“You not wanting to join the military,” Kael reminded me.
“Right.” I pulled myself together. “I mean, my dad was gone so much of the time and coming home from deployment but still being constantly absent while training. He was always so unhappy. My mom, too. The lifestyle basically broke her. You know . . .”
He nodded.
“So my brother and I promised after that fire that we wouldn’t live our lives that way.”
“Makes sense,” Kael said, looking around the yard, then back to me. “Wanna hear my side?”
I shook my head, teasing. He smiled.
“I get that. For real, I do. But to me, a Black kid from Riverdale, joining the Army changed the trajectory of my life. It was the thing that changed my whole family. My great-grandpa’s dad was a slave, my grandpa couldn’t find a regular fair-paying job, and my mother struggled her whole life, always encouraging me to find a way to leave, and here I am, you know? Until now, the only job I’d ever had was bagging groceries at Kroger, and now I drive a decent car, can help my mom—” He stopped abruptly.
“Don’t stop—” I urged him.
That earned me a small smile. “All the shit like that. It’s hard, yeah. Really fucking hard sometimes, but the Army was the only way I was able to afford living on my own, getting a college education, having health insurance.”
I sat, digesting. He had extremely valid points, given that his opinion of the Army was the opposite of mine.
“I get it,” I told him.
“There are two sides to everything, you know?”
I nodded, whispering, “Yeah. Two sides at least.” I tilted my head and asked, “Is your mom proud of you now?”
“Oh, of course. She tells everyone at church and anyone who’ll listen that her son is a decorated soldier. From my town, it’s kind of a big deal.” It was beyond adorable to see him turn shy and even a little embarrassed.
“Local celebrity,” I teased, leaning into his shoulder.
“Right,” he said, smiling. “Not like Austin,” he joked, as we heard my brother yelling again.
“What’s your mom like? I bet she’s—”
“We should probably go inside. You’re the chaperone, and if it stays this loud, the MPs will definitely come.”
I was well aware that he was avoiding my question, but I had already gotten more out of him than usual, so I decided not to be greedy. It was almost his birthday, after all.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
The party had quieted down after a few warnings to my brother about the Military Police coming. The coffee table was littered with beer bottles and plastic cups; the game controller sat idle in front of the TV. Limp bodies covered the couch and a few people had made themselves comfortable on the floor. It was mostly guys （and mostly soldiers）， except for the girl who earlier had been entwined with Austin. She was sitting alone on the floor now, moving slightly to the music, her shoulders doing this chill dance. Basically, she was doing that thing you do when you’re all alone at a party and you want to say It’s fine, I’m fine, everything’s fine.
“Do you need another drink?” I asked Kael.
He held up his beer, shaking the empty bottle. “Yeah, please.”
We made our way out of the living room, stepping carefully over denim-clad limbs. The kitchen was empty of people. Estelle’s attempts at what she called French Country décor—a dish towel that said Café, a ceramic rooster, a little metal Boulangerie sign that Elodie says Estelle pronounces wrong—were visible among the litter of empty bottles and pizza boxes. Still, seeing Kael here against the backdrop of so many familiar things, feeling him next to me, watching me, in the small space of this kitchen, made me anxious . . . He seemed outsized now, larger than life, and when I scooted past him, I almost elbowed him in the rib cage. He inched farther away from me, toward the fridge. Of course, I needed to get ice from the tray in the freezer.
“Sorry,” he said, nearly tripping over my feet to get out of my way.
“It’s fine,” I told him, my words blending together.
He made me feel . . . nervous. Maybe that wasn’t the right word. I didn’t feel tense or panicky, the things that usually come with nerves. He made me feel as if everything was so much closer to the surface, raw and more alive. When I was around him, my brain processed everything so fast, but everything felt still and calm in the cracks of him opening up to me. I felt bright and quick and stable and level all at once.
My heart raced when I glanced over and caught him looking back at me, his long fingers toying with the necklace around his neck. Maybe it was the effect of the vodka, but as I refilled my glass, I could feel Kael’s eyes on me, as if he was taking me in, head to toe. He wasn’t appraising me in that skeevy way some guys do when they are so obviously checking someone out. It wasn’t like that at all. When Kael looked at me, it was as if he saw me, the real me—who I was, not who I was trying to be. He held my gaze for a moment, then lowered his eyes. My chest fluttered. Forget butterflies—these were blackbirds. Big, glossy blackbirds flapping their wings, making my heart take flight. I took a deep breath to calm myself down. I felt him looking at me and tried to ignore the pang at the bottom of my stomach. I put the bottle back on the counter and mixed in apple juice. Someone had cleared out the cranberry.
“What’s that going to taste like?” He was standing right behind me now. Whether he had moved or I had, I couldn’t say. I saw his shadow in the metal sink and hoped like hell that he couldn’t hear the wild beating in my chest.
I turned slowly to face him. He was so close.
“Either great or not.” I shrugged.
He took a half-step back. My body didn’t calm.
“And you’re willing to take that risk?” he asked, smiling behind his drink. I wanted to tell him that he didn’t need to hide it—his smile, that was. That I really liked it when he was funny when he teased me. But I needed a few more shots to be at that level of bold.
“Yeah. I guess so.” I put my nose to the glass and took a sniff. It wasn’t so bad. I took a sip. It wasn’t horrible. But maybe I should microwave it to pretend it was a cider?
“Good?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said. I lifted the cup between us. “Wanna taste?”
“No, thanks.” He shook his head, holding up his beer.
“Do you always drink beer?” I asked him.
“Yeah, mostly. Not in a while, though,” he said, smiling but trying not to. “Because of being gone. Of being over there,” he clarified.
“Ohhh, because you were gone. Right. Gone. Over there.” I was an idiot, echoing everything he said. But it took me a second to catch on, regardless of how many times we had repeated the word gone.“Wow. Yeah, adjusting to being back must be so weird.”
Every time he reminded me that his life was drastically different from mine, I felt shaken. I noticed his glassy eyes again . . . his beautiful brown eyes. Maybe he was as buzzed as I was. I leaned toward Kael to ask if he was drunk, to ask him if he was okay. That’s when Austin barreled into the kitchen with Mendoza right behind him. Way to kill the moment.