didn’t know that his stare was loitering on the side of my face. Every breath I take has thought behind it, knowing he’s watching. I work to hold my mouth in check, my face expressionless, despite the burning sensation of his eyes staring at my lips. My pulse is racing, and I’m getting hot even though it’s forty degrees outside and the heater in this car is shit. A perfect storm of my mood triggers clashes in my chest, and finally, I just snap.
“Can’t you just go around?” I jerk my head to face him, catching the twitch in his eyes. I think he’s both nervous I caught him staring and jumpy at my tone. I sounded mean just now. I’m fucking hot, and . . . confused. And I want out of this car.
My hand moves toward the door handle with my panicked thoughts, and on impulse I push my door open a few inches.
“What, are you gonna go help them hurry things along, lumberjack Abby?” Tory adds in a wry smile and I tug my door closed again, crossing my arms in a humph as I fall back into the seat. His laughter grows, but he glances up at the rearview mirror and then over his shoulder, flipping on his turn signal.
“Hang on. I know a way around.” He hangs a quick U-turn, then speeds back past the diner, where June and Lucas are just getting in Lucas’s truck. The minivan is gone, so Hayden must have already rushed off to work. He was pretty excited about his first day, and even more excited about a paycheck in a few weeks.
“How come you don’t have a job?” I ask.
Tory doesn’t answer right away, and at first, I think maybe he didn’t hear me, but as he checks the mirror again, I note his grimace and pinched brow. My question came out kinda judgmental, I guess. It’s not like I have a real job, either. I have gigs, and all of this sort of fell in my lap. My dad signed me up for a summer acting class when I was six, mostly to get me out of the house, but I got hooked. That little class registration, of course, is the cornerstone of his legal argument for deserving a portion of my company. I think the summer fee might have been thirty-five bucks.
Tory makes a sharp turn into an older neighborhood where most of the homes have front porches and cute yards with huge trees now barren for winter. Flower beds are all emptied for the freeze, but you can see the outlines where they probably bloom bright reds and yellows in the spring. Winding pathways lead to swings and sitting areas where kids no doubt run through sprinklers while parents drink lemonade. I’ve always wanted to live in a house like one of these. I crave that Hallmark lifestyle. Maybe I just crave a normal family.
“I should be spending my free time on basketball,” Tory finally says, drawing my attention back to the driver’s seat. His eyes are hazed as he stares at the road ahead, and while my first reaction is to be defensive under the assumption that he’s talking about me taking up his free time, I realize he’s alluding to something deeper.
“You guys are going to get back in the gym, right?”
There’s a long pause before his answer, and I wonder if he’s thinking about last night, too. Less about the disaster and more about . . . us.
Tory leans his weight to the side and rests one hand on the steering wheel, wincing.
“We’ll be in the junior high gym until the new year, which is lame as hell. You know I dunked there in eighth grade?” He flashes a child-like smile at me, and I get that while he’s being funny, he’s also sorta bragging about it.
“Wow. Big time,” I tease.
Maybe I don’t have to be quite so cold with him. It feels as if we’re in a new place, friendship-wise. It happened with June, so perhaps we’re all coming around to each other and maturing.
“It’s been hard to focus, with all of the drama. I’m sure you get an earful from Hayden, and I’m fine, so let’s talk about you.” He glances my way with a tight-lipped grin that tells me his last little bit was complete bullshit. He’s not fine at all.
“You know, it’s not like I have a set number of hours to hear about people’s struggles. If you need