24. NOAH
Chapter twenty-four
I slam my locker shut and slip on my headphones, cranking up the volume. As I bob my head to Addicted To Love , my hand hanging down at my side and mimicking guitar strings against my thigh, my thoughts turn to a certain snarky brunette.
As they always do now.
The memories of her brown lips have been on my mind all day. Her eyes shining in the light and her strawberries-and-cream cheeks bunching up. Even in my dreams I see her smile, her laugh filling up these empty hallways and pieces of my soul, and the shy touch of her fingers as she shifts her hair to one side of her body.
Damn I love being the reason for it. I couldn’t pay attention in any of my classes, too focused on the way her eyebrows scrunch when she’s pissed with me, the tiniest dimples that pop out, all because I can’t stop tempting fate with Bellpond High’s 5-foot powerhouse of a girl.
My lips curl into a smile as I pass the girls’ restroom, reminding me of all the ways I’d love exploring Roxanne Wishmore’s sweet self. My hands itch to try taming that wildcat temper of hers. To grab her fists before she lands a punch and discover if her tongue tastes as good as it sounds when she sasses me.
One day I’ll take those chances. For now though, I rock the empty halls, waiting to catch her off guard again tomorrow.
Something has definitely changed between us after. After she showed up on my doorstep last week, all dressed up in her dark boots, the hem of her wet flannel brushing the soft skin above her knees.
After I let her in.
She keeps showing me small glimpses of the real girl buckling under the weight of shouldering it all alone for so long. Roxanne doesn’t need to pretend to be anything but human and I fall a little harder for her every time.
No one knows I am. I haven’t told a soul, because this isn’t for anyone but us. I hug the moments greedily to my chest, way sweeter than any secret fling or exploits my reputation might suggest. This new closeness feels like something sacred sprouting only for us, like a baby flower that starts to grow through the cracks in the pavement. And knowing that sometimes she trusts me enough to shed a bit of a layer for me, I’d hold her fucking cardigans and flannels every day.
I push open the doors to the outside, and the wind takes my smile with it.
Five feet in front of me and looking irritatingly at ease while leaning on the metal pole holding up the entrance awning, is Harley.
I did my research on him after I’d seen him at the lake, only there wasn’t much to dig up. Newbie “artsy” pretty boy rapidly climbing Bellpond High’s social ladder since the breakup I still don’t fully understand. The guy every girl now started paying attention to.
Every girl except Roxanne, that is.
I didn’t have all the details about their breakup, but I knew enough. He’d dumped her with zero warning after several months together in favor of her nemesis. He doesn’t deserve to breathe the same air as her after the way he crushed her.
My hands are dying to rearrange his face as he straightens up from the pole. She deserves better than assholes like that.
His doped up grin seems to falter slightly as I walk right past the invisible thunderclouds brewing above his head. If he knows what’s good for him he won’t press his luck. Roxanne is no longer his to toy with anymore, and I protect the things that I care about in this world.
And no two-bit Lothario is getting past me to hurt you again . That’s a blood oath.
I might get a kick out of provoking Roxanne, but when it comes to this double-crossing dirtbag, I'm firmly on her side. If she lets me, I’ll gladly be the bad guy and step between her and any more heartbreak from here on out. Starting with this dipshit.
Swinging my keys around one finger, I keep my gaze locked straight ahead on my bike, flat-out refusing to acknowledge Captain Arthouse’s existence. I still sense him hovering behind me with his sad rain cloud, can picture his colorful bag smacking against his hip. Can smell his overpowered hairspray following me.
After a minute spent awkwardly shuffling his feet on the pavement, Mopey McGee finally scampers around me, stopping right in my path. I bite my cheek to keep from laughing out loud.
I meet his glare with mocking politeness. “Did you need directions back to the playroom, kid?”
“What do you think you’re doing?” Harley demands with substantially less fire.
I pull my headphones down around my neck. “Doing? Just heading home, man.”
His eyes narrow. “You know that’s not what I mean.”
“I’m sorry?” I tilt my head. “Do I know you?”
Harley’s jaw ticks. “You know exactly who I am.”
Oh, I sure do.
“Doesn’t ring a bell.” I drop down to one knee to pretend to tie my already-tied shoe. I want to be a little shit and smile so hard, pat his shoulder and say something like ‘ Ciao, darling’ , but I hide my smile and fiddle with my laces instead.
