“Why are you playing Ping-Pong on that ankle, Jere?” she snaps. “You sit down, right now.”
He swallows hard.
“Jeremiah Brown!” a voice shouts from upstairs. His mother.
“Great,” he mutters. “Why are all the women in my life out to get me?”
“I need you to jump-start Mrs. Englewood’s car!” Mrs. Brown shouts.
“Coming, Ma!” Without another word he crutches up the stairs.
“Hi, I’m Kate,” the beautiful girl says, stepping forward. “I’m Jere’s brother’s fiancée.”
I shake her hand. “Matt’s?”
“Yep. And you are…?”
“I told you! She’s Annie,” Jennifer says with a grin.
“I’m Annie.”
“We didn’t know Jere was dating anybody,” Kate says.
Where would she get that idea? A girl can go to a guy’s house without doing him or whatever. “We’re not dating.”
Kate and Jennifer exchange a significant look.
“Jere used to bring girls home a lot,” Jennifer says. “But not anymore.”
“Oh?” Is he in a girl drought like Kelsey’s in a guy drought? Given how cute he is, I find that hard to believe.
“Jenn,” Kate warns, but it doesn’t do any good because she starts spilling all the juicy info.
“He used to bring girls home all the time, but he wasn’t serious about them. And Mama and Daddy got so tired of it they said if he brought one more girl home that he wasn’t serious about, Mama would stop cooking for him! And that is serious.”
“Okay,” I say slowly.
“But he brought you home!” Jennifer says, bouncing on her toes.
I take a deep breath. This has been an overwhelming day. An overwhelming year.
Kate clucks her tongue at Jennifer. “Your brother’s gonna get you for spilling.”
“Er, he doesn’t have to know. At least I didn’t tell Annie that Mama kicked him out.”
Kate shuts her eyes. “Now you’re in for it.”
“Oops,” Jennifer says sheepishly.
“Your mom kicked him out?” I ask quietly.
“Yeah, because he kept getting hurt at contests and stuff—he went to the hospital three times in one month! He, like, broke his arm mountain biking and didn’t tell anybody it hurt, and the bone grew back wrong and he had to have surgery to make his arm bend the right way again—”
“Jenn—” Kate tries to interrupt, but Jennifer is undeterred.
“And then he nearly lost his eye when he bungee jumped off this bridge and had to get ten stitches.” That explains the thin scar beside his right eye. “Mama said he couldn’t keep coming home and scaring her like that,” Jennifer says. “So he said he won’t do that stuff anymore because he loves me so much and he missed me.”
“How long did she kick him out for?”
“I didn’t see him for like a year!” Jennifer exclaims. “He missed my birthday party at Pizza Hut. And I had a two-tiered raspberry cake!”
My heart begins to speed up. How damaged is he? I touch my throat, swallow hard, and blink the tears away. I’m excited for college, but also dreading it because I won’t see Nick every day anymore. And Jeremiah didn’t see his sister for a whole year?
Kate senses my distress, I guess, because she whispers in my ear, “He used to do extreme sports, and he was hurt a lot, and their mom didn’t want his sisters seeing him injured when there was no reason for it. But Matt’s trying to help him get better.”
Is that why he works with Matt? Is that why he was so quick to jump to Jeremiah’s aid today out on the porch? How bad was it? He went to the hospital three times in one month? He broke his arm and didn’t tell anybody? Crazy.
I’m glad when Kate changes the subject. “So, Annie, how did you meet Jere?”
“Running on the trails. When are you and Matt getting married?”
“We’re planning on next summer.”
“I’m gonna be a bridesmaid!” Jennifer says. “And I get to pick out my own dress. It has to be a certain shade of dark red, but I can pick any style I want.”
“Sounds pretty,” I say. “You’ll look good in that color. Do you have any pictures of styles you like?”
She nods and rockets up the stairs, presumably to get pictures of dresses, and I sigh, grateful for the diversion.
“It’s so nice to meet you,” Kate says, pulling me to sit with her on the couch. “Are you in college?”