Drowning in Stars by Debra Anastasia

Author:Debra Anastasia [Anastasia, Debra]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Debra Anastasia
Published: 2020-08-05T18:30:00+00:00

Chapter 34

Gaze

Two years later . . .

I STRETCHED AS I woke up. Every muscle ached. Mike and I had been practicing out in the yard yesterday for the whole damn day. Saturdays were training days. To say we were close was an understatement. He was the best coach I’d ever had. He had basically unlimited energy once he put a knee brace on. He pushed, he praised, and we joked. Ronna was outside working on her furniture restoration business. She had a shed that was made over into an outbuilding where she kept her tools and projects, but on nice days she liked to get some sun. She wore a mask and stripped and painted wood in the distance.

Also outside was a rotating group of my foster siblings and their friends, who in some places were also mine. Teddi’s friends were the worst because they were all giggly and tried to be outside to watch me play basketball as much as possible. They’d splash in the pool in bathing suits and blast their pop music.

I took it for granted sometimes, that this new normal was extremely, just that normal.

As Mike and I ran drills, we watched a car pull into the driveway full of Milt’s gamer friends. A new game had come out that they were all crazy about. When they got out, we saw that they had costumes on and some fake weapons. They were hilarious and super entertaining to watch when they did tournaments in the den.

Austin was doing his second year at the community college, wanting to transfer to a fashion school soon. I wouldn’t complain about him being home—he’d turned into my favorite brother. Never best friend, because Pixie would always be that, until her betrayal, of course.

I was taller than Mike now, and Austin and I had been lifting in the garage for two years. We learned how to sculpt muscles through trial and error and still cracked up about our “only arms” period where we both had doughy stomachs and giant biceps.

Now, we both had lean strength and a deep love for each other. When we went to Princeville High School, I was anticipating some bullying, with Austin wearing a skirt and eyeliner on the first day of school. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Walking in as his new brother was like getting a crown on my head or something.

Speaking of crowns, Austin was nominated awesome with a giant crown at prom. There were a king and a queen and then Austin. He told me later that he hooked up with the entire royal court.

And that was Austin. It sucked going to school without him, but for two summers straight I grew like it was my only job, topping out at six-five.

Ronna loved to “complain” that I was growing and that she had to keep buying me new pants, but she also measured me on the family wall as well, scribbling my name and date in with theirs in Sharpie any time she felt I grew.

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