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He’s even more gorgeous than he was years ago.
Tattoos down one muscular forearm, disappearing up the sleeve of his shirt. A shirt that strained against his muscles. Cash has always been tall, but he’s filled out and he’s grown a beard.
He’s the total opposite of my ex. And it doesn’t even matter because not only is he the past, but I’m leaving Heatstroke the first chance I get.
I grab my purse from the passenger seat and force myself out of Ol’ Rusty and onto the sun-beaten sidewalk. The last time I talked to Mom was yesterday morning, and she told me to soak up all the attention I could get on my birthday, because one day I’d be old, my looks would be gone, and I’d have nothing left.
Patricia Jackson, ladies and gentlemen.
Nobody could accuse my mother of mincing her words.
You can do this. It’s just Mom.
But the sooner I ask my mother if I can stay for a while, the sooner I can start looking for a job to fund my future. My dream. It seems like an impassable mountain, my goal right at the top, but nobody ever got to where they were going by not taking the first step.
My mother’s house isn’t as fancy as Cash’s dad’s. The front yard is smaller, the windows are dirty, and the cream shiplap needs a coat of paint. The picket gate creaks as I open it and make my way up the stone front steps and onto the porch.
At the sight of the front door with its misted glass panes and the old swing seat, I’m struck hard by nostalgia.
I press the doorbell.
Mom curses somewhere inside. Her figure appears in the misted glass and the latch clacks.
“Hi, Mom.”
My mother has her graying hair scooped back into a bun that tugs at her roots. She’s a little hunched over, fast approaching sixty and she stares at me, brow wrinkled. “June?”
“I should have called. But I, uh, I was wondering if I can stay in my old bedroom for a while?”
Mom looks past me, and it hits me that she’s looking for Braydon. We’ve flown her out a couple of times, and she thinks Braydon is God’s gift to our family. Because he’s rich and sends her money whenever she asks.
“What are you doing here?”
Nice to see you too.I put up a sweet smile. “I, uh, I need help.”
“Where’s Braydon?”
“We broke up.”
My mother’s upper lip curls before I reach the end of that sentence. “What? Why? What did you do?”
“I didn’t do anything,” I say, “except for catching him cheating on me.” I wasn’t going to tell her why because it might hit too close to home for her after what happened with Dad, but it doesn’t make sense not to say it.
“Cheating on you. Cheating how?”
There are a finite number of ways a person can cheat in a relationship, and all of them are pretty bad. “He’s having an affair,” I say. “I—may I come in?”
My mother hedges. She steps back. “I was making cookies,” she says. “You should have some.”
My mother ranges between being lovely and sweet, baking cookies and sending cute texts with puppy dog memes, and telling me how I can’t do better than Braydon and that she wishes she had a daughter to be proud of. That I’m the reason her life fell apart.
The dichotomy gives me whiplash.
It makes me feel guilty. Like, if I had my shit together then I wouldn’t be asking for help.
My mother’s flip-flops squidge through the house, and I follow her past the living room with its floral print sofas and childhood pictures, many of them of Cash, Olivia, and me playing together at the quarry, and I repress the shiver that comes at that memory.
In every picture, Olivia stands between us, her arms draped over our shoulders, wearing her bright smile.
