“Your quarters?” Father repeats, his brow furrowed.
“Yes. I found a pair of my old sneakers covered in mud. I haven’t worn them in months, and it seems someone has snuck in there and dirtied themandmy floors,” I explain.
“Abigail? Atlas?” Mother questions, looking between the two of them.
“I haven’t gone in there,” Atlas says.
“It wasn’t me!” Abigail insists.
Huh. Okay.
“Well, I’ll meet with the staff members and ask, then,” Father tells me. “Are you sure you didn’t wear them and forget, Atticus?”
It’s an absurd question. I would neverforgetmuddying my shoes and leaving them out in the open. I am a meticulous person.
“I’m sure,” I say.
“We’ll get to the bottom of this,” he promises me.
I stare around the table, eyeing each culprit, but no one seems suspicious. In fact, the only thing I’m seeing is my mother asking Abigail how she’s enjoying the end of her school year, and Julian and Atlas as they exchange a secret, undecipherable look.
Atlas looks pale, his eyes wide as he stares at our attendee. And Julian looks pained, his lips pursed as they communicate without words.
Odd.
Cameron
15
WALKING INTO MY HOUSEafter working all day and then participating in a rigorous basketball practice has me on edge.
If Mom is home tonight, I’m afraid I won’t have the energy to play the role I meant to: the certified butler.
This most likely means that if sheishome, my evening will result in a hard slap and some demeaning words. But so is life, and I’m fuckingtired.
Especially with this damn birthday party hanging over my head. Tomorrow, I’ll be faced with Atticus Chastain—the man I hurt, the one I was falling so quickly in love with. The one who made it impossibly clear that I wasn’t worth the time we spent together.
Who made me feel like shit. Like I am nothing.
But good fortune is smiling on me today, because as I enter the living room, the house is silent. Mom isn’t home.
Which means I get to eat dinner, shower, and lie in bed in peace. For once.
I make a grilled cheese and pair it with a handful of off-brand potato chips. Eating alone had never really bothered me untilthat fall, the one in which I had someone to eat with multiple times a week.
In that little house in the middle of town, at Checkers, on the docks when the weather wasn’t so bad. And he always packed such delicious food: thinly sliced meats and cheese, salmon, Caesar salad. If we were in the mood for something, Atticus bought it or made it himself.
Now, I stand against the counter in my dingy kitchen and inhale a partially burnt grilled cheese in silence.
And then I shower in silence, too, remembering the way Atticus began following me into that overly clean bathroom shortly after I started sleeping over, and took it upon himself to wash me.
He’d run his large hands over my skin like I was a prize, like I was something to shape and mold.
And sometimes—well, about half the time—he’d bend me over, slam my hands against the tile wall, and stretch me open in a glorious flash of pain and pleasure. Preparing me for him, just as he always did.
He may be demanding and controlling, but he always insisted on never hurting me. Even when I begged him just to shove it in, Atticus would shake his head and smile, telling me to be a good boy and wait.
I did. Ialwaysfollowed orders.
