LITMIR.BIZ

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blond hair pulled back into a ponytail, Joy entered the kitchen. Opening the refrigerator, she took out the carton of skim milk and poured herself a glass. She drank it leaning against the kitchen counter.

      Sophie smiled at her and ladled batter into the frying pan. She’d already put syrup and butter on the table. “Want to put two plates out?”

      “Sure.”

      It only took a couple of minutes for the first batch of pancakes to be ready. Sophie put them on a waiting platter, covered it with foil to keep the pancakes warm, then put a second batch on to cook. Once there were enough pancakes to feed both of them, she turned off the stove, moved the hot frying pan to a cool burner and joined her sister at the table.

      Since it was obvious Joy wasn’t going to ask any questions about what Sophie might want to talk about, Sophie waited until they’d both eaten a couple of pancakes before saying, “I’m glad I got a chance to meet Aidan last night.”

      Joy, who had been hunched over her plate, looked up. Sophie’s heart pinched at the hopeful light in the girl’s eyes.

      “I told you he was nice,” Joy said.

      “He does seem very nice.”

      “So it’s okay if I date him.”

      “That’s not what I said.” Earlier Sophie had fixed herself another cup of coffee and she drank some.

      “Why not, if you like him?”

      Sophie sighed. “Joy, you know why not. He’s too old for you. That fact didn’t magically change because I met him and he seems like a nice boy. He’s still too old.” And troubled.

      Myriad emotions played across Joy’s face. “That’s not fair!”

      Sophie wished she could tell Joy she understood perfectly, that she’d felt exactly the same way when she was Joy’s age and wildly in love with Dillon. Could she? She wouldn’t have to tell Joy who the boy had been, but she could share some of what she’d gone through.

      Tears welled in Joy’s eyes as they stared at each other. Sophie battled the desire to comfort her, to give in, to make her sister happy. “I know you don’t think I understand, but I do. You have to trust me on this. You’re too young to be seriously dating to begin with, and Aidan is too old for you. Honey, he’ll be going off to college next year. And then what?”

      Sophie reached across the table to take Joy’s hand, but Joy snatched it away. She pushed her chair back. Her face looked like thunderclouds. “He’s less than two years older than me! You’re just using his age as an excuse because you think you know everything and I don’t know anything! So what if he’s going away to college next year? What difference does that make? He’s here now! And...and I really like him. And he likes me! I—I can’t wait till I’m eighteen and I can make my own decisions!”

      “Joy...”

      “Sometimes I hate you!”

      And before Sophie could say another word, Joy had jumped up and run from the room. Sophie sank back in her chair and listened to Joy pounding up the stairs, followed by the sound of her bedroom door slamming shut.

      “Well, that went well,” Sophie muttered as she debated what to do. Should she go after Joy? Maybe tell her about Dillon and what had happened between them? Without mentioning any names, of course. She thought back to the heartbreak she’d felt when Dillon left Crandall Lake...and her...and gone off to college. She’d cried for days, weeks. She hadn’t wanted to go anywhere or do anything. She’d haunted the mailbox, thinking Dillon would surely write to her. But he didn’t. She’d almost broken down and called him, but at the last minute she came to her senses and ignored the urge. It took her a long time to regain some kind of normality, because for months she’d felt as if the world were crashing down on her. Which was probably exactly the way her sister felt right now.

      Sophie sighed for probably the tenth time that morning.

      Would it do any good to tell Joy any of this?

      Would it have stopped you from seeing Dillon if Mom had warned you off him? Sophie’s mother hadn’t because she’d been too preoccupied with a new husband, a three-year-old Joy and a full-time job as an office manager.

      But even if she had realized what was going on with Sophie and Dillon and said something, Sophie had to be honest with herself. It wouldn’t have made a difference. Nothing in the world would have kept Sophie away from Dillon. Certainly not what some adult had said. When you fall in love with someone the way Sophie had fallen in love with Dillon, nothing anyone said would have mattered.

       Face it. It’s obvious things have progressed with Joy and Aidan to the point where she won’t hear you. She’ll continue to sneak around and see Aidan the way she’s been doing.

      Sophie sighed again as she got up from the table and cleared the breakfast remains. The only thing she could do now was make sure that when Joy did see Aidan, she saw him here at the house, where Sophie had some control over what they did.

      Sophie knew her plan was a Band-Aid when what she needed was major surgery, but until she came up with something better, it would have to do.

       Chapter Four

      As Halloween approached, the weather had finally begun to feel like autumn, with cool nights and mild days. In this part of Texas, the leaves hadn’t yet turned—that wouldn’t happen for another month or so—but it still felt like fall.

      Normally Joy loved this time of year. But the atmosphere at home—the way Sophie constantly watched her—had taken some of the pleasure out of it. And yet how could Joy complain? Sophie, for some mysterious reason Joy couldn’t fathom, had relented and Joy was at least allowed to see Aidan. Sophie had consented to him coming over twice a week, just as long as she was there and Joy and Aidan did not go upstairs to Joy’s bedroom, which limited them to the living room or dining room that had been converted into an art studio for Joy. Sophie watched them so closely that they hadn’t been able to make love more than twice that month, and both times had been hurried affairs—once in his car and once at school, in a storage closet near the gym—where Joy had been terrified of being caught.

      But there was something else nagging at Joy. Something she’d been trying to ignore. Something she’d been pretending didn’t exist—the undeniable fact that she’d missed two periods. Since she was twelve and had begun her menstrual cycle, she’d been pretty much like clockwork. Every twenty-seven days her period started and it lasted five days. Joy kept track on her iPhone calendar.

      Joy told herself she wasn’t actually worried. Not really. Aidan always used condoms, so there was no way she could be pregnant. Well, he had almost always used them. There was that one time they did it in the pool, early in the morning, when no one else was there.

      Her face heated as she thought about how sexy that was, how he’d been all upset about something and come to seek her out before the pool opened and found her alone setting everything up that morning. She’d never forget Aidan’s anger and frustration toward his uncle and how he’d started kissing her and how, underwater, he’d pushed her bathing suit aside and shoved himself into her. Even now, thinking about how it had felt to do it in the water, she felt all shivery and tingling down there. Because the sex was unplanned, neither of them had a condom. Neither of them even thought about a condom. Joy had just wanted to comfort him and make him feel better.

      And then, once it had happened, it was so wonderful she wished they never had to use condoms again. She’d even thought about getting on the pill, but that would have meant asking Sophie, because Joy couldn’t imagine how she could do it without Sophie’s knowledge and permission. Not in a town as small as Crandall Lake. And certainly not if she wanted to keep living with Sophie.

      When had the pool

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