Page 52 of Mad Girl

“You’re upset,” he said, walking toward me. “I’ll go with you.”

“Oh my God,” I groaned, clutching my head. “This is so ridiculous. I don’t need an escort to the fucking park. It’s the park!”

“We need to have a talk, anyway. Come on,” Hal urged, his large hand heavy on my shoulder as he tossed a glance over his.

The whole way there, I wanted to let the frustration, burbling up in my chest, tear through my lungs. Scream so loud everyone within a ten-mile radius, including my dad—at the firm—would hear it. I often felt like this. Powerless. Turbulent. Trapped.

It was one thing for Hal to come after me at nine years old—at ten and eleven, then again at twelve—when I tried running away from one of my nannies. But coming after me now? At seventeen? Absurd. I should’ve slipped out back, like I had the day you’d found me freezing in the park, feeding the squirrels.

In the Garden, Hal chose a bench closest to the pond—because he knew I liked that. “What’s wrong?”

“What a pointless question,” I said, laughing to hold back the tears, burning behind my eyes.

“Of course it isn’t pointless.”

“Unless you can change all the things that are messed up about my life? Then, yeah, it is.”

“Let’s talk about it,” Hal said, stretching out his arms across the top of the bench. “What’s going on?”

“Well, for starters, I can’t leave my house alone—but that’s nothing new—and Michael’s being a dick. Which is fine, I guess, because he’s got a point: I do cause drama every summer.” I turned my head, watched some woman jog around three tourists who’d paused to snap pictures of the jagged skyline behind the park. “Sometimes I want to walk away and never come back. Completely disappear.”

Can you believe I said those words, Casey? How weirdly prophetic was that? It’s like, on some level, I always knew.

Only I wouldn’t walk away. I’d be led away in handcuffs—from one prison to another.

“Actually,” Hal said, “that’s part of the reason we need to have a talk.” He waited for me to look at him before adding, “I know Casey’s not picking you up from school like he claims to be.”

My stomach dropped, followed by a wave of nausea. Shit. “How do you know that?”

“By the time I get Casey’s texts telling me not to pick you up, I’m already at the school waiting for you. So I’ve watched you walk off with Tinsley twice now—on one occasion, I watched you walk off by yourself—and Casey was nowhere to be seen.”

This was bad. Despite how tight Hal and I were, I knew better than to believe his loyalty to me outranked his loyalty to my dad. After all, I wasn’t the one who signed his paychecks. “So when do you plan on telling my dad?”

Hal stared at the pond, his dark sunglasses making it impossible for me to read his expression. Dread settled like a stone in my stomach, a sob clawing up my throat.

“I don’t,” he finally said, though I still could’ve sobbed—from relief. “We’ll keep this between us. But here’s the thing: next time you go somewhere—I don’t care where it is or how short the distance—I want you to text me, so I can take you there myself.”

“Why?”

“It’ll make me feel more comfortable.”

“But Tinsley’s place isn’t all that far. It’s a fifteen-minute walk.”

“Ell, text me.”

“No,” I said.

Hal yanked the sunglasses off his face. “I beg your pardon?”

“No. No one drives in Beacon Hill or Back Bay. No one I know has a driver or an escort. It’s weird. Casey’s letting me do this so I can go places—so I can do normal things, like a normal person—and if you’re taking me everywhere, like you usually do, that’s not normal.”

“Do you want me to get in trouble with your dad?”

“No.” I’d take the fall myself before letting that happen.

“Do you want Casey to get in trouble with your dad?”

I crossed my arms. “No.”