Page 239 of Across His Line

“I’ll tell you if you tell us what’s going on with Paige.”

He takes a bite and then walks out.

Kylie widens her eyes. “Those two will be the death of me. Neither of them are willing to say a single word, Tess, and I talk to her every day! Speaking of.” She waves her phone at me, then starts texting. “I might have to just wait her out like I did with you.”

I hear voices in the other room.

Kylie says, “Koda, come back here!”

He stops in the doorway with the cinnamon roll halfway to his mouth, and she takes a picture of him.

He says, “Why are you taking pictures of me?”

“I am sending it to your girlfriend.”

“I don’t have a girlfriend,” he says. “And if you’re talking about Paige, don’t send it please.”

Kylie drops her shoulders. “Aw, you know how to use the word please.”

He looks at me. “You’re the only level-headed one here, will you help me?”

Rafe walks in.

“Help you with what?” I ask.

Koda watches as Rafe walks over and lifts me off the counter.

He looks at Kylie as I wrap my arms around his neck.

She pulls her hoodie off her knees and drops to the ground. “The party poopers are here.”

“Kylie,” Koda pleads.

“I just need evidence because she’s not going to believe me.”

He bites the cinnamon roll, staring at Kylie like she’s the culprit.

Nash walks in and looks at Koda for a moment.

Koda nods. “Tell your girl to stop taking pictures of me.”

Nash looks down at him and then over at Kylie. Kylie shrugs like it’s no big deal.

Rafe’s mom walks in and saves the awkward conversation, saying, “Good morning.”

Everyone says, “Good morning.”

Mrs. Waleska goes straight to her coffee machine.

The days start running together after that.

Koda eats everything. I mean everything. Mrs. Waleska made a whole pan of lasagna for the next two nights, and Koda ate a third of it standing up at the counter at midnight with a fork, and when she found out in the morning, she didn’t yell at him. She looked at him for a long time, and then she made another one.

Nash disappears with Kylie for hours and comes back looking like nothing happened, which fools absolutely nobody. Mrs. Waleska makes everyone go sledding on the hill behind the old house on the twenty-ninth, on actual wooden sleds she pulled out of the garage, and Koda goes into the creek. He comes up the hill screaming and Rafe laughs so hard he has to sit down in the snow.

Mrs. Waleska makes hot chocolate every single afternoon in a big pot on the stove at three o’clock every day.

I read Mr. Waleska’s book on the couch while the four of them argue about whether a goalie can be a captain, and I keep writing in the margins with a pencil, under his notes, little arrows and question marks and why?, because he told me to argue with it, and I am. Kylie catches me doing it and leans over my shoulder and reads one of them out loud.