They Call It Heart 1 ~ The Chase

As the fog’s unrelenting moisture clings to the windshield, amplifying the heavy emptiness within me, I can finally understand. Is it so terrible to want another chance? A fresh start? An out; heaven knows I could use a do-over. This lifetime seems like a failure.

I press down on the gas pedal, traveling faster than I should for the visibility, eager to reach home, losing track of time and place while lost in my thoughts. Red reflectors gleam through the white mist. There’s a bridge coming up somewhere; it’s probably the source of the shrouded glowing lights up ahead.

The semi-truck’s red taillights aren’t recognizable until I’m on its rear. With a desperate lurch, I slam on the brakes and swerve. I’m jolted by the abrupt force as the steering wheel shudders in my hands, and I spin out of control...

5 Years Earlier

Amalia

Lessons learned. That’s how my mom describes her early dating years. I want a dramatic love story—a wild, unpredictable ride that is sweet, thrilling, and crazy, featuring the perfect guy with a happy ending.

If I ever get a love life...

It seems like I blinked, then opened my eyes to my third summer in New Sable. Well, it’s more like the end of my third summer now. In less than two weeks, I’ll be a freshman in high school and turning fifteen in a month. I’ll leave my closest friend in junior high. I’m not looking forward to becoming one of the newest and youngest high school students or sitting on the bench for slow-pitch softball, provided I even make the team this year.

My carefree childhood days and flat chest are gone, and everything is changing. I sigh. Everything but how I feel about Talan.

I spray on more anti-frizz gel.

Each new sunrise, announcing another monotonous day, has burned a little more since summer began, and now that it’s over, I’m becoming less spirited daily because of him.

It’s no exaggeration that Talan Swifthawk has been blinding me ever since he appeared at our door, clutching a football after a fight at the park and casting a tough, heroic aura that resembles my first book crush. All other guys near him fade into nameless, faceless blurs in my mind whenever he’s around.

Kinsley doesn’t understand it, so she’s always trying to convince me to date somebody else. This is because Talan goes out with other girls. She uses that argument on me all the time. I’ve heard much about the different girls who interest Talan, or whoever’s interested in him. My older brother, Jaxon, makes sure of that. I’m forever pretending not to care, which isn’t always easy. Sometimes, I’m disgusted with Talan, especially when I hear a story about him and someone I know. But his gorgeous smile permeates through me every time he flares it in my direction, so I never stay mad at him for long.

Besides, he has no clue about my feelings for him, so why wouldn’t he go out with other girls?

I shake my head at myself, trying to shake him from my mind because I’m not even supposed to like him.

Kinsley yells from the living room. “Ama, I’m here!”

Everyone calls me Ama for short. It sounds like Emma, but has a short “a” sound at the beginning.

“Be right down!”

Even though she’s a year younger than me, Kinsley Walker is my best friend. I’ve known her since before we moved to New Sable because our dads served in the military together. Their brotherhood brought my family from New Mexico to this small town, where we enjoy the mountains and are just an hour from the coast.

Abandoning my hair, I clasp my lucky anklet and sulk down the stairs. Kinsley is lounging on the sofa, rummaging through her shoulder bag, when I enter the living room. I sit beside her, cross my legs, and say, “I hate this awful humidity.”

“Same.” She lifts her head, shaking a hair scrunchy in front of my face before tying her long, silky, straight hair into a ponytail. “It makes the weather feel way too hot.” Her eyebrow slants. “What’s with the cranky face?”

I flick both hands toward the coffee-colored mane I inherited from my dad’s Spanish side of the family, which typically falls into mid-length loose waves.

She rolls her eyes. “You have some ringlets today, so what? It’s not the first time. Honestly, Ama, your hair is like that more times than it’s not, and it beats hardly being able to hold a curl.”

“I’d love it too if I was living twenty-something years ago, in my mom’s big-hair-day era.”

She smiles, returning to rearranging the contents in her bag while I watch her for a moment.

I say what has occupied my mind all morning. “So ... has Talan been in town?”

Talan is Kinsley’s older cousin. He lives in the next town over, on the reservation. He’s also Jaxon’s best friend. Talan hardly comes over now, a consequence of Jaxon’s love life. One day at the pool, Jaxon met a girl. She’s staying with her grandparents for the summer, and he’s spending all his time with her. She’s his first serious girlfriend, and because of this, it’s been two weeks since I last saw Talan.

“No. Not lately.” She looks up, her expression turning annoyed. “Let me guess. The only way to fix a bad hair day starts with the letter T.”

I resist the urge to roll my eyes, but it’s true. I already ache for Talan, and he hasn’t yet left.

“Talan is gonna be six hours away now, so you really should give someone else around here a chance.”

I brush off her comment with a wave, ignore my sadness about that, and ask, “Are we walking or riding our bikes?”

“I’d rather walk, so let’s go, or we might miss some of it.”

“Let me grab a sweater first, in case the air conditioning in the theater is too cold.” I rush up the stairs, and a knock sounds at the door on my way down.

In a sarcastic tone, Kinsley says, “Way to speak someone into materializing, Ama.”

Talan!

Unlike Kinsley, he still waits for someone to answer the door when he comes over, even though he’s welcome to knock and enter as the rest of their family does.

