Page 42

Thirty-Nine

I am very tempted to wrap one arm around my little sister’s shoulders and cover her big mouth with my hand. Instead, I fist my hand and rub my knuckles against her scalp. A good ol’-fashioned noogie to shut the girl up.

“Callum!” Tiff moans, shoving me away.

Fran watches us with a curious smile on her face. She doesn’t have siblings, but surely she’s witnessed siblings interact before. At the very least, in a movie.

“Come on,” I say. “Ready to meet the family?”

“Am I?”

“Don’t worry. Tiff is the scariest one of them all.” I wink at Tiff and earn myself a tongue-out eye roll from my sister.

“You’re the scary one,” Tiff says. “Do you realize you’ve been kissing a goober, Fran?”

Fran lifts one shoulder. “I’m not completely shocked to hear you say that.”

Tiffany laughs. “She’s funny. And I like her.” She lifts one brow at her brother. “Goober. ”

Fran’s cheeks swell with her grin.

“No more talking about kissing,” I say to my sister.

“I saw the video,” Tiffany deadpans.

“How have I not heard of this video until today?” Fran says, looking at my little sister.

“Well, unless you saw it, you may not have heard about it,” Tiff says. “The person recording got Callum’s face and the back of your head. Your friends might not even know it’s you—I mean, unless they already know you’re making out with my brother.”

I clench my jaw. “Can we not say make out? Please. Or I’m going to have to bring up Shane Willey.”

Tiffany gasps. “You wouldn’t!”

“I would.” I turn to Fran, ready to spill a not-so-embarrassing story that my sister has hated for the last seven years of her life. The day she was tricked into kissing Shane Willey on the playground. “When Tiffany was in first grade?—”

“Shush!” Tiff barks, covering my mouth with her hand.

I push down my sister’s fist and open the door to the place I will always call home.

“You can leave your things in the entry,” Tiff says to Fran, though I am the one literally carrying all of our stuff.

“Thanks, squirt, I’ll take them up.”

Fran peers at the low-hanging hooks in our entry and giggles to herself. “Cute.”

“Is Fran in Kailey’s room?”

“Umm, no,” Tiffany says. “Kailey is in Kailey’s room.”

“But I thought she’d come for the party and then go back to Montalvo.”

Tiff grins at me. “You thought wrong. She wants to stay here as long as you’re here.”

“And Asher?—”

“Asher’s in his room. Mom has Fran in with you.”

“Fran isn’t staying in my room with me, though.

It’s…” I peer from my sister to Fran. “Not like that.” I don’t mention to the fourteen-year-old that I have issues, Franny Fairchild issues, and every time I’m alone with the woman, I end up with my mouth molded to hers, ready to give her whatever she asks for. “I can sleep on?—”

“We can stay in Cal’s room,” Fran says, while I choke, “We can?”

“Yes,” she says. “We’re all grown up, Callum Whitaker. We’ll be just fine.”

“This is about a movie—isn’t it?”

“No,” she says, but I don’t believe that high-pitched tone for a second. “Well, maybe, but that doesn’t matter.” Fran looks at Tiff. “We’ll be fine.”

Tiff giggles. “Problem solved! You know Mom doesn’t like you sleeping on her couch anyway. You get all your boy sweat soaked into her pretty fabrics.”

I sigh. “I’m just going to take these up.”

“Good. Mom is in the kitchen. I’ll just take Fran to?—”

“Nope!” I spout. “Fran comes with me.” I snatch her by the hand, abandoning my bag altogether, and tug her up the stairs after me.

Fran chuckles. “I’m not allowed to meet your mom?”

“I didn’t say that. I just want to make the introduction.” It’s mostly true. What I don’t say is that I don’t trust my little sister with Fran—not for a second.

Fran pauses, tugging me back, and peers at the pictures trailing up the wide stairway, me and my siblings through the entirety of our lives .

“Is this you?” she says, pointing to a picture of me at five. I’m standing at the goal of a small soccer net—sobbing.

“That’s me. That was my first and last attempt at goalie. It’s not for the faint of heart.”

“And you’re faint of heart?” she asks, grinning at that photo my mother refuses to take down.

“I was back then.” I never understood why Mom framed and hung that particular photo, but Fran seems to be enjoying it.

“Tiff could always camp out in my room. You could take hers.”

“And miss the chance to live out a romcom?”

“Right.” I sigh. “Why would you do that?” Fran, in the same room as me—all night long. What are the odds I keep my hands to myself? Because as quirky as Fran Fairchild is, she’s also sweet and adorable with my own personal magnetic pull living somewhere inside of her.

I swallow, clear my throat, and check those raw, irrational feels at the door. Because at this point, I’m disappointing my mother, behaving the opposite of a gentleman, and I’m confusing myself as well as Fran.

Fran examines my bedroom—a shrine from my high school days.

