Kody Keplinger: A Midsummer's Nightmare

At least, not until Dad slammed his laptop down in front of me while I ate breakfast the next morning, his face beet red and his eyes practically popping out of his skull.

“What the hell is this?” he demanded, jabbing a finger at the screen. “Start talking, Whitley.”

I glanced at the monitor and realized I was staring at Dad’s Facebook page. At the very top was a new post. Greg Johnson has been tagged in a photo . My eyes found the image, and as I looked it over for a moment, I actually had to think about why he was angry. It was just a picture of Nathan and me. To be honest, it was kind of cute. Well shot. It looked a bit like a screenshot from a romantic movie. One of those perfect kisses.

“What’s the problem?” I asked.

“Damn it, Whitley.” His fist hit the table so hard that my cereal bowl shook.

I flinched.

“What the hell are you and Nathan doing? Why are you kissing him?”

And then I got it.

Dad didn’t know about Nathan and me yet.

No one did. Well, except Harrison… and Bailey, if she’d managed to figure it out on her own, which I was sure she had, since we weren’t doing much to hide our relationship now.

“We’re dating,” I said, picking up my spoon.

“No, you most certainly are not,” Dad snapped, making me flinch again.

We were the only ones in the kitchen. Nathan was at the gym. Sylvia had taken Bailey shopping for a new pair of athletic tennis shoes. And I’d only just rolled out of bed at eleven in the morning. I’d been halfway through my breakfast when Dad stormed out of his study, laptop in hand.

Now I wished I’d gotten up early. Gone shopping with Sylvia and Bailey, or even to the gym with Nathan. Anything to avoid this conversation. Which clearly wasn’t going to go very well.

“How could you do this?” he asked, still furious.

“Do what?” I asked. “I didn’t do anything.”

“I want you to end things with Nathan,” he said. “Whatever is going on with you two, I want you to put a stop to it right now.”

“No.”

“Don’t argue with me, young lady.”

I stood up so fast that my chair toppled over behind me. “No!” I was the angry one now. “We aren’t doing anything wrong. We’re just dating. It’s not like he’s actually my brother, so why should I have to end it?”

“Because I said so,” he snarled.

“That’s not a good enough reason.”

“Don’t talk back to me like that,” he said, his palms smacking the table again. He leaned forward, his eyes burning into mine. “You are my daughter, and this is my house. You will do as I say. You won’t see Nathan. You won’t date him or kiss him or do whatever it is you two are doing. And that is final.”

He straightened up and turned around, ready to leave the room.

“No,” I said again.

He stopped in the doorway to the living room. “Whitley,” he growled.

“No,” I repeated.

In a sick way, I was glad we were fighting. Glad he was yelling at me, paying attention to me. But now he was walking away. Not even listening to me. Not even bothering to hear my side of the story. I thought I might do anything to keep him in the room. Even fling myself on the ground and throw a two-year-old tantrum. Whatever it took to keep him here. To make him turn around. To make him see me.

And I thought the way to make him stay was to say something dramatic. Something that would shock him. Only, the words that came to mind happened to be the truth.

“I’m falling in love with him,” I said. “I’m not going to stop seeing him. I won’t.”

“Then pack your things.”

“What?”

“I’ll have someone fill in for me at the station, and I’ll take you back to your mom’s tomorrow afternoon,” he said, his back still to me. “I won’t deal with this behavior in my home.”

And he left the room.

It didn’t sink in at first. I sat down, my eyes on Dad’s laptop. I clicked the picture, read the caption: Whitley seems to have a thing for brotherly love.

“Fuck them,” I said quietly. “Fuck them. They don’t matter.”

But Dad did.

He mattered because he could take them away. Nathan, Bailey, Sylvia, Harrison—he could take away the only people who cared about me. The words sank in slowly. I was basically being kicked out.

Kicked out of my home.

At the beginning of the summer, I swore this place would never become my home, but it had. I didn’t realize it until now, until it was being taken away, and yet, somehow, this house felt safer, more real, than my mother’s house in Indiana ever had. The Caulfields had made this my home.

I didn’t want to leave.

I ran upstairs, hot tears stinging my eyes and burning the tops of my cheeks. I pushed open the door of the guest room— my room—and threw myself onto the bed— my bed.

I just lay there for a while, my face in the pillow, trying to calm down. When my heartbeat finally slowed, I rolled onto my back and stared at the ceiling. My head hurt. My stomach ached. Dad’s decision to send me back to Mom’s house put me in a serious state of pain. What was I supposed to do? I didn’t want to go back. I didn’t want to leave now. I had a week and a half left here. A week and a half left with Nathan. With the Caulfields. With my family.

Not anymore.

The house was eerily empty around me now. Dad was somewhere downstairs, I knew, but the TV was off. And the others hadn’t come back yet.

I needed to talk to someone. I needed advice.

I reached over to the nightstand and picked up my cell phone. The screen flashed one missed call from Mom and a voice mail, but I ignored it. She was the last person I wanted to talk to. We hadn’t spoken since our last argument a few days ago, and I was sure she wanted to bitch at me for bitching at her. Whatever. I couldn’t deal with her now.

I dialed Trace’s house number. L.A. was two hours behind, so I hoped he’d be awake.

“Hello?” Emily’s voice said when she answered the phone.

“Um, hey, Em,” I said awkwardly. My voice cracked, still not recovered from the crying.

“Whitley? Hey, girl. How are you?”

“Not… not good. Can I talk to Trace, please?”

“Sure. He’s playing with Marie right now. She just started laughing for the first time!”

“That’s great.”

“I know. We’re so excited. It’s almost ridiculous, I guess. Okay, here’s Trace.”

The phone crackled as it was passed to my brother, and a second later Trace said, “Hey, sis. What’s going on?”

“I have a problem,” I told him. “And I really just need you to listen and tell me what to do.”

“Oh- kay ,” Trace said. “I’ll do my best.”

I took a deep breath, let it out, and started talking.

I told him everything. About Dad. About the Caulfields. About Nathan, the graduation party (in minimal detail), and Facebook. Trace never interrupted. He just listened until I got it all out. Listened while I ranted and nearly started crying again and wallowed in self-pity. He listened and listened until I finally got out the last few words of my story.

“… and now he wants to send me back to Mom’s, and I don’t want to go. What do I do, Trace?”

“Wow,” he said. “Seriously— wow . I mean, what are the odds that of all the people Dad might marry, the chick’s son is someone you’ve—”

“Trace!”

“Sorry. Okay, advice… hmm.”

I waited through his thoughtful pause, half expecting him to tell me that the best plan would be to just end things with Nathan. Logically, that probably seemed like the solution, but I couldn’t. And I shouldn’t have to.

I guess Trace knew that, because he said, “Really, Whitley, all you can do is try to talk to Dad again.”