Page 55 of Turn

He’d never been the center of attention the way he had ever since Saylor brought him home. She found out what his favorite foods were and immediately purchased them all. She insisted on buying him an entirely new wardrobe despite my weak objections. Saylor just winked and said she loved to shop and anyway the boy had outgrown most of his old clothes. It wasn’t really true. Brecken hadn’t grown much at all these past six months. Some of Cassie’s teenage cousins who were also on summer break came over to help tutor him with math. I still took him to summer school every morning but instead of wandering over to the youth center afterwards he would get picked up by Saylor and they would have lunch. No wonder why the kid was ecstatic these days. He even looked healthier with a ruddy glow on his cheeks. The only cloud hanging over the current situation was Tristan. He hadn’t been in touch. I’d left word with the motel management in case he turned up there looking for us but I wasn’t optimistic the toothless hood-eyed manager would pass the information along even though I spotted him a twenty. I wished I had better news for Brecken when he would ask me at the end of every day if I’d heard from our brother. I also wished I knew if Tristan was out there in the world confronting all kinds of horrors and temptations. I constantly hoped he’d found a safe refuge. Deck Gentry had pulled me aside this afternoon to give me the bad news that he hadn’t had any luck tracking Tristan’s whereabouts. The Phoenix metropolitan area was immense and crowded. If a seventeen year old kid wanted to disappear into its depths he wouldn’t have to try very hard.

I’d drifted over to the corner of the yard and become lost in thought, watching Dalton instruct Brecken while Cord flipped the burgers and waved away clouds of smoke. I didn’t know Cassie had returned to the backyard until I heard her voice right beside me.

“Mom actually asked me if we should eat outside,” Cassie said. She roped her mane of thick hair into a knot at the base of her neck and fanned herself with one hand. “I told her she was crazy. It’s got to be a hundred and ten out here.”

“It’s Arizona in the summer,” I said. “Probably a few degrees north of the temperature of hell.”

Cassie picked off a tiny purple flower from a nearby sage bush. “I guess it’s as hot or hotter down in Emblem.”

“Just about.”

Cassie twirled the flower under her chin. “My grandpa still lives down there but he prefers to come up here rather than have us visit him. He says there are too many dangerous parts of town now. I know my mom was trying to talk him into moving up here now that he’s retired from the prison but he says he was born in Emblem and he plans to die there.”

“That’s a common sentiment in Emblem.”

Cassie was watching me. “Do you still know people down there? In Emblem?”

I thought about them, the people I knew who were still there. A handful of decent folks mixed in with the burnouts and the criminals. And of course there was the huge population of inmates behind the fences of the state prison. Can’t forget about them. Some of them had been Emblem kids once.

“Not many,” I told her. “Most of the people I knew down there are not the kind you ought to keep in your life if you want to avoid wearing an orange jumpsuit.”

“What?” She was confused.

“The prison uniform.”

“Oh.” Cassie held her flower in the palm of her hand. It was wilting already. She let it fall to the ground and then fastened me with a frank expression. “You’re lonely, aren’t you, Curtis? I mean, I know you’ve been busy working and trying to keep your brothers together but there are some things even family can’t help you with, right?”

I’d never thought about it that way. Being lonely. It seemed like I hadn’t been alone in many months. But that wasn’t what Cassie meant. And she wasn’t just talking about me. Strangely enough, it seemed like she was talking about herself too.

“some things even family can’t help you with…”

“Yes,” I said.

She nodded. “I get it.”

I didn’t see how she could. Cassie was beautiful and sweet and adored by her family and probably everyone who crossed her path. She ought to have the world at her feet.

“How could a girl like you be lonely?” I asked. I was honestly curious.

The question annoyed her. “What does that mean?”

I hadn’t meant to say anything wrong. “Nothing.”

“Is this about Parker?”

“Who?” It took me a moment to realize she was talking about the douchebag who’d slithered into Scratch one day, the same one she’d been smiling at in the coffee shop afterwards. “Oh, that asshole.”

“He’s not an asshole.”

I shrugged. “If you say so.”

Cassie didn’t appear convinced herself. She tugged at her lip. “At least not anymore. I used to hate him. But people can change for the better, don’t you think?”

“Not that fucking guy,” I said tersely. I didn’t know why I was suddenly fuming over the memory of Cassie smiling at Parker what’s-his-face. Or why I was so fucking sure that he was up to no good.

Cassie glared at me. “You don’t know everything about people,” she said and stalked back to the house.

When I glanced around the yard I saw that Cord was still actively blackening the hamburgers, Dalton was still instructing Brecken and Angus the Dog had fallen asleep in the shade. No one had been paying the slightest attention to the brief interaction between Cassie and me except one person.

Cami Gentry kept her eyes on me as her twin sister left the backyard.

She did not look pleased.

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