Finding Me (24 page)

My arm burns from the loss of his heat, and I try to recall if that’s just how it feels anytime you lose the warmth of someone’s touch. I realize I’m working to convince myself of the fact when Max’s voice interrupts my attempts.

“Don’t lose me, Ace.” He’s looking directly at me, keeping Kendall aloft with one arm under her shoulders and another beneath her knees. I pull the skirt of her short charcoal gray dress to ensure it keeps her covered and move my eyes back to Max’s, which are still intently looking at me.

“I won’t.”

He nods once and then heads into the hall with me in tow.

“Hey, Alex, what’s going on?”

Max stops when I place a hand on his back, seeing the girl with the bright red lipstick that had given me directions.

“Is she okay?”

“Yeah, she will be,” I reply, turning my glance to Max for needed confirmation. He nods once, and it fills me with the confidence I have been desperately seeking. I turn to look back at the girl.

“Is this one of your sisters?”

I confirm the fact and watch her look over Kendall, recognizing her appreciative expression. Even passed out drunk, Kendall’s shockingly beautiful.

“She’s beautiful,” she says, confirming my mental assessment. I smile and nod to say I told you so.

She turns her attention to Max and looks him over for a brief second. “Your girlfriend doesn’t realize she’s a fucking knockout. I don’t know if that’s because she’s really that cool, or because you’re not doing your job well enough.”

My eyes widen in panic and my mind scrambles to diffuse her words. “Thanks again for your help.” I place a hand on Max’s back and gently push him to indicate for him to move again.

“Hey, Alex?”

I turn once more, feeling even more hesitant.

“Your sister really is beautiful, but you’re heart-staggeringly gorgeous.”

I manage to give her a small smile and turn back to Max, keeping my eyes on the crowd as I closely follow him out of the party.

“I think you’re ringing there, Ace,” Max says as we cross the street toward a large gray truck.

“Whose truck is this?” I ask as Max pulls out some keys.

He looks over at me, his mouth set in a grim line before his attention focuses on the truck. “Mine.”

His words rock me. This is much bigger than getting rid of a pitcher, or a clock, or a blanket. This is his Jeep. The car that he worked to rebuild and drove since high school and that I had rode in to most of our dates. I really have been erased.

I fish through my small purse and retrieve Kendall’s phone as it rings again and see Jameson calling.

“Hey,” I quickly answer.

“Kendall?” Jameson’s voice is coated with anxiety.

“It’s Ace.”

“Ace, I’m so sorry. Can I talk to her please?”

“She’s kind of … unresponsive at the moment,” I begin.

“What? Is she okay? Where are you guys?”

“We’re okay. Max is here.”

“Where are you guys?” he repeats. Before I can answer he continues, “Ace, let me talk to Max really quick.”

I don’t object. If I was in a reverse situation, I would want to talk to my sister for her opinion on the situation too. I tell him to hold on and climb into the driver’s side of the truck, loathing the dress again as I try to ensure it remains in place with constricted movements. Max carefully deposits Kendall into the passenger seat of his truck and I help hold her and fasten her seat belt before handing him Kendall’s phone. I brush loose waves of hair from her face as I try to inconspicuously take account of the truck. It smells like leather and new car, with just the faint trace of him in the background that has me distracted for a few moments.

“She’s wasted, but she might have been roofied. Ace saw her chugging some tequila, so it’s tough to say, but her pulse and breathing are good.”

I can hear Jameson yelling obscenities and then angrily murmur.

“No one touched her. Ace called me and we have her in my truck now.”

Jameson’s voice grumbles another reply.

“I’ll see you at the house.” Max hands me the phone and closes the passenger door. I watch through the windshield as he crosses the front of the truck to the driver’s side.

Breathing seems like an Olympic sport as he slides in beside me, his thigh brushing against mine as he gets situated.

“Seat belt, Ace.”

I need him to call me Harper again. Having him call me Ace is too familiar and filled with too many memories. My muscles tense as I move to fasten my seat belt.

We ride for several minutes in silence that begins to feel endless before I break it.

“Did I really drunk dial you? I haven’t been drunk in forever.” I try to turn to look at Max without moving my entire body and see a faint grin grow on his face.

“When?” I cry, horrified that it may have been the night that I met Danny, or the night that I found Kitty in the hospital.

“Spring break last year. You, Kendall, and … God, what was her name? Shelly?”

“Shelby.”

Max shrugs with indifference. “You guys were on that cruise from hell.”

My hand covers my eyes as I recall the vomiting, heat, and terrible scents that permeated the air. Right now, I’d trade going back to that moment for nearly anything so I could return to those moments and change the month that followed.

“I don’t remember drunk dialing you.” I rack my thoughts to recall him even mentioning it to me.

“You were a little drunk,” he says with a laugh.

“God, I bet that was a fun call filled with whining.”

Max’s laugh fills the cab. The tenor of his voice brings a familiarity to my body, knowing how the sound feels against my chest. “No, you barely whined.”

I want to ask what we discussed, but Max seems content with his brief answers, and I don’t want to push him.

“Kendall’s the whiny drunk, after she surpasses her craziness. You were always happy, and as you called it, friendly.” My cheeks heat and my body involuntarily leans closer to him. “You just wanted to come home.”

