“We can talk about the Max elephant later. For now, tell me about the bigger one. Tell me what’s really been going on with you.”
With a deep breath of preparation, Emmie turned to face Marissa and unloaded. She rehashed the parts of the last couple years that Marissa already knew: how she and her father had started fighting after her mom moved out during seventh grade. How in ninth grade Emmie begged him to let her go live with her mom. How he eventually relented, even though her mom hadn’t been great about exercising her visitation rights.
“Pretty much as soon as I moved in, I could see how much she’d changed. I could see why she’d been skipping out on visits.” Emmie gave a humorless laugh. “She was basically a mess.”
“Because of the drugs,” Marissa said, and Emmie appreciated how hard Marissa was trying to make the conversation sound natural. Marissa’s parents ran a dry-cleaning business. Their kind of excitement was Bingo Night at the American Legion.
“When Mom and Dad got divorced, she was already smoking weed, but she’d gotten into some nastier stuff since moving out. That’s why she wasn’t good at keeping a schedule. When she agreed to let me move in, I hadn’t seen her in a few months, but it looked like she’d aged ten years. It made me worry about her. A lot.”
Sometimes Emmie wished she could hate her mom. If Emmie could do that, she wouldn’t worry about what would happen when her mom got out of the treatment facility she was in. She wouldn’t have to worry about her losing her car, or if she did, who’d be picking her up. She wouldn’t worry about who her mom was living with, or where she’d go if there was no one to take her in.
If she could hate her mom, she wouldn’t worry about whether she had enough money for her next fix, or how the drugs were slowly killing her. She wouldn’t care if her mom had food in her cupboards. She could be numb to it all, and dammit, that sounded like all kinds of wonderful.
Emmie didn’t say anything more for a while. Iggy Azalea was singing “Fancy.” Light and shadow bounced around the inside of their blanket fort as they moved in front of the flashlight. Emmie and Marissa talked about other things. Small things. High school things. Ultimately, Marissa pressed for more.
“What did you mean when you told Max that Nick wasn’t going to be a problem anymore? Who’s Nick, Emmie?”
Emmie fidgeted. Marissa didn’t drink or smoke, and she still hadn’t even kissed anyone. At least as far as Emmie knew. Marissa had never had to watch her mother pull meth from a spoon into a syringe and slam it hard, the weeklong binges, empty rigs rolling across a steamer trunk and toppling onto the floor…If she told Marissa the truth, what would she think of her?
“When I moved in with Mom, I saw how thin and old and shaky she was, but I was sure it would only take me a week, maybe two, to get her back on track. And we had some good moments, like…” It took Emmie a second to remember.
“On one of our first nights together, she suggested we make brownies.” Even now, Emmie could conjure up the warm smell of melted chocolate, stirred together with the yellow spiral of butter in the saucepan. They turned on the oven light and sat cross-legged on the floor, watching the brownies rise, then the crust cracking open. It hadn’t even mattered that Emmie had to use her own money to buy the ingredients.
“A couple times, we went to the movies, and once—about a month or two after I showed up—we had a camp-out in her car. Just us, under the stars. She told me stories about what it was like growing up, and college, and how she’d met Dad and had been taken in by his superhot accent.”
Marissa groaned, and Emmie said with a laugh, “Yeah. She promised never to use hot and dad in the same sentence again. Like, ever.”
“After the second night of camping, I realized that we’d been evicted from her apartment. She didn’t want me to worry. She told me not to tell Dad. When I think back, she didn’t want him to know what she really spent his alimony checks on. And that’s when I met Nick.”
Emmie swallowed hard and gathered her nerve. “He was her dealer, but he was also this incredibly good-looking guy. I practically swallowed my gum when I met him for the first time. He was…twenty-six and tall with these really great teeth.”
“Teeth?” Marissa asked.
“His dad was a dentist, but he also owned a building in the city that Nick stayed in. There was a bike shop on the ground level but this huge space above it, and Nick offered Mom and me one of the extra rooms. It was perfect.”
