Page 61 of Angels Fall

Her eyes squint slightly, like she’s deciding how full of shit I am.

“Look, I don’t know why all of this is happening either. Why this is you and me, and why it’s happening now, and what’s gonna happen in the future. I’ve definitely learned I suck at predicting the future. But I do know that I’m fucking tired, Maddie. I’m tired of fighting. I’m tired of fighting everyone and everything all the goddamn time. So… So, I’m choosing to see that you and me… Here… Now. That… That it means I can stop. For a little while, at least. Because I’m not all alone. There’s somebody out there who… understands. And that, if we choose to, we can help hold each other up. That’s the meaning I’m deciding to assign to all this.”

Her breathing speeds up again a little.

“That’s it. That’s all I’ve got. And not only was that a good fucking speech, it has the added benefit of also being true. So fuck it. I’m gonna stop while I’m ahead.”

She laughs a bit, which makes me realize I’ve been holding my breath, and now I let it out on a long sigh.

She smiles with her lips but not her eyes. “I’m tired too,” she says.

“I know.”

“You hurt me real bad.”

“I know.” I want to tell her I’m sorry. But it feels small. And besides… She knows.

Then she says, “Pete said something to me too.”

“Yeah? What?”

“He said when you’re young and haven’t fucked your life up so bad it can’t be fixed yet, you think there’s always a next time. And that there isn’t always a next time.”

“Jesus, Pete’s like Santa Claus meets the Buddha meets Rambo,” I say with astonishment, and she laughs. So do I. And fuck, it feels good. But not as good as her taking my hand in hers, which she does now.

“Tyler?”

“That IS my name.”

“I don’t know if I can do this right now.”

Fuck.

But, yeah, I get it.

“I know. I do. I know. We don’t have to…y’know. But maybe we can just… There’s a lot we need to catch up on. Maybe we can just hang out and at least… Do that?”

She closes her eyes and says, “...Yeah. Yeah. We can…do that. I mean, fuck, dude, that story you told about living in Rio HAS to have more to it.”

“Oh, hell yeah, it does. But I’m not gonna say that shit in front of your parents.”

She gets an impish grin and says, “Yeah, well, I wouldn’t worry about that. C’mere.” She grabs my hand and pulls me into the closet with her, opens a dresser drawer and pulls out something that looks like a woman’s fur stole with a piece of metal attached to one end.

“What is that?” I ask. “A…? Like, a boa, or…?”

She laughs loudly. I love her fucking laugh. “You don’t know what this is?” she asks. I shake my head. “It’s a fox tail!” she says in a whisper for some reason, even though nobody else is here.

“Well, yeah, I get that. I mean it kinda looks like a—”

“No. A fox. Tail.” Now she says it like putting extra emphasis on the words will help me understand better.

“I don’t—” I start.

“It’s a sex toy! This”—she holds up the metal part—“is a butt plug. And then this part”—the furry part, she means—“just hangs out the back and kinda makes a woman look like a…y’know…fox. Or kitten. Or whatever.”

“Uh, OK, well, first, that’s the hottest thing I’ve ever heard of. How do you know about it?”

“I work in a strip club.”