“But—”
“I work so hard, have worked hard for longer than you can even remember. I’m supposed to pay penance for the rest of my life for one night where I was able to relax and have a good time?”
Another arm-shake. Her face is very close to mine.
“Do you really think that’s right, Samantha?”
I don’t know what’s right anymore. My head hurts and my heart feels nothing but numb blankness. I want to reach into her argument and pick out the thread that’s wrong, but it all seems like a tangle.
I still watch the Garretts, relieved when I see signs of normalcy—Alice lying in a lawn chair tanning or Duff and Harry having a squirt-gun fight. But watching doesn’t give me the feeling it used to—at once hopeful and calming, that there were worlds other than my own, where extraordinary things could happen. Now it feels like I’m exiled, back in Kansas with all that color bleached to black and white.
I try hard to skirt around memories of Jase, but they’re everywhere. I found one of his shirts under my bed yesterday and stood there with it in my hand, frozen in amazed horror that I hadn’t noticed it—and Mom hadn’t either. I shoved it to the back of my own shirt drawer. Then I pulled it out and slept in it.
Chapter Forty-six
I’m walking up our driveway, one of the few times I’ve cast my shadow outdoors, when I feel a touch on my shoulder and turn around to see Tim.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he demands, grabbing hold of my hand.
“Leave me alone.” I yank it away from him.
“The hell I will. Don’t you pull that ice queen bullshit with me, Samantha. You dumped Jase with no explanation. Nan won’t say jack shit about you except that you aren’t friends anymore. Look at you—you look like hell. You’re all skinny and pale. You don’t even look like the same girl. What the fuck’s happening to you?”
I take out my key to unlock the door. Despite the heat of the day, it feels like it’s made of stone, so heavy and cold in my hand. “I’m not going to talk to you, Tim. It’s none of your business.”
“Screw that too. He’s my friend. You were the one who brought him into my life. He’s made things better. There’s no way I’m going to stand by and watch you crap on him when his world is already messed up. He’s got enough to deal with.”
I open the door and drop my purse, which also feels as though it’s made of lead. My head hurts. Tim, of course, king of no mercy, follows me right in, letting the door slam shut behind us.
“I can’t talk to you.”
“Fine. Talk to Jase.”
I twist to look at him. Even that movement feels painful. Maybe I’m slowly turning to stone myself. Except that then things wouldn’t hurt so much, would they?
Tim looks at my face and the anger in his fades, replaced by concern.
“Please, Samantha. I know you. This is not how you act. This is how crazy, messed-up girls into power trips act. This is how assholes like me act. I’ve known you since you were little, and you were put together then. This doesn’t make any sense. You and Jase…you two were solid. You don’t just walk away from that. What the fuck is up with you?”
“I can’t talk to you,” I repeat.
His cool gray eyes scan slowly over my face, measuring. “You’ve gotta talk to someone. If not Jase, if not Nan…I’m sure not your ma…Who’re you gonna to talk to?”
Just like that, I start to cry. I haven’t cried at all, and now I can’t stop. Tim, clearly horrified, glances around the room as though hoping someone, anyone, has come in who can save him from this sobbing girl. I slide slowly down the wall and keep crying.
“Shit, stop it. It can’t be that bad. Whatever it is…it can be solved.” He crosses to the kitchen island, pulling a length of paper towel off the porcelain holder, thrusting it toward me. “Here, wipe your eyes. Anything can be fixed. Even me. Listen, I enrolled to work toward my GED. I’m gonna move out. My friend Connor from AA has this apartment over his garage, and I’m gonna live there, which means I don’t have to deal with my folks anymore, and I can…Here, blow your nose.”
I take the scratchy paper and blow. I know my face is red and swollen and now that I’ve started crying, I think it’s very possible I won’t ever be able to stop.
“That’s it.” Tim pats me awkwardly on the back, more like he’s trying to dislodge something stuck in my throat than comfort me. “Whatever’s going on, it’ll be okay…but I can’t believe ditching Jase is gonna help.”
I cry harder.
With a resigned expression, Tim shears off more paper towels.
“Can I…?” I’m now doing that hiccupping thing that comes after too much sobbing, making it difficult to catch my breath.
“Can you what? Just spit it out.”
“Can I move in with you? To the garage apartment?”
Tim goes still, his hand frozen in the act of wiping my eyes. “Wha-at?”
I don’t have enough breath—or maybe courage—to repeat myself.
“Samantha—you can’t…I’m flattered, but…why the hell would you wanna do something like that?”
“I can’t stay here. With them next door and with Mom. I can’t face Jase and I can’t stand to look at her.”
“This is about Grace? What’d she do? Tell you she was yanking your trust fund if you didn’t ditch Jase?”
I shake my head, not looking at him.
Tim skids down against the wall next to me, stretching out his long legs, while I’m crouched in this small hunched circle, knees to chest.
“Spill, kiddo.” He looks me in the face, unblinking. “Hit me. I go to meetings now, and you wouldn’t believe the shit I’ve heard.”
“I know who hurt Mr. Garrett,” I squeeze out.
Tim looks incredulous. “Fuck me. Really? Who?”
“I can’t tell you.”
“Are you freakin’ crazy? You can’t keep that a secret. Tell the Garretts. Tell Jase. Maybe they can sue the bastard and get millions. How’d you find out, anyway?”
“I was there. That night. In the car. With my mom.”
His face blanches under his freckles, making his hair stand out like flame.
Silence falls between us like a curtain.
Finally Tim says, “I picked the wrong day to give up amphetamines.”
I stare at him.
“Sorry. Airplane joke. I’m immature. I know what you’re saying. I just don’t really want to know what you’re saying.”
“Then go.”
“Samantha.” He grabs at my sleeve. “You can’t keep quiet. Gracie committed a fucking crime.”
“It would ruin her life.”
“So you’ll let her ruin theirs?”
“She’s my mother, Tim.”
“Yeah, and your ma screwed up big-time. Because of that you’re trashing Jase’s life and Mrs. G’s and all those kids’? And your own…? That’s just fucked up.”
“So what am I supposed to do? Go over there—look Jase in the eye and say, ‘Sorry—you know that person you couldn’t believe existed, the one who would hit someone and drive away? She’s your next-door neighbor. She’s my mom.’”
“He deserves to know.”
“You don’t understand.”
“Nope, I sure as hell don’t. This is not exactly something I’ve run into. God, I need a smoke.” He pats at his shirt pocket but comes up empty.
“It would destroy her.”
“I could really use a drink right now too.”
“Yeah, that would help,” I say. “That’s what happened. She’d had too much wine and she was driving and—” I bury my face in my hands. “I was asleep, and there was this awful thump.” I look up at him through my fingers. “I can’t get it out of my head.”
“Aw, kid. Aaah, shit.” Gingerly, Tim wraps an arm around my shaking shoulders.