11. Dylan

Chapter 11

Dylan

No one in this town could mind their own business.

It was one of the reasons I left and a large part of why I never wanted to come back. Heat, not related to doing over a hundred pull-ups, burned the back of my neck.

A knock sounded on the door.

Either Rosie was coming to chew me out for giving the whole neighborhood a show, or she’d forgotten something. The house felt emptier without her stuff—she’d even taken her pillow and left me with something that looked like it could float me down the channel between Winterhaven and Thorne Bay.

I opened the door, surprised to see my cousin, Charlie—whom I’d purposely neglected to inform I was in town. It wasn’t that I didn’t want Charlie to know. I’d missed her a ton and loved the encouraging text messages she sent me before and after every game. It was that I didn’t want my sister, Lily, to know. To put it mildly, Lily hated my guts.

Charlie motioned toward my chest, biting back her always-present smile. “You just walk around like that?”

“The women of Winterhaven don’t seem to mind.”

“Ha ha,” she said. “Things haven’t changed, I see.”

I motioned for her to come in and jogged into my room to slip on my T-shirt. Then I came back into the living room and enfolded Charlie into a huge bear hug.

“Ew, gross. You’re all sweaty,” she squealed, but she hugged me just as tight. “Missed you, cuz.”

“I missed you too.” I pulled back and took her in from head to toe. Charlie had always been my very favorite cousin. She was five years younger than me, which meant she was too young to be involved in any of the family drama. I could do no wrong in Charlie’s eyes. After Charlie’s dad died when she was nine, and her mom had to get a second job to make ends meet, I babysat her every summer until I moved away after high school graduation. Babysat was a loose term, since she spent more time keeping me and Shiloh out of trouble and alive than any of our parents knew. As I got older, she became my sidekick and adorable wingman. What girl didn’t love a guy whose sweet younger cousin sang his praises. If I rewarded her exaggerations of my greatness with an endless supply of milkshakes? At least it got her eating again after grief wrecked her appetite.

“When did you get so old?” I asked affectionately as I pressed my finger into a nearly non-existent wrinkle between her eyes.

She pushed my hand away with a scowl. “Around the time you got ugly. What the heck happened to you?” She motioned toward my bruised nose.

“Rosie Forrester.”

Her face lit up with a delighted smile. “I can’t believe she didn’t tell me this story.”

“You know her?” But even as I asked it, I rolled my eyes. Of course they knew each other.

“She’s one of my closest friends,” Charlie said.

As I told her about my fateful meeting with Rosie’s broom—laughing along with Charlie even though I hadn’t thought anything about it funny when it had happened—I felt lighter than I’d felt in months.

She ended up staying for a late dinner of cheeseburgers from Jonah’s Grill. Food delivery had come to Winterhaven. Wonders would never cease.

We settled at the kitchen table, and my eye was caught by the blinding glint of light from Charlie’s hand. “I can’t believe you’re marrying Greg Marshall.” I bit into my lettuce-wrapped bacon cheeseburger and with one taste was transported back to being a teenager. Jonah made the best burgers in the world, and if there was one thing I missed from Winterhaven, it was this.

She waggled her ring finger before dipping her fry in ranch. “Eight months and counting until the big day.”

I made a disgusted face before I could help it. “Wasn’t Greg the kid we TP’d when you were thirteen? And we stuck rotten bananas in his shoes.” The bananas had been Shiloh’s brilliant idea. Hudson tried to convince us not to do it (“You don’t even know for sure those are his shoes”) but we had to do something with the bananas accumulating in the backseat of my car because my mom kept insisting I take one to school even though I hate bananas. It had been fate.

It had also been revenge. Greg had asked Charlie to the middle school dance but then backed out when a more popular girl asked him a few days later. Charlie had been devastated.

“I was twelve, but yes. One and the same,” she said. “I don’t think he’s ever forgiven me for the bananas, so thanks for that.”

“I’d do it again. Tell him to watch his shoes.” Greg Marshall. I hadn’t seen him in a decade, and I still knew she could do so much better than him. “And to watch his back too,” I added for good measure.

“You and Rosie, I swear.”

I raised my brows. “Has Rosie also stuffed rotten food in his shoes?”

“No, but she would in a heartbeat.”

My respect for Rosie rose several notches. “She would do this to Greg specifically, or to anyone?”

“Both. I mean, anyone she hates, but also yes, him specifically.”

I set my elbows on the table and leaned closer, intrigued. “Why does Rosie hate Greg?”

She covered her face with a groan. “I shouldn’t have brought it up.”

“You did, though. So you can’t leave me hanging.”

