Faking Perfect (22 page)

Someone had cleaned up the kitchen. Garbage was thrown away, drawers shut, counters cleaned. And no mouse.

Shit
, I thought when I realized it wasn’t where I’d put it. What had she done with it? Mom would never touch a dead mouse, even one securely enclosed in a box. It had to be somewhere. I searched under papers, behind the toaster, in the fridge . . . no mouse. With a resigned sigh, I flipped open the garbage can and started gingerly sifting through the stuff on top.

“Looking for something?”

I whirled around, the garbage can lid slamming as my foot slid off the pedal. Jesse stood in the kitchen doorway, watching me, arms folded over his bare chest. I hadn’t even heard him approaching.

“Yeah,” I said, suddenly regretting my outfit of tiny cotton shorts and a skimpy tank top. “My, um, dead mouse. For my snake. Have you seen it?”

He uncrossed his arms and moved farther into the room, not stopping until he was about a foot in front of me. Too close. The smell of liquor wafted off him like a nauseating mist. “Hmm, let’s see,” he said, his bloodshot eyes roving down my body. “You gotta ask yourself, ‘If I was a dead mouse, where would I be?’ ”

I tried to step back, put some space between us, but there was nowhere to go. The backs of my legs hit the stainless steel garbage can, sliding it against the side of the counter. Jesse noticed the movement and laughed, amused by my revulsion. The cold deadness in his eyes made my heart thump with panic.

“Your mom made me throw it out,” he whispered, like he was confessing a secret. “Said it made her want to puke. She’s a real hag, isn’t she? Your mom?” He shifted closer to me, one hand reaching up to touch my bare shoulder. “You’re a lot sweeter. Sexier, too.”

Adrenaline coursed through me and I jolted to the side, intending to skirt around him and make a break for it. But he stepped in front of me, blocking my way, and then maneuvered me back to where I’d been. My legs knocked against the trash can again, causing it to skate sideways along the floor until it smashed against the wall a couple feet away. The reverberation was loud . . . definitely loud enough for the entire house to hear.

“Not so fast,” he murmured as he backed me into the edge of the counter. He was so close, I could feel the heat from his skin. “I’ve been waiting months for this.” His fingers brushed the bottom hem of my tank top and slid underneath, skimming along the skin above my waist band. “Wonder what you’ve got hiding under here.”

My body was paralyzed. Helpless. I wanted to shove him away, knee him in the balls, but my limbs refused to cooperate. I was in shock, unable to fully comprehend what was happening. Months of being creeped out by this guy, of carefully avoiding his presence, had somehow culminated in him attacking me in my very own kitchen while my mother slept off a bender just a few doors away. This could not be happening.

I started to cry.

“Hey,” he snapped, grabbing my chin roughly and forcing me to look at him. “This is what happens to little cock teases like you. So stop the blubbering and—”

The kitchen exploded, the flurry of sounds almost deafening in my ears. A surprised yell, hard bones connecting with flesh. Chairs scraping and then clattering to the floor. Garbage can toppling, its contents scattering in the sudden swirl of air. The dull thud of a man colliding with a wall. And the uneven panting of a younger, stronger man, who was using his forearm to exert pressure on my assailant’s throat, pinning him to the wall as he struggled to escape.

There was no stopping Tyler, no stepping in between him and his target. He was too far gone and truthfully, I wanted him to hurt Jesse. Wanted to watch his face turn purple as he panicked and fought for air. That was what the vengeful, animalistic side of me craved. But the other side, the lucid, practical one, knew it had to end before someone got seriously hurt or ended up in prison. No lives would be ruined over me.

As it turned out, I didn’t need to intervene because my mother stumbled into the kitchen, her sudden presence snapping Tyler out of his wild rage. He let go of Jesse and walked over to me, his eyes blazing with hatred and blood-lust and underneath all that, concern for me.

“Are you okay?” he asked, loosening my fingers from the lip of the countertop.

I hadn’t even realized I was gripping it. Unable to speak, I nodded quickly, my eyes still on my mother.

“What the hell happened in here?” she demanded, her sleepy gaze moving from the upended kitchen chair to the heap of trash on the floor to Jesse, clutching his throat and gasping for breath. “Jesse?”

