Delicate Monsters (10 page)

He paused. “Why don't we explore your experiences with being watched, Sadie. Could you say more about that?”

“No.”

“Excuse me?”

“I said no. Aren't you supposed to be good at this listening thing? Isn't that what therapy is? I tell you things and you listen, and then I go home and have sex dreams about you or whatever?”

He gaped. “Is
that
what you think therapy is?”

“Ask me about my experiences with watching,” Sadie instructed. “That's more interesting than being watched. Because sometimes I see things I shouldn't.”

For a moment, Dr. CMT didn't answer. He pulled at his unattractively pink ear. He stared at his computer screen. Sadie understood he was torn between discomfort and his desire to challenge her, but he had to know there was nothing to be gained from trying to get the upper hand with her. That was the thing with psychologists, counselors, helping professionals, whatever boring category they wanted to identify with these days. Deep down they were all people pleasers. It's why they did what they did. They cared about being liked, and they cared what other people thought about them. Sadie, on the other hand, cared about nothing. So she could do this challenge thing all day, every day, and never break a damn sweat.

Not once.

“Tell me about your experiences with watching,” Dr. CMT finally said with a sigh. “What have you seen that you shouldn't?”

Sadie pushed a smile onto her face, waving that smug flag of victory. “Oh, all sorts of things. For starters, I see the way my mom looks at men before she fucks them.”

“Wait, I'm sorry. Your mother is single?”

“No. She's married to my dad.”

He blinked. “What religion are your parents, Sadie?”

“My father's an atheist. My mother's Catholic.”

“What about you?”

“Me? I'm pathological.”

Dr. CMT didn't smirk or respond. He typed something into his computer. “So does your father see what you see? The way your mother looks at men?”

“No. He doesn't see anything. Because he's not here.”

“Where is he?”

Sadie shrugged. “I haven't seen him since February.”

“You haven't seen your father since February?”

“Nope.”

“I'm afraid I don't understand.”

“There's nothing to understand. And it's certainly nothing to be afraid of. He's a filmmaker. He does a lot of work with human rights groups. Last I heard he was going to Sudan to film a documentary about education reform or something, but I don't think he's there anymore.”

“So where is he?”

“I don't know. He hasn't told us.”

“I see.” Wrinkles appeared in Dr. CMT's brow, and judging by the Feelings Chart, this meant he was worried. Or confused.

Sadie used her nails to pick at the pills on the shag couch cushions where she sat, collecting them neatly in her cupped hand. “It's not that big a deal. And my mom can do what she wants. I mean, I would if I were her. But that's not the only thing I saw this week.”

“It's not?”

“Mmmm, no. See, I went to this party Friday night, and I saw something there. I kind of want to talk to you about it.”

“Okay. What sort of party was this?”

Sadie shrugged. “Typical high school shit. Drinking games. Heavy petting. Music that makes you want to blow your brains out—”

“Blow your brains out?”

“It's a metaphor. Jesus.”

“Fine. Go on.”

“Can I ask you a question, Tom?”

“You can ask me anything. Whether or not I answer is a different story.”

Sadie bristled at this, and when she was sure he was looking, she dumped the handful of shag pills straight onto the floor. “I want to know what it's called when a guy is with a girl, and that girl is passed out drunk, like, completely trashed, you know? And let's say this guy, he's taking care of this girl because she's puked all over herself or something, I don't know exactly. So then he takes her clothes off, not to
do
anything to her. Not at first. He does it to help her clean up, I guess. But while he's doing this, he gets sort of turned on, and he—”

“She can't consent to sex while she's intoxicated,” Dr. CMT said firmly. “No one can. What you're describing is rape, Sadie. This is something you saw? Or is this something that happened to you?”

“No, this didn't happen to
me
. That's just it, though. What if the guy
doesn't
rape her? He doesn't even touch her. What he does do, though, is, you know.” Sadie leaned back and made the gesture with her hands.

