It’s the blood that makes that me regain my senses, including my voice, and I cry out, “Stop! Stop!” when the backpacker is down on the ground. The boy doesn’t listen and continues the beatdown.
“Dexter, stop!” a woman’s voice shouts from across the street. “I said stop!”
He pauses, his eyes clearing for a moment, but then refocuses on the backpacker, who is groaning on the ground.
Another figure comes out of the shadows and I see Tom racing across the street, shouting, “Dex!”
The two of them approach and urge him to stop. The boy slows and the woman, Sierra, I recognize now, eases next to him, tentatively reaching for him. She touches his shoulders and he flinches but doesn’t lash out. Tom grabs the knife off the ground and then drops down to check on the backpacker. He glances up at me. “Starlee, are you okay?”
The boy, Dexter, jerks his head in my direction. His knuckles are raw and bleeding.
I nod, unable to really speak. I’m shaken by the whole scene.
“Can you get back home okay?”
“Y—yes.”
The backpacker groans and I edge by them, careful to keep my distance. Sierra’s voice is strained when she speaks to Dexter, “What the hell were you thinking? Fighting? In the street?”
If he responds I don’t hear it, because I’m up in the lawn headed back to Leelee’s house. The image of Dexter beating up the man haunts my every step. The sheer violence of it all. So much anger. But there’s one thing that nags at me as I climb the steps on the front porch, hands still shaking at my sides: that he did it for me.
7
It doesn’t take my grandmother long to figure out why I’m refusing to come out of my room. I stay in the shower until the water runs cold and when she calls for me I tell her I’m sick, locking my door and hunkering down in my bed.
It takes everything in me not to call my mother. Everything. She was right. I shouldn’t go out alone. I should stay inside where it’s safe. Only venture out with others. Or honestly, maybe not at all.
But I don’t call her, even though my fingers hover over the keypad of the antique princess style phone next to the bed. Because if I do, she’ll come back and get me and as terrifying as the morning is, the thought of going back home doesn’t sit well.
I like it here. Or I sort of do. The fresh air and the endless sky. It’s so different and oddly liberating. I just need to take precautions and early morning walks by myself are off the table. Backpackers and boys from the Wayward Sun are definitely off-limits.
“Starlee, I need to go down to the office, you going to be okay?”
“Yes,” I reply, pillow up to my chin.
“Come down if you feel up to it. Or call me if you need me.”
“I will.”
I won’t. I won’t move an inch if I don’t have to.
At home, my mother would have hovered, asking me time and time again if I was okay. Leelee isn’t like that; she’s the daughter of a pioneer. Strong and resourceful. I wonder how that skipped a few generations, or just my mother’s. I wasn’t the only Starlee with bad experiences. My mother started the trend—it’s why she was so protective. She’d been there.
I didn’t remember much about my father. The things I did know were a mixture of photographs and truth, stories and legend. He wasn’t on the van that took my mother out of Lee Vines, but she did find him soon after she landed in North Carolina. He was a college student and she worked at a diner and convinced her to go back to school. Really, he just wanted her to be with him. Always. He loved her from the very first day and I guess that was the problem. You can love someone too much.
There’s a knock on the front door and I freeze in the bed, thinking if I don’t move, they’ll leave. I hear my name—called out by a woman’s voice—Sierra? But I don’t move. I don’t dare.
Her voice is kind when she says, “I brought you something from the shop. I’ll leave it here for you,” and her footsteps fade away. There’s no sound for a long time other than the tick tock of the grandfather clock in the living room and my pounding heart.
There’s one thing that always gets me in trouble: curiosity. Time and time again, the lure of what’s waiting on the porch calls to me and I slowly get out of bed. I peek out the front window but see nothing and finally open the door, spotting the brown, folded-over bag and a white paper coffee cup on the mat.
I stare at it for a minute, wondering if it’s a trap. The backpacker coming to get me? Luring me out with a drink.
Okay, Starlee, I tell myself. Even I know that’s going too far.
I bend down and grab them both, quickly shutting and locking the door behind me. I look at the drink, there’s a stamp of a sun with wavy rays on the side that says “Wayward Sun Coffee” and in the bag is a chocolate chip muffin—a Moose Muffin. Sniffing the drink, I catch the rich hint of mocha.
I know it’s silly to be flattered that they remembered my favorite drink, it’s a small town after all, but I’ve never had anyone remember anything about me. Not little or big.