“Okay.”
He sat for a moment. “I guess I should go now.”
“Can I ask you something?” He nodded. “Why did you lie about the Adderall?”
“I didn’t. I told you, we did some lines of it.”
“Not tonight. Months ago. That story about not having health insurance and Addison getting the prescription for you. You made that up. And about your family, about not having money.” He said nothing, so I continued. “Addison told me, in Columbus. That you’d spent the break with your grandparents in Malibu.”
“I know. He felt really bad.”
“Addison knew about us?”
Tyler nodded again.
“Why did you lie about all these things?”
“I don’t know, it just sort of happened. You assumed I didn’t have money, and I let you believe it.”
“What do you mean?”
“Remember when I told you about my soccer scholarship?”
“Yes.” Of course I did—I remembered everything.
“It’s true, I am on one. Not because I need it, just ’cause I’m good at soccer. But I could see it in your face—it changed what you thought of me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Like it made me different from what you assumed. Different from all the other rich kids at Sawyer. And I could tell you liked it.”
“Liked what?”
“That I was some poor kid you were going to rescue.”
“That’s ridiculous. You didn’t have to tell me all those stories.”
“I think it’s something about me,” he said. “Like people are into some idea of me, but it’s not really me. It’s something they make up in their heads. So I was just, I don’t know—trying to be the Tyler you had in your head.”
We sat in quiet for a while, neither wanting to move. I didn’t like what I’d heard, but I knew he was right. I wanted him to need me, I wanted to believe I could look after him. And all this time, he’d seen right through me.
“Okay,” I said, finally. “Go in. Clean up and get some rest.”
Tyler reached for the door but stopped.
“I did love him. I didn’t want to, but I couldn’t help it. And he loved me, too—I know he did. But he kind of loved everyone, I think. We hooked up once, last year, drunk after some party back at the room. I couldn’t believe it was happening. It’s like, I know it’s just sex. It’s not a big deal. But I had thought about it so much. What it would be like if it ever happened. We were kind of wasted and we passed out and when we woke up the next morning, my head was killing me but I was so happy. I felt so good. Like everything that usually stressed me out, soccer or my parents or grades, it didn’t matter. It would be fine. That’s what I thought—now everything will be fine. And I was just watching him while he slept—we were crammed together in my bed. And he opened his eyes and do you know what he said? He said—Don’t look at me like that, I don’t want anything to change. I felt so stupid. I just said I’m not looking at anything, or something like that. And then he goes,What a funny nightand jumps up and gets dressed like it was nothing.” Tyler paused, staring ahead, not looking at anything. “The ski trip was supposed to be special. For us. I really wanted him there—”
“I get it.”
“He was supposed to be there. It was my birthday. I’m twenty now.”
I moved through my apartment with the lights off. I stripped and stuffed my clothes into the plastic bag with Tyler’s. I placed thatbag in another, knotted at the top, to be safe. I showered, the heat as high as I could bear, and dressed. In the kitchen, I found a bottle of whiskey, untouched all these months. I poured, the amber liquid pooling in the dark. I pressed the kitchen window open. Cold air rushed in. I sat on the sill. There was nothing to see, just a great blank world. A half-smoked cigarette was tucked into a corner of the window’s outer ledge. One of Tyler’s from the fall, left to be finished later and forgotten. It was soggy from months of snow and rain, spongy between my finger and thumb. I brought the stub toward my mouth and touched my tongue to it. It tasted dirty but also like nothing.
In the silence and stillness, I finally felt the full weight of what I had done. What I had willingly, willfully gotten myself into. There was no turning back. Not for me, not for Tyler. It was the right thing to do, it had to be. If Tyler had called 911 right away, he could have passed it off as an accident. Addison had been drinking, a slip and fall was entirely plausible. But he had waited an entire night. And then came to me. When he needed help, he chose me. What choice did I have? Addison’s life was over. It was cruel and unfair—but nothing could change that. What justice was served by Tyler’s life being over as well?
I thought about Tyler, in the cold of that room, lying with Addison’s body an entire night. Pathetic to be jealous of a dead boy, I know, but Addison had gotten what I wanted, what I knew all along could never be mine: Tyler’s true affection, the heart of him. These past months—Stephen wanting me, me wanting Tyler, Tyler wanting Addison, Addison wanting Kennedy … is this all the world was? A chain of misplaced longings, never met?
But now, in some twisted, unbreakable way, I had gotten what I wanted. Now Tyler and I shared something no one else could orever would. Something undoable. Finally, Tyler belonged to me and I belonged to him. And for this, I only had to sacrifice everything. I pinched the cigarette stub and flicked it into the void. A small price to pay.
