Page 276 of Mad Girl

“Yeah, I—” Michael stopped talking to look at me. “Elliot,” he said slowly. “You weren’t really asleep while Casey and I talked that day, were you?”

“Of course not.”

“Jesus, Elliot.”

“I have some questions.”

Michael sighed.

“What happened in England?” I asked. “Who is Jake? And why are you so jealous of him?”

Michael winced. “I got weird over there.”

“Weird how?”

“We had to share a bed at his sister’s.”

“Oh, the horror,” I said.

“Shut up,” Michael said, nudging me in the shoulder. “I tried sleeping on the couch, but Casey told me to grow up and stop being weird about it, so we stayed in his bedroom at Claire’s.”

“What was his room like?”

“Simple. Crazy clean. Lots of books, but beyond that, not much else. It made me sad, you know?”

“Why?”

“Well, I thought of my bedroom at my parents’ house, and how…full it is compared to his. I have trophies, medals, pictures, and all the other crap that fills up a room, but Casey’s was so…barren. I mean, this was his bedroom the whole time he was a teenager, but there were almost no traces of him ever growing up like a normal kid, and it made me sad for him. Actually, everything about his life over there made me sad.”

“Like what?” I asked, aching to know more about you. About all the things you’d never been brave enough to tell me.

“Just—everything Claire told me. She said their dad was so toxic to him after their mom died that Casey spiraled pretty hard, so she had to get him out of there. She felt like she had to protect him, because their mom would hate for Casey to be treated like that.”

“When you say spiraling,” I asked, “what do you mean?”

“Claire said he drank a lot. Dabbled in drugs. Disappeared for days at a time. Even while I was there, he got hammered a few times. Like, pass-out hammered, can’t-function-the-whole-next-day hammered. And when he did that, it stressed Claire out, because on top of having to take care of their dad and Rhys, she was worried about Casey losing it, too, and that bothered Casey—he hates to worry her—so he’d pull it together for a while, only to get hammered again when their dad was particularly shitty to him. One time he got so shit-faced, he kept telling me I was his brother, and I said, ‘Sure, dude, I’m your brother,’ just to get him to stop talking and go to sleep. The next morning, he didn’t remember saying it.”

I pressed my lips together. “Um—what did their dad say to him?”

“Well, for one thing, he loved to make all these crude suggestions about what must take place between your dad and Casey in order for Nic to let him live with you guys and pay all his bills. He kept asking if Casey missed his sugar daddy.”

I made a face. “Gross.”

“Yeah. And while Nic’s kind of shitty to you, Elliot, Nic’s been pretty great for Casey. I don’t guess I ever realized that until we got over there.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just—when Nic got him on the phone, your dad must’ve said exactly what Casey needed to hear to keep him from completely losing it. One time, I caught Casey wiping tears from his face while they were talking. Whatever Nic said obviously made it to where Casey wasn’t bothered so much by all that horrible stuff his dad kept saying to him, because he seemed much better after that and quit getting hammered.”

Despite my own issues with Nic, I liked that he was able to help you through a rough time. No wonder he wanted to be a reliable father figure for you. Your adoptive dad sounded like a fucking nightmare.

“And I tried that, too,” Michael went on. “I tried talking to Casey when we were all alone, and I could tell he was feeling down, but he wouldn’t talk to me. He wanted to brush it off, pretend it wasn’t a big deal—but it was a big deal. Casey made his dad all this food, made him cup after cup of tea, tried making him as comfortable as possible, and his dad complained about all of it. He’d hand the tea back and tell Casey to remake it, or leave the food untouched, or yell at Casey to leave him alone. One day, he called Casey worthless and told him to go back to Boston where he belonged. He said Casey being there was making his recovery worse. I’m telling you, Elliot, if that man hadn’t been laid up in bed recovering from heart surgery, I would’ve beaten his ass. That’s how awful he was, and Casey didn’t deserve it. But what really shocked me was how his dad’s entire demeanor changed when Claire walked into the room. He was nice to her. He thanked her. He smiled at her. She’d get onto him for the way he treated Casey, and he’d just wave it off, say Casey could take it, and if he couldn’t, he needed to man up. That was another thing their dad did—he repeatedly attacked Casey’s masculinity.”

No wonder you’d never wanted to talk about your adoptive dad. No wonder you had daddy issues.

I found myself wishing for the sudden demise of a man I’d never met. A blood clot. A stroke. Another heart attack. Something.

“And then there was Jake,” Michael said with a roll of his eyes. “We met up with him a few times. They grew up together, so of course they had all these inside jokes. Jake is the one who told me most of that stuff about Casey—about the streaking, and the teacher he hooked up with, and the friend’s mom. He knew everything about Casey. Stuff Casey’s never mentioned to me. Just stupid shit, but still. When I was out with him and Jake, I often felt like the third wheel, and I hated that. A few times, they dropped me back at Claire’s, and Casey went back out with him. He’d stay out pretty late, and one night I just came out and asked, ‘Are you hooking up with this guy?’ And Casey said their friendship was a little different, that they’d been hooking up since they were younger, a friends with benefits kind of thing—no feelings, nothing serious. Even before Casey told me that, I’d been a total dick to the guy, and Casey was cool about it, never got mad at me or anything. He said he felt the same way when we ran into guys I went to high school with, guys who knew things about me that he didn’t—jealous.”