The therapist's eyes widened with comprehension, and now the Feelings Chart told her the look on his face was
disgust
.

“He did that … in front of her?” he asked. “Really?”

“Worse,” Sadie said, with a pinch of pleasure and a whole hell of a lot of satisfaction. “
On
her.”

 

chapter nineteen

The words started up again the moment Miles stepped off campus at the end of the school day.

“Hey, bitch,” someone called out from behind him. “Wait up.”

Miles didn't respond or look back. He didn't have to. This was the same cat-and-mouse game he'd been acting out his entire life, and while the stripes on the cat might change, or the cat might even be related to him, he was still always, always the mouse.

Even when he was the bitch.

“Why you walking so fast?”

“Slow down, sweetheart.”

Pain burrowed in his chest. A part of him wanted to give up right then, just lie down and await whatever brutality was undoubtedly in store. That wasn't a death wish, either, but a strategic analysis of the situation and a desire to conserve resources. Miles understood full well that if asked why he was walking so fast, it meant he was already trapped.

Still, his mind cycled reliably through the options, hopeless as they all were. He could try and run to get away from the guys who were trailing him. Or he could stop and do something submissive and hope they'd get bored. There was a third option, too, of course, which involved Miles doing nothing but what he was already doing—walking the deserted Sonoma streets in his slouchy way and not responding.

Inevitably, this was the inaction he always chose.

Inevitably, it never made a difference.

To others, he was worth the sacrifice. Nothing more.

So Miles kept walking. His mind hummed and rattled. Something about
this
day felt different, though. There was a twist in the wind. A certain slant to the sky. He pushed his feet forward and felt the sidewalk beneath him turn sticky and malleable. It was almost as if he'd fallen straight into a Dali painting or some separate corner of the universe where the laws of nature could be broken. Where past suffering didn't predict future pain.

Or maybe that was just wishful thinking.

He rounded the next corner, turning down a new street and leaving behind the long row of stucco homes with their sagging porches and unwatered lawns. He'd hoped to find human life here—a convenience store, a park full of mothers and their children—enough that continuing to follow him wouldn't outweigh the risk. But in his harried state, he'd miscalculated. This road he'd turned onto wasn't one Miles had seen before, which was strange, considering he'd grown up here. Rather than safety or familiarity, however, everything before him was desolate and bleak, a wide stretch of dimpled asphalt lined with nothing but the vast expanse of a deserted walnut orchard.

Miles didn't falter or turn back. He stayed the course, which was his game plan, after all. Besides, it was always possible the guys weren't going to actually
do
anything to him.

Oh, anything's possible, boy,
the wind whispered, raspy words running up his spine like a secret. To his right, a group of pigeons pecked and scratched in the yellow grass. Miles shivered. The orchard was long dead and the walnut trees stood in the sun like an army of corpses, their prickled limbs twisting toward the sky like a call for help. Other than the talking wind, the only sound in the air was the whine-hum zapping off the electrical wires strung down the opposite side of the street, and the hurried rush of footsteps coming up behind him.

The first blow landed on the left side of his head. The second, in the small of his back. Miles cried out as he fell forward, legs crumpling beneath him. The foreground flipped as he landed, face hitting the dirt, and the pigeons flapped their wings, fluttering away in a downward rush.

Pain exploded. His world grew louder.

The hum became a
roar
.

 

chapter twenty

“Mmmm,” May murmured as she squirmed and writhed beneath Emerson, her breath hot on his neck. “Don't stop, Em. Please.”

They were in her second-floor bedroom on top of her four-poster bed, with their clothes half off, their bodies pressed together, soft sheets twisted around their ankles. May's parents both worked and her little sister was at cheer practice, which meant this moment was theirs alone. Emerson took May's lead and kept doing the thing she didn't want him to stop doing. He did it faster, then slower, then in little circles like he'd read about online. It seemed to work. She arched her back. She shivered and gasped, pushing her face against his chest, her fingers into his skin, and when it was over and she fell against him, Emerson wondered if it had always been this easy. If all this time, all he'd needed to have her was for her to feel self-doubting.

