Leo: A More Than Series Spin-Off Read online

  He chuckles—a sound that echoes through the air, through my heart. “I know I’m scrawny, but I’m strong. I promise. I can carry your weight. Besides, you’re so little.”

  If you ask me to describe myself in three words, I’d tell you: short, chubby, plain.

  I’m not little, not by any stretch, but as I stand here, my insecurities laid bare between us, I realize that in his eyes… that’s how he sees me, and that… that means more than anything.

  More than it should.

  * * *

  I don’t know how long we ride before he finally stops in front of a high chain-link fence. We don’t speak on the ride, and I stay quiet as we get off the bike, and he leads us with the flashlight, which was attached to his handlebars, toward a hole in the fence. I don’t know whether he or his brothers cut it or if it was there previously. All I know is that whatever we’re doing is most likely illegal. He lifts the bottom of the wire for me to go through while I ask, “Can we get into trouble for this?”

  Leo sighs, but it’s playful. “Hey, remember when you thought I couldn’t handle you on the back of the bike?”

  Of course, I remember. It was, like, fifteen minutes ago. “Yeah…?”

  “And you still got on, right?”

  I nod, chew the corner of my lip.

  “Why’d you get on?”

  “I don’t know. Because I’m crazy?”

  “No.” He shakes his head, then stands taller. Prouder. “It’s because you trust me.”

  We walk through tall grass while Leo explains that we’re going to an abandoned water tower. During the weekends, some older kids go there to party. But in the wee hours of the morning, he’s never seen anyone else around. He admits that it’s most likely illegal to be here, but the cops turn a blind eye as long as no real illegal activity happens—besides, you know, teen drinking. He mentions that Cameron, his sister’s boyfriend, was the one to show it to him. “It’s because he knows I like the quiet,” he says with a shrug. “He’s an only child, so sometimes being at the house can get a little too much for him.”

  “Yeah,” I reply as if I understand any different. Sometimes Mom and I will eat dinner with the Prestons, but most of the time, we eat at the apartment and barely say two words to each other.

  Once at the bottom of the water tower, he asks, “You’re not afraid of heights, are you?”

  “No.”

  “Will you be okay to climb the ladder?”

  A giggle bursts out of me. “We have one of these on the farm.”

  His eyebrows rise, then he teases, “Ooh, look at you with your fancy farm and your fancy water tower.”

  “Shut up,” I laugh out, shoving his shoulder. He falls back a step, laughing with me, and there’s something about that moment that feels so significant. It’s the first time away from home that I let my guard down, let myself be me, and let myself be seen.

  Once at the tower’s highest ledge, Leo unzips his backpack and pulls out a thermos, snacks, and a paperback novel. It’s the same one he was reading the night before. “What’s the book about?” I ask.

  He huffs out a breath as he sits down beside me, our legs dangling off the edge. “I’m not sure yet.” He doesn’t elaborate further, and so I leave it at that. “I need to ask you a question,” he says, hesitant, as he concentrates on dividing the snacks between us. “And you don’t have to answer if you don’t want to…” He peers up at me through thick lashes, a strand of dark hair falling over his brow.

  My pulse picks up, anxiousness swarming through my veins. “Okay…”

  After clearing his throat, he stares ahead into the breaking dawn. He cracks each of his knuckles before turning to me, the intensity in his gaze creating fear in my chest. “Last night, my dad asked you if my brothers and I were—”

  “I’m sorry,” I cut in, looking away. “I shouldn’t have lied to him.”

  “I don’t care that you did,” he rushes out. “I just wanted to know why you did it.”

  With a shrug, I say, “I didn’t want you guys to get into trouble.”

  He doesn’t respond, and I can feel him watching me, scrutinizing.

  Leo may like the quiet, but I don’t like the silence, especially when it’s between us. Hoping to make a sound, I kick my feet back and forth and shove my hands under my butt to hide their trembling.

  Minutes pass, neither of us saying a word, and I keep my head low, my eyes shut. Finally, he says, “Is that why you’re like that with your mom?”

  My gaze snaps up, locks on his. “Like what?”

  His eyes widen in the way they do when you’re stating something obvious. “Like, you just let her treat you like shit.”

  I wince at his curse and shake my head, annoyance mixed with hurt causing heat to form behind my eyes. “I don’t want to talk about this,” I murmur.

  “I’m sorry,” he almost whispers. “I didn’t mean…” His tone’s so solemn that it has my chest aching. “I didn’t mean to make you mad or sad or… I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  I don’t respond, too busy trying to fight back my emotions.

  “Mia?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay,” I say, looking up at him. “It’s just that—”

  His head shake cuts me off. “You don’t need to explain anything. I won’t ever bring it up again.” He draws a cross over his heart, a sad smile marring his lips. “Swear it.”

  I offer a nod, grateful for his response.

  He kicks his foot against mine. “It’s time,” he says, pointing toward the horizon. The sun’s just breaking through in the distance, with silhouettes of trees splintering its appearance. The ground is a fog, a blur of existence. But it’s the sky that leaves me breathless… the darkness that enveloped us only minutes ago is replaced with all the hues of reds, pinks, and purples, stretching beyond what the eye can see.

