If I Break THE COMPLETE SERIES Bundle (140 page)

We almost had an accident once because he didn’t want to hit a confused baby squirrel that ran out in the middle of the street, so I know he has a heart even if he tries to deny it, but this broken man surely won’t be mine to fix. I’ll let another girl try to break through his smug, conceited—albeit super-hot—exterior.

“So your mom’s sending you up the river? Cuffing you to the ball and chain?” He laughs, taking a puff of his cigarette.

“It’s not funny. I can’t go to some crappy boarding school or fix-your-attitude boot camp,” I scoff.

He chuckles. “It’s not like your attitude needs fixing or anything.”

“You’re one to talk,” I spit back at him.

“Hey, I know I’m not winning any congeniality awards anytime soon, but I’m a guy. Chicks think it’s hot. My mom thinks it’s normal at my stage in life, expected even, but you’re a
girl
.”

I feel my face scrunch up. “What does that mean?”

He laughs again before taking another puff of his cigarette. “It means that you can’t be the female version of me.” He glances at me with a smirk I used to find sexy but I’m now annoyed with.

“Oh, my lifelong aspiration is crushed,” I say sarcastically.

“What I’m trying to say is you can’t do what I do, what any guy does. It won’t look right. Especially with stepdaddy having the political aspirations he does,” he says before drumming on his steering wheel to the solo playing on the radio.

“I don’t care about him and his dream of becoming the mayor, governor, or whatever else. I’m not going to change who I am because he’s an opportunistic jackass,” I say defensively.

“Look, it’s not just about that. You can kind of come off… like a bitch sometimes, and I mean that in the best way possible,” he says with a shrug.

“You can’t call someone a bitch in the best way possible.”

“Look, I know it’s the eighties and women’s lib and all of that good stuff, but at the end of the day, girls are expected to be sweet, demure, smart… well, since you’re cute you don’t necessarily have to be smart, but you get what I mean,” he says, and I turn the radio up to end this conversation. “Don’t touch the radio.” He turns it back down.

“I don’t want to talk. I just want to listen to music before I get on this bus for God knows how long,” I say, frustrated.

“Hey, it’s my car,”

“Your brother’s car,” I correct him.

“I’m driving it, and if I want to talk, we talk,” he says simply.

“Did someone lace your pot or something? What prompted you to go all mentor on me?” I scoff at him.

“I’m not trying to be your mentor, but I’m trying to tell you some good stuff so your ass doesn’t get packed away to boarding school,” he says, his voice rising.

For a moment, I think he’s offended. “You’re telling me to be someone I’m not, to change who I am, and it’s not cool!”

“Is this who you are?” he asks.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“I just remember this girl named Gwen Dwyer. She was a fourteen-year-old honors student who volunteered at the blood drives and followed her older sister around like she was Jesus. She was nice, sweet, and the type of girl who would be the perfect daughter to any political candidate,” he says simply.

I feel my face heat up.

“Something happened that made you say, ‘Fuck the world and anyone in the surrounding universe.’ You’re pissed, and hey, maybe you deserve to be, but deep down, you’re still that same sweet little girl who can play by rules and be what they want you to be.” Each syllable he speaks makes me madder and madder.

“Stop the car,” I say quietly.

“What, you have to pee or something?”

“Stop it!” I scream, and he slams on the brakes.

“Chill. What’s your problem?” he says angrily as I swing my door open, pulling on my bag behind me and walking to the side of the road. He’s still in the car, looking at me as though I’m a psycho.

“I’m going to catch another ride. You can go. Keep the ten bucks!” I yell.

He looks shocked then laughs. “Get in the car, brat.” He says it as if it’s a joke, as if I’m a joke. I hate when he calls me that or kid.

“I’m not a brat or a kid. You’re only a year older than me, and if you look at me like a kid, that makes you a pedophile since you’ve been trying to get in my pants for couple of months,” I shout.

“What did I do?” he says as if he’s clueless.

“You won’t shut up. All I want is a ride to the bus station—no long talks, no lectures, no advice, just a ride. I don’t know if it’s a full moon or something, but you’re not acting like the Zach I know. The Zach I know would take my ten bucks, blast the radio, and shut the hell up and expect me to do the same. So can that guy tell me to get back in the car? Because this one is really pissing me off.”

He shakes his head and grins at me. “Or I could drive off with your ten bucks and leave you here to get picked up by the police or some serial killer.” He shrugs with the indifferent smugness I know him for.

“That’s more like it,” I say with a small smile.

I hop back in the truck, and as I suggested, he blasts the music occasionally singing when one of his songs come on. I glance at him out the corner of my eye. I occasionally forget that Zach grew up here and knows as much about the people as I do. He’s so different, sometimes I forget that I only think that he’s from another planet.

When we finally make it to the bus station, he turns the music down. “Your stop, my lady.”

“You were being weird tonight. I don’t like it,” I say before climbing out of his truck and shutting the door.

