Page 120 of Wrong For Me

Rose

“Okay, who wanted pepperoni?” River asks, bringing an armful of pizza toppings to the table.

“Me,” Ash says, reaching for it.

“You want the ham, Violet?” he asks.

She narrows her eyes. “You know I want ham, Riv. Where’s my other topping?”

He groans. “It’s so gross, Vi! When are you going to outgrow that?”

She merely crosses her arms and waits until he finally grumbles and goes back to the kitchen to get her sliced pineapple. Violet will only eat Hawaiian pizza and it’s been grossing River out since she was a toddler. Our differences in topping preferences are the main reason we’re doing create-your-own pizzas for dinner. That and because it’s really fun and something we always did with our mom.

I feel a pang at the thought. I’ve only spoken with my mom once since the fight with my dad last weekend. She spent most of the call trying to convince me to answer his calls. When she wouldn’t drop it, I stopped picking up the phone for her, too.

I miss the hell out of her. I miss my dad, too, but that fact is drowned out by the anger that still simmers whenever I remember the look on Leo’s face in that kitchen.

“Earth to Rose,” Ash says, snapping his fingers in front of my face. I startle and refocus on the siblings in front of me. Violet is very carefully arranging her pineapple in perfectly spaced stacks. Ash is finished already, the entire surface of his pizza covered in pepperoni. I haven’t even touched mine yet.

“You okay?” River asks in an undertone. Even though there were no cousins in the kitchen during the fight, it didn’t take long for every one of them to hear about it. I’ve noticed River watching me out of the corner of his eye all week, clearly worried. Dad’s been calling him way more than usual, probably to check on me.

Or maybe because he’s sad. That possibility makes my stomach hurt so badly I have to push the thought deep down.

“Yeah,” I say brightly. “Just thinking we should take a picture of all this awesomeness to send to Fox. Let him know what he’s missing.”

Violet rolls her eyes. “He’s probably having a party right now. I locked my door before I left so none of his skanky friends can get into my bedroom.”

“Yeah,” Ash says, totally deadpan. “You wouldn’t want them to mess with your collection of horse dolls.”

She glares at him. “They’re not dolls. They’recollectables.”

“And you honestly think Fox’s nineteen-year old friends are going to give a shit about them?”

“I’m just saying—” she begins, but River holds his hand up.

“Enough bickering. Let’s all just agree that Fox’s friends are lame and leave it at that.”

The two Littles laugh and we get back to finishing up our pizzas. Once they’re in the oven, River pulls out the Risk board and we get set up. Risk is a big tradition in our family—some of our longer tournaments can go for days.

I needed this,I think, watching Vi laugh at something River said. I’ve felt a little off all day. I intentionally wasn’t home when our parents dropped the kids at our apartment. I figured I didn’t want to ruin the weekend for the twins by starting it off with an argument between me and my dad. But now I’m regretting it. That had been a childish move. I don’t like the idea that my parents got on a plane this afternoon and I didn’t even say goodbye.

I’m also missing Leo with a fierce ache, which is silly. It’s been less than twelve hours since I climbed out of his bed this morning. But he wasn’t in school this morning—he drove down to San Diego to do a formal interview with the research team he’d met at the conference. If all goes well, he’ll have a paid internship come summer. His cell phone has been acting up—dying as soon as he unplugs it—so I haven’t even had a text from him yet to know how it went.

Stop worrying,I order myself. He’s going to join us tomorrow when we go to the aquarium. I can handle not sleeping in the same bed as him for one night.

Violet is well on her way to amassing a huge army—the girl is scary good at this game. Ash says she’d make a great dictator in real life—when there’s a knock at the door. My heart immediately swells—maybe Leo stopped by after all.

But when I go to answer the door, it’s not Leo standing there. It’s Uncle Cash and Uncle Reed. And their faces are tight with worry.

My knees go week and I sway on my feet “Mom and Dad?” I gasp. “Are they—?”

Understanding registers on Reed’s face and he reaches for me. “They’re fine. We just talked to them. They made it to New York safely.”

I struggle to take in air, relief washing over me. When I saw their worried faces I thought—

“What’s going on?” River asks, coming up behind me. “Is everything okay?”

“Everything is just fine,” Cash says, pushing into the apartment. “We just need to talk to you.”