Page 39 of Take Me Home

He passed over a five, and the boy ducked back into the trailer.

“It’s cold,” Ash said simply, gesturing at her nose, the frigid tip of which she assumed looked like Rudolph’s. “And I didn’t get dragged here. I wanted to come.”

“Right.” She followed him to a nearby picnic table and sat across from him. “For a guy who was so desperate to get home, you have to admit it’s a little weird you’re not there.”

“I told you. My mom kicked me out.”

Hazel narrowed her eyes. He’d already walked that back. “You were fixing things,” she prompted.

Ash drummed his fingers on the table, looking longingly at the trailer. When the teenager didn’t immediately emerge with their drinks, he relented. “My dad is a big DIY guy. All my life, he’s made me help fix things. Once, he made me help replace our entire roof in the middle of summer. But now, I’m supposed to do nothing while all these things are clearly—” He shook his head, pursing his lips.

“Broken?”

He eyed her, a silent debate warring across his features. She wanted to pounce, to say,Tell me. She’d revealed all kinds ofpersonal things to him already. It was only fair. She sat up straighter, ready to say as much, when the kid came out with their drinks.

“Do you remember that party freshman year?” Ash asked, removing the lid to let it cool. “Right after the dorms opened but before classes started.”

“Vaguely.” Hazel’s nerves hummed to life. “Why?”

“You had cut your hair since graduation, and you looked really…” He trailed off, scratching one of his thick eyebrows. “It was just off your shoulders.”

“Yeah, I did the cliché girl thing and chopped off half my hair after Justin and I broke up.”

One corner of his mouth tipped up. “Part of your ‘fresh start,’ ” he recalled.

She crossed her arms. “I didn’t invent wanting a fresh start in college.”

“Didn’t say you did.”

“Then what are you saying?”

“I’m saying—” He laughed into his palms, raked both hands through his hair. “Why do you always assume I’m picking on you?”

She shrugged and shook her head like,Aren’t you?

A deep trench formed between his eyebrows. “This is exactly my point.”

“Whatis your point?”

“Nothing.”

“No. Go on.” She learned her elbows on the table. “You saw me at the party, and I looked like Audrey Tautou inAmélie—that was my hair inspiration—and then what? Something happened?” A lot had happened at that party, and while she couldn’t remember all the specifics, the bits and pieces that stuck hadreallystuck. She picked at a splinter on the edge of the table.

“You wererealhappy to see me,” he said with a dark laugh.

“Did you think I would be?”

Ash peered past her into the trees, shrugged.

Tensing under his silence, Hazel said, “In my defense, someone had spilled beer on my shoes, Sylvia disappeared five minutes into that party, and I dropped my ID through the patio slats, soyouturning up right then was just—”

“ ‘Shit icing on a shit cake,’ ” he quoted.

Hazel winced.

“It was also the first time you called meAsher.”

“I was drunk.”