“Is that what they stole from you in Alaska?”
Holden’s head whipped to me. “What?”
“You said nothing good could come of you being with that guy,” I said. “Is that what they taught you? That you’re no good?”
“Yes,” he said slowly. “But it began earlier with my parents. And it’s more complicated—”
“It’s bullshit is what it is,” I snapped. “Whoever made you think that, no matter when it started, it’s bullshit.”
I finished my beer and strode to the shack to get two more. I stood over Holden, offering. He looked up at me, gratitude in his eyes, and took one. The flask went into his coat pocket.
We drank our beers while the sun sank lower, and then Holden turned to me, his voice more subdued than I’d ever heard it.
“What was it like? Seeing something like…what you did?”
Instantly, my body stiffened. “What the fuck do you think it was like?”
“I have no idea,” Holden said. “I can’t fucking imagine it, actually. As much as I loathe the sentient viruses in human form that are my parents, to witness something like that…” He shrugged. “I guess what I’m really asking is are you okay?”
I shot him a glare, and he held up his hands.
“Don’t bite my head off. It’s a valid question.”
I held my stare, but the defensive anger was melting away as I realized no one apart from my social worker had ever asked me about my parents. She’d told me most people wouldn’t—that they’d be afraid bringing it up would remind me of my mother’s death. As if I’d forgotten all about it until they said something. As if I didn’t walk around with it all day, every day.
Or relive it in my nightmares every night.
I nearly told Holden to fuck off, but no one asked me if I was okay either.
“I don’t know,” I said to the fire. “I’m doing my best, I guess. And I’m done talking about it.”
Holden smiled—a rare, soft one with no sharp edges. “Fair enough. Let’s talk about something only slightly less painful and traumatic.”
“Like?”
“Girls. Not my preferred subject,obviously, but I confessed to you the depressing state of my love life. If you wish to unburden yourself likewise, I’m all ears.”
Shiloh’s perfect face with her smooth skin and full lips rose up in my mind. I recalled the intelligence in her eyes as she focused her attention on whatever job was in front of her. Like patching up a criminal like me. That was the gossip at school—Miller was the outcast, Holden was the vampire, and I was an ex-con posing as a high school student.
They were right, in a way. The stain of my father’s crime was all over me. Just standing in Bibi’s house or sitting on the patio with Shiloh felt wrong. Good but wrong. As if I’d broken into their perfect life and left bloody fingerprints all over it. But when I tried to hold back, stay quiet, and get to work, Shiloh drew me out of myself. I didn’t want to move so long as she was sitting across from me.
Holden was waiting for an answer.
There’s a girl, and I don’t want there to be a girl.
“Nah,” I said tipping back my beer. “There’s no one.”
***
At ten, Holden and I met Miller at the arcade. He got off his shift, and we walked the boardwalk, stopping for slices of pizza and to play a few carnival games. After, I walked home.
I walked everywhere. Luckily, the school, the shack, Shiloh’s place, and my apartment were all close enough to each other that I didn’t need a car. But it would’ve fucking helped.
I climbed the exterior cement steps up to my corner place, reaching for my keys. But the door swung open at the slightest touch, revealing a wedge of black that was deep and dark.
“Nelson?” I asked, my hand creeping toward my jacket pocket for the Taser I’d swiped from Frankie. “You here?”
I reached to my right, feeling along the wall to flip on the light when I sensed it. Him. Someone waiting…