Had my mom taken care of it?

No. It was my dad. I knew that. I remembered sitting on the counter as he blew on it and told me I was tough. How was it possible I could have these detailed memories and not remember different times, different events, where my mom spent time with me?

“She looked a lot like you do now.”

My throat constricted a little. “Yeah.” I already knew that. Aside from the wedding picture in the hall, we had a box of pictures of her. That’s how I remembered her, in still snapshots—standing next to me when I blew out three candles on a cake, looking up in surprise from where she sat on the couch reading a book, wearing a baseball cap and cheering on Jerom at his Little League game. I remembered the pictures, not the events. “What else do you remember about her?”

“She was quiet. . . .” He hesitated. “She used to come over and talk to my mom. One time I went into the kitchen where they were talking and she was crying.”

“What?”

“I remember it clearly because I was afraid my mom would get mad at me for interrupting them.”

“What would my mom have to be sad about?”

“I’m not sure. My mom was rubbing her back and she was—”

“How old were you?” I adjusted my back against the fence.

“I don’t know. Around seven, I guess.”

“How could you remember that?”

“It’s just one of those vivid memories.”

Irrational anger surged in my chest and I wasn’t sure why. “Well, maybe she was worried about your mom. Maybe she was pleading with your mom to leave your jerk of a dad.”

“My dad didn’t start drinking until his back injury five years ago.” His voice was tight, hurt.

I stood. “Well, my mom had a perfect life, so I don’t know what she’d have to be sad about.”

“Charlie.”

“I’m tired.” I went back in the house, letting the door shut harder than I should’ve.

Chapter 13

The next morning I woke up to find Gage looking through the makeup catalog Amber had given me. “Is there something you need to tell me?” he asked. “Since when do you . . .”

I threw my pillow at his head. “Maybe I decided to go girly.”

“As if. Dad would freak if he saw you in this much makeup. Plus, it’s not you.”

I didn’t understand what that meant. I stared at the girl on the front of the catalog he held. She was soft and feminine and beautiful—like the wedding picture of my mom in the hall. So which part of that wasn’t me?

I turned onto my stomach and put my arms over my head. Who was I kidding? None of that was me. “Someone just brought it by my work the other day.”

“Amber?” he asked, turning the catalog toward me and showing me her picture in the front where she had circled her name in blue ink. “Is that this girl here? Because if so, you have to introduce us. She’s hot.”

I rolled out of bed and snatched the catalog from him. “What do you want?”

“We’re playing soccer on the beach. Let’s go.”

“I don’t feel like it today.”

He stopped cold, then looked around like he was in some alternate world. “Um . . . what? You don’t feel like playing soccer?” He put his hand on my forehead, then turned me in a full circle. “What have you done with my sister?”

Truth was, I didn’t feel like seeing Braden because I knew I’d behaved badly the night before. What he said had caught me off guard, and I ended up throwing him and his family under a bus to make myself feel better. And even though I knew it hurt him, what he had said still bothered me, so I wasn’t quite ready to apologize.

“I have to work in a few hours.” I didn’t have to work today at all. He didn’t notice my lie.

“That whole work thing is really cramping your style. You need to talk to Dad about the fact that you’ve learned your lesson. I’m sure he just wanted to see if you’d get a job.”

“Yeah, I’m sure. I’ll talk to him soon.” Later. I was finally making good money . . . and work wasn’t as bad as it had seemed at first. It was something different that my brothers had never done, and I kind of liked that.

“So really? No soccer?”

“Really.”

As I was folding shirts on tables at work the next day, Linda began folding next to me. “Your aura is blue today. Most of the time that means sadness. Is everything okay?”

Wow, even my aura was upset about my tiff with Braden. “I’m fine.” I folded another shirt. “It’s just weird when a belief you’ve had your whole life is suddenly challenged.”

“What belief is that?”

“Nothing. I just pictured someone a certain way, and maybe they weren’t that way at all.” Maybe I had no memories of my mom because she was never around.

“That’s hard, when someone doesn’t meet our expectations.” She moved around to the other side of the table. “Sometimes we expect more than people are capable of giving at that moment.”

Shouldn’t a mother be capable of being there for her kids? Was that too much to expect?

She was there. It was my memories that weren’t.

“Honey.” Linda touched my hand. I wasn’t used to such a soft touch. It made my stomach feel hollow. I moved my hand to the next shirt to break the contact. “If you need to go home, I understand.”

“No. No, I don’t. I’m totally fine.” And I was. I didn’t need to get caught up in the stupid emotion of this. I could shake it off.

“Do you want to talk about it? Tell me more about this person?”

“No.”

She paused as if expecting me to change my mind. I wasn’t going to change my mind.

“Okay. I’m going to crunch some numbers in the back.”

“Sounds good.”

I continued folding shirts. A movement by the window caught my eye, and I looked up in time to see a mother and daughter walk by arm in arm. The two of them walking together made me think of how it could’ve been now if my mom were still here. We would’ve spent time together—talked, laughed, shared stories only she would understand, shared secrets I couldn’t tell anyone else. The pit in my stomach seemed to expand with that feeling. I didn’t like it. Why was I suddenly feeling like something was missing in my life? I had a great life. Linda and her concerned looks and gentle touch didn’t need to come around and make me think my life wasn’t amazing. I’ll run eight miles in the morning. That would take care of this.

Chapter 14

I walked into the kitchen to get a water bottle for my run and found Nathan staring intently at the red Frisbee on the counter.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“I can’t do it. I can’t call her.”

“You’re returning her Frisbee, Nathan, not asking her out. Just dial the number.”

“You’re right. I know you’re right.”

