Promise_to_Marry_by_Jessica_Wood_Epubdump_com

Promise to Marry

(Promises, #1)

Jessica Wood

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2015 by Jessica Wood

All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the author.

ERH Press

ISBN-13 978-1-940285-13-9

First Edition: January 2015

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ABOUT Promise to Marry

We were best friends since as early as I could remember. We grew up together. We were next door neighbors. We shared each other's deepest secrets.

When I was thirteen, we made a pact: If we were still single by the time we were 30, we’d marry each other.

Today was my thirtieth birthday.

I was single. I knew he was single too.

But we were no longer best friends, and a part of me knew that he hated me.

Table of Contents

Also by Jessica Wood

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Author’s Note

Other Books

Synopsis & Excerpt from Oblivion

About the Author

ALSO BY JESSICA WOOD

Emma’s Story Series

A Night to Forget – Book One

The Day to Remember – Book Two

Emma’s Story Box Set – Contains Book One & Book Two

The Heartbreaker Series

This is an Emma’s Story spin-off series featuring Damian Castillo, a supporting character in The Day to Remember. This is a standalone series and does not need to be read with Emma’s Story series.

Damian – Book One

The Heartbreaker – Prequel Novella to DAMIAN – can be read before or after Damian.

Taming Damian – Book Two

The Chase Series

This is a standalone series with cameo appearances from Damian Castillo (The Heartbreaker series).

The Chase, Vol. 1

The Chase, Vol. 2

The Chase, Vol. 3

The Chase, Vol. 4

The Chase: The Complete Series Box Set – Contains All Four Volumes

Oblivion

This is a standalone full-length book unrelated to other series by Jessica Wood.

Oblivion

***

Pre-Orders Currently Available

Promise to Keep – February 9, 2015

“Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul - and sings the tunes without the words - and never stops at all.”

Emily Dickinson

PROLOGUE

When we first met twenty-three years ago, I had hated him.

“You look like Pippi Longstocking!” That was the very first thing he’d said to me. He’d flashed me a boyish grin as he pointed to the pigtails my mom had braided for me that morning before I had said goodbye to her.

I’d stuck my tongue out at him in protest as I followed Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom into their house—my new home. I had known instantly that I wouldn’t like this boy. He was mean, he was a bully, and he sure wasn’t going to be any friend of mine.

Well, at least that was what I had thought that day when I moved in with Aunt Betty and her husband. But, like so many other things I’d thought throughout my life, I had been wrong.

Somehow, despite my resistance, he’d chipped away at my stone-cold seven-year-old exterior and won me over within a matter of just a week. I’d discovered that he wasn’t mean after all. He wasn’t a bully, either. In fact, somehow, without even knowing how it’d happened, he had quickly become my friend—and not just any old friend—he had become my best friend. My confidant. My constant. My anchor.

We’d been inseparable as we grew up together, spending hours in his treehouse, talking and laughing until Aunt Betty would call me into the house for bed every night.

And even in one of my darkest hour when I was thirteen—when I felt the most lost and alone, when I purposely drove everyone, including him, away—he had been there, by my side, to comfort me. He had been my rock and had refused to be ignored or pushed away.

That was the day we had made our pact: If we were still single by the time we were thirty, we’d marry each other.

I had known even then just how lucky I had been to have him in my life. I had loved him the way best friends loved each other. But it wasn’t until I had lost him that I had realized just how much I’d love him—how much my love for him went far beyond friendship. It wasn’t until we were no longer friends that I had realized that he had been my one and only love all along.

But by then, it was too late. I had screwed up. I had ruined everything. I had done something that was unforgivable. And a part of me wondered if I had enjoyed it. So how could I possibly ask him to forgive me when I couldn’t forgive myself?

Now, twenty-three years after we’d first met, we were both thirty and single, but I knew that it was he who now hated me.

CHAPTER ONE

Present Day

“Promise?” I looked into his rich, emerald eyes—those eyes that always had a way of making me feel at home.

“Promise.” He beamed at me and squeezed my hands as we secured the love-lock onto the bridge railing and locked it in place.

He pulled me into his arms and whispered in my ear, “You’re my best friend, Clo. You won’t ever have to worry about being alone. I promise that I’ll always be here for you when you need me.”

A splendid mixture of bliss and comfort spread through me like a warm blanket on a cold day as I sank into his inviting embrace. Despite everything that’d happened in my life, I felt hopeful. Because I knew that no matter what the future held for me, Jackson would always be there. And for me, that was enough.

“Here’s to your thirtieth birthday,” he said playfully as he finally pulled away.

“And yours too,” I added.

“Well, not exactly.” He paused and grinned—that same boyish grin from the first day we met, the same boyish grin I’d come to know so well in the past eleven years, the same boyish grin that made my heart soar with happiness.

“What do you mean?” I feigned a frown, knowing too well he was being a smart-ass.

“Well, seeing as I’m eight months older than you, our pact won’t start when I turn thirty.” He chuckled smugly. “So I’m rooting for your thirtieth.”

“Jax.”

The sound of my own voice woke me from my dream. My eyelids felt heavy as I tried to open them and keep them open, battling against the inviting weight of sleep. Finally, I gave in and closed my eyes again, a part of me hoping I’d drift back into that memory from years ago, a memory that seemed as vivid as if it’d happened just yesterday.

But it was too late. The dream was gone. I couldn’t return back to that moment in time—back to that moment with him.

I opened my eyes, drawing in a long inhale of breath as reality set in. Today was my thirtieth birthday. The big 3-0! I’d always thought that when this day finally came, I’d somehow feel different. I thought that this day would feel meaningful, that somehow a magical switch would turn on inside me and I’d have it all figured it.

I was wrong. I didn’t feel any different this morning than I had the night before. Nothing had changed. I was still working at my boring administrative assistant job at a law firm, living in a tiny studio apartment in a shitty neighborhood in downtown Los Angeles, and getting by, paycheck to paycheck. This wasn’t how I had envisioned my life to be at thirty. Because he isn’t in it, a tiny voice said inside.

Feeling a bit frustrated with myself, I kicked off the comforter and walked to the bathroom to splash some cold water on my face.

“You’re being ridiculous, Chloe,” I said out loud to the reflection that stared back at me from the mirror above the sink. “You’re overreacting. You don’t have a miserable life. In fact, it’s pretty damn good. You just had a weird dream and now you’re being irrationally nostalgic.” I splashed some more water against my face, trying to wake myself up so I could think clearly. Drawing a deep, labored breath, I looked back into the mirror and spoke again, but this time I spoke as if I were trying to persuade someone off a ledge. “That’s all in the past. You can’t change it. You can’t. The only thing you can do is move forward. You have a lot to look forward to.”

