I’m aware that he doesn’t know the importance of my dress. He doesn’t know that this was my mom’s or how I cling to it every night, foolishly searching for her warmth, her presence. The fabric doesn’t even smell like her anymore; I’ve washed it too many times.
I foolishly think that if I have something of hers with me, touching my skin, she isn’t really gone. She’s here, watching over me.
Zach doesn’t know any of that. And neither does Ashley.
But would they really care, even if they did? Would it really bother them, make them feel guilty that they ruined the last thing that meant the world to me?
“So here’s the thing, Zach, unless you can magically bring back dead people, it’s going to be very hard to find a replacement,” I say with a throat full of so many emotions that I’m drowning in them.
“It belonged to my mom. She died last year in a car crash. My dad, too. They were on their way back from their anniversary dinner. My dad thought it’d be a nice treat for my mom. Seeing as how he never took her anywhere because we didn’t have the money. I’m sure you know that because you and your minions wouldn’t let me forget it.
“You wouldn’t let me forget that I come from the other side of the line. The trashy side. But anyway, he’d gotten a great job, my dad, painting a church in the next town, and he thought why not? Why don’t I take her out and do something nice for her? So they went. But they never came back.”
I’d helped Dad plan the whole thing. Besides, I had good news of my own. I was going to tell them that after graduation, I was leaving on a cross-country road trip. My mom would’ve been ecstatic. She always wanted to get out of this town but never could. So in a way, I was fulfilling her dream.
“They died because my dad wanted to give her something special. Something she never had and something you guys take for granted,” I continue with fisted hands and stinging eyes. “Something that most of you don’t deserve. Because you never lift a finger to earn anything. You don’t even change your own sheets. You can’t even put your laundry in the basket and somehow, people like you get to rule the whole world.”
I take a deep breath and look into his black eyes. They are shimmering, penetrating, and if I let them, they’ll suck me in and drown me.
“So I don’t want you to replace it because you can’t. All I want you to do is let me go so I can get a good night’s sleep and get back to working for you so you get to be a big bully and potentially ruin lives.”
I have no idea where I even got the energy to say all those things. And why I even bothered to tell him this.
But whatever. I said it and now, I need to go cry in my pillow.
As I step away from them in my sticky dress, I look up and find everyone watching me. There’s Grace and Leslie. There’s Maggie too. They are all looking at me with pity.
Mrs. S is nowhere in sight. But I’m sure news will travel and she’ll come to know tomorrow.
Maybe I’m really fired after this.
But I can’t seem to care. I want to lie down. I feel heavy like my wet dress. A little dead too, I guess.
They let me go without a word and when I reach my room for the night, I curl up and hug the pillow, crying into it.
There’s a little bottle on the counter.
Leaving Ashley behind, I go and pick it up. Laxative.
It probably belongs to her. Sighing, I bow my head before pocketing it.
“Get lost,” I tell Ashley.
“What?” she asks, confused.
I turn around and face her. “Get lost.”
“But Zach –”
“Get the fuck out.”
“Are you doing this because of her?” Ashley asks, looking up at me with pleading eyes.
There was a time when my dad wanted me to marry her. That was reason enough for me to just fuck her, steal her virginity in a cheap motel room, and leave her sleeping on the bed.
Just to spite my dad. Anything to spite my dad.
But I underestimated the blonde, virgin princess. She never really left. She hung around, year after year, watched me fuck other girls. Always others, never her.
I never understood why but I think I do now.
She loves me. In her own way, she was giving me the time to sow my wild oats. She still thinks we’ll end up together one day.
Poor Ashley.
“This isn’t St. Patrick’s anymore,” I say.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means stop being a bitch and grow the fuck up.”
Her eyes flash fire. “Excuse me?”