Breakaway

B
R
E
A
K
A
W
A
Y

Also by Kat Spears

Sway

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.

BREAKAWAY
. Copyright © 2015 by Kat Spears. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. For information, address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

 

www.stmartins.com

 

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
(TK)

ISBN 978-1-250-06551-3 (hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-4668-7247-9 (e-book)

 

St. Martin's Griffin books may be purchased for educational, business, or promotional use. For information on bulk purchases, please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, extension 5442, or write to [email protected].

 

First Edition: September 2015

 

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For Harant “Harry” Soghigian, father and best friend, a king among men.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

As ever, a million thanks to my editor, Sara Goodman, for the way she deeply loves my characters and pushes me to write the best story possible. She has so much faith in my books it makes me wish I was a better writer. And endless thanks to my agent, Barbara Poelle, for always telling me I'm great, even when I'm not.

This is a very personal book for me, reflecting the people I knew in high school, their very real struggles and life situations. I must acknowledge the funny and amazing boys and girls, now amazing men and women, I knew in high school who made up my South A family of friends. Every “your mama” joke in this book was inspired by them.

This book also reflects the personalities and clever dialogue spoken by the people who populate my life at the Lucky Bar. People who work in the service industry, especially those at the Lucky Bar, are the funniest and smartest people I know.

Thanks to Maile for allowing me to use her Jay Z/DMX joke. I couldn't, in good conscience, ever take credit for that bit of brilliance.

Jason's personality and internal monologue were inspired by one very exceptional person. A person who I love and cherish. And even though he will go unrecognized in these pages by anyone who knows him, he's the only reason I could write this book. I hope everyone who reads this book falls in love with Jason, because he truly deserves it.

B
R
E
A
K
A
W
A
Y

CHAPTER ONE

I sat on the stoop, a small concrete step outside the door to our apartment, hoping I could avoid going back inside until everyone was gone. We lived in what the rental office called a “garden apartment” because we had a door that opened directly to the outside instead of into the central stairwell, though there was nothing even remotely like a garden on the grounds of our apartment complex. The hard-packed earth and gravel yard sustained only a few scrubby patches of grass, and the trees were wilted and sad, their knobby roots exposed.

As I sat there Chick came walking up the slope from the parking lot, rubbing his nose on the sleeve of his jacket. He was wearing something that resembled a suit. A dark jacket that was two sizes too big for him, and a pair of gray slacks that were held up with a beat-up, brown leather belt. The knot of his tie was almost as big as his head.

“Hey, Jaz,” he said as he approached me. “Sorry I couldn't make it to the funeral. Jordie and his mom couldn't pick me up and I didn't have another ride. You doing okay, buddy?” Chick was panting slightly and the small pink scars on his face stood out in stark relief to his chalky complexion.

“Nice suit,” I said as I ran my finger under the collar of my shirt to relieve the pressure on my neck. “Did you beat up an old man on the street to steal that?”

“You're hilarious,” Chick said with a tilt of his head. “And an asshole. But somehow, I still care whether or not you're doing okay.”

No, I wasn't okay, but I didn't say that. Actually, at that moment I had been thinking about how much I was dying to get out of my tie, but figured I should keep it on until everyone was gone. “I'm doing all right,” I said grudgingly. The way Chick's eyes were probing my face, I knew he wanted more of an answer, but he wasn't going to get it.

Chick's real name was Walter Fitzgerald Gunderson, but a really bad case of the chicken pox when he was a little kid had forever marked him for the nickname Chick. He was small and thin and took more sick days than any other kid in school. The scars on his face were a daily reminder of just what a sickly little kid he had been. At seventeen he still looked like he was twelve. I was the one who had started calling him Chick when he returned to third grade after a long absence for his illness. Maybe it had started out me calling him that because I was being a prick, but he had taken it as a show of friendship. I had made it to my senior year only because Chick did the homework I didn't have the patience to do myself, and I was the only thing that stood between him and the regular mistreatment he would have taken from bullies. Freshman year alone I got at-home suspension three times for fighting, just because I was sticking up for Chick.

“Is Mario here?” Chick asked as he peered through the window of the apartment.

“Yeah,” I said. “Jordie too.”

“Everything go okay at the funeral?”

I hesitated as I tried to think what I could tell him about the funeral. Nothing. There was nothing I could say, but I knew what everyone would be talking about at school. My little freak-out, which, I was trying to convince myself, maybe not everyone had noticed. Still, I didn't know how I was going to go to school on Monday, since it was all anyone would be talking about.

There had been plenty of people from school at the church for the funeral service, even a few teachers, but the sea of faces had been just a blur. The only faces there that meant anything to me were Jordie's and Mario's, the only people there who were real. Everyone else was just a confusion of insincere tears and empty condolences.

At the church, Mario and Jordie had both come to sit in the front pew, the space reserved for family, without being asked. They were the only family I had besides Mom and Aunt Gladys and Uncle Dan. At least, the only family that mattered.