In fact, everything with Nick had to be perfect. He liked things orderly. Neat. Pure. He ate organic. Which was ironic because he was cooking meth in the shed out back. Still, Nick never sampled his own product.
Do you think Mr. Hilton stays in his own hotels? Emmie’d once heard him say. I’m sure he’s got a house anywhere he needs to go.
As a result of Nick’s obsession with perfection, their new living situation was clean and comfortable. For a while, at least. Emmie quickly learned that nothing came without a price.
“Until…until Mom started struggling again, and Nick was there holding the reins. That’s when I agreed to work for him. It was Mom’s idea.”
Emmie can work for you for free, but in exchange for you helping me out, you know?
Emmie blinked back tears, and she was grateful for the dark. Why had she agreed? Why hadn’t she called her father to come get her?
The answers to those questions made Emmie feel sicker than the questions themselves. Because it was her mom, goddammit. She hadn’t called her father because she didn’t want to admit that he’d been right. That she’d been wrong.
“What kind of jobs?”
Emmie took a big bite of ice cream and let the cold freeze hit her brain. “Odd jobs mostly.” She paused to measure Marissa’s reaction, waiting for the tipping point where she’d have to stop, or to lie, so Marissa wouldn’t think too badly of her.
Narc. Whore. Pigeon.
Angie’s text message ran through her head: He forgives you.
“But you knew you had me, right?” Marissa asked. “You had people who cared about you. You could have called me.”
“Yeah,” Emmie said quietly, adjusting a spot where a blanket had sagged over the back of her desk chair. “But being with Nick was like another life. He kept Mom supplied with what she…needed. I mean, I know she should have stopped using, but the withdrawal symptoms were scary. At the time, I thought it was better if…Anyway, Nick kept it so I could keep living with her.”
Emmie stopped there. Marissa didn’t need to know the rest.
“Your dad must have freaked when he found out.”
Emmie fiddled with the edge of her T-shirt. “It all came out after Nick got in some trouble, and I testified against him at his trial. Now I’m not allowed to talk to him anymore.” The truth was, there has been a lot of guilt and fear about testifying, but ultimately she was relieved. She was so relieved about being able to leave. About getting out. Then she felt guilty about that too.
“Isn’t that a good thing?” Marissa asked. “Is that what happened with Max tonight? Did you tell him all this, and he freaked out and went to Katie?”
Emmie shook her head. “Max already knew about Nick.” At least a little bit. “But that wasn’t it. I got this text tonight.” Emmie pulled out her phone and let Marissa read Angie’s message. “I was on my way to tell Max about it when I found him with Katie.”
Marissa’s eyebrows hit her hairline. “Oh my God! This Nick guy is why your car got trashed, isn’t he?”
Emmie nodded.
“And now all of a sudden he forgives you and…still loves you? Isn’t he like a…man?”
Emmie closed her eyes. She probably shouldn’t have shown Marissa that part.
Marissa clenched her teeth, then said, “I’m going to kill Max for not being there for you tonight.”
“Well, if you do, I’ll still love you,” Emmie said, echoing Marissa’s words from earlier.
Marissa finished reading, then handed the phone back to Emmie. “So do you believe this A
ngie girl? That could be a bunch of bullshit about him forgiving you.”
Emmie nodded. She knew that. That’s why she hadn’t responded. Still, Angie’s message helped to lift the veil of guilt that Emmie’d been wearing, and it confirmed her earlier expectation. Emmie and her mom had lived with Nick—and by extension Jimmy, Frankie, and Angie—for nearly a year. They’d all been Emmie’s people. They might want to mess with her for a while, but it wasn’t going to go on forever. They’d sent their message, and now life was moving on.
In fact, now that she was home, she was embarrassed by her little, internal freak-out session back when she first got the message. She chalked it up to being in a strange environment. Now that she was home, she felt a hell of a lot better about it. She wasn’t a wimp. Why had she acted like one?
