Page 2 of Trash Talk
Chapter 1
Ruby- 14 years old
I flop onto the mattress on the floor of my new room. Well, I should say our new room (I’m sharing with my little sister, MB). I’ve made five trips— the initial to check everything out, then four more with heavy loads up two flights of steps. Skatá. I’m dead. Moving is the worst. This townhouse is smaller than our old home, apparently one of the negative side effects of divorce is that you no longer have dual incomes supporting one household. But the good news is, it’s cheaper to live in the country than the city, the high school I’ll be attending has an awesome art program and basketball team and Greek school only lasts six weeks here (last summer we all spent nine miserable weeks learning how to curse… umm, conjugate verbs in our native tongue). Plus, mom’s happy here. She’s opening her own little coffee/tea/smoothie shop downtown, Pot?. It’s Greek for drink. Clever, but maybe a little too cultured for a small southern town like this. I guess we’ll find out soon enough.
We said goodbye to Whitemarsh Island, the small inlet town on the outskirts of Savannah where we were born and raised, around 10am and arrived in Willow Creek, SC just a few hours later. It’s a quaint small town with lots of history and natural beauty. The scenery on the drive changed more than I expected. Nothing beats living minutes from the beach, but I am stoked about only being a twenty-minute bike ride away from my best friend, Emma. Her family owns a vineyard here, and we’ve visited several times a year since I can remember. The Alexander’s daughters are all the same age as my siblings and me; we’ve all been best friends since birth, which, I guess is fitting since mom and Mr. Alexander have been best friends since high school. Like brother and sister, not romantically involved in the least. They’re both happily married. Well, they were until mom walked in on dad last month with his secretary.
Apparently, it was the last straw. I may be young, but not stupid enough to miss the signs. I also have ears. I heard the arguments. The tears. The apologies. It’s not the first time dad’s had an indiscretion. I guess mom was through giving him second (or fifth) chances. I don’t blame her. I swore to myself that I’d never lose my heart to a man that couldn’t put me first. How can a man profess to love a woman, and not be faithful? As I said, I am young, and there’s a lot I don’t know about adulting, but I do know for a relationship to be successful, both people should be faithful. Trustworthy. Honorable. Maybe I’m being too hopeful. Maybe love like that only exists in the movies. There to make young girls daydream about a charming prince who sweeps in to save the day, only to have the real world snatch those dreams from them. I’ve always hated fairy tales.
MB throws herself down on the mattress next to me in a huff, “I didn’t know we’d be doin’ all the work. I thought someone would help us. I mean, didn’t mom hire movers?” I laugh, mom did hire movers, but they won’t be here ‘til tomorrow. We only brought what would fit in the truck and trailer—a few necessities to tide us over for the night. Really there’s not a lot left, just all the big stuff. “My arms are fallin’ off.”
“Hush. They are not, you drama queen. Rest here with me for a sec and we’ll both go down and get the last two boxes.” My sister looks like my mini me, except God blessed her with way more up top than me (and I don’t mean brains—although she is brilliant). It’s not fair that she’s two years younger and her boobs are already twice the size of mine. MB’s hair’s way curlier, her nose slightly smaller, and one of her eyes has flecks of brown, giving her the appearance of having one blue eye and one green. I’ve always thought my features rather plain compared to hers—straight nose, large blue eyes, small full lips, tan skin and thick wavy black hair. I’m short and straight as a board. I guess it could be worse.
She sighs heavily, “the only thing left is mom and Beck’s mattresses.”
Crap! I was hoping one of our new neighbors would see how much my brother and I struggled with the two twin mattresses we hauled inside and take pity on us. But they all appear to be in their late-sixties/early-seventies, so they probably wouldn’t be of much help. It’s likely to take all four of us to move the other two beds (they’re both queens).
“Get up lazies!” My brother pokes his head into the doorway grinning. It’s not fair, Beckett, like the rest of us, inherited mom’s coloring but he got all his other genes from dad. Tall, handsome and able to charm a fish out of water. He’s basically a young, blue-eyed Cary Grant. Girls swoon, and he’d clean up, if he were into that sort of thing. He hasn’t exactly come out yet, but I figure it’s only a matter of time. I don’t know what he’s waiting for; it’s not like we’d judge him or love him any less. He’ll always be my big brother that I adore whole-heartedly. “We only have two more trips, then mom promised movie night with pizza and popcorn.” Oh, thank God! Wait.
“Who gets to pick the movie?”
“The first one to get their lazy butt outside,” he says with a wink. I’m off the mattress like a shot, running full force down the stairs and don’t stop ‘til I hit the side of my mom’s pickup. “I win!” I yell to no one in particular. And turn to see my sister stomping toward me. I rub my hands together and give her my most devious look, “get ready for some cinematic gold, sis!”
“Just don’t pick one of those god-awful foreign films again. I’m too tired to read a movie after the day we’ve had.” I laugh at her, but I’m in total agreement. I don’t think I have the mental capacity for subtitles right now either. I’m thinking— light-hearted classic. Maybe Princess Bride or Mrs. Doubtfire, or possibly Drop Dead Fred. It feels like we could all use a comedic boost right now. Just as I’m about to put my sister out of her misery, I’m cut off by an unfamiliar deep voice.
