Page 34 of Paper Hearts

“Let’s start walking. They’re taking for fucking ever.” He motions me forward and turns his back to me. “Hop on.”

I do as he says leaning my chin on his shoulder as he carries me down the long dirt road. On the back of his neck, he has a scar that looks like someone stabbed him. “What happened?” My fingers lightly touch the raised skin running over the clean line.

He chuckles, adjusting his hold on me. “First summer we came out here, I was, what, like thirteen?” He nods, seeming to know he’s right. “Greer pushed me off the rope swing, and I landed on a stick.”

“In your neck?”

“Yep. Hurt too. Sixteen staples and one surgery to get the stick out.”

“Damn, you could have died.”

“Oh, don’t be so dramatic.” He’s downplaying it. “It wasn’t that bad.”

This is the first story I’ve heard of Greer, and it gets me curious about his relationship with him. Arya doesn’t talk much of him and neither does Myles.

“Do you still talk to Greer?”

“Nope. He left when he turned eighteen, joined the military, and we haven’t really heard from him since. He came home on leave, but I was in Jacksonville with Wiley and Walker.”

“You didn’t want to see him?”

Ender shrugs, adjusting his hold on my legs, hands slipping slightly on the mud that’s caked on my legs. “It wasn’t that I don’t want to see him. Greer is the good kid, like Myles, or even Arya. I’m the fuck up. The one parents wish would get his shit together but never really does.”

“Why?”

He draws in a heavy breath. “Why what?”

“Why are you that way?”

“Why should I be any other way? The only reason they want me to do good by them is for status. They don’t want me fuckin’ up because it looks bad on them.”

“So you’re that way for you?”

“No, shit’s complicated, and you’re a kid. Leave it that way.” He glances over his shoulder at me, his cheek brushing against mine. “How’s your face?”

“It’s fine.” I wiggle my way off his back to walk beside him. “What do you mean by complicated?”

Clearly frustrated I’m asking, he runs his hands through his hair. “Where the hell is Walker?”

Tightness in my throat returns. “I wasn’t trying to be mean. Just curious.”

“I know. I just… they want me to be Ender James, the little boy they had big dreams for, but that was their vision, not mine. I’m not sayin’ I wanna be a bum or anything, but I want a chance to decide for myself. It’s never really been that way for me. Not when your dad is Theo James.”

I don’t know much about Theo, but I know the James family owns a commercial construction company in North Georgia for the buildings being contracted by James Construction. They have their hands in everything, so my dad says. With that, comes expectations for his children, I assume.

“Is that why Greer left?”

“Part of it. He’d never admit to it. Like I said, he’s the good kid. But he joined the military instead of following in Dad’s footsteps. That should tell you somethin’.”

And it did. It told me a lot about the James boys.

13

WHEN HE ASKED IF I’D BEEN KISSED

Iget in a lot of trouble over the ditch incident with Ender. You knew I would. My face has a minor bruise, but nothing crazy. For a week, I’m not allowed to go over there. That is until Dad leaves for a work trip and my mom caves.

“Fine, but stay out of trouble. If you come back hurt, I’m not protecting you,” Mom tells me as I run out the back door in my bikini.

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