He leans toward my side. “You like everything about me.”

I roll my eyes at him. “Careful, Zach. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think that you’re starting to like me. Well, for more than just my amazing ass.”

“I’d definitely miss it if it got sent to boarding school,” he retorts.

“I’m not going to boarding school. I’d just have to run away and shack up with you since I now know you’re in love with me and all,” I tease.

He rolls his eyes, but I do notice his cheeks turn red, and I get little butterflies. He shakes his head and gives me the middle finger before he pulls off.

The bus ride to Chicago should have been titled the bus ride from hell. When you take forty people, most of whom haven’t showered for hours, add screaming kids, and put them all on a bus with little to no air circulation, you’re asking for trouble. The only thing I can say was half okay was the two hours I was able to sit by myself, which didn’t last long. I got a chatty Cathy on steroids who had the worst breath in the entire world as my neighbor for the rest of my three-hour ride.

After I get off the bus and thank God for the privilege of air that doesn’t smell like ten different colognes, BO, and dirty diapers, I immediately realize I’m not in my small town in Michigan anymore. Even the bus station is different from ours. Where ours is just a few benches and elevator music playing in the background with one payphone in the center, this station is bustling. They have arcade games, a dozen restaurant kiosks, and a currency exchange booth. Everyone seems to be in such a hurry that I’m almost knocked down a few times. It’s something like out of the movies—people everywhere, all different races, hairstyles, and clothes I’ve never seen before. It’s exciting but a bit intimidating, and for a moment, I’m even scared. Do I look like a little country girl who’s never been more than a half hour away from home alone and now I’m in the middle of one of the biggest cities in the US, thirty dollars in my pocket, an address on an envelope, and the clothes on my back? I walk over to a hot dog stand that already has six people waiting in line.

My stomach is growling. It’s five thirty in the morning, but I don’t see anything that looks as though it’s selling breakfast. The funny thing is no one looks tired or like they just woke up, but I feel like a zombie. The line moves fast and I grab my hot dog, eating most of it before I make it outside of the station. Thankfully there’s a line of cabs waiting to take you anywhere you want to go. I scan the faces of the drivers standing outside the cars and find a short, chubby Hispanic woman standing next to one. I bypass the other drivers and ask if she’s free.

“I sure am, sweetie. Let’s get going.” She hops in, and I get in the back, fumbling through my bag for the address. I realize I probably should have memorized it.

“Where we headed?” she asks just as I find the envelope.

“Here, please,” I say, handing her the envelope.

She chuckles. “Evanston. That’s going to be about an hour from here.” She glances at me in the mirror.

“Can you take me?” I ask, trying to sound sweet and innocent.

“Honey, I’d drive you to New York City if that’s where you wanted to go, but the question is, do you have the fare? It’s going to be about twenty five bucks,” she says through a chuckle.

“Twenty-five dollars? Are you kidding?” I say in disbelief.

“Yup, and that’s only because traffic is pretty light.”

I groan. This trip has wiped out my savings from the past two years. Back in Claredon, I could have had a personal driver for the day for twenty-five dollars.

“You’re not from here, are you?” The cab driver chuckles.

I feel my stomach knot up. I don’t want to make it so obvious, so instead of answering her question, I dig into my bag.

“It’s fine. Just get me there, please,” I say, handing her a twenty dollar bill.

She smiles widely. “My type of woman.”

In Claredon, everything looks the same. Of course some houses are a little bigger than others—you can tell which ones cost more and who doesn’t bother to keep up with the property upkeep—but here, it’s so different. For the first ten minutes, we drive past buildings taller than anything I’ve ever seen, all lit up as if they have lives of their own. Then we pass smaller buildings only about two and three stories high, clustered together, and after that, the driver tells me we’re heading to the suburbs. There, the houses look more like the ones in Claredon—some large, some small, but all pretty similar—but the longer we drive, the more things change. A distinct difference from what I had just seen. Even though some of the houses before were bigger, you can tell the smaller houses here cost more.

“Who are you coming to see here, hon?” the cab driver asks me.

“My sister. She’s in her senior year at Northwestern,” I reply.

“She must be a smart cookie. Northwestern is a great school,” she says, impressed. “We’re only a few blocks away from the address you gave me.”

“Is this area, I mean, does it cost a lot to stay around here?” I ask.

She chuckles. “Hon, I could work twelve hours a day and couldn’t afford a studio apartment here.”

How is Gia staying in a place like this? I don’t think my dad could have afforded her tuition and board here even if he was alive. Maybe she has a roommate? Is Martin making enough money to write her checks to live here?

We pull up to a house in the center of a block. It’s not as large as the homes around it, but it’s still beautiful, even more so for a single college student. Last I talked to Gia, she said she’d just started working in some department in her school.

“Are you okay here, little lady?”

“Yeah, thanks,” I say, heading out of the cab.

“Have a good one,” the cabbie says before pulling off and leaving me on the sidewalk, hopefully in front of my sister’s house.