“Wow, Moore, you did this all by yourself?”

“Shut up. We have a plan.”

He did a full loop around the truck. Then another. “What’s the plan?”

Amelia raised her hand. “A big truck and a rope.”

“So I take it you don’t want to tell your parents, then?” he asked me.

“I do,” I said, meeting his eyes so he could see the sincerity in mine. “I just don’t want this to be the first thing they see.”

He nodded. “I understand.”

Amelia hopped down from the truck. “I am going to get us donuts before Cooper gets here. I sense this is going to be a long morning.”

Amelia walked to her car parked on the street, then climbed in and drove away. The second her car rounded the corner Jackson said, “Are you going to come give me a hug or do I have to come up there?”

My cheeks went warm. “I wasn’t sure if . . .”

“If what? Did you not tell Amelia about us yet?”

“No. I told her.”

“You did?”

“Should I not have?”

In three big steps he was up on the platform and in the bed of the truck with me. I let out a yelp of surprise but then threw my arms around him.

“I thought I’d wake up this morning and find out you put the truck back perfectly in its place and wanted to not only pretend you hadn’t driven it, but pretend nothing had happened at all.” He interlaced our fingers together and leaned up against the side.

“When I came home last night everything looked eerily perfect at my house. Exactly the same and it felt so wrong. This mess I’ve made is a nightmare but at least it represents how different my life feels now.”

“Are you scared?”

“Terrified.”

He kissed me then, bringing our linked hands behind his back, pulling me closer to him. He tasted like toothpaste and pulled away too fast.

“I don’t know how long I can stay before my mom wakes up and remembers she grounded me last night.”

My eyes were still closed from the kiss. “You don’t have to go yet.”

He gave a breathy laugh, then his lips were back on mine. The truck tipped a little, not fully balanced on its perch. I let out a gasp and Jackson pulled back.

“Is it going to fall?” he asked.

“No. Amelia and I tried all sorts of counterweight maneuvers on it last night to get some traction. It’s pretty much wedged here. It’s just teasing us.”

His eyes turned worried. “You okay?”

“I’m fine.”

“Worse-case scenarios?”

My shoulders tensed up and I cringed. “Let’s not think about those right now. Let’s just fix this.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” I started to say, but then said, “My shoulders. I haven’t swum in a while. They’re stiff.”

He moved his hands to my shoulders and began rubbing them. “Do you think that maybe your shoulder pain has less to do with swimming and more to do with stress?”

“There does seem to be a correlation.”

“Maybe instead of working on conditioning them, you need to work on de-stressing your life.”

I laughed. “I’m trying.” I patted the edge of the truck. “This isn’t exactly the most relaxing situation.”

“We’ll fix it,” he said.

“We have to.”

Thirty-Six

Cooper’s truck rumbled up the drive.

“Cooper’s here!” Amelia called, shoving the rest of the donut into her mouth and running toward the drive.

“Oh,” Abby said as she climbed from the passenger side. “Fun.”

“So much fun,” I said dryly. “Did Cooper bring a rope or do I need to find one in the garage?”

“He brought one.” Abby turned to Jackson. “Hi, I’m Abby.”

“I’m Jackson. The boyfriend.”

I smiled with that statement.

Cooper joined us, putting an arm around Abby’s waist. “You ready to save this beautiful truck?”

“Yes, please,” I said.

As Cooper and I studied the bumper and wrapped the rope, I heard Jackson say to Abby, “So I heard you’ve met the guy who plays Heath Hall in the movies. Grant James.”

“Who told you that?” I asked.

Amelia laughed. “You know I tell that to everyone with ears.”

Abby smiled. “Me too. And yes I have. He starred in a movie with one of my best friends: Lacey Barnes.”

“Wait, you know Lacey Barnes?” Jackson asked. “That’s what you should be bragging about, Amelia.”

“How is Lacey doing, anyway?” Amelia asked.

“Great. She’s working on another movie and still dating Donavan Lake.”

“Is he famous too?” Jackson asked.

“No, but he’s great.”

“I think this will work,” Cooper said, tugging on the rope and bringing my attention back to the task. “Just let me back up the truck.”

“Sounds good.”

I clutched the steering wheel, ready to direct the truck the right way as soon as it was free of the platform. Amelia, Abby, and Jackson stood off to the side, Jackson chomping on his second donut and Amelia laughing at something he said as they waited for the show to start. Cooper revved the engine. My heart was in my throat. I turned on the music to drown out the sounds of my own breathing that was making me even more nervous. Jackson gave me a thumbs-up—to show support or to show his approval for the Pearl Jam song that now blasted out of the speakers, I wasn’t sure. Or maybe he was giving the go ahead to Cooper because suddenly his truck lurched forward, my cue to give a little gas as well.

The rope tied between the two trucks snapped taut and vibrated with the new tension. My brother’s truck moved forward ever so slowly. At first my whole body relaxed with the motion until a sound so loud I could hear it over the scream of the music—a groaning, a screeching of metal—pierced the air. The underside of the truck was being dragged along the edge of the platform. My first instinct was to slam on the brakes, not wanting to damage the truck. Cooper either didn’t hear the sound or didn’t have the same instinct because he kept moving forward. That’s when two other sounds happened almost simultaneously: first a loud creak, then a bang as the entire platform bent to one side, then collapsed. I bounced in the seat as the truck slammed onto the ground, all four tires finally level. The second sound was a ripping of metal as the front bumper of my brother’s truck was ripped free, flying through the air, and hitting the back of Cooper’s truck, then falling to the ground. That’s when his brake lights flashed and he finally stopped moving forward.

Pressure pushed against my ears, muffling the sound of the music as I stared at that unassuming piece of metal on the ground in front of me. A piece of metal that was sure to ruin my life. This was not supposed to happen. I was supposed to fix this, not shock my parents. And definitely not break my brother’s priceless truck.

Nobody moved. It felt like time had slowed down. The hope of hiding all of this vanished. What had I done?

Images of my parents’ reactions flew through my mind in still frames, each one worse than the last. The final image, the one that stayed as if trying to burn its likeness into my vision was my mom, her arms folded, wearing the face I had seen so often lately: disappointment. No matter what I did, how hard I worked, I could never escape that face. Now it would follow me for the rest of my life.