I stare back at her in disbelief. “You can’t expect me to be near this guy, knowing what he’s done, and just—”
“I do,” she says, voice firm. “If you can’t handle it, then you can leave. I’ll get another ride back to school.”
“I made a promise to you back there,” I insist, pointing back toward the bridge. “I’m not saying I’ll start shit with him, but if he touches you? I’m going to light his ass the fuck up.”
“Don’t you get it!” she cries, finally turning to me. Her chin wobbles, eyes shining with unshed tears, but her face is twisted bitterly. “This is hard enough! Having to worry about him, having to walk on all those fucking eggshells just to avoid—” She clamps her mouth shut and a tear spills over, leaving a track down her pale cheek. “It’s hard enough without having to manage you, too. I can’t do it, Sebastian. Either I handle him, or I handle—” she gestures wildly to me, lip curling, “—all this. The fucked-up way you’ve been treating me all morning, and the fact you’re obviously spoiling for a fight. I can handle one, but I can’t do it all. I can’t.” She shakes her head, swatting at another wayward tear. “So if you can’t keep yourself in check, then get out of here, because that’s the only way you can help me.”
I watch her, knowing that she’s wrong, but completely unable to argue. Isn’t this what I do with Heston? I manage him like a sickness, keeping people away, begging them not to make shit worse—not to let it spread.
I reach out to brush a tear from her cheek and she flinches back—hard.
“Please don’t touch me,” she says, face falling. “Not… not now. I’m sorry. Just not now.”
My hand drops heavily, but the sound of her voice like that, the fact that just being in this place means I can’t touch her… it just cements what I already know.
There’s absolutely no way I can promise not to protect her.
But there’s also no fucking way I’m leaving her alone at this house or with these people, especially him. I shove the keys into the ignition, cranking the engine. I make the only promise I know I can keep.
“I’ll try.”
I learn a lot about Sugar Voss when I step foot in her house. Probably as much as she learned about me when I brought her home. Her home is small. To say it’s the size of our pool house would be generous estimate. It’s clean, though—compulsively so. Marie would give Liesel a run for her money.
I feel a discomforting current of energy as we walk through the house, following Marie and her piece of shit husband through the entry. Sugar’s shoulders are still raised and tight, face set into a carefully controlled expression. She looked so small in my house, dwarfed by the tall ceilings and wide corridors. Here, she should look bigger, more proportioned. Instead, she tucks her limbs in close to herself, like she’s trying not to accidentally brush up against the energy of the house. Like if she makes herself small enough, she can sneak through it unnoticed.
After a long, uncomfortable moment spent shifting our feet in the living room, Marie suggests that Sugar give me a tour.
She starts at the kitchen, sticking her head into the narrow space that’s already filled with people I don’t know. Listlessly, she points to a small bathroom that everyone in the house shares. “My room is upstairs. Do you want to see it?” she asks, gesturing to the staircase behind a small door.
I follow her up, taking deep breaths with every step, trying to loosen the anger welling up inside of me. The walls are so narrow that my shoulders brush against them. At the top is just a squat little room. It’s got a slanted ceiling, and two dormer windows tucked under the eaves.
The only place I can stand up straight without my head touching the ceiling is right in the middle of the room, but none of that matters. My eyes roam the room, greedily sucking in everything I can about Sugar. One wall is nothing but torn-out pages of magazines—stylized pictures of modeling shoots, nature, and interesting architecture. Next to the slim, twin-sized bed are shelves fitted with clothespins that have Polaroids clipped in place, close-ups of abstract textures and objects that aren’t directly identifiable, but still look neat. The shelves themselves are filled with random little trinkets; a small collection of smooth rocks, a blue ribbon for a school contest, a stack of old books.
“It’s like the size of your bathroom closet,” she says, running her finger over a small brown dresser, “and there’s no Liesel to dust every week, but—”
“But nothing,” I say, slightly annoyed. “You know I don’t give a shit about money.”
She snorts, at least seeming a little more like herself up here. “The only people who say that are people who already have money.”
“True,” I concede, “but I don’t judge you for it. Or your mom, or even that piece of shit she’s married to.” I judge him for just about everything else.
I nod to a photo tucked in the mirror of her and a few friends. In it, she’s probably still in middle school and already is working the dark eyeliner. Her hair is pink, and she’s wearing a jacket with fringe. Her mouth is twisted in a smirk and she looks so ridiculously badass that I have to grin. “If I’d met you back then, I would have been obsessed. Like, hounding you for a date every day.”
“So pretty much like now.” Insecurity flickers in her eyes. It’s been there since morning and I’ve done nothing to fix it.
I’m not sure I can.
“Pretty much.” I take a deep breath, and since I’m still fighting against what I know needs to be done, I can’t leave it like that. “Look, about this morning…”
“Sugar?” Her mom calls from downstairs. “You upstairs? Aunt Jane is cutting the cake.”
Her body tenses completely, shooting me an apologetic gaze. “We need to go. Aunt Jane is very serious about dessert.”
I deflate, even though I know it’s for the best. “So I’ve heard.”
We walk down the stairs and she finishes up her tour, jerking her thumb at her mom and Doug’s room. Across the hall, there’s a second bedroom that has the words ‘Man Cave’ burned into a wooden plaque hanging from the door.
“Ah,” Doug says, creeping up behind us, “best room in the house.”
Sugar somehow manages to go more still than she has been. Her hands fidget at her sides, like maybe she’s looking for something to cling to. Something like a knife.
If she’s planning on responding to Doug, it’s caught in her throat. It makes my own fists clench, just knowing that this girl beside me—this girl who I’ve never seen scared to let her own thoughts known—is too scared to even reply to him.
“Sugar,” Marie calls, voice reaching down the hall. “Why don’t you come help us serve this.”
Sugar gives me a wary look, but Doug clasps me on the shoulder and says, “Don’t worry, I can entertain your friend.”
“It’s cool,” I tell her, flashing her a grin that’s probably not reassuring in the least. “I need to hear more about what happens in the man cave, anyway. I may need one of these one day.”