Rewind It Back (Windy City, #5)(10)

“That’s cool. How old are you?”

“Twelve.”

“Me too.”

He smiles. “Cool.”

My attention returns to the car to watch a girl climb out of the back seat too. She’s shorter than me and Luke but her hair is dark brown and wavy like mine. She’s wearing jeans that flare out at the bottom and a pink sweatshirt with a big yellow smiley face on the front.

She doesn’t look over in our direction. Instead, her eyes are locked on her new house. She’s got headphones over her ears and a cassette player in her hand.

“That’s my sister,” Luke says. “You don’t have to be friends with her since she’s a girl.”

“I have a lot of friends who are girls. And they’re all really smart and funny. I take a dance class and there are only girls there.”

“You take a dance class?”

“Yeah. It’s helping me skate better.”

“That’s weird.”

Luke’s sister is still staring up at the house next to mine. Her eyes follow the roofline, watching where her roof connects to mine until finally, she looks down and her attention lands on me and her brother.

“Hallie!” Luke shouts, waving her over.

She holds up a finger, silently telling him to wait before refocusing on her house.

Luke shakes his head. “She’s so annoying sometimes.”

I don’t have a sister, but a lot of my friends think their sisters are annoying, so I guess that’s a common thing. But I’d love to have a sister. Or a brother. I don’t care. It’s lonely being an only child.

Finally, Hallie pulls off her headphones, draping them around her neck, and joins us on my driveway.

She looks exactly like the woman who walked into the house earlier, but a younger version.

“Hi.” She grins at me. “I’m Hallie Hart.”

Luke groans. “You don’t have to tell everyone your first and last name.”

She simply shrugs, completely unbothered. “I like it.”

Luke rolls his eyes at his sister.

“I’m Rio DeLuca,” I say, giving her my last name too.

She smiles bigger.

“Luke!” their dad calls from the front porch. “Come help your mom get the dishes unpacked.”

Their dad waves at me and I lift my hand to wave back. He seems nice.

“You don’t have to help too?” I ask Hallie.

“Nope. I packed them. Luke has to unpack them. How old are you?”

“Twelve.”

“I’m eleven. Today.”

“It’s your birthday?”

“Yep. March eighth. When is your birthday?”

“August third.”

Her brows turn in, her head tilting to the side. “So, you don’t get to have a birthday at school?”

“No. It’s always right before school starts.”

“I usually get to have a birthday at school, but not this year. We drove here today from Minnesota.”

“That’s pretty far away, right?”

“It’s so far away. My friends are all there. But my mom said I get to paint my new room any color I want, so it’s okay, I guess.”

“That’s awesome. My room is just white.”

“I think I’ll do yellow. Do you like yellow?”

I shrug. “I guess so.”

“Yeah, I think it’ll be yellow.” She points up to a window facing my house. “That one is my room. Luke got to choose first and he picked the bigger room.”

I point to the window on my house that faces hers and shares a roof. “That one is my room.”

“You can watch me paint my room from your room!”

“Okay. That sounds cool.”

“Do you want to be friends?”

Well, that was easy. Just last night I was praying for a new friend, and here she is. “Sure!”

“My brother will probably tell you not to be my friend.”

“I don’t care. I’m friends with a lot of people. I can be his friend and your friend. Or we can be secret friends.”

Her smile grows. “Okay.” She looks down at my feet. “Where are your shoes?”

“I was practicing my skating, but I had to take them off because my dad went inside, and I fall too much. But I’m getting better at skating.”

“Do you like music?”

“Yeah.”

“Me too. I love music.” She presses the rewind button on her cassette player.

“CDs are way better than tapes,” I tell her. “You should start buying CDs.”

“I like tapes. CDs scratch too much when you rewind them and then they don’t work right.”

“What are you listening to?”

“I don’t know the name. I just picked a song to remember the moment.”

Huh?

She must realize how confused I am because she adds, “I pick a song when something cool or important happens so I can remember it. Then when I want to relive a moment, I rewind it back and start the song from the beginning.”

That’s kind of weird but I don’t tell her that. I also don’t think it’d bother her if I called her weird. I think she’d keep doing what she’s doing.