She hadn’t heard someone be called something like that in… several years. A specific image popped into her head of an outspoken teenage girl who used to get in trouble debating anything and everything under the sun with anyone who would give her an audience.
“She’s assertive – which is a good thing! A little impulsive. Very charismatic. Just drives kind of a hard bargain sometimes. She made it very clear she answers to almost no one when we offered her the shot at operating her program for the Tribe instead of out of her mom’s house and backyard. Which, come to think of it, sounds like an upgrade, right?”
Theo shook his head as if they’d all been duped.
He continued, “So,technically, the program falls under you, but I wouldn’t go into this really thinking that, you know?”
“Yeah, I think I get it.”
“Anyway,” Theo continued as they finally reached the door of the office they were walking toward. “Her program will play a role in achieving our Tribe’s vision of reclaiming our power in the food system with ecologically sound, culturally appropriate, and sustainable planting and harvestingmethods. Sounds like I’m reading off a cue card… which I guess I kind of am since she gave the whole administrative office talking points after she finally agreed to sign off on the budget allocations.”
He shook his head again at how ludicrous it all sounded. And it did sound ludicrous. And there was only one person, one person who also posed with corn stalks for a social media profile picture… No, there was no way. She was just being overly hopeful, andexcessivelyanxious.
“I’m sure she’ll explain it even better than me.”
Theo knocked a little tune against the door frame.
“Come in!”
Rowan heard through the door, in a voice she could recognize across a million different lifetimes. Her heart practically thumped against her rib cage.
“Good morning, Juniper,” Theo called into the room as he opened the door and stepped to the side, framing Rowan perfectly in the middle of the opening.
Rowan watched as Juniper’s vibrant smile – the one she’d stared at in that tiny profile picture more times than she’d care to admit out loud – dropped instantly. She watched the hurt flicker through Juniper’s eyes, a moment of raw vulnerability she could see her desperately trying to cover up in self-preservation, before they glazed over.
Rowan knew the color from her face drained instantaneously at the sight. Even though she had no right to hurt, it still hurt to witness.
“Good morning, Theo.” Juniper cleared her throat and looked back down at her desk. “Rowan,” she added curtly.
Chapter 3
[15 years ago]
Rowan flipped her dad’s truck’s tailgate down to slide her and Juniper’s fishing poles into the slatted grooves of the truck bed. A hot pink bikini-clad Juniper hopped onto the tailgate to sit, but instead of dangling her legs off the edge like she usually did while Rowan re-situated their stuff, she screeched and slid off theatrically.
“I think I burned my ass!”
Rowan flicked her in the soft curve of her waist.
“Well duh, the truck’s been in the hot ass sun all day,” she managed to get out before she realized she was still staring at her best friend’s wet and lusciously-brown bare skin. And thinking about her also luscious ass.
“Don’t flick me!” Juniper protested through her laughter as she flicked Rowan back.
“I’ll flick you whenever I want,” Rowan countered defiantly.
Then she thought about that for a moment and scratched the back of her neck. Not exactly what she meant. But yeah, that thought had crossed her mind many more times than she’d dared to count that summer. She needed to abandon this whole flicking conversation as soon as possible.
She had never touched anyone like that, much less kissed anyone. Not that she hadn’t wanted to, she just knew she wasinto girls, and in their small community, it’s not like girls who liked girls were very prevalent or even open about it. That she liked girls — and that she had fallen in love with her best friend that summer — were the only two things she had never actually told said best friend.
She grabbed an old flannel shirt out of the lockboxes at the back of the truck bed and laid it across the tailgate. Juniper smiled at her and hopped back up. Rowan tried not to gawk at the way her boobs bounced when she did. She was… unsuccessful.
She placed her hands on the edge of the tailgate and lunged her legs backward to stare at the ground beneath her instead.
“Junie,” she posed as more of a question without looking up, “did you want to kiss Jason?”
“Fuck no, I did it because it was a dare.”
Rowan chuckled at the little shiver she caught Juniper doing out of the corner of her eye, combined with a grumble ofugh.
