And I had. For three years, I’d done just that, but there I was, back on the weathered front stoop of the trailer I’d grown up in on the outskirts of the town I’d suffered in. I was back to my former Liv. The old live. I was sustaining, just getting by. Stagnating.
I withheld a sigh, wrapped my arm around Reese’s bony shoulders, and gave her a squeeze. “Paige will be okay. With the antibiotics in her system, she’ll be jumping handsprings around us tomorrow.”
Reese’s nose wrinkled in doubt. “Still, I better check on her again. Just in case she needs anything.”
I fitted my hand over her shoulder and stopped her from rising. “Reese, she’s fine. She’s been in a coma for an hour now.”
Reese’s eyes went wide.
“A sleep coma,” I clarified, nudging her. Reese had always been the worrier of the family. “Just hang here with me for a while and chat.”
“Chat about what?”
I leaned back into the porch step and gazed up at the sky. It was a clear night. There should have been stars spattering the sky, but stars had never really shown around these parts. I wasn’t sure if that was because they were too shiny for this place or if this place was too dark for them. “Chat about whatever you want. Pick a topic. Any topic.”
Reese bit her lip and gave me a sideways look. “There’s this boy at school—”
“Nope. Not that topic. As far as you and Paige are concerned, there are no boys in your school, or in this town for that matter.” I withheld another sigh. “How many times have I told you girls? There’s no boy in this town worth a damn, and the only thing you’re going to wind up with if you decide to give one a damn is a baby or a beating. Or this”—I waved at the atrocity behind us—“a rusted out, metal palace on a fine piece of barren land. Please, Reese, for the love of God, please tell me you’re not serious about ‘this boy at school.’” Because Lord, if she was, I would shake her and not stop until I’d shaken some sense into her.
She cracked a small smile, and this time I did sigh. With relief.
“Nah, I’m not serious. I just like getting under your skin every now and again,” she said.
“Well, that’s the way to do it.” There were a few things that could rip the future I hoped my sisters would one day have out from beneath them, and the biggest threat was falling for a guy from around there. It wasn’t my opinion or a personal bias or an unfair stereotype. It was a fact of life. “How’s dance been going?”
This time, Reese’s smile wasn’t small. “Great. Up until Paige got sick, we were practicing almost every day after school. Mrs. Miller is cool about letting us use the studio if she doesn’t have a class. She even gave me a key and said I could use it if we wanted to stop by early in the morning or later at night when it was closed.”
“Mrs. Miller’s a cool lady.” Mrs. Miller had been my dance teacher when Mom could afford a lesson or two a month—which hadn’t been often. I was certain Mrs. Miller had given me close to twice as many free lessons as we’d ever paid for.
“Wait. Was that you, Liv Bennett, admitting someone in the town limits was cool?” Reese gave me a shocked look.
“Technically, I think Mrs. Miller lives on the outskirts of the town limits, but even if she was a resident of Death Valley, I’m not saying there aren’t cool people who live here. Just no cool boys.” I held Reese’s gaze and lifted my eyebrows. “Got it?”
She rolled her eyes. If my sisters had any consistency in their lives, it was me preaching about the evils of local boys. “Yes, ma’am.” Reese was saluting me when her eyes shifted behind me and went a little . . . soft?
My eyes were already narrowed when I twisted around to see what she’d noticed. Even for me, it was a chore to keep them narrowed. “Who’s that?”
I didn’t really need to ask. The same family had lived on the land beside ours for as long as I could remember, but the Goods boys who’d grown up as our “neighbors” had been older than me. I’d been under the impression they’d all moved, or been kicked out of that trailer, years ago. Looks like one got left behind. Or forgot to leave the nest.
“Will Goods.” Damn, even Reese’s voice was soft. Not. Okay.
“And you’re staring dreamily at him why?”
Reese nudged me. “The exact same reason you are.”
