Something in the Way (Something in the Way #1)(18)

I should’ve probably walked away. I would’ve by now if I hadn’t felt so confused the past few days, and since I’d really only existed since Maddy’s death, nothing more, feeling anything was a welcome change. Losing my little sister had brought on the kind of darkness you don’t ever really come back from. Even day to day, there wasn’t much to my life. I went to work. Construction was good for me, it kept my hands busy, but it was hard. The men I worked with had seen shit, too. Some of them were ex-convicts, and others probably should’ve been behind bars—I’d almost gotten into it with some of them on Friday when I’d warned them not to catcall the girls. Then, I either spent my nights at the community college with other overworked, tired classmates, at a bar drinking by myself, or at home. I preferred it that way, I guess. I wanted to focus on graduating so I could be in a position to help others the way they’d helped me when I’d needed it, even though I hadn’t deserved it.

Lake was the only person I’d come across since Maddy who still hadn’t seen anything bad out of life. She was good. You could sense it just being around her. Not yet jaded. She had dreams, and she believed they’d come true. She was easy to talk to, ambitious, thoughtful. None of that meant she was uncomplicated. That day we met, when she’d sat on a curb with The Grapes of Wrath, I could tell she was having a hard time concentrating. I remembered Maddy reading a lot, but I’d forgotten that expression she made when she was trying to figure out a new word or when something went over her head. Lake made it, too. There were layers to her you might miss if you weren’t paying attention.

My sister’s death had turned my world dark, but Lake was light. By her age, I’d done all sorts of shit—drugs, alcohol, sex. Lake seemed so far away from that. Pure, na?ve, like Maddy would’ve been. I’d have seen to it. Maybe wanting that in my life, someone to look over, to shield from the bad stuff, was wrong considering she was sixteen. Then again, if I’d done a better job of that with Madison, she might still be around to do things like this, to take in the night sky from the top of a Ferris wheel. To taste dyed-pink sugar melting on her tongue. To ask her big brother for advice.

“What do you want to do after this?” Tiffany asked.

I looked over at her, wondering how long I’d been in my trance. We were moving now, going in circles, the breeze warm on my face. “Take you home,” I said.

“I don’t have a curfew.”

“Lake does.”

“Oh. Yeah.”

People became pins stuck in a 3D map as the buildings below us got smaller, more like a model of a fair than an actual one. The ocean stretched on one side of us. Carnival lights reflected orange, purple, green, and red on the water by the dock. But there wasn’t anything but black beyond that.

“We could just drop Lake off.” Tiffany put her hand on my thigh and left it there, as if deciding her next move. “Drive around for a while.”

If this’d been a date, I would’ve put my arm around her, pulled her close, kissed her. If I gave her what she wanted now, she’d give me what I wanted later. I wasn’t in the business of turning down sex from pretty girls. And Tiffany was pretty. A California beach girl, the kind men dreamed about. No doubt she was also experienced. I wouldn’t have to go slow with her. Not that I minded going slow sometimes. I might’ve liked being with a woman for more than sex if I’d ever found it. Had Tiffany had that before? Did she want it?

I put my hand over Tiffany’s to see how it’d feel. It didn’t answer anything, but it didn’t give me more questions, either. Maybe that was good. I was pretty sure if I tried to hold Lake’s hand, I’d feel something about it. We’d both be worse off for it.

With the reservations I had, hand-holding was as much as I was ready for tonight. “I’ll take you home after this,” I said. “Wouldn’t want your dad to worry.”

“He wouldn’t,” she said softly, looking up at the sky. “Not about me.”

I got the feeling this was the real Tiffany. That her bravado was a front for some insecurities that probably came from her dad. She needed someone in her corner. “You really think that?”

“We don’t get along so well,” she said. “In case you didn’t pick that up.”

I was beginning to. “That’s a shame.”

“Look how pretty the stars are,” she said.

Even though the shift in topic was sudden, it didn’t stop a lump from forming in my throat. I kept my eyes forward. The fucking stars. That was a place reserved for Maddy. I wasn’t willing to go there. “What’s pretty about them?”

She looked at me funny. “What kind of a question is that? They twinkle. They’re . . .” She couldn’t come up with anything else. “They’re just pretty. Did you look?”

“I’ve seen them.”

“So if you’re going to drop me off early . . . when will I see you again?”

I didn’t have an answer. I stretched my arm along the back of the seat. She took it as an invitation to move into my side. “I’ll be back on the lot Monday.”

“I don’t mean like that. I was hoping we could, you know, go out.”

I knew what she’d meant. I could just say no. I didn’t want to lead her on. But there was no reason, not one, that I should ever see Lake again if her sister wasn’t around.