If only he'd known.

May pushed his hand away and rolled on to her side. She whispered in his ear, telling him how good he'd made her feel and filling Emerson with a heady sense of pride and lust. Both sins, he reminded himself, deadly ones, and when she reached down toward his boxers and tried to return the favor, he stopped her.

“What's wrong?” she asked.

He shook his head. He felt weird all of a sudden. He couldn't explain it.

“Em?”

A faint chiming came from across the room, the back pocket of his discarded jeans. Emerson sat up, welcome for the distraction, the opportunity to lie.

“My phone,” he said, crawling from the bed. “I'm sorry. I have to answer it.”

“Where are you?” his mother snapped when he picked up, making his heart leap. She was using her emergency voice: all clipped and business-like.

“With a, uh, friend. What's wrong?”

“It's your brother. You need to get home.”

“Shit.” Emerson pushed his hair back. May turned and stared at him. “Another seizure?”

“No.” She told him how a truck driver had found Miles collapsed on the side of the road out near Jack London Way. The cops brought him home after getting him checked out at urgent care. It looked like he'd been beaten up. Bloody nose. Bruised ribs. Possible concussion.

“I need you,” his mother said again, her business voice slipping. “The cops, they're still here.”

“I'm coming,” Emerson told her, and he hung up.

He looked back at May, sprawled on the bed in the dying afternoon light with her hair down and her dark breasts still bared. The lesser part of him wanted to touch her again, feel her all over, breathe her in. It was a crazy sort of urge, given the phone call he'd just received and the thing that had happened between them over the weekend. But maybe urges like this were nature's reminders that they were mere animals. That all humans were driven by hormones and pheromones and biological imperatives, only to be copiloted by a mind that could rationalize it all. Then again, what he'd done Friday night, Emerson couldn't rationalize. But he felt guilty about it. That had to count for something. Guilt meant he wasn't like Sadie Su, who did things, not in spite of their badness. She did them
because
they were bad.

That was something different altogether.

Emerson's lust withered into crawling dread. Of all the people in the world,
Sadie
had to be the one to walk in. He'd never be able to talk sense into her, explain that what she saw didn't matter, so long as May never found out. He just had to hope against hope that she'd keep her dumb mouth shut. She would, if she knew what was good for her. Then again, it was Sadie.

Sadie, who never listened to reason.

Sadie, who believed cruelty was a virtue.

Sadie, who was the exception always, always willing to prove the rule.

*   *   *

The sky was darkening by the time he reached the apartment complex, and Emerson squeezed the Mustang into the carport with mere inches to spare. The asshole next door with the Suburban had parked over the white line again, and Emerson was lucky not to rip his side mirror clean off.

He cut the ignition, took the key out, and sat there. The old car settled with its usual pings and sighs and shuddering under-the-hood rattles, and with his own internal organs doing pretty much the same thing, Emerson realized he didn't want to go in and face whatever hell was going on with his brother. He just didn't. He knew it was terrible of him to feel that way. Miles was a victim. Someone had
hurt
him. That should make Emerson want to wring the necks of whoever had jumped his little brother.

And yet …

And yet, Emerson couldn't finish that thought. It was too horrible. Too heartless. He was better than that, or at least he
wanted
to be. What he could do, however, was slide out the bottle of whisky he'd hidden under the front seat last week—Johnnie Walker, Red Label, nabbed from the corner store in a dark moment of impulse and opportunity—and hold it between his legs. The shape of it, the weight, the slosh of the brown liquid all comforted him. The funny thing was, he'd stored the emergency booze in the Mustang
prior
to Trish Reed's party. Before he even knew he'd need it. Like he was psychic or something.