Page 33 of Miss Behaved
Monica is right beside me now, but instead of sitting, she kneels down in the sand at my feet and scans my face. Her fingers reach again, but this time I don’t pull away. I let her draw the line of my eyebrow with the pads of her fingers and soak up some of the pain.
“That’s a big bruise,” she says, tears pooling in her eyes. I reach up for her wrist and pull her hands to my lap.
Steadying her, or maybe myself.
“Hey, I’m fine.” I tip a finger under her chin and make her look up at me. A wet streak runs down the side of her cheek. “I got in a fight, that’s all.”
A fight with a whiskey bottle, and it hurt like hell.
Dad was on a bender, barely knew who he was mad at or talking to. Rambling something about Grandpa, and it morphed into an argument with my mom about how she burned the chicken. Next thing I knew, Mom slammed a cabinet, Dad’s voice hit another octave, and I stepped in line of the bottle just in time to take the hit before it shattered on the kitchen floor.
That sobered him up a bit. Enough to make him back down. He pulled a beer from the fridge and disappeared out back while Mom cleaned me up. She was crying the whole time, saying sorry. And I don’t know if she was asking me or herself for forgiveness, but what’s done is done.
Changing everything.
Monica’s fingers grip mine tighter, and the wind kicks up. Wild brown curls toss around her face, and she kneels before me. Her skin is warm against the backdrop of the cool Seattle sky.
If I had the words for that look on her face, and if I could take those words and mix them like colors, she would make the most beautiful painting.
“I’m moving,” I tell her, and it takes the air out of my chest watching her process what I said. “Mom finally decided she’s over it.”
Monica’s gaze drops down to our hands, which are still laced together in my lap as she lets out a shaky breath. “That’s good,” she says, looking back up at me with a forced smile.
I nod. “Dad’s staying put, so I’ll be back during summers. But Mom can’t do this anymore.”
Part of me wishes Mom would take me away and never look back. She offered. Said she would take him to court, and I could have let her. It’s not like I care to see my father live out his life in a drunken haze.
But all I could think about when Mom offered it was Monica. And I begged Mom to let me come back for summers instead.
“You’ll be missed,” Monica says, sinking back against her heels.
NotI’ll miss you.
ButYou’ll be missed.
Because even if she feels bad for me, she knows I’ll never be good enough for her.
Her chin drops, and her curls fall like a curtain over her face. “How did Sarah take the news?” she asks under her breath.
“She didn’t.” I shake my head. “We broke up last week.”
“Oh” is all that sits in the air between us as she draws circles in the sand.
I stand up and grab onto her shoulders, pulling her to her feet. Every year she seems to get shorter, only it’s actually me getting taller and her staying that same adorable height. Looking down at her, I’m tempted to kiss her and break the unspoken rule we’ve always had between us.
Just friends.
It’s all she wants us to be. So I stop myself from making a mistake and tug her along behind me instead.
“Where are we going?” she asks with that curious crinkle between her eyebrows.
I hold her hand all the way to the parking lot and open the passenger seat to my truck. “You’ll see” is all I say as I wave my hand for her to climb in.
I drive up the coast until I finally pull to the side of the road in a familiar indent of trees.
“Do you trust me?” I ask her, and her eyebrows pinch in the cutest expression.
“You know I do,” she says.