I looked away only to prove my point, not because I actually wanted to stop looking at him. I might have been callous when it came to the men in town, but I was still a woman. It was hard not to feel some sort of attraction toward the shirtless guy working under the hood of an old car. Not to mention the only light, other than the lamp by our trailer window, was the bright overhead lights inside of the old shed he was working in. It would have been impossible not to notice him out there.
“Which one is Will?” I was pretty sure the youngest one, who’d been a year ahead of me in school, was named Declan. Or Dylan. Something with a D.
“I don’t care.”
I elbowed Reese.
“I mean . . . I don’t know,” she clarified, shooting me a guilty grin.
“How long have you been gawking at him?” I kept my eyes on Reese so I wouldn’t go back to gawking at him myself.
“I don’t know. Thirty seconds? A minute maybe?”
“Focus, Reese.” I snapped my fingers in front of her face. “I don’t mean how long as in right this very moment, but how long as in days? Weeks? Months? Years?” The last Goods brother had left home the year before my senior year, and I hadn’t seen any of them again. From what I’d heard of about the four Goods brothers, I thought jail was their most likely current residence.
“Months. Last fall, I think.” Reese’s eyes wandered back to the shed or, more accurately, who was in that shed. “I was sitting here one night, working on my homework, when out he came. He burst out of Mrs. Goods’ trailer and tripped and stumbled his way to that shed.”
“That’s probably because he was rip-roaring drunk,” I mumbled. I’d had one class with the D-named Goods brother in high school—first-period World History. He’d stumbled and tripped his drunken ass into class every single morning.
“He’s been working on that car or some other one like it, every night since,” Reese continued, not letting my commentary deter her. “Although he’s been working on other cars too. Maybe he’s fixing them up for his friends or running a kind of auto repair shop or something.”
“Or maybe he doesn’t have anything better to do.”
Reese groaned. “Seasoned pessimists have nothing on Liv Bennett.”
“I’m not a pessimist. I’m a realist.”
“Uh-huh. No way.” She shook her head. “I just said Will stumbled to the garage one night and has been working on cars ever since, and this is what you hear . . .” She cleared her throat and made an unattractive face. “‘That must mean he’s a raging alcoholic and has nothing better to do than beat on cars’ motors at night and pick his nose by day.’” Judging from the tone she’d just used to paraphrase me, Reese must think I sound like I suck helium in between chain smoking.
“No, that’s not what I heard. That’s what I know.”
“How do you know that?” Reese turned the parental look I generally used on her and Paige on me.
“Probability. And experience.”
“Just as an FYI, a probability is not a certainty, and what kind of experience are you talking about? You’ve never so much as looked at, let alone dated, a guy from around here.”
My mouth opened to fire something back, but nothing came. Reese had me—on both points. Usually I could argue my way out of any corner, but I was having a difficult time sneaking out of this one. “So you’re saying that boy right there”—I hitched my thumb over my shoulder—“is the sweetest, kindest, most generous man in a five-state radius and that, in a few years’ time, he might just find the cure for cancer, obliterate world hunger, and become the president of the United States of America? Is that what you want me to believe?”
Parental look number two from Ree
se Bennett. “No, I don’t want you to believe, assume, pre-judge, or conclude anything about him. You don’t even know him. That’s my point. You shouldn’t slap a warning label on something before you even say hi.”
“And maybe you should start slapping warning labels on things before you eye-molest them from afar.”
“How did we come from the same mother?” she grumbled with a shake of her head.
“Well, we didn’t come from the same father, so yours must have been the one with his head in the clouds.”
“And yours must have been the one with his head up his ass.”
“What does that make Paige’s dad then?” My eyebrows came together as I considered my question. Reese was the sweet one, I was the resilient one, and Paige . . . well, Paige was the red-haired one. That pretty much summed her up.
Talk about fate putting a warning label on a girl before she came kicking and screaming into the world.
“I don’t think I even want to consider that,” Reese said after a few moments.
“Me neither.”
