Shallow River

When the fuck did I ask?

The words come close to slipping out, but I keep the comment trapped behind my clenched teeth, heavy on my tongue. If it slips through, he might try to cut it off.

After a moment of reigning in my thrashing temper, I ask, “What do you mean?”

“Amelia is a bad influence on you. I don’t trust her,” he says.

The shirt sifts through my fingers more aggressively as too many emotions to name rise inside me. I guess I didn’t have to worry about feeling numb when Ryan is a master magician at bringing emotions out of me. Anger is most prominent, but right behind that is panic. Amelia is the last person I can lose. She’s been there with me through it all—since I escaped Shallow Hill and started carving my own path in life. Amelia has been the hand to guide me throughout some of the scariest years of my life. If anyone is the bad influence, it’s me.

“No, she’s not,” I deny weakly. He growls from deep in his chest, glaring at me with devil eyes. I’m standing ten feet from him, but yet I still feel the need to back away. I hate that he has that effect on me.

“Can you not argue with me for once? When will you realize that I’m just trying to do what’s best for you?”

“You’re making a decision for me,” I argue. “You don’t even know Amelia.”

“I know her well enough to know she’s a boy crazy whore. She doesn’t make an effort to include me in anything, which just tells me she doesn’t want me around. And the only reason she wouldn’t want me around is so she can influence you.”

My mouth drops open. Amelia has actually tried to invite Ryan to plenty of things before, but I always brushed it off. I don’t really know why. The few times Ryan and Amelia hung around each other, David would be super sweet and touchy feely while Ryan would sit stiffly beside me and look down on everything they did. It’s honestly embarrassing.

But now, I suppose Amelia wouldn’t want Ryan around, not after the way he treated me. Amelia holds a grudge firmer than anyone I’ve met. She’ll never accept Ryan again, and that thought makes me incredibly sad. Inevitably, it’ll put a wedge between us. Ryan is my future, I don’t know how I’m going to maintain a friendship with her when they hate each other.

“And, did we forget about your little temper tantrum? When you left me for a week and Amelia refused to let me see you? I have no respect for someone like that.”

You mean when you left me in a puddle of piss and then went and fucked your secretary? That temper tantrum?

He continues on, making me feel smaller and smaller. “I let you live here rent free. You don’t pay for anything, and I give you everything you ask for. The least you could do is acknowl

edge the fact that all I’ve ever done is take care of you. That’s what I’m doing now. I only have your best interest in mind.”

“But…” I trail off, not really knowing what to say. The more I argue, the angrier he grows. I don’t want him to be angry with me. When he gets angry, he gets violent.

“I’m trying to work, River. You know, so I can pay the bills?”

Shame fills me. I don’t have a job, and he does completely support me. I never asked him to. He demanded I leave my job so I can focus on school, and I was so wooed by someone actually taking care of me for once that I acquiesced.

Now I just feel like a mooch. He does so much for me, and I do nothing for him except give him sex whenever he asks. The least I can do is stay home when he asks me to, even if his views on Amelia are completely misguided.

“Okay, I’ll stay home,” I relent.

“I don’t want you seeing her anymore. Never again.”

I don’t argue. I don’t know if I can comply with that. I’m not ready to give up on Amelia yet. She’s my best friend. Apparently, I’m just going to have to be sneakier about it. Sadness overwhelms me at the thought. I don’t want to lie to Ryan. But I don’t want to lose my friendship even more.

AMELIA CALLS ME SEVERAL days later. Ryan's out having drinks with his friends. Friends I’ve never met or heard of before. When I asked who, he said some guys from work and didn’t offer any other information. Not wanting to push, I didn’t say anything else and he didn’t bother to invite me.

“Whatcha up to?” she chirps sweetly when I answer my phone.

I stare at the T.V. in front of me as rich women complain about their lives and talk mad shit behind each other’s backs. The glare from the television is the only beacon of light in the dim living room. I’m settled into our huge leather couch with a mountain of blankets and pillows on top of me and a glass of wine next to me.

“Just watching trash television,” I say, trying to keep any somberness out of my tone. I don’t want her to hear how I depressed I am about being left alone in the house while my boyfriend fucks off and gets drunk with unknown friends.

And probably at a strip club, I think bitterly.

“Come over,” she says. “Me and David are making chicken tacos and margaritas. Well, my margarita will be a virgin, because this vagina is definitely not.”

I smile at her crass words. That sounds fucking amazing. My mouth nearly salivates at the thought.

Then, all hunger dries my mouth to the point of nearly choking me when the conversation from Ryan's office comes filtering back. His demands for me to stay away from Amelia. To never see her again. A cold sweat breaks out across my forehead as I concoct several excuses for leaving the house. I’m forbidden from Amelia and my mother, the only two people in my life. I have no other friends—at least not anyone I could go see and it not look suspicious to Ryan as to why I’m suddenly hanging out with someone I never have before.