“Well, that’s obvious. Why didn’t you ever pursue it?”
She shrugged.
“I don’t know. My parents were down on it. I was in chorus in school, but I was in a bunch of other things too and they made me give up one, so I gave up chorus.” She looked at the zoo painting, turning her head to the side. “Hey! You’re not supposed to be helping me with my issues. I’m supposed to be helping you.”
“Talking about you is helping me.” It was helping me not think about Ric and what I’d done to her.
She glared at me for a second before she took my hand again.
“I guess. Do you think that’s an elephant?”
“Looks more wooly mammoth-y,” I said.
We looked through the rest of the art, trying to figure out what some of it was and coming up with ridiculous stories to go along with each of the scenes. She held my hand. Some of the older kids’ stuff was pretty good, and you could spot who had natural talent. We were completely alone. I could hear voices downstairs, but they never came up to check on us. Probably figured no one would actually steal a kid’s finger painting that wasn’t worth anything.
I let myself be surrounded by the art, and Katie and the sweet little moment we were sharing. I shouldn’t have. I should have made her leave the second she walked in and drowned my sorrows alone.
I was letting myself have a sweet moment with my girlfriend while Ric was…
“I don’t want to talk about it right now, but there are some things I need to tell you,” I said.
“Shh…” she said, putting her finger to my lips. “Not right now. We can do it later. Right now we’re looking at…um what are we looking at?”
I kissed her finger and slipped it into my mouth, tasting her skin.
“I think it’s a flower.”
***
“I knew looking at art would make you less asshole-y.” She said as we got back in the car.
“Oh, I could still flip the asshole switch.”
“I don’t think you will. You sober yet?”
“Getting there.” I was going to have quite a hangover though.
“We should probably get some water into you.” She drove back toward my apartment, but stopped at a fast food place to get us something to eat. I seized the moment to check my phone. I had several messages from Trish, asking where the hell I was and why I wasn’t answering my phone.
“We should go check on Trish,” I said, hating myself for not doing it sooner. After she’d told me about Ric, she’d said she was going back to her apartment, and I’d been in a such a state, I’d let her.
“Aud’s on it. Simon called her.”
“Still, she’s a bit of a wreck.” I’d never seen her like that, and she’d been through a lot.
“Were she and Ric close? I never got the impression that they were.”
I turned on the radio and flipped to the alt rock station. “No, not really. They used to have this weird love-hate friendship.”
“Huh.”
I was also in the dark as to why Trish was so upset over Ric.
“Okay, okay, we’ll go see her. I’ve never been to her place before.”
“She’d probably like to keep it that way, but desperate times.”
Trish’s apartment wasn’t as large as mine, but it was a little bit nicer, with the exception of her insane roommate.
Katie parked the car in the only empty space and I showed her where Trish’s place was. Her building had two apartments on the first floor, two on the second, and hers was on the second.
Katie knocked softly and the door opened a second later.
“Oh hey, where have you been?” Audrey said, her voice a whisper. “She’s in rough shape.”
“Yeah, guess the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree,” Katie said, elbowing me. “Can we come in?”
“Oh, yeah. Of course.” She held the door open and we walked in to find Trish wrapped in a blanket on the ugly flowered couch, a pile of used tissues all around her like giant snotty snowflakes.
“Hey, Trish,” I said, going over to her and crouching down. “How you holding up?”
“Where the hell have you been?” It was a little hard for her to glare through puffy eyes, but she managed.
“Katie and I just took a walk.” It would be weird to try to explain the art gallery interlude. “Are you going to be okay?”
“No, I’m not going to be okay. She died, Stryker. She died.”