“Of course. Road food is inherently unhealthy. And you’ll waste all your money on that stuff if you’re not careful.” Alden spoke deliberately, as if I were eleven with too much money to spend at the camp store or something. To me, road food was one of the best parts of a car trip, but his words made me feel stupid for looking forward to it. Before I could come up with a good retort, Alden added, “My moms are making muffins for the morning too.”
“Oh, I do love Judith’s cooking.” Professor Tuttle clapped his hands together.
“Yeah.” Alden sighed a little as though it was such a burden, having awesome parents. I’d had a biochem class with Professor Goldstein, Alden’s mother, sophomore year, and I knew both from things she’d said as well as clues Alden dropped that his other mother was some sort of bigwig doctor.
And two moms? How fucking lucky could a queer kid get? I imagined that Alden’s coming out—if there had even been need for one—had been greeted with a cake and streamers. That they were baking him send-off muffins was no surprise, and if a bitter tang gathered in my mouth, I tried to swallow it and other less-than-charitable thoughts.
“Surprised the moms are letting you off the leash.” The words escaped my better efforts and earned me a disgusted look from Alden.
“I’ll make sure to leave some muffins for Professor Herrera too,” Alden offered, giving Professor Tuttle his full attention, effectively dismissing me.
“He’ll love that. Now, let me just duck back inside a moment.”
“You need help?” I turned to follow him, but he waved me away.
“No, no. I’ll be right back. Call of nature, and I want to make sure I didn’t leave anything upstairs.”
More like he probably wanted to escape the tension between Alden and me, but I was still smarting too much from Alden’s comments to apologize for my own crack, especially not when Alden waited until the professor was back in the house to remark to Jasper, “I’ve been thinking. Given the age and sentimental value of this car, perhaps certain ground rules are prudent. Like no drinking or smoking.”
“I don’t smoke.” I didn’t know what he’d heard, but that wasn’t among my many vices. And he might have been addressing Jasper, but I knew darn well that he meant his rules for me, and I was having none of it. “And if you’re implying that I’d be stupid enough to try to drive—”
“But I heard—” He stopped, the silence damning. I had a pretty good idea what kind of crap he had heard. “You did have a car, but it was taken away. I’ve been worried that perhaps you don’t have a license anymore.”
“It wasn’t a freaking DUI,” I growled at him, fierce enough to make him take a step back. “And I am a damn good driver. Like I said, I’ve driven big SUVs. I’ll be just fine with this car. You’re the nervous one, not me.”
“I’m not nervous.” Alden plucked at something on the cuff of the sweatshirt he wore over khaki shorts.
“Sure you—”
“I’m going to go check on the professor.” Not waiting for a reply, Jasper headed for the house. A natural peacemaker for our little group, he’d never been much on conflict, and I should have felt bad for chasing him off, but Alden and his stupid-ass assumptions had me too worked up.
“You are. You’re scared about this trip.” I stared Alden down. “You’ve been like a nervous rabbit ever since the tickets appeared—all twitchy and on edge. Maybe you should just bail.”
“Like you did on school?” Alden shot back. Then he flushed and looked away, as if he hadn’t meant to rise to my bait.
“That’s what you think? That school was too hard for me? Or that I flunked out?” It felt good, actually fighting with him instead of us just taking random swipes at each other.
He shrugged, picking at that fraying cuff again. He wouldn’t meet my eyes. “You never say what happened, but you did like to party.”
“And so does half the damn school. You don’t know dick. If you knew the truth—”
“Conrad! Come quick!” Jasper’s panicked yell cut through my rage. I turned toward the house, emotions reluctant to disengage from Alden, but then Jasper called out again, “It’s Professor Tuttle! Call 911.”
And with that, every dream I’d clung to for the past few weeks froze, crumbling like flowers caught in a surprise spring blizzard. I should have known better than to pin my hopes on anything.
Chapter Six
Alden
Jasper hadn’t called for me, but I still ran after Conrad, already fishing my phone out of my shorts.
“I can call,” I yelled, already dialing. “What do I tell them?”
“Professor Tuttle fell down the stairs carrying a box of books. He’s conscious but hurt bad.” Jasper lowered his voice to speaking tones as we entered the house. His skin had taken on a sickly green cast. “I’ll go unlock the door for the paramedics. Tell them to hurry.”