I grabbed a towel and patted off the water from my face. “You’re right,” I responded back to my reflection and flashed a resolute smile. “I have so much to be happy about. I’m thirty and I have a wonderful boyfriend who makes me happy and takes care of me.”

Just then, as if in support of my positive thinking, my phone started ringing. It was Carly.

“And I have a new best friend, and here she is now.”

Feeling a lot better than moments ago, I grabbed my phone and answered it.

“Hi, Carly,” I said cheerfully.

Before I could stop here, Carly’s musically-challenged voice came through the phone as she sang me “Happy Birthday” off-key with such confidence, you’d think that was how all people sang the song if you hadn’t known any better.

I burst into a fit of laughter. “Thanks for that. I really needed a good laugh this morning.”

“Hey, everyone loves my incredible off-pitch renditions of songs. I’m simply giving them the Carly-twist.” I could hear the humor in her voice as she pretended to sound serious.

“And I, for one, love the Carly-twist,” I played along.

“Well naturally,” she said sarcastically in her diva voice.

I giggled as I pictured her flipping her long blond waves over her shoulder as she batted her long lashes.

“So how does it feel to be so old?” she teased.

“No different than I felt yesterday. But don’t worry, you’ll find out for yourself in a few short months,” I teased back.

“Touché.” She groaned. “Get those old-lady walkers ready for me.”

I laughed and shook my head. “You’re too much sometimes, Carly.”

“Oh, you love it.”

“Riiight.” I dragged out the word, highlighting the sarcasm in my voice.

“So what do you have planned today? Will I even get to see you?”

“Well, Jeff’s taking me out for dinner and this comedy show tonight.”

“Ohhh, that sounds like fun. So are you going into work today or taking the day off?”

“I’m working today. I want to save my vacation days and can’t afford to take a non-paid day off.”

“Girl, you seriously work too hard. You need to live a little. It’s your thirtieth birthday, and you have a self-employed boyfriend who works from home. What you should be doing today is having lots of obligatory birthday-sex with your hot sex-on-a-stick boyfriend.”

I laughed. “All you think about is sex.”

“True story. It’s the gift that keeps on giving.”

“You’re seriously too much sometimes, Carly.” I giggled.

“Thank you,” she said proudly.

I rolled my eyes. In the past two years I’d known Carly, she’d always been that free-spirited wild child, the type of girl that I’d dreamt about being, but knew I could never emulate even if I’d tried.

“Anyway, babe,” she continued, “I gotta get going now, but I wanted to wish you a happy birthday.”

“Thanks, Carly. Maybe we can grab lunch today near the office?” Carly and I worked only two blocks from one another, so we tried to meet up for lunch at least once a week.

“Yeah, maybe a late lunch? I have a business meeting out of the office this morning, so I probably won’t be back in the office until one.”

“Sure. How about one-thirty, then? And if you’re running late, just let me know.”

“Sounds like a plan. Have a good day at work, babe. See you soon.”

“Thanks, Carly. And don’t worry, I’ll be sure to make time for that birthday sex.”

She laughed. “Get it, girl!” With that, she clicked off.

***

“Thank you, Mr. O’Brien. I’m sorry this was so last minute.”

“Don’t worry about it, Chloe,” my boss reassured. “It’s been a slow week at the office anyway. Have a nice birthday and enjoy the day off.”

A huge smile spread across my face when I got off the phone. After my conversation with Carly a few minutes before, I realized that she was absolutely right. I had to live a little. It was my thirtieth birthday. I had a gorgeous boyfriend who had a flexible schedule. Why shouldn’t I treat myself to a day off work and spend the day having birthday sex?

With a renewed sense of excitement, I’d completely pushed my dream from this morning out of my thoughts as I raced to my closet to find something to wear. I reached for my phone to tell him I was coming over, but before I pulled up his name, I decided that I wanted to surprise him instead.

Surprise sex for him. Birthday sex for me. Win-win. I felt giddy with excitement as I riffled through my clothes. After a few seconds of searching, my fingers stopped dead in their tracks when they found the perfect outfit. A devious smirk curled my lips as I quickly grabbed it from the hanger and got ready.

Thirty minutes later, I was standing outside his apartment in nothing but a sleek black trench coat that came down mid-thigh and a pair of black five-inch fuck-me boots.

I felt sexy, adventurous, and aroused as I knocked on his door, anticipating the things we’d do to each other, the things he’d do to me. Jeff may not have been perfect in many ways, but when it came to sex, he was pretty damn close.

When he didn’t answer the door, I knocked again. Still no response. I leaned my head on the door and could hear what sounded like the TV from the other side. He must be working at his office desk in his bedroom.

Just then I remembered that Jeff had given me a set of his keys for those in-case-of-emergency situations.

Is the need for birthday sex on your big 3-0 considered an emergency? “Close enough,” I decided out loud as I pulled out his keys.

When I walked into the living room, I could hear the muffled sounds of cries and a struggle coming from the TV in the bedroom.

I laughed when I realized what Jeff must be watching and walked through the hallway leading to the bedroom.

“Jeff, are you watching Jerry Springer again? I knew you secretively loved that—” But when I walked into the room, my words got lost in my throat as shock paralyzed me in place at what I saw.

There, on the cream sheepskin area rug I’d gotten him last Christmas, was Jeff, naked and on his knees, pounding himself in and out of some blonde’s ass.

“Chloe!” Jeff called out in alarm. He leaped off the woman, his erection emerging from inside the blonde. It wasn’t until that moment that the woman turned around, causing a sharp gasp to escape my lips.

She wasn’t some random woman. She wasn’t some stranger. She was none other than Carly, my best friend.

I felt like the oxygen had been sucked out of the room and replaced with something more dense and threatening. For what seemed like eternity, we just stood there, staring at each other in wide-eyed shock, both unable to say a thing.

“I—I can explain!” Jeff stammered out as he moved toward me, causing his still-hard erection to point straight at me, almost as if to ask me to look at it and acknowledge where it’d just been.

“Don’t touch me!” I screamed as I backed away from him. I glared at him, then Carly, and then back to him. “I don’t understand. How could you guys? My boyfriend? My best friend?” I drew in a sharp, uneven breath. “And on my fucking birthday?”

