The Lies About Truth(7)

Trent stopped laughing and said, “Don’t tell Gray I told you. Okay? Or Gina.”

“Okay.”

“Swear,” he said, and put out his pinkie.

We swore all the swears we knew.

Trent claimed pinkie swears should be rated R. Then, without further discussion, we turned our backs to each other and took off the rest of our clothes. I held mine in my hand. I’m not sure what he did with his.

There I was, naked with Trent McCall. Technically, I was naked near Trent McCall, but it seemed like a pretty legit skinny-dip to me.

“Are we going to turn around?” he asked.

“Don’t ask me. This was your idea. You think it counts if we don’t?”

“Yep.” He sounded truly nervous now.

“What do we do?” I asked.

His voice crawled out of him. “Put our underwear back on?”

We did exactly that, swam back to the rocks and hauled ourselves out, dripping and laughing. “I didn’t think you’d strip,” Trent said.

“And miss out on the trifecta of adulthood? I don’t think so,” I teased.

“But we’re not going to tell anyone?”

“Naw,” I promised.

And I hadn’t. Except now, it seemed like I had.





CHAPTER FOUR


I opened my computer, hoping to wind down the night with Max.

The connection at the convent compound where he’d lived for the past eleven months could be pretty sketchy. We were lucky enough to live in the same time zone, but El Salvador didn’t do daylight saving time, so he was actually an hour behind me. It was nine forty-five his time. I opened a chat window and waited to see if he would respond. If not, I’d email.

Me: You there?

Three little dots appeared.

Him: Yep.

Me: What’s up?

Him: I have a surprise for you.

Me: I need a good one. Rough night around here.

Him: Tell me about it.

I opted to leave him out of the mysterious Big business and go straight to the most worrisome thing on my mind.

Me: My parents are currently the spawn of Satan.

Him:



I laughed. Max and his small victories of making heavy things light.

I explained that they were making me go back to school in the fall and that they wanted me to be social this summer.

Him: What do you think about all that?

Me: It would be easier if you were here.

I didn’t want to say too much on the topic because Max felt really isolated.

He’d lost his brother and most of his voice, and then his parents had moved him to a third-world country. On a scale of suck, he topped out pretty high on the charts. Complaining about school—something he dearly missed—would be insensitive.

Him: Well, beautiful, that could be arranged.

I held beautiful in the palm of my hand instead of letting it go to my heart. He only said stuff like that because he couldn’t see me. Hadn’t seen me. I’d told him all about the plastic surgeries and physical therapy, but that didn’t translate into an image for him. What would he say when he came home for the anniversary?

Injuries weren’t the only obstacles we’d face. Email Sadie was confident. Email Sadie flirted.

Email Sadie wasn’t a lie; she was an invention of hope.

So I had to question if the relationship we had here, created in a year’s worth of emails, would hold water at home.

I had serious doubts.

That I kept to myself.

Me: Tell me you’re coming home tomorrow.

Him: I’m coming home tomorrow.

Me: Don’t mess with me.

Him: I’m not. That was my surprise. I’m flying home tomorrow with Mom.

Tomorrow.

Whoa.

Me: :-) Best news ever!

I was incredibly ready to see him. I just wasn’t ready for him to see me.

Him: I know, right? I thought Mom was joking until she showed me the tickets. Can you pick us up?

I couldn’t pick him up by myself. Driving a car wasn’t something I did. I’d been getting around in my tennis shoes and an old Honda Spree. Even if I did manage to snag a ride, the airport . . . well, I hadn’t been in a crowd like that since my last panic attack at the grocery store.

Him: I really meant . . . can you meet us? I know crowds are hard for you. I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t really want to see you. But if you can’t, I’ll wait until I get to the house.

The sheer power of his understanding fueled my courage.

Me: One way or another, I’ll be there. What time?

We exchanged the details, and I let him go so he could pack.

Max was coming home.

It was the best news I’d had in a year.

Switching off the lamp, I settled under my duvet and stared at the slivers of moonlight slicing through the miniblinds in my room. Light, flying through space, bouncing off the moon from ninety-three million miles away. Crazy-powerful.

Max only had to travel twelve hundred miles tomorrow, but I thought of him the same way: a crazy-powerful light. What would he think of me? I flopped this way and that—worried about his reaction and that whoever had gone through Big might start sharing those notes with other people—before I gave up and retrieved Big from the floor.

“You can stay up here. As long as you keep your beak shut.”