And he would never know.
Twenty-Two
Why take the high road when you can take the psychopath?
—Creed to Birdee
Creed
I spoke until I was hoarse, and then spoke some more.
I didn’t stop when we got into the diner.
I just kept talking, telling her everything that I could think of, giving her me in hopes that she would forgive me for my sins.
And they were big ones.
Needless to say, I spoke when I was nervous.
And she gave me one hundred percent of her attention.
She didn’t look away.
Not when she spoke to order her drink.
Not when she spoke to order her food.
Not when the waitress asked if we needed anything.
Not when I told her my entire life story, from beginning to end.
Those brown eyes that I was so totally in love with stayed on me until I finally ran out of things to say.
When I stopped talking, the silence was almost deafening.
But that smile she gave me when she realized that I was done was blinding.
I loved her slightly crooked teeth. The slight points of her incisors making her look like she had baby vampire teeth.
It was cute.
And all Birdee.
“I love your teeth,” I found myself saying. “It looks like you have tiny little fangs.”
She snorted. “Those two teeth were the bane of my existence in high school. When I was thirteen or fourteen, Mable found out that they bothered me. And she called me a blood sucking whore from about fourteen on. I’m not sure when she actually stopped. Probably around the time that the school started to adopt the moniker.”
I blinked. “Why did she call you that?”
“I wasn’t a whore, if that’s what you were thinking,” she hurriedly said. “In fact, I’m a…”
She quickly cut herself off, her cheeks heating.
“Tell me.” I leaned forward. “I just told you everything about myself. I told you when I lost my virginity, for Christ’s sake. You can tell me this.”
She shook her head, almost as if she couldn’t believe what she was about to do, and then admitted, “I’ve had one sexual experience in my life. And it’s not even that kind of sexual experience. It was one time in college, I fooled around with a boy-man when I was nineteen or so. I didn’t like the way he made me feel, so I asked him to stop. The end. That’s the end of my experience.” She winced. “So for Mable to call me that felt like a slap to the face.”
“Didn’t I once hear you dated Mable’s ex-boyfriend? Slept with him or something?” I hurriedly held up my hands to try to do damage control when I saw the indignation on her face. “I know that you didn’t do it.”
