Finally, she sighed in defeat. “Well, it’d be nice if I could. You owe me big time for this.”
With that, I knew everything between us would be okay. Her mother might still be gone, it was going to take time for her to heal, and she would probably still cling to her guilt for a while, but I knew she’d get there eventually, because she’d forgiven me, and since she’d allowed me to stay in her life, I would do everything in my power to help her through this.
BRANDT
AGE 16
After Sarah left my house to live with Mason and Reese, things changed. I have no idea what she’d done to me, but I missed her like crazy. I missed her living in my house. I missed her sleeping in my bed. I missed her just being there, to talk to whenever I wanted.
Somewhere between drying her tears each night and helping her brush her hair each morning, I’d become dependent on taking care of her.
Sometimes I’d tell Noel I was going to the park to play ball with the guys when really I was going to her house instead. Not sure why I lied, maybe because I was afraid he’d tell me I was spending too much time with her. No matter what? I wasn’t going to spend any less time with her.
Then, in the evenings, after Mason told me I needed to head home, I’d sneak around to her window as soon as I walked out the front door, so I could crawl in through there and spend more time with her. It wasn’t as if we did anything wrong. We just hung out, watched movies, made fun of posts on Facebook together? boring regular friend stuff.
More often than not, I used her window. We just figured it raised fewer questions this way, especially since I usually ended up falling asleep with her.
We had a feeling her brother would have a hard time buying that our relationship was purely platonic if he ever discovered me spooned up behind her in bed some night. So we typically just bypassed letting anyone else know about every visit I made.
I couldn’t get kicked out at curfew if they didn’t even realize I was there. Plus, it was fun to bend the rules a bit.
Sarah was sitting on her bed, watching something on her laptop with earbuds in one evening when I came tapping on her window.
She looked up and smiled when our gazes met through the glass. Then she crawled across the mattress to grasp the window and heave it up.
“I’m not going to make it through this school year,” I complained, even before I started to climb inside. “I’m just not.”
Sarah merely rolled her eyes as she returned to the head of the bed to sit upright against the pillows and pull the laptop back onto her legs. “Who is it today? Aspen or Noel?”
I scowled at her.
Okay, so maybe I’d been complaining a bit much lately about having my sister-in-law working at school as my English teacher and my brother there as my new football coach, but gah...it was freaking embarrassing.
“Noel,” I railed anyway, despite her disinterest. “I mean, he’s only worked there a week, the season’s almost over, and do you know how many fucking suicide drills he had us do today in practice?”
“You know what I can’t believe?” Sarah asked, her attention on the computer and not me. “That you came over here to see me while you’re drunk.”
I blinked, utterly stumped. “What the hell are you talking about? I haven’t been drinking.”
“Oh, really?” She finally glanced up as she arched a challenging eyebrow. “Then why is it, all I’m hearing is wine, wine, whine?”
“Wow.” I shook my head and narrowed my eyes before letting out a reluctant smile and plopping down next to her against the headboard of the bed. “Low blow, smart-ass. Thanks a lot. But fine. I’ll stop whining.”
Honestly, I loved her smart-ass ways. She was always so different when we were alone. At school, she usually retreated into her shell, all introverted. Sometimes it was even hard to get her to talk to me in public. But as soon as she knew no one else was around, she shed the shyness and was my Sarah once again.
A part of me was pleased she was this way. No one else knew how fun and smart and sarcastic she really was, so I could hog her all to myself. I didn’t have to share her with anyone. Then again, I also worried about her because I couldn’t always be around, and her timid, withdrawn behavior made her a bigger target for bullies. The idea of people picking on her unnerved me.
I wanted to kick the ass of anyone who even looked at her wrong.
Glancing at the computer screen that was still stealing her attention away from me, I frowned at what looked to be a YouTube recording of a live comedy show. “What’re you watching, anyway?”
“My new hero,” she answered, her gaze intent on the woman who sat on a stool on a stage and talked into a microphone.
“Really?” I wrinkled my brow. “A comedian?”