“Chloe,” Carly’s voice was soft, almost pleading, “I’m sorry. We didn’t intentionally want to hurt you…”

“Shut up, Carly! Just shut the fuck up! What was all that bullshit this morning about making sure I got my birthday sex from Jeff today, and how I should take the day off? And when I decide to take your advice, take the day off and come see him, I walk in on you fucking him! Did I miss something? Is your name Chloe? Did you turn thirty today? Is he your boyfriend?” By this point, I was fuming with rage.

“I—I didn’t know you’d show up, Chloe,” she pleaded. “I asked you this morning what your plans were today. You said you’d be at work. I didn’t plan for you to see this.”

I snorted at her attempt to reason with herself. “Oh, so that makes it okay for you to fuck your best friend’s boyfriend? Because you didn’t know I’d find out?”

I watched her open her mouth to respond but then she closed it without saying a word.

Jeff moved toward me again. This time, he grabbed one of my hands and forced me to face him.

“Chloe, I love you. This was just a mistake. It doesn’t change the way I feel about you.”

I stared at him in utter disbelief. “Do you really think this doesn’t change things between us? Do you really think I can just forget this happened—that I can forget everything I just saw? Because trust me, if I could scrub the images of you fucking my friend in the ass from my memory, I’d ask you to go get me some bleach and a scrub brush.”

“Please, Chloe. Baby?” He flashed me an innocent frown.

“Fuck you, Jeff! Don’t you ‘baby’ me!”

“Come on, let’s talk about this,” he persisted.

“Get your head out of your ass, Jeff—or her ass for that matter! Don’t you get it? There’s nothing to talk about. We’re over!” I yanked my hand from his grasp and ran for his front door. I ran as fast as I could until I reached the safety of my car. It wasn’t until I drove away from his building that the anger evaporated away and tears took its place as they streamed down my face.

I cried the entire way home. And as my mind raced with a million thoughts, there was one that seemed to resonate in my head more so than any other.

It’s karma. After almost a year of eluding it, it’s finally caught up to me, and I deserve every painful moment of it.

CHAPTER TWO

Present Day

I was on a bender.

I was on the reckless path leading to self destruction.

I was completely and utterly lost.

But the thing was, I didn’t care.

This was what I wanted.

This was the only way I knew how to mentally escape from everything.

This was how fucked up I was.

Tonight was yet another night I’d found myself at the neighborhood dive bar on Hollywood Boulevard. Much like the previous nights this week, I’d gotten home after work, absentmindedly ate whatever takeout I’d grabbed on the way home, took a few vodka shots in the kitchen—to save money, of course—before walking the four blocks to the bar to close out the night in a blurry haze.

It was just a little before nine when I got to the bar tonight. It was a Friday, so the place was much more crowded than the previous nights. More options and no work in the morning, I thought to myself. I walked straight to the bar when I arrived and waved the bartender over.

“Hey, there. Chloe, right?”

“Yup, that’s me. Hey…?” I tilted my head toward him slightly, signaling for him to remind me of his name. Who could possibly keep track of names when you were just a few drinks away from being three sheets to the wind?

“Steve.” He flashed me his perfect pearly whites as he wiped down the counter between us. Wannabe actor, I immediately thought. Living in Los Angeles, you could spot them from a mile away.

“Right. Hi, Steve.”

“So what are we having tonight?”

“A glass of vodka, dirty, and a shot of Bacardi 151, hold the judgment.”

He smirked at me. “So the usual?” I wasn’t sure why, but his smug comment bothered me.

I didn’t answer him. But instead of waiting for a response, he went to make them, clearly taking my silence as a yes. A minute later, he was back with my drinks.

“Tough day?” He placed the glasses in front of me and looked at me with half-interest.

“How about tough week?” I corrected him as I threw back the shot of 151 and chased it down with a healthy gulp of vodka.

“Whoa there.” Steve raised his eyebrows, his eyes widening slightly with surprise. “Honey, you’d better slow your roll if you want to remember anything in the morning.”

“Didn’t I say ‘hold the judgment?’” I challenged him, feeling agitated by how he looked at me with unease, like I was some unstable person who needed help. It’s not like he hasn’t seen me drink the previous nights.

Okay fine, so maybe I was a little unstable, and maybe I did need help. But he was the bartender. I was paying him to make me my drinks, not to be my shrink.

To my relief, Steve had no time to respond. A group of girls at the far end of the bar waved him down, and he seemed relieved to leave our conversation to go take their drink orders.

As I sat there and sipped my vodka, something from the corner of my eye caught my attention. A girl with electric-blue hair had just walked through the front door and was waving to a group of people sitting at a booth on the opposite end of the bar. It wasn’t this particular girl, nor the color of her hair that I was drawn to. It was the red heart-shaped lock secured around the strap of her messenger bag that had caused my body to tense up.

“Ugh. I don’t want to think about him,” I muttered under my breath as I peeled my eyes off the red lock. But the harder I tried to not think about him, the more thoughts of him that began to surface in the forefront of my mind. Jax. I downed the rest of my vodka, trying to drown out my thoughts. “I want to think about anything but him right now.”

“Why don’t you think about me instead?” came a voice from right behind me.

The closeness of his voice alarmed me momentarily, but I recovered quickly and turned to face the stranger who had just walked up to the bar and sat down on the stool next to mine. He flashed me a meaningful smile and I gave him a quick once-over before returning my gaze to my empty glass. He looked to be in his mid-twenties and was cute enough for my purposes.

“And why exactly should I think about you?” I challenged in my flirtatious voice.

“Well, a sexy lady like you shouldn’t be drinking alone and not thinking about me.”

I raised an eyebrow but didn’t turn back to look at him right away. I liked that he was cocky and had more confidence about himself than he should probably possess. He was exactly what I was looking for tonight.

When I finally turned to meet his salivating gaze, I knew by the way he looked at me that this was going to be too easy.

“Well, you’re wrong. I’m not drinking alone tonight.” For a second, his face fell. “—because I’m drinking with you.”

His face immediately lit up like a Christmas tree in December and he inched his seat closer to mine. There was a greedy lust in his eyes, and I knew to him, this was probably his lucky night, where a sleazy pick-up line actually worked for a change. But to me, I just needed to forget.

“So what would you like to drink?”

“Another glass of vodka, dirty.”

“Dirty,” he repeated. “I like that.” He smirked and licked his lips.

“I’m sure you do,” I shot back sarcastically.

