I heaved. “Oh, shit.”
“That good? Great. Well, Michael’s got Clint. They’re headed out front. Maybe we should try and wash you off long enough to get you out there.”
Another knock came at the door and I vomited again.
“Just kidding. Ten more minutes, and then we’re going to meet them out there at the Uber. All right?”
She rubbed my back and I started crying.
“Rae?”
Between the heaves, I sobbed. I pressed my cheek against the rim of the toilet and let it all hang out. With my ass crack halfway out of my jeans and my tits shoved up against the warm porcelain, I heard Allison murmur something about a disaster. I didn’t care, though. I felt more inclined to cry myself the river that almost swallowed Clint whole all those months ago than pick myself up.
I was tired of picking myself up.
“Why did he leave?” I asked.
Allison paused. “What was that, honey?”
“Why did Clint leave? Why didn’t he just stay?”
“From the sounds of it, he’s pretty--”
I sniffled. “Why didn’t he let me help him with things? Why couldn't I have stayed with him and Cecilia?”
She sighed. “Are you talking about last year?”
I drew in shuddering breaths. “I just wanted him to take me back so I could help, Allison.”
“I know. And he did take you back. You’re together, honey.”
“Not really. Not since them. He’s staying for her. For his stepmother. He doesn’t wanna come with me because she’s family and I’m not family and I’ll never see him again because he’ll find someone closer and he won’t be able to come see me because he doesn’t have a bike and he doesn’t want to move in with me because he hasn’t brought it up because he doesn’t love me, Allison.”
She snickered. “Oh, boy.”
I sniffled. “And all I wanted was for him to love me and for him to like me and for him to always be with me and then he left when things got hard. So how do I know he’s not going to leave when college gets hard? When I get stressed and frustrated and hard to be around?”
“I mean, he’s doing a good job of sticking around right now.”
“Yeah, until I leave to go to college and he’s free to do whatever because I’m not around to do anything with and he finds someone else. Maybe he’s using college as a way to distance us. Maybe if I stay with Mom, he’ll stay with me.”
She dropped next to me. “No, Rae. You have to get away from your mother. Even Clint knows that.”
“Then why won’t he come with me like Michael’s going with you?”
She rubbed my back. “Is that what this is about?”
I heaved. “I thought he’d want to come to college with me and move in with me and w
e could live our lives together and never look back but he’s staying for Cecilia so maybe I should stay with Mom until he’s ready to move away and make a life for himself.”
“Honey, you have got things so backwards it’s sickening.”
Snot dripped from my nose. “Yeah, I know I’m sick.”
And as I went back to dry-heaving into the toilet, I continued to cry. I cried and I cried. The bathroom filled with fumes from my ass, and still I cried. I cried until my voice was hoarse. Until my eyes were so swollen I couldn't see out of them.
Then I felt Allison pull me away from the toilet.