She sipped her drink. “Yes, I know. About time you realized that.”

When they got home, the household was in full chaos. Ryan and Dee Dee were fighting over control of the Xbox, Eve was screaming at her little brother for making so much noise that she couldn’t hear her music, throwing couch pillows at him. Landon was sitting at the kitchen table finishing off a pizza with a tall glass of milk.

“You didn’t get dinner?” Lou asked.

“I had dinner,” Landon replied, stuffing another big bite in his mouth.

“What the hell’s going on here?” Mac thundered at his kids.

Lou walked serenely to her bedroom. She hung up her jacket and pulled her cell phone out of her purse. She sat on her bed and hit the speed dial for Joe while simultaneously flipping on the TV. On her nightside table was her electronic reader and a couple of print books; on the other side of the bed, lotion, brush, lip balm and a glass of water from the previous night. Her cave.

She expected to leave a message, but Joe picked up. “Hey, babe,” he said.

“Hi, Joe. Well, I’ve been laid off. Mac wants to get married. As soon as possible.”

A low rumble of sexy laughter answered her.

* * *

There was just a week left of school and most of it was just a waste of time. There would be senior skip day, graduation rehearsal for seniors, a couple of tests and virtually no new assignments as the end drew near. Landon was determined to do very well on the last final of the year so he was hitting it hard, spending that last weekend studying. Next Friday night was graduation for the seniors. Juniors, like Landon and Eve, would celebrate by taking over the school as seniors in the fall.

The sound of the doorbell broke his concentration. He opened it to Eve. “What are you doing here? I told you I’d be over later.”

Her eyes welled up with tears. “I have to talk to you.”

He opened the door so she could come inside. “Are you breaking up with me?” he asked.

“No, but maybe I should. Let’s sit down. This could be bad.”

His heart skipped a few beats. “Spit it out,” he said, leading her to the couch.

“Remember that time a couple of weeks ago when we got a little carried away? When we got a little...close?”

“It wasn’t that close,” he said, but it had been. He was ready to grab the condom and go for it, but he held back the best he could.

“It was closer than usual. And my period didn’t come. Rumor has it, those suckers can swim!”

Landon died on the spot. She was going to have to give him mouth-to-mouth and pound on his chest. He could feel all the color drain from his face. Then he felt his face get hot. “Huh?” he said so eloquently.

“I’m late. Five days. Or so. I’m never late, Landon. Never.”

He knew this. He was not allowed to get her worked up at period time—she felt insecure about it. He, on the other hand, thought that might be the best time of the month if there was an accident, based on what he’d read.

“What are we supposed to do now?” he asked.

“I need a test. One of those pregnancy tests. But I can’t just go buy one at the grocery store or drugstore where everyone knows me. And I can’t borrow the car to leave town—my dad’s working. If he saw me, he’d kill me for sure.”

“I’ll take you. Where should we go?”

“I’d like to go to the moon right now, but maybe Bandon’s far enough away. Will you really take me?”

“Sure. Of course,” he said.

“Then I’m going to have to stop in a bathroom somewhere—like a gas station or something. I can’t take a pregnancy test home! Lou has the nose of a drug dog.”

“We can come right back here. Sarah’s sitting alert tonight.”

“But what if she sees it in the trash?”

“I’m the trash man, Eve. I guarantee you, Sarah has never looked in the trash because I toss Ham’s yard apples in there, too. And I always have it done before she gets home from work so there’s nothing to complain about. Now, how’d you get over here?”

“I borrowed Aunt Lou’s van. But I promised her I’d be less than an hour.”

“Let’s take it back to the house and drop it off. You tell your aunt we’re running into Bandon to the sporting goods store. I want to look at running shoes—we’ll start football practice in a couple of months and I want to get ahead of it. And you want to pick up some wax for your board.”

She smiled. “I think that should work,” she said a bit tremulously.

“Stop worrying. It’s going to be fine. It would be more fine if they sold pregnancy tests at the sporting goods store. But we’re going to take care of this.”

* * *

Landon thought he’d been pretty smooth when Eve brought him this problem, but in fact his insides were trembling like a five-year-old on the high diving board. They didn’t talk much on the way to Bandon. Every once in a while he grabbed her hand in his and gave it a squeeze. He tried very hard to be cool.

He went in the store with her, but left her to do the shopping by herself. He pressed a twenty into her hand and said, “Don’t just buy the cheapest one.” And then he went to the paperback and magazine section for ten minutes and left, empty-handed. He met her back in his little truck and all the way home, she read him the directions.

“What if it’s too early?” she asked.

“It says it’s not. But if it’s negative and your period still doesn’t come, we’ll get another one next week,” he said. “Look, we don’t have that many choices. And I really don’t think you’re pregnant. I don’t.”

When they got to his house, she immediately headed for the bathroom with her package and Landon paced. Then she came out with a big grin on her face. “Was it a no?” he asked.

