The girl walking next to me through the field is the reincarnation of my best friend from the past. She’s telling me how she freaked out when Glory chatted with some “spirit.” Scarlett laughs, and my soul lifts with the sound. We don’t need the moon or stars to guide us. She’s shining brighter than any light that could lead us home.
“I know I can keep this a secret from Dad, and I’ll be able to make a ton of money and I’m going to be able to figure out how to go to the University of Kentucky.” Scarlett skips ahead of me, does a circle like she did when we were kids and claps her hands. “I have a job!”
She does and seeing her happy scabs over old, open wounds.
“Jesse,” there’s a breathlessness in her tone that makes me feel lighter, “thank you.”
My stomach drops. She needs to know why I’m helping her. I’ve told her before, but she didn’t believe me. If I do this wrong, the wall that’s currently down will go back up before I have the chance to blink. Now that Scarlett is in my life, I don’t want to lose her again.
I slow when we reach my backyard. Scarlett’s aglow, a brilliant smile gracing her lips, but it fades as she searches my face. “Are you okay?”
“I need your help.”
“With what?”
“I need your help to keep my land.” Scarlett remains quiet as I download Marshall’s lack of confidence in me, his influence over Gran, her tribunal decision and why they weren’t going to inform Scarlett about her involvement until closer to the vote.
Halfway through, I have a tough time looking at Scarlett as horror overtakes her expression. I understand. I can’t escape this nightmare. I finish speaking, and her continued silence is almost too heavy for me to bear.
“So you weren’t kidding at lunch,” she finally says in a quiet voice that creates guilt. Her doubt in me, in how I’ve declared us friends again, is so tangible I could reach out and touch it.
“No.” I shove my hands in my pockets, and wish I could punch my fist through that wall she’s throwing up. “I see your mind working, and it’s not what you think.”
Her eyes flash to mine, dark with anger. “Don’t do that. Don’t tell me what I should think or how I should feel. I get enough of that crap at home.”
I scan the looming fortress of stone she calls home. Thanks to Mom’s stellar choice in guys, I know how to take a hit and I know from experience a verbal hit can be just as damaging. Is that what’s happening to her? Is her dad the manipulative asshole who punches with words? Better question: Does she know it?
“Fair enough,” I say slowly. “You’re correct, I don’t have any right to tell you how to feel. Neither does anyone else.” I pause, giving that time to sink in. “I want us to be friends again. Not because I need your vote, but because I miss you. This whole thing started out with me needing your help, but the rest of it has been real. I haven’t lied to you. Not from the start.”
“What if I don’t vote for you?” she pushes. “Are you still going to be friends with me?”
It’s a tough question, it’s real, and I give her an honest answer. “I’ll probably be mad for a while, but we’ll still be friends. I’m tired of not having you in my life.”
Her shoulders roll forward as if she’s exhausted. “I need to go before Dad notices I’m gone.”
She’s heavy as we cross the street, and it almost makes me wish I hadn’t mentioned the vote, but not doing so would have been unfair. We reach the tree near her room, and she pauses as she surveys the climb. Up is more daunting than down.
As I start to take a knee to give her a boost, she says, “I’ll vote for you to keep the land.”
My head jerks up. “What?”
“I’ll vote for you to keep the land. Even if you didn’t help with the job, even if you had called me an ice princess every day until the end of May, even if you had never spoken a word to me, regardless of how you treat me going forward, I will vote for you to keep your land.”
“Why?”
“Because this land belongs to you. It always has. I disagree with what your gran and Marshall are trying to do. If you fail, you fail. If you succeed, you succeed. I’m sick and tired of adults acting like we’re glass that will shatter if we fall. Sometimes they need to let us fall. Sometimes we need to make our own mistakes. Sometimes, adults need to butt out.”
I don’t think she’s talking about Marshall, but that’s okay. I agree with every word.
“You don’t have to do this.” Her tone is sad. “I promise you’ll have my vote regardless.”
“Do what?”
She gestures between the two of us. “Pretend we’re friends.”
I’ve seen that look before on my mother, and it’s an expression I never wanted to see again. I didn’t have a word for that look as a child, but Scarlett gave it a name: empty. Pale face, haunted eyes and a brokenness that covers her like a shroud.
Someone’s hurting her—somehow. I have the urge to gather her up, hold her close and run. To take her as far from here as I can carry her, but the farthest I could take her is to the edge of my land and something tells me that wouldn’t be far enough. At least not for her.
To survive, I need my land. To survive, she needs to leave. I don’t know how to fix her, but I do know how to help staunch some of the bleeding. “When can you meet me again?”
“Maybe we can sneak in the boxes while my mom and dad go grocery shopping—”
“That’s not what I meant. When can you sneak out your window like you did tonight?”
Her eyes widen in disbelief, as if me asking to hang with her again was never in her realm of possibilities. “I don’t know. Tomorrow night I’m supposed to help Camila throw Evangeline a birthday party and then after that it’s school nights so—”
“When you do have a free night, I want you to flash your light three times at midnight, and I’ll meet you here, okay? There’s something I want to show you. It’s something that fixes me when life gets to be too much.”
Scarlett eyes me with suspicion. “What if I can’t get out for another month?”
She’s testing me, and if I were her, I’d do the same. I’m going to have to work for her trust. The good news—I’ve never shied away from anything hard. “Then we hang out in a month.”
“You’re going to watch my window every night for the rest of your life until I’m ready?”
“Yeah, but do you want to take that long for another adventure? ’Cause that sounds like a boring life, and you’re better than that, Tink.”
Her lips twitch with a grin and a bit of life flares in her eyes. Me—I’m smiling everywhere. Heart, eyes and face. Yet she rolls her eyes at me. “You’re impossible.”
Good God, she’s beautiful and I’m a lucky man because she’s looking at me. I crouch then lace my hands together. “I’ll give you a boost.”
“How did you make it up without a boost?”
“I’m taller than you.”
She frowns like she doesn’t like my answer then studies the tree. Damn if she still isn’t stubborn and competitive and that makes me proud. I stand because there’s no way she’s accepting my help now. “You’ll need a running start.”
“I’m aware.” She motions to the lowest branch. “Did that hold your weight?”
“Barely. I had to move quickly to the one on the right before I could gain my balance.”
Scarlett breathes in deeply and then she’s on the run. While I jumped straight up with the sprint, she sprints up the trunk of the tree, using it as a ladder, and then grabs hold of the lowest branch. She kicks up her legs, snakes them around the branch, then uses her arms to heave herself onto the opposite side. My heart stalls as the branch dips, but it holds her weight as she scrambles to the next, sturdier branch.
Her quiet laughter eases some of the knots in my stomach. “You look sick.”
I feel sick. Even though I encouraged her to climb, after that tumble we took as kids from a tree, I keep seeing her falling and breaking her neck. But I can’t say anything. I take as many risks as she does, and I’m not into throwing stones at glass houses. “Go to bed, Tink. You have to be exhausted because this isn’t as funny as you think.”
She calls a good night, and I watch with tense and ready-to-catch arms as she weaves her way up the tree then back into her room. I watch her window, wondering if she remembers the routine we had in place for so many years. A minute later, she reappears and waves. I wave back, and she closes her curtains. I head home, happy that I found my friend again.