Page 2 of Road Trip

“I thought he was just a dick,” Charlie said with a grin that told me he didn’t mean it. Mostly.

“Eh.” I shrugged. “That too.”

It was still pretty early when we got home. Mom and Dad looked surprised to see us so soon, but Luke was happy we were back.

“Hey, dickbags,” he said. “Let’s watch a movie.”

We liked each other really, I promise.

We headed down into the basement with chips and sodas, and Luke demanded to know all the details of the party.

His jaw dropped. “You saw Savannah’s boobs? Holyshit. Tell meeverything.”

“You little perv.” I snorted, and he looked to Charlie beseechingly.

“I’m gay,” Charlie said and shrugged. “They were nice, I guess. Symmetrical.”

“Jacob,” Luke whined.

“Dude, if you’ve seen one pair, you’ve seen them all,” I said. Boobs were overrated, honestly.

“I haven’t seenany,” he muttered and threw me a death glare. “I don’t have a girlfriend like you do!”

I gave a guilty jolt.

Shit.

Layla.

“Hey!” she’d exclaimed when she saw me at the party and pushed herself up onto her toes to kiss me. “I’m gonna go say hi to Kennedy. Meet me back here?”

“Sure,” I’d said and then, like an asshole, I’d forgotten about her andleft.

I winced as I pulled my phone out of my pocket.

Five messages and two missed calls.

“Shit,” I said. “Start the movie without me. I have to make a call.”

And I headed upstairs and all the way out into the backyard, where, if Layla actually picked up, I could apologizeand grovel without having my brother and my cousin laugh at me.

Ashower of pebbles on my window woke me when it was still dark, because apparently Matt had never heard of texting. Like, I didn’t even need to look out the window to know it was him. Who the hell else would throw pebbles at my window instead of picking up his fucking phone? He’d been doing this since we were kids.

I climbed out of bed, careful not to step on Charlie, who was sleeping on a mattress on my floor for the summer. I crept around him and opened my window.

“Matt?”

“Yeah.”

I caught a glimpse of his pale face in the gloom before he melted back into the darkness under the dogwood tree.

I closed the window and tiptoed toward my door. Luckily, I knew my way through the house in the dark and which creaking steps to avoid as I went downstairs. I let myself out onto the back porch where Matt was waiting.

“You been home yet?” I asked.

“Yeah. Zeke’s there, though.” Matt wasn’t the biggest fan of his mom’s boyfriend, although that was more on account of how thin the walls in their trailer were than anything the guy had done. He showed me a crooked smile. “Wanna go to the beach?”

At three in the morning?

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