I wasn’t worth anything.
“I would have stopped him if I had known,” Dania had whispered, holding onto me tightly.
I pulled away from her, not wanting her to touch me. “We need to get ready for school,” I had said, not wanting to talk about it ever again.
Sometimes it was hard to reconcile the Dania I knew at home, the girl who tried to protect me at the expense of herself, with the girl who ridiculed and abused Flynn.
But right now, with my emotions shut off and my head pounding from being sick and used, I didn’t care.
I was feeling mean and unfeeling.
“Hey tard boy!” I hollered, throwing a balled up piece of paper at Flynn as he walked up the steps. People were looking at us but no one intervened. They knew better. We weren’t a group others wanted to mess with.
Flynn’s shoulders came up and he tucked his chin into his chest, holding his bagged lunch in his clenched fist.
Dania and Stu howled with laughter when I threw a pencil and it bounced off his back.
Then he looked up at me and the ice around my heart melted in an instant.
He was hurting.
Because of me.
Why would I do that to him?
I stopped laughing. I tried to get my friends focused on something else. I couldn’t let them treat Flynn like that.
Not when his green eyes looked at me like I was destroying him.
I found him at his locker before class.
“I’m sorry, Flynn,” I said. And I meant it. The only time I felt anything was with him.
It flooded through me unabated.
Flynn wouldn’t look at me. I reached out and touched his shoulder but he flinched and pulled away. I dropped my hand.
“You’re mean,” he said, and I couldn’t argue.
Because Iwasmean.
But I needed to talk to him. Even though I had sworn I wouldn’t anymore. I needed what he gave me. Acceptance. Love. Comfort.
“Talk to me, Flynn,” I said softly.
Flynn slammed his locker shut and peeked up at me through the thick strands of his dark hair. “I hate your hair,” he said and walked away.
Why did it feel as though he were saying that he hatedme?
**
“I want you to come with me to see Leonard,” Flynn announced later that day. Since deciding to go to New York, we had spent the entire morning looking at pictures and street plans of Manhattan. I wasn’t even sure exactly where Nadine lived, but I sure as hell wouldn’t tell Flynn that. That would have thrown him into a tailspin.
“Uh, yeah. Okay,” I said, though not entirely sure how I felt with the idea of seeing Flynn’s shrink. I had been through more than enough therapists for one lifetime. But I also knew that Leonard was an integral part of Flynn’s life. That it was Leonard who helped him grow comfortable with pushing his boundaries. Just as Flynn’s counselor Kevin had done before him.
“I have an appointment tomorrow after work. You can meet me at my office and we can drive over together,” he said.
“That sounds fine,” I said, suddenly very nervous. I didn’t like the idea of being picked apart by anyone. Particularly someone that I knew would be looking for things to analyze. And I’m sure I’d give this Leonard dude all kinds of things to analyze.