Emmie wouldn’t hide behind her father anymore. She wouldn’t hide behind Max either. She couldn’t. She was on her own again, and that was fine by her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
FORGIVEN, NOT FORGIVEN
Max woke up sick to his stomach. He always knew today was going to suck, so he was thankful for a fourth Saturday on the work crew. If Dan hadn’t extended his time, he wouldn’t have had this natural opportunity to see Emmie today. More importantly, she was forced into spending time with him, and he needed her more today—of all days—than he ever had before.
He got to the sheriff’s parking lot early, so early he had to actually wait for Emmie to show up. Max had guessed that it was her habit to arrive first because she always got the first-row seat, by the window. Sure enough. Shortly after the van arrived, so did Emmie. She was wearing her SpongeBob pajama bottoms again, and her curls were pulled up in a knot on top of her head. Half of it was falling out in back.
Max waited in his car until she was getting into the van, then he sprinted to catch up, making sure to get ahead of the other guys who were pulling into the parking lot. When Max slid into the seat beside her, Emmie glanced over and groaned. She laid her head against the window and closed her eyes. If she meant to discourage him, she was going to have to work harder than that.
He needed her. He didn’t know how to explain it to her. He’d tried once, and it had sounded all wrong. He hoped, instead, that she would simply intuit how he was feeling—like she’d done at the Happy Gopher when she pressed her hand against his, steadying him.
He’d been about to lose it when he thought Marissa was going to offer her condolences. He’d felt the shaking in his fingers and the tightening in his chest, that panicky feeling of plummeting in a plane. But that night, just one touch from Emmie had him leveling out. He needed that steadiness to get him through this day.
“You can’t ignore me forever,” Max said.
“I probably could,” she said. She pulled out the hair binder, and her hair fell forward, creating a curtain that hid her face. He wanted to reach over and draw it behind her ear, but he knew better than to touch her now.
Hearing her voice was a little victory. “See, you’re already not ignoring me.”
“Let me sleep, Max.”
The first two guys were nearly to the van. If Max hoped to smooth things over between himself and Emmie, he’d need to talk faster. “Nothing happened at the party. You misinterpreted the whole thing.”
She didn’t answer. She was terrible at faking sleep. The two guys slid open the van door and climbed in. One of them was the guy who usually sat next to Emmie. He looked at Max with confusion before figuring out the new seating arrangement. Behind them, another three guys climbed in and found seats in the back.
Dan opened the passenger door and got in. There was frost in his goatee. He placed his travel mug in the cup holder, took off his gloves, and grabbed a pen from behind his ear. When he turned in his seat to take roll, he didn’t seem nearly as surprised as the rest of the crew to see Max sitting next to Emmie. “Last week for you, Shepherd.”
“Yeah,” Max said. “It’s been fun.”
“We’re headed back to Goodwill today,” Dan said to the group. “I’m going to need a few of you to help move some furniture that came in.”
The driver put the van in gear and pulled away from the curb. Everyone’s bodies rocked as he drove over a speed bump, and Max’s left arm rubbed up against Emmie’s right. She pulled herself in tighter and folded her arms. Max leaned closer to her and whispered, “Emmie. Please. That girl, she—”
“Save it,” Emmie said without opening her eyes. She reached into her pocket and put earbuds in her ears.
Max sighed and straightened up. How was he ever going to fix this?
Two hours later, Max and some of the other guys had moved three full living-room sets onto the thrift store’s showroom floor. Emmie was out in front folding baby clothes. Every time Max tried to go talk to her, Dan would yell at him to come out back, or Emmie would find a reason to help a customer find “the most perfect red dress” for Valentine’s Day.
The shift was nearly over by the time Emmie headed for the restroom and Max found his opportunity. He followed her into the ladies’ room and held the door shut so no one else could come in. Emmie spun around in surprise when she heard his voice.
“What are you doing in here?” she asked. “Get out.”
“Emmie, you need to listen to me.”
She pushed her hair behind her ears and stared at a spot on the wall just beyond his shoulder. “You can’t be in here.”