  It’s endless.

  Infinite.

  “It’s as if the world’s being split in two,” I breathe out.

  “I know.” He pauses a beat. Then: “It reminds me of you.”

  Chapter Four

  Leo

  I’ve never taken anyone to the water tower before. It had always been my spot, somewhere I could get away from the shouting and crying and general chaos of the house. Dad knows I go there some mornings, and as long as I’m back for breakfast, he doesn’t seem to mind. He doesn’t seem to mind a lot of the things I do or didn’t do, as long as I’m “present” for the things that matter. Physically and mentally. This morning though, I lost track of time. I could’ve spent the entire day with her there, sitting in complete silence, as long as she was by my side. It felt like seconds, and I wish those seconds could be minutes, hours, days.

  My legs are burning by the time I get us back home, cursing internally when I see Dad walking down the porch steps with his work gear. He pauses when he sees us, and I slow to stop in front of him. “Sorry,” I rush out, careful to balance the bike long enough for Mia to hop off. Her cheeks are flush, either from windburn or embarrassment, I’m not sure.

  “Morning, Mr. Preston,” she says quietly, removing the backpack I’d given her. I already miss her touch, the way her hands gripped my shoulders as we rode.

  Dad smiles down at her and then over at me. “You weren’t gone all night, were you?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Water tower?”

  I nod.

  He gives a curt nod and focuses on Mia again. “Does your mom know you left the property?”

  Mia’s staring down at her feet. “No, sir.”

  Dad sighs heavily but doesn’t say any more. He gets in his truck and starts the engine. “The older boys are still asleep,” he tells me. “So eat as much as you can before they get up.” He winks at me, a silent message I don’t quite understand.

  Mia and I watch until his truck disappears down the driveway. I hop off the bike and take my backpack from her. “Want to do it again tomorrow?”
r />   She bites her lip, her eyes the lightest I’d ever seen when they make contact with mine. There’s something about the way she always looks at me, the way her gaze stops on me for just a second whenever we’re in the same room. I both love it and fear it.

  “You’re not in trouble?” she asks.

  “Nah.” At least not from my dad. My brothers—that’s a different story. And I hope that Dad won’t tell them about us.

  I’ve been with girls before—in the way most seventh graders have. I’ve held hands and kissed a couple, but they never lasted. Sometimes it’s because they wanted me to be something I wasn’t. They pushed for more than I was willing to give, and they’d end things before they even began. To be honest, I didn’t care. It’s not as if I truly felt anything for them. Most of the time, my brothers would find a way to ruin it. Either the twins would tease us, or Lucas would exist; they’d fall for him instead, or Logan would steal them just because he’s Logan.

  With Mia—it was different. I don’t know why, and I can’t explain it. Not even to myself. I’m terrified that I’ll say or do something to make her not like me, even as friends, so it was easier to just not show her too much of myself. Or not enough.

  But I was in it now, and I was in deep.

  The last thing I want is my brothers ruining this for me.

  Whatever this is.

  “Same time?” she asks, and I nod, hiding my pathetic grin until we part ways.

  I make it through most of the day, thinking I’m home free. My brothers have no idea about this morning. It’s not until halfway through dinner when Dad says, “I don’t know how I feel about you and Mia sneaking off in the middle of the night,” that I know it’s all over. There’s a twisting in my chest, right before my heart drops to my stomach. Logan and Lucas cut off their guffaws when Dad gives them a pointed glare. The twins giggle to each other, then laugh at me. Lachlan throws mashed potato across the table and hits Logan square in the face. “You little shit!” Logan yells.

  “Logan!” Dad reprimands. “He’s just a baby!”

  “He’s three!” he yells back, using a spoon as a slingshot to catapult a clump of potato back at our youngest brother. It misses, hits one of the twins, World War III starts, and I do what I always do when that shit happens.

  I check out.

  Eat my food.

  Wash my dishes.

  And walk away.

  I go to my room, lie flat on the bed, and stare at the ceiling, my fists balling. It doesn’t take long for my door to burst open, for Lucas and Logan to enter unannounced. “Mia?” Luke says. “Really?”

  “They’re sneaking off in the middle of the night.” Logan chuckles. “I thought I was the bad one.”

  I don’t react.

  Reacting only makes things worse.

  “She’s a little… weird, don’t you think?” Luke adds.

  Logan scoffs. “Understatement. But so is Leo.”

  Lucas laughs. “Did you kiss her?”

  “Did you fuck her?” Logan cackles.

  In this moment, I hate them both. Not because they’re saying what they’re saying, but…

  All I wanted was one thing that’s mine and mine alone. And Mia’s that “thing.” And they’re taking away the importance of the time we’ve shared.

  They’re taking away her.

  They’re ruining it all, and I know they’ll keep finding ways to make it worse, just like they do everything else.

  I won’t let them.

  Not this time.

  She means too much to me, and I don’t want to erase how I felt this morning, or last night, when it was just us and no one else, and I know… I know I’ll never be able to have moments like that again now that my brothers know.

  I want to keep those memories alive.

  And keep those feelings safe.

  “Get out of my room.” It’s all I say, and I should say more, but I don’t.

