I wasn’t a kid any more, and this wasn’t a weeklong visit. I was a college student who needed a place to live for four years. A legal adult who couldn’t afford a dorm or an apartment along with tuition. Heller told me I’d be paying him rent, but it wasn’t much. I knew charity when I got it, but for once in my pathetic life, I was grabbing it with both hands, like the knotted end of a rescue rope.
LUCAS
‘I’ll take the first couple hours, and you can take the last two.’ Jacqueline slid her dark sunglasses over her eyes and grinned at me from the driver’s side of her truck. ‘But don’t nap, or we could end up halfway to El Paso. I need you to navigate.’
As she backed her truck down the driveway, I waved goodbye to Carlie and Charles, sliding my sunglasses into place. ‘That’s a completely different highway.’ I chuckled. ‘You aren’t that bad.’
She shook her head and sighed. ‘Seriously. Don’t tempt fate. You’ll be sorry. We could end up lost and driving aimlessly for our entire spring break.’
When I stopped to consider the fact that Jacqueline was coming home to the coast with me, driving aimlessly for a week instead didn’t sound so bad. I shook my head. ‘I guess I should have gotten you a new GPS for your birthday.’
She wrinkled her nose. ‘That sounds like a sensible gift.’
‘Ah, right, I forgot – we don’t do sensible gifts.’
She’d told me that her parents had always bought each other (and her) sadly pragmatic gifts, but they’d hit a new low – buying their own gifts. ‘Mom got herself a new StairMaster and Dad got himself a grill,’ she told me when we’d talked Christmas night. ‘It’s a big grill, with side burners and warming drawers and, who cares, because holy cow – buying your own gift for Christmas?’
I didn’t tell her that seemed like a great idea to me. If she believed practical gifts were out, then I was destined for a lifetime of impracticality. Bring it.
We’d each had a birthday in the past two months. My gift from her: driving a Porsche 911 for a day. Massively impractical. Heller and Joseph were both massively jealous. I texted a pic to Boyce and he texted back: Fuck the bro code. I am stealing your woman. You have been warned.
For Jacqueline’s birthday, I’d chosen one of my mother’s watercolours – a rainy Paris skyline – from Dad’s attic stash when I was home over winter break. I had it mounted and framed for her. She went very quiet after she opened it, tears coursing down her face. I was sure my aptitude for gift-giving had just crashed and burned, and I should never be allowed to choose a gift again for anyone.
And then she threw herself into my arms, and an hour later, I shoved my fingers into her hair and kissed her. ‘Wait,’ I said. ‘My next birthday is eleven months away. How did that just happen?’
Jacqueline was curled in the passenger seat, asleep, as I confronted the fact that we were fifteen minutes away from the coast. That I was taking my girlfriend home, where she would meet my uncommunicative father and my frequently inappropriate high-school best friend. And oh hell, were we sleeping in the pantry? Shit. I should have reserved a hotel room.
‘Mmm …’ She woke slowly at first, yawning, unfolding her legs, extending her arms, and then all at once she sat up, blinking. ‘Are we there?’
I nodded. ‘Almost.’
There was a line for the ferry. Welcome to spring break at a cheap coastal beach. Where I just brought my girlfriend of three months to visit. A heavy feeling lodged itself in the pit of my stomach, like I’d swallowed an iron bar. If she hadn’t woken up when she did, I might have made a U-turn before boarding. A guy in an orange vest pointed us to the leftmost ferry and we pulled over the ramp and on. Disembarking on the other side, we were five minutes from home, maybe ten because of the increased tourist traffic that infused money into this community after the slow winter months.
There was nothing unusual or extraordinary about this place to me, but Jacqueline sat up straight, eyes wide to absorb it all – the mural-coated buildings painted in sunny colours, the touristy shops and diners, the blacktopped streets that blended into yards with no kerbs, the water and boats almost always visible just beyond.
‘Palm trees!’ She grinned. ‘They’re so cute.’
I arched a brow at her.
‘I mean, compared to how they look in say, L. A. – they’re tall and thin there. These seem to know there aren’t many tall buildings or any hills to compete with here. They’re –’
‘Stunted?’
She laughed. ‘Cute.’
After a few reflexive turns, I parked on the gravel drive in front of Grandpa’s – now Dad’s – place. Swallowing, I turned to Jacqueline. ‘I don’t know how he’ll be to you – I mean, he won’t be rude or anything. He’s always been courteous with clients, and I’m sure that’ll be the worst –’
‘Lucas.’ She took my hand, squeezed it. ‘He’ll be fine. I’m not expecting hugs and a welcome party. He’s a quiet guy – like you. I get it.’
I scowled. Like me?
She turned my hand and kissed the back of it, chuckling like she could read my mind – and she probably could.
I reached my left hand to her nape, pulling her closer as we angled over the console. Threading my fingers through her hair, I kissed her, and the dread overrunning my mind calmed. She was here with me because she wanted to be. We’d talked about my dad; she was prepared. Thanks to my weekly therapy sessions, I was coming to terms with how he’d dealt with his grief, even if it had been far from ideal for either of us.