“You’re feisty.” He laughed and motioned Steve over. I avoided Steve’s gaze, not wanting to see any hint of judgment in his eyes. I was on a good buzz, and I didn’t need it to be ruined by reality.

“So my name’s Brent. What’s yours?”

“C—” I paused for a second. “Carly.” I grinned over at him. All I wanted to do tonight was to forget about who I was. It seemed fitting in more ways than one to use her name.

When the drinks came, I grabbed mine and downed half the glass without bothering to wait for the guy.

He chuckled as he reached for his drink. “I love a woman who can appreciate a good, stiff drink.”

Feeling tired of this forced banter, I moved my hand under the bar counter. When I found the growing bulge in his jeans, I leaned over and whispered so only he could hear, “That’s not the only stiff thing I can appreciate.”

That not-so-subtle invitation was all it took. Minutes later, before he had a chance to even taste his drink, we were in the men’s bathroom where he had me pinned up against the wall in the last stall.

“Fuck me hard,” I demanded as his hands frantically removed my black mini-dress over my head and threw it over the stall door. “I want it rough and painful.”

“You’re a bad girl, aren’t you, Carly?” he growled in my ear, the heat of his breath sending a mixture of anticipation and disgust to run down my body. But I knew I couldn’t stop. I knew I wanted to stop thinking. I knew I needed this escape, now more than ever. I closed my eyes and felt the alcohol numbing my body as his hungry mouth pressed hard against mine and his hands began to massage my breasts. I gasped and moaned at all the appropriate moments, but my heart wasn’t in it. It was as if I was having an out-of-body experience and I was watching an up-close porno. My body didn’t resist as his moved down to my breasts, his tongue flicking my nipples as his hand disappeared down between my legs, his fingers exploring the depths of my wetness. I heard myself cry out in pleasure as his slightly-curled fingers moved in and out of me, causing my legs to buckle under me.

Then he pulled out of me and sucked my juices from his fingers as he dropped his pants and slipped on a condom. I could see from the hungry frenzy in his eyes that there was no turning back.

“You want it rough, baby?” His ragged voice was dark and threatening.

“Yes,” I heard myself beg.

Suddenly he lifted my legs off the ground, and I felt his erection rub against my entrance. “God, you’re so fucking wet,” he groaned in a hoarse voice.

I was about to respond, but it was too late. Instead, I cried out in both pain and pleasure as I felt him plunge all the way inside me, not holding back a single inch of him. I dug my nails deep into the muscular hardness of his back as each of his violent thrusts went deeper and harder than the last. Through my half-opened eyes, I saw his face twisted in pleasure as uncontrollable gasps and moans escaped my lips.

A few minutes later, we finally climaxed, taking me to the peak of pleasure and oblivion. In that split second, my mind was completely free from the shackles of my thoughts. But as quickly as it came, it also left, and as I pulled up my panties and adjusted the dress on my body, reality began to creep its way back into my consciousness.

“Fuck, that was incredible,” he growled in a husky voice as he leaned forward to nuzzle against my neck.

I cringed and averted his touch and reached for the bathroom-stall door.

“Where are you going with that sexy ass of yours?”

I felt a little dizzy and sick but turned back to face him. When our eyes met, I realized that I had just let a complete stranger fuck me in a disgusting bathroom stall, and it wasn’t until after our dirty act that I’d actually looked at him clearly for the first time.

Why did I do this, again?

To escape the pain you fell in your heart, I heard a small voice respond inside me.

But escaping the pain was short-lived. Not even the empty bliss of an orgasm could keep it at bay for too long. I felt my body waking up from the pain-numbing effects of ecstasy and I knew I needed to get out of here before things got worse.

As I started to pull the stall door open to leave, his hand found mine and pulled me back inside. Before I could pull away, he guided my hand down to his already-hard erection.

“How about another round?”

I looked away, cringing inside at what I had just done with this stranger. “Sorry. I gotta go, Bryan,” I said as I finally managed to pull my hand out of his grip. I quickly opened the door and stumbled out of the stall.

“It’s Brent.”

“What?” I looked back at him, realizing he had just said something to me. My mind was somewhere else—already running away from this mistake.

“My name is Brent, not Bryan.”

I sighed. “Look. I really don’t care. I’m not looking for anything serious here. If I was, I probably wouldn’t have let you fuck me in the men’s bathroom at a bar after meeting you for less than five minutes.” Shame consumed me when I realized that I had just slept with another man I had no feelings for.

“Oh, don’t be like that,” he teased. “We can still go back out to the bar, have a few more drinks, and then take the party back to my place for a night cap.”

“Trust me,” I said almost inaudibly as I turned away from him, “you don’t want anything to do with me.”

Regret gripped my insides as I ran out of the bathroom without waiting for him to respond.

Turning thirty had rattled me more than I wanted to admit. I wanted to blame it on the events of last week—blame Jeff for cheating on me, blame Carly for being a shitty friend, blame my luck for having it all happen to me on my thirtieth birthday. But I knew deep down there was something more to my unhappiness. I knew it had nothing to do with Jeff, or even Carly. I knew it was something that had been brewing over the past nine years. What happened with Jeff and Carly was only the trigger, the tip of the iceberg. But they weren’t the iceberg. They weren’t the root of the immense pain I’d bottled up inside, a pain that’d pressed against my chest, unable to find its release.

CHAPTER THREE

Present Day

By the time I stumbled into my apartment, I felt like shit. I felt dirty. I felt more alone than I’d ever remembered feeling. All the drinks I’d had in the last few hours crashed down on me all at once and I felt myself start to unravel emotionally. I knew I shouldn’t fixate on the one thing—the one person—who could push me further down this rabbit hole, but it was too late.

In my drunken stupor, I pulled up Facebook and typed his name in the search box: “Jackson Pierce.” He was the first result. We had twenty-one mutual friends. But we weren’t friends. He’d de-friended me after that day. I hovered the cursor over his name and hesitated. I knew there would be no turning back once I clicked through. I knew I’d want to look through everything. Twice. I knew this wasn’t healthy for me. But it was just too hard to resist. I was like a kid who was left in a room alone and told not to look inside the shiny box full of toys. I have to look! This is killing me, I convinced myself.

Before I could snap to my senses, I clicked on his name. In a blink of an eye, I was staring straight at his profile picture. His olive complexion, his rich, emerald eyes, his warm smile—he looked more handsome than I’d remembered, and he looked happy as his photo smiled back at me. I smiled back and traced the outline of his face with my fingers. For the next hour, I felt myself tumbling down the bottomless rabbit hole as I combed through his Facebook page, looking through every status, every comment, every photo. I tried to soak up everything I could about his life, trying to imagine myself in it, trying to imagine how my life would be if we were still friends—if I hadn’t destroyed our friendship.

