told her Oreo McFlurries tasted like concrete paste.
She said nothing until she dropped the McFlurry on her lap. And then she muttered, “Cumbuckets,” and gave me a look, “Can concrete paste, do that?” Her whole lap was wet with ice cream. Teal running shorts drenched. I handed her a roll of paper towels and helped wipe up the stream of ice cream that trickled down her leg.
She tensed.
I pulled back a little bit, wadding up the paper towel.
She used to always let me help her, but now—now it’s weird. Is it because she’s older? Because she’s dating—or she’s willing to date? I wish I knew. Things are stranger than I can even comprehend. Heat smothered me, and I just nodded to her.
Sulli mumbled a thanks and scrubbed the rest of the ice cream off with harsher, frustrated force.
“I can drive,” Banks offers.
“No,” Sulli and I say in unison, but I add, “You’ve clocked in the most hours behind the wheel.”
“I’m better at staying awake longer,” Banks reminds me.
He’s not wrong. Sulli and I have chaotic sleep schedules. She rises at odd hours. We always nap a shit ton, but I’ve caught Banks popping Tylenol like they’re Skittles today. When I asked him about it, he said, “Just a headache. It’s nothing.”
He needs rest too. Beyond being my friend, he’s one of my men. I’m not driving his health into the ground by leeching his sleep.
“Sul, take the next exit,” I say, like an order.
She switches lanes. “Do you see another campsite?”
“I saw a sign for a motel.” And it might be the last one for a while. “We’re getting some sleep. All of us.”
“And that’s an order,” Banks jokes light-heartedly.
I smile, but my face slowly morphs in a grimace when we arrive at the motel in nowhere Wisconsin.
“What a shithole,” Sulli mutters, parking beside a beat-up truck.
The neon vacancy sign is half-busted. Only the V and C’s are glowing. The single-level motel looks grimy and rundown: paint chipped, overflowing trash bins, and a few broken windows on rooms 3 and 5. Safety hazards, definitely, but with me and Banks on her detail, she’ll be protected all ways around. No matter where we crash for the night.
“As long as it has running water, should be fine with me,” Banks says as we all unmount from the Jeep.
I pop the trunk. “You need some help raising your standards, Banks.”
“At least my standards are higher than Donnelly’s.” He pulls his rucksack out of the back. “I wouldn’t have slept in the Lost & Found room.”
“The what?” Sulli asks, slipping her Patagonia backpack on her shoulders. The one her dad gave her before we left the REI.
“The Lost & Found room,” Banks says. “It used to be a guest bedroom in security’s Hell’s Kitchen apartment. Stunk like stale beer and piss.”
I explain, “Bodyguards would crash there when they were in New York for the night.”
Sulli looks surprised. “And Donnelly wanted to sleep there?”
“I heard he was willing to,” Banks says. “I would’ve just crashed with my family before sleeping there.” He goes quiet, his gaze dropped.
I understand the somber shift. So does Sulli.
Donnelly doesn’t have a home to run to. Not like the Moretti brothers, who have an army of uncles in South Philly at their disposal. These days, I don’t have a home anymore either.
It’s gone.
It’s not gone, Nine.
With my mom living back in New York, sometimes it feels that way. Shoving those thoughts aside, I grab my red duffel.
Sulli fits on her Philly baseball cap, even in the dead night. “I know my sister couldn’t come because high school started back up, but you think I should’ve invited my cousins to Montana? Like Moffy or Jane or Luna?”
I’m about to answer, but when I turn, I realize she’s asking Banks.
My stomach sinks.
He lifts a shoulder. “You want them here?”
She stares off at the flickering vacancy sign. “The FanCon tour was one of the coolest adventures I’ve ever fucking had—when we were all together. But Beckett was there too and Charlie…” Her frown deepens. “I guess I just miss how close we all got. Anyway, if I asked them, I think they’d just say sorry, we can’t.”
I chime in, “I doubt that, Sul.”
Sulli rests her hands on her head. “You would say that, Kits, but nothing stays the same with friendships. Everyone is growing up and growing apart.” Her words sound pained. “No one has time to travel to Yellowstone to watch their cousin free-solo some cliffs.” Wind picks up the dirt on