“You better be careful with her,” he snips, flicking his bangs out of his eyes with a twitch. “You don’t know what she’s been through.”
The wind blew at my curls, making me nearly grin when I smelt Roxanne on my jacket. Of course I know. I’ve spent countless nights imagining what it would be like to hold her, to tell her everything’s going to be okay.
When I look at him trying to look hard by staring down his nose at me with his hands on his hips, I know he’s referring to their past relationship—how he was her real first boyfriend. Her first in a lot of ways probably. This guy still thinks he has some claim over her because of that, even after being a prick of a boyfriend.
I bet she supported the hell out of his art shows, playing that perfect role of the adoring girlfriend. The number one fan showering him with compliments while that ego of his expanded. How did trusting, sweet Roxanne get repaid for treating Captain Sulkypants here like a goddamn king? By getting abandoned the second something “better” caught his disloyal eye.
He’s having regrets about what he’d done now that Riley doesn’t do any of that shit, but Roxanne isn't his anymore. Yet here he stands, looking like a total asshole storming up to me like this.
“I know enough.” I switch to my other tied-up shoe. “You don’t have her anymore though, do you?”
“You don’t know a thing about Roxy,” he spits, taking an aggressive step forward. Who the fuck is this guy? “And I know that you only want one thing.”
“Yeah, I understand that completely. It’s pretty crystal clear that I’m only interested in one thing and you know what it is…” I trail off, meeting Painterboy’s glare straight on. “Your ex-girlfriend.”
His face reddens, nearly stomping a foot. “I don’t think you know the value to certain individuals that can’t be calibrated by many, if any. So I mean it, back off.”
I slowly straighten to my full height, muscles going tight. The boy had obviously gone through something with her if he was this protective, and I find it too fucking amusing considering what he’d done.
“Are you saying you’re claiming ownership over her? Roxanne can make her own choices.” I lean in, a cold stare to match his. “She does not belong to you. What’s between us is none of your business.”
Harley huffs, his intimidation attempt crashing and burning so hard.
I just smile. “Here’s some advice from someone who does know her worth—don’t start claiming and discarding what you can’t appreciate.”
He scrunches his face up, and looks about ready to unleash some good curse words so I step around him, heading for my bike. Let him obsess about how to get her back. No skin off my back.
I toss one last parting shot over my shoulder as I walk off.
“While you search for your misplaced guts...” I pause, letting the silence stretch taut for one deliciously devastating beat. “Tell Riley I said hi.”
His face screws up constipated-like and I fold my lips into my mouth before I bust a gut laughing. His attitude is begging to be taken down a notch. Or six.
Whatever lingering claim or feelings he thought he had over her, I wasn’t going to put up with it. Or anyone else’s who can’t appreciate her worth. Roxanne deserves so much after how he broke her spirit, and I was going to make damn sure she got it.
In whatever ways she’d let me.
Straddling my bike, I gun the engine, giving Harley a warning rev when it looks like he has something else to say to me, then peel out towards the skatepark to clear my head fully of useless exes. My parents are back in town today, and I'm not in the mood to deal with them yet.
The sun beats down on my back as I hit the throttle, smiling at the wind passing over my temples. Soon it’ll be too cold to be biking around for fun like this, and I’ll have to suffer frostbite on my fingers to get to school. Wind still whipping my hair, I breathe deep, trying to shake off the bad energy.
But goddamn if Harley’s parting words didn’t nag at me a little… What exactly had Roxanne been through with him? She never opened up much about their relationship and it must have been quite the emotional rollercoaster if Picasso is still so riled up.
I shake away the last of the pessimistic thoughts as I roll up to the park, propping my bike next to the fence and hitting the kickstand. Daniel is here and focused, grinding on a rail. I pull out my board and step onto its scratched deck, feeling the rumble of my wheels rolling over the concrete. The vibrations through my body and numbing of my feet is a place that's safe, where all I have to worry about is which part of the board needs to hit the curb and which way to land, each crack and pebble sending tremors up my legs.
I fucking love skating. It never gets old .
We fist bump before he’s attacking the rails again, board grinding with a scraping shriek before he pops flawlessly back to the pavement. Skating was cooler when Daniel was around with his fast moves and dimpled smile that probably inspires the love poems he gets stuffed in his locker.