Yeah, I realized that all three of us coming from different fathers only further confirmed our trailer-trash reputation. The thing I hated about my reputation, though, was that the one that had been attached to me wasn’t one I had actually earned. My reputation had been created for me thanks to mommy dearest.
“So?” Reese nudged her shoulder into mine.
“So . . . what?”
“So are you actually going to say hi before you form your opinion about Will Goods?” Reese’s eyes trailed behind me again, and that whisper of a smile fell back into place.
Had I taught her nothing? She had a few weeks left of her junior year and one year as a senior to go, and then she could get out of here for good. She’d made it this far without getting strapped down by a guy or a baby, and there she was, getting all starry-eyed over some cute neighbor messing under the hood of a car.
“I’ll make you a deal,” I said as a plan hatched. “I’ll go say hi first, then form my opinion about him . . . if,” I added when Reese’s face lit up. “If you promise that once I do that, you’ll stop sighing and drooling over him every night. There are more important things to do than check out hot guys.”
“Like what?” Reese propped her fist under her chin and continued her stare-fest.
“Like homework. Or sleep. Or watching grass grow.” I snapped my fingers in front of her face again. It didn’t work this time. After a couple more snaps, I sighed and gave up.
“Wait. Did you just say he was hot?” It might have taken Reese a solid minute to process what I’d said, but after she did, she looked at me like she didn’t recognize me. “Well, did you?”
The twelve-hour bus ride, waiting in the minor emergency room for five hours, and going close to forty-eight hours without sleep was catching up to me. Otherwise I never would have made a slip like that. “He’s hot in a far-off, caveman-banging-on-a-carburetor kind of way. Not in the other kind of way.” Nice recovery, Liv. Not.
Reese’s eyes trailed back to him. “Whatever kind of hot that is, I’m good with it. Really good with it.”
“So? Do we have a deal?” I rose and slid in front of Reese’s nice “view.”
She took a minute to think about it as she chewed her lip. “Fine, we’ve got a deal. Not because I’m actually looking forward to missing out on my free nightly show.” She sighed, dropping her shoulders. “But if this is the only option I have to get you to open your mind before banishing a guy to Not-Worthy-Land, I’ll just have to take it.”
“Okay, Joan of Arc, I’m off to try that whole open-mind thing.” I didn’t make it two steps before Reese’s face froze.
“You’re going . . . right now?”
I nodded.
“What’s the big rush?” Reese’s gaze shifted between Will and me at warp speed.
“The sooner I go say hi, the sooner I prove my point.” I lifted an eyebrow before turning and heading across the weed-infested yard. At least the weeds were green. Come July, everything would be dried out to a crispy brown.
“Liv?” Reese called.
“Yeah?” I spun around but continued crossing the yard. I was eager to have this whole meet-and-greet done with. I didn’t need to be convinced that Will Goods was actually no good, but it appeared I still needed to convince my little sister.
“Thanks for coming. I know how much you hate this place and how serious you are about school and all . . . but I don’t know if we could have made it through this without you.”
Reese was tall like me, but she had a way of seeming small most of the time. I’d never been able to pinpoint why exactly, but I think I might have just then. She didn’t have faith in herself that she could weather life’s storms. And maybe she couldn’t. Gentle creatures like my sister weren’t intended for the life we’d been born into. Did I believe that Reese could have figured out a way to manage a “home” while her younger sister was sick with pneumonia? Yes, I knew she could, but what mattered was that she believed she couldn’t. That was why I was there. That was why I’d be there for a while.
“You’re welcome.” I forced a smile despite feeling like the whole future I’d been carving out for myself had just collapsed.
“What are you going to do now?”
That was one question I didn’t want to acknowledge the answer to . . . because it was too damn depressing. I lifted my shoulders. “What I do best—survive.”
“What about school?”
Reese didn’t know today had been my first day of finals. She didn’t know tomorrow was the second and final day either. She didn’t know the whole past semester had been one big waste because I hadn’t showed up when it really mattered. A whole semester came down to one day, one test.
