“And yet you stayed married to him. Why?”
“It’s complicated,” I reply. “Mostly it was about his family, about making them happy…and about my fear of abandonment. Plus, it didn’t seem important to have a formal dissolution so long as we were cordial with each other.”
“So, what changed?”
Ilmari’s good at this. He’s careful with his words and he doesn’t look my way, giving me the space to answer or not, and in my time. I’m usually the kind of person that seeks to fill an awkward silence, but with Ilmari I find myself wanting to lean into it.
“I think I changed,” I reply, giving him the simple truth. “Through every stage of our relationship, I was always the one changing. I changed to please him so many times. I changed my habits and my likes, my sense of humor. Hell, I even changed my coffee order. I’m not even convinced I like coffee. I drink it because he does,” I finish with a shrug.
We’re both quiet for another minute.
“And now?”
I let out a breath. “And now I’ve changed again. I’m stronger, I think. Resigned to my fate.”
“And what fate is that?”
“To survive,” I reply.
“What does that mean?”
“Not everyone is meant to thrive, Ilmari. Some of us are born merely to endure. It took falling in love with Troy and falling back out again to realize how adept I am at survival. And I want it, Mars,” I whisper, heart in my throat. “I want to survive on my terms and by my strength. Troy wanted me to think I was weak. He wanted me to be malleable clay he could make and remake in his image.”
Ilmari glances my way. “And are you that clay, Tess?”
“No.”
“Then what are you?”
Taking a deep breath, I hold it in my lungs, letting it fill me. “I am the fire that forges the clay into something stronger.”
Ilmari is quiet as he considers my words. At last, he glances my way and says, “It sounds to me like you need to answer the phone for yourself.”
As if on cue, the phone begins buzzing in my hand. I glance down to see the name on my caller ID: DEVIL SPAWN.
“What will you do?” Ilmari asks, his tone so calm and quiet.
I gaze down at the phone, feeling the buzz of it in my hand. “I should answer it. I should let him have his say, right? That’s all he ever wants is the last word. He can scream at me and rage, and then we can be done with it. He won’t sign otherwise. He’ll never let go if he thinks I’m somehow winning in all this.”
“So, you want to answer the phone,” Ilmari summarizes.
“No,” I say quickly. “I don’t want to answer. I don’t care if we never speak again. He’s a monster, and his words are nothing but poison.”
“I think you may be overlooking one of the important nuances of human communication,” he replies.
I glance his way, the phone still buzzing in my hand. “What?”
Ilmari just shrugs, his gaze on the road. “No answer is still an answer.”
I let that truth sink deep. No answer is still an answer. I don’t want to answer my phone. I don’t have to answer my phone. So, I won’t.
Breathless with nerves, I jam my thumb down on the automatic window switch. The tinted window rolls halfway down, and the cab of the truck is suddenly blasted with icy air as we climb the bridge stretching across the water. With a shriek, I fling the buzzing phone out the open window, watching it sail over the guardrail and out of sight.
I’m on autopilot as I roll the window back up and turn slowly to look out the front. I can still feel the chill of the wind on my face. “There,” I say at last. “He has his answer.”
Reaching across the center console, Ilmari pats my arm. “Good girl.”
I let out my breath, shoulders sagging, as fresh tears sting my eyes. But these aren’t tears of feeling anxious or trapped. These are happy tears. I feel giddy, like I swallowed a freaking rainbow. Troy will likely find a way to make me pay, but in this moment, I swear to God I don’t care. In this moment, I’m free.
I place my hand over Ilmari’s on my arm. “So, tell me about these sea turtles. Have you ever actually seen one?”
21
I’m in the car with Lauren Gerard and her two little girls, the four of us rocking out to Disney songs, when my phone rings in my pocket. The front lights up with a picture of my sister and me from Christmas, stretched out on towels at the beach.
Lauren turns down the music, and I answer the phone. “Hey, Cass. What’s up?”
“Hey, bro,” she replies. “You got a sec?”
I groan. My sister Cassie may be thirteen months older than me, but since our dad died, I feel like I stepped in to fill his shoes. It was little things at first, like scaring off her douchey boyfriends and being her DD at parties. Once I got drafted, I became her main financial support. Right now, I’m putting her through the last two years of her PhD program in Comparative Literature.
Yeah, Cassie got all the brains. She just doesn’t know how to turn that bookish cleverness into a job that pays. Oh, and she’s a slob…and she forgets to do things like pay her cell phone bill. But she’s my only sister, and Mom can’t really help her on her meager nurse’s salary.
So, Cassie leans on me. And damn it, but I let her. It’s always all been on me. She’s only calling now because she wants money.
“What do you need, Cass?” I say.
“Well, hello to you too—”
“I’m in the car, so spit it out.”
“Fine,” she huffs. “The deadline is approaching for this really cool opportunity to study French in Bordeaux this summer. I talked to my advisor, and she says it’ll be a quick way to complete my language requirement for my program.”
I sigh, glancing over at Lauren. She gives me a weak smile and a shrug. “It’s for your program?” I press. “Like, it gets you credits to graduate on time?”
“Yeah, totally.”
“How much?”
“Umm…it’s only like nine thousand dollars,” she replies. “And it’s all-inclusive.”
“And there’s not a scholarship or anything?”
“God, Ryan,” she huffs. “If there was a scholarship, don’t you think I would have applied? If nine thousand dollars is really that big a deal—”
“I never said that,” I say, bristling at her tone. “But this isn’t going to be like the summer you spent drinking and riding bikes with your sorority sisters across Tuscany, right? You’re actually going to school? You’re like, learning and shit?”
I can practically hear her eye roll through the phone. “Yeah, Ryan. I’m learning and shit. Want me to send you the website link?”
My hackles rise higher at what I know is meant to be a jab. “You know, since you’re the one asking me for the favor, you could try saying something that sounds a little more like ‘please.’”
“Please,” she says quickly. Her voice softens a little. “God, you know I hate having to lean on you like this all the time. Please, Ry? My program is almost done. This is my last summer, so this is, like, the last big thing, I swear.”
I sigh, looking out the windshield as we head over the bridge into downtown. “When do you need the money by?” I say at last.
“Tomorrow.”
“Fuck,” I mutter.
“Mommy, he said Daddy’s bad word,” Estelle calls from her booster seat in the back.
Lauren glares at me, and I flash her a look of apology. “Fine, Cass. I’ll transfer the money over tonight, okay?”
“Thanks, Ry,” she chimes. “You’re the best.”
We hang up, and I glare down at the phone.
Lauren smirks. “I can’t wait to see you as a girl dad someday. You’ll be worse than Jean-Luc.”
I groan, dropping my phone in the cupholder as I crank the tunes back up. I was already in a shitty mood because of the weirdness with Tess earlier and Shelby’s warning. Now it’s a hundred times worse. But it’s nothing a little “Hakuna Matata” can’t fix.
22