How to Repair a Mechanical Heart - By J. C. Lillis Page 0,67
at her. “I guess.”
“I feel like crap. I totally told whispering!sage I’d meet her at the Long Beach con. Like, why did I do that? You lie enough and all of a sudden it’s like lying is the language you speak and your first language starts to disappear.” Her eyes get bright and hungry. “God. That’s good. I wish I still wrote fic.”
She tries a smile. I can’t.
“Look, I said I was sorry,” she sighs. “What do you want? Money? I’m completely broke.”
“No…no.”
“Seriously—you can’t be surprised. Not really. People pretend all the time. You live online, pretty much everyone’s a character.” She points an eyebrow. “Even you. Right?”
“That’s different.”
“Why? Because shit got real and you’re all in love now?”
“Italics not necessary.”
“Oh, Brandon.” She crunches up the gummy bear bag. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but as the Internet’s foremost expert on you, I think you need some therapy.”
“Really.”
“I mean, whatever: you guys are pretty hot together. I’ll admit. I wouldn’t have kept writing that silly fic if you weren’t, you know…compelling in some way. But taking your past into consideration?” She makes a dismissive tch sound. “I don’t think you’re ready for a relationship.”
I feel six inches high. “That’s…mean.”
“No it’s not. Look, I freaked when I saw your schmoopy post that night. It was a total what-have-I-done, Frankenstein’s-monster moment. I had no clue it would go this far.”
“Yeah, well, we would’ve—”
“Hooked up anyway? Maybe, maybe not. It’s a bad idea regardless. I’m a screwed-up Catholic too, you know? I sympathize. I mean, Missy’s too full of herself to have hangups but I’m a total chickenshit in real life, to the point where I’m too chickenshit to even deal with being chickenshit, which means I’ll never get anything figured out.” She pops a handful of gummy bears. “I’ll probably be a virgin till I die. I think I might be a lesbian. Or maybe I’m bi, I don’t know. I don’t have any answers.”
“Oh.”
“Like, all that stuff I spouted in my fic, how God didn’t make us to suffer? Pfft. How would I know? Maybe he’s like Xaarg and he uses us for his sick amusement, you know? Maybe he thinks it’s hilarious that I’m attracted to people, but then I sort of feel like throwing up when they touch me, and I’ll probably end up dying alone in a studio apartment with a Chihuahua eating my face off.”
I study the railing. “You won’t.”
“Don’t be so sure. Honestly, I don’t think people ever get un-screwed-up. I think it’s just, how well can you pretend to be someone else, and how long.”
Two businessmen in suits clomp across the bridge. The koi startle and scatter. Abel appears across the lobby, scanning with the bewildered concentration of someone trying to find someone.
My time with her is almost up.
“So, ah,” I draw in a breath that makes my throat ache. “Guess you weren’t really sent by God?”
I try to keep my voice light and jokey, but it splinters on the word God. She flicks one last gummy bear off the railing and stares down into the clear trembling water.
“You’ve thrown a lot of pennies in ponds,” she says. “Haven’t you.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
I don’t want Abel to find me. Not yet. I duck down a corridor, slip into a quiet stairwell.
I don’t think people ever get un-screwed-up.
My heart pummels so hard I expect to hear an echo.
I don’t think you’re ready for a relationship.
I lean over the railing. My head swarms. I wish I was good at dismissing people. I could be like Nat: What a bitch. Screw her. Who does she think she is?
I don’t have any answers.
My phone goes off. I jump. HOME CALLING.
I sink down on the steps and pick it up, not thinking it through. All I’m thinking is yes, please, I need home.
“Thank God,” Mom says. “Brandon, we were worried!”
“You haven’t called for days,” Dad snaps. “We just get one email, four words long—”
I feel like crying. “I’m sorry.”
“You could’ve been kidnapped. Maybe someone was impersonating you. How would we know?”
“Did you really think—”
“Oh, it doesn’t matter! The point is, you made your mother lose sleep.”
“You’ve just been having fun with Becky, right, Brandon?” Mom says. “That’s all.”
I drop my head on the concrete step behind me. “Yeah,” I get out. “It’s been really great.”
“That’s so wonderful. See, Greg?”
“Did you take her out for that dinner?” Dad harrumphs.
“No, but I will.” I close my eyes. “Maybe tonight. I think tonight we will.”
“Okay. All right,” Dad says. I sense the anger funneling