“So that’s why you came back?” I asked again, barely hearing my words as I spoke them. “For revenge?”
Beck’s mouth twitched like he was trying to stop it from curling into something ugly. His eyes were too dark, unfocused, darting like he was watching the past play out somewhere just over my shoulder. “It doesn’t matter now.”
Something inside me caved in, crumbling like a wall under too much pressure. And crumbling, too, were the lies that I’d been surrounding myself with all these years. I’d told myself that Beck taking the blame for the garden had been fine—he was a boy with a budding reputation, anyway.
But I’d helped solidify that image in stone. I’d started the fire and pushed him into it.
Tears pooled in my eyes. I should’ve stood up for him, four years ago in the garden, and every chance I’d had since. Instead, I’d let the boy I’d had feelings for burn.
The boy I still had feelings for. In that moment, I was sure. They would never go away.
I wanted to beg for Beck’s forgiveness. And that thought scared me, almost as badly as the hollow look in his eyes had. Almost as badly as being caught in the garden had.
Beck lowered his gaze from the sky, and I watched as he risked a flippant glance at me—and then did a doubletake. His features hardened when he spotted my shining eyes, and he yanked his phone back out of his pocket. His throat bobbed as he swallowed hard, and he muttered, “Where the hell is your brother?”
I couldn’t believe how drastically the night had changed, from the car ride to the muddy trail path to now. It was like we’d stepped into a different reality entirely, where we might’ve had a mud fight, but we’d never laughed together after it. Where Beck had never cradled my head to protect my fall, and I’d never curled my fingers into his shirt to hold him close. As if we’d never had a truce at all.
“I didn’t let you take the blame because I thought you weren’t worth it,” I told Beck. I spoke the words slowly, softly, not overthinking them. “I didn’t think you’d get into so much trouble. I—I didn’t know. I was just afraid, and now…”
Beck looked back up from his phone with a stony frown, but the glow of his screen illuminated the shakiness behind the mask. The effort he put into keeping it in place. “And now?”
I stared at him, committing this version of him to memory. With spiky, mud-streaked hair and hard, flickering green eyes. He looked like an animal trapped in a corner, unsure whether the hand in front of him would strike or leave him behind. “I’m terrified.”
His forehead creased further. “Of what?”
Of myself.
Of messing it all up again.
Of letting myself be imperfect.
Headlights swept into the park then, and Jamie’s car bounced and crunched over the gravel of the parking lot. He stopped just in front of the picnic table, leaving the lights on to illuminate where Beck and I sat. I lifted my hand, blocking enough to see both the driver’s door and the passenger side door pop open.
And then—“Whathappened?”
I stood up from the picnic table, wiping at my cheeks again. The dried mud there smeared from the wetness of my tears. Jamie’s eyes were wide when he came closer, just as they’d been before I stormed out of the house earlier, except this time, they were filled with anger. “Jamie?—”
“What did you do to my shoes?”
“Oh, your shoes, huh?” I felt like kicking them off at him. “That’s what you’re concerned about?”
Jamie came close enough to reach out and shove my shoulder, hard. “You’re so selfish, you know that?” he demanded, chest rising and falling hard. “Storming out without your phone, not coming home for hours—I thought you—I-I thought you could’ve?—”
“You’d know if I was dead,” I muttered, rubbing at my shoulder ruefully. “Twin telepathy.”
“You scared me,” he got out, voice shaking. “And you’recrackingjokes?”
I hadn’t realized how serious he’d been. A twinge of pain pinched behind my ribs. “I’m sorry,” I whispered, wrapping my arms around his torso and hugging him tight. “I’m sorry.”
Jamie didn’t hug me back, just let his arms hang limply at his sides. “You suck.”
I hugged my brother tighter, guilt stirring inside me as thick as mud.
“And you’re disgusting,” Jamie grumbled, craning his neck away from me.
“What’d you do?” Daisy’s voice at my side had me jumping, even though I’d seen her door open. Her red hair was tied in a low ponytail, brought over one shoulder. She also had a towel in one hand, folded and propped in her elbow. “Roll around in dirt?”
I let go of Jamie, looking down at where smears of mud had pressed onto his shirt. Whoops. “Jamie called you?” I guessed.
