“I’m sorry.” I start to sob, my face in my hands. Their chairs scrape like Mom’s did the last time we discussed Reid, but they aren’t storming out. They’re putting their arms around me, tel ing me they’re sorry, too. And I know I’m going to cal Reid and thank him for everything he’s done, because he’s been better to me than I ever could have expected him to be. And then I’m going to tel him goodbye.
Half an hour later, alone in my room, that’s exactly what I do. He doesn’t speak for a ful minute, but I hear him breathing so I stay on the line and let him absorb what I’ve said, and I close my eyes and hug Esther and pray I can take whatever he says, because he’s bound to be angry, and he has every right to be.
“I understand,” he says, control ed and quiet. “Goodbye, Dori.”
The line goes dead and I cry until I fal asleep, curled into a tight bal in the middle of my bed and holding onto my dog, clinging to any comfort I can find.
Chapter 46
REID
“I haven’t seen your friend’s car out back in a while.” Mom is perched on my bed, skimming through the pages of that novel with the hot-but-sul en fictional boy who reminds me of my Wil Darcy role from School Pride—if Wil Darcy had been created in the pages of a dystopian novel. (What the hel is it about brooding guys that’s attractive to women, anyway? I’ve become one since Dori’s cal three weeks ago, and it’s made me more of a chick magnet. I shouldn’t be surprised—being a dick never hurt my appeal before.)
“That’s because she hasn’t been here.” I would wonder that Mom noted her absence, but she has a way of noticing everything, even when she seems to be in too much of a stupor to notice anything but her own feet, shuffling through the house. Her eyes seem clearer now, however, staring at me like a reflection.
“Did you two have an argument?” She asked this same question when Brooke stopped coming over, after we broke up.
I shrug. “There was no fight at al , actual y. Her parents didn’t want her seeing me, so she just gave up.” I don’t know if this is true, but it feels true. I should have known she’d submit to their wishes eventual y. Did they make her feel ashamed of spending the night with me, or just spending time with me at al ? Did they threaten to kick her out? I’ve never understood the ultimatum-delivering parent.
Part of me rises to that—I could have rented her a place if they’d fol owed through. Or hel , I could have gotten u s a place.
Wow, shit. Gotten us a place? I am gone. Over Dorcas Cantrel , a girl who convinced me in a one-minute phone cal that I meant nothing to her: I’m grateful for everything you’ve done for me—you probably saved my life. But I can’t see you anymore. I’ve got too much going on right now, and I don’t know what we’re doing anyway, you and I.
It’s just… my parents need me, and it’s time I get back to my life and let you go back to yours. I’m sorry.
She’d choked back a sob then as I lay in my bed with my phone to my ear, trying to wake up and waiting for her to say something else. To take it back. She hadn’t.
After I hung up, I threw my phone across the room where it struck the wal with enough force to leave a dent in the sheetrock and crack the screen irreparably. And then I found her note next to the bed. The one with “Don’t worry” preceding her scripted D. An hour later, after I calmed down enough to form coherent thoughts, I dug the crumpled note out of the trash, smoothed it out on the desk and read it through fifty times, trying to make sense of the combination of her spoken and written words— absolute antitheses of each other.
“Hmm,” Mom says, going back to reading.
“What?”
She angles one eyebrow, but doesn’t lift her eyes from the book. “Maybe you gave up too easily.” I laugh. Right. If only it was that simple.
She checks her watch, slides off the bed, and walks over
—steadily—to ruffle my hair. “I have a meeting to get to. We can talk later, if you want?” Newly manicured fingers under my chin, she tilts my face up, and I notice her eyes are clearer. She’s trying to stop drinking again. I don’t want to ask. Don’t want to jinx it.
I stomp down the burst of hope in my chest, nod into her hand. “Sure, Mom.”
***
“Wil there be anything else, Mr. Alexander?” The rep delivering my new Ferrari FF is smokin’ hot and practical y purrs this question. She’s taken every opportunity to brush against me or lean in such a way that I can see right down her silky top, the top three pearled buttons unfastened.
We’ve gone over every spec and completed a thorough inspection to ensure that not a single surface scratch mars the metal ic pewter gray paint or the pale gray leather interior. No further reason to keep her here unless I want to do her on the hood (total y possible—this girl is not in the running for a subtlety award).
In my head is John’s voice— Why the hell not?
My newly enlightened thought processes, that’s why not.
Such as wondering what she sees in me, aside from a young, rich celebrity. None of that counted worth a shit to Dori. I don’t know what did count to Dori. I don’t know what changed between the day I met her—when she couldn’t wait to be rid of me, to the kiss in the closet, to the night out before Vancouver and Quito, to the moment she agreed to defy her parents and hang out with me several nights a week. What happened to make that last night together possible?
“Thanks, I’m good,” I tel her, and she huffs a disappointed sigh. No doubt she’l report to everyone she knows that I’m definitely g*y. I don’t give a shit.