Page 25 of One Last Breath

“Yes. It seems that you weren’t happy to leave her behind.”

That’s not exactly what Sylvia says, but I’m making an educated guess why Annabelle might have been upset to have Lila tutoring her instead of attending high school, and perhaps why her parents chose to finish her education at home.

It seems I’m not far off the mark.

"No," Annabelle admits. "I wasn't." She bites her lip, and some of the color returns. "I… well, I missed my friends. Not just Sylvia but mostly Sylvia. It's hard. It's really hard to find people who truly understand you."

She looks down a moment, then says, “Would you join me on the balcony? I think I need some fresh air.”

“I think she needs some space from listening ears, but that’s fine with me too. “Of course. I would love some fresh air myself. I still haven’t gotten used to the humidity down here.”

“Oh, you’ll never get used to that,” she says. “I’ve lived here my whole life, and I’m still not used to it. At least the mosquitoes don’t love you as much as they love me.”

“It’s only because you’re so sweet,” I reply.

She laughs, and I feel a pang of guilt because that laugh is genuine, and the look she gives me after is so earnest. Whatever mistakes she may have made, she is only a very young woman after all, and she has no one to look up to who she can trust.

But if one of those mistakes was the murder of Lila Benson, then I can’t allow myself to feel sorry for her. Or at least, I can’t allow my compassion to blind my sense of justice.

I try to keep that in mind as I join her on the balcony. She produces a flask out of nowhere and offers it to me. “I’ll let you take the first belt if you’d like.”

There’s a hardness to her voice again. I shake my head and say, “Oh, no thank you. I try to avoid drink when I can. I’m afraid I get quite silly.”

She shrugs and takes a healthy draw from the flask. “Good for you. I try to avoid it too, but I don’t think I’m as good at that as you.”

“Just try not to make it a habit, dear. It’s an easy one to fall into when you’re young and a very difficult one to break when you’re older.”

“Do you think that we really change when we grow older?” she asks. “I wonder sometimes if people are always who they were meant to be, and the idea of growing as a person is just more bullshit they feed to you so you’ll work harder and complain less.”

“There are some things that never change,” I allow, “but there are many things that change whether we want them to or not.”

She shrugs. “I’ll take your word for it.” She takes another sip from the flask and puts it back in her pocket. Her face grows pensive, and she hesitates a moment before saying, “I lied to you the other night. I told you that Lila was boring the other night, but that wasn’t the truth.”

“What’s the truth?”

“I hated Lila.”

That’s the admission I expect, but the fact that it comes so bluntly and so immediately still leaves me stunned. Annabelle notices my shock and says, “I know it’s not the kindest thing in the world to say, but it’s the truth. I fucking hated that bitch.”

The venom in her voice shocks me, and I still can’t come up with a response. Annabelle reaches for the flask again, thinks better of it, and continues.

“She was… the word I’m thinking of is Victorian, but I don’t know if that’s right either. She was just so… so certain all the time.”

“Certain?”

“Like…” Annabelle sighs, frustrated at not being able to express herself precisely. “She always knew what was right. Or what she thought was right. There was always The Right Thing to Do, and there was never any other thing to do. It didn’t matter what you thought, what you felt, what you liked or what you hated. You had to do the Right Thing. I fucking hate that.”

She’s growing angrier. I think the prudent thing to do right now is to stay silent, so I do.

“Like, how can the right thing always be just one thing all the time? I mean, sometimes it should matter how it makes you feel, right? Like, are you supposed to feel like shit all the time just so you can do what your parents want you to do? Are you supposed to go to school, get your degree, find a career, marry a rich man and have two perfect children just because that’s what ‘good girls’ do? What if that doesn’t make me happy? What if I’d rather run away with someone I actually love and live a simple life in a van or an apartment somewhere? Why do I have to care so fucking much about the ‘family name’ and ‘opportunities’ and being a ‘good girl’?”

I notice the point of view shift as she grows angrier. She’s confessing to me right now.

I don’t like that confessing is the word I choose.

“You don’t,” I say firmly. “You can be whoever you want to be. All you need is to be honest and kind to others. Beyond that, the right thing is different for everyone.”

“Honest and kind to others,” she repeats. “Even when they’re not kind to you.”

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