“I didn’t have to take it,” she said. “I just got you know what.”

And Landon fell flat on his back on the living room floor. “Holy crap!”

She laughed at him and knelt down beside him. “It’s okay. I shouldn’t have panicked.”

“Eve, we gotta get ahead of this. You have to talk to Aunt Lou.”

“Oh, I’m scared to.”

“Then I’m not going near you! We’re not making out one more time because we both get a little crazy and one of these days... I love you like mad, but I want to be a little older before I start a family. I don’t want one thin layer of latex between us and the next generation. And you shouldn’t, either!” He pushed some of her pretty dark hair over an ear. “I’d like to be with you forever, but I don’t know what you’re going to want in a year or two. I don’t want to have a baby at seventeen.”

“We need to cool it down,” she said.

“We can do that, too—whatever you want, but we can’t get this scared again,” he answered. “I’m willing to—”

The back door opened suddenly and Sarah popped in. Landon’s school books were still covering the kitchen table and he was cuddled up with Eve on the living room floor. “Oh, hi, Eve,” she said. “I didn’t know you’d be here. I forgot my e-reader and didn’t have a book with me,” she said, passing through the living room on her way to her bedroom. She turned back to them and smiled. “I’m not going to sit up watching TV all night with the guys—I’m in the middle of a good book.” And then she darted into her bedroom.

And then she darted out, e-reader in hand. “Sorry I can’t stay and chat—I grabbed an hour to run down here and get this, but I have to get right back.”

And then she walked into the bathroom, shutting the door.

Eve sat straight, folding up her legs. “Landon...”

He sat up, as well. “Where did you leave it?”

A shriek came from the bathroom. The toilet flushed. Sarah came out, e-reader in one hand, pregnancy test box in the other. Her face was in a scowl. Her eyes were narrowed. “Have we taken the test yet?”

No one spoke for a second. Finally Eve said, “It turned out, it was unnecessary.” And her cheeks were so bright red, heat burned off them.

Sarah stepped into the room. “All right, you two. I know I can’t control you, but there are two big rules. Huge rules. First, safety. And second, discretion. To live in polite society you have to not shock and dismay people. No embarrassing PDA. Public displays of....”

“We know what it means, Sarah,” Landon said.

“So.” She stared pointedly at Eve. “You on the pill?”

“Sarah,” Landon began.

But Eve shook her head.

“Do you need me to take you to see a doctor? Because you should never have to buy another one of these,” she said, lifting the box.

“I...ah...”

“We got it, Sarah,” Landon said, more than a little furious with his sister.

“You have two days,” Sarah said. “You either go to the doctor or clinic or talk to someone in your family and tell them it’s not a good time to take crazy risks or... Or I will. Are we clear? Because I want to hear from your parents—either Lou or Mac, that is—or see evidence there’s a prescription in place.” She zeroed in on Landon. “And I’m counting on you, Landon.”

“Sarah, stop it!”

She took a step toward him. “I want you to imagine yourself having a daughter next year. And I want you to imagine her at sixteen—and she just bought a pregnancy test kit and I want you to ask yourself, would you ignore this and leave it up to a couple of kids to make a mistake that could really mess up their lives or would you say something. When you have an answer to those questions, I will indeed stop it!” They both just stared at her. She turned on a heel and went back to the bathroom, putting the kit back where she found it. Then she faced them again. “I hope you don’t have any big plans for your future life, Landon, because Mac might kill you! Love is grand. It’s also been known to kill a lot of brain cells. Talk among yourselves.”

And she left.

“I’m going to kill her....” Landon muttered.

“She’s right,” Eve murmured. “I’m just scared to face it.”

“You’re scared?” he asked. “Your father is going to kill me.”

“Landon, it was both of us.”

He smoothed her thick, dark hair over her shoulders. “You’re not afraid your aunt Lou will chew you out, are you?”

“No telling,” she said with a shrug. “She’s the best, but she has a double personality and the other one is pretty growly.”

He laughed. “Don’t they all.”

* * *

Three hours later, after the McCains had dinner and Aunt Lou had closed herself in her bedroom for alone time, Eve cautiously tapped on the door. She started with, “Can we talk for a minute?” and then said, “Landon and I have been dating for nine months or so and things are getting kind of...” She shrugged. “A little serious.”

“Come and sit down by me, baby,” Lou said. “Here—” She patted the bed. Then she turned Eve around so she faced her back. She massaged Eve’s shoulders and talked softly.

“When I was seventeen, I had the hots for a guy at school. I was so crazy about him, I could’ve died. Of course we were very involved—we dated the last two years of high school. We were steadies. Back then there were no clinics and, in fact, birth control pills were pretty new and kind of scary. Everyone was supposed to wait. Save it for marriage. I went to a small high school but near as I can figure, four girls dropped out because they were pregnant. And hardly anyone with a steady boyfriend for more than a year waited.”