“That guy tried to strangle me,” he croaked, tilting his head toward Tyler.

“Because you were sexually harassing a teenage girl, you sick son of a bitch,” Tyler snarled at him.

“
She
came on to
me
, Stacey, I swear,” Jesse inserted quickly. “I was just trying to fend her off, and the next thing I knew this maniac had me by the throat.”

Tyler dropped my hand and started toward him again, but I yanked him back and held on tight. He complied and stayed put, albeit reluctantly. I looked back at my mother, watched her face harden as she slowly pieced together what had happened. When it finally clicked, she turned to stare at me.

“What did you do?” she asked me quietly. When I didn’t answer right away, she repeated her question with volume.

“N-nothing,” I replied, stunned. She was seriously blaming
me
? Tyler stepped closer and squeezed my hand, keeping us both in check.

Mom blinked at him, confused, as if she was just now noticing his presence. “Who the hell are you?” she barked at him. “Why are you in my house? Get out of here before I call the police and have you arrested for assault.”

“No!” I told her, and then said in a softer voice to Tyler, “She means it. Go.”

He shook his head. “I’m not leaving until he does.”

Mom ignored him and shifted her disdain back to me. “I should have known,” she said, voice dripping with venom. “I see how you act around Jesse. I’m not stupid. Always flirting with him, parading around the house half-naked. You can’t stand to see me happy, can you?”

“What the hell are you talking about?” I yelled back at her. “How can you believe him over me? I’m your
daughter
. He attacked me, Mom.
He’s
the one who should be arrested for assault.” I snatched the cordless phone off the counter and held it out to her. “Fine, go ahead. Call the police. I’ll tell them
exactly
what happened.”

“To hell with this shit,” Jesse muttered, and then he stormed out of the kitchen and down the hall to Mom’s bedroom.

Mom followed him, pleading with him not to go as he gathered up his stuff and made tracks for the front door, ignoring her all the way. Once he was gone, zooming off in his fancy SUV, she returned to the kitchen, her cheeks wet with tears. “Thanks, Lexi,” she spit at me. “Thanks a lot.” Then she turned and went back to her room, slamming the door behind her like a bratty little girl.

The adrenaline had worn off and I was shaking uncontrollably, just like I’d done the night Keith Langley had beaten Mom to a pulp and I threw a can of vegetables at his head. The night Teresa threatened to have me taken away. What I’d never told her, or anyone else, was that sometimes I wished Keith had come back, just so she’d have to follow through on her warning.

Tyler wrapped his arms around me and I muffled my sobs in his shirt for what felt like hours. When the sobs tapered off into sniffles, he led me down to my room, helped me into bed, and tucked my quilt around me. Then he locked my bedroom door and slid in beside me, curving his body around mine. “Just in case he comes back.”

Less than five minutes later, I was asleep.

Just after dawn the next morning, I leaned over Tyler’s sleeping form, grabbed my cell phone off the nightstand, and quietly tapped out a text to my father.

If the offer still stands, I’d like to come and visit you.

Six hours later, a plane ticket arrived in my inbox. Three days later, the morning after graduation, I woke up at four a.m. and got dressed in the dark. I called a cab and wrote a note for my mother.

I’m on my way to Alton to see my father. We’ve been in contact for months. When I get back next week, I’ll be staying at the Bruces’ house for the rest of the summer. I’m an adult now, which means you no longer have any say in what I do or who I see.

Nolan will be dropping by every morning while you’re at work to change Trevor’s water. He has my house key and trip info, so if there’s an emergency and you need to contact me, you’ll have to ask him or Teresa.

Lexi

Chapter Twenty

A
t first I thought he’d forgotten about me. Minutes dragged by as I stood in the baggage claim area, sweaty hands clutching the straps of my backpack and eyes darting through the crowd, scanning for a possible match. The airport was enormous. How was I supposed to find someone I hadn’t seen in person since my preschool days?

Just as I was about to veer right toward baggage claim, I saw him. The man from my pictures, approaching me head-on with a small, expectant smile on his tanned face. He wore a plaid shirt with the sleeves rolled up, faded jeans, and cowboy boots—an interesting complement to the intricate tattoos covering both his arms.