Charlie gave me an annoyed look and then set down her half-eaten burger with a sigh. “She thinks he’s a taker, and I’m a giver, and that he takes too much, and I give too much.” She sat up straighter with a defensive expression. “But she doesn’t see the side of him I do when it’s just the two of us.”

Red flags were waving in the wind. But we weren’t as close as we used to be, and I didn’t know how she’d take any criticisms toward her fiancé from me. I didn’t want to alienate one of my few allies in this town.

But I was definitely stocking up on bananas.

“So when did Rosie move here?” I asked.

She shot me a grateful expression at the change of subject. “Not long after you left. Maybe eight or so years ago.”

“Is her family here too?”

“One of her brothers. Bennett.” She looked at me expectantly.

“Okay …”

“Lily’s ex. They dated two years. They were talking marriage.” She circled her hand like, come on, we’re almost there .

“Oh.” I didn’t know Lily’d dated someone for that long, much less his name or that they’d broken up. I didn’t expect the pinch of hurt I felt at learning something so significant about my sister secondhand. We weren’t close; hadn’t been for years. Lily had made it clear she resented me growing up—all the time, money, and energy my parents had put into hockey had been stolen directly from her. It hadn’t made things any better when I’d insisted it had nothing to do with her and wasn’t personal. It had felt personal to her regardless of intentions.

No one had cheered louder when I left Winterhaven than Lily.

“Yeah, it’s been pretty awkward around my house since then. Especially since Lily and Rosie can’t stand each other, which is heartbreaking. I love them both so much.”

Somehow, it didn’t surprise me to hear that Rosie and Lily clashed. Growing up, Lily was always very strait-laced to a self-righteous fault. She loved enforcing rules and tattling whenever I inevitably broke one of those rules. Getting me into trouble had been her favorite past time.

In just the few times I’d talked to Rosie, she’d struck me as someone who looked at rules as loose guidelines she may or may not agree with and may or may not follow. Which was intriguing, but I didn’t want to be intrigued by my landlord.

Charlie wasn’t reading my mind like a good cousin should, and she continued. “Rosie’s had a hard life, so you wouldn’t expect her to be so happy. But she’s the most loyal person I’ve ever met and she makes life fun. And if a mouse flies past your face at the wrong moment, well, being friends with her is worth all the unpredictable things that happen in her presence. Trust me.”

Affection for Charlie nudged at my impenetrable emotional shell. When I looked at her, I’d always see the overwhelmingly sad nine-year-old girl who followed me everywhere. But she’d also grown into a beautiful and kind woman who’d transformed her pain and grief into empathy. Even toward a loser like me. “You’re one of the few people I do trust, Charlie. But I don’t plan on making friends here. I just want to keep my head down and pass the time until Coach lets me back on the team.” I rapped my knuckles on the table to drive my point home.

Charlie frowned. “How are things? Since … Shiloh?”

Hearing Shiloh’s name yanked me from the bit of nostalgic sunshine I’d been basking in, and back into the cold reality of life. “Fine.”

“I saw the memes.”

“Everyone did.”

“It doesn’t seem like you,” Charlie gently pushed. “To act like that.”

“It’s exactly like me.” She’d only ever seen the best in me. That was how Charlie was—seeing the best in everyone, when people really just messed up and disappointed you in the end. Or died.

I stood abruptly. “I’d better get showered.”

“Yeah, sure, of course.” The glowing vibe had dispelled, thanks to me. A fresh cube of ice in already tepid soup. “You should come play softball with us. We have practice Sunday afternoon.”

Even if it wasn’t against my contract, the last thing I wanted was to join some small-town softball league. “No thanks.”

I must have missed the mark on casual and hit condescending by the way her face fell.

She stood slowly and moved to throw away her trash, but I stopped her, feeling like a jerk. The itchiness inside me was expanding, and I needed to do something to let it out. I’d have to do more pull-ups, with the window closed this time. At this rate, I wouldn’t be able to lift my arms tomorrow.

“I’ve got it.” I filled the to-go bag with our trash and left it in the middle of the table. She gave me a hug that I made awkward by not wrapping my arms tightly around her. Every signal blasted that I was ready for her to leave, and she respected that with a quick departure.

“Love you, Dyls. I’m glad you’re home,” she said sweetly enough to make me feel frozen.

Pull-ups weren’t enough. Push-ups. Sit-ups. Lunges. None of it. I needed to run.

Better yet, I needed to play hockey.

That would solve everything. I’d get back on the team. Away from Winterhaven. Away from a lifetime of memories with Shiloh. Away from the watching eyes and the people who didn’t want me here.

Energy zinged through me, pulsed against my skin, ached to be outside of me instead of inside of me.

I went into my room, sat on the floor with my back against the wall, and pulled out my phone, ready to sell my soul if necessary, to get back on the team.