22. Chase
Chase
My throat constricts when we pull up outside Addie’s house not ten minutes later.
The only thing keeping me awake right now is white-hot adrenaline.
We both stare at the single-story redbrick.
“You going in?” he asks.
I was positive this was the right thing to do. The only way I could help her … but now I’m not so sure.
Jesus. My head falls back against the headrest.
How did we even get here?
Never in a million years did I think we’d end up in bed together, only to wake up and watch everything we ever had fall apart.
When I fell asleep with her soft body curled into me, I thought we’d be happy. Whether that was in Ocean Grove until she was ready to leave—on her own terms—or not. I assumed we’d figure out the bumps and curves along the way. I’d be there to support her music. I would’ve done anything.
Maybe she was never meant to be mine.
“Earth to Chase,” Steele says, leaning over the center console and waving his hand in front of me.
“Huh?” I ask, snapping out of my daze.
“I asked if you’re gonna sit there looking lost all afternoon, or are you going in?”
“Oh,” I say, gathering Summer’s things. “Yeah. Are you coming with me?”
“Nah.” His eyes lower to his lap. “It’s probably best if I stay here.”
I gather a slow, calming breath, then open the passenger door and climb out, tucking the envelope in my back pocket.
The walk to the front door feels like a countdown. I glance at the items in my left hand, raising my right to knock. I hesitate before I bang on the wood.
A muffled voice sounds from inside. “Mooommmm! There’s someone at the door!”
A shuffle of footsteps follows shortly before the door swings open.
An average-height, middle-aged woman stares at me blankly. “Hello,” she says.
“Hey, Mrs. Walker,” I say, palming the back of my neck. “Um. I’m Chase. Chase Whitmore. I went to school with your daughter.”
“Of course. I’m sorry I didn’t recognize you.” Her eyes widen. “Are you looking for Addison?”
“Is Summer here?” I ask, pulse racing.
Her expression softens. “She’s resting right now. I think it’s best we don’t interrupt her.”
“Okay … yeah, okay.” I nod. “Good. That’s good.”
She offers a small, sympathetic smile. “I’ll get Addison for you. Wait here.”
She disappears and I chew the inside of my lip, fingers tightening around the objects. A minute passes before more footsteps approach and Addie appears.
“Ouch,” she says, wincing when sees the state of my nose.
I’m the only one who deserved it.
“Hey, Addie.”
She looks like she’s had as much sleep as I have.
“Stalking me now, Shitmore?”
“You stopped answering my calls and texts.”
“I was avoiding you. How did you get my number and address, anyway?”
I gesture over my shoulder, and she tenses when she spots Steele. “Of course he did.” She rolls her eyes. “He isn’t welcome here.”
“Don’t worry. He’s not coming up,” I assure her.
“Good.” She studies me with a troubled look. “Sorry, I’m being rude. I’m still processing everything, I guess.”
“How is she?”
She exhales sharply. “As good as she can be, I guess. She’s tired. Sore.”
I swallow. “Can I see her?”
“She said she doesn’t want to see you again.” Regret flashes across her face.
My heart sinks. “She said that?”
Her mask slips. “I’m sorry, Chase. I really am. I know how much you care about her.”
I clench my jaw. “This is so fucked up.”
“I know.” Her eyes turn warm when they meet mine. “I feel so terrible. It was right in front of me.”
“This isn’t on you, Adds. She didn’t want us to know.”
“But you did.”
“Yeah.” I look at my sneakers. “I found out after Xav’s party.”
“How?”
“A bruise on her collarbone.” The truth leaves an acidic aftertaste, and I decide not to mention the cuts.
“I don’t understand. We’ve had sleepovers.
Gym class.” She says it as if she’s talking to herself, putting the clues together.
“Sometimes she was weird about getting changed in front of me or anyone else.” She gasps, her hand flying to her mouth.
“That was why. Oh my god. How the hell didn’t I notice? ”
“It wasn’t only on you to notice. You can’t blame yourself, Addie.”
A beat passes before she whispers, “Do you?”
“Do I blame myself?”
She nods.
“Yeah. Every second.”
She casts her eyes downward.
“Do you know when she’s leaving?” I ask.
“Day after next.”
“Do you know where she’s going?”
Her lips press into a thin line, a tear sliding down her cheek. “She made me promise I wouldn’t tell.”
The world tilts.
“Addie—”
She squeezes her eyes shut. “Please, Chase. Don’t make this any harder than it already is.”
I bite down on my lip until the tremor settles. “I need to know she’s okay … please, Addie.”
