I whip my head around and crash against Mom’s icy stare. It casts a chill so deep my bones ache. Crushing weight turns my breath shallow as I hear the sound of Mars’s engine fading down the road.
“Sage Emerson, do you have any idea what time it is?” It’s pretty damn late.
“I’m sorry, Mom. I lost track of time.” I step inside and pull my arms around myself to create some sort of barrier between us. Mom would never hit me, but the way she throws her words feels like a sucker punch.
“Lost track of time?” She repeats the words like they’re foreign. Like I’m speaking a language she’s never heard me speak before. We move up the steps to my room, the sound of our feet marching in unison sounds like an angry drumbeat.
“Who is he? I saw a guy drop you off.” Her eyes are all over me, probing and searching for clues. I rake my fingers through my hair, hoping to cover the bruises Mars left on my neck.
I can still feel his lips on me. His tongue sliding over my skin.
I snap my eyes to Mom. She’s pissed. Her lips are pressed into an unforgiving line and her hands are anchored to her hips.
“A friend. He’s just a friend,” I say. All the words I want to say clog my throat and refuse to come out. Mars is more than just a friend.
He’s my bright spot.
My dragonfly.
He’s not corrupted by Ashton Hills. Somehow he hovers right above the poison that runs through the veins of this town.
“A friend?” She scoffs then slaps my hands away from my hair. A blanket of prickly heat wraps around my throat. Her eyes narrow and hone in on my neck like laser beams, and then I can’t breathe.
My lips part involuntarily in effort to suck in more air. She leans in close and I smell the toothpaste on her breath. “Friends don’t leave hickeys, Sage.” She’s so pissed her cheeks are turning crimson and now splotches are covering her neck too.
I’m almost nineteen years old. She can’t be mad at me for staying out late and having hickeys. I’m grown.
I can’t bring my mouth to speak those words though. Instead, I turn my head away from her judgmental glare. She can’t possibly understand what it feels like to find someone who finally gets you. Someone else who feels alone in a world of people who don’t understand.
Someone who feels alone in their own home.
The wall rolls in and the stone is thunderous in my ears.
“You’re out there running around with some boy—who’s probably beneath you—judging from the piece of trash he was driving, and you’re lying to me. What has gotten into you?” My heart thumps hard and fierce at the way she talks about Mars like she knows him.
She doesn’t know anything.
She doesn’t know how sweet he is, despite the pain in his eyes. She doesn’t know how he lights up when he talks about art or how soft he says my name.
Dad walks in my room and sighs at the scene unfolding before him. I’ve tried to shrink myself into nothing. My shoulders are drawn up to my ears, my arms are hugging my middle, and my chin is tucked against my chest.
I want to disappear.
“Eleanor, let Sage go to bed. She went out on a date. It’s not the end of the world.” He looks at her with a frown on his face that weighs his features down and she bristles.
“Do you know what time it is, Charles? You’re okay with your daughter running the streets with some boy we don’t know?”
“I’d like to meet him, but do you think yelling at her at two in the morning is going to make her want to bring him to dinner? You’re not exactly being warm and inviting.” Dad glances at me, his brown eyes full of sympathy.
“As long as you still live in this house, Sage, you will not stay out until two in the morning again, and you will definitely not come home with hickeys!” Mom fumes. At the mention of hickeys, Dad’s gaze finds my neck.
I’m on display and I fucking hate it. Where’s the law against eighteen-year-olds going out and coming home with hickeys?
Anger piles up high in my belly, until it’s pressing against my chest in an effort to break through my breastbone. I want to be alone. I want to shove them both out of my room and lock the door, so I can replay the perfect date I had with Mars.
“We’ll talk later, Sage,” Dad says. He’s still eyeing my neck when he tugs Mom toward my open bedroom door. When they finally leave, I collapse on the bed and push out a frustrated growl.
Like he can sense my irritation, Mars texts me. Seeing his name flash across my phone makes me smile. It makes me smile hard.