Page 7 of Now to Forever (Life on the Ledge Duet #2)

Four

The house resembles a ridiculous pyramid constructed in the seventies and smells like the walls are insulated with mothballs. The photos did not do this place justice: it’s worse. All ridiculous lines and wallpaper and outdated everything.

The downstairs of the house is both open and cramped, the angles of the walls seemingly stealing square footage.

A U-shaped kitchen and small living room bleed into one another, and down a short hall there’s a bedroom, bathroom, and a utility room with a washing machine one spin cycle away from falling apart.

Other than the pristine view of the lake out of the one solid wall of windows, it’s ghastly.

My heels click up a steep spiral staircase that leads to the master loft.

Behind the clunky headboard of the bed is a smaller wall of windows, framing in a thick hedge of trees.

The closet has a few of Archie’s shirts, fishing gear, and a lone pair of suspenders.

The Pepto-colored tile master bathroom has a full-sized bathtub, grimy grout, and carpeting on the toilet.

Through the entirety of it all, above me is the exposed, wood-planked apex of the roofline.

I lean on the spindled railing that overlooks the open downstairs, wondering if I can do this. If I want to do this. If it can possibly sell for enough money to get me out of here.

Straight ahead, the lake and the town’s namesake rock ledge fill the windows like a painting.

While most of the lakeshore sits down at water level with a gentle slope, there’s a long section—directly across from me—that’s bordered by a slick granite rock face that drops straight down.

At the top, a rock ledge where the first people settled and declared the town Ledger.

Way Archie told it, his great-great-grand something was the one who led the Ledger-naming charge.

Light from the mid-afternoon sun makes the ripples on the water look like sparkly confetti.

The house, though burning my retinas, vibrates with a kind of energy that begs to be noticed. Like it’s only ugly because nobody thought to make it shine.

And, dammit, something in that grabs my throat and squeezes. Like maybe all my ugly and all the ugly in this stupid triangle can become something less ugly together.

I push off the railing and start toward the steps, stopping when I catch my reflection in a gold-framed mirror leaning against the wall, its old age evident by the wavy glass .

Everything about me looks abstract: my dark, brown-haired bob is big and wild, my hazel eyes are more wideset, and my lean build is Wanda-like curvy.

I tug on the lapel of my blazer, tilting my head.

My reflection is always a mind fuck; it never shows what’s there, only what’s not.

Even though I’ve come to accept it, every time it happens it’s a deep bruise being pushed on.

This mirror might be the most accurate one I’ve ever looked at.

Down the stairs, across the shaggy carpet, by the tube television and floral everything furniture, I emerge onto the large porch and take a deep breath of the hot summer air.

At the wooded corner of the property sits a shed resembling a kill room.

I make my way toward it, clusters of pine needles making the points of my heels wobble with every step.

Unkempt grass and piles of leaves slope gently down to a sandy patch of beach with a canoe resting bottom up, two paddles next to it.

In the middle of the yard, a bird lands at a half-filled bird feeder hanging from a hook.

I spent my entire childhood on this lake, laughing with June and being chased by Ford.

Pretending I belonged here instead of the run-down trailer park I grew up in and with the worthless parents that bred me.

Standing on the familiar shoreline, I feel just as fraudulent all these years later, and it nearly knocks the wind out of me.

Ripples caused by a small boat kiss the shore as I let the idea of me in this house—a place of my own on the lake June and I used to dream we’d live on—be the thing to cut the shackles that have tied me to every person I’ve lost—dead or alive—and set me free .

At the cedar-shingled shed, the door sticks the first time I try to open it, swinging open the second. No dead bodies, just a wooden workbench with tackle boxes and tools. There’s one window letting light in and a single dusty bulb hanging from a beam in the center with a string.

I open a tackle box and chuckle: Between the hooks and lures, there’s a plastic bag of rolled joints. Archie, you sneaky bastard.

In the first cabinet: dried up cans of paint. In the next: a small box I pull from the shelf.

A loud bark rips through the air and a shot of terror makes the box fall from my hands—metal sinkers and plastic bobbers scattering across the floor—as my head snaps to the doorway.

There, sitting with a tilted head and another loud bark, is a dog.

Hand to my chest, heart pounding, I let out a breathy laugh. “Shit, dog.”

Its tongue lolls out of its mouth as it barely lifts its ass off the ground, wags its tail once, and sits back down with a whimper before barking again.

I wince at the noise, studying the strange pattern on the fur—I recognize it from one of the photos Lydia showed me.

It’s mostly black with random yet bold streaks and splatters of white.

Like a zebra and a wolf got drunk at a party and banged a new species into existence. “The hell did you come from?”

Another whimper, but it doesn’t bark this time. I look around the shed, keeping my distance from the creature but noticing the details I hadn’t before: metal bowls on the wood-planked floor, kibble in a container, and, much to my dismay, a doggy door. Archie had a dog.

Fuck.

We stare at each other, me and the strange animal, some kind of sizing up like we aren’t quite sure what to make of the other.

Out of nowhere, it barks again—loud—and leaps like a kangaroo toward me until its front paws land on my thighs. I stumble back as the thing licks my face between barks.

“God,” I grunt. “Get the hell off me.”

“Molly!” a female voice calls from outside, making the dog pause and ears perk. “Molly!” she repeats. “Here, girl!”

Instantly, the creature drops from me and takes off out of the shed at a sprint.

I mutter, wiping the dirt from my pants and follow. There, dropping a bike in the middle of the driveway, is a teenage girl, crouching as Molly licks her face.

