Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 119476 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 597(@200wpm)___ 478(@250wpm)___ 398(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 119476 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 597(@200wpm)___ 478(@250wpm)___ 398(@300wpm)
But tonight, when she asked me if I was excited to meet Rand and his son, I just couldn’t.
I totally snapped and told her I wasn’t excited and that she should be ashamed of herself for sneaking around the way she did. I told her it was obvious she didn’t care how I felt about it all one way or the other, otherwise she wouldn’t have hidden it from me.
Her eyes filled with tears, and she had to grip the steering wheel really hard to keep us from sliding all over the wet road. She said I wasn’t being fair. I told her she wasn’t either.
I feel bad for making her cry, but come on! Who does that to their kid?
Whatever. I wish I could say that was the worst part, but sadly, it wasn’t.
We bickered all the way up until we got to his house—although it’s more of a cabin, really. And way out in the woods. Like so far away that no one would hear you scream.
Rand, as Mama calls him, was waiting outside for us. I thought he looked mad, but when he came and opened Mama’s door, he was all lovey-dovey and sweet. To her. He completely ignored me. Not that Mama noticed. She was too busy soaking up his affection to even think about me.
Rand’s a big guy. Tall, with dark features and a little gray in his hair. His face looks mean anytime he’s not looking at Mama. Whenever he focuses on her, his hard eyes go all soft and gooey.
I guess as long as he’s nice to her, it doesn’t much matter what he thinks of me. He doesn’t have to like me, because I don’t see myself ever liking him either.
The biggest surprise of the night was that Rand has a son. He’s grown, though, and kind of looks like a superhero. He was nice enough, even if he did call me a pipsqueak.
I wasn’t very nice to him, though, and now I feel awful. He made an effort to talk to me, and I ignored him. I was acting like a total snot. He even caught me when the weather scared me and I tripped. I didn’t even say thanks. I just ran inside and did my best to ignore everyone for the rest of the night.
Atlas—that’s his name, by the way—tried to include me in the dinner conversation, but I didn’t want to talk.
Even worse, I cried over dessert. Rand served banana pudding, which was Dad’s favorite. We used to make it together at least once a month. We tested hundreds of recipes before we found the perfect one.
It felt wrong to eat it at Rand’s table. Mom sent me to the bathroom to “dry it up” and called me a brat on the way home, which really hurt. But I guess I deserved it.
If Dad would have been there, he would have said he taught me better than to be so rude. Guess I’m just a disappointment all around.
Any dreams of having a cool, older friend are out the window, too. I’m sure Atlas thinks I’m a little crybaby. I definitely came off like one. I guess the real question is which is worse—being a crybaby or being sad and socially inept?
Humiliated, Nora
CHAPTER 4
ATLAS
The sound of my phone ringing pulls me out of Nora’s despair. After two more cups of coffee, I retreated back to my room and fell face-first into her diary.
Reading our introduction, and the events that led up to it, leaves a hollow feeling in my chest. The kid’s been through more shit than anyone her age should have.
Swiping my thumb over the screen, I blindly accept the call. “Hello.”
“Atlas, man,” Ellis’s voice trickles through the line. “It’s not good.”
With those three words, he has all of my attention. “Tell me,” I demand, jumping up from my desk chair, I begin pacing back and forth in front of my window. “Just… tell me.” My voice breaks at the end, as I beg my oldest friend not to sugarcoat it.
“The place is totally trashed.”
“Trashed how?” I ask, coming to an abrupt stop. My dad’s a lot of things, but a slob isn’t one of them. He was always damn near militant in his need for cleanliness.
“I don’t know…” He pauses, and I can almost picture him surveying the space, his eyes narrowed and his feet planted wide. “Like someone tossed the place but didn’t take anything.”
“What do you mean?” My voice comes out steady, which is a small miracle given the Class VI rapids of conflicting emotions crashing against my insides.
“The furniture’s all a mess, the dressers have been ransacked. But that’s not all.”
Icy dread crystallizes in my veins. Call it a premonition or something, but I know the next words out of his mouth aren’t going to be good.