Chapter 30
The mailbox groaned when I opened it, like it resented being touched this early in the afternoon. Usually, it was empty. Or full of things that had nothing to do with me.
But today, as the stack of mail slid forward, one envelope stuck out from the rest—crisp, thick, and very yellow.
Central Missouri University.
My full legal name.
The Quinns’ address.
The combination of my name and their address hit nearly as hard as the university seal, even though I’d filled out every application with that info.
My chest tightened, but not with panic. It felt more like someone had quietly lit a candle under my ribs, and I didn’t know where to put it.
Or how to put it out. I ran my thumb across the address again.
Seeing it typed there—seeing myself tethered to their life on paper—felt weird and good and terrifying in a way I didn’t have words for.
It was somehow distracting from the more important things.
Like what the contents of this envelope said.
Before I could decide whether to open it right there on the porch, the door banged open.
Gavin filled the doorway; he hadn’t stopped growing in the last year. Between puberty and working out, he was nearly unrecognizable—broad shoulders, arms the size of Zach’s, and his chin now at the top of my head. But his expression? The same goofy smile since I’d met him.
“What’s that?” he asked, leaning forward so far I couldn’t stop him from seeing.
I tried to play it cool, holding up the envelope. “Mail.”
His eyes dropped and landed on the university logo. Then he exploded, his voice cracking. “DUDE. EASTON. IS THAT WHAT I THINK IT IS?”
I barely opened my mouth before he grabbed the collar of my shirt and hauled me inside as if I weighed nothing. My feet actually left the porch for a second.
“Kitchen. We need flat surfaces and bright lighting,” he announced, speed-walking like a grandma in the mall.
“Gavin, calm down—”
“I AM CALM,” he said, which was a lie so outrageous I didn’t bother with a response.
He let go of me only when we reached the counter. He bounced on the balls of his feet, all six-foot-something of him vibrating and ready to explode.
“Open it,” he urged, eyes huge. “You gotta open it. I can’t—dude, OPEN IT.”
My hands shook. Not because of the pressure—I was nearly positive I had gotten in; I’d talked to the coach last week—but because the envelope suddenly felt impossibly important.
I slid my finger under the flap. Paper tore, a small piece floating to the ground softly. I pulled out the letter. The first sentence hit with the force of a shove to the chest. “We are pleased to inform you…"
Gavin erupted. A full-on yell, a foot away from me.
It was a noise that probably registered on the Richter scale.
Before I could react, he grabbed me around the waist and lifted me off the ground like a sack of flour.
“YOU’RE IN! YOU’RE IN! MY DUDE IS A COLLEGE-BOUND KING!
” he yelled, spinning us in a sloppy half-circle.
“Put me down!” I gasped between laughs. “Gavin—I’m gonna barf—”
He set me down so fast I stumbled, then he immediately grabbed the acceptance letter as if it were his birthright. “Look at this fancy paper,” he said, rubbing his fingers over the crest. “It’s what adult documents look like. Like taxes. Or marriage licenses.”
I snorted. “Pretty sure this is none of those things.”
Gavin ignored me and read the letter aloud in a voice meant for stadiums, adding explosion sound effects after every sentence. When he reached the scholarship line, he threw both hands up like he’d witnessed a miracle.
Somewhere in the middle of his victory dance, I pulled out my phone.
My hands steadied the moment I typed:
Got into Central Missouri. Officially.
Then, after a second:
Still can’t believe it.
The reply came almost instantly.
EASTON!!!! LET’S GO!!! I’m so freaking proud of you. Seriously. Call me later.
I read Tanner’s message twice, maybe three times, before pocketing the phone.
Gavin didn’t notice. He was busy reenacting my supposed future as a Division II baseball legend.
But this was it. It may not have been the school I’d dreamed of attending, but it was the school I’d be going to—with the program I wanted. Regardless of how baseball ended... I’d have a future. And a good one.
That night, everyone else sat at the dinner table when Gavin and I came in. He tried—for maybe two seconds—to contain himself, but the moment we joined them, he began wiggling like a toddler with a secret.
I wanted to wait until we’d eaten, but I worried Gavin would combust if he had to hold it in any longer. I cleared my throat. “So... uh. I got mail.”
Three heads turned.
I placed the envelope on the table.
Mrs. Quinn’s breath caught for a half second before her body relaxed to normal. Zach’s face softened into a crooked half-smile, measured practice after receiving three separate acceptances of his own. Mr. Quinn’s chair squeaked as he sat up straighter.
“Well?” he asked.
“I got in,” I said.
Silence followed. The great kind of silence.
Mrs. Quinn’s eyes shimmered. “Oh, Easton. That’s wonderful.”
Mr. Quinn nodded once. “That’s a big step. You should be proud.”
Zach raised his water glass. “Congrats, man. Seriously.”
And Gavin, his mouth stuffed with food, said, “HE SCREAMED LIKE A FOUR-YEAR-OLD WHEN HE SAW THE LETTER.”
I glared. “That was you.”
The rest of the night followed with a quiet happiness I couldn’t remember in years. I’d stayed in this house for months. But that night—with the envelope never straying far from my hands—was the first time I stopped bracing for someone to ask me to go.
Tanner came back from school on Friday, even though I’d told him a dozen times not to. He made some excuse about missing Gavin, but I knew he was lying even before he offered to buy Gavin, Maissie, and me ice cream after dinner.
We piled out of the Durango and wandered into the restaurant. Gavin had his hand wrapped around Maissie’s as Tanner and I walked in behind them.
