Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 92208 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 461(@200wpm)___ 369(@250wpm)___ 307(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92208 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 461(@200wpm)___ 369(@250wpm)___ 307(@300wpm)
Ryan groaned.
She showed no sign of hearing him. “—to come and meet some of them. Her friends are so well-behaved, and they’re good girls. They’re the type you’d want to be friends with. Right, Peach? You and your friends seem like the popular girls in your class, even though Mackenzie is a grade above you.”
“Mom!” She was horrified too. “Shut up.”
“Mom,” Ryan drawled. “She doesn’t want to hang out with strangers right now.”
“Mmmm?”
I could only sit there and watch this unfold in front of me. Mrs. Jensen seemed oblivious, sipping at her coffee as if it were an IV filled with morphine. I frowned, scanning the back of the kitchen for a hint that maybe she put something else in there besides coffee. Then I felt Robbie’s foot pressing into the top of my knee. He was pushed right up against the table, holding on as he stretched his leg all the way to me.
I thought I’d done my sisterly duty before, getting the attention off him, and I lifted an eyebrow at him.
He mouthed the word bathroom.
I nodded. “Can we be excused from the table?”
“We?” Mrs. Jensen looked from me to my brother. “Oh. Yes. Of course.” Her eyes fell to our plates. “Neither of you has eaten. Okay, Rose? Can we make sure there’s food left out in case they want to grab a bite later? We could order bagels if we don’t have any on hand.”
God. Bagels. I felt whiplash at that word.
“Willow, you aren’t hungry?”
My mom never knew. Right? It wasn’t that she didn’t want to know. Right?
“Well, we have bagels, Willow. Make sure to grab one, okay? You need to start the morning off right. Snack on it during the day if you need to.”
Tears threatened to spill, but nope, I would not cry. No way.
Robbie’s chair scraped against the floor. He pushed it back and stood there, a look of surprise on his face, as if he didn’t realize what he’d done. “Um . . .” His mouth opened—nothing. It closed. Then opened. Still nothing.
I said softly, “Bathroom.”
“Oh yeah.” He darted around the table, around Ryan, and hurried up the stairs.
Another uncomfortable silence descended.
I looked down at my lap because, honestly, why would I want to see their pity? I’d had to remind my little brother why he stood from the table. That wasn’t normal, and nothing about our visit was. We weren’t friends with these people. We barely knew them. We had no other friends or family here. I mean, I was pretty sure I was sort of friends with Ryan, but we weren’t there for a fun visit.
I could feel their attention. I hated it.
Willow had wanted attention. She and Robbie. But it was on me, and not in the way I’d always gotten it before. I was the laid-back one. The one who could joke. The one in the background. The one who everyone always forgot about. I was the steady one. That kind of attention—or lack of attention—was what I liked. This attention, I loathed.
It wasn’t mine to have. It had been forced on me.
Clearing my throat, I had to get out of there. I turned to Ryan. “Warcraft till my grandparents show up?”
He stood right away. “Hell yes.”
He was as happy as I was to leave that kitchen. I should’ve wondered why, but I didn’t.
We spent the rest of the day in his room, Robbie too, until the doorbell rang around seven that night.
Shit got real once Grams and Grandpa Bill arrived.
There were tears. Hugs. Patting on the back, a lot of it. And that was between the adults.
“Have they met each other before?” Robbie asked me in a whisper. Once they turned to us, he stuck to my side. Still, he was almost mauled by Grams.
Ryan, who was leaning against the wall next to me, snorted but coughed to cover it when his sister shot him a dark look. It transferred to me before she seemed to remember why I was there. Her head hung, and she kicked at the floor. I couldn’t really blame Peach. I suppose I wasn’t like the other girls she knew. I mean, I wasn’t crying. I’d left her bed and had stuck like glue to her brother, and the few times she’d talked to me, I hadn’t been the most receptive. I wasn’t rude. But I didn’t respond to her the way she was clearly used to. That was Willow’s role. She’d been the social one, the engaging one.
The perfect one.
I folded my arms over Robbie, pulling him back against me, and rested my chin on top of his head. “No. I think Grandma needs to cry. That’s all.”
Robbie found my hands and held tight. “Grandpa looks like he wants to cry too.”
Standing off to the side, Grandpa Bill clutched a white cloth handkerchief in his hand. He always had one in his pocket, Grams insisted on it, but I’d never seen him use it before today. As Grams talked with Mr. and Mrs. Jensen, Grandpa Bill scrunched his nose, blinked a few times, and turned to the side. His hand came up before he turned back, and he blinked his eyes a couple more times. At the end he lifted his shoulders and rolled them back, as if he had to keep reminding himself to stand tall.