I gain speed toward the half pipe where Molly and Levi are doing their usual scam—trying to sell single cigarettes to outsiders for 10 cents each. As I sail up the steep wall and pivot into a tail stall, I imagine Roxanne’s eyes watching my moves from behind the glass windows of Primal Vinyl and I’m convinced that’s the only reason I land it so clean.
We spend the next hours attempting tricks, bailing spectacularly because we ham it up for any attention. Honestly, scraping knees and elbows is so worth it when we finally land anything. Being airborne and flipping the board under your feet helps you to stop obsessing about anything for a bit, way too focused on trying to touch every inch of concrete.
No parents, exes, or confusing crushes can touch you here. All the social pressures and expectations melt away as you shift your weight, trying to angle each landing.
By the time we were dripping sweat and scratched up, the sun is sinking low behind the trees. I gulp down the plastic jug of water Levi always brings, fist bump Daniel my goodbye, and reluctantly kick off for home, muscles zinging every time I punch the gas.
Sadly, I couldn’t avoid it any longer. It was time to face the parents.
Pulling up to my house, I lean my bike against the side of the garage and sit at the end of the driveway until stars begin to peek out in the sky. I’m hoping I can avoid going inside for a little longer.
The lights stay brightly lit inside and today I figured out how impatient of a person I am.
They waited up for me.
With a resigned sigh, I flick my cigarette out into the street and steel myself to face the music. The closer I get to the front door, I already hear an argument filtering out.
Time and time again, I wonder if Mom and Dennis were ever really happy together. If they ever stared at each other with a fraction of love and felt giddy at the thought of finally getting to see each other after time apart. Did they ever have laughs that made them want to kiss the shit out of each other? Smiles that had them kicking their feet underneath their sheets?
Somehow I highly doubt it.
Slipping inside quietly, I brace for the gruff voice of Dennis competing with my mom’s shrillness, both voices crowding in to take over the other one’s place. The entryway is still cluttered with unpacked leather luggage and floral carry-ons fresh from their first class trip to wherever so they must have been going at it for a while.
I creep down the long foyer, trying to avoid knocking down any of the art or bumping into the table, their angry words starting to bounce off the vaulted ceiling and only getting clearer with each step.
“Work… never home… care about anything else!” my mom yells.
Dennis scoffs, ice clinking in his glass that is no doubt filled with brandy. “At least someone’s career is finally taking off, no thanks to the burdens at home!”
My presence goes ignored as usual while accusations keep flying.
“You sleep all day while I’m the one who has to straighten this shit out!” I hear Dennis also yell.
I pause at the base of the stairs, feet sinking in the faded salmon carpet that’s probably due for a shampooing, not ready to retreat yet in case something happens. My fingers find a loose piece of wood on the banister, just begging to be picked at while biting my lip at the image of my stepdad’s severe, demanding face in my mind.
It’s difficult for me to decide which I prefer more: the constant bitter quarreling of those two when Dennis is home, or the near-dead silence when he’s not and my mom stays behind.
After a few more acidic words are thrown between them, I tiptoe my way up the staircase, cringing as each step creaks under my shoes. I was terrified Dennis would come rounding the corner with his drink in hand, grab me by my jacket and pull me back into their toxic fucking vortex.
Safely making it to my room, I close the door and flop down on my bed, groaning into the sheets. Being in this house is one giant gas cloud you have to wade through and forcibly adapt your lungs.
I’ve been debating escaping back out to go wander the streets until they pass out or give up, but drowning them out with music sounds like the path of least resistance tonight.
Before isolating myself fully, I swap out my sweaty shirt for a fresh black tee, then quietly walk past the thin, white and beige striped walls in the hallway, and into the bathroom next to my room.
I wipe at my warm face and neck with a towel, their verbal match still raging downstairs and filtering up through the Pepto-Bismol pink tiles.
Their sound only amplifies when I walk back toward my room, the words still indistinguishable, but the tone is definitely angrier than before. I'm straining to hear my mom’s reactions, picturing her down there alone and facing his temper. She thinks I don’t notice the extra makeup, the oversized Jackie O shades, and the reclusive days barricaded in their bedroom after their fights, but I miss nothing when it comes to people I love.
Loud crashing sounds ascend up the stairs, and I lean over the banister toward the noise. Pots and pans start clattering to the floor, cupboards slamming. What the hell is going on down there?
