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“It’s right at the back, but I can get out here.”
He lets out a long, drawn-out breath. “Just show me where.”
I guide him to my trailer, where my car sits useless in the allocated parking space. “Thanks for the ride,” I say, already pushing the door open.
I need to get out of this truck.
Out of my head.
I need to go into my house, my solitude, where I can be alone and be myself, where there’s no one around to judge me for dressing the wrong way or saying the wrong things.
“Look,” Holden says, and I freeze with the door wide open and my back to him. “I know we have this bullshit banter going on, and it’s whatever, but Mia—she’s off-limits.”
I don’t look at him when I say, “Got it.” And then I practically run out of the car and into my house. Where the only person around is the most judgmental one I know: myself.
7
Holden
“Dammit!”Jamie hisses, pulling her hands away from the blackberry bush. She looks down at the fresh scrape on her wrist caused by the thorns. It’s the third time she’s done the exact same thing in the space of five minutes.
When she got in my truck after school, dressed in her usual clothes, I asked her where she planned on changing. She said she didn’t. So, dressed in a pale pink blouse, another nana skirt, and completely inappropriate shoes, she’s been using garden shears to cut through the brush in Esme’s yard.
Meanwhile, knowing what to expect, I’m in work boots, a long-sleeved khaki shirt, and gloves.
After her second hiss of the afternoon, I offered her my shirt.
She declined.
After the fourth, I offered her my gloves.
She declined that, too.
And now her hands are scratched to shit and she’s glaring at the blackberries as if it’s their fault. Maybe it’s mine. Maybe I should’ve prepared her.
“At least take the fucking gloves,” I offer again, exasperated.
“No.” It’s been an entire week since we last spoke. Even the morning locker interactions have been void of conversation. I don’tthinkit’s on purpose. I just haven’t had anything to say. Plus, I’m usuallyalwayslate to class, and being on time, beingpresent, was part of the promise I’d made to Mom, and I’m nothing if not a man of my word. “Take my shirt then.”
“No.”
I drop my hands and face her. “Why the fuck are you so stubborn?”
“Why the fuck do you care?”
“Because I have to work next to Whiney Wilma all afternoon.”
Her eyes thin, directed at me. “This is a big yard, Holden. Go stand somewhere else.”
“You’re being a bitch,Jameson. Take the fucking gloves.”
“No!”
I drop my shears and rip off my gloves, then take her free hand and start forcefully putting them on her. Surprisingly, she doesn’t fight me. I even manage to get the second one on before she speaks up, but what she says surprises me. “I’m sorry.”
“For being so difficult?” I deadpan, releasing her hand and shifting my eyes to hers.
She’s already watching me, those hazel eyes bright against the afternoon sun. Biting her bottom lip, she keeps my gaze hostage for a second, two, before dipping her head, her voice low when she says, “No. For what I said in your car last week.”
