“I’m such a bitch to you. Why are you so nice to me?”
“I could be a douche if you want. I have a pretty good track record of douchery.” I also had a list of witnesses that would swear to it under oath.
She giggled as another tear fell.
“Get your shit together and get the fuck out of my apartment,” I said, standing up and kicking her wallet out of my way. “I don’t want all that shit on my floor.”
She looked up in shock and then I smiled.
“See? Now get your pink ass out of here.”
She shoved the rest of her stuff away and hurried to get out the door.
“I’ll call you. Asshole,” she added at the end.
I laughed after she shut the door and I swore I heard her laughing as she jogged down the stairs.
Katie
After much begging, Lottie finally agreed to my makeover idea. I was looking forward to it until Trish started grilling me about Stryker.
I didn’t know how much of what we were doing she knew, but from the way Lottie and Audrey talked, they’d put him in my ‘boyfriend’ box already. I didn’t tell them it wasn’t like that because, to be honest, I didn’t want them to think less of me. They were both so sweet and innocent when it came to that. I couldn’t imagine Lottie ever having a strictly physical relationship and Audrey had been engaged for Christ’s sake. Commitment wasn’t one of her problems.
They’d been treating me with delicacy ever since the whole Zack thing. If I thought they talked about me behind my back before, that was nothing compared to after, especially when I was always going over to Stryker’s.
So I settled on the ‘it’s complicated’ box and let them think what they wanted. They always thought the best of me, which was part of the problem. I hated that they saw the best in me, expected the best, because inevitably I would disappoint them. It always happened.
I was having trouble sleeping, and kept waking Lottie up from nightmares about Zack. I had a voicemail from his mother saying how sorry she was for everything. I wanted to delete it, but I couldn’t. It wasn’t really her fault her son was an abusive, psychotic d-bag.
Stryker honored my request that our relationship be ‘just sex.’ I would text him or call him, we’d meet somewhere, fuck and then one of us would leave. Sometimes we wouldn’t say a word. I liked it better that way. No talking, no music, no soul-sharing. The one thing I wished I could get him to stop doing was look at me. Those damn green eyes had this way of searing into me like a searchlight. I never felt more naked than when he was looking directly at me.
The therapist, Dr. Sandrich, turned out to be a pretty decent guy. He didn’t push me to talk about anything I didn’t want to, so I was free to make things up and pretend I was talking about my feelings. He knew, but he just listened and after my hour was over he shook my hand and let me go. I was always waiting for him to call me on my bullshit, but he never did.
I had to go to court to talk about what Zack did to me. It was humiliating and traumatic and all the worse because my parents were there and they both cried and all I wanted was for the courthouse to catch fire and destroy us all. The only good part was seeing Zack in handcuffs. Of course, his stepfather had bailed him out so he was free from jail for now, but on a tight leash, and he’d been kicked out of school. I took comfort in the hour of driving that separated us now.
One way or another, Zack and I were done, period. I was moving forward, or at least taking one step forward for every two steps back, until I saw that I had a missed call from Lottie after my anthropology class one afternoon. I’d started getting involved in my classes again, and I’d come to find I actually enjoyed most of them. There was something comforting about sitting in a lecture hall, listening to someone else speak, taking notes, letting the information wash over you. I didn’t have to think about anything else. Just listen.
“Hey, what’s up?” It wasn’t like her to call me in the middle of the day for something silly.