“From what I heard last night,” I say resentfully, still skeptical of her sincerity, “you don’t want me within five feet of him.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” she says, shaking her head again and gesturing her hand. “I totally admit that I said some messed-up shit, things I shouldn’t have said. But you’ve gotta understand that I really do love him like a brother, and he’s been through so much and he means everything to me. I know it sounds clichéd, but I just don’t want to see him get hurt. Especially right now. It’s too soon. He hasn’t even come to terms yet with Landon’s death and I’m just so afraid that if something else happens before he can find some closure, he might lose his shit, y’know?”
I nod slowly. I do understand, as much as I can anyway, only being someone looking in at the situation from the outside and not having all of the details.
“Luke is better around you,” she goes on. “Since you came here he’s changed. He’s happier—I dunno, like I said, he’s just better around you. I just think you should at least give him a chance to explain.”
“If I ask you something,” I speak carefully, “will you answer me honestly and not get offended? Because I’m not trying to offend you in any way.”
“Sure.” She shrugs her petite shoulders and raises her back out of a slouch, resting it against the chair. “As long as it’s not about Landon. I don’t talk about Landon.” There was a harshness in her words this time that I recognize right away as unbridled pain seething beneath the surface—she’s at as much risk of losing her shit as she says Luke is; this much is clear to me.
I nod, agreeing, and then prepare my question, but I’m so nervous about the answer that I literally feel sick to my stomach; tiny beads of sweat are beginning to form in my hairline. I take a deep breath and try to compose myself, try to prepare myself for the truth, no matter how deeply it’ll cut into my bones to hear it, if I turn out to be right.
Licking the dryness from my lips, I look back at her and say, “Has anything ever happened between you and Luke?”
She looks down at the floor. “No,” she answers, surprising me, because I thought her hesitation was all the answer I needed. “But there was a time when I tried.” She can’t look at me for a moment. She appears ashamed. “But don’t worry about me, or feel like I’m somehow a threat. I’m not. And I don’t want to be. That’s not what any of this is about and it never was. I guess since I tried to hook up with Luke months ago, he can’t help but mistake my concern for jealousy. It’s understandable, I guess. Frustrating, but understandable.”
“But … something you said,” I begin. “You mentioned something about if I found out about the two of you.” Was Luke telling the truth? And why am I now suddenly feeling sick to my stomach because of the possibility that he was?
She shakes her head and corrects me. “No, I said ‘about us,’ but I wasn’t talking about Luke and me. I was talking about all of us. Me, Seth, Luke, Alicia, and Braedon.”
Suddenly Kendra jumps up from the chair, lets out a long, deep breath, and heads for the door. I get the feeling she doesn’t want to talk about anything having to do with her and Luke anymore, beyond what she’s already admitted.
I feel a sort of panic rising up in me because she didn’t elaborate on her explanation. “But … what were you talking about, then?” I ask with faint desperation in my eyes—now that I know Luke was telling the truth, I need to know what the rest of the truth is. “What about you and Luke and Seth and everybody?”
She sighs and shakes her head, looking briefly at the carpeted floor.
“Luke didn’t want you to know before,” she says, “because he thought it would scare you off. It always does with girls like you.”
“But what does—girls like me—I don’t understand.” I can’t decide which question to ask first.