Max didn’t know what the big deal was. It was just a bathroom. “I don’t care.”
“Yeah? Well, I guess you don’t care about a lot of things.”
Her words caught him off balance. How could she think that? Nothing could be further from the truth. If he had a flaw, it was caring too much. “Would you stop it? That girl—”
“Katie,” she said, finally looking him in the eye. “Jade’s cousin. You’re such an asshole!”
“Emmie. Would you just listen?”
“Go be with her if that’s who you think you should be with.”
Max threw his hands up in the air, and they landed against his legs with a slap. “Should. Could. What about who I want to be with? I want to be with you.”
Emmie rolled her eyes. “It didn’t look like you wanted to be with me when you were straddling Katie, and she had her hands all over you. What happened to playing pool with Chris and Brock? Or was that some cover story to give you a way to get alone with her?”
“Of course not. That’s not what happened. Please. I need—”
“You don’t need anything from me,” Emmie said.
She couldn’t have been more wrong, but Max could hardly blame her. She didn’t know today was the day. As in, the day. As in, Please, Emmie. Don’t leave me alone today. But it sounded so pathetic in his head that he didn’t dare let her know what a mess he was. He wanted to protect her. It wasn’t supposed to work the other way around.
One of the Goodwill employees opened the bathroom door, saw Max standing there, and gave him a dirty look.
“Give us one second,” Max said to her. The woman closed the door, but Max bet she was going to find the manager. He didn’t have much time.
“I went upstairs to play pool. Remember I asked if you wanted to come with me?” He took one step closer.
“It’s okay,” Emmie said, stepping back, her eyes cast sideways. They seemed shinier than before, but maybe Max was imagining that under the fluorescents. “I’m not even mad anymore. I don’t need you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Max reached toward her, but she stepped away again, her hand landing on the edge of the sinks.
“I told you. I’m not in danger anymore from Nick or his friends. There’s nothing for you to protect me from anymore. Everything’s fine.”
“What do you…How do you know? What happened?” He couldn’t tell if she was lying to him. Would she put herself at risk to keep him away from her? Had he messed things up that badly?
“Nick’s forgiven me. There won’t be any more trouble from his friends.”
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“How…? Emmie, you haven’t talked to him, have you? What about the court order?” Max reached out again and this time laid his hand against her arm.
She shrugged him off. “Of course not.”
“Then—”
“Go back to work, Max. This isn’t any of your business.”
“What isn’t? What’s going on?”
Emmie stormed past him and flung open the bathroom door just as Dan—followed by the interfering Goodwill employee—was about to walk in. Dan stepped to the side like a matador as Emmie charged past him. Max followed Emmie out of the bathroom but stopped beside Dan.
“What’s going on with our girl?” Dan asked.
“I messed up,” Max said, “and”—he sighed in defeat—“apparently Emmie can take care of herself.”
But Max didn’t believe that last part. In fact, Emmie looked more vulnerable to him now than she had when Jimmy Krebs had pulled up in his car. For a second, Max thought about telling Dan that she’d been in contact with Nick, but he held his tongue. There was the matter of the no-contact order. He didn’t want her to get in more trouble with the courts.
“That’s quite the statement coming from you,” Dan said.
Max continued to watch Emmie with the most intense sense of longing he’d ever felt. He was on emotional overload today—to the point that he wondered if there was a tipping point for the male mind. He wanted to hit something. He needed to hit something.
There were old mattresses outside, leaning up against the building. Someone had dumped them off in the middle of the night. The health department wouldn’t let them be resold, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t serve a purpose. Max bet he could beat the stains right off them.
“How are those anger management classes going?” Dan asked as if he could read Max’s mind, or maybe out of professional obligation.
“Fine,” Max said.
Emmie checked her phone and quickly dashed off a text. Then she glanced over her shoulder at Dan and Max, who were both still standing outside the door to the ladies’ room. The look of guilt and embarrassment on her face triggered a gut reaction in Max that something wasn’t right.