Between Now and Heartbreak - Dylan Allen Page 0,18

for his daughter’s pussy?”

“He actually said that? Her father?” I remember the casual cruelty he displayed that day at their house. But, she’s his kid. Monster was right. My mom has caught me with --- my thoughts come to a screeching halt as the rest of what she said sinks in. She was fucking someone in East Winsome?

“Not himself. He sent his goons to do his dirty work. Beat up a couple of the boys he managed to get his hands on. Just to drive his message home. And to think he wants to be governor. God help us. The corruption in this town, you wouldn’t believe.”

“Who was it? The guy she was with?”

“God only knows. I only saw her in East Winsome once. The night before her brother died. Must have been someone she met then.”

She’s talking about me. Her dad found out.

My stomach drops. Her eyes had been hauntingly grave when she’d warned me about this that day in the church.

“If he found out I was seeing you, he’d find a way to stop it,” she’d said .

Fuck.

“Wow. So, what happened?” I panic and glance at her when I realize I’ve slipped and called her by my nickname. She doesn’t appear to have noticed.

“Nothing. She disappeared. Just gone. They said she went to live with her grandmother.”

“Is that in a different town?”

“Yeah, near Dallas. I think she was in rehab,” Etta says, her grin is sinister. I’m used to people making shit up about me and my family. But they’re gossip columnists. Not my neighbors. The dexterity with which Etta vaults her verbal missiles is clearly a result of practice.

“Is Beth…like who are her friends?”

“If her Instagram is to believed, Georgia and a girl named Ava. But who knows. She came home from her grandmothers,” she puts mimes air quotes and rolls her eyes, “looking like a new person. Ms. Perfect. And now she’s got her perfect fiancé.”

“So, they weren’t dating before?” I ask, surprised that anyone would describe him that way.

“Of course not. He would never have. I think his Daddy is making him do it. I mean, I don’t see what else it could be. She’s like plastic. You know? I heard she’s got all sorts of fillers in her face. Not that I’ve been close enough to find out for myself.” She snorts derisively. “She goes all the way to Houston to get her highlights done like she’s fucking Ms. America, or something. Not that I want her business. The smell is sulfur would be bad for business.”

Bitterness must run in long, uninterrupted cords through her veins. She seems consumed by it.

“You know they’re cursed, right?” Her voice has lost some of its edge, but it feel forced. Like she knows she might have gone too far and is trying to pretend that she’s not dead serious.

I’ll play along because her dislike of Beth is extreme and disconcerting.

“Who’s cursed?”

She shoots me a glance and her annoyance is clear as day. “Her family.” If she’d added a “you sack of numb nuts" to the end of that sentence it couldn’t have been more patronizing. “Like the Kennedy’s, ya know? She has another brother. Older than the one who died. But he disappeared. But heard Wolf disowned him because he was gay.”

“Would he really have done that?”

“Oh yeah.. I mean, it may be the 21st century in NYC, but here we… time stopped when Ronald Regan died.” She laughs.

It’s possible that her theory about the cause of his leaving is pure conjecture with no basis in fact, but that it’s even in the realm of possibility makes me sad for them. Her father doesn’t deserve the children he’s been given. What an asshole. Maybe monster wasn’t harsh enough.

“Anyway, just watch out for her. She’s an opportunist. If she finds out who you are, she’ll be after you, too.”

My skin feels too tight for my body. It’s hard to sit and listen to hear her talk about Beth like that and say nothing in her defense. Things may have been turned upside down, but the Beth I spent the night with last summer is the real her.

I know it, the way I know water is wet.

Whatever she’s done, or said, she’s not a malicious, self-absorbed, fake. Not even close.

But I bite my tongue. Because to defend her would reveal things I don’t want Etta to know. In her hands, the truth about us would be repurposed into ammunition.

“Can you drop me off at the car rental place instead