Leah considers this. “So you don’t know anybody here except your mom?”
Vivi shrugs. “Well, I’ve met some people. Why? Do you have any good friend recommendations? Or fun things to do? Or the best places to eat?”
“My house,” Leah says. “That’s the best place to eat.”
“Your house?” Vivi grins.
Leah nods. “Jonah, can Vivi come over for dinner tonight?”
“Um . . .” Look, I’d love to go out to dinner with this girl. But not dinner at my house with my crazy family. They’re both looking at me. Shit, I honestly have no excuse. We don’t have any food? What a lie—I buy stuff in bulk to save money. The truth is too brutal: my mom is lost in a depressive episode, and I have five dysfunctional siblings. Vivi makes eye contact with me, and I mentally plead with her: Please don’t make me sit at our kitchen table and watch you take it all in. The bickering, the stark lack of a parent. “Sure. If you want to.”
Vivi claps happily, and Leah smiles. You didn’t have a shot anyway, I tell myself. So nothing lost. Leah handed me a ticking time bomb of an idea, and I signed for the delivery. Now I’ll have to let it blow up in my face.
“What are we having tonight?” Leah asks.
“I haven’t decided yet. What do you want?”
“Pizza. But not the store kind. The kind you make.” She glances at Vivi. “It’s the best. You’ll love it.”
It’s not a cheap meal to make, but I’ll do it. Leah gets up to choose an additional paint color. When she’s far enough away from us, I stoop my head down. “You don’t have to do this if you don’t want. Honestly, she’ll understand.”
“Of course I want to.” Vivi narrows her eyes like I’m talking crazy. As if accepting a dinner invitation from a five-year-old is the most normal thing in the world. “Like I said, I’m new to town, and also, my mom doesn’t cook, so I’ve eaten cereal for dinner for a week. Delicious cereal, actually, but I could use some hot food. Some sustenance, you know? So, what time should I come over?”
“Um . . .” I trail off. I’m calculating how long it will take me to get ingredients, walk home from work, and make the dough. And how long it will take me to clean up the house, persuade my siblings to be normal in front of Vivi, and figure out what, if anything, to tell this girl about my parents. Or lack thereof. I need two weeks, minimum.
“Here.” Vivi grasps my wrist, pulling my whole left arm toward her. I feel wetness against my skin, the cool stroke of a damp paintbrush. When she’s done, my arm displays ten digits in blue paint. Her phone number runs from my bicep, where my T-shirt sleeve begins, to the base of my palm. “Just text me when you know.”
By the time we step outside, we’ve been at the shop for less than an hour. In that time, Leah made a new friend, and I got a girl’s phone number painted on my arm. I look down at Leah. “That was weird.”
She nods. “Good weird.”
Now I have less than half a day to make my life seem normal—or at least normal enough that a pretty girl can come over and not run away screaming. I need a plan. And a haircut. And possibly tranq darts for my siblings.
Leah is walking on the curb like it’s a balance beam. I watch her for a moment before asking, “How weird do you think our family is, on a scale of one to ten?”
“One hundred,” she says simply. “But good weird.”
Most days, I feel like I’m barely holding it all together. But if my littlest sister can believe that her life is good despite having no dad and a ghost of a mom, then it’s worth it. Good weird. I know it doesn’t sound like much. But it’s enough.
CHAPTER THREE
Vivi
“Morning, Vivi!”
I look up to see Whitney bustling toward the front counter. Her hair frames her face with tiny tendrils, deep chestnut with a hint of red in the broad daylight. I’m immediately envious of the maroon skirt that wraps around her waist and falls all the way to the floor. “Good morning!”
“How’s business today?” She sets down a small box of new paints.
“Pretty darn good. Fifteen customers in—what has it been, six hours? One person painted two things. Plus I made a new friend. Aaaaand”—I turn to her, making my eyebrows dance with intrigue—“I met a boy.”
Whitney spins toward me, already grinning. “Oh, really.”
I think back on Jonah, his messy hair, his dark eyes the color of a filled-up coffee mug when you stare into it—deep and brown and fading into black. Delicious, warm. “Mmhmm.”
“Would I know him? Is he a vacationer or townie?” Whitney rubs her hands together like she’s waiting for me to bundle up my juicy details and hand them over.
“Townie. Jonah.” His name is easy to overpronounce for bravado. Jo-nahhh. I love the oh and ah, and the n sound that requires tapping my tongue on the roof of my mouth. My name only needs lower lip and front teeth to say out loud.
Whitney’s eyebrow ring moves up at least an inch, catching the overhead light. “Jonah Daniels?”