I shift again, pressing my knees together so hard I think I may be bruising them. “You know, I really didn’t know your nephews were at your house. Honestly, I would never have encouraged them to do that.”

Max glances at me, his blue eyes shining in the dark of the night. “I know,” he concedes with a tight nod. “I wasn’t trying to blame you for it. Things are just …” His words drift off with the song playing softly on the radio.

I resituate to angle my body so I can support Kendall better, hoping Max will finish, but attempting to disguise my near need for it.

“Is that stuff you said about you and your sisters … is that really how you feel?” Max asks quietly, breaking the brief silence that has settled over us again.

“Stuff I said about my sisters?”

“About you being the leftover, or not being as pretty as them, or whatever.”

This is not the conversation I expected to have. Not at all. I look down at Kendall and her gleaming blond hair. “They all just have such a beautiful pureness with their blond, blond hair blue eyes, and alabaster skin.”

“How would you describe yourself?”

I turn my head to look over at him again and try to consider his question. “I don’t know. I mean, I don’t think I’m ugly or anything, I just don’t have the unique and undeniable beauty that they have. I’m kind of plain looking. People just think there’s more because of my name.”

“Seriously?” Max scoffs. “I’ve heard people describe you using a lot of different words. Never was the word plain used to…”

My phone rings at full volume, startling me, and I’m pretty sure Max when I see his eyes move from the road to my purse.

I fish it out, not certain if I feel relieved for the interruption or just disappointed. “Hey, Kyle.”

“What’s going on? Do you need help?” His voice is anxious. I hadn’t left messages because I didn’t want to alarm them, but having called each of them multiple times warrants the concern in his tone.

Max’s hand comes into view as he turns the radio down as I quickly assure Kyle that everything’s okay, leaving the details of the situation open so Kendall can share what she wants when I know so little.

Jameson meets us in the driveway, with Landon behind him, when we pull up. I unlatch her seat belt and help Jameson unweave it from her arms so he can lift her from the cab. Before I lower down to the driveway, I remove both of my heels and feel the residual warmth of the sun meet my feet.

We head inside and Jameson changes her clothes while I wipe off her makeup. Max appears when Jameson opens his bedroom door, holding two glasses of water. “See if you can get her to drink these when you try to wake her up. I’d set an alarm for every ninety minutes.”

“I’ll set mine too,” I say, looking to Jameson, knowing that an alarm likely won’t wake him up.

When I come out to the living room in a pair of cotton shorts and an old soccer camp T-shirt, Landon, Zeus, and Max meet me, propped on the couch.

“What are you guys doing?”

“Thought we’d join your slumber party, since you won’t be sleeping anyways,” Landon says, flipping on the TV.

“You guys should go to sleep. You have work and school. I have nothing going on until tomorrow night for the bachelorette party.”

“I don’t know if Jameson’s going to let her out tomorrow,” Landon says, mirroring my very thoughts.

I get situated on the edge of the couch with Landon beside me. Zeus sits between him and Max.

“
The Breakfast Club
!” I cry when the TV focuses.

“The what?” Landon asks.

“
The Breakfast Club
. It’s Molly Ringwald.”

Landon looks at me with raised eyebrows and a small smile as he lowers the remote. “Who in the hell is Molly Ringwald?”

“The Brat Pack,” Max answers, shocking the hell out of me.

We make it through most of
The Breakfast Club
before checking on Kendall to find her only slightly responsive. I sit behind her, my legs straddling her waist, as we get her to sit up and drink. Jameson sits beside her. He hasn’t fallen asleep either.

Once we manage to get Kendall to drink the contents of a single glass of water, we finish the movie. Following it, we watch something much darker that has me burrowing further into the couch.

“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.”

–Ralph Waldo Emerson

I
panic seeing the sun streaking through the windows. I sit up further hearing a familiar squealing.

“Abby!” I cry, standing up as she rushes toward me with Max protesting for her to slow down on the slick floors. She wraps around me, squeezing me so tightly I can’t catch a breath, undeterred by his warnings.

“Oh my God, I fell asleep!” My body goes rigid as I begin pulling away from Abby.

“It’s okay, she seems to be feeling way better than I expected,” Max says.

“She’s awake?”

Max nods and my eyes go to the clock to see that it’s already two. “It’s two? In the afternoon?”

Abby pulls back and uses one hand to wipe at some stray tears as she laughs at my shock, still keeping the other firmly latched on my shirt. “I’m starting to experience some strong waves of maternal instincts, so it’s probably best you guys don’t tell me what’s going on. Unless there’s some sort of racy information, then I want to hear it.”

My eyebrows raise with a laugh. “Oh, Abs, I’ve missed you,” I say, hugging her again before pulling back and placing a hand on her tiny belly that’s proudly on display.

Abby sniffles and wipes a few more tears from her cheeks. “I’m so happy to see you!”

I smiled broadly, feeling the comforting sense of home filling me again before a thump hits my palm. “She’s kicking me!” I cheer.

“She’s excited to meet her Auntie Harper!” I smile and continue to feel the soft kicks.

“Abby are you hungry?” Max asks.

“I’m always hungry,” she admits.

“Want some pizza or something?”