Free Because I Love You by Tori Rigby Page B

keys on an antique chest in the foyer. “Try to keep it down. You don’t want to meet my mother.” His gaze flicked everywhere but toward me. “Hungry?”
    “Sure.”
    I followed Neil through an outdated dining room and into the kitchen. From off-white, yellowing cabinets, he pulled a loaf of bread, some peanut butter, and a bag of potato chips. A rickety stove sat beneath a cracked window, and a rusting refrigerator was tucked in the far corner. Sympathy warmed my chest.
    “My parents bought this house before I was born,” Neil said. “It was their intent to fix this place up and flip it, like those families you see on TV. They started with the inside and worked their way from top to bottom. Completed the upstairs then finished the living room, family room, and foyer.”
    His hand movements were jerky as he slathered his bread with peanut butter. I knew what was coming next; his dad had died when we were in elementary school. My fingers twitched, aching to touch Neil’s arm, to tell him he didn’t need to share this with me. But he continued before I had the chance.
    “Then on my eighth birthday, my dad came to pick me up from a sleepover at Owen’s, and on our way home, our car was struck by a semi.” Neil’s gaze caught mine for the first time since I lashed out at him on the side of the road. There weren’t tears in his eyes, but the spark that had filled them the last two days was gone.
    Someone stuck a hot, jagged piece of iron in my chest and twisted as my own memories flooded my mind. I’d been sitting on the couch in our living room when the police officer walked through the front door and gathered my mom and me together. As Mom screamed and collapsed to the floor, I stared at the dark television, dazed, like it was a dream, like I’d wake up the next morning and hear my dad call me “sweet pea.”
    But Dad never read his newspaper at the kitchen table again, or brought me a present from one of his speaking tours, or chauffeured me to another dance class. The ache I felt in my bones every time I saw Mom sitting alone in the stands at football games . . . there was no comparison.
    “Neil . . . .” I placed my hand over his.
    Dropping the knife he’d been using for the peanut butter, he stepped back. “I’m not done. In case you can’t tell, this place was never touched again. Mom started drinking and never stopped. I became a parent to a younger sister who still blames me for her dad’s death. And the only thing that keeps us from complete poverty is my asshole uncle who, because of some promise he made my dad, pays for our tuition and bills while holding it over our heads. The rest of it—the clothes, the groceries—it’s all from the monthly check we get from my Dad’s life insurance or the money I make on the weekends, working for my uncle.
    “So, next time you want to accuse me of being a low-life asshole with nothing better to do than use women like toilet paper, remember this: I built that reputation so people don’t get close enough to see this. ”
    My heart pounded in my ears as Neil’s nostrils flared and he seemed to forget how to breathe. I understood why he’d want to hide this from people, why he’d pretend to be something he wasn’t. I hated the pity stares and comments from people who knew about my dad’s death, and I didn’t have poverty looming over my head. If I were in Neil’s shoes, I wouldn’t want people to know the truth either.
    I swallowed a lump in my throat. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”
    “Precisely.”
    “Look, about what I said—”
    He sighed. “Forget it.”
    “No, let me finish.” I held up a hand, fighting the burn in my throat. “I lost my dad, too, two years ago.”
    Neil’s shoulders drooped. “I know.”
    “And you’ve been nothing but kind to me these last couple days. Why, I don’t know, but I still shouldn’t have lashed out at you, even without knowing about your family. I’m sorry.”
    We stared at each other for a