The Perfect Homecoming (Pine River #3)

She tried to play Deadly Dungeon Duels with me, my newest video game, but she kept asking these existential questions, like, why dungeons, why not forests, and other dumb stuff. It was annoying, but it’s okay. About that time, my right hand stopped working, and I can’t do the controller with my left, so it didn’t really matter. Emma and I started watching TV.

Check it—one day, I’m in bed watching House of Cards on Netflix, and I’m on episode eight, and it’s totally intense, and who crawls onto the bed with me and lays there like we’re a couple? And I said, “People are going to talk. I hope you’re okay with that, because I sure as hell won’t deny anything happened since I have a reputation to protect.” She said, “I don’t care—let them talk. I have a reputation to protect, too.” Which is why I totally dig her.

But I said, “Well, look, Emma, this is okay as long as you don’t talk or disrupt the streaming video, and for God’s sake, don’t ask me questions during House of Cards.” She said she wouldn’t, so we started streaming videos together.

Luke told me it didn’t look good for me and Emma to be lolling on a bed in the afternoon streaming video from Netflix all afternoon. Personally, I think Luke is a little jealous because there was a time back in the day that chicks used to flock to him. Those days are over for sure, and even if they weren’t, Luke is going to marry Madeline on New Year’s Eve, and Madeline doesn’t strike me as the type to put up with “shenanigans,” as Dad would say.

During these afternoon video-viewing sessions, Emma’s done a little talking. She’s said things like, you don’t look at me like other guys. Which I pointed out was probably because I can’t turn my head. And then she would say this off-the-wall stuff that had nothing to do with the program, like, sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be someone else—do you? I can’t snort anymore, but if I could, I would have to that question. It’s not like I lie around wondering why me, why MND, but yeah, the idea of being someone else has definitely crossed my mind a time or two in the last couple of years.

She said some other stuff that I won’t share because I promised Dani Boxer I’d tell her everything first, and I haven’t had time to deliver the dirt. Anyway, I didn’t need my superior intellect to guess where this was all going, so one day, I casually say, “You know, Emma, I’m not going to live forever.” As in, not very long at all, but I didn’t say that, as it tends to freak people out.

As expected, she got all flustered and said, “Why do you say things like that?”

I said, “Because you need to get a grip—I can’t be your boo.”

She said, “You can’t be my what?”

And I had to sidetrack a little and explain to her the Real Housewives of Atlanta, but then I circled back around and said, “Look, I know you’re totally into me, and that’s okay. Lots of chicks are. And I don’t mind you hanging around at all. But you need to know that it isn’t really going to go anywhere, you and me.”

Emma smiled in this funny way that made me think maybe I’d hurt her feelings. But then she said, “Obviously I know that. You’re dying.”

Hey, even I was a little shocked by that. But at the same time, I really dug it, because at least Emma Tyler can say it out loud. At least Emma doesn’t pretend I’m going to somehow miraculously beat this thing and live. No one else around me can face it, much less say it. Only Emma and I can.

“Well, that’s kind of beside the point,” I said, because it was. “The point is that I’m just not that into you.”

She sort of averted her gaze and said, “You’re so funny, Leo.”

Yes, I am. But I wasn’t being funny then. And even though she pretended to think I was, I could tell she knew I wasn’t being funny. She got kind of quiet and wouldn’t say anything for a while, and then said she didn’t want to watch another episode of The Americans, so you know she was pissed.

She got up and left my room, and I could hear her talking to Dad for a long time, and he was probably spelling it out for her: Leo. Is. An. Ass.

Hey, I wear the mantle proudly.

But the next day Emma was back and she was her same old self, and I thought things were cool and we both knew where we stood. But I didn’t count on Hollywood showing up at my door. Isn’t that the beauty of this life? Just when you think there’s no hope, that things are going to be totally boring for the rest of your life, something pops up to make it interesting again.





FIVE

Emma knew Bob Kendrick didn’t trust her. He followed her around to double-check everything she did, from changing the sheets to making Leo’s protein smoothies. Once, he even leaned over her shoulder to make sure she was recording the right show for Leo.