forward, resting the arms of his red University of Illinois Chicago hoodie on the table.
My best friend could easily belong in some outdoorsy family sitcom.
Perpetually cheery smile, insatiable thirst for adventure.
He keeps his brown hair faded on the sides but a bit longer on top.
I say he keeps it that way because his hairline is starting to recede, and then he usually tries to kill me.
Poor guy is destined to be bald if he has even a fraction of his Dad’s DNA.
The thought of father-son relationships knots in my stomach, and a familiar wave of anger heats my blood. I wouldn’t know a trait of mine to attribute to my own father if it punched me in the face. Usually you have to know someone to hate them, right?
Wrong.
I don’t know what’s worse—the fact that he left my scared mom with a newborn, or that he waited till I was born, looked me in the face, and then decided he didn’t want to be a father.
Scratch that.
I definitely know which is worse.
I break out of my trance to Julia’s worried eyes and the hushing-girl giving me a little finger wave. I bob my head in acknowledgement, then return to the pages of my book.
Tuck’s whisper is the perfect imitation of an Australian crocodile hunter. “Impossible. Brandon Roberts, spotted in his natural habitat, a total babe at the ready and he doesn’t attempt to mate.”
“Shut up, Tuck,” I mutter, but Julia lets out a snarky giggle.
“You’ve not been this pissy since Brielle Shumway in the ninth grade.” His teasing expression falters. “Did something happen with your mom again?”
Worry again enlarges Julia’s eyes, and I shake my head before she can spiral too far.
But irritation holds my tongue hostage. Even though Tuck and Julia are like my siblings, the mosh pit of emotions slamming around my stomach makes me want to throw a fist through a wall.
I’ll take it out on a punching bag later.
This degree of frustration doesn’t make sense where Kate is concerned. Why should a girl that I met once have this much hold? Abandonment issues aside, I refuse to be desperate like my mom. I don’t throw myself at others. Or beg.
So what if Kate is like a walking, talking, sexy enigma? Sure, our conversation put me under her spell for a minute. But it wasn’t like that one kiss…
“Oooh.” Tuck snaps like he just solved global warming. “It’s motorcycle girl.” He slaps the table in triumph. “That’s why I haven’t seen you hitting on anyone.”
“Pay closer attention, then,” I deflect, flicking my pencil lightning fast. It bounces off his chest and prattles onto the table.
“Brandon,” Julia chastises, snatching up the pencil and scanning for witnesses.
But Tuck’s hazel eyes widen as he pats down where the pencil struck him like a bloody gunshot wound. He crumples forward.
“Tell…” he wheeze-whispers against the wood, “my mom… I love her…” Then he goes still.
“You’re an idiot,” I growl, and Julia bites back a laugh.
He pops back up. “Brando. Talk. If it’s not motorcycle girl—”
“Kate. Her name is Kate.”
My best friends react like I’ve just whipped off my clothes and streaked through the library.
“You’re calling her Kate?” Tuck sputters. “Not taco-breath or huge-noggin? Since when do you use names?”
“Since it’s her name, you receding-haired moron.”
“Brandon.” Julia spears me with a disappointed look, then cuts to the now fuming man beside her. “And knock it off, Tucker. Brandon’s clearly upset about something.” She swats at Tuck’s shoulder, but he catches her hand and pins it against his chest.
“But what if I’m upset about something, Jules?” he says, fake agony lacing his expression. “Would you take care of my heart, too?”
A guttural “shush” emanates from behind us, and the decrepit librarian hobbles by as we slink deeper into our chairs.
I inwardly curse the whole situation, but especially myself. This is exactly why I keep things casual. Sweat beads along my hairline even as my mind continues to unravel.
I claw off my leather jacket and shove it into my backpack. My red sleeveless shirt is enough to cool me down. Yeah, it’s almost December, but my shoulder tattoo was ridiculously expensive so it seems negligent to always cover it with sleeves.
