It seemed like women were my worst nightmare, and, at the same time, I couldn’t survive without them. Not for the first time, I put the blame on the way I looked. Kimberly had been right all along: Women thought they loved me because I was physically attractive and made them think lewd thoughts. The fact that it had been Logan’s girlfriend who had fallen for the deadly honey trap this time made me feel wracked with guilt.
Half an hour later, we sat down to dinner, and I didn’t touch my meal. I spent the whole time staring at my brother, who was seated across from me.
He couldn’t even bring himself to look at me.
I kept trying to catch Logan’s eyes because the blank indifference he showed me was worse than any “fuck you,” but he just kept ignoring me. Then, I shifted my attention to Matt, who was eating his chicken, and watched Chloe nibble at a piece of bread, lost in her own thoughts. The only sounds in the room were the clink of cutlery and Anna’s soft footsteps as she moved around the dining room, making sure that nothing was missing from the table. The tension between my brother and me was so biting it was almost tangible.
“Okay, that’s enough. What’s going on, kids?” my mother broke the silence with a vexed tone and stopped eating. I leaned back in my chair then and gave her a flat stare, drumming my fingers on my plate. “Logan?” Obviously, she’d decided not to waste time trying to pry anything out of me, knowing how seldom I talked, and started with my brother instead.
“Nothing, Mom. It’s fine,” Logan answered with a sigh of irritation.
“Is it? I’m your mother. I know when something is wrong,” she answered, dabbing her mouth with a napkin. I managed to keep from laughing aloud and instead just cleared my throat sarcastically to get her attention. Her eyes moved to me, and she frowned.
“And what are you scoffing at, then?” she asked me sternly.
“Do you really consider yourself the kind of mother who is good at knowing when something’s wrong with her kids?” I asked sardonically. “I don’t, but, you know, we can pretend for tonight.” I waved a hand through the air like I was shooing away a gnat.
I stared at her, daring her to argue with me, and, fortunately for her, she decided to pretend I hadn’t spoken.
“As I was saying, Logan…” She turned back to my brother. “What’s up? Also, where did Alyssa go? Wasn’t she going to have dinner with us?” she continued, glancing at the empty chair where Alyssa often sat. A tic in Logan’s jaw demonstrated his discomfort, and a new surge of guilt hit me, crushing my chest like a boulder.
“Apparently she wanted to fuck someone else,” he answered decisively. He shrugged, and suddenly everyone, even Matt, turned their attention to him.
“What?” Matt asked.
“For real?” Chloe cut in, and I went rigid, staring down at the fork abandoned on my plate.
“Yeah. She cheated on me just like Amber did,” Logan said sharply, referring to his ex-girlfriend. Before Alyssa, she was the most serious relationship he’d had. I didn’t know what to say or what to do. I didn’t even have the balls to tell the rest of the family that I was the other man involved. Instead, I just silently reflected upon everything that had happened recently. Everything was going tits up: Matt hated me ever since he found out I was sleeping with his daughter. Chloe almost died because of me, because Player was usingthe people around me to get revenge on me. And now I’d let my brother down as well. I was the sole reason that each one of them was suffering. I was the one who was always causing pain and frustration, fear, and worry.
I was the cause of everything.
“I’m going to leave after graduation,” I blurted out, still staring at an indeterminate spot in the middle of the table. I figured I had all eyes on me by that point because I’d said something so unexpected and caught them all off guard. But there was nothing else to do at that point. Walking away was the best choice for everyone. I could keep my family out of the shitshow that was my life and protect them from whoever wanted to kill me.
“What are you talking about, Neil?” my mother asked, and I almost laughed at her crestfallen tone. I chewed my lower lip anxiously and looked up at her so she could see that I was serious.
“My architecture professor put me forward for this internship in Chicago. It’s for the most deserving students in his class, and apparently I’m one of them. I hadn’t decided whether to accept it or not, but I think I’m going to go. The distance will be good for all of us,” I told her, affirming for myself that it was the right call.
Shit, the thought of spending that much time with Megan made me wince, though. But that would have to be a problem for another time. I could find out something to keep her away from me. Besides, graduation was still a few months off, so there was no point in getting myself tied up in knots about the situation right away.
“You didn’t tell me anything about that,” my mother answered, sounding confused.
“I haven’t told you anything about me or my life for years now. This shouldn’t come as a surprise.” I got up, unwilling to keep sitting with them and enduring this unpleasant atmosphere that only made me sick to my stomach. Then I walked out of the room without waiting for her reply. I had no interest in stumbling through some faux-maternal conversation with her.
I knew that, inside, they were all celebrating my decision. I felt like a stranger in my house, someone who was only ever a complication in the lives of others. Unsurprisingly, everyone was looking at me like it was an inquisition, like they were ready to judge and condemn me.
I went out to the backyard and, ignoring the cold, sat down on a lounge chair. I gazed into the pool and took note of how my breath condensed in the freezing air.
I felt like I’d been drained of all emotion.
I had a void inside me, and I knew that empty place would never be filled.
I turned my face up to the sky, a mantle of black serving as a backdrop for the full moon, high and bright. I wondered what Babygirl was doing just then. Was she wearing those horrible pajamas or those boner-killing fluffy slippers? It was only then that it occurred to me that my decision to leave would actually take me closer to Detroit.
I smiled bitterly at myself.
There was no future for us, just like I’d thought. Our paths were fated to diverge. Selene still needed to finish undergrad and achieve all her dreams. Plus, there was no way she was going to leave her mother and move to God knows where with a man who didn’t love her and was incapable of giving her anything like security.
Disheartened, I gave up on trying to find something positive about my life and recognized that it was nothing but negative.