My father’s an inked-up cowboy
, I thought as I slapped on my own version of a smile, letting him know he’d found the right girl.

“Lexi,” he said when he reached me, grinning wide. “I knew it was you just from your profile. It’s almost identical to your mother’s. You have her nose.”

I smoothed back my hair, which felt frizzy and tangled, and looked up at him. He wasn’t as tall as I remembered, even though he was a full head above my five-foot-six. To four-year-old me, he must have seemed like a giant. At a loss for words, I managed to squeeze out a weak “Hi.”

“Look at you.” His bright blue eyes—identical to my own—drank in my features. “You’re even prettier in person than you are in your pictures. I just . . . I can’t believe you’re actually standing in front of me right now.” He shook his head in awe and then hesitantly lifted both arms as though he was getting ready to hug me.

I felt myself stiffen, but I relaxed a little when he met my eyes first, silently asking permission. In response, I took a step forward and waited for him to fold me into his arms. When he did, I even hugged him back, desperate for a glimmer of connection. Up close, he smelled like a mix of Irish Spring soap and motor oil. Unfamiliar. I felt a pang of homesickness and wondered if I’d made a huge mistake in coming. This man was still a stranger to me. He was still the same guy who’d willingly let me go almost fourteen years ago, and one week with him wasn’t going to change that.

We pulled away at the same time and just looked at each other awkwardly for a few moments.

“Let’s go get your luggage,” he suggested brightly.

I nodded and turned away, pretending not to notice the tears in his eyes.

“We’re almost there.”

My eyes popped open and I glanced around, disoriented and thinking I was still on the plane. At some point during the two-hour drive, I’d completely passed out. “Hmm?” I said, my brain sluggishly playing catch up.

“Next exit,” the voice said.

I looked to my left and saw a plaid shirt and tattoos and a kind, open face.
Right
, I thought as I sat up straight and rubbed my sore, grainy eyes. My father and I were sitting in his gigantic, heavy-duty pickup truck, tooling down the rain-slicked highway toward Alton. It hit me at that moment how little I really knew this man. Sure, he’d seemed nice over the phone, and so far he seemed nice in person too. But still . . . I was encased in a moving vehicle with a virtual stranger on my way to spend a week at his house with people I’d never met before in my life. Everything about it felt surreal.

“I didn’t mean to doze off,” I said, stifling a yawn.

“No problem. You must be beat.” He took a drink from the bottle of water he’d bought back at the airport.

I glanced at his tanned, calloused hand as it curled around the bottle, trying to reconcile it with the warm hand that enveloped mine in my memories. I wondered if he remembered those walks in the woods as clearly as I did.

“Hey,” he said, and I returned my gaze to his face. “I meant to ask you before . . . how was graduation yesterday?”

Well, my own mother—who hasn’t spoken to me in days—didn’t even bother to show up, people were whispering about prom night, and I spent the entire ceremony wondering if my ex-friends were going to throw rotten tomatoes at me when it was my turn to cross the stage. Other than that, fantastic.
“It was fine,” I told him.

“Wish I could have been there.”

I didn’t respond because honestly, he’d missed the vast majority of my life’s milestones, so why should he get to witness that one? Eric seemed to be experiencing similar thoughts because he got really quiet and the air between us grew heavy with tension. Thankfully, the sign for Alton was just up ahead because I could hardly wait to be out of the truck. Within minutes, we were off the highway and cruising along the town’s main street.

“I guess you wouldn’t remember much of this,” Eric said. He was back to smiling, the tension diffused.

“No,” I agreed, peering out my rain-smeared window as we passed a gas station, a convenience store, a grocery store, a drug store, and three restaurants. Alton was even smaller than Oakfield, quaint and quiet, just like Mom and Teresa had described. Nothing about it triggered any memories, not even when Eric started pointing things out to me.

“That’s where you used to go to daycare,” he said as we drove by a small used clothing store. “I mean, back when it was a daycare. And right up there, that’s the playground you used to play on. You loved the swings the most.”

Like Grace
, I thought with another stab of homesickness. What had I been thinking, coming here? I picked up my backpack and held it to my chest, longing for something familiar.