Page 102 of Over & Out

Chris reaches up and gives me a hug, surprising me. In my ear, she whispers, “Breathe.”

She thinks I’m just upset about being in his presence. I am. But she doesn’t know the rest.

She’ll have to.

I need to do it in a better way. I thought I had more time. My heart twists. I know if I tell her I don’t need her, she’ll insist. So I have to do something I don’t want to do.

“I don’t want you here,” I say, unwrapping her arms from my neck. The words are hard. Final. “Just go inside, please.”

Hurt skips over her features. I’ve never talked to her like this. At least not since we were still at each other’s throats. The look in her eyes makes me sick. Especially because, after this, I’m going to cause her a lot more hurt. But Chris wouldn’t be my Chris if she went quietly, would she? She wouldn’t be her if that hurt wasn’t replaced by a flame of anger.

“No,” she says.

Not now.

“I’m asking you, Chris?—”

“And I’m saying no. You can’t trick me into leaving when you need me.”

I press my hands to my temples, both furious and devastated by her empathy. My heart is a pulpy mess. Fuck, I love this woman.

I clench my jaw. Then I turn on my father, who’s been watching all of this like it’s a fucking tennis match.

“I have given you everything you wanted,” I say. I should stop there. But I don’t. I can’t. Because I’ve never said these words to him. Not all at once. “You pimped me out.”

My father opens his mouth, but I keep going.

“I gave you everything I made. Every cent. You took my childhood and used me like a fucking ATM. You—” My words crumple in my throat. I try again, because this is the worst offense of them all. “You kept my mom from me. You lied to her, told her I was happy. You changed her number. You forged ourfuckingletters! Do you know how sick that is? All while you were fucking everything that moved right in front of me.”

“First of all,” my father snaps, “I did not do that.” He looks at Chris, as if he wants her to know that most of all.

“Oh, no?”

“No. I was always discreet.”

I laugh then. It’s a maniacal sound. One I’ll probably be ashamed of tomorrow. “Right. You got your own hotel rooms. My fucking bad.”

“At least I didn’t hire thugs to beat up my own flesh and blood!” my father roars.

The blood drains from my face. Because there it is.

I turn to find Chris still beside me. She never left my side. I was an asshole, and she didn’t leave. My throat threatens to close. “Chris,” I say. “It’s not like he says.”

Her eyes meet mine. They’re alarmed, but she says nothing.

My father sticks his chin out, looking wildly over at Chris. “Guess he didn’t tell you that, huh?” He shakes hiscane at her. “It’s why I use this fuckin’ thing and I’m not even sixty!” Spittle flies from his mouth.

“Stop,” I say, my voice heavy with a thousand-pound weight.

But he doesn’t stop there, because of course he doesn’t. He’s breathing hard. He’s not drunk, but he still doesn’t know how to control that temper. “He didn’t tell you a lot of things, did he? Like how he got that bitch Mabel to cover that up. How he got her to cover up that other thing too. He put a girl in the hospital. Did you know that? Knocked her off a motorcycle just this summer. Broke all her fuckin’ bones and walked away.”

Mabel was right. He found out. It doesn’t matter how.

I truly thought I knew what hurt felt like. I really did. But I’ve never known anything like the pain I feel when Chris’s eyes flare even wider, her mouth falling open as she puts the pieces together.

“Did he tell you that?” my dad rants.

She looks at me, needing to verify it. Needing to see the truth in my eyes.

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