My stomach sinks as it hits me what’s going on. Just crap. Maggie yanks out of my grasp and races for the park. It warms my heart to hear Jax and Kaden encouraging her to run faster.

“So,” says Mom.

“So,” I repeat, feeling the need to hide the bruises on my face that I thought I had covered so well with makeup.

“I heard you talked to your dad this morning.”

“Yup.”

“I also heard that you talked to John about a scholarship.”

Figures John would snitch on me, but I ignore the twitch of anger because of the hope that spreads within me. Maybe this isn’t about the bruises. Maybe the makeup has worked. “Yes.”

“Alice Johnson’s son heard from Notre Dame.”

I stop, because the ache that I was rejected is still too fresh. Mom pauses beside me and places a comforting hand on my arm. “Did you get in?”

I shake my head because I’ll cry if I speak.

Mom stretches an arm around my shoulder and rests her temple against mine. “Why didn’t you tell us, Haley? Your father and I want to be here for you on this. And not just with the college search, with everything. It’s like you’re keeping everything bottled up all the time.”

I readjust, forcing Mom to drop her arm. “I was going to tell you,” I lie. “Things just got busy.”

“Haley,” Mom starts, but I don’t give her an opportunity.

“I told Maggie I’d race her on the monkey bars.”

Mom’s forehead furrows, but she nods, accepting that I’m ending the conversation. “No matter what, I’m here if you need me.”

If I need her.

I need her and Dad desperately, but since we lost our home everything has become distorted. “All right.”

“Believe me,” she pushes.

“I believe you.” I don’t and as we walk down the street, neither of us holds ourselves as if we believe the other.

Chapter 22

West

An insanity leaks into my brain that makes deciphering reality from fantasy impossible. The cold creeps past my skin, past my muscles, and burrows deep within my bones. My limbs feel numb. Mainly my toes and my fingers. I blow on them and I no longer sense heat.

I’m low on funds and low on fuel, but I can’t take the chill anymore.

With a flick of my keys, I start the engine and turn the heater on full force. This is my third night sleeping in the car. I think it’s my third. My stomach growls. Two in the morning, I’m freezing my balls off and hungry as hell. I don’t know what the f**k I’m doing anymore.

At home I’d be warm. I’d be in a pair of boxers under a pile of blankets. Stomach full.

I could go back. Pull in and walk through the door, but I stop the thought. Dad threw me out and if I walk in, he’ll throw me out again.

I roll to my side in the reclined driver’s seat, searching for comfort. Each night, I fall asleep, then wake up from the cold. And if the plummeting temperatures don’t jerk me awake, the demons haunting me do.

Exhaustion causes my eyesight to blur, but I force myself to stay coherent. I can’t fall asleep with the car running. I’ll be out of gas by morning. It’s in these moments when reality mixes with dreams that sleeping in the car becomes dangerous.

Wake up!

My eyes snap open and my entire body shivers. I dreamed it. I slam my frozen hand against the steering wheel. I dreamed again that I had powered on the car. My breath billows out in a cloud and my fingers hurt as I bend them. I pinch myself after I turn over the engine. I’m awake this time.

Awake.

The air first blowing out of the vents is cold, but within a few minutes hot air defrosts my frozen digits. I push a button and the radio plays. Not loud enough to draw attention, just soft enough to keep me awake.

This song played the last time I talked to Rachel—the night of the accident. She was pacing in a conference room in her golden ball gown. She was a replica of one of those f**ked-up fairy tales she was addicted to when we were kids. Only Cinderella wasn’t a seventeen-year-old high school junior with severe anxiety issues.

“I’m sorry, Rachel,” I say as if she can hear me now—as if her memory could have heard me then.

“You stole from me, West.” The gown crinkled as she completed the endless pacing loop in the small room. “You expect me to speak to you after that?”

“I was helping Gavin.” Our oldest brother. My breath is a white puff of smoke in the cold air. “I stole the money out of your room because he gambled too much. I didn’t know you needed it. You should have told me you needed help.”

In an extremely bold and uncharacteristic movement, my sister lifted her skirt so she wouldn’t trip and invaded my personal space. “Isaiah and I needed it. If anything happens to him...” She paused, then pressed on her stomach as if she was in pain.

Fuck it. I rub my eyes. She is in pain. The night of that last conversation we had was the night she went after Isaiah. She went after him to save him and she ended up in an accident. She ended up in pain.

And Rachel told me if anything happened it would be my fault.

A bell rings and I jump in my seat. My heart pounds hard once as my breath comes out in a rush. The cheap-ass alarm clock I bought continues to blare in the passenger side and the first light of day breaks in the east.

My neck is stiff from falling asleep against the driver’s-side door. My fingernails are blue. I stretch my legs and my knees automatically lock.