If- Nina G. Jones Page 0,52

with her friends on the phone. She owned a boutique and kept irregular hours. It felt like whenever I saw her, she was on the phone with one of her sorority sisters or something.

“I don’t know . . . it’s like Miller is blind.”

I stopped to listen. Is she talking shit about my brother?

“No, it’s just that with a baby on the way . . . his brother is unstable. It’s like the whole family is in denial. Miller being number one. I understand, he lost Sarah and he’s clinging to Asher, but it’s a lost cause.” She always called me Asher, like she refused to become familiar with me. And did she just say there was a baby on the way?

“No . . . technically he hasn’t intentionally hurt anyone, but he’s unpredictable. He’s a drifter for Christ’s sake! And just because he looks clean, thanks to us, I might add, and he’s articulate, and he’s the little genius that could . . . everyone is blind to the fact that he’s really a bum! Would you want that around your child? . . . We had an argument last night. I told him we should get Asher’s key back, and Asher needs to get a job. He needs tough love! But Miller got all pissy. He said I didn’t understand. I understand that Asher doesn’t want to get better . . . he has it too easy. Everyone coddles him. I think he exaggerates his issues . . . You know, Sarah wasn’t just Asher’s sister, Mill lost his sister too . . . Whatever, sometimes I think Asher is more important to Miller than I am . . . Anyway, Mill caved and said he would talk to him, but he is such a softy when it comes to Asher. So I don’t know . . .”

I guess it’s one thing to know what someone thinks of you, and another to hear it. She was right. I was a loser. I was all unrealized potential. But what bothered me the most was that I was putting Miller in a tough spot. He was about to have a baby, and I was getting in between him and Ella. I wasn’t her number one fan, but they loved each other. They were trying to build a family, and I was the child she never agreed to.

Burden. I would always be a burden. No matter what I did, I would be that to my parents and Miller. Even if I got a job today and recalibrated my meds, I had already caused so much irreparable hurt, that just seeing me would be like picking at an old wound.

I tip-toed back to the guest house, took my key, left it on the kitchen counter, and waited until Ella was back in the house. Then I left.

BIRD

IT HAD BEEN three days since I had seen Ash and I was starting to freak out. That night on the roof, everything was going fine until he did something stupid.

He stood on the edge, taunting me. His eyes were wild, he thought the whole thing was funny, but I was terrified. The more I begged, the more he teetered, laughing, until I started to cry because I thought if I let the tears go, he would understand how serious I was. He did, finally jumping down and professing how sorry he was, as if he couldn’t possibly understand why I was so serious about the whole thing. It was like he had a death wish, or he was being insanely immature and stupid, which was bizarre since I had always thought of him as mature in many ways. For the first time, I was really pissed at Ash. Pissed at him for risking his life for a laugh, pissed that he taunted me, and pissed that he freaked me out so much that it brought me to tears.

Ash kept saying he was sorry, and I knew he was, but something felt off. I couldn’t put my finger on it. On paper, the way he had been acting was fun. He was inspired, coursing with art and energy, but he also wasn’t eating or sleeping and sometimes his energy shifted from fun to jittery. I figured it was the new project—he was excited, and like many artists in the throes of inspiration, he pushed everything else to the wayside. Ash just needed some rest. He was starting to get loopy.

So after he apologized fifty times, I