better life for themselves, and I could have wrecked it. And I was”—what was it Dec had said—“I was dissing them, their lives. Making a joke out of them. I didn’t really get what a big deal it was at the time, but now—”
Susanna was giving me a look of profound skepticism. “I should have told you,” I said to Melissa. “I just didn’t want to upset you. I was working my way up to it, and then . . .” She shook her head, one brief quick move: Don’t worry about it or Don’t give me that or We’ll talk about it later, I couldn’t tell.
“Hold the phone,” Leon said, eyebrows up. “That’s your big moral crisis? You fooled a bunch of people about some paintings? And you gave me shite because mine wasn’t dramatic enough?”
“Everyone has breakups, man. Not everyone feeds a line of total bullshit to hundreds of people—”
“Total strangers. And no one got hurt.”
“Well, yeah,” I said, mildly miffed. “Total strangers. I wouldn’t do anything to anyone I love. I know you would, you just said that, but—”
“Or,” Susanna said coolly, “Leon figures the things he’s done to people he loves are more serious than the things he’s done to total strangers. And you don’t.”
Some part of me noticed that she seemed a lot less fucked up than the rest of us, which I didn’t like. “No. No no no.” I waved a finger at her. “That’s what I’m telling you. I don’t do stuff that would hurt people I love. People who love me.”
I made it good and self-righteous, and sure enough, Leon’s head went back. “Oh. My. God. You are unbelievable, do you know that? You’re in your own world, it’s like talking to an alien—”
“Dude, what are you on about? Give me one example of me doing something to anyone who—”
“OK. Fine. I, just for example, when Dominic bloody Ganly started making my life hell, I went and told you. Do you even remember that?”
He was sitting up straight, glaring at me through his hair like a bristling cat. “What are you talking about?” I said.
Leon let out an angry laugh. “I’m not surprised. It’s not like you gave much of a fuck at the time.”
“Jesus,” I said, putting up my hands. “Su, give him some more hash, quick.”
“Leon,” Susanna said.
“No. I don’t care if he’s messed up or whatever, he’s being a total—”
“Whoa whoa whoa,” I said. “Back up the truck here. Dominic was giving you hassle?”
“Everyone gave me hassle. You were right there, you saw plenty of it, occasionally you’d actually bother to go, ‘Hey, guys, lay off my cousin,’ and they’d back off for a while. But Dominic was the only one who actually scared me. The rest were just being Neanderthal idiots, but he was a total sadist. Vicious. He kept it down around you, but when you weren’t there, God— So finally I told you. And you”—twist to Leon’s lip, almost a snarl—“you went, ‘Oh, chill, he’s just messing, I’ll have a word with him.’”
“What’s wrong with that?” I demanded. “I was straight in there, ready to help you out. What did you want from me?”
“I didn’t want you to have a word. I wanted you to get Sean and the two of you knock Dominic’s teeth in and tell him you’d rip his head off and shove it up his hole if he ever went near me again. But you said, God you were so reasonable about it, you said oh no, that wasn’t the way to go about it. You said you couldn’t be there minding me all the time, and if you beat Dominic up, he’d find a chance to take it out on me. You said I needed to learn to deal with my problems myself.”
And, at last, there it was. The grudge, spiking through his voice as sharp and bright as if it had been yesterday. “Well,” I said. My heart was going wild, I couldn’t tell how much was the revelation and how much was the hash—stupid, I should have stayed straight for this— “I had a point, didn’t I? What part of that is wrong?”
“All of it. It doesn’t work that way, it sounds great but— You had your word with Dominic, and of course that just made him worse, exactly like I’d told you it would. Because after that it wasn’t just casual stuff in passing, slamming my locker door on my head like he would have to anyone weaker