More ear splitting noises make me flinch, the violence of shattering dishes pumping up the blood in my ears. Gripping the orb at the top of the banister, I suck in a deep breath, the need to intervene warring with hard-learned warnings that come from leather on my skin.
Don’t engage. Weather the storms. He’ll burn out eventually.
The repetitive shattering continues, sounding a lot like my mother’s fine bone china being chucked around brick walls. I'm already halfway down the stairs, palms slick on the railing, straining to catch a glimpse of the war zone erupting in our kitchen.
There is broken glass glittering in the foyer, mixed with food from the kitchen flung across, from pieces of lettuce to rolling oranges attempting to even escape their force-field.
Dennis is raging at inanimate objects now. What’s next? Sledgehammer our fucking TV?
Another crash twists the muscles in my face, followed by a cry of pain in a voice I know very well, and hiding out in my bedroom like a coward is no longer an option. I grip the railing, hop down to the last step, and round the corner of the foyer to peek into the kitchen.
My mom has tears streaming down her face as she shouts at my stepdad with some surprising backbone despite her shoulders shaking. He towers over her, his left hand opening and closing at his side, the knuckle under his wedding ring whitening.
I should lock myself in my room with my doodles and cassette tape until the typhoon passes. Except this time feels different—the danger more immediate, my mom more scared.
Dennis’ arm whips forward and slaps Mom hard across the face. The harsh crack slices through the destroyed kitchen and she staggers backward, collapsing to the floor with a wounded cry that splits my heart into fragmented pieces like the fucking dishes at my feet.
Shock whites out everything.
Mom… Dennis… Violence… Does not compute.
The world tunnels back into focus at the tears springing into her eyes as she curls in on herself, leaning up against one of the wooden cabinets. Then red seeps in, blood pounding like a couple of really fucking pissed off bongos.
Before this venom infecting Dennis poisons what family bonds remain, I rush into the kitchen, murder in my clenched fists, and put myself between him and my mom. His eyes widen down on my face—a promise of hell.
“Get away from her,” I rasp. “Now.”
He glares at me, and my stomach knots. Not with nerves, but with something darker. His gaze is heavy, weighted and brokering no room for argument as he barks loudly, “Get out of the way, boy. This doesn’t concern you.”
“The hell it doesn’t!”
I brace for his reaction, for excuses or deflection or even swung fists.
“I said move!” Spit and expensive scotch spray from his mouth.
“No.” I’m granite, immovable. Mom needs this. Needs me to be the fucking breakwater against Dennis’ waves of control.
He lets out a harsh laugh. “Playing the big man, are we?”
My hands tremble with coursing adrenaline but I hold firm between monster and mother. The blood bongos roar louder in my ears, drowning her cries and sniffling, the glass crunching under my feet as I step forward.
“Maybe if you weren’t such an asshole, she wouldn’t be so scared of you.”
His eyes flash. Mistake .
“You really are a disrespectful little punk,” he seethes through bared teeth, rank scotch fumes wafting with each word. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
He gets in my face and my muscles burn, though I refuse to give him an inch. I keep my jaw locked, not wanting to show him that fear exists within my body while I wait for him to lose himself to his rage.
“I know you’re a bully,” I hurl back. If he wasn’t going to hit me before, that was going to do it.
Sure enough, his open hand lashes across my face. Pain explodes through my head, stars bursting across my vision, and I stagger backward, glass crunching under my feet as I catch myself on the counter.
Fuck. This isn’t over.
I probe my swelling lip from where his wedding ring caught me, breathing deep against the black creeping inward. I’d rather him crash against me instead of her.
“Well? Feel powerful now, big guy?” I straighten slowly and Dennis’ eye twitches as I force a red-toothed smile through the pain, unwilling to bend. “Did putting us in our place help your tantrum?”
The tension keeps mounting. My smartass quips aren’t helping, but fuck it.
Ah shit .
His other hand whips out with viper swiftness, knocking me back into the counter. This time I was expecting it. I was able to clench my jaw to absorb the impact, refusing to make a sound, but the copper tang of blood fills my mouth where I bit my cheek.
“Don’t ever speak to me that way again,” he roars, face reddening. “You and your mom need to learn respect.”
I meet his glare and laugh low in my throat. “Respect needs to be earned.”
The back of my hand swipes across my mouth and I straighten again, preparing for him to give me another blow.
