Right. He didn’t have to go to once-a-quarter mandatory training sessions with a bunch of people he didn’t know, because he ran his own business.
I stood by what I’d said to Brad. Morgan was the smartest man I knew.
“Pretty much. The idea is that you tell me three things about yourself, and two of them are true, but one of them’s a lie. I’ve gotta figure out the lie. I can go first?”
“Sure,” Morgan said. “Not sure you’re much of a liar.”
“I can be wily,” I said. “Cunning like a fox.”
“Uh huh.” Morgan chuckled, clearly not convinced. “Okay. Hit me.”
I paused to consider, throwing a piece of bark into the fire and nudging it against the embers until it caught. I hadn’t checked the time, but it must’ve been two or three in the morning, judging by how dark the sky was, how silent the world had fallen.
Right now, it felt like it was just the two of us, huddled under a blanket of stars.
… I’d been listening to Morgan recite poetry too much.
“Okay. When I was four years old I ripped the beard off a mall Santa,” I said. “Peanut butter makes me gag, and I have a tattoo of a chrysanthemum on my ass.”
“The peanut butter is the lie,” Morgan said instantly. “You love peanut butter. Andreally?”
“Really what?”
“The tattoo,” he clarified. “I believe you about the mall Santa.”
“Oh, yeah, really,” I said, wriggling my butt instinctively. “I can show you later if you want. Aiden did it.”
“Why a chrysanthemum?” Morgan asked.
I shrugged. “They’re pretty,” I said, and then felt guilty for not telling the whole truth. Morgan was sitting out here with me at who knew what hour of the night. I owed him a real answer.
“And I read a thing, in high school, about flower language and what they mean. And next to chrysanthemum it readjoy despite anxiety. Which I interpreted to meandon’t worry, be happy. I… do you really wanna hear this? It gets kinda… serious.”
“I really wanna hear it,” Morgan said gently. “If you wanna tell it. No pressure.”
I took a deep breath and braced myself for whatever reaction I was about to get.
“I started having panic attacks when I was fourteen,” I said. “At first I had no idea what it was, I kinda thought I was dying, and I didn’ttellanyone because I couldn’t stop thinking about how sad Mom would be if I died, too, and I was scared that telling someone would make it real, and then I’d know.”
Morgan shuffled a little closer, which wasn’t exactly the reaction I’d been expecting.
But I’d started now, and I couldn’t stop.
“Eventually I had one in front of my mom when we were having one of those stupid arguments teenagers have with their parents and she did actually rush me to the ER becauseshethought I was dying, but I wasn’t. I was just… panicking. Whole body freaking out, like… well. I think you know what that’s like.”
I’d seen Morgan panic when we first got here. If I’d needed convincing that he was the one person I’d ever met who’dreallyunderstand me, that would have been it.
“I do,” Morgan agreed.
I nodded, not wanting to think of Morgan being as scared as I’d been back then.
“Anyway, turned out it was just my asshole brain telling my equally asshole body we were in mortal danger despite that not being true. I saw a couple of doctors and tried some things, eventually figured out that the only thing I could really do was avoid things that set me off and remember that I wasn’t actually dying if it did happen, and just… try to cope.”
“It’s not easy,” Morgan said, because of course he knew exactly the right thing to say. He was perfect.
And I was scaring him off for good right now, probably.
“It was fine for a while. I actually got better, it stopped happening, I almost kinda forgot that it’d ever happened by the time college rolled around.”
