Next to Never (Fall Away #4.5)

Cracking open the door, I creep inside, knowing they’re not home yet, but Addie could be lurking around somewhere, too.

I close the door and dash into my mom’s closet, walking past the clothes and shoe racks, the handbags and jewelry. I loved playing in here as a kid. Trying on her things and pretending I was as sophisticated and beautiful. I kind of like finding out she didn’t always have it together. That she was far from perfect.

Taking down the white box on the shelf, I dig through it until I find her black journal underneath her old yearbook.

Holding it in my hands, the nerves under my skin are firing so hard I almost feel sick. I don’t want to read this. It’s private, and I love my parents. I don’t need to know all their secrets, because it doesn’t change how much they mean to each other and me.

But someone sent the book to me for a reason.

I absently fan the pages, not ready to look, but the book automatically falls open in the middle and I widen my eyes in shock.

“Oh, my God.”

Sitting between the pages is a small pile of one-hundred-dollar bills and a business card. An old tattered one, yellowed from age, and it has my father’s name on it.

I count out the money. Four hundred. The same amount Jase gave Kat for changing the oil in his car.

Chapter 6

We sail down the highway, the radio blasting with Madonna’s “Like a Prayer,” and I have to laugh as I look over at Dylan.

She’s bouncing against the back of her seat, singing at full volume.

“This song’s like really old, you know?” I shout, teasing her.

She smiles, punching the stick shift into fifth. I grab onto the safety bar, because she freaks me out when she drives.

“It’s sexy, though,” she taunts, turning down the volume. “Did you know it’s about a blow job?

I shoot my eyes over to her. “It is not!”

She laughs, nodding. “It is! Listen.” And she starts singling along with Madonna, “‘I’m down on my knees, I want to take you there.’” She eyeballs me. “See!”

I look away, turning it over in my head as my entire childhood shatters. How many times have I danced to this around my house? In front of my parents?!

Squeezing my eyes shut, I bury my face in my hands and practically growl. My mom is right. My dad shelters me, and now my younger relatives are teaching me shit. Awesome.

“Just . . . drop me at Jax’s,” I blurt out, changing the subject. “I need to talk to Juliet.”

“Are you sure?”

I unfasten my seat belt as she makes a small detour, turning onto Fall Away Lane. “Yeah, I’ll catch a ride with them. Don’t worry. I’ll be there.”

“Okay, see you soon then,” she says with a hint of threat in her voice, like I’d better be there or else. I know she’s nervous about her first race tonight. Even though she’s been on that track and many others her father has taken her to her entire life.

Walking up to Jax and Juliet’s house, I slow my steps as I take in the white two-story with black shutters, looking at it with new eyes now.

My father bought this house. I wonder if my brothers knew that. No wonder my mother never took Jax’s money for it. It wouldn’t have been right. My father gave it to her as a gift, and she passed it on as a gift.

If my dad had never bought the house, Jax and Juliet wouldn’t live here now. Jared might never have met Tate, at least not until high school, and Hawke, Dylan, and James might never have been born without all those events that brought everyone together. It’s incredible how something that seems so insignificant can alter the lives of so many. How our family started out so unsure, but now, here we are. Practically a clan.

I walk into the house without knocking, which is pretty much standard in our family. There’s so much coming and going, everyone knows not to walk around naked.

Making my way toward the kitchen, I stop when I hear Jax’s voice, then I notice Hawke at my side. He must’ve come in behind me.

He’s sweating, wearing only black shorts and a backpack with no shirt. “I’m home!” he calls, rounding the bannister. “I’m gonna shower, and I’ll meet you at the track, Dad.”

“Ok, hurry up,” Jax tells him. “It’s Dylan’s night.”

Hawke heads upstairs, and I continue into the kitchen, seeing Jax come toward me.

“Hey. What’s up?” He plants a kiss on my forehead.

“I just need to talk to Juliet. Are you riding separate?”

“As usual.” He grins. “See you there.” And then he walks around me, heading out.

Juliet is at the sink, using the hose to spray water over a plant, and I stand and watch her for a moment.

I admire all of my sisters-in-law: Tate for her strength and the way she stands up for herself, and Fallon for the way she doesn’t bend and sticks to her convictions. But Juliet is a little different.

I always looked up to her, because I liked how girly she was. Or is. She flaunts her femininity.

She’s beautiful, and despite the fact that she teaches high school English and Literature and writes young adult books on the side, she never gives into pressure to fit a mold or hide her personality to meet an expectation.

I love how she wears her personality. The big necklaces that are a perfect contradiction to her jean shorts and T-shirt, the heels she wears with skinny jeans, the lip gloss the color of cotton candy . . . all of those things were a very big deal to an eight-year-old who looked at this woman and saw glamour.