Chapters (47)
- Cover
- Dedication
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- 2 Months Later
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- Books by Kasie West
- Back Ad
- About the Publisher
She joined me, then laid her head on my shoulder. “You have no idea how proud I am of you right now.”
I gave a single laugh. “For what? For taking my brother’s truck and failing to put it back right?”
“No. For realizing that you don’t have to earn your parents’ love.” She squeezed my hand. “And if they don’t kill you first, I’m sure they’ll realize that too.”
“Thanks. Very helpful.”
“Maybe Jackson will know how to right this truck. We should call him.”
“At two o’clock in the morning? I think I can wait until a decent hour. My dad won’t be home until tonight anyway. I have time.”
Amelia stretched and leaned her head back to look at the sky. “This is a great view.”
I looked up as well. The stars were bright tonight. “How long have you known that my swimming was about my parents? My brother?”
“First of all, you love swimming. Don’t let this make you think you don’t. But in a race, as soon as you tap the wall, your gaze goes first to the scoreboard. If, and only if, your name is in the top spot, do you look to the stands.” She took my hand in hers. “Maybe now you can swim for yourself, Hadley. Enjoy it even more.”
Thirty-Five
I awoke with a pain in my neck and two mosquito bites on my right arm. A bird chirped from the tree above. I groaned and rubbed at my neck while I sat up. The hard metal floor of the truck bed was not a comfortable mattress.
My phone, sitting next to me, informed me it was only seven a.m. The sun or the bird or the mosquito bites must’ve woken me up because this was too early to get up on a Saturday morning. Amelia still slept next to me, hugging a pillow, the blankets pulled up over her ears. The night slowly came back to me: taking the keys, driving my brother’s truck off the ramp, getting my brother’s truck stuck on the platform, then spending hours talking to Amelia in the back of it. At some point during the night, I had run inside, grabbed some blankets and pillows because we were cold, and brought them back out to the truck so we could finish talking. We must’ve fallen asleep.
My head ached. The events of last night did not seem better this morning. The sun only made everything that much clearer. The huge patch of grass stripped away, now muddy and dark beneath the front tire, looked so much worse in the light of the day. I let out a small whine.