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A flash of a white face looking up at me, that same hand I’m now holding wrapped around a drainpipe about to break—
Right.
Admit it, Luna, you thought he’d jumped off the roof on purpose, that he’d been contemplating it for quite some time. He stood on that edge time after time. Who knows how many times he came close to stepping off?
A shiver wracks me.
“Cold?” he asks, and before I can find my voice, he releases my hand to wrap his arm around my back. “Better?”
I nod, at a loss for words.
Yes, so much better. Nice. And it somehow calms my thoughts, my worries. Maybe it wasn’t like that, maybe him falling really was just an accident. I can’t pretend to know his mind after talking to him a handful of times.
But God, it’s so weird, to be walking through town with his arm around me. But also nice. Easy. Sweet. Exciting. My face warms up when Mrs. Adams stops from sweeping her porch to stare at us, mouth open in an ‘o’ of surprise. She knows me, knows Ross, heck she knows everyone in this town, and I bet in a thousand years she wouldn’t have counted with me and Ross hanging out together.
After all, the news of my flight to my aunt three years ago must have kept the gossip mill running—second hot topic after discovering the bodies Jasper Jones buried, I guess, and his son’s shenanigans.
Stop thinking. Don’t think. Who cares what Mrs. Adams or anyone else thinks? You’re past that now. New Luna doesn’t give a damn about what’s being said behind her back, or even to her face, because...
Because she’s what she is, who she is, pretty or not, thigh gap or not (still not), clever or not (still up for debate) and dating (or not?), walking Ross Jones back to his house. Where she has already had sex with him. Twice.
Yeah, all this isn’t helping with the burning flush spreading on my cheeks at all.
Cars drive by, and we walk past the last houses in silence, heading toward Little River. Little River isn’t a river, not really. More like a stream, a creek, meandering among reed groves and trees on relatively rocky ground, creating small pools and eddies. Mom fell in love with the area, Dad told us once, and that’s why they bought the house there. Never in a thousand years would any of us have imagined we’d be neighbors with a serial killer.
And his hunk of a son.
“Jenner wasn’t around today?” he asks as we appro
ach the house. It rises from among the trees like a haunted ruin, tiles missing from its sloped roof, a chimney—though I don’t remember seeing a fireplace inside—and a boarded-up window.
“No. Few customers.”
“Good. There’s something about him that makes me see red. I don’t give a fuck if he wants to look like me, that’s his fucking problem, but he’s a hell of a creepy fucker. I don’t want him around you.”
“Yeah,” I gathered, I say drily, about to tell him that he doesn’t get to make such decisions about me—but then surprise myself when I stop and tug on his hand, then rise on tiptoe to kiss his cheek.
He trails his fingertips on the spot my lips touched, eyes comically wide. “What was that for?”
Something in my chest that was missing, a gap in my feelings, slides into place with a click, like a missing piece from a puzzle.
“For worrying about me,” I reply, and smile.
***
The house is dark, the smell inside musty, the furniture and curtains moth-eaten, the wooden floor creaking alarmingly in places. It’s nothing like my home with its bright-colored living room sofas and kitchen counters, the well-maintained garden outside. Dad likes to clean and took on the role of both Mom and Dad with seeming ease all those years ago, and although it’s not perfect, even now I’m here to help, it still is pretty good—unlike this place.
I try to imagine Ross—or any kid—growing up in here and fail. Of course, I have to remind myself, the place has been all but abandoned for the past couple of years. Still, you can tell it was run down before that. The dirt on the kitchen counters and cabinets has the patina of many long years, and the sink... yuck. It looks as though something died in there.
Ross has gone back out, mumbling something about water. He really should get it connected, electricity, too. Using the woods as toilet and the stream as bath can get old, fast.
I’m on to perusing the few titles on the shelf above the ratty sofa when he staggers in, a bucket sloshing with water in each hand, sweat soaking into his dark blue T-shirt. A triumphant grin on his flushed, wet face, he puts one bucket down in the kitchen, then wanders off to leave the other one in the bathroom.
“All done,” he says, returning to the living room, wiping his hands on his bedraggled jeans, grin still in place. “Hey, you know what? It’s too hot.” He grabs my hand. “Come on, let’s take a dip.”
“What? Wait!”
“You’re all sweaty.”
