Dad’s on a rampage. I’m doing my best to ignore him. It’s after nine at night and I’m lying in bed, my earbuds in while I listen to music. But Dad’s deep, angry voice reverberates through the walls, and although I can’t tell what he’s ranting about, I know he’s still yelling.

Mom is home too, because it’s her day off work, and I really hate that he’s ruining it by being an ass. But she’s not yelling back, so I don’t think he’s mad at her. He’s probably just mad at the world, like always.

Another half an hour goes by and I’m still trying to ignore it, but even the loudest music I’ve got doesn’t drown out the sound. I am so freaking exhausted from endless drills at soccer practice and then delivering pizzas on my days off. I just want to sleep.

I want to stop fearing that at any minute, I’ll be caught for what I did. I’m sure it’ll blow over, but Coach sure isn’t making it easy on us.

I turn off my music and walk to my door, listening to see exactly what it is that has my dad all pissed off. But now he’s no longer yelling, and has instead decided to stomp through the kitchen and to the living room.

I open my door a crack and stick my head out. From my room, I can see down the hallway and partly into the kitchen. Mom is sitting at the table, using her old laptop that tends to freeze up more than it works. For Christmas, I hope to buy her a new one. The glow of the screen highlights the dark circles under her eyes.

“I found a shop that will do a free estimate,” she calls out to my dad.

A few seconds later, he storms into the kitchen. “I don’t need an estimate. I know what’s wrong with it. The fucking brakes don’t work.”

“Maybe they could tell you if it’ll really cost that much money,” Mom says, her voice soft. It’s the soothing tone she takes when he’s trying to calm him down.

“Doesn’t matter what it costs!” he shouts. Guess her calm voice didn’t help. Dad takes a long sip from his beer bottle. “It’s still a few hundred dollars at best. We don’t have that.”

I step into the hallway and the hardwood floor creaks beneath me. Both of my parents turn to look at me, Mom with her soft eyes and Dad with his glassy ones.

“The brakes went out on my truck,” Dad says without me needing to ask. “I damn near died on the highway today.”

“Wow, that sucks.”

Dad looks at me like I’m stupid. “You think?”

“What will it cost to fix?”

“Three hundred,” Mom says, which I barely hear because Dad talks over her.

“Too fucking much, that’s how much. I don’t have cash just lying around after I spend it all on this house and these bills.”

I know what happens if Dad can’t drive his own car to work every day. He’ll take mine.

And while I’m happy to help out, that’s just not going to work. I’ve poured my soul into my 2004 Chevy pickup truck and I’m not going to let him drive it the way he drives his.

I slip into my bedroom and pull open my sock drawer, taking out three hundred dollar bills from the envelope I stash under my boxers. When I go back to the kitchen, my parents are once again arguing as if I’d never been there just thirty seconds before. It’s giving me a headache.

“Here,” I say, tossing the cash to the table. “Get your brakes fixed.”

“What the hell is this?” Dad says, taking the money and staring at it as if he’s never seen such a thing. “You a drug dealer or something?”

“I have a job, Dad. I worked all summer and saved up.”

His eyes narrow. “How much cash do you have?”

“Not much more than that,” I lie. “But I want you to have it. Mom and I need you to be able to get to work.” It never hurts to stroke his ego, and plus, it’s true. Without Dad’s job, we’d be screwed.

Dad puts the cash in his back pocket. Mom gives me this quick look, thanking me with her eyes. I smile at her.

For just the slightest moment, it looks like Dad might actually thank me. But then he scowls. “Don’t expect to be paid back, boy. If anything, you owe me much more than this for putting a roof over your head and feeding you all these years.”

I could argue that taking care of your own child is kind of what the law requires and that he’s not a saint for it, but I don’t. I just nod because I’m exhausted and just want the damn yelling to stop. “Understood.”

Back in my room, I don’t need my earbuds anymore because Dad is finally content. I go to my sock drawer and pull out the envelope of cash, knowing that it needs a better hiding spot now that my dad knows I have some money. I look around my room, and finally settle on pulling up the corner of the carpet that’s under my bed. I shove the money under there and then toss some dirty clothes on top of it.

Then, just for good measure, I take out a few twenties and put it back in my sock drawer. If Dad goes snooping for my money, I want him to think he found it.

When I slam the drawer closed, it rattles, reminding me that there’s half a bottle of whiskey in there from a party I went to over the summer. I open the drawer again, and grab the bottle from the back of it. The amber liquid sloshes around, practically begging me to take a long sip. Just enough to calm my stress and lull me to sleep.

But then just as quickly, a sickening feeling falls over me. I feel slimy thinking this way. That’s what my dad does. He drinks to forget about all of his pathetic problems. If I did the same, I’d be no better off than him.

And I have to be better than him.

I put the bottle back in the drawer. I am not my dad.

