Puck Daddy

I swore after Layla turned me down that I’d lay low. I know damn well my reputation got in the way of that deal—it was no secret that I could talk the panties off pretty much any girl in our grade. “Ah, hell, why not? I like a challenge.”

Gunner shakes his head, chuckling. “You really are a manwhore, aren’t you?”

“You aren’t much better, you realize that, right?” I smile, my first real smile since this stupid party got underway. “You’ll screw any—”

I feel something hit the back of my neck before I hear the hissing sound that accompanies it. Stumbling away from the table, I clamp my hand down on my neck, feeling something wet. “What the—”

All at once, I realize that the substance is a bright shade of blue, that it’s still coming at me, covering my shoulders, back, and head…and that there’s a loud wave of high-pitched shrieks assaulting my ears.

I turn around, holding my jacket up as best as I can to shield myself, but it’s no use. “Come on!” I bellow, pissed off at the gang of young girls. “Fucking silly string? That’s enough!”

But the shrill laughter continues.

Every ounce of anger I feel about this party, this stupid family dynamic, and this day erupts inside me. Lowering my jacket and seeing Sadie there, with her finger pressed down on the silly string canister, only makes my blood reach its boiling point.

“Happy birthday, Ashton!” she screams, her laughter so loud and obnoxious that there are stray tears on her cheeks. The young girl weaves one way, then the next, trying to keep far enough away from me so that I won’t take the aerosol can from her, but never once lets up on the steady stream of string that continues to propel toward me.

“You think this is fucking funny?”

“Ash—”

I can hear Gunner trying to calm me down. Our parents are probably yelling a blue streak, too, because I’ve just cursed at their fucking beloved Sadie, but I can’t hear them over my pounding pulse.

In one foul swoop, I dive for the canister in her hand. I grab Sadie by the wrist with one hand, and tear the can from her fingers with the other.

Her laughter stops immediately. “Hey!”

I let her go, turn, and pitch the canister high into the air, into the heavily treed area behind our house. “I told you to fucking stop!”

Sadie stands there, wide eyed, her handful of friends tucked in close behind her, not saying a word. Her voice comes out no louder than a whisper. “I just—”

“You just what? Wanted to be a pain in the ass?” The words come out of me in a tsunami of pent-up rage, fed up with having to put up with this ridiculous charade any longer. “Because you’re succeeding. That’s all you are…a pain in my goddamn ass!”

Sadie’s bottom lip quivers, and any decent man probably would have left it at that. But I can’t seem to stop myself.

“You’re just a fucking kid! Go play with your Barbie dolls, or whatever the hell you irritating little girls do!” I yell.

“Ashton! Cool it!” Gunner barks.

But the damage has been done. A thin line of tears streak Sadie’s face. Despite her small stature and her thin frame, she stays standing there, taking each verbal blow as it comes. “But…it’s our birthday. I thought we were friends—”

“Friends?” I choke out the word like it tastes bad, running my hand through my hair, still tangled with blue string. “We’re not friends. Or family, for that matter, but you’d never fucking know it with this crap still going on every year.” I glare around me, at everyone who’s now stopped talking, stopped breathing, mortified by my outburst. “And our birthday? Christ, keep it, Sadie. I’m through sharing it. You can fucking have it.”

I know I’ve crossed a line, and I damn well know I’m an asshole for taking it out on a kid, but that doesn’t stop me from turning away from that little girl’s tear-streaked face and storming past everyone on the patio.

No one says a word. Which is good, because by the time I hit the pavement of the driveway, I’m not sure there’s anything anyone could say that would make me feel any worse than I already do.

Chapter 1

SADIE

Present

No one said growing up was going to be easy. And with only days until my twenty-fourth birthday, it seems I’ve spent more than enough time figuring that out. Being an adult is definitely not my forte, though. That’s pretty obvious.

I mean, why else would I be hiding out in my apartment, not answering my phone, or the buzzer to unlock the doors downstairs?

Because I’ve failed at being able to adult like normal people do.