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From Shani’s nonplussed expression, I wasn’t sure that was the endorsement Conner seemed to think it was.
“Oh,” she said, springing up from her seat on the couch. “I brought that book I was telling you about.”
She rummaged through her oversized purse, coming up with a slim book with a black-and-white cover and the font choice of a church brochure. It was also obviously meant for an even younger audience than I had imagined, more preteen than teen. It seemed inappropriate to my situation for a number of reasons, and I had a visceral negative reaction to what on closer inspection was definitely Brush Script MT with a shadow effect. But Shani had been sweet to think of me, and she was about to be family soon. I accepted it with a smile.
“I read a few pages on the way over and it’s really powerful,”Shani said, glancing over at Conner as if for encouragement. “I think you’ll find a lot to identify with.”
That glance told me a lot. It told me that they’d discussed this, that they’d discussedme, and I could only imagine what conclusions they’d drawn. Conner had been only six when our parents divorced, only eight when I’d stopped coming back to my dad’s house every other weekend. So if he thought he had some insight into how I might feel about losing my father, who’d already been lost to me for years before, I’d love to hear it.
Shani gave me a sad smile, and all the energy fizzled out of my anger. It really had been thoughtful of her to think of me, even if I didn’t like the idea that she and Conner were somehow conspiring to get me “help.” I flipped through the pages as if I was semi-interested in what they might have to say.
“I’ll put it on my reading pile,” I said. “Right after the memoir by the Sunrise Slayer’s daughter. You remember that one, Conner? He was linked to at least eight murders around Central Florida in the eighties.”
Conner shook his head. “That was before my time,” he said. “And I don’t watch black-and-white television.”
I rolled my eyes. “It was before my time, too, jackass,” I said. “But it happened close to here—just over an hour north. You could’ve still heard about the guy.”
“I just collected Pokémon cards like a normal person,” Conner said. “Speaking of normal people, is the neighbor having a party or something? There were a bunch of cars out front.”
I jumped up to check the window. Sure enough, there were three new cars packed onto his driveway, and several more liningthe street halfway around the circle. All my vigilance, and I’d completely missed this whole development.
“Well, that explains the ice,” I murmured.
I turned just in time to see Conner giving Shani aspeakinglook. First they’d had their little exchange over the book, and now this. I couldn’t let it go. “What?”
“Nothing,” he said, his eyes wide.
“Conner thinks you’re fixating on the neighbor as a way to deal with all the change in your life,” Shani said at the same time.
Conner gave her athanks a lotlook that would’ve been more effective if he hadn’t still had taco sauce smeared around his mouth. “I never said that. I said my therapistsuggestedthat might be one explanation for Phoebe’s focus, but—”
I held my hands up, as if warding off the whole conversation. Now he was discussing me with histherapist? Jesus.
“Both you and Dr.Freud are making a much bigger deal out of this than it is,” I said. “We had a couple weird interactions, okay? It’s natural that I would want to look out for myself. I’m a single female, living alone.”
“Okay, but...” Conner wrinkled his nose in a supremely annoying look of little-brotherly doubt. “Weird becausehewas weird, or because you were?”
“Hey, he’s the one who—” I realized that I had no way to finish that sentence that helped my cause. He’d moved my desk for me, politely accepted a misdelivered package, mowed the lawn. It was hardly the Macdonald triad.
There was still that night he’d been doing something in his garage. A mysterious liquid on his hands. The plastic dropcloth from his car. None of that would make him the most careful killerever, but there had been blood all over the Ford Bronco and O.J. still got off.
“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “I won’t be needing to borrow a cup of sugar anytime soon, and if I do, there’s always the cat lady on the other side.”
“Pat’s still there?” Conner said. “She always reminded me of the grandma inNapoleon Dynamite.She’d be out in her yard throwing bread to the birds, like,I’m doing this for your own good! Eat up, you little shits!”
“If you think about it,” I said, “she has all those outside cats and still encourages the birds to come. Pretty dark.”
“I hadn’t thought of it that way,” Conner said, making a face. “But listen. The point is, we know you’re isolated out here. We hate the idea of you worrying or feeling unsafe.”
He reached out to grasp Shani’s hand, and that was honestly the first clue that the “we” in his sentence had been him and his girlfriend, rather than him and his therapist. It saved me from having to have a serious talk about boundaries, at least.
“And that’s why we’ve decided,” Shani said, glancing at him as if for support, “that we’re going to move in here, too. That way you won’t be so alone.”
I had no idea what my face was doing. In my mind, my eyes were wide with disbelief, my mouth opening and closing like a fish, my nostrils flaring with a barely contained exasperation. But outwardly, I must have been maintaining some semblance of control, because my brother was grinning at me like they’d just presented me with the greatest gift.
And objectively, it was very well-meaning of them. Very kind. It was true that I’d moved back to a town where I didn’t reallyknow anyone—except Alison, which was a relationship best left buried under old issues ofTeen Beat.And it was true that there was a lot of work ahead with the house, work that I’d sometimes wished Conner would be around more to help with.
But it was also true that if I had to live with Conner and Shani, I would go out of my fucking mind.
