“Gee, I’m so sorry I wanted to make sure you were all right.” Sarcasm drips from my tone. “Forgive me for caring about you. How dare I!”
His lips twitch. “You done?”
“Nope.” I inject more snark into my voice and say, “The nerve of me!” Then I smile sweetly. “There. Now I’m done.”
With a sigh, he leads me over to the bed and we sit on the edge of it. “You don’t have to worry about me,” he assures me. “I’m fine.”
I moan in misery. “No, you’re not. You got fired.”
“Yes. And I’m fine. I’ll find something else.”
I moan again.
“Seriously, Beth. It’s all good.” He nods at the door. “Jack already said I can join him on the crew again for the next few months. Lots of yard cleanups to do and then snow removal season’s coming up.”
That makes me feel better. Jack had previously hooked Chase up with a job at his landscaping company, but that was only for the summer. “So you’ll have a job?”
“I’ll have a job.”
Relief flutters through me, but it fades into anger pretty fast. “I can’t believe my dad called the shelter and had you fired. He’s such an asshole.”
“No, he’s just protective of you.” Chase’s face is grim. “I already took one kid from him.”
“Not on purpose. It was an accident.”
“Accident or not, I was still at fault. I was driving too fast.” His voice cracks slightly. “When she ran into the road, there was no way I could’ve stopped.”
“I wonder why,” I say suddenly.
That brings a frown to his lips. “Why what?”
“Why she was running.” An ache forms in my chest as I picture Rachel racing into the middle of the dark street, unaware that she was about to die. She and Jeff had been at a party at her friend Aimee’s house that night. As far as I know, Rachel wasn’t drinking or on drugs.
“Do you think she was upset? Not paying attention?” I ask. An unformed thought floats in the back of my mind, but I can’t grasp it.
“It doesn’t matter if she was,” Chase says gently. “If I wasn’t speeding, I could’ve stopped in time. But I was sixteen and stupid and I hit a girl with a car I stole.” He shakes his head, at himself, I think. “Of course your father hates me, Beth. He’ll always hate me. He should.”
Every word hurts my chest, like someone’s scraping my heart with a dull razor. I hate how resigned he sounds. Even worse, how he thinks he deserves to be hated.
“I don’t hate you,” I whisper.
“I know you don’t.” He eases closer and rests his cheek on my shoulder. His soft hair tickles the bottom of my chin. “But you should, too.”
“Never,” I say fiercely.
Sighing, he lifts his head to look at me. “You’re the most stubborn person I’ve ever met.”
“So?”
A grin springs to his lips. “So? That’s your answer?”
“What else do you want me to say? No, I’m not? We both know I’m stubborn as fuck.”
He chuckles and pulls me toward him, surprising me with a quick kiss on the lips.
My heart jumps to my throat, and I instantly loop my arms around his neck so he can’t get away. “That’s twice in one day,” I tease.
“Twice what?”
“Twice that we’ve kissed,” I clarify. Grinning, I kiss him again and pull back. “Make that three.”
He leans in and presses his mouth to mine. When our tongues meet, I whimper.
“Make that four,” he rasps against my lips.
After that, we stop keeping count. Neither of us came upstairs for this reason, but we can’t fight it. Maybe it’s this house, this bedroom, this off-limits neighborhood. Whatever it is, I can’t keep my hands off him. And he can’t keep his hands off me. At some point, we need to stop.
But not now. Not for a long time.
Unfortunately, I’m the only one thinking that way. Chase draws away, setting me a firm arm’s length from his big, warm body. “I think...” He trails off.
I lean in. “You think what?”
He gets up. “I think this has to be the last time.”
“The last time for what?” I ask, hoping he can’t hear the panic in my voice.
“The last time we see each other.”
The panic surfaces in full force. “Absolutely not.”
“Beth—”
“No,” I interrupt. “We’re not going to stop seeing each other. We’re going to see each other every day for the rest of senior year, and then we’re moving to Iowa together. I’m going to be a vet and you’ll be a welder and we’ll be blissfully happy. End of story.”
“Your father will keep coming after me. And if you keep sneaking out to see me, he’ll keep punishing you.”
“I don’t care. He can’t ground me any more than he already has.”