My hand flinched toward Tanner’s when I saw it, an involuntary compulsion to match their body language. Instead, I pulled up my hood. I was not sure why Tanner had decided on ice cream while it was still this cold, but when a Blizzard was offered to me for free, I never said no.
After we ordered, the four of us took seats in the back corner, my back to the window, my leg near Tanner’s. The distance was inches but might as well have been a mile, a Calvin-sized barrier hanging between us.
“How’s school, Gavin? Going to miss any games this season?” Tanner asked as he took a sip of his milkshake.
Gavin licked his vanilla cone, ignoring the question.
Maissie answered for him. “He’d better not. He’d get dumped if he did.”
I snorted. “Since when do you care about baseball?”
She rolled her eyes at me before spinning the pink scrunchie on her wrist. “I don’t. But I’m not dating someone who’s too lazy to pass all of their classes.”
I tilted my head and nodded. “Probably fair. Glad you could get Gavin to not suck at life.”
“You know,” Gavin said between licks of his ice cream, “I liked the two of you better when you weren’t friends.”
Without processing Gavin’s words, the hair on my arms lifted before I realized why. My eyes darted to the counter, away from the conversation, to where the ghost of my father stood ordering.
Except I wasn’t positive it was a ghost this time.
He had the same red and navy Cardinals hat he’d worn since I was eight, with the words “St. Louis” written in cursive on the back.
The beard looked longer than last time, longer than I’d ever seen on him.
He studied the menu board like his biggest decision of the day was whether to get a waffle cone or the cherry milkshake he normally got.
My hands turned cold—colder than holding the Blizzard.
For a second, I let myself believe he wouldn’t see us. That he’d order, leave, and never know how close he’d come.
The others kept talking. Gavin said something that made Maissie laugh, and the rest of the table moved at normal speed while I dropped into slow motion, every sound arriving a half beat late.
Don’t turn around. Order your milkshake and go.
I counted his movements the way I counted my pitch count. After he ordered, he pulled out his wallet from his back pocket. The same cracked brown one he’d had my entire life, cash coming out of it before I decided what to do.
Then the girl behind the counter handed him his shake, and he turned.
I managed to get my fingers to the edge of Tanner’s green hoodie and pull on it. He laughed, swatting away my fingers; but when he saw where my fingers were pointing, he shot up, his hand going to my shoulder.
Recognition crossed Dad’s face slowly—confusion at first, then something like a smirk—nothing like the one the Quinns always wore.
Gavin spun to see what we were looking at, his body contorting in his seat.
I wiped at my eyes, trying to clear them, trying to process.
“Go to the car, Maissie,” Gavin said. He stood as well, stepping in front of me, with Tanner moving around me to get to his side.
“What? No,” Maissie said.
“Go. Please.”
Maissie looked at me—whatever was on my face—and didn’t ask for clarification. She grabbed Tanner’s keys and blurred by us and out the door.
We should have followed Maissie out the door, never given him a chance. But I was frozen, glued to the tiny booth, the walls of the ice cream parlor pushing and squeezing around me.
He walked within five feet of us, close enough I could smell that he went with the cherry. And that he was drunk. He shook his head. “A restraining order? Really? And these two pussies for your bodyguards?”
I locked eyes with him. Still frozen. I had no words at my disposal.
He turned and walked toward the exit, possibly realizing the consequences if he stuck around. Or possibly afraid of what Tanner and Gavin might do.
The two of them wordlessly walked toward the windows, their eyes never leaving Dad.
I sank lower into my seat, scooping a bite of the Blizzard into my mouth, ignoring the freezing cold on my tongue, hating everything about this. The booth felt too small, the air too loud.
“Easton.” Tanner’s voice wasn’t panicked.
I didn’t look at him.
“Hey.” His voice was softer this time. His hand wrapped around mine on the table.
Gavin slid back into the booth across from us, shoulders tight, his face looking older than he was. “He’s gone,” he said. “I’m going to go sit with Maissie in the car if that’s okay.”
I nodded, the word “gone” ringing in my ears. I swallowed as he left, the red plastic spoon spinning in my fingers. “I thought he wasn’t allowed within five hundred feet of me.”
“He’s not.” Tanner’s fingers squeezed mine once. “I think we can call it in or something.”
The old version of me would've already had the phone out. Would've wanted him in a cell by nightfall, wanted the paperwork, the proof, the distance. I put my spoon down and grabbed the edge of the table.
“Easton?”
“If I call it in," I said slowly, feeling the shape of it as I went, "then the rest of my night is about him.
Tomorrow's about him. I spend the next week giving statements, looking over my shoulder, waiting to hear if it stuck.
" I shook my head. "He shows up for ninety seconds and gets to own the next ninety days. "
Tanner didn't say anything. He just kept his hand around mine, listening the way he did—letting me find it.
"My whole life he decided things," I said.
"When I could talk. What I could feel. Whether I got to be scared or had to swallow it.
" The words came easier than I expected, like they'd been waiting.
"I'm so tired of him deciding things. And calling it in—I know it's the smart move, I know it's what I'm supposed to do—but it feels like handing him one more.
Like I can't go get ice cream without him still controlling me. Like I can’t live my life. "
"That's not dumb," Tanner said, before I could call it dumb myself.
"It's a little dumb."
"It's not, even though you won’t believe me,” he said. The corner of his mouth moved, and for the first time since the bell over the door had stopped ringing, I relaxed.
He started again. “We should go live our lives. And by that, I mean we shouldn’t leave Gavin and Maissie alone in the car for too long.”
We stood, my fingertips slowly brushing Tanner’s palm as I pulled away. I wished I had decided sooner not to let my dad control my life. Back when being brave might have meant reaching for Tanner’s hand instead of letting it go.