Sunbound

☀ When Life Calls, You Don't Send It to Voicemail

C H A P T E R  21: When Life Calls, You Don't Send It to Voicemail

☀ ☀ ☀

Scott Compton wasn't the kind of father that threatened boys with shotguns or locked his daughter in her room until she was thirty. He wasn't the kind of father to ask too many questions or ever make his daughter feel like she wasn't allowed to have her own identity. He didn't ask for much in return, either. All he had ever asked of Scout were the following: "Please, for the love of God, don't get pregnant in high school," and, "Please, for Christ's sake, don't do any drugs." Those weren't wild requests, and so Scout had no problem upholding either one.

However, as Scout stood in the middle of her bedroom with a duffel bag half packed and a determined bead of sweat over her brow, a part of Scott wished he had a shotgun and a padlock.

"Dad," Scout began, clenching her fists because her fingers were trembling. "I'm leaving with Skylar."

Scott could feel his temples pulsating. His fists clenched just like Scout's. They were mirror images of each other; all the determination and aggravation amplified by the sweltering sunlight flooding the bedroom.

"I can see that," Scott said. His voice was steady but everything else was not.

Silence blanketed the room. Scout expected her father to immediately begin yelling, and when he hadn't, she was at a loss for words. She carefully picked up a couple of T-shirts and place them in the duffel bag as if they'd fall apart if she moved any faster. Really, she was afraid that making any sudden movements would jar any patience Scott had left and she would never get out of the shit-hole she described Santan Valley as.

After awhile, Scout cleared her throat.

"Well," she said, "you know how badly I've wanted to travel. I love this town that you raised me in, but I also hate it just as much. Maybe I wouldn't if I'd seen anything else in the eighteen years I've been alive, but I haven't. Now is the time."

Scott wanted to yell. He wanted to yell so loud that Georgia would hear him from down the street and come running to help him set Scout straight. Dad's weren't very good with these things. Girl things. More specifically, girl things that involved boys who may not be good for them. Scott thought he lucked out with Scout. She was a tomboy as a child, after all. He didn't ever anticipate boys being an issue, hence the lack of shotgun shells and doors that needed keys. He honestly thought Scout may have turned out like Bo, and he would never have to worry about wayward boys and birth control. Then Antonio came along and Scott swore he had a headache for the whole year and a half that that boy was around. Once Antonio was out of the picture, Scott thought he was in the clear again. Now, however, his luck had run out entirely and all those years when he had no worries about Scout and boys were all catching up to him.

"We're supposed to be looking into colleges, Scout," Scott said. He sounded sadder than Scout could ever remember. "I'm supposed to be helping you apply for scholarships and tag along on your college campus tours. I'm not supposed to be watching you pack your things for some dead-end trip with a boy that neither one of us know well enough."

Scout placed a pair of shorts in the bag beside a pair of sweat pants. She wasn't sure where they were going or if the weather would be agreeable, so she wanted to be prepared.

"I don't even know how long we'll be gone," Scout said. "So, we can still do those things when I get back."

Scott's fingernails were carving crescent moons into his palms.

"College isn't something you want to put on hold," he said through gritted teeth.

College on the line or not, Scott hated the thought of watching his only child leave from the only place he could protect her. He wished she was still just a wild-haired kid with freckles like flecks of gold and a smile that matched his own, but Scout was also her mother's child. Virginia had a wanderlust strong enough to make a mother leave her child. If Scout got nothing else from that woman, she at least got the eagerness to leave familiar places. Scott would never say it, but Scout was more like her mother than she would ever care to know.