“I know you care about her. I wish I could tell you, but I just—I can’t. I gave her my word, and I need to honor that.”
The hardest part is that I don’t blame Addie. She’s doing the one thing I swore I would do and didn’t: keeping Summer’s secret.
“Yeah, right. Of course.” I shake my head, holding out the picture, cell phone, and sheet music. “I wanted to drop these by. Will you give these to her for me?”
She takes them carefully. “I’ll make sure she gets them.”
Her thumb brushes the broken frame. She flips it over and her mouth twitches when she looks at the photograph. “She looks happy.”
I lean in to steal another look. Summer’s mother’s smile is so wide the corners of her eyes wrinkle. Summer’s head is thrown back, her hair blowing in the wind, laughing at whatever her mom has said. It’s beautiful and innocent—everything childhood is supposed to be. “Yeah. She does.”
“Where did you find it?” she whispers.
“I … snuck back into her room.” I wait for her to react, but she doesn’t. “I thought she might want them. You know, before she leaves. It was knocked over when her dad—” I cut myself off when Addie’s eyes snap to mine. “It fell off her dresser.”
“Oh.”
“Does she hate me?” I blurt.
She blinks.
“I’m sorry. You don’t have to answer that.”
“She doesn’t hate you.” She sighs. “But it’s complicated. She’s angry. She had a plan to get out of here when she was ready, and now, she’s running because she has no other choice.”
“We can help her.”
“That’s not our call to make. I wish it were.” Her shoulders droop. “I didn’t want her to leave either. But I did some thinking, and maybe leaving will be what’s best for her. Everyone’s off to college soon, anyway. It might be good for her to feel like she’s in control of something again.”
When I say nothing, Addie reaches out and presses a gentle hand to my shoulder. Her touch barely registers. I don’t need comfort. What I need is right through that door.
She’s so close, but she’s never felt farther away.
Something shifts in my chest, and then it happens. That connection—that invisible thread I’ve felt pulling me toward her since the moment I laid eyes on her—pulls taut. Then it snaps.
“Do you think she’ll ever forgive me?” I whisper.
She sucks in a shuddering breath. “I can’t answer that.” Addie steps back. “Summer’s one of the strongest people I know. She’ll survive whatever comes next.”
“I know she will,” I say quietly. “I just wish I could be there to see it.”
Addie gives me a sad smile, her eyes glistening. I know it’s time to walk away.
I pull the thick envelope from my jeans pocket and hold it out to her. “Could you give her this too?”
She takes it from me, frowning. “What is it?” She unfolds the lip and peeks inside. Her face pales. “Oh my god.” Her eyes burn holes through me. “Where the hell did you get this?”
I scratch the back of my head.
“Please tell me this isn’t shady money,” she pleads.
“It’s not shady, I promise.”
The guy who I sold the truck to is, but she doesn’t need to know that.
She leans against the doorframe, eyes narrowing.
I sigh. “I sold my truck.”
Her spine snaps straight. “You what?! Are you insane?”
“I want her to have it.” I gesture to the money. “She can use it for a plane ticket. First month’s rent. Whatever she needs to start over.”
“No.” Her mouth opens and closes. “This is too much. She’ll never accept it.”
“She will if she thinks it’s from you.”
“What?” She tries to pass it back. “You want me to lie to her?”
“Tell me she can’t do something good with the money.”
“If I tell her it’s from me and she still doesn’t take it, then what?”
“Shove it in her bag when she isn’t looking.”
She huffs a laugh.
“I stole her control away from her. The least I can do is give her a fighting chance. Please, Adds. I’ll never forgive myself if I don’t.”
She works her jaw, pinning me with a pensive look. “Okay. Fine.”
I nod. “Thank you.”
She clutches Summer’s belongings close to her chest.
“Can you promise me something?”
Her bottom lip wobbles.
“Promise me you won’t let her give up on music.”
She swipes at her cheeks and nods again. “I promise.”
“Take care of her, Addie,” I say, turning to leave.
“Chase!” she calls after me.
I turn back.
“Thank you,” she says.
My brows yank together. “For what?”
“Calling the police. I would have done the same thing.”
“She might never speak to me again. But there isn’t a version of this world without her that’s worth living in.”
Steele’s face tightens with concern when I drop into his passenger seat and slam the door shut on a yawn. He doesn’t ask how it went and I don’t offer up any information. Not yet, anyway.
He starts the engine and pulls away from the curb. He flicks on the stereo, rolls the windows down, and drives me home.
We roll into my driveway, both turning rigid when we spot Mom on the front steps, watering her potted geraniums, and Dad cutting the lawnmower off.
