Levi.
His hair was longer back then and he had dyed it purple—neon purple—and spiked it up all over his head. The school’s star football player dying his hair a silly color wasn’t jaw-dropping or mind-blowing, but it was outrageous enough to keep any attention off of me.
Levi and I didn’t speak that day, but once, as we passed in the hall, he gave me a crooked smile and that’s when I knew.
I was his completely.
Bowling pins crash against the floor and the loud noise ricochets in my ears as Matt jumps in triumph over his eight-pin knockout.
I glance over at Amanda, whose head is still down as she and her group finish their game and leave the bowling alley.
I hope she has an Andrews family in her life, or at least a Levi.
Especially a Levi.
“Earth to Sarah.” Matt waves his hand in front of my face.
I look up at him. “My turn again?”
“Yep. Go get ’em, tiger.”
Rawr.
Matt and I bowl for a while longer and we’re having a perfectly pleasant time—and by “we” I mean Matt—when he throws a giant-ass wrench into the evening.
“So,” he says after throwing his fifth strike. “What are you doing Fourth of July weekend?”
I stand from my plastic seat and walk to the ball dispenser. “I haven’t really thought about it. Why?”
He doesn’t sit back down, but instead watches as I pick up my sixty-five-pound ball and insert my fingers into the dark holes of other people’s dead skin cells.
Have I mentioned I hate this game?
“I was thinking about flying back home to San Diego for the weekend. And I want you to come along and meet my family.”
I look up. “Wow. Random.”
He laughs. “Not really. We’ve been together for a while and I think it’s time to show you off. I’ve told my parents all about you, and they can’t wait to meet you in person.”
He told his parents all about me?
My mother doesn’t even know Matt exists. Hell, Ellen barely knows. Should I have been prepping my family members for a Matt meet and greet? Shit. I really suck at the girlfriend thing.
I swallow. “I don’t know…”
Am I ready to meet his family? Am I ready to go on a weekend trip with him? Wouldn’t a weekend trip mean sex? My fingers start to sweat into the ball holes.
“Come on.” He smiles. “I really want you to meet my family.”
I scrunch my nose. “But… why?”
“Because you’re important to me.” His smile stays in place, but his voice lowers in sincerity. “And because I love you.”
I almost drop my eighty-pound ball as I stare at him. We’ve never said the “L” word to each other.
Obnoxious party music and the loud echoes of falling pins fill the silence between us as he waits for me to respond.
Up until this moment, I wasn’t sure if Matt and I would have a future or not. But standing here, in these ridiculously slippery shoes, with my fingers wedged in the sweaty holes of a ninety-five-pound sphere of nasty, I’m completely sure.
14 Levi
It’s late and the kitchen lights are dimmed as I lock the back door. Just as I’m turning to head for the east wing, the dining room door swings open and a pissed-off Pixie flies past me, knocking into my shoulder as she huffs to the sink.
“Whoa.” I turn around. “Who pissed you off?”
“Matt,” she says through clenched teeth as she washes her hands. She yanks some vegetables from the fridge, grabs a sharp knife, and starts hacking away at mushrooms.
“Matt?” All my guard dog instincts immediately go on alert. “Why? What did he do?”
I’ll kill him. If he hurt her, I will kill him.
“He told me he loved me!” She thrusts her arms out, the sharp knife in her hand glinting under the kitchen lights.
I lift a brow and wait because, surely, that’s not the reason for the broken expression on her face. But she doesn’t elaborate.
I pause. “So…?”
“So…” She laughs without humor as she goes back to hacking. “Just when I think I’m making progress in my life and might be able to get back to normal, or finally have sex with someone other than drunk Benji, or just move on from this deep, sad place I’m in all the time, Matt goes and tells me he loves me and totally screws everything up!” She starts chopping more aggressively.
Pixie hasn’t had sex with anyone other than Benji? I’m outrageously pleased by this information.
“I mean, who does that?” she continues. “Who declares their love for someone they don’t even know? Does he know about my pet turtle when I was nine? No.” Chop, chop, chop. “Does he know that my mother is evil incarnate? No.” Chop, chop, chop. “Hell, five hours ago he didn’t even know my hair was naturally curly! He knows nothing about me. And yet he wants me to fly away with him to meet his parents because he loves me? No. Just no!” Chop, chop, chop.
Pixie has been with only one guy, one time. Why am I so happy about this?
“And you know what else?” She points the knife at me violently. “I am not Captain Hook. If anything, I’m Tinker Bell.” She returns to her wild dicing. “Tinker Bell!”
Tinker Bell?
Shit. I need to start paying attention.
“He’s a crazy person,” she says. Chop, chop, chop. “So clearly I had no choice but to break up with him.”
I squint at her. “He told you he loved you… so you broke up with him?”
“Yep,” she says, popping the p.
“Why?”
“Because Matt doesn’t love me. So it’s all just bullshit. Him. Me. Everything. Bullshit.”
“How do you know he doesn’t love you?”
“Just because.”
“Because why?”
She throws her arms out again and yells, “Because love isn’t something that needs to be said out loud!” Her face flushes with passion. “It’s something you just know. It’s an unspoken thing. It’s humble and quiet and constant…” She goes back to slaughtering the mushrooms, but lowers her tone a bit. “I mean, you can’t just say you love someone and make it true. That’s not how it works. Real love doesn’t need to be declared or confessed. Real love just… is. You know?”
My throat constricts because I do know. God, I know. I know so much it’s hurting me to look at her.
“So yeah.” She swallows. “Matt doesn’t love me and I don’t love him and now I’m right back to where I started, which is exactly nowhere and I’m just so”—chop—“freaking”—chop—“sick”—chop—“of being nowhere. And nobody gets it. Nobody!”