The Girl in the Love Song (Lost Boys #1)(9)

“Your parents?”

“If they see us, I’ll say you got grass stains working on the garden. You’re here because your mom’s working late, and you got locked out of your…house.” My throat tightened. “You have to spend the night.”

Miller nodded listlessly.

I opened the lid, and he poured his clothes—and a few items of his mom’s—into the huge washer. Then I took him by the hand and led him through the house, upstairs to my bedroom, stopping at the linen closet on the way. I grabbed a towel, and inside my room, pointed him toward the bathroom.

“Take a shower if you want. Or a bath. Take as long as you want but toss your clothes out, and I’ll add them to the wash.”

“You want me to give you my underwear?”

“Wrap them in the jeans. I don’t care. I won’t look anyway.”

Miller did as he was told, and I took the bundle of his clothes downstairs. They didn’t smell bad. They smelled of the forest and leathery car interior and him.

When the washing machine was churning, I headed to the kitchen and grabbed a shopping bag. I took two bottles of Mom’s favorite water and dumped them in.

No running water. No toilet. No sink. No shower.

Tears filled my eyes again, but I blinked them away and grabbed two more water bottles. I was determined to change Miller’s reality somehow, but the guilt that I hadn’t followed him sooner was hot and sharp in my chest.

Mom must’ve gone to the grocery store that day; the fridge and pantry were stocked. I made two ham and cheese sandwiches and wrapped them in tinfoil, then grabbed a bag of Doritos and a package of chocolate chip cookies and headed upstairs.

Miller was just turning off the shower when I arrived back in my room. I set the bag down and rummaged through my drawers for the least girly things I owned: a pair of black and white plaid flannel pants and a white UCSC sweatshirt with the yellow banana slug mascot on the front.

The bathroom door cracked open, steam seeping out.

“Uh, Vi…?”

“Here.” I put the clothes in his hand.

He came out of the bathroom a few minutes later. The flannels were too short for him but fit around his narrow waist. He eyed the grocery bag.

“You can eat now or take it with you,” I said.

“I’m tired.”

“Then sleep.”

In a real bed.

I pulled back the covers and climbed into bed. Miller hesitated, then climbed in beside me. We lay on our sides, facing each other. His head sunk into the pillow and he sighed with relief so deep I nearly cried.

“How long?” I asked.

“Eleven weeks, three days, twenty-one hours.”

I bit the inside of my cheek. “You can’t stay there anymore.”

“I know. When school starts…I don’t know what the hell to do. They’ll crucify me.”

“They don’t have to know. But you have to get out. To a shelter, at least.”

Miller shook his head against the pillow. “Mom refuses. She says they’ll take me away from her. She says that at least the car is something that’s still ours. And everyone would find out for sure. No one sees me hiding in the woods. I have a shot.”

“And if a ranger kicks you out?”

“Mom’s getting the money together for a deposit and I’m helping.”

“How long will that take? You both should move in here. We have more than enough room.”

“No, Vi.”

“Why not? Don’t you think your mom would want to…not do what she does?”

“Yes,” he said through gritted teeth. “But she doesn’t trust anyone. And neither do I.”

“You can trust me, Miller.”

His hard expression softened, and he started to answer, but the timer on my phone went off.

“That’s the wash. Be right back.”

I hurried downstairs, past the den where I could hear the TV droning and see its blue-ish light spill out from under the door. Dad, still exiled out of the master bedroom to the foldout couch, while Mom was ensconced in their king-sized bed.

I stopped outside the den door. I could ask my dad for help. For advice.

Then I thought about him waking Mom because Miller was in my room—my bed. They’d freak out, humiliating us both.

In the morning then.

In the laundry room, I switched the clothes to the dryer, and when I came back up, Miller looked to be asleep.

I propped my desk chair under the doorknob just in case my parents remembered I existed and turned out the light. I lay down beside him and pulled the covers up around us. My head nestled against my pillow and he opened his eyes.

“Vi…” he whispered.

“I’m here.”

“What am I going to do?” His voice was thick, and my heart felt like it was cracking into a thousand little pieces.

“Sleep,” I said, trying to sound brave. Like he told me I was. “We’ll figure it out.”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. We’ve been in that car for weeks, but it feels like I was born there. Sometimes, I just want the earth to open and swallow me up.”

“I won’t let it. I need you.”

“You can’t tell anyone. Swear to me you won’t.”

“Miller…”