“Let me guess. You’re one of those girls that just loves a good rom-com.” I turn to let the idiot-boy, who dared have an outrageously wrong opinion about me, have it, but my butt-chewing is halted by the man-boy in front of me. Holy moly; he’s attractive. Tall, broad shoulders, dark eyes. Eyes that seem to pierce and hold me right where I’m standing. Incapable of speech or movement, I allow my gaze to make another pass over him. Tennis shoes, mesh shorts, damp t-shirt that clings to what looks like an impressive set of pecs attached to a lanky, muscular frame. Long dark hair flips out under the edges of his backwards blue ballcap. This guy is totes hot. “Maybe a good princess flick.” He smirks, while I check him out. How can someone this beautiful be so dumb? I mean total freakin’ vlákas.
“Actually, Ruby hates chick flicks. I’m her sister Marybeth, but everyone just calls me MB.” Look at my little sis saving the day. She holds her hand out for him to shake and that’s when I notice he’s holding a basketball under his right arm, that he switches to the left to shake her hand.
“Knox Teller. I’m your next-door neighbor. Gramps wanted me to ask if y’all needed any help unloading.”
“Oh my gosh, that’d be so great! Wouldn’t it, Rubes? We were just sayin’ how tired we were. We’ve been at it for hours.” She’s smiling so brightly at him, like he’s some kind of second coming. And we’ve only been actually moving things for an hour and a half, we spent the first thirty minutes fighting over who got which room (MB and I get the largest, since we’re sharing) and the last ten lounging on the bed.
“I would’ve helped sooner, but I just got back from basketball camp. I was gonna see if your brother wanted to shoot some hoops after we’re done. Can’t ever have too much practice.”
MB laughs, “Becks? Umm, he’s not exactly athletic. Ruby here is the all-star baller.”
I feel his gaze sweep up, down, and back up again. My entire five-foot-four frame seems to be shaking. His eyes are doing weird flippy things to my stomach and my skin feels all hot and itchy. He chuckles, “This little thing?”
It’s at this very moment that my voice box decides to function again. Too bad my brain is still playing catch-up. “I bet I could beat you.” Oh snap, I did not mean to say that. I mean, I’m used to playing against girls that are taller, bigger or older than me. I’m short and skinny, but I’m quick, and I’m good. I usually thrive on challenges, but the one I just threw down is closer to a David and Goliath situation. He’s huge. And if he’s going to basketball camp, I imagine he’s decent. I take a closer look at the shirt clinging to him like a second skin. It reads, ‘St. Matthews Academy, Regional Champions.’ What have I done?
“Okay, Little Miss Ruby. Let me help your brother carry these mattresses inside and we’ll see what you’ve got.” His cool voice sends chills down my spine. Is it wrong to pray that he sprains his ankle coming down the stairs? Regardless, I do it anyway. Seems the gods aren’t in the prayer-answering mood this afternoon. It takes fifteen minutes for them to finish their task and me to gnaw off my bottom lip. MB’s so excited, she looks like she’s about to witness a Bird/Johnson showdown. The pressure is on.
“All right, Short Stuff. What’ll it be? One on One? Or do you want to try something a little more evenly balanced, like HORSE?” I’d like to kill him for making fun of my size, but there’s no way I could get inside that long reach he’s working with. And as confident as I am, even I know when I’ve bitten off more than I can chew. The only way I have a chance of beating him is with my trick shots, which (thanks to hours of practice with my dad)happen to be my specialty. Knox Teller is going down.
1 week later
“Hey,” a deep voice, that I’ve already memorized calls out behind us. I refuse to turn around though. My name is not, hey. But he knows that. And he also knows it drives me nuts that he won’t use it. Technically, I don’t use his either. I’m rather taken with his nickname at the moment. Em, Poppy, HK and I are walking out of the movie theater (they’re my girls for life—we made a blood pact, it’s a thing), having just watched The Village. Em and I thought it was good. HK and Pop both hate scary movies (even though it wasn’t scary). They made me promise if I got to pick the movie this week, that one of them could pick next weeks. So, they’re planning to see The Notebook next Saturday. I’m planning on coming down with a summer cold by Friday.
“Wait up, Shorty.” Knox lightly grabs my shoulder to turn me around.
I stop so quickly; he almost slams right into me. What is that delicious smell? Like fresh cut grass and mint. OMG, I just sniffed him. How embarrassing. There’s another boy with him. Not quite as tall, and not quite as handsome (to be fair, I don’t know any boys that are). He’s quiet, maybe shy or disinterested might be a better word. He hangs back and looks around like there’s someplace he’d rather be. Clearly, unimpressed with us. “Well, if it isn’t Toolbox Teller. What could you possibly need to say to me?” He just laughs off my nickname, like I didn’t just insult him. Note to self: work on trash talk.
“I want a rematch.”
“Of course, you do,” I spin, link arms with Em and continue walking toward our bikes. Poppy and Hannah Kate are already waiting at the curb. They’re cousins. Pop’s mom dropped them off and will probably be back to pick them up any minute now. Anxious to end this conversation and get back to my girls before we have to part ways, I toss what I hope is a parting shot over my shoulder, “I won fair and square, Teller.”
“Well, I didn’t know you were a little hustler now, did I? How fair could it have been? I was going easy on you.”
