Page 23 of Places We've Never Been

CHAPTER 5

“Let me see it,” Ezra said, reaching for my sketch pad. I moved it to my lap. We had just finished dinner and still sat at the picnic table between the two RVs at our campsite. A soft glowing light shone from the lantern in the center of the table and moths kept bumping into the glass.

I hadn’t finished the sketch at Artists Palette, that would’ve taken too long, but I’d gotten enough down that I could fill in the details later. “No. If you wanted to see it, you should’ve come and seen it IRL.”

“Did you really just sayIRL?”

Paisley laughed. “She did and it was funny.”

“Let me see it,” he said again.

“Look up a pic on your phone.”

“Mom, Norah is being a brat,” Ezra said in a fake tattletale voice.

Because the boys had made dinner, Mom and Olivia were cleaning up—repacking the ice chests, washing the dishes in a soapy water bucket. Mom didn’t even look over to humor him.

“I will show it to you,” I said, “if you tell Paisley and Skyler and Austin here about that time you ran into the street sign in front of that girl you liked.”

“You did not just say that out loud,” he said.

“Huge bump on his forehead for like a week,” I said, petting Ezra’s unruly mop of brown hair. The freckles across his nose stood out in the glow of the light and made him look much younger than nineteen.

Paisley was giggling and Ezra was slapping at my hand with his goofy smile on. It had been a while since I’d seen Ezra so relaxed. It had been a while since I’d spent much time with him at all, actually. He’d just finished his freshman year of college and lately it felt like he was always gone—either at school or work or some other mysterious college function.

“Austin once stepped in a huge puddle of water getting out of his car because some cute guy was across the street,” Paisley said. “I swear the whole bottom half of his jeans were wet the rest of the day.”

“They were my favorite pair too,” Austin said, unfazed.

“Do you really want to start sharing embarrassing stories?” Ezra asked. “Because I have a lot on Norah.”

My mind filed through some stories he might have had on me, but it had been a while since I’d made a fool of myself in front of him. Most of my embarrassment stayed in my head, where it belonged.

“Let’s hear them,” Austin said.

“Um…” Ezra looked up, obviously searching his brain. “What about that time you fell in the pool?”

“Like at school or something?” Paisley asked.

“No, in our backyard,” Ezra said. “When she was going to go swimming anyway.”

I laughed.

“That was a good comeback, bro,” Austin said.

“Shut up,” he returned.

“What about that time…” Skyler spoke up from the other side of the table, where he hadn’t said much all night.

My cheeks pricked as the blood drained from my face. Ezra may not have had any stories on me, but there were numerous ways in which Skyler could humiliate me. It hadn’t occurred to me until that moment that he would.

“That time we were walking home from the orchard,” he continued. “And that big dog chased us.”

My mind instantly latched on to the memory. We were eleven. The sky was twilight gray and we were rushing home before we got in trouble for staying out too late. We’d spent the afternoon exploring the orange orchard and our clothes and hands were covered with dust. I’d wiped mine on the back of my shorts.

“Do you think you can beat me in Mario Kart when we get home?” I’d asked.

“Only if you don’t pick the stupid rainbow level,” he said.