“That’s exciting. Em, I’m proud of you. You needed to go out and have some fun for a change. I hate that my drama ruined it.”
She pulled back and pinned me with an incredulous look. There was a word people didn’t use enough. Incredulous. I vowed then and there to start using it more.
“Your drama, as in you getting physically assaulted and nearly beaten to death. I don’t know if it’s the meds or what, but this is serious, Drew. And you need to tell the police who did this to you, so they don’t do it again—to you or to someone else.”
“Calm down before you get an eye twitch.” I patted her gently, bringing her back to lay beside me. “I’m not going to see him again. Period. Trust me, he’ll leave me alone. He has much more to lose than I do.”
She peered up at me. “Drew…was it like…a hate crime?”
I sighed and tried to figure out how to explain. “Look, Em, I know you’re upset, and I know you’re upset because you love me. I love you, too. But trust me when I tell you, this person, the one who did this, he didn’t do it because he hates me. He did it because he hates himself, and all that anger, all that toxic hatred, it’s poisoned him, and he may never get it out of his system. Can you imagine a harsher punishment than hating yourself? I mean, you’re stuck with yourself forever so…it’s a life sentence. Literally.”
She relaxed a little, the tension in her body easing slowly. “Sounds kind of like my mom in a way.”
I nodded. “Exactly. You know the hateful things she does aren’t because of you or Ethan. It’s her she’s unhappy with—her life, her illness. Things she feels powerless to control.”
“She was mad about me leaving. Then I didn’t come home last night. I texted and told her I was staying at Camille’s. She threw a glass at my head when I got home.”
“Jesus. I’m sorry, babe.”
I gave her a squeeze but then I remembered Camille had come to visit, according to my mom. And Emersyn wasn’t with her.
“Wait. Did you really stay at Cam’s?”
She was quiet for so long I checked to make sure she hadn’t dozed off. Her cheeks were pink.
“Emersyn Elizabeth Tyler! Did you spend the night with mystery carnival man?” She nodded against me and I feigned shock. “Oh my gosh, Geppetto. She’s a real girl now!”
“I might smack you if you weren’t all busted up,” she said softly. “I didn’t sleep with him, Drew. I mean, yeah, technically we did sleep. We did other stuff, too, but not everything.”
“Still holding onto that V-card with a white-knuckle grip, huh?” She inhales deeply and I rub her back as much as possible with an IV sticking out of my hand. “I’m just giving you a hard time, Em. Don’t rush it. I hope whoever you decide to give yourself to deserves it.”
They say you never forget you first time, and I guess it’s true. After what happened in the park, I wish I could though. I think that’s why I didn’t fight back, because I couldn’t intentionally hurt the first person, I’d made love to.
“Are you going to be okay, Drew?”
I close my eyes and it’s still there. All of it. Every moment with him. The good, the bad, the horrifying. So, I don’t lie to her.
“Eventually I will be. I hope.”
Funny thing was, everyone was worried about the wounds on the outside when it was the ones on the inside that were killing me.
“Can I give you some advice, young grasshopper?”
She sits up and eyes me warily. “Sure.”
I sucked in a breath and said all the things I wished someone had told me. “Love is fleeting, Em. And it varies in degree from one minute to the next. I know you’re waiting on some mystical kind of fairytale love but that’s not what it’s like at all. It’s real and sometimes painful because we aren’t dealing with magical creatures here. Whoever you eventually fall for, he’ll be human. He’ll be flawed. He’ll have a past and weaknesses and triggers and damage because we all do.”
She bites her bottom lip and pulls her knees up to her chest. “He’s not like anyone I’ve ever known. He made me feel alive and free and…”
“Wet?” I offer, to lighten the moment.
“Yeah, that too, perv.” She shrugs. “But he’s twenty-four, Drew. I didn’t tell him I was just taking courses at Southeastern through correspondence with my high school. Pretty sure he’s graduating, and I honestly probably won’t ever see him again anyways.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m in high school and I already have more on my plate than I can handle. He lives in Riverside. I got the impression he doesn’t plan to stick around.”
“Got the impression how?”