Fuck.
My forehead rocks against the glass, leaving a smear. I’ll need to wipe it before Mama notices. She’s probably frantically preparing dinner to serve promptly tohis majesty. And here I was thinking I wouldn’t have to put on an award-winning performance as Andrea the Perfect Daughter for at least another hour.
God, why do you hate me?
Guilt pours through my veins like scalding, liquid metal.
I’m sorry. Forgive me. I’m just so… tired.
I want to ask when this test will end. When the promise of peace will find me. When I’m able to take a full breath again.
Have I ever though?
“Drea.”
Reluctantly, I pry my eyes open. “Yeah, I heard you.” Twisting on the seat, I drop my legs and stare at Lilly.
She’s a porcelain angel— two years younger than me, delicate, with a pale complexion, honey hair and bow lips always curved in an anxious frown,bleedinginnocence and purity.
She shifts from one socked foot to the other. “We need to set the table.”
“Why is he coming home early?”
Her gaze flicks to the window. “I thought you were watching.”
Watching? What the fuck is she talking about? My brow lifts. She doesn’t elaborate, but her eyes dart to the window again. Huffing, I turn to see what has her all twitchy.
And freeze.
Lilly’s presence hovers at my shoulder, her fingers steepled on the cushion as she leans forward, both of us transfixed by the scene in the driveway of the house next door. Or more specifically, the U-Haul and multiple vehicles encroaching on the narrow neighborhood street.
“Did the Sutherlands sell?” I whisper. The old snowbirds’ health issues might’ve kept them up north for a while, but there wasn't any mention of them passing at church. Surely, their son, who lives in Cape Cannon and attends Mass regularly, would’ve said if?—
“They’re renting it out,” Lilly murmurs.
I’m about to drill her for more when a figure emerges from the depths of the moving truck.
T-shirt and dark hair soaked in sweat. Muscled arms flex under the weight of a large cardboard box stuffed to the brim. He pauses. Shifts the box. Glances up.
Lilly and I duck, scrambling to the floor. We exchange a loaded look.
“Daddy found out today.” She wets her lips. Hesitates. “I heard him on the phone with Mom. He sounded… annoyed that the Sutherlands didn’t mention it.”
Of course he would be. Pastor William Sinclair has to know everything going on in this town. He basically runs it. I almost say a prayer on behalf of the family moving in, but my sister goes on.
“He’s going to introduce himself.”
My eyes close, head falling back against the seat cushion.
“Shit.”
Two
SEBA
Guitar rifts riseas the country song blasting in my headphones nears its end. Adjusting the box of who-the-fuck-knows-what in my arms, I squint against the setting sun reflecting off the second-story window of the neighbor’s house.
She’s not there anymore.
