Chapter 22
Felix
Robert marches into my bedroom without even knocking and begins rattling off everything that will happen this evening.
“Your father will walk down the stairs at 8:00 PM sharp, and you need to be at the foot of the stairs to celebrate his arrival—”
“Will you be providing the party horns and noise makers, or should I have purchased those in advance?” I ask.
He’s not amused. Not one bit. “This is an incredibly important fundraising event for your father. Margaret Ebelstein and Theodore McClane will both be in attendance, and a donation from just one of them would be critical for your father’s campaign.”
Yes, yes, yes, many rich assholes will be in attendance, and dear old daddy has been deep throating cucumbers in preparation all week.“Don’t worry, Robert. I’ll be there, cheering on our fearless leader with the vim and vigor of a North Korean propaganda squad.”
Robert narrows his eyes, surely wishing he had the telekinetic powers to make me spontaneously combust. “Haveyou taken your medication today?” he asks.
Nope!“Of course, I’ve taken my medication. I’m not a fool, Robert. Tonight’s imperative for my father’s success.”
I make sure I say it with as flat an affect as possible to give the illusion that the medical straitjacket Father tried to put me in is still coursing through my veins. I stopped taking them shortly after my dream, and it’s been nearly a week.
And what an emotional roller coaster of a week it’s been.
“Good,” Robert says with relief. “Please be downstairs in two hours.”
I nod and watch him exit my bedroom and close the door.
“Ass-kissing sycophant,” I mutter under my breath.
Thank God.Now I can sleep. I didn’t do anything right when I stopped my pills. Someone with good sense would have tapered them off gradually, but I never really did anything gradually. I keep some in my backpack, in case his aides ever search me, but most went down the toilet the morning after my dream.
The lethargy I’ve been living with post-meds is intense, but at least I’m sleeping again.
Speaking of sleeping.
Two hours is just enough time to take a nap. I disrobe and crawl into bed in just my underwear, and the first thought that enters my brain is, “I wonder if Torren would like the panties I’m wearing?”
They’re not my sexiest, but they’re neon green briefs. I imagine he likes black, but perhaps he’d find the splash of color against my skin exciting.
Yesterday, when I saw him at the game, I was sure I was hallucinating. I’d started hallucinating the longer I took the pills, and, even though I’d stopped, there was a possibility theyhadn’t fully left my system.
But then I caught sight of Derek Obringer, wiping mustard and ketchup off his neck, and turning back to glance at Torren every so often.
AndTorrenwas shooting him a look that could have turned a man to stone.
That’s when my mind started connecting the dots.
The rev of his motorcycle at the press conference, the vision of him parked outside my house, and then his sudden appearance right when my old high school bully magically stopped tossing chips at me and was somehow drenched in condiments and fear…
It all feels too coincidental.
Is he following me?
Or am I looking for meaning where there is none?
Again.
Maybe I am hallucinating?
Jesus, I wish I knew what to do. I’m so scared the dream was just another figment of my imagination, and that thelastthing I should be doing is stopping medication. But, then again, my mother was the only one in my whole life who told me to trust my instincts. When you’re queer, and your dad is a big, homophobic toad, you spend most of your time doing the opposite of what you want to do, because the real you is “wrong.”