“Noah, leave him alone!”
“What?” I whirl toward my mom on the ground, staring down at the purpling skin on her wrists. How the fuck can she worry about him?
“You don’t understand!” Tears stream as she tugs at my pant leg. “He takes care of us!”
She keeps tugging at my pants, those wet eyes of hers begging me to stop. I'm stunned.
Is she seriously taking his side? After everything he’s done, she’s going to defend him? Are fur coats and designer shoes really worth this ? Has his shadow really darkened every corner of her world, convincing her this dysfunction is normal... that this is love?
I can’t believe this. She’ll really keep enduring the abuse as long as financial security remains.
I pull away from her grasp, suddenly feeling helpless. Detached. The kitchen line’s been breached, and I’m adrift in enemy territory. “You want me to stand by and let him hurt you?”
“Please, you don’t know anything that’s going on,” she sobs. “He buys you things, lets you do what you want. Let this go!”
“But—”
“Noah,” she barks, “just leave us!”
My voice deserts me. What could I say that would sink past her bruised paper-thin skin at this point?
I blink my eyes down to meet my mom’s matching ones.
The silence stretches, charged and fucking brittle. Dennis looms. Mom cowers. And I...
I need to get out of here. She wants me to leave? I’ll show her how to fucking leave. Something I wish she took after her first husband—my dad.
I storm out, china crunching as loud as gravel beneath my feet as I charge back into the foyer, my fist raised and ready to connect with that front door. It slams violently behind me as I leave that house of horrors with my arms hanging limply and defeated at my side without looking back.
The night’s icy air bites at my skin, but I’m too fired up to care that I don’t have my jacket. I pace around the driveway, hands flying to my hair and trying to push down on the ache in my skull from Dennis’ ring. How could she ask me to do nothing? Does she not realize how twisted and fucked up this is?
Fuck. I want to hop on my dirtbike and go—just go and feel the wind touch my cheeks as I push past 120 MPH until the many different colors of anger and sickness and disgust can’t be felt anymore.
Except my keys are still all the way upstairs, tucked in my jacket pocket.
No way am I facing their dysfunctional shit again tonight. I’d rather freeze my nuts off out here all night and sleep in the backyard pool chair than go back in that fucking house.
My feet wear raw circles in the concrete until I can’t taste the blood in my mouth anymore. Then I kick a stone as hard as I can across the pavement. The darkness around me is starting to feel heavy, like a storm is brewing up above. Fitting for the way I feel inside.
I turn up to the sky, no more stars in sight. It was definitely going to rain tonight.
How lovely.
Shoving my hands in my pockets, I start walking down my street, needing to get away and clear my raging mind. My fingers push into the seams of my jean pockets as I walk faster, my cheek still stinging where Dennis’s hand mashed into my face.
Some stellar mentors and role models I’ve gotten stuck with, huh? A drunk sperm donor who split when booze flowed thicker than his blood. Now Dennis—a violent, manipulative asshole who is our provider. Their flawed examples are supposed to mold me into a man somehow?
I scrub my fingers over my burning eyes. No way am I crawling into a bottle or lashing out like them, right? I have to be better somehow.
Blinking back the sting, I pick up my pace. I hate Dennis with every piece of my fucking existence and need to get out of that house. I’m still counting down the days until I can graduate and take possession of my dirt bike, then he’ll lose that control he lords over me like a leash. I’ll cut ties for good once I have that title in one hand and my diploma in the other.
Just seven more months until then and I figure something out.
Christ. The thought of enduring even ten more minutes under his thumb, let alone months, makes me walk faster into the night. Alone. Always fucking alone.
I pass all of the darkened houses I’ve been to countless times—Hayden’s, where I’d only give him more ammo to use against me if I showed up on his doorstep looking like I’d just got done crying. Chris’, who means well but wouldn’t truly get why I can’t shrug off a fight with the parents. Daniel’s place wasn’t too far either, but he wouldn’t really get it either. No one else would understand.
There’s somewhere else I need to go. Someone else I want to see. Someone whose fire could burn clean off the wounds inside of me like a leech stuck to my skin.
My steps slow, breath misting raggedly as a car drives up the street toward me. Shit, I hope they don’t stop and ask if I’m alright. The blowup at home has already stripped me raw, nerves exposed and stinging, and tonight there is only one balm I crave. The image of Roxanne’s spring eyes and dimples glows brighter, guiding me forward, toward a feeling I don’t think I deserve and a comfort I’ve never known.