A tiny voice in the back of my head whispers that my dad also wouldn’t confess to vandalism. I tell it to shut up.

 

*

 

The next morning, I find myself rushing to school for possibly the stupidest reason ever. Those first fifteen minutes of class. The rest of the school day is boring and filled with AP classwork, but those first fifteen minutes are the most interesting minutes of my day.

Even though I’m here five minutes before the bell rings, Clarissa is already in her seat in homeroom, along with a couple of other students who’d rather sit in a desk than socialize in the hallways.

“Good morning,” I say, grinning at her as I walk by. She’s wearing a V-neck shirt that’s not exactly low cut, but it shows enough skin to make me wonder how soft it’d feel to run my lips across her collarbone. Her hair is always shiny and straight, which makes me want to run my fingers through it.

I’m finding that I want to do a lot of things where Clarissa is concerned.

“Morning,” she says, lifting an eyebrow as I slip into my desk. “Did you see the good news?”

“What’s that?” I ask, leaning forward slightly. She’s turned sideways so we can talk, and I want to do whatever it takes to keep her this way. The back of her head is pretty, but the front of her is better.

She nods her head and I follow the direction to see a much younger, much shorter woman behind the teacher’s desk. “Who’s that?” I whisper.

“Substitute,” she whispers back, giving me a grin. “I remember her from last year. She lets you do whatever you want.”

“Nice.” I bite my lip. I’m running out of things to talk about, but I don’t want to stop talking. “Homeroom is supposed to be a blow off class anyway.”

She rolls her eyes. “It’s supposed to be a class to get important information.”

“Same thing.”

She gives me a look that makes my heart skip a beat.

The guys walk in just as the bell rings, and they’re both absorbed with TJ’s phone.

“Dude,” TJ says as he slides into the seat to the left of mine. “The cheerleading sleepover is all over snapchat. You want in?”

He tips his phone toward me, showing a snap of three girls in their underwear having a pillow fight. Normally I’d be all over this. But Clarissa is within earshot and I want to make a good impression. “You know they post that shit just for attention, right?”

“Yeah, fucking duh,” Beau says. “That’s what makes it so good.”

I open my binder as if there’s something important in there. TJ snorts. “He just wants to look at them at home where he has some privacy.”

“Dude,” I say. “Shut the fuck up.”

“Ugh, such a teacher’s pet these days,” TJ says, which makes absolutely no sense, but whatever.

“He’s just pissed about the soccer drills,” Beau says. “We’re all pissy about that.”

“Punishing the whole team for something one of us did is stupid.”

TJ looks at me for a long moment and in the corner of my eyes, I see Clarissa turn slightly toward us. She’s listening.

“They said it was two people,” I say, playing this game with TJ where we act like we’re innocent. “And yeah, I’m sick of the drills. Someone needs to fess up already.”

Now Clarissa turns all the way toward us. She widens her eyes like she’s sharing a secret. “Do you know who did it? Was it one of the hot ones?”

“Whoa,” TJ says, putting a hand to his chest. “Are you saying I’m not one of the hot soccer players?”

“No, but…” She stumbles over her words and I’m ninety-nine percent sure she’s lying. “My friends think it’s that super hot guy on the team, because he seems like a rule breaker.” She shrugs. “I don’t really care, but they’d freak out if it was him.”

“Who exactly is this really hot guy?” I ask, both because I think she’s lying in an effort to find out who ruined the greenhouse, and because up until now, I’ve always felt like I’m on the more attractive side when it comes to my teammates.

Hey, I’m not trying to be an arrogant asshole here. It just is what it is.

“I don’t know his name,” she says, not meeting my eyes. “He’s tall. Brown hair, I think.”

“Dude, she’s describing you,” Beau says, smacking me on the arm.

Clarissa turns bright red, which is probably the cutest thing ever. She covers it by rolling her eyes. “I said super hot, not super cocky.”

I lean back in my chair, fixing her with my favorite smirk. “I see how it is.”

Beau and TJ go back to looking at Snapchat and Clarissa turns back around. I spend the rest of homeroom trying to think of something to talk about, but I’m speechless. This has never happened with girls before.

Maybe I’m just out of practice. I stopped dating midway through last school year because my home life was just too crazy. Between soccer games and working at Magic Mark’s and dealing with my embarrassment of a father, it’s hard trying to keep up with a girl.

And I know from experience that they get pissed if you’re not able to hang out with them all the time. So why the hell am I sitting here thinking about this girl in front of me? Why can’t I let it go? Just dismiss her as another pretty girl I don’t have time for?

When the bell rings, Clarissa is out of her chair and instantly walking to the door. I rush to catch up to her, not giving the guys time to start talking to me.

“Hey,” I say.

She looks startled. “What?”

I shrug. It’s completely stupid but I can’t help myself. “You want to hang out tonight?”