“I’m sorry, Jax,” I whispered to his photo. “If I could go back and do things differently, I wouldn’t have hurt you. I would have figured out another way through the mess.”

Against my better judgment, I stumbled over to my bookshelf and riffled through a box of CDs on the bottom shelf. As soon as I found what I was searching for, I pulled it out and pushed it into the CD slot of my sound system. It was a CD Jax had made for me a decade ago when we were in college. I never knew why I hadn’t realized then how he’d felt about me, but every song on the CD made it perfectly clear that he wanted to be more than friends, that he wanted the same thing I’d wanted for us but was too scared to hope for. I fast-forwarded to my favorite track on the playlist, Jeff Buckley’s “Lover, You Should’ve Come Over,” and programmed it to play on a repeated loop.

I slumped down on the couch, suddenly feeling physically and emotionally drained. As the guitar strummed the melancholy melody and Jeff Buckley’s deep voice sang the hypnotic song about young lovers and regret, tears began to stream down my face. I’d tried for a long time to hide from the truth, to ignore my true feelings for him, but tonight, after I’d lost everything that seemed to have had any value to me, there were no more walls I could hide behind.

I missed him. I’d missed him for a very long time now. Deeply. Desperately. Painfully. I missed him to the point where it’d become hard to breathe. I would give anything for us to be best friends again. I would give anything for him to be here by my side right now like he’d promised me years ago when I felt lonely. Tears continued to stream down my face as the song radiated through me and the lyrics hit home, speaking straight to my heart and how I was feeling about him.

Just then I sat straight up on the couch. “Maybe it’s not too late,” I said out loud as I responded to a line in the lyrics. “Maybe we’re like this song and we were just too young for anything good to happen between us? But now we’re older…”

Before I knew what I was doing, I pulled up the number I’d had of his from years ago and pressed the call button before I could change my mind.

After two rings, he picked up and I heard his half-awake voice mumble, “Hello?”

I drew in a deep breath, ready to tell him everything, that I was sorry, that I’d missed him, that I was thirty and single, and the only person I wanted to be with was him. But nothing came out of my mouth. I felt paralyzed by fear.

“Hello?” I heard him say again, this time sounding louder and more awake.

Suddenly, in a moment of clarity, I panicked and ended the call without saying a word. What was I thinking calling him in the middle of the night when I was wasted, reckless, and emotionally unstable? We hadn’t talked or seen each other since that day nine years ago. Nothing good could come out of a late-night drunken phone call right now.

I let out a groan and slumped back onto the couch. It was then that the pile of bills and junk mail I had thrown on the coffee table several days earlier caught my attention. There, in the middle of the stack, was a thick, large, ivory card-stock envelope. I reached over and plucked it from the pile. I didn’t have to open it to know that it was a wedding invitation. I glanced at the return address.

Mr. and Mrs. Montgomery

6843 Lester Court

West Chester, Pennsylvania

West Chester. That was where I grew up with Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom. But who were the Montgomerys?

Then it hit me. Clara Montgomery. The always-bubbly and high-spirited girl from high school. She had been in the same circle of friends with me and Jax. I hadn’t talked to her in over two years, and that was when I had randomly run into her on a quick trip home to visit Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom after I had been abroad for five years and before I’d moved to Los Angeles.

I smiled. She had always been nice to me, the eternal optimist in our group. I was glad to see she’d found happiness. As I read the wedding invitation, I wondered if Jax was going to go to Clara’s wedding this summer. A jolt of anxious nerves shot through me as I imagined seeing him again, after all this time, after everything that had happened. Hundreds of questions invaded my mind. What would I say to him? What would he say to me? Was he single? Did he miss me? Could he forgive me? Was there a way things could go back to the way they were? With all the questions I had, my mind seemed to always return to the same one: Did he remember our pact?

While “Lover, You Should’ve Come Over” continued to play in the background, I drifted in and out of consciousness. My living room slowly slipped away and was replaced with a familiar off-white ceiling that glowed with a kaleidoscope of magical lights. I felt his sweaty hand holding mine as he smiled over at me. This is where we made our pact. This is where he first kissed me. This is where I want to be.

And right before I was completely engulfed by sleep, I heard myself mutter, “Jax … I’m single … I hope you are too …”

CHAPTER FOUR

Summer 1992

Seven Years Old

“You be a good girl, you hear, baby?” My mom brushed through the knots in my chestnut-brown hair, preparing to put it in pigtail braids.

“I will, Mommy.” I tried to turn and smile up at her. I knew she thought I always wanted her to braid my hair because I liked it in pigtails. But that wasn’t it. I thought pigtails made me look like a silly kid, and I didn’t want to look like a kid. I needed to grow up, so that I could take care of us both.

I actually never liked my hair in pigtails at all. But I never told my mom that. The real reason I always wanted her to braid my hair was because it was one of my favorite things to do with her. It was when she would talk to me without being distracted, when she wasn’t on the phone talking about money, when she wasn’t crying or angry. And because she needed to use both hands to braid my hair, she couldn’t smoke or drink either, and I knew that was good for her.

When my mom would braid my hair, she seemed happier as well. She would smile and hum to herself, and I loved it when she smiled. It made her look so beautiful, and it made me feel warm and happy inside.

But today felt different.

I couldn’t see her as she stood behind me, but I could tell that something was wrong today. She wasn’t smiling or humming today. “You don’t have to worry about me, Mommy.” I tried to stay positive and happy for her.

“You need to always listen to what Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom tell you to do, okay?” There was an unusual crack in her voice that made me sad, but I wasn’t quite sure why I felt that way.

“I will. I promise. Cross my heart and hope to fly. Stick a beetle in my pie.”

Suddenly, my mom started to laugh, but it wasn’t her normal laugh. This sounded like she was laughing and crying at the same time.

I turned around and looked up at her in confusion. “What’s wrong, Mommy? Why are you laughing funny?”

“You’re just the sweetest girl any mommy can have, baby.” She beamed at me, and for a brief moment, her normal, blood-shot eyes looked clear and focused. She leaned down and planted a gentle kiss on my forehead, which instantly made me giggle with delight.

“That tickles, Mommy!” But my mom didn’t seem to hear me correctly, because she started to tickle me on both sides of my stomach, causing me to squeal and laugh, and I begged her to stop.

