Page 15 of Dream (Fighting Fate)

“You can call me Josh,” he said, halting my escape. “I don’t mind. Most of my friends do.”

I smiled in response, still poised, ready for a quick getaway.

“Would you mind if I joined you on your walk?” he said suddenly.

Okay. Not what I was expecting. “Oh, um . . . sure, I guess that would be fine. I didn’t really have a destination in mind, though. I was just going to enjoy the peacefulness.”

“Sounds perfect.” He smiled at me, then came to stand beside me, nodding his head in the direction I was heading.

I blinked, realizing I was just standing there like an idiot. Taking a step forward, I started slowly walking as he moved beside me. Glancing back at his house, I was startled to find the guy who’d come to my door yesterday staring down at me from the balcony. I was about to wave, but the intense expression on his face didn’t look anywhere near as friendly as it had the day before.

“So, where are you from?” he asked casually, interrupting my worrying.

“Oh, I’m originally from Salt Creek Beach, but I’ve been living in Uganda for the last six years.”

He stopped walking altogether and turned fully around to stare at me. “In Uganda?” he asked with a touch of incredulity.

I laughed at his shocked expression. “Yeah, my parents joined this World Aid group when I was thirteen and decided we should go help out as a family. We were stationed in a shanty town just north of Gulu. It was a pretty wild experience.”

He was still staring at me, disbelief coloring his expression. “You were living in a shanty town?”

I didn’t laugh this time. The memory of the people I’d met, and come to love, who lived in that shanty town, made me too emotional. “Mmmhmm. I worked with them, went to school with them, helped them try to cultivate the land to feed them, gave them medical relief, tried to encourage the girls to stay in school. I even entertained them.” I laughed at that last part. Some of those girls had become some of Taylor Swift’s biggest fans.

Josh was quiet for a while as he watched me, then he cleared his throat softly. “Entertained them how?”

I gave him a knowing glance full of self-importance. “With my musical prowess, of course.”

He looked taken aback for a second, but then I laughed, and his expression turned to confusion. “You’re a singer?”

“Oh, God no,” I said quickly. “I learned the guitar when I was a kid, so it was just a way to help keep spirits up. The younger ones liked it. Some of them even learned to play a bit themselves.”

He shook his head. “Wow. That’s . . . incredible. I think I’m a little speechless right now.”

I blushed. I didn’t really see it that way, so I didn’t say anything in response. We started walking again, this time in silence. I guessed he was trying to wrap his mind around it all or something. After a while, he cleared his throat again. “So, six years. I’m assuming you came home for vacations and stuff?”

“Oh, no. We never felt the need.”

He frowned a little, as if in thought. “So, what about your own entertainment? Did you get to go to the movies, or read the typical girly magazines? You would’ve kept in contact with your friends, surely?”

I laughed a little at that. “Nope, nope, and nope. We did put on movie nights every now and again, but they were from an old video collection left from the many people before us. VHS and all. I’m pretty sure everything in there was pre-millennia. And girly mags?” I gave him a withering look. “The last thing I wanted to do was look at the rich and famous in glorious locations, while I was standing knee-deep in mud.”

“And friends?” he asked.

I sighed. “I tried. We used to e-mail and text, but after a while our contact grew less and less, until it just stopped altogether. And to be honest, I think I was actually glad, you know? All they ever wanted to talk about was which boys they thought were hot, who I was missing out on drooling over, and which celebrities they’d like to do. After spending the day trying to convince a fourteen-year-old girl that it would be better for her to come to school than go sleep with some AIDS-infested forty-year-old for ten dollars, I really couldn’t stand listening to them.”

He stopped walking again, so I did too. I gave him a questioning look, wondering what he was doing. He was just standing there, staring at me. I couldn’t even decipher his expression, but it gave me a chance to gaze at him unabashedly. He really was very good-looking.

Suddenly, Aunt Jenny’s idea of a little holiday fling didn’t seem so ridiculous. If only I could be bold enough to follow through with it.

Chapter 12

Josh

I was honestly speechless. This girl had actually rendered me mute.

Taking a minute to gather my thoughts, I gave her a warm smile. “Wow. I think I’m actually a little in awe of you.”

Her cheeks filled with a soft pinky color. It was just beautiful. She was just beautiful. Without makeup, without her hair styled or straightened, without any sparkling accessories. She was simply perfect the way she was.

---