Read Compulsive (Liar #1) for Free Online Page A

Teddy’s the bald one with the
gross beard that always has crap in it.”
    I expelled a short laugh. “I’ve seen him before. You
really need to get that key made.”
    “She said she would do it yesterday.” Alyssa jumped up
from the couch and went to the kitchen. “ She loses her key, and I’m the
one shit outta luck. Got any soda?” She pulled the refrigerator door open and took
out a drink as if I’d answered.
    I got up and checked the front door to make sure it
was locked. “Text your mom and let her know you’re staying over. You know where
everything is. I’m going to bed.”
    A few minutes later, I heard a noise and saw a shadowy
figure in my doorway. “Gray?”
    “Yeah?” I said through the darkness.
    “Do you think you’ll ever be a mom?”
    I paused and breathed out. “You know I hate kids.”
    “There is that.” I felt the smile in her response.
    “Plus, I’m probably sterile from all my drug and
alcohol abuse. You should keep that in mind. There’s your PSA for the night.
Now, go to sleep.”
    She continued to linger in the doorway.
    “What? C’mon, I need my beauty rest.”
    After a moment, she said, “Sometimes I wish…you were
my mom.”
    I sat up on my elbows and looked her way. “You know
what I think?”
    “What?”
    “Someday you’re going to have a kid. And you’re going
to be the most kick-ass mom there is…because you know what a kid needs and what
it feels like to not get it.”
    “You really think so?”
    “Look at how you take care of all those animals.”
    “That’s because they’re helpless, and I love them.”
    I lay back down on my pillow. “Babe, you just
described a mother.”
    The next morning I woke with a start, my eyelashes
dampened, a feeling of emptiness washing over me. The memory of whatever dream
I had been having loomed just beyond my reach. I closed my eyes, attempting to
grasp it, even though my gut warned me I shouldn’t. A memory flashed behind my
eyelids of my mother walking barefoot on the beach, her belly extended out
about eight months’ worth. A seven-year-old Gray skipped blissfully ahead, clearing
a path for her like a snowplow in the winter. Along with the image came a clear
memory of my mission that day. I’d been picking up tiny shells from the sand.
Not to collect them, but to protect my mother. To make sure she didn’t step on
anything that made her fall and get hurt or hurt my new baby brother. I’m
fine, Gray , she had laughed. But you can’t see past your belly.
    A noise from the front room yanked me back to the
present. I wandered out, almost forgetting that Alyssa had stayed over. She sat
at the table, which was set with two plates of stacked pancakes. Glasses of
juices at twelve o’clock with place settings at three. “Wow,” I said,
approaching her. “I’m impressed.”
    “I was waiting for you,” she said eagerly. “I just
warmed these in the microwave.”
    “Thanks.” Eating a pound of carb-loaded flapjacks was
the last thing I wanted to stuff into my gut right then, but I took the syrup
and poured it heartily onto my plate.
    She waited for me to take the first bite before
digging into hers. “Are they good?”
    Her straight, jet-black hair featured weaves of purple
and streamed down over shoulders. The combination of dark hair and dusky eyes
paled her skin in the morning light. The angelic grin on her face took me back
to when we first met, leaving me with a trace of sadness. “Best pancakes I’ve
ever tasted.”
    She rolled her eyes and continued eating. A gaggle of
metal bracelets clanked against her plate as she ate.
    “Did your mom teach you how to make these?” I asked,
hopefully.
    “Right. Nathan taught me,” she said around a mouthful.
    “Oh.” Simply hearing his name made me miss him. It
wasn’t like we saw each other every day, but knowing we weren’t right killed
me. “So, have you heard from your mom?”
    “Yeah.”
    “So…did she say anything about last night?”
    She kept her