Finally, when my stomach hurt so much from giggling that I could barely breathe, she finally let me go.

“All right, enough fooling around, honey. Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom will be here soon. So if you still want me to braid your hair, then you have to stay still.”

“Okay, Mommy. I’ll be good.”

As she braided my hair, I brushed through my Belle Barbie’s brown hair, mimicking my mom’s movements. I smiled and kissed Belle on the cheek. She was my first and only doll. She was my best friend. I could still remember when I got her last Christmas. I had felt like the luckiest girl in the world when I opened the wrapped package. My mom said a secret Santa got it for me. She said that I had been a very good girl last year, and Santa wanted to give me something special this year. She was right. Belle was really special.

“Mommy?” I looked back up at her as she secured the hair-tie ball at the end of one of the braids.

“Yes, honey?”

“Do you know if there are books at Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom’s house?”

“Why do you ask that?”

I held Belle Barbie up so my mom could see her. “Belle likes to read books. When she was living with the Beast, there was a library in his castle, so she was really happy. Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom’s house is big like a castle. Does that mean they have a library too?”

My mom smiled down at me. “I can’t remember if they do, but there’s a library nearby that I’m sure Aunt Betty can take you and Belle to if you ask. Doesn’t that sound wonderful?”

I grinned up at her and nodded enthusiastically. “Belle will like that a lot.”

“You and Belle will be really happy there.” Her voice sounded sad again.

I frowned, wondering if I had said something that made her upset.

“Mommy, how come you’re not moving to Aunt Betty’s with us?” I looked back up at her and made myself smile. I didn’t understand why, but I knew my mom was very sad, and I needed to be brave so she wouldn’t worry about me.

My mom didn’t respond right away. “Honey, you’ve asked me that before.”

“I know, Mommy. Sorry I don’t remember what you said.” I felt bad for lying to her, but I didn’t want to tell her that when I had asked her the other day, she had forgotten to tell me.

I heard her let out a deep sigh before she turned me around to look up at her. “Chloe, you’re a big girl now, and you deserve to know what is happening. So I will tell you something important, okay?”

I nodded.

When she bent down to face me, I could smell the usual stale remnants of alcohol on her breath mixed in with her morning cigarette. “Honey, Mommy is sick.” She paused and I saw some tears in her eyes. “For a long time, Mommy didn’t want to admit to herself that she was sick, but she is. And because she’s sick, she hasn’t been taking care of her baby girl the way a good mommy should.”

Her words scared me. “Are you going to die, Mommy?” I tried as hard as I could to hold back the tears that burned my eyes. I had to be strong for her. I had to be strong for the both of us. But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t stop my body from shaking as I started to cry. I buried my face in her chest and held on to her as tightly as I could.

“Shh, honey,” she crooned as she held me. “It’ll be okay. I’m not going to die.”

I pulled my face from her chest and sniffled. “You promise?”

She nodded and smiled. “I’m going to get better, baby. I’m going to a place where they’ll help me get better.”

“How long will you be gone?”

She shrugged. “I’m not sure. It can be a long recovery process.”

“Oh.” I bowed my head and looked at the floor, trying to think about what she was saying. “Can Belle and I come too?” I looked up at her hopefully.

“No, I’m sorry, honey. It’s a place just for sick people to get better. That’s why you’re going to be living with Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom. You’ll be happy there.”

I shook my head and pouted. I wasn’t happy with what I was hearing. “Mommy, I can pretend to be sick like you. That way I can be with you and take care of you. I can be really good at pretending. Please, Mommy? I just want to be where you are.”

“I really wish you could come too, baby, but you can’t. There are good people who protect kids like you and they think that Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom can take care of you better right now.” Tears streamed down her face, which made me very sad.

“Please don’t cry, Mommy.” I reached up and wiped away her tears with my fingers. “I didn’t mean to upset you. I will be a big girl for you, Mommy. I’ll take care of Belle and I’ll listen to everything Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom tell me to do. I’ll be a good girl. Please don’t be upset with me.”

She smiled, but her eyes didn’t twinkle like they usually did when she smiled at me.

But before I could ask any more questions, there was a knock at the door, causing us both to jump in surprise.

“All right, that must be them, Chloe.” My mom pulled me into her arms and hugged me tightly. I could hear the fast beating of her heart through her chest. “Remember to be a good girl. Everything will be okay. I promise.”

“Okay. I’ll remember.” My voice came out as a whimper as I tried to stay strong and not cry again. I could tell my mom was very sad, so I didn’t want her to see me cry anymore.

Thirty minutes later, after I had hugged her for a very long time, I was sitting in the backseat of a car with Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom. The moment I felt the car engine roar to life, tears fell down my cheeks. I looked out the window and saw my mom crying, too.

“No! Mommy!” I cried out as I pressed my hands and face up against the closed window.

“Be good, Chloe! I’ll see you soon. I promise.”

As I struggled to breathe through my sobs, I wondered if she would keep that promise.

CHAPTER FIVE

Summer 1992

Seven Years Old

I woke up when the car finally pulled up to the driveway of Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom’s house. When I realized what had happened, I was immediately upset with myself. I had wanted to pay attention to the roads and try to remember how to get back to the apartment complex my mom and I lived in. I needed to know how to get home just in case my mom needed me.

“Aunt Betty?”

Aunt Betty had just unbuckled her seatbelt when she turned back to look at me. “Yes, honey? We’re here.” Being my mom’s older sister, she looked a lot older but had the same smile as my mom, which comforted me.

“Can you draw me a map to me and mommy’s apartment?”

She kept the smile on her face, but I could see a worried expression in her eyes. “Honey, your mommy’s not going to live there anymore, remember? She’s going to be living with other people who are also sick, and she’s going to stay there until she gets better.”

“Oh.” I did remember my mom telling me that, but I was hoping things had changed. “Can I call her?”

“Of course. Let’s first get settled in, and we’ll call her before dinner. Okay?”

I nodded. I really wanted to tell Aunt Betty that I wanted to talk to my mom now, but I knew I was supposed to listen and be good.

“Now, come on. Let’s see your new room,” she said with excitement. “We have a surprise for you.”

“Really?” I looked at Aunt Betty with a new sense of hope. A surprise? Maybe it’s Mommy! Maybe Mommy is playing a joke on me.

I grabbed Belle, who was sitting in the seat next to me, and got out of the car. It was sticky-hot outside but I felt a little happier to know there was a surprise in my room. I looked up at Aunt Betty and Uncle’s Tom’s house in awe. It was so much bigger than the apartment. They had three spaces for their cars in the garage, which was bigger than my entire apartment with my mom.

