Boys Like You

He kept clenching and unclenching his fist.

“I only broke my left pinky finger, if you can believe it, and other than a few bruises and cuts from flying glass, I was good to go. The girls were okay too, a few minor scratches but nothing serious. We were all knocked out, but Trevor…” His voice trailed off and he finally glanced away.

It was then that I realized I’d been holding my breath.

“You don’t, you don’t have to…I don’t want to know,” I whispered. And suddenly I didn’t. I didn’t want to know anything about Nathan Everets and this Trevor guy.

He shoved away from the table suddenly. “Let’s get out of here.”

I followed Nathan through the crowd, half running to keep up with him, but then maybe he was trying to get away from me. He finally stopped near the edge of the midway, and the sounds, the laughter was so loud that I turned away and faced craft alley.

We were surrounded by families, by teenagers and kids who were having a blast. They were laughing and shouting, and why shouldn’t they? What was not to like? If you were into peaches, that is. There was every kind of dessert imaginable, rides and games, and over on the other side, I saw a stage with instruments, drums and guitars. So there was entertainment too.

There was everything that most normal people needed to have a good time. Except I wasn’t normal, and the more smiling faces I saw, the angrier I got.

It wasn’t fair.

“I wish they would shut up.”

“Huh?” Nathan glanced down at me, his hands shoved into his pockets, his expression blank.

“Everyone.” I gestured toward the Ferris wheel. “Everything. It’s too loud.”

His cell dinged, for the twentieth time, and I snapped. “Aren’t you going to answer that?”

Nathan grabbed his phone and glanced down at it.

I assumed it was his girlfriend, his “at the moment girlfriend,” and I looked away in disgust, my eyes falling upon a cotton candy stand. A little boy who looked to be six or seven was in line for a stick, smiling up at his dad as the two of them waited. When the lady handed him his prize, the vibrant pink color caught my attention.

For a few moments, it was all I saw. Pink. Fluffy. The little boy.

Sweat trickled down the back of my neck, and I lifted a heavy chunk of hair and pulled it forward over my shoulder. I couldn’t take my eyes off the treat, and when the little boy dug in, his mouth grabbing for the biggest piece he could get, I wanted to yell at him.

Be careful. You’ll get that crap in your hair, and then your mother will be mad, and then I’ll have to…

“Monroe, are you all right?”

“What?” I shook my head and exhaled a long, shaky breath. I thought of my bed. Of the pills I no longer had. And I glanced down at my wrist, at the single, solitary scar that was there. It wasn’t big and it wasn’t flashy. Kind of like me.

It was a testament to the real me. The weak part. The part that couldn’t do anything right.

“Monroe?”

“I hate it here,” I said quietly.

Nathan glanced at his cell one more time, his long fingers running over the screen. “If I ask you to take me somewhere, will you?”

“You’re not some kind of criminal, are you?” I thought of his suspension and realized I didn’t know much of anything about him.

“Nope,” he answered. “Not the kind you need to be afraid of, anyway.”

My gaze returned to the little boy whose face was all but swallowed by the large stick of cotton candy, and I knew if I stayed, I would be sick.

“Sure,” I said and took a step forward, “as long as you promise there aren’t any rides, games, or peaches.”

Or kids.

“I promise,” he said as he fell in step beside me.