Page 1 of Our Hearts Knew Better

PART ONE

THAT SUMMER

Welcome to Summer, Summer

As soon as the sun went down, the walls closed in. My own heartbeat and my own circling thoughts were all I heard. All I wasallowedto hear.

My father, who only wanted me to exist and not live, his logic went something like this: when he has to move us to another new town, he should make sure this new house has a second story to move me in so I won’t sneak out. It was another disagreement of what he says goes when he wouldn’t let me go to a movie some girls, who could’ve become friends, invited me to at our last house—it was just amovie—and he overheard one of them giving me the idea to sneak out.

But I never made it out my window.

His memory worked, but his logic didn’t tell him to take down the trellis.

This night, this balmy night in picturesque Rosalee Bay, North Carolina, was the one my isolation decided there was only so much reading and watching television—witnessing others living their life, having the kinds of experiences I should’ve been having—that I could do anymore.

Fictionalpeople had it better than me. And I was starting to hate them for it.

And, in a couple months, I was going to be the new girl again, ripped from my old high school to start my senior year here. I couldn’t be another fish out of water with no bearings, floppingaround until I died under the pressure of this unfamiliar outside world.

I needed to explore this new land.

Mylogic reminded me there wasn’t a lot of exploring I could do at night, with things being closed, but it was the only chance I got. And without my dad’s terms and conditions.

I needed out of these walls. I needed out of myskin.

They—whoevertheywere—said the body replaces its cells every seven years. I didn’t do my research to prove it true or false, but from having gone through two and a half cycles of sevens, I’d say it was a bunch of fluff. My only living grandmother, on my mom’s side, who had a falling out with my dad, and so with me, after my mom’s death, would’ve called ithogwash.

I still wore the same fatigue from my underwhelming and on-edge existence, still carried around the same yearnings, still stood in the same old skin that hadn’t been gazed at or touched by anyone in any way I wanted.

I stalled a pulse-pounding moment once both my hands and feet were clinging to the rungs of the trellis. Dad’s bedroom window was two over from mine, the bathroom in the center like an island between our different life perspectives.

I still needed to discover mine. I needed to discovermebefore I was too late. Seventeen, almost labeled a woman before I had time to be a girl. And now, a proper teenager.

Time that was stolen from me the day my mom’s ran out.

But my clock was still ticking, my own time running out, too, this tip to the cusp of adulthood putting me on the chase.

It wasn’t that I couldn’t get how my dad wanted to protect me, but he was also depriving me of air, then frowning and sighing me from his sight when I tried to breathe.

I took a big breath and started the climb down.Slow and steady wins the race to freedom.

But my heart was in its own race, and I realized quick that my flip flops weren’t the best shoe choice for this. The bottoms wouldn’t grip and they were hanging too far from my heels.

They thumped to the ground as I kicked them off, and the pain in my toes moved me down faster—too fast, and I lost my footing, thumping myself to the ground.

My ass and hands, now covered in dirt, throbbed, but…I was out.

I lay on the grass for another pulse-pounding moment, listening and waiting and watching, for movement from inside, for my dad’s window to glow, for his curtains to part. For the downward tilt of his mouth that I’d have to pay for putting there later. I set the shake in my jaw at the burned image of disappointment in his eyes, to not let just the thought of him rope me back up the trellis in regret.

He’d never have to know.

And when the world didn’t end right then and there, everything still dark, the only sound still the thudding in my chest, I scrambled to my feet and for my flip flops, sprinting on tiptoes toward the street with adrenaline-rushed giggles.

I’m out!

I felt like I was breaking the law.Alaw. Dad’s Law.

And while my heart refused to calm down, my lungs didn’t ache, and that bit of lightness alone told me there was no consequence imaginable that would make me regret this.

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