Because I had a feeling . . .
“Taking your laundry for a spin or what?” He chuckles.
“Huh?” My face wrinkles and my lip sneers, then I look down and remember what I’m doing out here. “Oh, yeah. Spilled something and the dorm laundry room is packed.”
I struggle to make direct eye contact because I’m waiting for him to call bullshit and ask me about diving into the pool with Lily.
“Just use ours. Come on.” He steps around me and gestures me to follow, unfazed by my lie. My shoulders relax as I sense he didn’t seeshitin the fieldhouse. I don’t know James that well, but I don’t think he’s a spectacular bluffer. Just a hunch.
I follow him inside and glimpse his dad and a woman I assume is his mother laughing while cooking in the tight kitchen space. My chest tightens at the vision. There’s this photo Anika stole from one of our mom’s old albums. It’s of her and our real dad, laughing just the way these two are. Happy. For a little while, we were all so happy. And then our dad died, and nobody was ever truly happy again.
“Theo needs the laundry. I said it was okay,” James says, leading me through the living room and past the dining table where we first met.
His dad pops his head around a corner.
“Don’t get used to days off, Theo. We hit the field for full pads practice tomorrow at three.” There’s a seriousness in his expression. Coach is invested in winning, which means he’ll be running a tight ship. I like that. Less room for my mind to wander. Between school, my internship, and football, I may just make it through this semester.
If I could somehow get rid of Lily Beachem . . .
“You serious about letting Lily tutor you?” My scheming takes over on instinct as I shovel my wet clothes into the dryer. Hopefully the chlorine smell will fade.
“Heck, yeah. She seems smart, and my dad would kick my ass if I switched out a class just because I thought it was too hard. He’s big on perseverance. You know her, right? Is she as smart as I’m assuming?”
My back to him, I push my tongue in my cheek and consider the many ways I could take this. I shake my head and go with the first idea that forms on my tongue.
“I mean, she’s average. She took that class, I guess.” I’m not technically lying. I know from that night when we talked that Lily isn’t in the top of our class. She’s smart, but I wouldn’t say she’s brainy. She’s not really lazy, either. She’s . . . like me.Indifferent.
“She was in that accident, huh?” His voice goes quiet, and I know that’s his way of beingdelicate.There’s no gentle way to bring up my sister’s death, and I want to punch him a little for thinking there is.
“Uh, yeah.” I keep my focus on the dryer, twisting the simple knob around as if I don’t understand it.Fuck! It’s a basic dryer.I don’t want to talk about this.
“Sorry, man. I know it’s probably a lot. I’m sorry I didn’t know more before we met.”
“It’s fine,” I clip, pressing the button to start the cycle and flipping around, leaning my weight on the dryer and dropping my hands in my sweatpants pockets instead of folding my arms around myself defiantly. My heart is pounding under my arms, behind my ribs.
James leans against the counter opposite me, his family’s laundry folded into perfect piles. Everything in his life is in order. He has no clue how quickly that can change.
“So, your sister . . .”
My stomach squeezes more.
“What was she like?”
I breathe in, a slow draw of air that coats my internal pain. I actually like when people ask about Anika, about who she was. Those are the things I enjoy talking about. It’s hard to get to that stuff lately. All anyone sees when they look at me is her death, the tragedy—and Lily.The hero.
I chuckle at a brief thought of Anika pulling her gum from her mouth mid bubble and sticking it to my ass when we were in the mall two summers ago.
“Anika was all the good stuff.” A smile settles onto my lips and my rigid muscles relax as my eyes move up to meet James’.
“Let me guess; you were the troublemaker and Anika was the goody-two-shoes.”
“Ha! Hardly! The opposite. She was just good at never getting caught. She was good at throwingmeunder the bus. Like when we were kids, it was always Anika’s idea to pull off the candy heist when our parents weren’t looking. And when we first got our licenses, she was the one who figured out how to back the car out of the garage without the engine on and get us down the street, out of earshot.”
“She sounds like a blast,” James says, and I blink at his reaction, suddenly very present, the past gone.
“She was that, but she had layers. She was my best friend, butfuck, you know?” I shrug, masking the shivers gripping my body as ache tackles my heart. “She had a lot to her that even I didn’t know. And now I never will.”
My eyes flutter shut, partly out of self-hatred for letting such dark words come out of my mouth. I don’t want to be like that here. I want to escape it.