“Do you think I look like her?” She angled her face toward mine so I could get a better look.
“Yes,” I answered honestly. It was a long time ago, but my memory of Sunny’s mother was as crisp as a photograph: long coppery hair, wide smiling mouth, skin that glowed from the inside out. She was a sun and everyone else was meant to orbit around her. Sunny was her mother in every way.
“I haven’t heard from her in three years,” Sunny said quietly. “Not even on my birthday. It’s like she disappeared.” She made a choked sound, as though the next word got stuck on its way out of her mouth. When she turned back to look at me her face was somber. “Promise me you won’t leave me, too.” She grabbed my hand and gave it a squeeze. “I know I can be a real bitch sometimes, but I don’t mean it. I don’t want to lose you, too.”
I swallowed thickly, trying to push back my anger from the evening’s events.
“I promise.” It was so like Sunny to find a way to eclipse my anger.
“Can we swing by my house so I can walk Miss Violet Beauregard? She gets lonely, and I’m the only one who looks after her. She needs me.”
“She’ll be fine. It’s only one night.” My voice was tight and filled with warning. As it was, my mother would be pissed because I didn’t call to let her know we were heading home, and I wasn’t about to release a hand from the steering wheel for fear of veering off the road. Besides, that dog was a cockroach. Between the doggy door and automated food and water dispensers littering the house, she could survive Armageddon without ever needing another human. In fact, she looked like she already had—she was easily the ugliest, meanest creature I had ever met. I never understood what it was Sunny loved so much about that dog.
“You can walk her in the morning,” I added so Sunny wouldn’t protest further.
My mom was ready to launch into a lecture when I walked through the front door. Her hands were perched on her hips and a familiar scowl deepened the line between her eyebrows.
She opened her mouth to say something, but closed it once she caught sight of Sunny’s unsteady eyes and barf-covered shirt.
“Oh, you poor dear. I’ll get you some water,” she said to Sunny, watching as I struggled to get her into the house. Then she leaned in and whispered to me, “Why don’t you soak her shirt in the sink so we can wash it in the morning?” Like she didn’t want to hurt Sunny’s feelings by telling her how disgusting she looked.
I tried not to let my mom see my irritation, focusing instead on getting Sunny up the stairs without breaking something. If I came home drunk and puke-covered, I’d never get a sympathetic oh, you poor dear from my mom, let alone a glass of water. But when it came to perfect Sunny, all was forgiven. Sometimes I wondered if my mom ended up with the wrong daughter.
“I’m really sorry about tonight,” Sunny muttered after I’d finally gotten her cleaned up and under the covers of my trundle bed. “I’ll make it up to you, I swear. Will you forgive me?”
She shifted her weight, letting the creak of bedsprings cut through the darkness. I had already forgiven her, the way that I always did, but I kept my lips pressed together and turned toward the wall.
I didn’t remember what I dreamed about that night, but for the first time in months I didn’t wake up thinking about Justin Cobb.
Instead, I woke up thinking about Logan.
CHAPTER SIX
HELL HATH NO FURY LIKE A GIRL IN GYM SHORTS
This time I wasn’t surprised when I appeared back on the staircase. The posters on my bedroom wall faded into a blue sky, and like before, my feet were moving up the steps like they’d never stopped. Was it possible to be in two places at once?
I squinted against the bright afternoon, searching the steps. Something green swayed in the distance. At first I thought it was another ghost waiting to torture me, but as I got closer I saw that it was nothing more than the reaching stem of a sunflower.
Weird. I climbed closer to the plant. It was the first sign of life I’d seen since appearing on the staircase. How had a flower managed to grow in the middle of bumblebutt nowhere?
The green stalk stretched up through a crack in the stone until it was almost at my knees. Bright leaves splayed helter-skelter along the stem, and at the top sat a perfect circle of yellow petals, opened like a palm toward the sky.
There was something brave about the flower, something defiant in the way it broke through the steps like nothing could hold it back. Maybe my brain was still mash-potatoed from the car crash, but I thought it was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
I wanted it. No, I needed it. There was no way I could take another step without having the perfect yellow petals to keep me company.
I wrapped my hands around the stem, surprised at how sturdy it felt, and gave it a sharp tug.
The flower didn’t move.
I tried again, this time pulling and yanking and twisting with everything I had, but the damn thing wouldn’t budge. It stayed rooted in place like it was planted in cement.
Something inside me snapped. It wasn’t just the flower—it was everything. The staircase. Sunny. Logan. Justin. It all welled up inside me until I couldn’t take it anymore. I wanted to take it all out on the immobile flower. The stupid, stupid flower that was so hell-bent on staying put.
I jumped on top of it, using my heels to grind the stem into the staircase. I kicked it and clawed it, then hopped and danced and jumped until I was sure the flower was mashed into paste.
But when I stepped to the side to admire my destruction, the flower looked unfazed. Its leaves still stretched toward the sky, and its yellow petals beamed as brightly as ever. It was as if nothing happened.
As if I didn’t exist.