an awkward pause in the car as they wait for me to be the one to leave. I cross my arms over my chest. This may make me a horrible human being, but Liam’s driving me home.
“Fine.” Clara breathes out like she’s choking on fire. “I’ll be waiting here when you’re done.” She slams the door, then collapses to the curb in front of the car like a beaten stray dog.
I hate her. I hate Liam for not leaving. I hate myself more for considering getting out. Even though Clara does stuff like this to needle me, there’s something about how she fixates on the ends of her brown hair that makes her appear broken.
“What’s her problem?” I ask. Clara drops her hair like she’s disgusted. Most of us in the family have black hair. She’s tried dyeing hers black, but her hair never holds the color.
“She’s going through some stuff. Big stuff. Clara needs a friend right now.”
Don’t we all.
“Clara’s upset Mom and Dad asked her to pay tuition. She struggles with focusing.”
Clara’s brain is like mine. She also remembers things extremely well, but the craziness I experience when I’m not working on something—when I’m not solving a crossword puzzle or a brainteaser—Clara feels it constantly, and I hurt for her. I’ve felt like she does twice in my life and both times it was like someone blaring a never-ending foghorn. I’ve found ways to keep my brain active. Clara never discovered a solution to stay focused. At least a healthy solution.
“Handling how your brains work,” Liam continues, “it doesn’t come as easily to her as it does to you. It’s like you’re the same, but hardwired differently.”
Clara has said that to me more than a hundred thousand different ways since we were young. My favorite being that I stole her ability to focus while we were still eggs in my mother’s ovaries. Because that happens.
“She needs me,” Liam says quietly.
So do I, but I don’t say that. Instead, I lay my fingers on the door handle.
“Thanks, Bre.” Liam smiles as if his approval should be enough of a reward. Unfortunately, I’m pathetic enough that a part of me gets sappy because I did earn it.
“I am sorry for yelling. The Reign of Terror are dangerous. They hurt people. If you knew the stories I’ve heard, seen some of the shit they pull, you’d understand why I was angry.”
Liam’s eighteen months older, but he consistently treats me like I’m eight instead of seventeen. I doubt there’s a soul in this town who isn’t aware of the Terror’s reputation.
“And you were there with them. Alone. That’s not good.”
“I know,” I say softly. “He approached me. It wasn’t the other way around.”
“Did any of them hurt you?”
“No.”
“Scare you?”
Yeah, but somehow that feels wrong to say. “The guy that was near me fixed my phone.”
Liam chuckles and it relieves some of the tension in the car. “It broke again?”
Against my wishes, the ends of my mouth edge up. “Yeah.”
I need a new one, but with nine kids, three of them in college, money is tight. I bought that phone with money I earned selling soft-serve ice cream last summer at the Barrel of Fun.
“Jesus, Bre. Just, Jesus.” The lightness fades as Liam rolls his neck. “Are you sure you’re okay with this? It’s only three blocks and Addison’s house is on the way.”
It’s not okay, but what difference would it make if I said so. My response is to leave the car. I have the fleeting thought to ram my fist into Clara’s stomach when she hops up from the curb and heads for the passenger seat with a smirk on her face. She played her hand and she won.
I hate her. I really, really do, and for the level of hate festering in me, when I die, I am probably heading to hell.
Liam U-turns and I watch as the headlights of the other passing cars blur into one another. I tilt my head back and stare at the first bright star in the sky. A long time ago, I used to wish on stars, but the act is useless. It’s a fairy tale created to make us think we have some semblance of control over our lives. I used to believe in magic, but I’m seventeen now and I gave up on happy endings a long time ago.
THE WATER BEATS down from the showerhead and steam rises around me. I should scale back the temperature from boiling to near scalding, but the heat eases some of the anger tightening the muscles in my neck.
“Razor?” Dad calls, wondering if it’s me. I come and go as I please and sometimes guys from the club crash here if they require a place to lie low.
A knock, then the door to the bathroom opens. Cooler air sweeps in and a thunderstorm of mist drifts overhead. My hands are braced against the wall and I dip my head so the drops roll along my face and not into my eyes. I’ve been in here longer than needed. Finished washing minutes ago, but I let the water fall over me.
It’s five in the morning. Got in after midnight, and thirty seconds after striding in, I figured out Dad brought a girl home. Walked out and I spent the rest of the night nursing a beer on the steps to the porch.
“You okay?” he asks.
It’s an awkward question, but because I’m biologically his, he feels compelled to ask. We both know he doesn’t want the honest answer. “Yeah.”
“You’ve been in here for a while.” Dad hacks and it’s a reminder as to why I rarely smoke cigarettes. “And it’s early. Sun’s not up yet.”
That’s the point. If I wait in here long enough, Dad will have the opportunity to keep his promise. After Mom died, Dad and I were torn up—at least I thought we both were. I continually gasped for breath like a fish living on dry land and I had assumed Dad felt the same.
But then a few weeks after her death, I caught Dad kissing another woman at the clubhouse. I was ten and in tears. The blonde was barely old enough to drink and vomited after she saw my reaction. Dad was old enough to know better and dropped to his knees.
He promised he’d never disrespect me or my mother by bringing a woman home. His promise disintegrated two months after Mom’s funeral, but he did offer me another oath. One that has stung less and less as the years have passed, but one I expect him to uphold—even tonight.
Dad swore to never let a woman sleep in the same bed as my mother. Never overnight. Not even for an hour. He would do his business and then she’d leave.
I remain in this shower because at two this morning the light sneaking out of Dad’s bedroom door went out. The girl he brought home—she stayed.
The first rays of morning light will hit soon, and if I hang in here long enough, then Dad could possibly keep his promise—he won’t further disrespect the memory