She stands, cocking her head to the side as dark brown hair hangs over her pale face and raccoon-inspired eyelinered eyes squint at me.

“What the Wednesday Addams fan club are you supposed to be?” I ask, crossing my arms over my chest as her black-edged eyes widen. The rest of her outfit is just as ridiculous. Black combat boots, black leggings, and a black sweatshirt, sleeves so long they nearly swallow her fingers.

“A human,” she says, eyes wandering down to my shoes before snapping back to my face. “What in the stick-up-my-butt pantsuit are you supposed to be? ”

I snort a laugh, studying her. “What are you doing here?”

“Feeding Molly.”

I eye Molly and the teenage goth queen, noting they resemble one another, but am unsure of what to say to any kid other than June’s. “Hm.”

“Who are you?” she demands, borderline rude.

I look at the house and lake, every reason I have to leave both behind flashing before my eyes. “The new owner. Does this dog just free-range it or something? There’s no fence or leash.”

“She’s trained to stay. She’s trained to do a lot, really. Archie let her in when he was here, and when he wasn’t she just kind of . . .” She looks around the property. “Did whatever.”

I look at the dog again, seemingly harmless as the girl pets her.

“It’s trained?” I ask, suspicious.

“ She is.” She pins me with an annoyed look then holds her palm out and looks at said trained dog and says, “Sit.”

Molly sits.

“Down.”

Molly lays down.

“Porch.” Molly runs across the yard, around the trees, up the four steps of the porch and lays by the front door, a sort of pride in her pant.

“Impressive,” I admit.

The girl smiles in a way that translates to I told you so . “Do you have kids?”

“No.”

“Husband? ”

My eyes narrow. “No.”

“Why not?”

“Didn’t your mom tell you that it’s rude to ask so many damn questions?”

Her expression remains neutral as we start toward the porch. What little bit of her eyes I can see stay fixed on me.

“My parents were shitty,” I tell her.

Something like disappointment flitters across her features. “So because you had bad parents you can’t be one?”

“Would you go to space without going to astronaut school?” I ask, eyebrows raised.

She looks back to Molly, not responding.

“How old are you?”

“Fifteen.”

“Where do you live?”

She scoffs. “I can’t tell a strange woman where I live.”

“Ah. But you can come to a strange woman’s house and interrogate the shit out of her?”

“You swear a lot.”

I lift my chin with a smirk. “It’s part of my stick up my butt appeal.”

For the first time, she almost laughs, and we stop at the porch, leaning against the edge.

Molly whimpers from her spot by the door and the girl gives a firm, “Here,” prompting the dog to do a kind of army crawl across the porch until she’s beside us, earning a scratch behind her black-and-white ears .

I study the girl’s weird features again; she’d be pretty if she didn’t wear so much makeup.

“Your mom teach you to wear eyeliner like that?”

She shrugs.

“Your parents know you’re here?”

She holds up a wrist, barely pulling up the sleeve of her sweatshirt to show a chunky watch with a screen. “My dad makes me wear this so he can track me.”

I puff out a laugh at the annoyed expression on her face. I can’t relate: I’ve never been tracked in my life. “And your mom? She okay with you going to a triangle house hanging out with a dog by yourself?”

At this, she pushes herself off the porch, dusts her hands off, and looks at her combat boots. “She’s out of town. She’s a poet.”

“A traveling poet?”

She rolls her eyes. “So?”

I don’t care enough to push it. “Fine.”

“I usually come by in the afternoons and feed her if you want me to keep coming.”

I look at her ridiculous eyeliner and the dog who could be her twin sibling; I have no clue why she’d want to keep showing up here. “Fine.”

“Well, I just have something I need to get out of the shed, and then I can get going.”

She starts walking and I hold a palm out stopping her. “Is it in a little plastic bag?”

Guilt writes itself all over her face. Busted .

“Yeah, that’s not happening.”

She blows out a breath. “What are you going to do with it?”

I shrug. “Smoke it. Flush it. Sell it on the street to a stoner in need. Either way, it’s not yours.”

She rolls her eyes—again—and starts toward her bike with a muttered, “Whatever.”

“What’s your name?”

“Wren,” she says, turning to look at me as she picks up her bike. “Yours?”

“Scotty.”

“That’s a boy’s name.”

“Better than a bird.”

She swings a combat boot–clad foot over the bike and positions herself on the seat and shrugs. “Not my fault.”

Wren takes off down the driveway, and I chuckle. Little weirdo isn’t wrong about that.

When she’s gone, I turn back to the house. A triangle in the woods, not making a lick of sense with its big front porch and wall of windows, a subtle reflection of the trees and water on the glass.

I close my eyes and take a deep inhale. It’s clean. Crisp. It’s still warm, hot even, but fall isn’t far away, confirmed by the slightest yellow tint on the tips of trees across the lake when I open my eyes. Even just one fall here would be more than I’d ever imagined for myself.

I’ll live here, renovate it, sell it, and get the hell out of this town.

I said it to Ford last night in a moment of spontaneous verbal combustion—even when I texted June I wasn’t sure I actually meant it—but I see it all so clearly now: Everything I’ve felt these last months is because Ford waltzed back into town, reviving thoughts of what was and what-ifs.

Even if I wasn’t leaving, houses like this belong to people with babies in bathtubs and families who sit on porches—things I’ll never have or want.

Molly barks, bringing my attention to her at my feet. “Fine,” I say, petting her on the head for the first time, surprised at how soft her fur is beneath my fingertips. “I’ll keep the house. For now.”

She barks—again—making me wince as she looks up at me with a doggish kind of smile.

“You chew my shoes and you’re fucking fish food.”