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used to bring me and my brothers when we were kids.” He negotiated the car out of the parking lot and onto the main highway. “It was when my mom moved out and the divorce wasn’t finalized yet. My dad was depressed and went to the park to get some perspective.” He smiled. “I guess it worked. Now when I visit him and my stepmom in Vegas he’s always urging me to get laid and calling me a fucking pussy when I don’t talk to girls.”
    “Awesome.” Kimber reclined in her seat. “I can’t wait to follow in your dad’s footsteps. Then I’ll flip through those Vegas hooker magazines, pick an escort, and call up some sex god to do me on my lunch break.”
    “Right. And it all starts with the park. My dad said it helped bring him peace when he had a broken heart. Maybe it’ll do the same for you.”
    They cruised the nearly empty highway weaving through the Pennsylvania mountainside, the sinking sun flickering through the trees flanking the pavement. Kimber rolled down her window, letting a rush of air inside the car, and Jay did the same. Her ears filled with the roar of wind, the deafening noise providing a welcome distraction from the dark thoughts crowding her head and blackening her heart.
    They turned off the highway onto a desolate route, and a few moments later the Monte Carlo slowed in front of a dirt-and-gravel lot surrounded by tall grass. Jay parked the car between the only other two vehicles present—a red flat-bed truck and a gold Malibu—and raised his chin at Kimber as he got out, signaling her to follow. She trailed him as he led the way to a nearby path worn down over time by countless feet and surveyed the area. To the left was a steep tiered knoll backed by a thicket of trees, and to the right stretched a stream with a designated swimming hole. Beyond lay a field, in the middle of which stood a slanting, splintering barn. Kimber relaxed, the quiet, unfamiliar setting erasing some of her stress.
    Jay glanced her way and gave a half smile. “Nice, right?”
    “Yeah.” She squinted into the setting sun, burning bright in the horizon. “Where’d your dad ever find this place? It’s so removed from reality here.” She smiled. “I sort of feel like we’re running away from home.”
    “We are.” Jay gestured to their surroundings as the path led into the woods. “Didn’t I tell you? We live here now.”
    “No way. I’m not cut out for roughing it in the wilderness.”
    “You’re underestimating yourself.”
    “You’re underestimating the likelihood of me getting eaten by a bear.”
    Jay laughed. “No bears are going to eat you. You worry too much.”
    “Maybe I do.” Kimber’s thoughts crept back to Dane as she picked up a fallen branch and swiped at a passing tree trunk with it. “Maybe I get worked up over nothing. You think?”
    “Where are you going with this?” Jay’s voice held a note of suspicion.
    “Just thinking. I mean, isn’t it possible that Dane really isn’t so bad? Maybe my expectations are just too high.”
    “It sounds like you’re what’s high. Are you being serious?”
    “Listen. Dane is who he is.”
    “And you hate who he is.”
    “No, I just haven’t learned to accept him as he is.” She chucked her stick aside. “I wanted him to fit the ideal boyfriend mold I have in my head, but maybe that’s not realistic.”
    “What does the ideal boyfriend do, call you? Take you out? Want to spend time with you? Find a way to make things better when he fucks it up? Make you feel like you matter?”
    She shrugged, feeling as weak as her collapsing argument. “Well, yeah, of course.”
    “And you didn’t get any of that from Dane at all. Do you realize that even the dumbest fucking people in the world know how to show the ones they care about that they, in fact, care? It isn’t hard and it isn’t an inconvenience. I can’t even believe this is up for debate.”
    “Neither can I.” Tears pricked Kimber’s eyes as she thought of all the hurt