“How come you didn’t park your car in the garage, Uncle Tom?”

Uncle Tom chuckled. “You’re a very smart and observant kid, Chloe.”

“Mommy says I like to ask a lot of questions, and she says sometimes it’s rude to ask too many questions. I’m sorry if I was rude, Uncle Tom.”

“You weren’t being rude. Being curious is a good thing.” He reassured me with a smile. “And to answer your question, since Charlie is in college now, we moved his things to the garage for now, and his old room is your new room.”

“Oh.” I remembered Charlie. He was a lot older than me and I never really talked to him much. But he wasn’t mean to me, so I liked him. “Will Charlie be mad if I’m in his room when he comes home?”

“No,” Uncle Tom said with an understanding smile. “I mentioned it to him already. He’s going to stay in the guest room when he’s home from college. But because you’ll be staying here for a while, we wanted you to have the bigger room so you feel more comfortable.”

“Come on, Chloe,” called out Aunt Betty as she walked to the front door. “It’s really hot out. Let’s get inside. Uncle Tom will grab the rest of your things.”

“Okay, Aunt Betty.” I hugged Belle a little tighter and whispered, “We’re going to be living here for a little bit while Mommy gets better, Belle. Don’t be scared, okay? I’ll be here to protect you.” I kissed Belle on the forehead, the way my mom would kiss me when she wanted to make things better.

As I walked up the driveway, a boy popped his head out from the treehouse between Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom’s house and the even larger house next door. We stared at each other for a moment. I wanted to ask about his treehouse because I’d never seen one before in real life. But before I could ask, he yelled down, “You look like Pippi Longstocking!”

His words stung, and it made me mad. “I do not, you big meanie!” I screamed up at him.

“Pippi Longstocking!” He flashed me a boyish grin and he pointed to the pigtails my mom had braided for me that morning before we’d said goodbye.

“And you’re a big, fat meanie!” I screamed up at him again, but this time, I stuck my tongue out and made a face at him, too.

Then I turned away and ran into the house because I didn’t want the boy to see me upset.

“Did you make a new friend out there?” Uncle Tom said with a smile as he walked toward the staircase leading up to the second floor.

“No,” I immediately retorted and twisted my face in disgust. “He said I look like Pippi Longstocking.”

Aunt Betty laughed. “Sounds like someone has a crush on you, Chloe.”

“No. He’s mean.” I frowned and wondered if Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom had problems with their hearing. There was no way that boy liked me.

“Give the poor boy a chance,” Uncle Tom continued with a chuckle. “Sometimes boys just have a hard time expressing their feelings.”

He didn’t seem to have any problems expressing his feelings to me, I wanted to counter, but I remembered what my mom said and I knew that a good girl didn’t talk back to adults. So I kept my thoughts to myself as I walked up the stairs with Aunt Betty and her husband. But I knew they were wrong. That boy didn’t like me and I didn’t like the boy, either. He was mean. He was a bully. He would never be my friend.

Minutes later, all thoughts of that boy vanished, because when I walked into my new room, I saw the surprise Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom had for me.

My eyes grew wide with glee as I took the entire room in. “Is this really my room?” The room was almost as big as the whole apartment my mom and I had lived in. I couldn’t believe that such a large room was going to be just for me.

“Is that a dollhouse?” I squealed as I ran over to the corner of the room near the bay window where a large dollhouse stood. It was so tall that I had to get on my tippy toes to be able to touch the top of the roof with my hands.

“We heard that Belle was going to be living with us, too.” Aunt Betty walked over to me with a smile and helped me open the dollhouse so we could see the inside. “So we wanted to make sure that she felt at home as well.”

I gasped when I saw the inside. It wasn’t a dollhouse; it was a doll-mansion. “Thank you, thank you, thank you, Aunt Betty! Belle’s never had such a big house to herself.” Then I cried out in delight and pointed at one of the rooms. “Look, Belle! There’s a library in your house! Look at all those books you can read.”

“So does that mean you like your room?” Aunt Betty’s eyes twinkled as she smiled at me.

I nodded excitedly. “Thank you, Aunt Betty! Thank you, Uncle Tom!”

Uncle Tom flashed me a huge smile. “I don’t think you’ve noticed the surprise.”

“What do you mean?” I stared at him in confusion. “Isn’t this room the surprise?”

Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom exchanged a look, like they knew a secret.

“Is Mommy here?” My eyes lit up in excitement as I looked around the room for places she could be hiding.

But then I noticed Aunt Betty and Uncle Tom exchange a look that made them seem worried. “Well …” Aunt Betty looked at me apologetically. “No, honey, your mommy isn’t here.” She then smiled, trying to convince me to do the same with her expectant eyes.

I felt downcast that my mom wasn’t with me. I also felt guilty that a part of me felt excited about living in this big room when I didn’t know where my mom would be living.

“The surprise is on the ceiling,” she finally told me.

I immediately looked up to see what she was talking about. A loud gasp left my lips as I clutched Belle tighter with excitement. “Stars!” The entire grayish-blue ceiling of my room was covered with hundreds of stars of various sizes. “Is it the constellation?” My eyes lit up as I looked at Aunt Betty and then Uncle Tom for confirmation.

Uncle Tom nodded with a grin. “You’re a smart girl, Chloe. Yes, it’s the constellation.”

“We heard you really love looking up at the sky at night and reading about things that occur in the sky,” Aunt Betty explained. “Now you can sleep under all the stars.”

I nodded with a smile as I looked up at all the stars.

“And guess what?” Uncle Tom asked.

“What?” My eyes went wide as I looked up at him.

“At night, all the stars will glow in the dark.”

“They will?” I wasn’t sure how that was possible, but I couldn’t wait until it got dark. I had so much excitement coursing through me, it felt like I was on a sugar high after a night of trick-or-treating on Halloween. For the first time that day, I started to feel happy about being there.

CHAPTER SIX

Summer 1992

Seven Years Old

“Okay, class,” a tall lady with strawberry-blond hair in front of me called out from the front of the class to the other kids in the classroom, “it’s time to get started. Everyone, take your seats.” She turned and flashed me a warm smile. “I’m going to introduce you to everyone. Is that okay?”

I nodded. I sneaked a quick glance to all the kids sitting at their desks, who were now all staring at me with interest. My face felt hot and I looked down to my feet.

“Good morning, class.”