“He hates me,” Chase says flatly. “Everyone in Darling hates me, Beth.”
“Then everyone in Darling needs a lesson in forgiveness,” I shoot back. “The accident is in the past. You should be able to walk around with your head held high, Chase. You paid for your mistakes. Don’t let them judge you.”
To my surprise, he laughs. A dark, humorless laugh.
I frown deeply at him. “What’s so funny?”
“Nothing. Nothing is funny.” He shoves strands of hair off his forehead. “But it’s kind of ironic that you’re telling me to not let people judge me when that’s exactly what you do.”
My jaw drops. “That’s not true.”
“Of course it is. You claim you forgive me, but I don’t see you telling anyone we’re seeing each other. Your friends don’t know. Your parents don’t know, though now they probably have an idea we might be.” He offers a shrug. “At school, you act like we’re strangers.”
Frustration courses through me. “Because that’s the way you want it!” I argue. “You’re constantly giving me signals—or telling me outright—to stay away from you at school.”
“I’m not blaming you for that. Not at all,” he says gently. “But don’t talk to me about the past being in the past, and me needing to walk around with my head held high, when you’re just as afraid as I am of being judged. If you weren’t, you wouldn’t be keeping our relationship a secret.”
I’m taken aback. Crap. He’s right. I am afraid of what people will say.
That’s why I’ve been meeting Chase in secret for the past few weeks. That’s why I don’t talk to him in any of the classes we share. I tell myself that it’s because he wants to lie low at school. And whenever he gives me a shake of the head or a look that says, Don’t stand up for me, I grab onto those opportunities like they’re life preservers and I’m drowning at sea. The one time I stood up for him, after the fire alarm incident, everyone looked at me like I was psychotic, even my closest friends, and I immediately went back to pretending we’re strangers.
Chase gives me the easy way out at school, and I take it. Every damn time.
“I don’t blame you for that,” he repeats, because obviously my shame is oozing from my every pore. “I understand why you can’t be seen with me in public. Why you can’t tell people about us. But...”
My heart clenches as I wait for him to finish. I know I won’t like what he has to say. I know it’s going to hurt me really, really bad.
I’m not wrong.
“But...” His blue eyes seek mine in the darkness. “That’s why it’ll never work out with us.”
30
The rest of the weekend is pure and utter misery.
When I stumble home three hours after escaping through my bedroom window, my parents are there to pounce on me. I don’t remember much of what they say or threaten me with. I’m not listening to them because my head is still back at Jack’s house. Back with Chase, who told me we’re not going to work out.
He didn’t break up with me. I specifically asked if that was the case. It wasn’t.
He just doesn’t see a future for us.
“It’s impossible” were the parting words I got before he deposited me into an Uber that he paid for. And those two words run through my mind like a broken record as I sit in the living room and receive the lecture of all lectures from my parents.
They know I wasn’t at Scarlett’s or with any of my other friends. Fortunately, they also know I wasn’t at Chase’s. Unfortunately, they know this because my dad stormed over there, demanding to know where his daughter was. Apparently Chase’s mother was terrified by Dad’s outburst. The mayor threatened to have him arrested, and Mom had to drag Dad to the car.
I, of course, am blamed for all of this—total bullshit. Just because I went AWOL doesn’t mean Dad had to show up at the mayor’s house and yell like a madman.
On Sunday, I’m not allowed to leave the house, not even to go to the shelter. Dad calls in sick for me, which gives me a sliver of hope because at least he didn’t outright quit on my behalf again. That means there’s a chance I’ll be allowed to go back next weekend.
When Monday morning comes, I’ve never been more excited for school. My parents took my phone again, so if Chase texted me during the rest of the weekend, I have no clue. But I intend on intercepting him at his locker before AP Calc and demanding to know what he plans to do about our relationship.
I don’t get the chance. When I near the senior locker bank, Macy races over to me before I can look for Chase.
“Everyone is saying you hooked up with Charlie this weekend!” is her opening statement. Her eyes are cloudy, but I can’t tell if she’s jealous or disappointed. “Is that true?”
“Of course not,” I lie and then cringe when I remember Chase’s gentle accusation that I keep our relationship a secret from everyone.