Is she carrying her own heart? Or someone else’s?
Joanne hands me the notebook. The white pages inside are empty. “It’s for you. If you ever want to write down any thoughts. Or not. Maybe it’s just a pretty picture on the front and you write grocery lists in it,” she says with a shrug. “It’s whatever you want it to be. All I hope is that you can someday know that love doesn’t have to be a brutal, bitter power game. Love can be the ugly beautiful.”
The ugly beautiful.
I’ve never heard the saying before, but it resonates deep in my bones.
It’s an oxymoron. But like many oxymorons, it makes sense.
Like this malformed heart drawing. Like my lack of makeup, like my telling off Neil, like the kitten hanging in there, like the arrow that’s coming or going.
I don’t know if the arrow is coming or going. I don’t even know where I belong. But the arrow is real, it exists, and it’s in my misshapen heart.
“Is that what you have with your fiancé now? The ugly beautiful?”
She nods. “I think so. He knows me. I know him. I am flawed and I’ve made mistakes—I did things that were horrible. But I learned to forgive myself. And I learned how to change. I don’t have to be the person I was. I know she was sick, hurt, and terribly flawed. But I own up to it, and now I try to live a different life. I try to make some good out of it by helping others.”
“By helping the ugly become beautiful?”
“Yeah. I believe that’s possible.”
“Thank you,” I say to Joanne, and I mean it.
Because I don’t want to be stuck in the past anymore. I don’t know what my future holds, but I know I need to start moving forward.
I leave, feeling a surge of adrenaline as I run up the steps of the church basement in my Converse. I dial Trey’s number again. I want to tell him my plan. I want to tell him what I’m going to do. I want to share this moment with him. Even if he’s vague, even if he’s hot or cold, even if he’s messing with my head.
He doesn’t answer, but that’s okay. I’ll find him soon, but for now I don’t need him. I don’t need Cam right now. All I need is myself, and the one thing I’ve been doing my whole life over.
Writing.
Because I am going to take care of one thing at a time. I will figure out how to say goodbye to Cam, how to let Kristen in, and how to be honest with Trey.
But first, I will pay off my debt to Miranda. I will stay up all night tonight and keep going all day tomorrow, and I will be done. I will finish ahead of schedule, and I will be free of her.
I need to get the bitch off my back.
6
Memoirs of a Teenage Sex Addict
Mac, short for MacDougal, was the first man I saw naked. A fond memory from the year I turned all of nine. He was a Scotsman visiting Manhattan for a summer to work on his dissertation, and he quickly became my mom’s lover.
One time when he stayed over, I woke up in the middle of the night to pee. As I left the bathroom, he was walking down the hall without anything on. I froze, and so did Mac. Then he laughed, and his laugh even had a Scottish accent. He kept walking and patted me on the shoulder. “Someday you’ll like it.”
He didn’t even shut the bathroom door, just started whizzing with it still open. I slipped back into bed and tried to fall asleep. But I couldn’t, because Mac and my mom were going at it again. It’s really hard to get some shut-eye when your mom is crying out, “Oh my God, Mac, I’m so wet. I’m so turned on. I want you to fuck me hard, Mac.” I pulled the pillow over my ears, so tight and hard I was drowning my ears in pillowcase, but it didn’t matter. My mom’s cries rattled through my skull, then burrowed into my skin, and I was never going to erase them ever. Because once you’ve heard something like that, you can’t blot it out. Those bedroom moans are tar that coats your soul.
7
Trey
Beads of sweat form on my upper lip, and I lick them away.
The needle is hitting every nerve ending in my body, frying them. My ribs rattle and shake, and I am queasy. I swear I’m about to revisit this afternoon’s turkey sandwich if this isn’t over soon, because I can taste the bile rising in my throat. I draw a sharp breath, like that can center me. But nothing changes. A thousand bees still sting my ribs, my sides, my hip. I grip the edge of the chair, digging my fingers hard into the vinyl, as if I can relocate the pain, send it elsewhere, deliver it to this inanimate object I’m sitting in.
Then, like a rainstorm ending in a snap and the sun appearing, the pain ends. It doesn’t drift off; it doesn’t fade away. Nope. It’s like electricity. On, then off when Hector removes the needle from my skin.
He steps back, a master artist appraising his work. “It’s beautiful,” he says.
“Thanks, man. It’s all you.”
He shakes his head. “You gave me a beautiful drawing. All I did was bring that drawing to your skin.”
“We’re a team, then. I couldn’t have gotten this sucker on my flesh without you.”
He hands me the Vaseline, and I apply it to the new ink, smoothing it over. Then he gives me a bandage, and I wrap it over the tattoo and tape it down. I’ll leave it there for a few hours.
“You know the drill. It’ll scab over tomorrow,” he says.
“Like a sunburn.”
“It looks good, man. I want a picture of it. Those trees are works of art.”
A tree is the symbol of strength. Of healing. Of remembrance. Of understanding. But most of all, a tree is the symbol of regeneration, of new life. And it’s the reminder on my body of the trees I planted myself in a park one night when my parents were out on a call.
They are my trees. They belong to me.
8
Harley
I spend the next twenty-four hours running on Diet Coke and determination. I churn out page after page for Miranda, more than she asked for, more than she expects. I am a machine. Kristen knocks on my door a few times, asks if I’m okay, if I need anything. I tell her I’m working on an epic history paper for my final assignment of the year.
I only hate myself slightly for the lie. Because I am so accustomed to lies that they feel true now.
“Want something to eat?” she offers. “I’m making myself a peanut butter and honey sandwich. It’s kind of awesome. Especially with a cup of milk.”
“Sure.”
I eat the peanut butter and honey sandwich, but don’t drink the milk. There will be time for calcium later. I briefly consider ordering in a triple espresso too, but the coffee shop around the corner doesn’t deliver. Bastards.
I crumple up can after can of Diet Coke as I down them. Sounds of crushing, followed by sounds of typing, are the soundtrack of finishing. I give Miranda everything she wants. I satisfy her every salacious demand with more, more, more. Shame, shame, shame. Whore, whore, whore.
It’s what she wants. Even though she’ll never know the whole truth of how I got into the tangled mess.
I write more, stopping a few times to text Trey to check in, but I don’t hear back from him. My mother writes though. She tells me things with Neil are growing stronger, and that she’s even starting to forget about Phil. Isn’t that great?