Anything?I flinched at the piercing word and all it meant.
Cole looked between us, wearing a frown of confusion. “Y’all are readingJane Eyretogether?”
I stood so fast, my chair raked across the floor. But before I could catapult myself across the kitchen table and tackle Ava, the traitorous words were already hanging in the air.
“I’m reading it to her. She understands it better.”
And that was the moment I died of humiliation.
Cole’s gaze swung to me. “She reads it to you?”
I couldn’t bear to look at him, so I collapsed back into my chair and stared at my knees. If a smile of devilish delight had overtaken his features — as I was sure one had — I didn’t want to see it.
“Yeah,” Ava said. “It really helps. We’ve been doing it for years.”
And then Mama just had to chime in. “It’s why she’s passed the last two years and now has a B average.”
I dropped my face in my hands, realizing I’d been wrong. I had not yet died of humiliation. Death by humiliation could never be sure and swift.
“Elise…” The sudden hush that overtook Cole’s voice made me look up at him. His brows creased over his now intrigued ice-blue eyes. “…are you dyslexic?”
“No!” I denied, getting to my feet again. I knew what the word meant. Sort of. It was just a fancy way of saying too dumb to read.
“Elise.” Mama’s tone told me everything.“Lower your voice. Don’t speak to the Whitehursts that way. Remember your place.”
“If you’re diagnosed with dyslexia, there are a lot of things your school has to provide for you,” Cole said, his tone one I didn’t recognize. “Thomas, my roommate, is dyslexic. He gets all of his textbooks on audio, and he takes his tests in the student services office where an aid reads to him.”
Skepticism had me studying his face for signs of deception. “Someone with dyslexia got into Tulane?” I asked, annoyed disbelief dripping from my voice. I might not have been book smart, but I had sense, and I wasn’t gullible. Taking Cole Whitehurst’s word on anything was idiocy.
But he just chuckled under his breath. “Yeah, people who are dyslexic can be really smart.” He popped a grape in his mouth and talked around it. “They just read and see the world differently.”
I didn’t know what to say then, and I hated not knowing what to say. I also hated that Cole, Ava, and Mama were now all watching me. My face was hot with embarrassment, and since I couldn’t scream at them to stop looking at me, I did the only thing I could do.
I picked up the plate of my half-eaten lunch. “I’m gonna change and go to Alberta’s,” I announced before turning and heading for the trashcan. I knew it was a crime to throw away the rest of my food — especially since it wasso good—but I couldn’t stay there feeling like I was half-naked under their eyes.
It didn’t help much that I really was half-naked in my bikini and see-through cover-up.
I was about to tip the contents of my plate in the trash when Cole spoke.
“Wait a minute,” he said, giving me a look of disappointed surprise. “If you let me finish my lunch,I’llread to you.”
I froze. He couldn’t be serious.
“Well, Cole, that is so sweet of you,” Mama cooed, her voice dripping like honey.
Ava chimed in. “She really likes to read by the pool. Y’all should go out there.”
My eyes flashed in panic between these two traitors. How could they do this to me?
Grinning like the devil he was, Cole waved me over. “Come back and finish your lunch. We have all afternoon.”
I swear, I couldn’t move. Fight or flight had definitely failed me.
“Good grief. He’s right, Elise,” Mama scolded, taking in my plate. “You need to finish your sandwich, at least.”
I was fifteen years old, and with that one sentence, I felt all of five.
No escape to Alberta’s was possible now. I couldn’t refuse Cole Whitehurst’ssweetoffer in that moment any more than I could have lit up a joint or gotten a tattoo. Walking like a wooden soldier, I made my way back to the table and sat.
