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"Josh, Ezra never did go upstairs when he first got here a few hours ago. Did you, Ezra? Got here and then he set right off."
Ezra—that’s the lunatic’s name—shakes his head. How the hell did he roll up at my house, not even bother to see his own bedroom, and end up on the damn train trestle bridge?
"Why don't you show him upstairs?” Mom asks me. “You can show him where you keep the soap and shampoo and all that good stuff. We got two of everything—even though I know you may have brought your own,” she tells him. “Your towels are blue. Joshua's are gray."
Ezra arches a brow, doing something that I guess should be a smile, but it looks...like he thinks my mother's crazy. I feel a flash of sympathy for Mom before he lifts his chin just like the other football players at my school do when I pass one in the hall. And he says, "Joshua."
"I'm sorry—Josh." My mother does her phony telephone laugh, the one that's supposed to make strangers like her.
I give her a flat-lipped, wide-eyed ugh look, then lead the way back through the dining room into the family room—maybe a little bourgeois with its white built-in shelving and Carl's giant big screen TV. But maybe Ezra wouldn't think so. I can feel him behind me. I glance over my shoulder, finding him a few paces back. His face is grave—almost angry.
"What?" I say as we move through the foyer, toward the staircase.
"What?" he echoes.
Now there's definitely an edge in his voice.
"What's your deal, man?" I start up the stairs; I feel him like a shadow, and I’m not sure how much I like the vibe I’m getting from the guy.
"I don't have a 'deal,' man." I look back over my shoulder, finding he's got one eyebrow quirked. Fuck, he's gorgeous. I don't know how I got so unlucky, but he looks like a fucking model. Tall and lanky, scowly, broad up top but lean like maybe he's been locked up in a cage and starved for just a couple of weeks. There's muscle under his pale skin, but he makes me feel porky.
"You gonna keep on walking or just eye fuck me?"
I'm so unglued, my eyes cling to his as I struggle to find words. Then I realize what he just said. I can feel my face flame.
"Dude, I'm not eye fucking you."
"God hates fags, eh?" he says.
I'm stepping onto the second floor landing, and I nearly trip. "What?" I whirl around to face him. My heart's pounding like a damn drum.
"God hates fags, yeah? This is Alabama,” he says.
"You're from Virginia."
"Yes." He gives a deadpan blink, and my heart misses some beats.
"Is that what you think?" I manage.
"What do you think?" He smirks, but it's mean now.
"I don't know."
"Cat got your tongue, Joshua?"
I realize with a jolt that I don't like him. We're three feet from my bedroom door—the door on the right just after you top the stairs—and I don't like him at all.
I blink, trying to set my face to neutral. "No, Ezra. That's not what I think."
He smirks like he's just been teasing.
"Well" —he waves at the second-floor hall— "get on with it."
I grit my teeth, fighting down a heavy, roiling feeling in my stomach as I step into the hall.
“My room.” I wave at it. “Closet.” I nod at the door directly in front of us. Then I walk leftward down the short hall, pointing upward at the square punched into the ceiling. “Attic.” I wave toward my right. “And right here is your—” room, I’m going to say, but his raspy chuckle interrupts me.
“Check this out.”
I turn to him with a glare, narrowing my brows as he smiles faintly at a framed portrait of mom and Carl and me at their wedding.
"Joshua in tux."
"My name's not Joshua."
"No?" His lips twitch.
"Everyone but my mother calls me Josh. All my friends call me Miller—because there's another Josh. Josh Byrd."
"Another Josh?" He quirks a brow, smirking again, and I can’t do this for another second.
"You realize you almost fucking killed us both? I hit my head on my boat?"
His face hardens as I point to my head. "I don't even remember getting into the boat. Then you just left. I was passed out. My fucking back is sunburned."
"Yeah, because I rolled you over face-down. Pretty damn pale for a boater boy,” he says.
"Then why'd you roll me over, exposing my largest land mass to the sun?"
"So you don’t sprout more freckles."
I search his face for some flaw, wanting to snap back like we're in third grade.
"Yeah, I don't have freckles, boat boy." He smirks.
"Also don't have a brain.” I throw up my hands. “What did you think would happen when the train came?"
"How do you think I'm standing here?” he asks. “I stepped out on one of the side rails, wrapped myself around it. Would have been fine except I had to jump in after your ass."