“Moment of truth,” Steele says. “Good luck, man.”
“I’ll need it.”
“Call me later.”
“Will do.” I hop out and give him a fist bump through the open window.
He reverses out and disappears down the street.
My parents stare at me as I make my way toward the porch. Dad wipes the sweat off his forehead with his sleeve.
He’s the first to speak. “Chase.”
I shove my hands in my pocket.
“Why did Steele give you a ride? Where’s your truck?”
Here we go.
“I sold it.”
The watering can tumbles from Mom’s grasp, clattering down the steps. Water spills out over the uneven pavement.
Color drains from Mom’s face and my insides pinch.
You did it for a good reason. At least, that’s what I keep telling myself.
Dad plucks his work gloves off one finger at a time. “You want to run that by me again?” He slaps the gloves over the mower handle.
Mom looks to Dad, then to me, and back again.
“I sold it,” I repeat.
“You. Sold. It.” He stares at me, throwing his arms out wide. “You had it for a goddamn week. What happened?”
“I gave the money to Summer.”
“Jesus, Chase,” he mutters, releasing a sharp breath out his nose. “Kitchen. Now.”
I gulp, following the sweet scent of freshly baked lime soufflé as we head inside. Dad pulls a chair out for Mom, pushing it in and ensuring she’s settled with a kiss on her forehead before taking his own.
I cross one ankle over the other in an attempt to stop my knee from bouncing, acutely aware of how tightly we’re squeezed around the four-seater table.
Dad’s expression grows stormy. “Start talking.”
“I had the money. She didn’t.”
“You had a truck,” he corrects.
Mom presses her fingers to her temple. “Oh, Chase.”
“How much?” he asks.
“How much, what?”
“For the truck, Chase. How much did you get for the truck?”
I nibble the inside of my cheek before answering. “Six.”
His eyebrows jump to his hairline. “Thousand?!”
I nod.
Mom draws in a ragged breath.
“We paid ten for it a week ago!” Dad shouts. “For fuck’s sake.” He tips his head back.
Mom chimes in, her voice calm. “Did she ask you to do this?”
“No,” I reply. “She knew nothing about it.”
“I know you only wanted to help,” Mom says. “I’m just … trying to understand.”
“Understand what? You saw what that asshole did to her because of me! Because I was with her!” My focus bounces between them. “I couldn’t just sit here and do nothing. It’s my fault!”
The admission tears out of me.
He beat her because I slept with her.
If I’d left her alone like I told myself I should, none of this would’ve happened. I kept my distance for a whole year. The second I gave in to my own selfish desires, a bomb detonated.
I touched her—loved her—and the next morning she was bleeding.
“We care about Summer. What happened to her was horrible, and I’m sorry. But selling the truck wasn’t your decision to make,” Dad says.
Heat simmers beneath my skin. “What the hell was she supposed to do? Leave with nothing? You know she can’t stay here. She’s leaving because of me.”
“Of course we don’t want her to leave with nothing. We want the best for Summer, always.” Dad rubs his forehead. “But you should have come to us first.”
“YOU DON’T HAVE ANY MONEY!” I boom. The dam breaks and I keep going. “She’s leaving because of what I did!” I emphasize my point, smacking my chest. “Everything is completely fucked up!”
Mom reels back in horror, her chin trembling. I immediately wish I could roll the words up and lock them away. She fishes a crumpled Kleenex from her sweater sleeve and dabs her tears.
Dad takes a moment to rub Mom’s back, steadying her before leaning forward.
His eyes lock on mine. “I know you’re upset,” he says evenly.
“You finished school. Your mother’s sick.
Summer’s leaving. None of this is easy. We get that.
” He points a finger at me. “Now, you may be our son, but that doesn’t give you the right to lose control.
Do not ever speak like that around your mother again.
You will treat women with respect. Always.
” He shakes his head once. “Does that sound fair to you?”
I gnash my teeth together. “Yes.”
“Would you like to try that again?”
“I’m sorry for disrespecting you, Mom,” I say, voice low. “I didn’t mean to lose control like that.”
“Thank you, sweetheart,” she croaks.
Dad claps me on the back. “What have we always said to you?”
I sigh. “Don’t let your mouth outrun your character.”
“We don’t want to be upset with you. We know your heart was in the right place.
It took a lot for us to get that truck. So yes, we’re hurt and disappointed that you did what you did.
We bought it for you, so you’d have a way to get around at UCLA.
So you could come home whenever you wanted to,” he says.
I stare at the kitchen table, wondering how I’m going to dig my way out of this next hole.
“Yeah,” I drag out. “About college …”