Page 2 of Cusp: A Renzo + Lucia Companion

Marty said shit Diego didn’t understand. And some he did.

Sponsorships. Product placement. Representation. Maybe some modeling. Definitely brand deals. Contacts are everything; you need to come out to LA.

“Are you even listening to me?” Rose called.

Her voice brought him back to the present all at once. Responsibilities. Decisions. The exam he was supposed to write during fourth period, and the graduation he probably wouldn’t attend if he decided to chase the dream that had just been placed into his hands.

Adulting was for the fucking birds.

It wasn’t even the whole turning eighteen part of the growing up business that Diego thought was stupid as fuck. It was the expectations that followed him because he was turning eighteen and what people thought he should be doing with his life because of that fact.

Like college.

Choosing a career.

Doing something … normal. Expected. And entirely fucking boring. All things Diego had no interest in whatsoever. Mostly because he never bothered to sit down and think about it at all. The things his sister wanted him to look forward to and work toward as an adult weren’t the kinds of things he’d ever considered for his own life. Not when he’d been too busy learning how far he could fly on a skateboard while filming it for others to see, too. He did the school thing. Like they told him to.

Wasn’t that enough?

“What is up with you lately?” his sister asked through the bedroom door. “It’s not like you, you know? You can’t miss the exam today, Diego. Don’t skip again, all right?”

Diego turned to head for the bedroom door and shoved the card into his bag before zipping it up and tossing it over his shoulder. He had more questions about the LA thing that wouldn’t leave the back of his mind, and since Marty was only going to be in the city today, he didn’t have a choice but to miss the exam his sister was currently bitching about.

Pulling the bedroom door open, he already had a smile waiting for Rose. She worried about him enough. Her entire life seemed to revolve around making sure he was doing what he needed to do. Diego understood why that was … but he wished she would just let him grow up the way he wanted to now.

Her eyes widened, and the hand she’d raised to knock again on the wood lowered back to her side. His grin had her softening a bit. Last year, his height shot right up and now he stood six inches taller than her at six feet. She shook her head as she looked up at him.

“Sorry,” he said. “I was just late this morning.”

“Ace that exam. You need the grade.”

Right.

For college.

“And I got an email today,” Rose added, “about the open house at UNR. I mean, you’re going to see Ren for a week in a couple of days, why not check out the university while you’re there?”

The text he received that morning from Marty in reply to asking if the man could meet up burned a hole in the bag hanging off his shoulder. So did the exam and grade. His sister.

“I’m not sure I want to go to school. I was thinking I might move out to LA and—”

“Diego,” Rose said, rolling her eyes and smiling like she thought he was being silly. “Come on, be real for a second. You gotta get serious about this stuff. You can’t play on your skateboard forever—all right?”

That was the thing.

He was serious about it.

He just needed to be taught how to do something with it.

“All right?” Rose asked again.

“I guess,” he said.

What else could he say?

He had a manager to meet.

She still wanted him to write that exam.