I have heard him clearly.
Clutching Art to my chest even tighter, I ask, “When?”
He clamps his jaw before saying, “A long time ago.”
And then, he spins around and leaves.
I was ten when I fell into that hole.
By then, I’d stopped making silly cards or trying to improve myself or be better. Just so they’d love me back.
By then, I’d learned to sneak out of the main house and roam free on the grounds. I had an entire plan set up to run away as soon as I figured out how to make money and save up enough to survive on my own. Although the way it came about – me, moving out – wasn’t how I expected it to be.
I was down in the hole for hours. For the entire night, actually.
I remember trying to get out on my own, grabbing onto the roots and heaving myself up. I also remember falling on my ass a lot.
When I got tired, I remember lying there and watching the sky. I thought no one would ever find me. No one would even bother to look, definitely not my parents.
When I stopped trying to win their approval, they stopped bothering themselves with me. They handed me over to nannies, tutors, maids, whoever they could find to pawn their kid off to. They paid them enough money not to open their mouths about my disability.
My dad didn’t want the world to know that his son was anything less than perfect. And neither did he want to waste his time on an imperfect kid.
And my mom? Well, my mom never wanted a kid to begin with. She didn’t want anything to interfere with her parties and her carefree, rich life. Ironically, it was my dad who wanted a child. So when my mom gave him an imperfect one, she did everything she could to make up for the fact, including neglecting said child.
I remember wanting to cry down in that hole. Crying for my mom, my dad, even. I remember making deals with God that I’d try harder. I wouldn’t run my tutors off. I’d spend time practicing lessons. I wouldn’t be deliberately difficult and stir up shit.
Just get me out of this hole.
But then, I also remember stopping myself and getting angry. I thought, why the fuck should I try? Nothing is ever good enough for them. No matter how much I practiced, my dad would find a flaw and bash me over it.
I went to sleep, debating and exhausted.
It was Nora who found me the next day. She’d sent out a search party when she went into my room to wake me up for school.
For two days I was in bed; I’d sprained my ankle. And for two days, Maggie and Nora were the ones who took care of me.
When they told my parents, my dad’s reaction was to pretend it never happened. And my mom’s reaction was to say, “Why do you keep making waves, Zach? Why can’t you be a good, quiet boy? You’ve always made things difficult for me.”
Yeah, Mom. I was lying in a fucking hole the entire night and things are difficult for you.
I think she was counting on me falling to my death or something. Although she’d never say anything crass like that, but disappointment was pretty fucking clear on her face.
Yeah, I’m a huge fucking disappointment. For everyone.
Not for her, though.
Blue never acted disappointed in me because she’s always assumed the worst. She’s always looked at me with disgust and hate.
It’s comforting. Familiar. It’s how everyone in my life has looked at me, if we count out Nora and Maggie. But then, they’re getting paid, aren’t they, to be nice to me.
What isn’t comforting is the way Blue looked at me today when I found that kid and pulled him out of the hole.
Today she looked at me like I moved the stars.
It hurt.
It still does.
I never thought it would. Never thought that naïve, innocent, warm look in her eyes would be so glaring and harsh.
Never thought it would make me angry.
It made me want to remind her who I was.
But it also made me want to grab her and kiss the fuck out of those blue-painted lips.
And that can never happen.
She won’t let it.
Everyone thinks he’s the prince.
The savior. The hero.
They haven’t stopped talking about how he pulled Art out from the hole. Everywhere I turn, someone is talking about the new Mr. Prince.
The cooking staff fawns over him when he goes to eat breakfast. Grace claims that he smiled at her while they were passing each other by in the hallway. Doris calls him my good boy.
“I handed him the bottle,” Leslie breathes to a group of us standing by the stairs in the servant’s wing, going upstairs to the first floor. “He was working out by the pool and I was coming out of the pool house, you know. He was like, hey, excuse me? Can you hand me that bottle of water? I had a fresh bottle of water.” I roll my eyes at that obvious statement, but she goes on, “I did and…” She pauses to sigh. “Our fingers touched.”