Private 02 - Private Paradise

running her own resort one day, somewhere quiet and serene, the polar opposite of the flash and noise of Vegas where they grew up.
    She opened up about her mother and how after her father had left them, her mother had fallen into a deep depression, leaving Carla to fend for herself and her younger brother. How, after years of therapy and medication, her mother had finally pulled herself back together to the point where Carla could feel comfortable spending the summer away without worrying that everything was going to fall to shit without her there. “At least my dad sends child support every month,” Carla had told him, “or else we would have been totally screwed.”
    Sam had grunted and said, “At least your dad has money to spend. Mine hasn't held down a job for more than a month since my mom died.”
    Carla had heard from Chris that Sam's mom had died when he was just thirteen, but she'd never heard anything about his dad. Though Sam didn't elaborate, now their run down house in the worst neighborhood in their school district made sense. “He sounds like my mom. She pretty much collapsed when my dad took off. Your dad is probably depressed too―”
    “ He's a worthless asshole,” Sam had snapped, every muscle tensing against her. “And he's not worth talking about.” With that he'd pressed her back against the blanket, covered her mouth with his, and slid his hand up the front of her tank top. Carla had laid back and eagerly wrapped her arms around him, letting any questions about his father or anything else drift away on the night breeze.
    Sam told her other things though. Like how his struggles in school started after his mom died. “I didn't really care, and there was no one around to tell me why I should care.”
    Carla understood how that could happen. Though there were definitely smart kids in her high school - her cousin Chris had been at the top of his class when he'd graduated with Sam three years before Carla―the public schools in their neighborhood were among the worst in the state. Schools were crowded, the teachers overworked and unmotivated to chase down a kid who wasn't interested, regardless of the cause.
    Instead they focused on kids like Chris, whose wealthy father wasn't about to let him fail, and Carla. Smart and self motivated, she was a rundown high school teacher's dream student. Academic achievement wasn't her only goal. Unlike Chris's dad, her father was not a multimillionaire who would be able to send Carla wherever she wanted to go to college. She knew the only way she was going anywhere in life was on the power of her own intelligence and hard work.
    She could see how Sam, without anyone to push him would fall through the cracks and learn to rely on his looks and charm to get by. But that summer it seemed he realized he needed to buckle down and get to work if he wanted any real future. “I don't want to end up some forty-year-old loser, drifting around, trying to pick up women half my age like….” He trailed off, but Carla knew he was talking about his dad. “That's why after this summer, I'm enlisting in the army.”
    The decision had shocked Carla. “Really? The army?” she asked, the disbelief evident in her voice.
    She felt the muscles of his chest tense against the hand she rested on him. “What? You don't think I can do it?”
    “ It's just,” she'd started, her hand making small, soothing circles on his chest as she tried to form a tactful way to make her point, “isn't the army all about rules? You're not exactly the most by the book guy I know.”
    He let out a soft chuckle and she felt him relax. “I can't really argue with that.”
    “ Especially not after they found it was you who took Mr. Ramsey's car joyriding and stuffed it full of packing peanuts.”
    Sam let out another soft laugh and ran his hand up and down Carla's spine as she snuggled even closer. “That wasn't even the half of it. And the only reason I got caught was because Natalie Cushman ratted me out after I told her I wasn't going to take her to prom.”
    At the time, Carla had felt a little pinch in her chest as she remembered the details of that story. Even as a freshman and a nerdy one at that, Carla would have had to be dead not to hear about what went down between those two. Natalie Cushman, who had been hooking up with Sam on and off all spring, had been so heartbroken when Sam had declared, in front of all five hundred students who had first period lunch, that he wasn't her