I was supposed to have been a pallbearer, along with Aunt Gladys's husband, my uncle Dan, and the two men who were serving as ushers during the service. But when it came time and I sat there contemplating the white casket smothered in pink lilies sitting at the base of the altar, I felt a sick feeling rising in my gut. All I could think about was that only a few inches of lacquered wood separated me from Sylvia's body, and it creeped me out so much, I couldn't move, as if my feet were glued to the floor. There was no way I could put my hand on that coffin. No way I could lift it knowing the weight I carried was the dead body of my sister.

I had just stood there like an idiot for a minute, then turned and looked back at Mario as everyone in the church waited for me to join the other three men at the casket, their hands poised above the handles. Though it felt as if an eternity passed while Mario read my face, in reality it was only a few seconds. Mario stood and, without another glance at me, took my place at the fourth handle. I hung back near the altar while everyone else filed out of the church behind the casket.

“How was the service?” Chick asked, bringing me back to the present.

“I don't know. Okay, I guess,” I said, wishing he would drop it. Chick had a terrible habit of talking about his feelings, and expecting other people to do the same. That, and his weak body, had permanently relegated him to the friend zone with girls.

“You know, I've never been to a funeral before,” Chick said thoughtfully. “Least not one that I remember, since I was a baby and all when my mom died. But it's good for you, you know? Gives you a chance to be sad. You really need that.”

“Mm,” I murmured as that was all the encouragement Chick usually needed to keep on talking.

Mario and Jordie came spilling out the door then, eager to get away from the crush of strangers. Mario had been tugging on his tie, and the knot was twisted to one side, his shaggy black hair lapping over the collar of his shirt. He had forgone his usual fauxhawk, at his mom's insistence I was sure. She made him go to confession and Mass every week, though he always went to Saturday evening Mass so he didn't have to get up early on Sunday and spend half the day at church with his family. Over the years, I had endured many sermons as I waited for Mario's release into the freedom of a Saturday night.

Mario's mom had come to the church service but left before we went to the cemetery because she couldn't get the time off work to stay for the graveside service. She was a small woman who didn't speak very good English, though her chocolate brown eyes knew everything with a glance. She and Mario crossed themselves during the service since they were Catholic. Mario's mom usually attended Spanish Mass, so I wasn't even sure she understood everything the priest said, but she knew instinctively when to stand, when to drop her head and pray, when to cross herself.

“Hey, Chick,” Mario said. He worried the knot in his tie as he spoke. I had never seen Mario dressed in a suit, and the clothes looked almost as uncomfortable on him as he must have been in them.

Jordie wore a suit too, but with the comfort of long practice. His dad was a colonel in the army, and that was what we all called him, the Colonel. Even Jordie called him that. But Jordie's dad also came from money. Jordie's mom was Vietnamese, a fact he was always trying to forget, though she cooked the best Vietnamese food you'd ever taste. Her pho was legendary. Jordie was a strange blend of his parents—fair skinned with honey-brown hair, but with his mother's eyes.

“How you holding up, Jaz?” Mario asked.

I shrugged. “Okay, I guess.”

“Jesus, so many people were at the funeral,” Jordie said. “I couldn't believe it. You'd think Sylvia was Miley Cyrus.”

“You keep mentioning Miley Cyrus, man,” Mario said with an accusing glance at Jordie as he dug a crumpled cigarette out of his pocket and straightened it with care. “Why are you so into Miley Cyrus?”

“I'm not
into
Miley Cyrus,” Jordie said, taking Mario's bait. I was immune to it. Mario could never suck me into a defensive conversation anymore. I knew him too well. But Jordie, even after knowing Mario and me for five years, almost a third of our lives at that point, was still an easy mark. “I'm just using it as a comparison,” Jordie said, giving way too much explanation. He never was good with a comeback. “Miley Cyrus is famous. So, I'm saying it's like Sylvia is famous.”

God, Jordie couldn't just let it go. Mario had gotten what he wanted, a rise out of Jordie, so he would soon lose interest.

“I'm just saying you mention Miley Cyrus a lot,” Mario said to Jordie, changing tack as he lit his cigarette, then took it away from his lips to blow at the ember. “If that's what you're into, that's cool.”

“Watch out,” I said with a nod toward the parking lot. “Your mama just got here, Mario.”

Mario's cigarette was already on the ground, his foot hovering just above it as he spun to look over his shoulder in a panic. Jordie and Chick laughed in appreciation as Mario cussed at me.

“
Pendejo
motherfucker,” Mario said. He scowled in my direction as he bent over to retrieve his cigarette, now flattened, the tip still barely smoking. He straightened the cigarette again and relit it, then kicked my shoe.

“Mama's boy,” I said, the worst insult we could throw at each other short of talking shit about someone's mom. Maybe I was immune to Mario, but I could still get him just about anytime I wanted.