And he knew, because his Dad and Gramps and Aunt Dusty mentioned it and even Aunt Debbie talked about it, but she did it bitchy (as usual), that Aunt Dusty knew all about the farm. She’d worked the fields with Dad and Gramps before she took off.
He couldn’t do it alone. Kirby could help and would. He’d make his brother do it. But he couldn’t do it alone.
He needed help.
His Ma had a part-time job in town making coffees at Mimi’s Coffee House. She made shit money. It was just something to do with her time once him and Kirb had started getting older and not needing her so much. And she hadn’t gone to work since Dad died. So now they weren’t even getting that little bit of money in.
They needed the farm working.
And fuck it all, he’d heard her talking to somebody on the phone about them coming to “visit” and “survey”. He didn’t know what that shit meant. He just knew it didn’t mean good things.
Shit, he needed Aunt Dusty to come and sort his Ma’s shit out and help him make a go of the farm until he graduated in a year and a half and could do it on his own.
He sensed movement, looked to the top of the stairs and saw his brother coming down.
“She okay?” Kirby asked quietly, knowing exactly what Fin was doing.
“What do you think?” Fin answered and watched Kirb’s mouth twist to the side.
Shit, he also had to look out for his brother. Kirb and Ma were tight. But Kirb was only fifteen. He had no clue how to deal either.
Fin looked back at his mother and called out, “Ma, we’re goin’ to school.”
She jumped so big he saw it and Fin felt his mouth get tight.
Then she turned, her face still that pale it had been now for weeks, her eyes weird and vacant.
Then she seemed to sort her shit out and called back, “Okay.”
Fin stopped himself from rolling his eyes. Instead, he hoisted his book bag on his shoulder and he and Kirb moved to the front door.
“Do you…uh,” she called after them, they both stopped and looked back, “have, uh…your homework done?”
Too late to ask now, we’re going to fucking school, Finley thought.
But what he said was, “Yeah,” and it was the truth.
“Yeah, Ma,” Kirb said too and Finley knew that was the truth because he rode his brother’s ass last night to get it done.
“Okay, boys, have a good day at school,” their Ma told them and Finley thought she sounded like a robot.
“You have a good day too, Ma,” Kirb replied.
Fin didn’t bother. He just went out the door and got in Gramps’s old pickup that he left behind when he and Gram moved to Florida. Dad had kept it running and had given it to him last year when he got his license.
He loved that fucking truck. It was the shit. Beat up, rusted and totally fucking cool. Aunt Dusty thought the same thing. That was because Aunt Dusty was totally fucking cool too.
The truck had a bench seat. Trucks didn’t have bench seats anymore. That was too bad and he was happy as fuck his did. By the watering hole on The Back Forty, Fin had done Marisa, Julie and Tamara on that bench seat last summer (not all together, obviously). That bench seat was perfect.
He drove his brother to school and did the class gig.
It was at lunch when she made her approach.
He was surprised. Clarisse Haines was a cool customer. Fin had had her in his sights for a while. She was a little young for him but that didn’t mean she wasn’t fucking pretty. She was. Tall, great tits already and her hair and eyes were a-fucking-mazing.
But there was something about her. She was like, aloof or something. Like she was there but she wasn’t. He didn’t know if she didn’t want to be there or if she was in her head or if she just got that she was better than that place and was doing her time.
She totally was better than The ‘Burg. Honest to God, she could be a model. That was how pretty she was. He totally could see her finishing school and going to New York City or somewhere and being in magazines.
And she dressed great.
“Uh, hey Fin,” she said when she got to him and he liked it that she couldn’t meet his eyes.
She was into him.
“Yo, Rees,” he replied and her eyes skittered through his.
Yeah, fuck yeah. She was into him.
He grinned.
“Can we, uh,” her eyes went through his crew at the table around him then came back to him, “talk private?”
“I can talk private with you, Rees,” his friend Dylan said and Fin sliced his eyes to Dylan.
No way was Dyl going to cut into this action. And Dyl was a total player, he’d try.
Dyl caught his look and Dyl knew Fin could wipe the floor with him even though Dyl talked a lot about how awesome his bod was.
When his eyes went back to Clarisse he saw her looking at Dylan like she was trying not to gag and he just stopped himself from bursting out laughing.
What he did do was get up and mutter, “Yeah, let’s go.”
She looked up at him and nodded.
They moved away but Fin turned back to his crew and at least two of them, not surprisingly Dylan being one of them, had their mouths open to say something smart. They caught one look at Fin and closed their mouths.