I took great care in being quiet when I reentered the house. I took three breaths between every step and I avoided every board I’d ever known to creak.

What I noticed when I got to the bottom of the stairs, though, when I was nearly home free, was that I only heard one snore—my mother’s. Alton’s coarser rumble wasn’t mingling with hers in the stillness. That meant he was awake. And waiting somewhere for me.

I tried not to panic, but I could feel my heart rate increase as my brain scrambled for a way out of this. I scanned the living room, looking for something, anything that might give me an excuse for being down here or being up. My eyes lit on a book I’d been reading. It was lying face down, open, on the end table. I doubt anyone had noticed it.

Before I could second-guess my actions, I flew across the living room, flung myself onto the couch, grabbed the book and dropped it onto the floor as though it had slipped from my fingers when I fell asleep. Hurriedly, I pulled the blanket off the back of the cushions over me and pretended to be asleep.

I inhaled as deeply as I could through my nose to calm myself, and I counted backward from one hundred.

Ninety-nine.

Inhale.

Ninety-eight.

Exhale.

Ninety-seven.

Inhale.

Ninety-six.

Exhale.

I continued until my breathing was deep and even, and my body relaxed. I don’t know what number I fell asleep on; I only know that I jerked upright with a start when I felt a slap on the top of my foot.

I squinted at my mother who was standing at the end of the couch, glaring down at me, a fuming Alton towering behind her.

I sat up and glanced around, a bit disoriented, which went well with my ruse. The sun was pouring through the side window in the living room, assuring me I’d slept for at least a couple of hours.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, rubbing my eyes with the back of my hand.

“What are you doing down here, Brinkley?” It was my mother’s stern, you’re-in-trouble-young-lady voice.

“I couldn’t go to sleep, and it was hot in my room, so I came down here to read. I guess I fell asleep.”

I bent to pick up my discarded book, making a point to dog-ear some later page before I laid it on the coffee table.

“What’s wrong?” I asked again, playing the sleepyhead card.

Momma glanced back at Alton, who was staring at me with eyes narrowed in suspicion. When she turned back to me, she was still frowning. “Nothing. We couldn’t find you, that’s all.”

“Why were you looking for me? Has something happened?”

I knew exactly why she was searching for me. Alton had discovered I wasn’t in my room. Why? Because he’d gone up there looking for me. Maybe to see if I’d snuck out.

Maybe for something else.

A shudder passed through me and I played it off as a cold chill.

When she didn’t respond and Alton only continued to scowl at me, I tossed off the blanket and put my feet on the floor. “Well, I’m going back to bed for a while.” I stood up and made a show of yawning. “What time is it anyway?”

“Fifteen till eight.”

I nodded and moved toward the stairs, glad that I’d fallen asleep and I was too groggy to be freaking out. I would later, though. I knew I’d probably wake up in a cold sweat thinking about how many ways it all could’ve gone wrong, and what that would mean for Dane.

“Don’t let me sleep past eleven, Momma.”

That was the last thing I said to them before I reached the top of the stairs and proceeded to lock myself in my room.

* * *

Later that night, a new routine was born. If I’d needed confirmation that Alton suspected I was lying, his change in habits gave it to me.

I spent the afternoon at Angel’s helping her clean up after the party. We ordered pizza and watched a movie, and all I could think about was Dane. Being with him. Getting back to him. Saving him from me.

When I got back home, I excused myself to go to my room and read before bed. Neither Momma nor Alton argued. So far, so good.

I waited until midnight before I cracked my door and listened for their snoring. Usually, they both went to bed around eleven and were dead asleep by twelve. Only the house wasn’t quiet but for their snoring as it normally was. I could hear the television blaring from the living room, and I could tell it was a news channel. That had to be Alton.

Frowning, I crept back into my room to wait a while longer.

At one, the television was still on.

At two, the television was still on.

At three, the television was still on.

At four, I realized that since all I could hear was static, Alton had fallen asleep in front of the television and the station was no longer playing anything, hence the static. But as long as he was in the living room, I couldn’t risk going down.

I went back into my room and locked my door. Not seeing Dane…it felt like pure torture.

I walked to the window that looked out over our field, and I curled up in the window seat. I pressed my hand to the cold glass, hoping he could see me, certain he could not. I sat that way until the tears came. This time, I let them fall. I let them fall until the well ran dry, and only then did I make my way to the bed.

I slept with the light on so Dane wouldn’t go to our rock and expect to find me there. On that night, he wouldn’t.

Much to my horror, Alton did the exact same thing for the following five weeks straight. Every single night, without fail, he stayed up late watching television and then fell asleep in front of it. If he’d wanted an effective means of keeping me in the house, he’d found it. My hands were tied.

My world wilted without Dane James in it. Not being able to see him—see him and talk to him and touch him—was killing me. At least it felt like it was.

Between his rising popularity at school, his faux relationship with Lauren, football, and farm work in the evenings, I never saw him. A stolen glance here and there was all I could get, if that. Fate, it seemed, was working even harder to conspire against us.

One day, I walked down to our rock after dinner. I didn’t care who saw me as long as Dane did, and he came to meet me.

Only he didn’t.

Either he wasn’t home or he didn’t see me, because I sat there on that rock all alone for two hours, crying for the boy who was never really mine to begin with.

I watched the sun set, felt the warmth of its attention fading from my face, and made myself get up to go home. It was as I was getting ready to climb down off the rock that I had the idea to reach up and take out one of my earrings and leave it behind. I didn’t know if Dane would find it, or what he’d think if he did, but I hoped he’d know that I’d been there, thinking of him, waiting for him, and that in some way I always would be.

I cried all the way home, and when I got there, I went right upstairs and slept for sixteen hours straight.

And woke up sick as a dog.