I smiled.
“It’s like living with a mini dictator,” he grumbled, but he was smiling too. “I’ll leave you two to it. You can put your shoes by the door, kiddo, and I’ll get them fixed up for you.”
“Oh. You don’t have to do that. I was just going to scrub them a bit more.”
“If there’s one thing I know, it’s how to mend things. Leave ‘em by the door.”
“Thank you.” I had no idea what he was planning on doing with them. I honestly wasn’t sure if anything could be done. So there was no downside in letting him try. I kicked them off at the door and followed Kennedy into my room.
“Okay, we’re going to unpack all your crap.” She started to open up one of my cardboard boxes. “And while we do that, you’re going to tell me everything you love about Matthew Caldwell.”
“I don’tloveanything about him.”
“Fine. What do youlikeabout him?” She pulled out some of my clothes and started putting them in the wrong drawers.
I followed her around fixing everything she was messing up. “He just seems so…happy.”
Kennedy laughed as she tossed an unfolded shirt into my underwear drawer. She was terrible at this. “Happy? That’s all you got? What about those muscles? And his gorgeous smile?”
“Yeah, those things too.” I wasn’t sure Kennedy would understand the fact that I was more interested in the Untouchables’ inner traits than outer ones. A nice smile could only get you so far in life. My mother had a beautiful smile. And she’d died single at the age of 36 without a penny to her name.
But she was kind and funny and so charismatic. She was the greatest person I ever knew. And she always said she had everything she ever needed. Me. I would have loved her even if she looked like a monster.
“So you look at him like a love-sick puppy because he’s happy? There are plenty of happy people at our school.” She took a break from ruining my closet’s organization to eat some of the mini cakes.
I started rearranging the things she’d hung up. “And carefree.”
“That’s basically the same thing.”
I pulled out a stack of pictures. The top one was a selfie my mom had taken of the two of us. We were sitting in her hospital bed. She still had so much optimism. So much life left to live. I placed the pictures down on my nightstand.
She’d want me to be living my life. Making new friends. Calling my uncleuncle. Trying to start over. Today was the first step I’d really taken in any of it. “He’s also really nice,” I said.
“How on earth do you know if he’s nice?” Kennedy said through a mouth full of food.
“He followed me into the restroom after I cut my hand.”
“He did what?”
“I thought maybe I had walked into the men’s room and that he’d already been in there. I was focused on getting the stain out of my shoe. And then he was just…there.”
Kennedy plopped down on the edge of my bed and stared at me. “Continue!” she almost screamed.
“He washed my hand.”
“Weird.”
“No, it was really…nice.”
“There you go with theniceagain. God I hate that word,” Kennedy said. “Give me more details now or I’ll kill you in your sleep!”
I started laughing because I knew she was kidding. At least, I was pretty sure she was kidding.
“Is everything okay in there girls?” Jim said from outside the door.
“Great!” Kennedy yelled. “Go away, we’re having a top secret discussion!”
I laughed and sat down next to her.
