Sidebarred: A Legal Briefs Novella(27)

Kennedy gently touched Brent’s wrist. “If you really want to, you will.”

She sounded so certain, he believed her.

Brent swung his right leg over the small bike, awkwardly, hopping a bit on his prosthetic. He gripped the handle bars and tried to raise the kickstand. It took him three tries, but he did it. Then he sat on the bike, braced his prosthetic foot on the pedal and pushed. It slipped off before he moved an inch. He repositioned himself and tried again, but his balance was all wrong and he was just able to catch himself before he toppled over.

“This is gonna take a while,” he said, then sighed.

Kennedy sat on the ground and folded her hands around her knees. “We’ve got all summer.”

****

One Week Later

“Woooooo! Faster Brent!”

Kennedy’s brown braid had come loose and her hair tickled his face, lifted by the wind that poured over them as they raced down the hill. She sat on the handlebars, her feet braced on the lip of the bolt on either side of the wheel. Brent stood behind her, pumping the pedals.

“Okay—hold on!”

And they were off. He flew down the path, through shadows and patches of sun, bouncing over roots and rocks, thin branches slapping at his arms, still wet from yesterday’s rain, but he didn’t feel the sting. Because he was having too much fun. It felt like he was flying.

And he felt something else he hadn’t for a long time.

Normal.

“Yes!” Kennedy screeched. “Go-go gadget leg!”

Brent laughed, ducking his head beneath a particularly low branch. Then he pulled up on the handlebars to hop over a raised bump, making her bounce.

He was having such a good time, he didn’t notice the large rock right in the bike’s path.

Not until they’d hit it.

And then he was literally flying—they both were. His breath burst from his lungs as he landed in the wet grass with a hard grunt. For a second, he didn’t move. Nothing felt broken or injured. Then he sat up. Brent saw the bike on its side a few feet away, the back tire still spinning. He saw Kennedy a few feet beyond that. Her glasses had been knocked off her face, her eyes were closed and she wasn’t moving.

At all.

As he looked at her, something inside him felt like it was breaking after all. In the seconds it took to get to her, a dozen thoughts ran through his head—each more horrible than the one before.

She was hurt—and it was all his fault. He would never forgive himself.

Never.

“Kennedy!” He knelt beside her, touching her cheek, looking for blood, his voice raw. “Kennedy wake up! Look at me.”

Instantly her eyes snapped open, shining like amber stones. And Brent was so relieved, he didn’t realize what was happening.

Not until Kennedy said, “Gotcha!”

Then she laughed. Loudly. Freely. Without a worry in the world.

Brent sat back. Relief turned to understanding. And understanding turned to anger. “You idiot! You scared the crap out of me.”

Disgusted, he scrambled to his feet and walked a few steps away.

“You should’ve seen your face!” Kennedy cackled.

Then she slipped her glasses on and was able to see what Brent’s face actually looked like. Pale. Tight. His breath escaped fast and hard.

Then she wasn’t laughing anymore. Because she realized what she hadn’t before: Bad things, terrible things really did happen. And Brent knew that better than anyone—because they had happened to him.

The smile fell from her lips. She crawled forward, rose to her knees. “Brent, I’m sorry. I didn’t think . . . it was stupid. I’m really sorry.”

He didn’t look at her right away. He stood, turned around, his hands on his hips.

And Kennedy wanted to cry. She could do it, easily, because she felt so awful.

When he did finally face her, his eyes were hard, two sharp-cut sapphires. Then he forced out a big breath. “It was stupid. And do you know what happens to stupid girls?”

“What?”

“They get the mud.”

Kennedy wasn’t familiar with that expression. But as she started to ask what the heck he was talking about, a glob of cold, wet mud landed on her shirt—splattering across her chest and neck.

“Ah!” She yelled out.

She looked between her muddy shirt and the boy who’d made it that way. And he was smiling again.

Kennedy’s eyes narrowed. “You are so dead.”

She scooped up the wet earth and formed a ball in her hand, like a mucky snowball.

Brent wiggled his muddy fingers at her. “Oooh, I’m so scared.”

Kennedy Randolph didn’t just spit like a girl—she threw like one too.

A girl with perfect aim.

Brent tried to dodge the attack, but a moment later the back of his white t-shirt resembled the Rorschach Test. And it was on. They scrambled and crawled, flung and smeared, screamed and shouted and trash talked. When it was over, there wasn’t a clean spot between the two of them. Brent spit brown saliva. Kennedy used a leaf to wipe off her glasses.

“If my mother saw me right now, she’d shite bricks.”

“What?” Brent laughed.

“Seamus, our new driver is Irish. That’s how he says the s-word—shite. I like the way it sounds. Shite bricks. It makes me feel powerful.”