He laughed. “Do you want to talk about her?” he asked after a moment.
“I’ve done a shit-ton of talking already, don’t you think?”
“No, I like listening to you. If you want to talk about your mom, you can. I know I would if I could remember mine.”
“You don’t remember her at all?”
Evan smiled but it didn’t touch his eyes. “Nope. I’ve tried. But it seems like my life began at the firehouse.”
“I can’t quite remember my mom, either. Not really. Or, I can remember her, but all those years feel grayed out to me. Like I can’t quite reach them.”
“What do you mean?”
I moved to the edge of the pool and folded my arms on the cement. Evan did the same, a few feet away, and we rested our heads on our arms, looking at each other.
“This one time, when I was a kid, my mother took me to Tybee Island. We had the best time. I know we did. But I can’t recall how it felt. I know it was sunny but I don’t remember feeling warm. I know I laughed but I don’t remember feeling happy.” I glanced sideways at him. “Weird, right?”
“I don’t think so,” Evan said. “Coping mechanism, maybe, for her death.”
“Coping,” I said, looking away.
I hadn’t told him the truth about my mother, or my scar. I felt like I should—or could—but the words stuck in my throat. It was all so ugly and terrible, and I wanted Evan to keep thinking of me as a girl who’d been in a tragic car accident. Not one who’d cut up her own face to stop her uncle from touching her in the middle of the night. I swallowed the words down.
“Yeah, coping. We all have our tricks for it.”
“And here I am,” Evan said, indicating the pool with his head.
A silence descended. I pulled myself from my own memories to look at Evan. This close to him, I could see so much. His white T-shirt was threadbare. Through the thin, wet fabric I could see the planes of his chest and the cut of his abs. I could even see the greenish tinge of an old bruise on his right pec.
I moved closer along the edge, until I was right beside him. He didn’t move but let me look at him. Watched me take in the dark purples and blues of fresher bruises on his back and arms.
My heart thudded in an unfamiliar cadence. It had been a long time since I’d been afraid for someone beside myself.
“Who does this to you, Evan? Your brothers? Or your dad?”
God, tell me it’s not his dad…
“Brothers,” Evan replied. “Merle, specifically. We fight a lot.”
“Why?” I raised my hand, poised it over a particularly dark splotch on his right shoulder blade.
“He’s not bright. He does whatever Shane tells him to.”
“But why does Shane tell him to do this?” I gently touched the bruise beneath his shirt, covering it completely with the flat of my hand. The skin on his arms broke out in gooseflesh.
“To remind me I’m not blood,” he said, looking straight ahead. “And that I’m different.”
I removed my hand. The bruise beneath was still there. “That’s no reason.”
Evan didn’t reply. The air between us seemed to tighten, grow a little colder. “Why are you being nice to me?” he asked in a low voice.
I blinked, my defenses going up at once. “What do you mean? Because—”
He turned on me and I pulled back from the intensity in his gaze. “I’m fucking serious, Jo. Why are you here? Why are you hanging out with the town freak at a waterpark in the middle of the night? Tell me the truth, please. Please.”
Two pleases.
My jaw worked soundlessly as my brain shuffled through a half-dozen bullshit answers. I had nothing. No words. Instead, I brought my hand up and moved the hair from the left side of my face.
The air felt cold against my damp skin. My left eye, so used to having only a curtain of hair to look at, was suddenly free. It looked at Evan. The suspicion melted off his face; I’d already forgiven him for it anyway. No one was kind to him; I’d have been suspicious too. But mostly I just watched him take what I was offering, my breath held tight in my chest.
He smiled at me.
His eyes roamed over my scarred face. I didn’t sense a shred of revulsion or disgust or even curiosity. Evan Salinger smiled at my messed up face as if it were a gift he wasn’t expecting.
“This,” I whispered. “How you’re looking at me right now. This is why I’m here. I thought…if you saw me, you wouldn’t care that I’m ugly.” I swallowed hard. “You might not think I was ruined.”
Evan’s smile melted into a pained expression, his brows furrowed. He moved closer to me, facing me. “You’re not ruined,” he said softly. “I already saw your scar. When you dove into the pool to save me. When you came out of the water with me, your hair was back and I saw it.”
“I didn’t save you,” I said, hardly able to breathe and he moved even closer, into my space. I felt the heat of his body across the water that separated us, and felt myself pulled toward it.