“At least you only have to deal with them for three more years.” Jay sat on the edge of her bed at a slight angle, so they were facing. “Then you can leave.”
“Like you did?” His tone was almost accusing. “You’ve changed.”
“So have you, metal boy. It’s called growing up.”
That brought the ghost of a smile to his mouth.He looks different when he smiles, Jay thought, surprised by her surprise. He looked less like his father, and more like himself.
“Dad called you a bra-burning bitch the other night,” Nick drawled. “He said he isn’t paying almost ten grand a quarter for a bunch of communist pricks to teach you how to hate men.”
“I don’t hate men,” Jay said tightly.
“Not yet.” Nick kicked his feet against the wheels of her desk chair. “If you do burn your bra, just make sure you’re not wearing it when you do. Or better yet, go to one of those cool protests where they don’t wear anything on top at all.”
“Please stop talking about my underwear,” said Jay.
He gave her a sideways glance. “You used to like it here. I remember you almost creamed yourself when you saw your bedroom that first time. Now, it’s like you hate it.” His eyes narrowed and she squirmed uneasily as his expression shifted so minutely that no one else would have noticed but her. “Did your mom say something to you before you left?”
“What? No.”
“My dad?”
Her heart froze, making the rapid pump of blood feel sharp and painful. She stood up abruptly from the wall, folding her arms over her chest. “It’s nothing like that. I’m just busy. That’s all. Sometimes, it’s just a little overwhelming, dealing with all that pressure.”
“What,” he began, getting up as well, “doyouknow about pressure?”
“I work hard,” she said defiantly, wondering why she felt frightened. “I always have. Coming from nothing, and being forced to prove myself again and again—that’s pressure.”
He stalked towards her in a way that felt deliberately predatory and as she tilted her head up to maintain eye contact, she realized, with a jolt, that he was now taller.
Nick seemed to realize that, too. A shadow passed through his slate-gray eyes as he looked down at her face. “You don’t deal with pressure, blue jay. You run from it. My dad thinks so, too.”
“Your dad’s an asshole,” Jay said hotly. “You can’t trust anything he says.” Anger flickered through her, hot and unsteady. She swallowed it back. “Especiallyabout women. I don’t—”
“Jay.” Nick leaned an arm against the wall, bending closeenough to see the flecks in his gray eyes, and their fringe of thick, sooty lashes. Her voice died in her throat as she glanced at his arm. “You’re deflecting.”
“Shut up, Nick.”
“Hollybrook’s little angel,” he mocked gently. “What are you running from now?”
Still caught in her dreams like a snare, Jay was not sure where she was, or evenwhenshe was. All she knew was that she wasn’t in her sunflower-dappled bedroom or Nick’s austere master suite, and for some reason the light was wrong, and the air was cold and stale—
Terror filled her lungs, white-hot as a blade fresh from a forge.You’re alone, that awful voice whispered in her ears, and she grabbed at the mattress.You’re nothing. No one loves you.
“Mom?”
Alone.
“Nick?”
Her memories hit just as the panic attack did, both of them battering her like a rogue wave against a cliff. A sob left her lips and she thrashed so violently that she woke herself up for real.
She was in her apartment, tangled up in the vintage patchwork quilt she had purchased at an estate sale because it had so much personality that she couldn’t bear to leave it there to molder. Fake plants lined the top of her clumsily painted dresser, their plastic and rubber leaves throwing out sinister shadows that stretched over her face like long fingers. Catty corner from that was a photo collage of people she used to hang out with, so faded from the sun that she could barely make out their yellowed faces.
(What are you running from now?)
I don’t know.Jay slid out of bad, bracing herself against the edge of the mattress as the ringing in her ears subsided. Her stomach turned and tilted, and she found herself swaying as she stood upright on that nubby old carpet and forced herself towards the kitchenette.Maybe everything.
She began to brew a pot of coffee to go with her breakfast and then remembered as she looked into her odorous fridge that she had given most of her food away to a neighbor before leaving for LA. There was a box of Kashi in her cupboard, still sealed, and she ate it dry from the box while some only-slightly-stale coffee dripped into the pitcher. It smelled like it came from a gas station, but Jay didn’t need fancy coffee. She’d survived on far worse.