  They leave, laughing to each other as they do.

  I don’t sleep that night. Not a single wink. And when my alarm goes off at 4:20, I get up from under the covers and look out my window. I wait for her door to open, watch as she peeks outside. I look on from the darkness of my room as she sits at the bottom of the stairs, continuously checking the time. And as the minutes pass, I can feel time slipping away, feel the cracks in my chest start to widen.

  After waiting for an entire hour, she finally gives up.

  And I finally give in.

  I reach under my bed, pull out the old shoebox, and lift the lid.

  Hundreds upon hundreds of photographs come into view.

  Hers is the first one I see.

  On top of the pile, right in the middle, her light brown eyes stare back at me.

  I hold it in one hand while I go through the others, flipping them over to read their backs.

  Three words.

  All different.

  Because it’s all my mother asked.

  * * *

  It started a year before the cancer diagnosis. She was worried about me; I could tell by the way she looked at me. She didn’t look at my brothers like that. They’d always been fine, always spoke up, or spoke in general.

  I was quiet.

  Too quiet.

  Until I wasn’t.

  I’d have “outbursts,” Mom called them. Sometimes verbal. Sometimes physical. “Leo can’t handle his emotions,” I heard her telling Dad one night. “It’s like he keeps them buried, and then he just… explodes.”

  The next day, she brought me a ton of random photographs, mostly of my family, but some of images she’d cut out of magazines and catalogs. I was sitting at my desk, staring out the window. She slid a picture toward me. It was of me holding the twins right after they were born. Lucy was beside me, making sure I was doing it right. I was grinning down at the twins the way Lucy was at me. “How do you think you felt when this happened, Leo?” Her tone was gentle, soft. “Or how do you feel looking at it?”

  I stared at the photograph a moment before looking up at her. “Happy,” I said, my voice low.

  She smiled then, dragging the picture toward her. She flipped it over and wrote on the back: Happy. “What else?”

  “Grateful,” I replied.

  Her smile widened. “Why grateful?”

  “Because they were here, and they were healthy.”

  She nodded, wrote down: Grateful. “One more?”

  “Scared.”

  She looked up; her brow dipped in concern. “Now or then?”

  I shrugged, looked out the window again. “Both.”

  “Why, Leo?” she asked, placing a hand on my shoulder.

  I kept my gaze trained on the tree line ahead. “Because I don’t want to break them.”

  For a long moment, my mother didn’t respond, but I could feel her watching me, and I’d wondered how long it would take her to realize that I was the broken one.

  “Do you think you could do some more of these?” she finally said. “For me?” Then she added in a rush, “Or just for yourself. You don’t have to show anyone.”

  Without waiting for a reply, she walked over to my door. “Just think of three,” Mom said. “Write them down.”

  * * *

  In the photograph, Mia’s sitting at the bottom of the porch steps, her phone in her hand. She was sad. I could see it in her eyes, in the way her lips pulled down at the corners.

  I don’t know what it was about that particular moment that had me rushing to my sister and asking to borrow her phone. I snapped the picture, emailed it to myself, then deleted it from her device, leaving no trace of what I’d done.

  It was the first summer Mia had spent with us, and it was odd to have someone stay with us at the beginning. We’d all just gotten used to her mom being here and now… now there was a girl around my age who seemed to appear and disappear without anyone noticing.

  I noticed, though.

  There was something internally, as if I had an off switch whenever she was present. It was as th
ough I would check out, but at the same time, be so aware of her.

  Just her.

  I didn’t know what it meant.

  I still don’t know.

  And maybe that’s the reason why there are no words on the back of her picture.

  Not a single one.

  It’s

  Blank.

  Void.

  Empty.

  Just like me.

  Chapter Five

  Leo

  Mia doesn’t leave the apartment in the mornings after. I know, because I watch out for her. She isn’t at breakfast or lunch like she sometimes is, and I never catch her playing in the yard. If she leaves her apartment at all, I don’t see it. Part of me is grateful that she isn’t around, that I don’t have to protect her from my brothers’ teasing and torment, but mainly, I just feel guilty.

  And as pathetic as it sounds, I miss her.

  I miss our quiet conversations and the silence we share.

  It was Monday when we went to the water tower, and by Saturday, I’m starting to lose my mind. I just… I want to talk to her, to apologize, but I don’t know what to say. I know that whatever it is, it has to be thought out. It has to come from a part of me that I honestly don’t know exists. Mostly though, I have to find a way to do it in private.

  As I lie in bed, listening to the birds chirping outside, welcoming a new day, I come up with a plan. I’ll fake a project to work on in the garage below the apartment. That way, if she leaves, I’ll be the first to notice. I’ll grab her attention, and I’ll say two words: I’m sorry. And then I’ll go from there. Even if I have to fumble through the rest of it, at least she’ll know how I feel.

  The plan’s foolproof, and for the first time since the early hours of Monday morning, I find myself smiling.

  I practically run down the stairs and then skid to a stop at the bottom. Dad’s in the living room. So is Mia. They’re sitting on the couch, and whatever they’re saying is interrupted by my presence. “Good, you’re up,” Dad says, getting to his feet.