“Good morning, Ms. Peters¸” the class greeted back in unison.

“Before we get started, I want everyone to say hello to Chloe Sinclair.”

“Hello, Chloe Sinclair,” the class repeated.

“Hi,” I replied in a hesitant voice as I waved to everyone.

Ms. Peters smiled down at me. “Chloe just moved into the area and will be joining our first-grade class this year. Because she’s new here, she is still figuring her way around the school. So if you see her around, please make sure she feels welcomed and answer any questions she may have, okay?”

“Yes, Ms. Peters,” the class responded.

“Chloe, we’re all really excited to get to know you. There’s an empty desk in the third row. Why don’t you take that one?”

“Okay. Thanks, Ms. Peters.” I flashed her a smile before walking to the seat she pointed out.

As I walked up the row to my seat, a girl with pretty blond hair smiled at me. I smiled back and was about to say hi to her, but as I got closer to her, I noticed that her smile was more of a smirk.

“There are black holes on your overalls.”

Feeling embarrassed, I looked down to inspect my red overalls and Strawberry Shortcake top. I noticed the small black burn marks the girl was talking about. They were from my mom’s cigarettes. She would sometimes get clumsy when doing the laundry after she had some alcohol.

I didn’t know what to say to the pretty girl, so I just walked past her and sat down at my seat.

“Okay, let’s start out the day with some vocabulary,” Ms. Peters called out from the front of the room and instructed us to take out our notebooks.

As I pulled the new notebook Aunt Betty had gotten me the other day from my backpack, I thought I heard someone whisper, “Pst! Hey.”

I looked to my left and then my right and didn’t see anyone looking at me.

But then the low whisper came again. “Pst! Pippi Longstocking.”

My body froze when I heard those words. It can’t be him. Can it? I finally looked around again, and there he was, in the next row, a desk back from mine. It was the boy I had seen in the treehouse a week ago, the mean boy who I wasn’t going to be friends with.

“It’s me,” he whispered with his boyish grin.

“Duh,” I shot back. I then stuck my tongue out at him and turned back around. I wasn’t going to talk to him.

And I didn’t. For that entire morning, he had tried to get my attention three more times, but I pretended that I couldn’t hear him and looked straight ahead to the front of the class.

***

When lunchtime came, I started to feel nervous. In my old school, I used to sit at a small table with another girl who didn’t seem to have any friends either. She was very shy and didn’t talk much. But that was okay. I liked sitting next to her because she wasn’t mean and didn’t bother me.

I took my new Barbie lunchbox out of my backpack and looked for a place to sit and eat. The cafeteria was noisy, and smelled like tuna fish and French fries. As I walked around the large, crowded cafeteria, I couldn’t see an empty table anywhere.

I was about to give up and go find an empty bench in the hallway, when to my delight, I heard someone say, “Hi, Chloe.”

I quickly turned toward the voice and smiled. It was the pretty blond girl from my class.

“Hi … I don’t know your name,” I admitted sheepishly.

“It’s Amber.”

“Hi, Amber.” I smiled and waved at her and the three other girls at the table. They giggled and said hi back.

“Where are you going to eat your lunch?” Amber asked.

“I don’t know,” I replied. I looked down at my feet and wished I was like her and had friends to sit with.

“Well, we have an extra seat here that you can sit in,” she began and she pointed to the empty seat next to her.

My eyes lit up and I looked up at her as I felt the relief wash over me. “Really?” I asked hopefully and took a step toward her table.

“But,” she continued and the same smirk from that morning spread across her face, “I don’t think you want to sit with us.”

I frowned. “What do you mean?”

“You’re dirty and you love to sit on the ground so your clothes can get more dirt and black holes on them.” She started to laugh and her friends joined in.

When I heard her words, I felt my face grow hot with embarrassment as tears welled up in my eyes. Aunt Betty had bought me some new clothes last week, but I wanted to wear my Strawberry Shortcake top and cherry-red overalls. They reminded me of my mom because it was her favorite. My mom had bought the top and overalls at a yard sale a year ago for only $0.50. I still remember how happy she was that it had fit me perfectly. She’d said it was her favorite because I’d looked as sweet as strawberries in the outfit.

“I’m not dirty,” I finally said. I wanted to sound louder, but my words came out as a whisper. But I didn’t wait to see if she had heard me. I turned around and began to run to the nearest exit to get away from their giggles.

But I only got past one table before I tripped over someone’s extended foot. I watched in horror as my Barbie lunchbox flew out of my hand as I fell forward and landed across my chest.

“Oh my God, she totally ate it,” Amber cried out as she called attention to my fall.

An explosion of laughter echoed in the cafeteria as my chest started to hurt from the impact. I could feel everyone’s eyes on me as I remained face down on the green-and-white checkered vinyl floor. I didn’t want to get up. Not because my body hurt, but because I didn’t want everyone to see me cry.

Then I heard someone walk up to me. I held my breath and prepared myself for more embarrassment.

“Amber’s breath smells like stinky farts,” cried out a boy’s voice. “Don’t let her breathe on you!” Another uproar of laughter exploded around me, but to my relief, it didn’t seem to be directed at me.

I turned my head slightly and tried to see who was making fun of Amber. But before I could see who it was, Amber screamed in a piercing voice, “It does not! You take that back, Jackson!”

Jackson just laughed. “But it’s the truth,” he continued with mirth in his voice. “That’s why you chew gum all the time when we’re not allowed to.”

“That’s not true at all!” Amber screamed. I couldn’t see her but it sounded like she was about to cry. Just as I picked my head up to look in her direction, I saw Amber storm past me and in the direction of the cafeteria door. “I hate you, Jackson Pierce! I’m going to tell your mom.”

“That’s because you’re a tattletale! Tattletale Amber.” The boy named Jackson laughed, and to my surprise, several kids started laughing and chanting, “Tattletale Amber. Tattletale Amber.”

A part of me felt bad that everyone was laughing at Amber for having stinky breath and being a tattletale, but I was more relieved that no one seemed to be looking at me anymore.

“Hey, take my hand,” came Jackson’s voice from behind me.

I smiled and wanted to hug this boy who had helped me. But when I turned around and rolled to my back to face him, I gasped.

The boy named Jackson—the boy who had just saved me from evil Tattletale Amber—was the same boy in the treehouse who lived next door, the same boy who called me Pippi Longstocking the first time we met, the same boy whom I hated.

“It’s you,” I blurted out as I stared at him and his outstretched hand.

“Yes,

Date: 2015-02-28; view: 963