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Dad had told me she came from money, but seriously.
The diamonds around her neck? In her lobes? On four of her ten fingers for a weeknight dinner at home?
And her driver would take us in a limo—a damned limo—to high school.
What the actual fuck?
I was in another dimension. At least I was the steady sort and didn’t get too flustered with change. Outwardly, anyway. Inside? I attempted to cling to a deflating floatie of normalcy in the ocean I’d been tossed into.
Preston sat across from me pushing his food around his plate with a fork rather than eating. I wondered if he felt the same. Our gazes caught, and his face flushed before he jerked his eyes back down as though afraid I would punch him for looking at me.
The poor kid. He seemed terrified of me. Or, maybe he was all uptight about the school Jacqueline continued to go on about.
Had Preston been bullied in eighth grade?
The thought roused heat in my chest. Made me want to curl up my fist and smash something. I’d always had my best friend Sean’s back, so I recognized the rising protective instinct for what it was.
“The first day will be here before you know it,” Jacqueline said with excitement in her voice, and I realized she spoke to me. “Less than two weeks!”
A flash of nerves lit inside me as I nodded, unable to smile. I expected Preston and I would both be half-sick while being carted to a new school. I might be calm by nature, but I wasn’t above first day jitters. Swallowing shit down and putting on a brave front would be my top priority if for no other reason than to help keep Preston from tossing his cookies.
“Will…Dad be here to see me off like he used to?” Preston asked, his voice as quiet as a mouse.
The air cracked like an impending lightning strike, same as that time Dad and I had gotten caught in a storm while fishing up in New Hampshire.
Tension hovered over the table stifling everything as though awaiting the thunder.
My new stepbrother stared at his plate, fork poised over a spear of asparagus, his cheeks pale compared to moments earlier, shoulders hitched up around his ears. That need to wrap the kid in my arms sparked to life inside me again. It was too bad he didn’t like me all up in his space because he could definitely use a good hug or ten.
I glanced at Jacqueline—the source of the disturbance in the atmosphere.
She glowered at Preston, her lips pressed into a tight line and cheeks mottled red. My forehead dented into a frown. Dad eyed her funny too, like he had no clue what the fuck was going on.
Married or not, you couldn’t know everything about a person’s past a few days after meeting them.
“Nancy is no longer allowed in this building,” Jacqueline snipped, the name spat out like a curse, “or the high school for that matter, so no, he will not.”
The fuck?
Dad and I caught each other’s gazes. He shrugged.
“That…man is an abomination,” Jacqueline continued, waving her hand as though her ex-husband was nothing but a pesky black fly. Her hard, annoyed tone hinted at the same. “You will not speak of him—her—or whatever it is Nancy believes himself to be these days.”
Tears welled in Preston’s eyes at Jacqueline’s harsh statement, and empathy and anger bolted through my chest.
One of Sean’s and my classmates had come out as trans the year before. I guessed Preston’s dad had done the same, and Jacqueline couldn’t handle Nancy’s truth.
If that were the case, Dad’s new wife, while rich and beautiful, reeked of transphobia, which made me assume she was probably homophobic as well. That whole manly word’s strangeness took on meaning.
My heart fell even though anger for Preston caused it to beat harder than the norm.
Guess I’ll be staying in the closet a little bit longer.
I wiped my mouth with the linen napkin and set it atop my plate. “Dinner was great, but I’m beat,” I lied, needing to get the hell out of there. “Hey, Preston, want to show me my room? Dad told me we’re across the hall from each other.”
Preston pushed back from the table immediately, scurrying away without a word like his ass was on fire.
Jacqueline’s face reddened further, and she opened her mouth, most likely to bark about us not asking to be excused or finishing our dinner. She seemed the sort to do both.
