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Just do it, Harley. Go down there. Go talk to him.
I wouldn’t get any sleep until I found out what was goin’ on. I’d never snuck out of my house before, but at this point, I didn’t have a choice. I needed answers, and the only person who could give them to me was the boy I couldn’t stand.
It was him or no one.
My parents never checked on me after they shut my door for the night, but just in case, I went back to my bed and made a fake Harley with pillows. Makin’ it look like I was still snoozin, safe under the covers.
Without carin’ about the consequences if I got caught, I snuck out of my house. In less than a minute, I was runnin’ down to my dock and grabbin’ my paddle board, carefully placin’ it in the water.
The lake was dead calm. You couldn’t even hear a fish flappin’ around. Makin’ it easy to make my way over to him.
One stroke.
Ten strokes.
Thirty strokes of my paddle.
It felt as though I blinked, and I was standin’ by the shoreline with him. His eyes instantly connectin’ with mine. There wasn’t even a hint of shock written on his face that I was right in front of him.
Almost like he knew I’d come.
Did he feel me too?
I opened my mouth to ask him what was goin’ on, but he abruptly shook his head at me. Silencin’ me, as if he thought I was gonna start in on him.
Did he really think I was gonna pick on him? Knowin’ somethin’ was up with his momma?
“Not here, Harley. Anywhere but here,” he muttered, loud enough for me to hear.
I had the overwhelming urge to yell that I would never be that insensitive to him. That I would never use his hurt for whatever was goin’ on with his mom against him.
That I…
That I…
That I…
Would never not care about what he was goin’ through in this situation.
I may have hated him, but there was a line I wouldn’t cross.
And his momma was it.
There was so much I wanted to say to him, so much he needed to know and hear. Startin’ with how my family would be there for them. For him. Tell him no matter what, our hatred for one another didn’t stop them from being my family.
I hated Jackson, but he was my boy to hate.
All mine.
“I’m sorry, Jackson. I’m so sorry about your momma,” was the only thing I managed to choke out.
“So, you know? You know she has Dementia?”
I gasped, jerkin’ back. I imagined it’d be bad, but I never thought it would be that bad. We just learned about dementia in school.
“Oh. My. God!”
“You fuckin’ brat!” He was over to me in three strides, gettin’ right in my face.
