I am working up to it.

He smiles and shakes his head. “You eat like a college student,” he says, and I narrow my eyes at him, confused.

“Um, I am a college student.” I thought he knew that. But judging by the way his eyes widen, I guess he didn’t.

“You are?” he asks, and he’s so distracted by that fact that he doesn’t seem to notice Bruiser sidling up next to him, his eyes trained like homing beacons on Ash’s hamburger. A smile spreads across my face and I look back up at him.

“What? Why do you look so shocked? Don’t you think I’m smart enough?” I’m teasing, but he seems to be taking me seriously, and he begins to turn a little red around the neck.

“Yes,” he says. “I mean, no. Of course not.” He shakes his head as if to clear it, and he looks down just in time to see Bruiser take a snap at the burger in his hand, and yanks it away before the dog can get it. Bruiser whines and falls back on his haunches, making sad noises at his owner, like he’s bemoaning the terrible injustice of it all. It’s fabulous. That dog deserves an Academy Award.

“No, I mean you’re smart enough. Of course you are. It’s just—”

“Just what?” I dunk another piece of my sandwich into my pot of soup, confident in the fact that my food is safe for now, and pop it into my mouth.

“I just didn’t realize there were any colleges around here. Like, at all.”

“Oh, no,” I say. “I don’t think there are. No, I go to school in Climbfield.”

Ash

Shit. Shit. She lives in Climbfield. That’s two fucking states away.

Of course she does.

I feel like every muscle in my body has tensed up all at once, to haul myself up over the edge of a cliff, only to go limp and fall over the side, anyway. I’m so screwed. I finally find a girl like her, and she’s leaving. It’s June now. When does college start back up, August? September? I don’t even know. There’s no way she’ll want me. I don’t even have the smarts to know when college starts, let alone attend one or do anything worthwhile with my life. There’s no way she’s going to give me a shot, not when she’s leaving so soon. And she’s got a ton of shit going on in her life, anyway. No wonder she wants to sell the house.

Oh fuck. The house.

That’s why she needed my help. So she could get it done in time to sell it before school starts back up.

Fuck.

I look up at her. She’s practically glowing in the evening light, skin all golden from working in the backyard with me for the past two weeks. She’s smiling from ear to ear, telling me about the program she’s in, about the kids she’s going to be able to help once she’s done.

I barely hear a word of it. My brain has screeched to a brutal halt. All I can think about is the fact that she’s leaving.

There’s a whine beside me and I look down to see Bruiser gazing up at me with sad eyes. I sigh and take one last bite of my burger before tossing the rest to him. Star stops talking abruptly as he chows it down, and when I turn to look, she’s got this little wrinkle between her eyes and I’m so screwed, because I want to lean over, smooth my hands down through her thick, inky hair and kiss that wrinkle away.

“You okay?” she asks, and even though I’m choking on the words, I nod and force them out.

“Yeah,” I say. “Just not really hungry, I guess.” I’m about to turn to her, to tell her that I should be hitting the road, when my eyes catch on something, something that’s been niggling at the back of my brain, bothering me. And it’s like a fucking target I can’t get out of my sights.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Well, that was something,” she says, giving me a little smile, “but I suppose I’ll allow it.”

“You might get pissed.” I know I would if someone started questioning my ink. Tattoos are fucking personal.

But she just raises her eyebrows at me, and shakes her head, still smiling at me. “Just spit it out, Ash.”

“What’s wrong with your tattoos?” I blurt out, and then instantly want to kick myself. Because that came out way wrong. “I mean . . . ” I need to fix this before she starts thinking I’m a total asshole. “They look like they’re fading or something.”

The smile slips from Star’s face, and she looks down at her arms, brow furrowing. Then she does something completely out of the fucking blue.

She tilts her head back and laughs.

“Oh god,” she says, reaching up to clap a hand over her eyes. “You scared me for a minute there.”

“Okay, I’m really fucking confused,” I tell her. What the fuck is she laughing at?

“They’re just drawings,” she says, voice muffled by her hands covering her mouth. “They’re permanent marker.”

“What, all of them?” I ask, because if so, they really fooled me. But she just shakes her head and lets her hands fall back to her lap.

“The waitress at the diner kept giving me her murder-face whenever she caught a look at my real ones, so I started adding to them with the sharpies Autumn sent me, just to piss her off.” She stands up and reaches out, turning her extended arms this way and that, so I can take a closer look. Without thinking, I squat down so we’re at the same level and reach out and wrap my hand around one of her wrists, turning her arm gently. She’s right. They’re just marker. Now that I’m up close I can see where her real ones end and the drawings begin. It’s pretty obvious, actually.

I kind of feel like an asshole, though. But Star just smiles at me, looking up at me through her dark lashes.

“They’re kind of shitty, I know,” she says. “I’m not a very good artist.”

“I am,” I murmur, and then freeze when I realize I’ve spoken aloud. I wait a beat. Then two. Three. Then I tear my gaze away from her arm and look up at her. She’s staring at me, a little furrow forming between her brows.

“You are?”

“Shit,” I say, and drop her arm and pull myself out of my crouch, trying to put some distance between us. “I didn’t mean to say that. Your drawings are fine.”

“My drawings look like they were done by a twelve year old on Ritalin,” she says, and instead of just letting it go, she stands and turns to face me. “Now what did you say about being an artist?”

“Oh god,” I say, and reach up to scrub a hand over my face. I am giving too much of myself to this girl, sharing too much. And the damnedest thing is, I want to.

But I can’t. How the hell can I keep my distance when I keep letting her get close.

“Wait here,” I tell her, and then walk down the porch, around the corner, and through the gate.

I could just get in my car, I think. Get in my car and just drive away. Then we’d never have to talk about this, and I’d actually be able to stay away from this girl.

But I don’t. When I reach my car, instead of swinging open the door and sliding into the driver’s seat and tearing off down the road, I just lean in and pull out the hardback book I keep on the passenger seat. I don’t even let myself think about what I am doing on the walk back. Because if I do, I’ll chicken out.

“Here.” I thrust the book out to her. She blinks at it, then at me, like she isn’t sure what I’m doing. I sigh, embarrassed. “Just take it,” I tell her. And she does.

She opens the cover, and immediately sinks back down to sit on the step. “Holy shit, Ash.” She says, flipping through pages. “Did you really draw all these?” She goes from page to page, through my sketches. Sketches of Bruiser as a puppy, the yard at the prison I spent five years in, the hallway at Avenue High where my friends and I used to hang out when we should have been in class. They’re decent, but they’re nothing special. I only picked up drawing because it made girls dig you and simultaneously managed to keep me out of trouble in high school. After all, when I was busy drawing, I wasn’t busy doing things I shouldn’t have been doing.