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“JJ?”
He left town and never came back after we graduated. I haven’t heard anything from or about him since his family no longer lives in the area either. But it makes sense we were betting on Clayton being Ben’s. There wasn’t much we didn’t bet on back then. We were always trying to one-up each other.
“Yeah.”
Something in her tone makes my back straighten. Please tell me JJ didn’t do something that means I’m gonna have to search him out and cut off his dick.
“You left, and he stayed,” she says.
“But Koa was with you?” My heart rate ramps up, and my body tenses.
“Yeah. But he was giving me a lot of attention. You disappeared for a while.”
Of course I did. Fucking idiot. I’m sure I was in the barn.
“He was hitting on me, but I didn’t take it seriously. I mean, I knew I wasn’t his type. I wasn’t a cheerleader, didn’t even go to the football games. Well, not without Gillian. It was hard for her to go for a couple of years, but that’s another story. But JJ didn’t really know who I was, and I wasn’t sure why he was giving me attention, but I liked it. I was kind of messed up in the head back then.”
“No, you weren’t. You were a freshman liking the attention from a senior who a lot of other girls were probably admiring. Did he try something, Briar?”
“No!” The word comes out so fast and adamantly that I believe her. “It’s not like that.”
“Right, because this circles back to me at some point, right?”
She doesn’t say anything for a beat. “Laurel came over and grabbed Clayton, telling me to go enjoy myself, that she’d keep Gillian occupied. Gill was protective, even then. After Laurel left, JJ told me to meet him on the other side of the barn, that he wanted to tell me a secret. Koa wasn’t going anywhere, too enthralled in his video game, so I told him I had to use the bathroom.”
Dread weighs in my stomach and pins me to the floor as I wait for her to tell me, not remembering one moment of this night. My family has had tons of Fourth of July pig roasts, and I went a little crazy that summer, knowing I was staying in Willowbook. Eating up every minute with my friends, getting drunk, and acting the fool. My dad had a long talk with me that August. That’s your summer of fun, he told me, and I should feel privileged because I only got that because I was the youngest.
“Go on.” I hold my breath, waiting for her next words.
“I walked to the side of the barn. God, I don’t want to tell you…” I hear her groan. “Please can we just move on?”
“I can’t make up for it if I don’t know what I did.”
“You don’t have to make up for it. You were young, and I was a nobody.”
I frown. “Don’t say that. You’re not a nobody. Though I have a bad feeling I treated you like that.”
Her silence confirms I was a dick.
“Fine. I was walking and heard you and JJ talking so I snuck to the side to eavesdrop. I didn’t really want JJ, to be honest. But I felt like if JJ wanted me, maybe you’d notice me. I was so stupid and naïve.” She exhales, and all I want to do is hold her. Let her know that was the past, and I’m not that guy, whoever I was, whatever I did.
“You’re killing me. Just tell me what I did.” I push my hands through my hair.
Her head bangs against the other side of the door. “JJ told you about me meeting him behind the barn, and you asked him why he’d want me. JJ said something I couldn’t hear, then a loud girl started trying to pull you away. You told her to go back to the party, and you’d meet her there.”
“Carly,” I say, a flicker of a memory sparking. “It was Carly Hawkins. She was always loud and clingy.”
“Thankfully, she was drunk and didn’t notice me, but I was hiding in the shadows of the barn, and there wasn’t a lot of light.”
“The whole reason it’s the make-out spot.”
She lets a quiet chuckle loose.
“What did I say?”
“You said I was trash and said everyone would make fun of him if we hooked up because I was a nobody.”
The air whooshes from my lungs. When I recover, I ask, “Anything else?”
