It’s about me wanting to help, maybe repent for dumping her afterwards.
“I don’t know what to say except thank you. A million times. It was brave and really stupid . . .” She tries to hide it, but I see a glimmer of wetness in her eyes.
“Julia?”
“Yeah?”
“I’m sorry for prep school. You were a virgin, and I should have known you’d get hurt. I didn’t want attachments. It wasn’t me, I mean, it was, but I was different then. I had issues. I still do, but . . .” I’m babbling.
She blinks rapidly. “Okay.”
“Julia, you’re up,” says the guy with the beard who tossed me out. He’s opened the door and glares at me like I’m scum.
“You alright, Julia?” He checks her out from head to toe in a businesslike way. “This guy giving you trouble?”
“No. I’m fine, Eddie. He’s a . . . friend.” She looks back at me and gives me a little smile. “See you around.”
She slips through the door and leaves.
I stand there for several moments, feeling winded by her abrupt departure.
I circle back to the entrance and find Reece waiting outside as he thumbs his phone. My phone buzzes from him. Where u at?
He looks up and laughs. “Dude! Were you the guy they escorted out?”
“Me? No way.”
He smirks. “Good thing I videoed it. What the hell happened?”
I push out a laugh and consider explaining the Julia situation but decide to let it go. She’s a private person.
I feel relief. In telling her. Hoping it helps.
9
Julia
The buzz, buzz, buzz of the alarm stirs me from a nightmare where I raced down the alleys of Sparrow Lake trying to catch up with my mother. She laughed, then darted into the laundromat.
I rub my temple and sigh as I get out of the bed. I barely slept last night from worry about her not replying to my texts. My morbid mind goes to the worst-case scenario. My mother dead in a ditch. Overdosed.
I grimace when I see a text that came in last night.
U r so hot. I want to pull your hair back and fuck you until you scream.
Parker. Drunk texting. Again. Bye, Douchebag. I press the block button. Should have done it ages ago.
After I take a quick shower, I change into frayed shorts and a tank top, scuff into my flip-flops, and scrape my wet hair back into a bun. I shove my school-issued laptop into my backpack and head out.
My early morning class is a seminar in the history of Sparrow Lake, an elective for my degree in art. My steps are light as I make the trek to campus. Some of the chaos that’s usually in my head is defeated. The fear that’s haunted me for a year feels snuffed out.
Now that the pressure is off to pay back Connor five hundred a month, I can cut my hours at the club and focus on looking for a new job. Sure, it won’t pay as much, but it will be enough to pay back Eric a little at a time, cover bills, and maybe sock away money for next semester.
I still owe Poppy and Taylor. And Marcia. I need those burdens lifted too.
A side of me wants to dash to the pawn shop and get the ring back, but that feels impossible. I need to put other things first.
I think about Eric showing up at the club and a bittersweet feeling washes over me. His act of kindness was surprising. And not at all something I imagined him doing.
My mind races with thoughts of us in prep school. His lingering looks. The little notes he’d slip me when he walked by my desk. The way his leg felt pressed against mine when we did a project together. We each had to write a poem, then read it and take critiques. I have it saved on my phone and bring it up.
I’m angry at the world
For taking you away from me.
I’m angry at God
For not saving you.
I’m angry at fate
For being so cruel.
I’m angry at you
For leaving me behind.
Most of all, I’m angry at myself
For stepping in that house.
I’m sorry I’m not you.
I’d been stunned at his emotional words, at the hesitant way he waited for me to tell him my thoughts.
“It’s beautiful,” I told him.
I didn’t care that he had a reputation.
I believed he was as crazy about me as I was him.
I remember the day we had sex. After it was over, his eyes were far, far away.
And when I texted him the next day, and the next, and the next, he blew me off with I’m busy. Can’t talk.
I saw him kissing another girl later in the week, and when I confronted him, he told me that he played around and he was sorry if it hurt my feelings and perhaps it was best if we didn’t mess around.