“Of course you bothered me, you absolute ass. I’m a fucking human being. I cried all the time. Alone in my bedroom, but still.”
Ouch.Ouch.I want to reach back in time and strangle thatstupid kid I’d been. Maybe I thought I had reasons, but honestly, I was just a little shit. Maybe I would say that she bothered me because she didn’t seem to care about the things I cared about—namely, what people thought of her. I was taught that the superficial stuff was important. But it doesn’t really matter. I did so much damage, and I can never atone for that.
“I don’t know what else to say. I was horrible and I know that.” I step toward her. “I don’t even think I believed the things I said to you at the time. I always thought you were beautiful?—”
She shoves a finger toward me, making me take a step back. “Don’t fucking do that. Don’t act like you bullied me because you had a crush on me or some other bullshit. If that’s true, that would make it worse. Then you’re making itmyfault. So don’t tell me you thought I was pretty. It’s actually better if you were just a shameless dick.”
“Okay. All right. I deserve that.” I nod, head shaky, and lace my fingers together behind my neck. Sweat collects at my hairline. I continue to fuck this up.
She starts to walk back toward the door but swivels to face me again instead. “Actually, I’m not fucking done.” She inhales. “You crawled out of the same holler I did, and you aren’t better than me. You were just high on your tiny amount of power. And now you’re supposed to be alleviating human suffering, and it just shows how unfair this world is, because you were the source of mine.” Her eyes water, and she blinks it back, as though she can’t bear to be vulnerable in front of me.
Bile churns in my stomach. I was awful to this amazing woman, and now I can hardly speak around the guilt clogging my throat.
“What can I do?” I want to reach for her, to give her a hug, though I know it would be unwelcome.Thisis karma—this lovely bright person who entered my life again to remind me of how I was the villain in someone else’s story.
Kendall’s friend—the one with the blue at the ends of herspiky hair—now stands at the doorway, eyeing me with unabashed hatred. And no wonder her friends hate me. She must have told them she was working with her former bully.
That word. Bully. The force of it hits me like an avalanche. Despite all the therapy, I haven’t truly reckoned with it until now.
“For what it’s worth, I believe you’re sorry,” she says, “but I don’t think I can truly forgive you. I’m trying to be more polite at work. That’s the best I can do for now.”
I nod. That’s more than I can ask for.
She turns to join her friend at the door, and I watch her walk away, wondering if I can really go back inside and chat with my old buddies when memories of my crimes dance through my head like ghosts in a haunted house.
I keep staring after her until she disappears. She doesn’t look back at me. I kick a piece of gravel and watch it skip across the outside lot, obsessing over whether or not I should follow her. I tug at my collar—I’m wearing a button-up and it’s still hot and humid out, even with the sun sinking behind the trees—and look around me. Though the venue here is new and beautiful green scenery surrounds me, the hills and hollers cradle dilapidated homes and rusted truck beds. The message rings out in the lines of the sagging roofs and stacks of tires in front yards: poverty. It’s such a huge problem here. Kendall clawed her way out of it, no thanks to me. She’s a goddamn superhero, and I’m an absolute sack of dirt.
I chew on the inside of my cheek. After a few deep breaths, I trudge back into the big, absurd barn structure, hands stuffed into my pockets, to find my old friends again.
The lights have dimmed, and a few people file out onto the dance floor, Kendall and her friends included. We’ve had a decent turnout with a few dozen people here. I find Brayden staring at Kendall across the room.
He startles when I speak.
“Sorry about that,” I tell him, along with some of my fellow former teammates. I’m not sure what else to say about sprinting out of the gym like a weirdo.
His eyes widen. “Were you following that woman?” He inclines his head toward Kendall. “You know her?”
I glance toward the woman in question. She and her friends bounce along to the music. A banner with our mascot and graduation year hangs in the background. The scent of beer drifts to us.
“I work with her now. It’s, uh, Kenzie, if you remember her. Kenzie Amburgey. We went to school with her.”
He narrows his eyes as though trying to place her. My old friends have stopped to listen.
“You remember her,” one of them, a guy named Luke, says. He puffs his cheeks out. “Kinda chubby, wore glasses. Super smart.”
My neck starts to burn.
“Wait. No way!” Brayden smiles at me. “You serious? What happened to her? She win the lottery or something? She looks way different.” He grins wider. “Have you been hooking up with her?”
Dear God. My skin crawls. I knew these people hadn’t changed. He doesn’t think it matters how mean I was to her, if he even remembers. Several of us were terrible to her and her friends.
“No,” is all I say.
I make excuses a little while later and sneak off to my car, where I lean my head against the headrest. My gut tightens. What am I going to do now?
The answer—I knew it as soon as soon as she told me who she was—is whatever she wants.
9