My pulse speeds; I pinch my face with my palms for cheek coloring, then pat and pull my hair together over my shoulder. She’s already tugging the door open as I reach the bottom of the stairs, taking a deep breath so I don’t give him an overly excited smile. His hair is quite short again. He cuts and regrows it constantly, but during boxing season, he prefers it shorter so it doesn’t make him uncomfortable under his boxing headgear. I like the way he looks, no matter the length.

His gaze slides past Kinsley to me, holding mine for a second as I grin. The fleeting flare of delight that I likely imagined in his eyes disappears, as if extinguished by a twitch of his jaw. Without returning a smile, he asks, “Where’s Jaxon?”

I bite my lip and glance away, my enthusiasm fading. “With Mara, as usual.”

He grimaces and doesn’t hide his sarcasm. “Must be love. We were supposed to go fishing today. Tell him I stopped by again.” He’s disappointed. His brows always knit together, creating an extra fierceness in his eyes whenever he’s in a bad mood. “How about Kade and Erik? Where are they?”

Kade is Kinsley’s twin brother, but he looks more like Talan, except Kade wears his hair long enough to pull it into a ponytail, braid it, or tie it up in a ball at the base of his neck. They all have dark chocolate-brown hair with sun-kissed highlights and ebony eyes, but Talan and Kade have golden skin tones, and hers is a shade or two lighter.

Erik is my younger brother, and he and the Walker twins are the same age. I’ll never know how my mom, Jasmine, popped out three kids right in a row, still claiming none of us were accidents.

“I think they’re at the pool,” Kinsley says.

“Maybe I’ll swing by there.”

I grab Kinsley’s shoulder and grovel when the door closes. “Ask him to come with us.”

She squints in aggravation. “No, you do it if you want him to come.” She doesn’t mind that I like Talan if I keep her entirely out of it, a principle of hers I don’t understand.

“I can’t do that.” I peep out the window. He’s on the way to his car, parked across the street. “Come on, Kinsley. He’s leaving next week. I won’t see him for four months.”

I join my palms together in a prayer position, pleading with my eyes, with my entire being. “I’ll owe you one. Hurry before it’s too late.”

Talan will attend Chimotae Indian School this year, a boarding school composed of Native American kids from all over the country. The bigger town has a well-known boxing club, and he will go anywhere and do anything to help him achieve his Olympic dream.

“Fine! You’re just lucky I’ll miss him, too.” She groans and runs out the door. As the door is closing, she says, “He’s gonna kill me.”

Unsure of what she means, I make a mental note to ask her about it later. I give her some time before I follow them outside, taking in the sharp, extra-sweet scent of pine caused by the muggy weather. The second I step on the porch, my eyes absorb Talan’s stare. I halt the moment my breath stops, and my arm hairs lift with goosebumps. His eyes drift from my face to my feet, then return to my face, and a sudden warmth creeps up my neck. The peculiar expression he wears quickly envelops me, and I say, “What?”

I throw a questioning glance at Kinsley, hoping she didn’t say something she wasn’t supposed to say.

“Are you sure you don’t know where Jaxon is?” Talan asks me.

“Sorry. No idea.”

His face brightens as his forehead relaxes and his lips curve into a smile. “I guess I’m driving then.”

Going to the movies together is nothing unusual. Some variation of the six of us always do it. This is something different, though, because Talan is in his head. He keeps glancing at me, saying nothing. So, the quiet yet antsy tension radiating from him during the drive prevents me from speaking.

Oddly, Kinsley’s doing enough talking for both of us. “It’s probably crowded today. Hopefully, they’re sold out. I mean, it’s not sold out. Is this movie supposed to be any good? We should just do something else. It’s hot, and I bet Kade and Erik are having fun. We should go to the pool?”

“I didn’t drive over here for nothing, Kinsley.” Talan sounds as annoyed as I feel.

“We’re already here,” I say. “We might as well go inside.”

She pretends not to notice my glare. Her strange behavior causes me to hook her by the belt loop of her pants to get her attention while Talan moves to the ticket line. “What did you mean back at the house? Who’s gonna kill you?” I ask.

She seems startled that I overheard her, but gives a vague, incomplete response. “I knew I shouldn’t have…” She turns her head, hiding a frown. “Never mind.”

We buy our tickets and follow Talan into the dimly lit theater. We find seats, and Talan steps aside and guides Kinsley and me before him. I glance up at him, my eyes widening as his gaze sweeps my face when he smiles at me, igniting an adrenaline rush and quickening my heartbeat. I sit beside Kinsley, exhilaration bursting as he takes the seat beside me, making it difficult to pay attention to Kinsley’s abnormal, excessive chatter.

“Well, Ama? Should I get the white high tops tomorrow or the black and white ones?” Kinsley says.

“I think the black and white ones. They’ll match with more things.”

As the lights fade and the curtains draw, descending us into darkness, I shift my gaze from Kinsley, whom I’d been mostly absentmindedly nodding at, to the screen, settling into my seat. Talan shifts, and my arm skin tingles at the closeness of his arm and hand.

I’m suddenly more clammy, and though I’m filled with excitement, I’m also a little scared. Happily scared.