Page 108 of The Right Garza

I drift over to his dresser, touching the items there. A globe map, a bobble-head Michael Jordan, and a framed picture of Monica and Flavio.

I squint when I notice something folded up and stuck into the lower corner of the dresser mirror. Setting the mug down, I pluck it out and unfold it.

It’s a picture of me. I can’t have been more than fifteen and I’m smiling cheekily with a finger to my bottom lip. It’s difficult to tell when or where it was taken because whoever else was in the picture with me has been cut out, the edges jagged and worn.

I flip it over and find scribblings on the back.

I love you.

I hate you.

I lied. I still love you.

But I really, really wish I could hate you.

Judging from pen point and ink, all four lines were written at different times. And my heart breaks for teenage Trent. To be in love with a stupid, oblivious, self-absorbed girl who looked him over and went straight for the older brother. That couldn’t have been easy for him to deal with or accept. Especially at an age where we barely understood our emotions or how to process our feelings. I understand now why he’d turned to Maggie.

If he’d resented me back then, he never showed it, because I never felt it. He used to piss me off, irritate me, press my buttons, but I can’t say I’ve ever felt real hate from him. Ever.

But I really, really wish I could hate you.

Pressing the picture to my chest, I pad to his bed and flop back on it, staring up at the plain ceiling. I want to text him and tell him I’m in his room, but I don’t have a phone, as I’ve decided to remain unplugged while I’m here.

Trent and I haven’t spoken since he dropped me off two weeks ago. Monica told me he called for me several times on the house phone when I wasn’t there, but I’m yet to return any of his calls. I figure it can’t hurt to see if, after an extended time of not seeing or speaking to him, my feelings will remain the same. Just so I know this is not some “Ohmygod, I almost died, life is so short and precious, so I love you and want to spend the rest of it with you” phase.

I’m quite often fickle and impetuous, so I want to be sure this is true, and genuine, and real. Because that man, that wonderful, amazing, beautiful man, does not deserve anymore of my fuckery. He deserves thebestof me, all that I am and can be, doing right by him and making up for lost time, so I need to make damn sure my heart is in the right place.

Rolling onto my side, I pull my knees up to my chest.

My restlessness is no more.

In no time at all, I’m lost in unconsciousness.

Chapter THIRTY-THREE

“What’s the verdict?”

Lexi

I exit the bathroomand cross the hall to Trent’s old room, stopping short when I find Monica sitting on the bed with the cordless phone in hand.

With a sigh, she stands and hold out the phone to me.

I begin to shake my head no, petrified, but she grabs my hand and forces the phone into my palm until I have no choice but to close my fingers around it lest it falls to the floor. “He didn’t want to wait for a call-back this time.”

As she walks past me and leaves the room, I look down at the screen, at the running minutes.

Trent

12:18

He’s been waiting on the phone for twelve minutes?

In the week and a half, I’ve since ditched the guestroom and have been sleeping in his childhood bed, drowning in nostalgia, but still haven’t returned his calls. Twice he’d showed up at Mama’s restaurant looking for me and I made her lie to him that I wasn’t there. Another time he showed up at the house and I hid and made Monica lie that I’d gone for the night with Maggie.

Suffice it to say, both mothers are sick of my antics and cowardice and warned me they wouldn’t lie for me again.

But I know he knew they were lying. Red Cage has hidden cameras all around Monica’s property, and I’m strongly convinced they have surveillance on Mama’s restaurant, too.