"And you know what happened to me."
"Yes."
She picks up the pill bottle and throws it. Hard. It hits the wall behind the bar and bounces off a shelf of liquor bottles and one of them rocks but doesn't fall. The bottle skitters across the floor and comes to rest under the ice well.
"Then tell me what the fuck happened to me."
I look at her. She's shaking. Not the withdrawal tremor. This is rage. Full-body, teeth-clenched, hands-fisted rage. Her tapping has stopped completely, the way it stops when something overwhelms the coping mechanism, and her eyes are on me and I am the target.
"You were taken," I say. "When you were eight years old, from a family that loved you. You were trafficked for five years. At thirteen, you were placed in Philadelphia with a manufactured identity and a family that was paid to watch you and a prescription that kept you from remembering any of it."
Her face doesn't move. Nothing on her face moves for five full seconds. She's frozen. Processing at a speed her brain wasn't designed for, taking in information that rewrites everything she knows about her own life.
"I was taken," she repeats.
"Yes."
"Trafficked."
"Yes."
"For five years."
"Yes."
"And the Marinos."
"Paid operatives. Placed to monitor you and maintain the medication."
"And Linda's not calling back because..."
I hold her gaze. I don't flinch. I don't look away. "Because I killed them. Five days ago. Both of them. So the pills would stop and you could start remembering. And because of what they did, knowing where you came from, what you’d endured."
The silence in the restaurant is deafening. No kitchen sounds. No music. No dishwasher. Just Grace on one side of the bar and me on the other and the biggest truth I've ever told sitting between us on the polished wood.
She walks around the bar. She comes to my side. She stands in front of me where I'm sitting on the stool and she's between my knees and her face is at my chin level and she looks at me, and her eyes are wet and her jaw is set and her hands are shaking.
"You killed them."
"Yes."
"You killed the people who raised me."
"They didn't raise you. They drugged you."
"You don't get to decide that for me." Her voice breaks on the last word. "You don't get to decide what they were to me. You don't get to kill people and call it a rescue. You sat at my table and ate my food and kissed me and fucked me and you knew the whole time. You knew who I was and what was done to me and you said nothing. For weeks. You said nothing."
"I know."
"Is that all you have? I know? That's your answer? I know. I know. I KNOW. I KNOW. That’s all you can fucking SAY TO ME?"
"Yes."
She hits me, open palm, right across the face. Hard enough that my head turns and the sound cracks through the empty restaurant. My cheek burns. I don't move. I don't react. I sit on the stool and let her hit me because I earned it.
She hits me again. Same hand, same cheek. Harder. My lip splits, and there’s blood in my mouth. I taste copper and swallow it.
"Hit me again," I say. "If you need to."
