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“The kid was hiding under a bed. Heard everything.”
I really don’t want this to be true. Maybe it isn’t.
My father stands and pats me once on the head. That means I’m supposed to leave and I do. But I’m happy that he’s not angry at me. I’m happy that I still have a dad who is alive.
Last night I had a nightmare that my own father was dead instead of Ethan Lyonne. That dream was much worse than when I dream of the screaming angel. For a long time I stared at the dark ceiling in my bedroom with my sunshine-colored quilt pulled up to my chin and felt like I couldn’t breathe.
I’ll never tell anyone. If I say the words out loud then they might come true. Nothing in the world scares me more than the thought of my father being with my mother in the ground beneath the stone angel.
My shoe is still broken so I have to move slowly, dragging my foot through the grass as I walk all the way around the pool, across the open lawn. But if I wasn’t looking down at my broken shoe then I might have missed the yellow head of a dandelion poking up out of the thick grass.
Anyone who says dandelions aren’t a flower is wrong. I like how they grow where they’re not supposed to grow. I also like how they don’t really die and instead just turn into feathery wishes that get blown into the wind.
The stem breaks off in my hand and I feel bad. This dandelion will just have to come home with me. I’ll take care of it. I’ll put it in a glass of water on the white table next to my bed.
I’m careful as I carry my flower toward the thick fruit trees and bright rosebushes.
This is where I find them, all three of them.
They are cousins. Micah is the only who lives on my street but it seems like Gage and Conner are here every day.
My father knows all of their parents. Parents who are friends always think their kids should be friends too. I’m forever being told to go ‘play with the boys’. I have to invite them to my birthday parties and I’m forced to go to theirs.
I’ve tried really hard to like them but I don’t think they want to be liked. They are rough and dirty and loud and they even curse. The only one who is a little bit nice is Conner and even he isn’t all that nice.
Every day I wish really hard for a girl to move in around here. Then maybe I won’t be stuck with nothing but awful boys all the time.
They are doing something to the rosebushes. When I get closer I see that it’s really just Micah who is doing something. His two cousins stand back and watch.
One by one, Micah is ripping the flowers from his mother’s beautiful rosebushes. But Micah doesn’t just take the flowers off. He tears them apart and throws the torn petals on the ground.
I hate what he’s doing. The roses did nothing to him and pretty things shouldn’t be destroyed for no good reason.
He crushes another flower.
I cry out. “Don’t!”
Conner and Gage turn their heads.
Micah kills another rose like he didn’t even hear me.
“Micah, you need to stop.”
He doesn’t stop.
“Go away.” Gage now has his arms crossed. He always means what he says. “Just go the hell away, Tess. You’re always bossing people around. That’s why you have no friends.”
I don’t even look at Gage. I don’t want him to know that he’s hurt my feelings because he’ll just say something worse.
Micah destroys more flowers.
Conner keeps watching and says nothing.
Sometimes I want to cry when the boys get mean like this and sometimes I do cry. But I won’t cry right now.
I swallow hard and remember what I’m supposed to say. “I’m very sorry for your loss, Micah.”
Micah finally stops what he’s doing. There’s a huge rose in his hand but he hasn’t ripped it up yet.
