Page 27 of Easy On Me

I frowned, trying to remember which of my classmates had been a cheerleader and unreasonable. Bet my ass it was Allison Barnett.

“She was yelling at me, called me a slut and a whore.” Another shrug. “I shut her up.”

The economy of that admission told me all I needed to know. “I see.”

“Mrs. Hatcher and another teacher tried to break it up.” Her voice was the smallest I’d ever heard it. “I hit her, flailing about.”

Which her she meant sunk in, and the memory clicked into place. I remembered that – Grandma breaking up a fight, getting clocked in the face, the bruise on her cheekbone she sported for a few days.

Eyes wide, I turned my head to stare at her before I remembered I was driving. “That was you?”

She cringed into the seat. “It was an accident. I would never have hurt her on purpose.”

Unwilling humor pushed up from my chest. Grandma had laughed it off at the time, but Grandaddy had been furious. “You popped my grandma.”

“Jase, no.” A note of real distress colored my name on her lips, and I sobered. She crossed her arms over her midriff. “I got suspended and then I couldn’t stay in the home any longer because I’d violated their rules–”

Oh, hell.

“--but that part turned out okay because that’s how I ended up in Thomasville with Mama Nancy.” She made a face. “Apparently, when the social worker told her I was troubled and a handful, she said I was perfect.”

“I might agree with her.”

Her sidelong glance from underneath her lashes called me out as a bullshitter. But damn, she was the closest thing to perfect I’d ever seen.

And believe me, I’d had the farthest thing from perfect in my life, so I knew what I was talking about.

“I never got to tell her I was sorry.” The torn whisper, not much more than a breath, hovered in the air. She blinked hard a couple of times and turned her face away.

“She knew.” I laid a hand on her thigh, just above her knee. She flinched at the contact, then relaxed beneath my palm. “I remember her talking to Mama and Daddy at the time, and she was adamant it was an accident. She was worried you’d feel bad about it.”

She buried her face in her hands. “Oh, my God, your parents know about this? They’ll think I’m–”

“Just as great as I said you were.” I flexed my fingers, going for comforting and supportive.

“They know about me?” She lifted her head, skin pale around the taut line of her lips.

“Well, yeah.” I raised my hand and flipped it palm up. “I don’t really keep things from them, and they noticed I wasn’t at church that Sunday morning after–”

“Oh, my God. This just keeps getting worse.” Her voice rose. “You didn’t tell them we slept together the first night we met?”

“No. No.” I squeezed her leg again. “They don’t need to know that. I just said I’d spent the day with you, and Mama wanted to know what you were like.”

Actually, Mama had grilled me, wanting to know she wasn’t like Elizabeth, well, what I called the new Elizabeth. The first few years I’d dated her, Mama had been okay with her. The last year? I’d lost count of the number of times Mama had reminded me it was easier to break an engagement than get a divorce.

“Grandma likes you. My parents are going to like you.” I swallowed a stop worrying. Nobody needed to hear that.

“I don’t know why I’m so freaked out.” She twisted her fingers together in her lap. Her chest rose and fell with a couple of deep breaths that felt deliberate. “But I wasn’t expecting to see her, and all I could think about was how angry I was back then, the person I used to be.”

“You were a kid dealt a shitty set of circumstances you had no control over.” I slowed for the left hand turn onto 37. “I don’t blame you for being angry.”

“That doesn’t make my behavior okay.” She chewed the very tip of her index finger, worrying the skin rather than scraping her teeth over her fancy polish. “I could have really hurt her. Did I think about that? No. That little heifer insulted me, and all I wanted was to shut her the fuck up . . . what are you doing?”

I’d swung into my driveway instead of continuing toward her subdivision. “Giving us a quiet place to talk a few minutes.”

She collapsed into the seat, a shaky exhale bleeding between her lips. “I’m not that girl anymore.”

“Well, no.” Under the carport, I put the truck in park and killed the engine. “But you still carry her around with you, the same way I carry the things I might not want to think about.”