“So why haven’t you asked motorcycle—ow, sorry—Kate out yet?” Tuck rubs his shoulder as Julia retracts her pinch with a satisfied smirk.
I run a frustrated hand through my hair and consider lying. Kate out-played me, which honestly I might find more offensive than her not texting me back.
“She won’t text back,” I mumble, but then immediately regret it.
A slow grin pulls Tuck’s face into something far too animated for my liking.
“You texted her? And she ghosted you?”
I fold my arms, puff out each bicep, and look him dead in the eyes.
Tuck isn’t affected in the slightest. “I was wrong, Brando. This is worse than Brielle Shumway. Much worse.”
Much to Julia’s dismay, I chuck another pencil right as the librarian materializes beside us. Her droopy frown hangs even lower as she demands we shut up or leave.
We shove our books and computers into our backpacks and hurry out onto the campus sidewalk. A windstorm blew in last week, and now the autumn leaves are scattered like embers beside their previous homes.
I scuff my boot along the pavement before I decide to man up and actually call her. That way I can finally move on—either by taking Kate out or by closing whatever freak chapter this has been and returning to my philandering ways.
Tuck and Julia loiter nearby, conducting a fake conversation well within earshot. I press Kate’s number. It rings a few times, then she picks up.
“Hello?” I say.
“Roasted, are you ordering for pick-up?”
My eyebrows fall. “Roasted?”
“Yeah. Roasted. As in the coffee shop? Are you ordering or what?” Whoever this woman is, she sounds much too nasal to be Kate.
I meet my friend’s confused expressions with one of my own. “No, I’m not ordering. Thanks.” I end the call.
Tuck sputters a laugh. “You got fake-numbered.”
“No, I didn’t,” I snap. “Must have been an accident.”
His devious smile pulls wider, but he nods. “Yeah, Brando. She must have accidentally typed her own phone number wrong.”
I shove him hard enough to knock him back a few steps.
“Guys. Can’t we act like adults for once?” Julia hisses.
“I’m not the one that gave you a fake number.” Tuck’s pout vanishes into a grin. “Kate did.”
“Shut up, Tuck.” I clench my jaw.
If a girl this hot is equally as crazy, is she really worth the effort?
My mind screams “No,” but a deeper wound isn’t quite ready to let this go. I’ve never had a girl brush me off like this before, and I don’t enjoy the sensation of being left behind. Unwanted. I curse my ghost of a dad—whoever he is—while trying not to resent my mom. She did the best she could.
I glare at Tuck, who is likely never going to let me live this down.
“Gotta go,” I mutter, slinging Julia into a quick hug. “Extra credit thing. I’m about to be late.”
“Bye, Brando.” Tuck tries to fling his own hug around me before I jerk away and storm off. “I love you!” He calls down the sidewalk. “Now say it back.”
I raise a middle finger as I stride away.
KATE
I wrap up a text to Liza as I swing my hips into a desk. The college classroom seats orbit a raised center platform, and my least favorite art professor, Miss Njay, tinkers beside her desk. An involuntary shiver rings throughout my body again. My trek across campus has left me chilled to the bone.
KATE: I need sister time ASAP. Free this weekend?
I hit send on the text as heat radiates over my back. I revel in it, happy to have found a seat so close to the heater. Although it’s still technically November, the weather has decided to forge into an early winter. I shiver, tugging the drawstrings of my baby pink Kappa Alpha Theta hoodie.
Waking up in my private room only served to remind me of how much I hate living alone. Liza’s absence felt like a big fat thundercloud, stabbing lightning into my tear ducts at random.
So, in full sad-girl mode, I threw away any notions of fashion or make-up. My oversized sweatpants are rolled at the hip, my shoes resemble more slipper than sole, and my hair is piled into a reckless messy bun.
Students file inside the classroom, nameless, and I couldn’t care less. I’m not in the business of making friends at the moment. Especially not when my heart feels like the equivalent of a used tissue.