It was funny how life felt the same way.
But that was what had made part of my decision easy. On the day my sisters really needed me, on the day it really counted, I wouldn’t let them down. I knew what I needed to do, but that was the only easy part of my decision.
“School will wait. Pneumonia won’t.” I forced another smile before turning and continuing toward the Goods’ trailer. Reese was the intuitive one, and I wasn’t ready for her to see through my act. I wasn’t ready for her to know what I’d sacrificed to be there because I knew what she’d feel next: guilt. I might not be able to avoid making her feel guilty, but I could delay it. Even though Reese had nothing to feel guilty for—fate was the one that deserved a heap of it—she would. “If you don’t mind, I’ve got a theory to prove.”
Reese chuckled. “I’d say you’ve got a theory to disprove.”
I waved over my shoulder and continued up the hill. I wanted to have this over and done with. Then I’d crawl onto the sofa and get some rest so I could wake up tomorrow and figure out what the hell came next. Summer officially started in a few weeks, but the temperature told a different story. The crickets chirping their chorus, as well as the sheen of sweat coating Will’s back, could attest to that.
When I realized I was studying Will’s back, I forced my gaze down. Staring at the dirt was safer than staring at one of the Goods boys’ sweaty, muscled backs. Just outside of the shed, I waited for him to acknowledge me. After a few moments of him continuing to tinker in a state of total oblivion, it looked like him acknowledging me would take a while. I was running through possible greetings when he leaned back to rummage through the nearby toolbox. Surely he’d catch a glimpse of me now.
Or not.
The guy either had hardcore tunnel vision, or I’d turned invisible. When he went back to working under the hood, I stepped inside the shed.
“Hi.” I smirked. I’d said hi, so now I could form my opinions . . . although I could only imagine Reese’s wrath if I just turned and left. Besides, I had a plan for this meeting, and it wasn’t just to say hi. “I’m Liv, your neighbor. Well, I used to be your neighbor. Now I’m just kind of here temporarily.” In terms of greetings, that probably qualified as my lamest one.
 
; Will’s back stiffened, but he stayed buried beneath the hood. And dammit . . . I was checking out his back again. That was probably because, as backs went, it was a very nice one. One with so many cuts and grooves a girl wanted to trace each one. If I could have slapped myself without looking like an idiot—because I’d sure as heck already sounded like one—I would have.
“Hi, neighbor Liv. I’m Will,” he said, barely glancing back. “I’d shake your hand, but I’m going to assume that’s a mess you want to avoid.” Sticking one hand outside of the hood, he proved his point. That was one hell of a mess I wanted to avoid.
He went back to tinkering under the hood while I drowned in an awkward silence. I’d been the one to initiate this odd exchange, so I supposed it was only fair that I took the heap of awkwardness.
“I went to school with your younger brother.” Profound, Liv. Real profound.
“Declan?” Will wiped his hand on his side before fumbling around his toolbox until he found a wrench.
My eyes lingered on the patch of oil-streaked skin. “Yeah, he was a year older. I didn’t really know him.” More like knew of him. “How’s he doing?”
“Declan’s doing Declan. Kind of like he always has.” Will shrugged before putting the wrench to work.
“You have a couple other brothers too, right?” Okay, this small talk thing needed to stop. Although, given Will had said barely a handful of words to me and hadn’t given me the standard guy “check-out” yet, he hadn’t proven my theory. Yet. I supposed I wasn’t going anywhere until he had.
“Yep. Two older brothers—Ryker and Grant. None of us really keep in touch too much, so if you want to know how either of them are doing, I won’t be able to give you a truthful or accurate answer.”
I don’t think I’d ever said a word to any of the Goods boys, and they’d never spoken to me growing up either. I’d been under the impression they were a wild band of brutes who spoke in grunts and four-letter words. I’d managed to avoid them through childhood and the all-important teen years . . . and there I was in my twenties, trying to strike up a conversation with one of them.