“Fuck!” I cradle my head in my hands. Why does this kind of shit happen to me?
Fresh tears fill my eyes—and then I hear a car crank. I make it around to the other side of the roof in time to see Dash drive away.
Twenty-Four
Dash
I drive around the neighborhood a few times, wanting really fucking badly to go somewhere and get drunk. I know I can’t. Amelia deserves better. She has always deserved better. And I have always been so fucking selfish.
Since we were kids, I wanted her. I jacked off to thoughts of her when I was fifteen and she was twelve. She barely even had boobs, but I wanted her. Wanting her, not being able to even dream of having her, has been one of the worst trials my life. She’s why I know about amor fati, about philosophy of suffering.
Her stepmother is the other reason.
I drive in circles around Chatham Hills and try to tell myself to calm down. I can tell her. She’ll listen.
Will she, though? What if she doesn’t?
Fuck.
I’m sweating as I drive back home and go in through the front door, so I can avoid my parents.
I check the movie room first, and when she isn’t there, I pray she’s waiting on the roof. She could have called an Uber. Fuck, I hope she didn’t…
I climb out my window, but I don’t see her. I walk carefully across the roof to Lex’s window—and that’s open.
Okay. Shit. I stop a minute. Try to take a few deep breaths. Then I move slowly and carefully around the corner.
I find Am sitting on the ledge of a big window that goes to the upstairs laundry room. She’s got her head down on her knees. When she hears me, I see her body tense. She doesn’t lift her face.
I’m shaking as I sit down, near her feet. Goddamn, my heart is pounding. I want to touch her, but I know I can’t. I don’t deserve to.
“Am…?” She doesn’t move, just shakes her head a little. I shut my eyes, and for a second, I don’t think that I can do it. I can’t talk about this shit—but I push through…for Am.
“Fuck…” I heave a big breath out. “I know you probably hate me right now.” I have to stop and swallow just to keep my fucking voice from breaking. “I just want to talk to you. If you don’t want to hear from me, get up and I won’t follow you. I’ll do anything you want…”
She doesn’t move, so I inhale and exhale, then begin.
“I was…” Fuck. I lick my lips. “I was a junior when your— Manda first came up to me. I was swimming and she came over. You were gone with…Lex somewhere.” I swallow again, because saying my sister’s name makes my throat tight. “I told her that, and she sat down and…watched me swim.”
Amelia lifts her head and glances at me before looking back down at her shoes.
I grit my molars. “She hung around. I didn’t know what the fuck to think. She had a mixed drink, some sort of daiquiri or some shit, and when I got out of the pool, she asked me if I wanted some. I didn’t. She said, ‘maybe just the liquor next time’ and winked, and yeah, I thought it was kind of weird and funny that she acted that way. When you’re sixteen, it doesn’t take a lot to make you feel excited about a woman wanting you. You can’t figure out if you’re the shit or nothing. You want everyone to want your dick.”
Her face tightens, and I want to kick myself in the fucking face. I rub my head, clenching my jaw.
“She would come over sometimes, always when no one but me was there, and she would bring shit. Food, one time this lemon cake. Another time a screwdriver. She said she got it for me since she knew I didn’t like the fruity shit.”
“An orange is an actual fruit.” Amelia eyebrows arch, and I let out a nervous laugh.
“Yeah, it is. So that was fucking stupid. Anyway, I got the message that she…liked me. She told me that your— that she heard I was a good artist. She wanted to see my stuff. I still thought she was just being really nice, some kind of proxy mom gone overboard or something. Everybody knew my parents were never here. I kind of liked the mom attention.” I let out a long breath. I can’t look at Ammy anymore.
“She started coming over more. It was the fall of my senior year, and she would wear her bathing suit. She started getting in the pool with me. One time she asked if I could help her with her backstroke. She would ask about school, my friends. She acted like she…you know…gave a shit. About me.” Telling Ammy this shit makes me want to shoot myself, but I continue. She deserves the fucking truth. “She would offer me advice and tell me how mature I was. Tell me I was a man.”
I take a few more breaths, because it’s so fucking embarrassing. So humiliating, even now.
“I was fucking stupid, okay?” My gaze flickers to her face, finding it grave. “When I think about this shit now, Am, it makes me want to claw my fucking skin off, but I didn’t know this then. I was…just stupid.”
I know I was stupid, because Amelia’s face gentles and she starts to look like she feels sorry for me.
“Don’t feel sorry for me. One day Manda came over and the pool was warm, it had started getting cold outside. And she took off her swim suit. I was worried, kind of freaking out that someone would come by and see her. They might think that I’d done something…you know, something wrong. She was a married…” I shake my head. My face is hot. My heart is pounding. “I know this is horrible to hear.”
“It is. I can’t believe this.” I look over at Amelia, and she’s crying. “Why, Dash?” Her voice sounds brittle. My chest hurts like something physical is wrong with me.
“I don’t know.” I put a hand over my face.
“I’m sorry.” She sounds quieter. “I shouldn’t have— keep on going,” she says softly.
“She found out....that I wanted you.”
“She came over,” Ammy prods, gray-faced. “And it was cold outside.”
“And she said, ‘Don’t you think I’ve noticed that…’” I blow my breath out. “That I reacted to her. She said she knew I wanted her, and that she never felt that way before about…a younger guy, but she… But I was different.”
“You were different. You were different! Fuck, of course you were, the guy I wanted, he’s the different one!” Ammy’s jaw is tight. Her eyes glitter with tears. “So go on, Dash.”
“I can’t.” I shut my eyes. I feel like a weight is on my chest, and I can’t breathe. “I’m a fuckup. I was just a fucking pawn she used, because my stupid ego… I never felt like anything and here she was, wanting to do this shit with me. Shit that I felt bad about—I felt fucking terrible, I was up every night and on this roof, wanting to jump off—but she would come back, wanting me. She wanted me. She made me feel like I was so important. She would talk to me, she’d help me with my homework even. I was so fucked up, I thought this shit was great! That someone gave a fuck, that someone wanted to spend time with me when they could do a bunch of better things.”
My voice breaks, and I put a hand over my face. “I’m sorry, give me just a minute.”