my mom bugging him. His blonde hair was greasy; he hadn’t showered today. It was like he didn’t care enough to take care of himself, not with everything going on.
“Where do you plan on going to college, Archer?” Mom spoke, trying to keep the table in steady conversation.
Archer picked at his food, muttering, “I thought I was going to Hillcrest, but now I don’t know.”
“Honey, you can’t neglect your future,” she said.
He threw a glimpse at me before saying, “I don’t know if I’ll have the money after my dad’s court and lawyer fees—”
My mom’s expression fell. “Oh. Well, no offense, Archer, but from what I hear, your father isn’t a good man. The money would be put to better use for your education, I think.” Basically my mom’s way of telling him fuck your father. You do you.
“I know,” he whispered, sighing and sounding utterly defeated.
Sensing Archer was done talking, Mom turned to me. “What about you? Have you applied anywhere? I know you’ll have to take on loans, but the education is worth it—from what I’ve heard, the connections you could make at a university like Hillcrest will more than pay for itself.”
Ugh. My mom really wanted me to go to Hillcrest. Me? I didn’t know what the hell I wanted to do. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to go to college. It seemed degrees these days were a dime a dozen, and putting that much on loans… I didn’t know if that was smart.
“Mom,” I said, “I really don’t want to talk about that right now.” You know, come to think of it, I never wanted to talk about it. I stuffed my face full of meatloaf, chewing, hoping she’d get the hint and drop it. No more college talk.
It’d be a miracle if I lived that long, anyways.
“You’re running out of time,” she said, not dropping it. “You need to at least apply—”
I tuned her out, not wanting to hear it. The rest of dinner, I steadily ignored any attempts at conversation, because anything she said just wound up circling back to Hillcrest. Yeah, yeah, it was a good place, blah, blah. At this point, I really didn’t care.
Mom said she’d clean up dinner, so when I was done, I excused myself and went upstairs, leaving Archer to fend for himself.
Not for long, though.
Archer followed me up the steps, stopping just outside my room. “Your mom is right,” he said, causing me to whirl on him. To think—I thought I’d sit down and try to do some of my homework. Silly me. “You should at least apply.”
“Oh, yeah? What about you?” Crossing my arms, I moved toward him, leaning on my door. “Why won’t you stop funding your dad’s bailout and use it for yourself?” Okay, I was aware it wasn’t a bailout. His father wasn’t a large corporation. And Archer had done good, by refusing to meet the insanely high bail amount the judge had given him. Being a pedophile made you quite the danger to society.
Sighing, he was slow to whisper, “I don’t know. I guess I… I just feel like it’s pointless, like it doesn’t matter.”
Even though Mom would kill me if she saw me getting close to him, I did just that. I set a hand on his arm, touching him gently, causing those pretty blue eyes to stare at me. “Everything’s going to get better, Archer. Maybe not now, maybe not this week, but eventually it will.”
He lifted a hand, clasping it around mine, holding it against his arm as if he was afraid I’d slip away. “And if it doesn’t?”
“Then we’ll get through it together,” I promised. “Day by day.”
Day by day, we could do that, right?
“Now, maybe you should end tonight with a shower,” I said, trying to lighten the mood between us. “You’re starting to smell.” He wasn’t, but hygiene was always a good thing to enforce.
He released my hand, going to sniff his pits like he reeked something fierce. “Yeah,” Archer whispered. “You’re probably right.”
I watched him go with an ache in my heart. I wished I could make it better for him, wished I could make all of his pain go away and bring back the old Archer. The sarcastic Archer. The dimpled, blonde boy who’d stolen my heart even while lying to me.
I waited until he was gone, and then I quietly shut my door and headed to my desk. If I was knee-deep in schoolwork, that would stop my mind from ruminating about