I’m not sure how many times Dad has asked Mom to turn one of our rooms into a gym or an extra office.

But Mom always tells him no. She’s sentimental like that.

In some ways, she reminds me a little of Fran.

Details matter. Time matters. Memories matter.

For the record, I would be completely fine if Dad turned my room into a gym, and yet, it’s kind of sweet coming home to my Pelé posters and my junior team trophies on every shelf in the room .

“Wow,” she says as we cross the threshold. It’s the same word Simone uttered the one and only time she came into this room. She came, met my parents, and saw my childhood bedroom, and less than an hour later, she left.

Same word—but completely different meaning. Fran speaks with amazement. “This is you, Callum—kid you. It’s like I’ve stepped back in time.” She lets go of my hand and turns a full circle, taking in the space.

“Yeah, Mom likes to keep things a certain way. She’s nostalgic like that.”

“I can appreciate that,” she says. “It’s very…” She picks up my stuffed bear with the San Jose Earthquakes logo on the front. “Interesting.”

“Hey,” I say, unsure if I’m teasing her or myself, “Landon Donovan and I have been through it all together.” I steal the bear from her grasp, pat his head, and set LD back on my bed.

“Landon Donovan?”

“He was my dad’s favorite player. I saw him in person once, but I was young.”

“That’s nice.” Fran sits on my bed, and while it’s a queen, it does not feel big enough for the two of us and the space I will need to put between us. She bounces once, then twice, her eyes still wandering.

Self-destructively, I sit next to her. “What was your room like?”

“Mine?” She shrugs, her brows pinching like it’s difficult to remember.

“Not this. I didn’t really have decorations or posters or anything too memorable.

Mom wasn’t into that stuff. When I left for college, I took it all with me.

There isn’t anything like this back home.

I’m not even sure she’s in the same apartment. ”

“You aren’t sure where your mom lives?”

“We don’t talk much. She doesn’t have time.”

Fran’s mother doesn’t have time for her daughter? Instinctively, my hand rests on her back. “Fran, I’m sorry if I stepped out of line the other night. Again. I’m not sure what’s wrong with me. But if I made you uncomfortable?—”

She presses one finger to my lips. “You didn’t.”

I nod, and she pulls back her curling finger. “I want you to know that I respect you,” I say. “And I would never want to do anything to make you…”

“Uncomfortable,” she says.

“Right. Or to do something that might cause you…”

“Discomfort?” she offers, grinning at me.

“Yeah.”

“You didn’t make me uncomfortable. Did you make yourself uncomfortable?”

Her shoulder brushes mine, her eyes warm and steady, keeping watch on me. I can’t look away, and I am intently aware of her every curve that touches part of me. “Not in the moment,” I confess. “But afterward, a little.”

She nods as if to say she understands my predicament. She cups her hand on my cheek and tilts her head. “If it’s all just practice,” she says, “then there’s nothing to worry about.”

My heart thumps with her words, and it pounds when her eyes fall to my lips. The woman does not need practice. She’s run her drills, and she’s ready to go pro.

“I’m not sure,” I whisper. “I just want to be careful.” But even as I offer the cautionary advice, she leans one inch closer to me. She’s giving me every clue I taught her to watch for.

“Maybe you could be quiet,” she whispers. Her fingers snake around my neck and slip through the ends of my hair. “For just a second.”

Fran’s magnetic pull draws me closer. Her eyes fall to my lips before fluttering closed, and her chin lifts. Lean, touch, look— consent.

I am the moth. She is the flame. I’m going to combust, and I’m not sure I care.

But before my lips touch hers?—

“Callum Archie Whitaker! If you don’t hug your mother in the next ten seconds, there will be repercussions!” Tiffany’s voice travels up the stairs and into my room without any trouble at all. Man, that girl is loud. “I’m just the messenger,” she yells again. “So, don’t get mad at me!”

I pause, my lips just centimeters from Fran’s.

Her eyes flick open. “Your middle name is Archie?” Fran says, so close that with the words, I feel the slightest tickle from her lips.

“It was my grandfather’s name,” I say, inching back.

“Hey,” she says, her mouth pulling up at the corners. “I’m named after my grandfather too.”

I smirk, peering down at her. “Let’s go, Frances.”

“Don’t. You. Dare.” She huffs. “Callum, are you trying to break my heart?”

A laugh rumbles in my chest and I cup her cheek. “I’m sorry.”

“Very sorry,” she says.

“Very, very sorry.”

She taps her pointer to my chest. “And you’ll never call me that name again.”

“Never.”

She heaves out a breath. “Fine. You’re forgiven.”

So easy. So gentle. So merciful. “Thank you. ”

Her eyes flick up to mine, steady there. “So, no kissing then?”

I groan. Does she have any idea what she’s doing to me? “No kissing,” I tell her. “You’re all caught up on practice.”

And I’m not that strong.