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He frowned. “You’re eighteen, aren’t you? I was on my own and had a job at fourteen.”
“But—”
“But nothing. You been in California for a hot minute and already dreaming about lazing around on a beach all day? Typical.”
I gritted my teeth. I’d been working since I was eight—either on juvie work programs or doing chores for whatever foster family would take me in for a few months. The gig at the farm in Manitowoc was thirteen hours a day under a boiling sun and shit pay.
Don’t talk to me about lazy, asshole.
“What’s the job?” I asked.
“Apartment management. Maintenance. Handyman-type stuff. You ever do any carpentry?”
“When I was sixteen, I was placed with a family who owned a construction company. I learned a few things.”
“Good. What about plumbing? HVACs?”
“Not much.”
“Not much to know,” he said. “I’ll teach you. I like to do repairs myself. Keep costs down. Keeps me from being ripped off by overpriced, so-called professionals who don’t know a quarter inch pipe from a hole in the ground.”
I shifted in my seat. My uncle wasn’t interested in a family reunion. There weren’t going to be any meals at the same table. No watching the game together. I was manual labor. Nothing more.
My stomach felt hollow, as if I hadn’t eaten in years and wasn’t about to any time soon.
“What about school?”
Nelson frowned. “What school?”
“I got one more year.”
He snorted. “Really?”
“I missed a grade when…all that shit went down. I want to graduate. Get a diploma.”
“Take the test if it means so much to you. You’re not going to have time for school. It’s a lot of work. When someone moves out—or gets kicked out—then we got to clean up their mess and get it ready for a new tenant. We have to advertise a vacancy, vet the applicants. Then there’s rent to collect, and that’s a whole other ordeal. You’d think I was running a charity, the excuses I hear.”
My uncle droned on while a memory surfaced. The last time I really talked to my mom, only three days before she died.
“Finish school, Ronan,” she said, handing me a freshly washed dish to dry. “No matter what happens. Don’t be like me. I dropped out and it’s been nothing but doors slamming shut in my face ever since. The end of the road.” Her clear blue eyes turned shadowed, then she beamed at me. “You’re smart. Don’t let anyone tell you different, and don’t let anyone take it away from you.”
“Take what?” I asked, stacking the dish on the counter.
“Your future.”
I turned to Nelson. “I want to finish school.”
“That’s not the deal.”
“What is the deal? You want to put me to work.”
“In exchange for a roof over your dumb head.” He raised his brows at my stony silence. “You got other options? How about that farm, mucking cow shit and sleeping in a barn? If you want to go back, by all means, tell me to stop the car and I’ll let you out right now.”
Like leaving a dog on the side of the road, I thought as every hope I’d had burned up, one after another. I was on my own again. So fucking be it.
“Pull over.”
Nelson frowned. “Huh?”
