Page 48 of Badd Ass

I stared up at him. “Yeah?”

“We both know something happened back there, so there’s no point denying it.”

“Okay?”

“So, yeah, I’m yours.” He paused, as I had. “For this week, at least.”

“And after this week?” I couldn’t help asking.

He let silence build between us, not letting go of my arms. “Are we really gonna have this conversation right here, right now?”

I shook my head, realizing how right he was. “No.” I pulled out of his grip and re-threaded my fingers through his. “No, we’re not.”

We walked another half mile or so, reaching downtown and the movie theater. There were only two movies playing, as Zane had said there would be—an action movie, and a rom-com; Zane told me to pick, so I went with the rom-com. He paid for the tickets and led us into the movie theater…all the way up in the very back against the rear wall, in the corner farthest from the door.

As we waited for the movie to start, he glanced at me. “You know, I’ve told you a bit about myself, and I’m realizing I don’t know dick about you.” He rubbed a thumb over my knuckles. “You don’t have to get into anything gnarly or super deep, but…I’d like to know a little about what makes Amarantha Quinn tick.”

I sighed, long and slow. “Okay. Well, what do you want to know?”

He shook his head. “Nope, that’s not how this works. You tell me what you want to share, and if I have questions, I’ll ask, but you’re not obligated to answer if you don’t want to.”

I tapped a finger against the armrest. “I’m an only child, so there’s that. Which means I truly do not understand your family.” I hesitated, because that was about as much as I usually shared. “I grew up in a little podunk town in Indiana. My mother is a dental hygienist. I played varsity volleyball in high school. I had a horse, a Rocky Mountain mare named Ethel.”

“The horse’s name was Ethel?”

I laughed. “Yeah. We bought her from a breeder, and he named her that, not sure why though.”

There was silence then, with Zane eyeing me expectantly. When I didn’t burst forth with any more intel, he frowned at me. “That’s it?”

I shrugged. “What else is there?”

He tugged on a lock of my hair. “Quite a bit. You didn’t mention your dad, for one thing.”

“That’s a touchy subject.”

Zane sighed. “Look, I’m really not trying to push. But I just feel like like maybe you don’t really trust me. Which I get, I guess. But I thought this was supposed to be us practicing opening up to each other. But so far, I’m the only one doing any trusting. I told you about Marco. Not even my brothers know Campy had a kid.”

I groaned. “It’s not about trust, Zane. It’s just…I don’t talk about Dad. You want to know about my boyfriends in high school? I’ll tell you. I dated Brad Riley my freshman year. He was my first boyfriend, my first kiss, and the guy I went to second base with for the first time. He broke up with me after three months to date the captain of the cheerleader squad—who also happened to be the school slut. I guess I wasn’t moving fast enough for Brad? I don’t know. He just gave me a generic break up excuse and was tongue-fucking Cherry the cheerleader in the hallways the next day.” I lowered my voice as the lights dimmed and the previews started, although we were the only ones in the theater, so far. “I dated Dane Howell in tenth grade, to whom I gave my virginity on prom night, in the back of his shitty Ford Taurus. We dated most of tenth grade. Eleventh grade was Tom Wyland, Jeremy Ring, and Morris Morrison.”

“Morris Morrison?”

I snickered. “Yeah. He went by Morrie. Hated his name, hated his parents, and drove a brand new Mustang he’d bought himself dealing pot at the elementary school playground after school.” A teenaged couple entered the theater and sat a few rows down from us, giggling together. “Senior year was Joey Fustinelli, but I only dated him a few weeks as a ‘fuck you’ to my mom. He was a major douchebag, and I never even slept with him. Kyle Pruitt, who was nice, but a little slow. Greg Michaels, a Harvard-bound soccer star, and a stuck up prick who I only dated because he had a BMW and a credit card and used me as a fuck you to his parents, which worked out for me because I got cool points in school and a couple really nice Coach purses. And last, but not least, Isaac Horowitz. Sweet, poor as dirt and nearly illiterate, but good-looking in an unassuming way, and would legitimately give you the shirt off his back if you asked for it. He was the epitome of wrong side of the tracks. His mom was black, and his dad was a non-practicing Orthodox Jew. Isaac was…amazing, actually. Really, really amazing. Probably the most genuinely kind person I’ve ever met.”

Zane was quiet for a minute, and then he twisted that same lock of hair around his index finger. “Can I ask what happened?”

I had to breathe slowly for a moment or two before answering. “He was bullied his whole life. All through elementary school, junior high, high school. Beat up, made fun of, treated like shit. He never let it get to him, just kept on being himself despite it. We were assigned to be partners for an AP physics project. He was nearly illiterate because he was dyslexic, but he was a wizard with numbers and things, and physics wasn’t really my thing, but I was smart enough to make the AP class. I joined late, and Isaac had been left without a partner because nobody wanted to work with him. So I was stuck with him. That’s how I saw it at first, too. Like everyone else, I just sort of either pitied or looked down on him, because I didn’t understand him. Then we were partners on the project, and I got to know him. Discovered what kind of person he really was, you know? Saw past the crappy, dirty, third-hand clothes and the way he stuttered through English class, and how painfully shy and withdrawn he was.”

“Not liking where this is going.”

I shook my head. “Whatever you might be thinking, it’s worse.” I swallowed hard. “I stuck up for him. Became his friend, and then eventually we were spending all our time together. I lost all social standing at school, but Isaac had made me realize how stupid all that was. I…I don’t know. We never talked about being in love or anything, but Isaac was…special. Super, super important to me. The bullying got worse. They started targeting me. This is rural Indiana, remember. Lots of the kids were…um, let’s just say they were closed minded. Learned it from their parents. Not that everyone was like that; I’m not saying that. There were some really nice, sweet people. But there were others who were just…cruel. They spray-painted swastikas on his locker and then went to his house and burned crosses in his yard. Evil shit like that. I’m not talking just pushing him around and punching him a few times, this was hard core antagonization.” I had to swallow again. “Um. Like I said, when Isaac and I went open with our relationship, it got…ugly. Really, really ugly. The whole town got sort of…dragged into it. His dad got beat up so bad he was hospitalized and lost his job at the factory, his mom was fired by her racist boss, and they started egging my house, slashing my tires, all sorts of nasty stuff.”

“Jesus.”

I nodded, blinking hard. “One day, um, I was driving Isaac home. He lived a long way outside town, so you had to drive through a whole bunch of nothing, just endless cornfields. No traffic, no neighbors, no gas stations, just the highway and the corn. Well, I got rear-ended. Lost control, ended up in the corn. Hit my head and passed out. When I came to, Isaac…uh—shit. Isaac had been—they’d dragged him out of my car and beat him…beat him so badly he…”

I couldn’t keep going, and Zane sat holding my hand, waiting.

I cleared my throat. “A semi saw the headlights in the field and stopped. Radioed for help. But by the time the cops came, Isaac was gone.”