Trouble From the Start Read online

  “So do you guys want to watch a movie?” I asked.

  Fletcher was sitting on the couch. Kendall was curled on Jeremy’s lap in one of the recliners. She looked at him. He shrugged. She nodded, turned her attention back to me.

  “Listen, we’re going to go,” she said quietly. “But if my mom should ask, I was here with you all night.”

  “Are you sure?” I asked.

  “Uh, yeah,” she answered, somewhat sarcastically.

  Jeremy lowered the footrest and they clambered out of the chair. “Thanks for all the food,” he said.

  And the alibi, which remained unsaid.

  I followed them out to the entryway, aware that Fletcher was behind me.

  At the door, Kendall hugged me. “Seriously, we just don’t get enough alone time together, so . . .”

  Yeah, so I was going to lie to her mother if she asked. But what were the odds of her asking? One in a gazillion. Because she’d have no reason to suspect her well-behaved daughter wasn’t behaving. I didn’t want to judge Kendall. I didn’t have a boyfriend. I didn’t know what it was like to want to spend every hour of every day with him and not be able to.

  “Just be careful,” I whispered.

  She smiled softly. “We will.”

  They left. I closed and locked the door, and turned to Fletcher. “Want to watch a movie?”

  Chapter 34

  FLETCHER

  Watching a movie was the very last thing that I wanted to do with Avery. But I understood her rules. Even respected them. I’d never had a girl set down conditions before. To be honest, I found it a little hot.

  But then I found everything about her hot.

  We sat beside each other on the couch. She put on some movie that had Sandra Bullock and the guy who played Green Lantern. Just based on the first couple of minutes, I knew I’d rather be watching The Green Lantern.

  “I guess boyfriend types are supposed to sit through movies like this,” I said. Earlier I’d put my arm along the back of the couch. Now I took advantage of my positioning to toy with strands of her hair. They were so thick and silky. The only light in the room came from the flickering TV. It illuminated her hair, made it look like moonbeams.

  “It’s better than shark-wielding tornadoes,” she said.

  “Yeah, that is a pretty silly movie. Giant crocs is more believable.”

  “Nothing in those movies is believable.”

  “And what happens in these movies is?” I asked, pointing at the screen.

  “Romance movies guarantee a happy ending.”

  “There’s a happy ending in monster flicks. The good guys always win out.”

  “Yeah, after much blood and gore.”

  I slipped my hand beneath the curtain of her hair and began kneading her neck. She didn’t object, but kept her gaze on the movie. I darted a quick look at the munchkin. “Should I take him up to his bed?”

  “He’s fine where he is. He’ll think it’s an adventure that he slept on the floor.”

  I couldn’t remember being young enough to think something so simple was an adventure.

  “So, this boyfriend thing,” I began. “What are the other rules?”

  She shifted around until she was perpendicular to me, her lower leg pressed against my thigh. She had changed into a tank top after we went swimming. I skimmed my fingers up and down her bare arm.

  “You have to share things with me,” she said.

  I stilled, grinned. “I have something to share.” I leaned in—

  She shoved me back. “Not a kiss. Nothing physical. Something personal. Tell me about your mom.”

  What could I say to that? I barely remembered her. Made me feel like a jerk. But I could spout facts, which would probably make me seem like more of an ass. “She died when I was eight. Think it was cancer. Not sure. Just remember her being sick for a long time, not having any hair. My dad would never talk about it.”

  She combed her fingers through my hair. I liked the way it felt.

  “That had to be hard,” she said.

  “I don’t really remember. It makes me an ass, I know. Sometime after that my dad went all psycho.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “Look, this is why I don’t talk about all this stuff. I don’t want your pity or your sympathy or your sad eyes.”

  “Because you’re so tough?”

  “Yeah, pretty much. Sometimes life is rough. You get through it.”

  Her gaze wandered over my face. I felt like she could see every bruise I ever sported.

  “How did you meet my dad?” she asked.

  “Are we going to do twenty questions again?”

  “This will be the last one.”

  I sighed. I hated answering questions. Probably the reason that I hated taking tests. They were nothing but questions.

  “Met him when I got caught stealing some stuff from a convenience store a few years back.”

  She didn’t seem surprised so she probably knew about my shoplifting, not that I thought her dad had told her. But the store hadn’t been empty. Anyone could have been the snitch.

  “What made you steal stuff?” she asked.

  I was hungry. My dad had disappeared for a couple of weeks. I didn’t have any money. Not that I was going to tell her that. I didn’t want to see the puppy dog look again. Which I figured made me awful boyfriend material. “Why do you think? I wanted it.”

  “What did you take?”

  Twinkies, peanut butter crackers, M&M’s. “Can’t even remember now.”

  “I shoplifted once,” she said with her usual straightforwardness.

  I wasn’t expecting that. “You’re kidding?”

  “Nope. A pack of gum. Mom doesn’t believe in chewing gum. I was about six. I waited until she put me to bed, then I snuck it out of its hiding place, and chewed the whole pack. Don’t know how I got all of it in my mouth, but I did. I was still chewing it when I fell asleep. And when I woke up in the morning it was all in my hair.”

  I stared at her. “What did you do?”

  “What could I do? I took scissors to it.” She shook her head. “I looked like a freak. She made me go to school with my hair sticking out all over the place. There was still gum in it. Which Kendall, thankfully, cut out during recess. You know, with those little paper scissors that don’t really cut well. Then she decided to play beautician, and I ended up with bald spots.”

  I wanted to laugh, but I imagined this little kid paying for her crime in such a public way.

  “After school, Mom took me back to the store. I had to apologize to the owner and pay for the gum with my tooth fairy money, which I had been saving for Disney World. Then Mom took me to her stylist to see if she could do anything with my hair, so it got cut even shorter. That was my last foray into crime.”

  I skimmed my knuckles along her cheek. “I thought you were born obeying the rules.”

  “No, but I learned pretty early on that disobeying them came with consequences. Never chewed gum again. Not even when I played softball my sophomore year.”

  “I watched you play,” I said, and wondered why I’d confessed that.

  “You were just checking out the girls.”

  “Yeah.” But she was the only one I remembered. “So maybe I’m thinking about not checking out other girls anymore.”

  “How seriously are you thinking about it?”

  “Pretty seriously.” I cupped my hand around the back of her head. “Really seriously.”

  I leaned in—

  “Avery?” a little voice whined.

  Not now, munchkin, I thought. Not now.

  Avery waited. The voice came again. She unfolded that long, slender body of hers and went over to where her brother was stretched out on the floor. He’d kicked off the afghan.

  “Hey, squirt,” she said. “Ready to go to bed?”

  “Don’t . . . feel good.”

  “Told you not to eat all that junk. You’ll be fine in the morning. Let’s go on upstairs.”