Series: Like Us Series by Krista Ritchie
Total pages in book: 241
Estimated words: 236417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1182(@200wpm)___ 946(@250wpm)___ 788(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 236417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1182(@200wpm)___ 946(@250wpm)___ 788(@300wpm)
Guilty. “Eliot never told me you found it first.”
“Clearly.” He places the book behind him. “My brother loves a story where he’s at the center.”
Eliot might be a showman, but he’s also thoughtful enough to put his ego into question. In high school, he bowed out of the lead role in Almost, Maine because he would’ve had to kiss Jeffra. He refused to kiss the girl who relentlessly bullied me.
“Reality is often colder than the stories we tell,” Charlie says, lighting a cigarette. “But you know that.” He blows smoke downward. “What do you want, Luna?” His eyes flit over to me.
I can’t lie and say I came here for a casual chitchat. It’s too obvious I didn’t.
With a readying breath, I let it out. “I found a journal that Original Luna wrote—that I wrote. I’m not sure how detailed it is or what it says, but I’m nervous reading it from front-to-back will shade my perception of events and people. But if someone else reads it, they might be able to share helpful information, so I won’t have to read the text myself. That way, I won’t know everything, just some things, and this person would be a guardian of my memories. And that’s my longwinded way of asking if you’d read my journal for me.”
Wow that didn’t go as smoothly as I hoped. No matter how ineloquent, I think I made enough sense. I cage breath, nerves assaulting my body.
Please say yes.
Charlie thinks for a half-a-second. “Sure.”
“Sure?” My brows rise. “You can sleep on it. It’s a big deal. It’s my diary.”
“You called it a journal,” Charlie says.
“Same thing.”
“A diary implies there are more personal pieces of information than just a journal. Scientists keep journals. They don’t necessarily keep diaries.”
Oookay.
“Well, I guess I’m not sure how personal it is. It’s like a dournal.”
Charlie smiles at the made-up word while taking a drag. I know his dad would have cringed at it. “Alright then,” he says, smoke billowing out of his nose. “I’ll read your dournal.” He looks at my empty hands.
“It’s in my duffel bag. I can bring it to you later. I didn’t want to assume you’d say yes.”
“Lack of confidence is noted,” Charlie tells me, snuffing the cigarette against the bark of the tree. His youngest brother would not love the desecration of Mother Earth, but I’m not here to poke at the Charlie-Ben eternal feud.
Without another word, Charlie descends the platform, his book beneath his armpit. I follow him to the safety of the ground, and in silence, we hike back to the lake house. Reaching the clearing, I hear an engine cutting out.
His gaze swings to the graveled parking pad. Where a black Mustang just rolled to a stop. We wait as our youngest uncle exits the driver’s seat. Uncle Garrison wears a black hoodie underneath a jean jacket—what he wore to Grandfather Calloway’s funeral. Aunt Willow has on a simple black dress, an old backpack hooked over her shoulder.
Hand-in-hand, they walk past the lake house and go straight to a little boathouse not far from the dock. It’s where we store canoes, kayaks, lifejackets, and other lake toys.
I frown. “Strange.”
“It is,” Charlie agrees, and I figure he’ll drop the matter. Until he sets course for the boathouse with the casual stride of a sightseer in Paris. Then he spins around, walking backwards, just to catch my gaze. “Are you coming or are you just going to stand there like a stupefied tree?”
Solving a mystery with Charlie wasn’t on my bingo card today. But the invitation is all I need to accept the voyage. And the risk.
18
LUNA HALE
The boathouse is old. Like ancient. Rotted wooden boards and peeled paint. Eliot, Tom, and I tried our first joint in there behind a canoe, and we got caught because we screamed when a rat crawled over Tom’s foot.
It’s a strange place for my parents, aunts, and uncles to congregate. The only reason they’d choose it is because it’s far enough from the main house that they wouldn’t be overheard or stumbled upon. I don’t think they imagined that two of us would currently be crouched beneath the lone window, which has never properly closed.
So it’s a good spot to eavesdrop, except for the fact that Charlie and I are squatting near a pricker bush. One slight shift to the left and I’m attacked by spiky foliage.
“Now that we’re all here, can we please talk about this?” Uncle Stokes asks.
“There’s nothing to talk about, Sammy,” my dad says, his voice caustic. “The answer I gave over text still stands. No.”
“Come on, Lo,” Uncle Stokes replies. “Things have changed now that we’ve all seen Greg’s will. You can’t deny that.”
The boathouse goes eerily silent for a beat.
Charlie is rigid.
I cage my breath. They’re all dressed in funeral blacks. We just came off resting my grandfather six-feet under the earth, and it never really occurred to me there’d be greater consequences to his death. Other than grief.