I sat completely still, struck, even stung, but deep down I sensed it was a hurt I had to feel, and I let myself feel it as I stared at her.
“I’ve been watching you and how you hold yourself apart,” she went on. “You’re interested in people. You’re the first to offer if someone needs something. But they drilled it in your head for so long that you’re unworthy, and it hurt so bad, you protected yourself from maybe finding out what they convinced you is true out in a world without them. And I get it. That kind of conditioning is hard to shake. But if you think for even a second on it, you scared the piss out of them.”
I did?
“What?” I whispered.
“You’re pretty and you’re sweet and you’re funny and you explained what a transistor was to your dad when you were six. You were better than him when you were six. And he didn’t see that as something to be proud of. He didn’t see that as something to nurture. He didn’t stop at nothing to forge the path for you to find the you that you were born to be. Your mother failed at the same thing and did worse. Your brother fuckin’ hated all you were because he was already small, and you made him feel smaller. And they all made moves to hold you down. They made moves to make sure you didn’t understand your gifts and how beautiful they are. They made sure to minimize you so you wouldn’t reach your full potential, because if you did, you might see what wastes of space they all allow themselves to be. And as a kid, you got no defense. But Evan, as an adult, that’s a different story.”
When she stopped talking, I realized how heavily I was breathing.
She started talking again.
“Now I see you sitting here, letting them twist shit in your head. Talking yourself into seeing all that’s going down as on you. When you did one thing. You made a tough decision. Look after your brother and get mired in shit or don’t look after your brother and mire someone you love in shit. There was no right decision to that, Evan. You didn’t make the wrong one. You just made a decision. And you’d be in a place right now, beating yourself up, no matter which way that swung, and he put you there. You should not have had to make any decision at all. Do not take that on. Do not let him take away any more of what you fought to have.”
She reached out and took my hand in a firm grip.
And she kept going.
“I know you were sitting here, planning to bolt. Planning that, when I heard you today, gabbing with your girls in your bedroom about shoes. I saw a man who digs you sorting through your vinyl, smiling at himself because you like Metallica. I saw the Evan and the life she had that was meant to be. Not a single fucking soul in this room, or out of it, outside members of your family, are pissed at you about what’s going down. What we’d be pissed about is if you bolt.”
“Danny got shot,” I whispered.
“Yes, he did, and he survived, and I’ll tell you right now, you got a battle on your hands and it’s not what you think. The battle you got is that he allowed that man to get to you and he’s killing himself right now he let that happen. Now you got a real important decision to make. You can give in, let them win, or you can fight for what you deserve. You can take off and leave Mag where he’s at in his head right now, or you can be here and stand strong for your man. What’s it gonna be, Evan? What really makes you? Who really are you? What life do you really want to lead?”
“I wanna get my degree,” I told her quietly. “I want to stop stripping. I want friends to go to movies with. I want a life not defined by my family.” I pulled in a breath and said, “I want Danny.”
She shook my hand. “Then fight for that.”
I felt something weird, like an electric hum, skating up my spine.
“You want Mag, so you understand all there is to have if you have him,” she continued. “Nikki wanted him too. It’s Mag’s to tell you and I’d normally