I opened the fridge and grabbed a water bottle. When I turned around, Nathan was in the exact same position.

“If you were Lauren and some guy called you to return your Frisbee, what would you think?” he asked.

I pulled my foot to my butt to stretch out my thigh. “I’d think that some guy was calling me to return my Frisbee.”

He grunted. “Yeah, but you’re not a normal girl, so that doesn’t count.”

The ache in my stomach twitched, and I cringed.

“Normal girls read into everything.”

Switching feet, I stretched the other leg. “And what exactly are you doing right now?”

“I’m not reading into anything, I’m psyching myself out.”

I grabbed the phone off the counter and dialed Lauren’s number. “There. It’s done.” I thrust the phone toward him.

He held up his hands and wouldn’t take it from me, jumping away from it like it was an opposing team’s mascot or something.

“Ugh. You’re such a wimp.” I put it up to my ear.

“Hello?” a girl answered.

“Hi. Is this Lauren?”

“Yes.” She sounded like a completely normal girl—whatever that meant.

“My brothers and I were playing disc golf out at Woodward Park the other day and found one of your Frisbees.”

“Oh. Awesome. I guess putting the info on the back really works.”

“Yeah. So what do you want me to do with it?” Disc golf Frisbees weren’t like standard cheapie plastic things. They were weighted and high-quality, so I knew she’d want it back. I happened to glance up at Nathan, and he was clutching the Frisbee in two hands, staring at me.

“Can I come get it, maybe?” Lauren asked. “Do you live near Woodward?”

“Not really. We’re actually about five minutes east of the mall, by Hillman Park.”

“Oh, cool, that’s not too far from me. Will you text me your address?”

“Yes, but I’m getting ready to leave. My brother Nathan will be here, though.” And he owed me big for this.

“Okay. Thanks.”

I hung up, then texted her our address.

“Did she sound cute?” he asked.

“Nope, she sounded like a big, burly girl. Have fun.”

I lay on my bed, throwing a soccer ball in the air over and over. It was midnight. I couldn’t face sleep. I wondered if Gage, whose room shared a wall with mine, was going to come over and tell me to be quiet. I caught the ball with a loud smack and then pulled my arm back, poised to hurl it against the wall this time. That would wake him.

I sighed and let it roll off my fingertips instead, landing on the floor with a thud. I didn’t want to talk to Gage. I wanted to talk to Braden. I needed to apologize. That’s why my bedroom light was still on, after all—a hope that he would see it. His room was dark, though. I sat up and planted my feet on the ground. Forcing myself to stand up, I walked to the light switch and flipped it off, then lay back down again.

The curtains on my bedroom window weren’t drawn tightly closed, and a strip of light from the moon cut across my ceiling. It was as if the moon were trying to tell me to stop being so stubborn. I stood again and marched down the stairs and outside. Then I sat there in the dirt by the fence. I should’ve just texted him, but I couldn’t. What if he ignored it? At least this way if he didn’t come, I could tell myself it was because he was asleep.

I wasn’t sure how much time passed as I sat there. Long enough for me to wonder why I was still sitting there. I stood and paced the fence. If he didn’t come out by the time I counted to fifty, I’d go back inside and forget about this. I started my count. When I reached forty-nine, I decided that one hundred was a much better number. I needed to give him a chance, after all. Fifty seconds was barely more time than a center got to snap a football.

The numbers ticked through my head, one for each step I took along the fence line. “Seventy-six,” I whispered aloud, my bare foot landing on a rock. “Ouch.” I stopped and clenched my fists. This was ridiculous. Just as I turned to head back to the house, I heard his back door snick shut. I whirled to face the fence again and watched him walk slowly toward it. He didn’t know I was there. I should call out to him. If he did know I was there, would he tell me how heartless I was for what I said the other night?

I was surprised when he walked right up to my board and leaned his forehead against it. “Hey,” he said.

I leaned into the board as well. “Hi,” I whispered. “I didn’t think you could see me.”

“You’re wearing white. It practically glows through the cracks.”

I looked down at my basketball camp T-shirt. “Oh.”

“Are you still mad at me?” he asked.

“No . . .” I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. Relief flooded my body. I had missed him more than I realized. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For what I said about your mom and dad. My family is far from perfect—you know that as well as anyone. I’m sorry for turning it around on you. I was just surprised.” I shoved my hands into the pockets of my sweats. “Maybe my mom was different than I imagined her.”

“Your family is pretty amazing, Charles.” I heard him draw in a deep breath. Maybe he was relieved we were talking again too. “I shouldn’t have said that about your mom. I wasn’t thinking. Here you were upset you couldn’t remember anything about her and what do I do? Give you these depressing memories that aren’t even yours. There were so many reasons she could’ve been sad. Maybe your brothers were fighting too much that day and she was at her wit’s end. She had four kids in six years. That had to get overwhelming at times.”

Unlike when we sat back-to-back against the fence, I could feel his breath seep through the crack and touch my cheeks. I still didn’t open my eyes. We were so close that the air smelled like him. I didn’t realize I knew how Braden smelled until that moment. “Thank you.” I twisted, turning away from his scent, which was making my head spin. I put my back to the fence once again, then looked up at the night stars.

He didn’t do the same thing, because his voice was crystal clear next to my ear. “My dad is a jerk and my mom should leave him.”

“No. I shouldn’t have said that. He’s sick. If he would just stop drinking—”

“It didn’t start five years ago. I mean, the drinking did, but he was always a jerk. You know that. The alcohol just makes it worse. Why do you think I claimed your dad was mine at school that day? I wanted him to be mine. I wanted to be in your family.”