Total pages in book: 83
Estimated words: 87856 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 87856 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 439(@200wpm)___ 351(@250wpm)___ 293(@300wpm)
It's not fair to decide for him.
But I'm not deciding for him.
I'm deciding for me.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
PATRICK
Fuck.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
PATRICK
The hearts and thorns tattoo on her ribs.
The references to swimming.
The Fiona Apple lyrics.
Has it been obvious all this time?
I scan old entries. The excitement about a possible tattoo a week before she contacted me. The desire for sex the night she booty called me. The excitement after our first attempt at exhibitionism.
And that's only what she's written since I've known her as Imogen.
All the other hints, the pieces of her I collected?
I should have seen it.
How the hell did I miss it?
The woman I've been following all year, the woman who makes me laugh and cry and understand, is the woman who wants to screw me senseless.
Imogen is Hearts and Thorns.
I don't put my phone away. I don't text her with a confession.
No, I do something much worse.
I read her entire online journal, cover to cover.
I pore over every word.
I fall in love with her.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
IMOGEN
Usually, my thoughts are the safest place to be Sunday evenings.
Today, they're dangerous.
Today, instead of trying to stay out of the fray, I try to enter it. But I can't latch on to a single word. There's too much swirling inside me.
Patrick's sister died by suicide. She overdosed.
With a more lethal medication (obviously).
She lived alone. She didn't need to work out careful timing or think up some place no one would find her.
She was lucky. Unlucky, I guess.
I am grateful to the rent-a-cop who tried to kick me out of the strip mall parking lot. He saved my life.
I should be more grateful, probably, but I'm not. It's too messy. Don't get me wrong. I'm glad I'm here. But I wish it was different, easier.
There's something odd about knowing I had the guts to go through with it, knowing I could now correct my mistakes. It's terrifying and comforting in equal measure. It's different now. I know how hard it is to come back. I don't want to go through that again.
I work—hard—at treatment so I don't have to go through that again.
Weekly therapy during the school year and a regular prescription aren't enough to fix me, but they keep me steady.
Julie pulls me out of my thoughts with a soft kick to my shin.
Slowly, my surroundings come into focus. My food is barely touched. Dad is in the kitchen, pouring another drink. Mom is staring at me.
"You said you love the micro-economics class," Julie says. "So I figured you're acing it. She's such a show-off when it comes to math, isn't she?"
"I'm doing well so far." Are we talking about grades? That's an easy enough topic. No subjectivity. Either I have an A or I don't. "The summer session moves quickly."
"It would be fun to do something together," Julie says. "In the two-week break between summer session and fall, right?"
Right. She asked and I… did something.
"Mom still doesn't see the appeal of San Diego," Julie says.
"It's only an hour drive. Why stay?" Mom asks.
"It's beautiful," Julie says.
Really? Mom wants to travel to somewhere besides Julie's softball games? That doesn't sound like her.
"Or Cabo San Lucas," Julie says.
"Expensive." Mom shakes her head.
"TJ would be cheaper," I say.
Julie laughs. "Right? And all the guys go for the strip clubs."
"What guys?" Mom asks.
"The seniors at school," Julie says. "They talk about the easy women."
"Boys at your school hire prostitutes?"
"Mom! They're dancers, not prostitutes. And the term is sex worker," Julie says.
Mom mutters something in Vietnamese. That's a bad sign. Around middle school, she decided we needed to integrate, to become "normal" and she stopped speaking to us in Vietnamese.
She still cooks traditional food, but she and Dad watch American movies, listen to American (and British) music, and try to love American pastimes.
Thus all the baseball and Julie's love of softball
And I guess swimming is normal enough for the area.
"We're not in Vietnam," Julie says. "Things are different."
"Things for women are the same everywhere," Mom says. "Don't talk to those boys."
"They're posturing," Julie says.
Mom shakes her head. "They mean it. They don't know."
"Okay. No dancers," Julie says. "Only authentic tacos and cheap Valium."
Mom's eyes darken.
My throat tightens.
"Are you done, Mom? Julie and I can clean," I say.
Mom mutters another Vietnamese phrase. I don't catch this one either. My skills are beyond rusty.
But she doesn't explode or lecture. She shakes her head. "Finish first. You're getting too skinny." She stands and leaves.
To the deck, on her own.
"She's smoking out there," Julie says.
"We'd know."
"We do know." She motions to herself. "We're here. But you're right. She vapes."
"No way."
She shrugs see for yourself and steals a bite of my stir-fry.
I lean to the right, but I can't see the deck from here. So I stand, sneak around the table for just long enough to see Mom outside.
She doesn't look like the stern woman who tries to paper over my pain. She looks overwhelmed and scared and impossibly small against the sunset.