Towards her.
I’m hoping she’s not there when I show up. My head is a mess and I’m not sure I can handle any more confusion about what I want from her right now. It’s too tangled up in loaded stares, exes that have gotten into our heads, and now both of us are waiting for someone to take the plunge. She’s always dancing that line with me but then pulls away as if she has a parachute strapped to her back.
I’m in no shape to withstand her hot and cold merry-go-round tonight.
Stronger than that is my bone-deep craving to see her be there. I want her to open the window and look down at me, to sense that only she can clear out the shit choking all other air from my lungs tonight. No questions asked, only acceptance shining in her eyes, the ones that are so green and unreadable and fucking beautiful. Maybe she’d shine some of her sun down on me between those leaves around her irises.
The sick part of me wants her to play games while I’m balanced so precariously over an abyss of ugly truths. If it comes to that, then I might stop playing back. Might tell her the full weight crushing my ribs and beg her to either free me finally or crush every dream to pieces so I can feel anything besides our constant suspense lately.
God help me I wanted—I just wanted, and that was the most dangerous thing of all.
I’d never wanted something like this. I’ve never wanted someone like this.
Feet pounding pavement, I sprint past cookie-cutter houses with their neat rows of hedge-cut fencing, some with lines of lit pumpkins on porches, chasing the escape she represents. My heart is beating fast, my breath draws short, and all the little hairs down my body stand upright.
The want is painful now, gnawing away beneath my sore skin. More painful than Dennis’ marks. I don’t know what reaction I hope for most when I get to her house, but I can't get there fast enough. I have to see her, no matter how dangerous wanting anything feels right now. She is the only one who can make this feeling inside me go quiet, even if it’s only for as long as she lets me stay.
I might get the door slammed in my face, or I might get two seconds. It depends on the Roxanne that is home—the one who hates me or the one who's starting not to.
Hell, I'll take either. They both seem like enough time for me.
I take a right at the end of my street, tasting the autumn air on my tongue as I slide my hands deeper into my pockets and follow the sidewalk until I see the start of Main Street. Beginning my trek through Bell Pond Park, I pass the giant oak tree with its twisting branches going up toward the sky like an arthritic hand. The cold air feels so good on my hot skin, and it’s relaxing—walking alone at night with nothing but the bugs and leaves dotting the ground with reds and golds.
It’s quiet over here, only the sound of crickets, and my shoes crunching sticks and leaves across the park, which isn’t helping the intensifying pounding of my heart from the distance that’s closing between me and her.
A Thursday night and the town is already asleep, which is nothing new. This place basically has an 8 PM curfew. Though with the street lights reflecting off the roads, shining like little guiding moons, it’s kind of nice. Pretty. Calming, even.
Maybe this is why people take up jogging.
I pass through the park, glancing back at the dark, rippling water once more. Not many people know Roxanne lives a few blocks over, but after much pestering, Stephanie had surrendered the top-secret information last weekend on the condition that I swore not to ever show up uninvited.
I guess my mind knew something before I did because here I am, unable to stay away after the explosion at my house. Most rules are meant to be broken anyways.
I know I've hit the west side of town when I start to see overgrown rose bushes choking mailboxes. Everyone on the east side wakes me up at 6 AM on Saturdays with their hired weed whackers, needing to keep up their perfectly manicured lawns hiding the ugly shit that happens inside their houses.
I reach the end of her street, her monster of a fucking car parked in the driveway, and I spot an amber light glowing behind her sheer curtain. She’s still awake .
The window slides open as I stop mid-throw, dropping the rest of my pebble arsenal collected from the park. Backlit by her bedside lamp, leaning on her elbows, dark hair spilling over her shoulder as she glances down at me with those impossibly green eyes and a sly smile—the exact smile already burned into my memory that kept my feet moving in this direction—is Roxanne.
I’m hypnotized by this girl who’s slowly letting me into her world of mixtapes and brown lipstick. Unable to resist the swing of some mental pocket watch leading me to her window with my handful of pebbles, knowing I shouldn’t have knocked but hoping she’d let me in anyway.
I glance around, teeth sinking into my lower lip. It wasn't a good idea, but damn do I live for the bad ones.
And on the scale of bad ideas, this one might be the best one yet.