Page 109 of The Long Way Home

“Sorry boys.” He shrugs. “Didn’t mean anything by it. I’m sure she’s great.”

“She is,” I tell him sternly.

“Magnolia, listen, I’d really love to catch up — you know, smooth everything over.”

“Perry.” I cross my arms over my chest. “There’s nothing to smooth.”

He flicks his eyes, a bit annoyed. “Magnolia, I—”

“—No, listen.” I shake my head. “I understand that you were more Paili’s best friend than mine, okay? You did the right thing by her but not by me. I don’t want to see you and I don’t want to catch up.”

“That’s bullshit, Magnolia.” Perry shakes his head.

“What’s that now?” Henry squares his shoulders.

“It’s fucking shit, Parks. And typical you.” He scoffs. “Always all about BJ.”

I lift my eyebrow, waiting for more.

“You’re out to lunch with BJ’s best friend—” He gestures at Jonah, his eyes clouding over with resentment.

“So?”

“So, you can’t forgive me but you can forgive Jonah?”

“You know that, do you?” I blink. “That I’ve forgiven Jonah?”

“Clearly.”

“Clear, is it?” I blink a few times as I point over at Perry. “You know how I feel in my chest when I see him?” I gesture towards Jo. “Jonah, my friend since I was twelve, who not only lied to me for three years about probably the most painful and monumental experience of my life but also concealed it, covered it up, took away my closure, and let me live in the dark while I floundered around in it, unable to move on, couldn’t let go because no one would tell me the fucking truth—”

“—Parks.” Jonah sighs, eyes heavy.

“We did the same things,” Perry tells me, though he looks a bit sorrier now. “I was just trying to protect Paili.”

“And who was trying to protect me?” I yell louder than I mean to. “I was the only one in that whole situation who didn’t do anything wrong, and who was making sure I was fine?”

“Magnolia.” Perry pushes his hands through his hair. “Darling, it was so long ago now. And it was one thing, one time, one mistake. I covered for my best friend in the world when she did a terrible thing, but I’m not the villain that you think I am—”

“—Oh, so you didn’t try to convince Paili to kiss BJ while he was high that time in Paris?” I stare over at him, unflinching.

Perry’s face freezes, but Henry and Jo stare over at me, eyes bulging.

“How do you know about that?” Perry asks.

“He told me.” In those letters he wrote me that I ignored.

Perry pulls back a bit. “He told you?”

“Did you or didn’t you?” I wait for his confession.

“Magnolia, listen, you’d been broken up nearly two years—”

“—I know, Perry.” I nod. “I remember.”

I remember everything about that night because it was the first night BJ got high since his overdose. It was about two and a bit years ago now. We were all in Paris, it had been such a fun trip til that point. BJ and I got adjoining hotel rooms so we could pretend that we wouldn’t just sleep in the same bed. We’d been there a few days and then this one night… he had a shoot the next morning, he said he didn’t want to drink because he didn’t want to feel like shit when he woke up. So he did a bump or three, because BJ can’t say no when with me or with drugs. I had a feeling by the time we were at the third club of the night — just with how he was touching me — as though we were by ourselves and not in a club with five hundred people who knew who we were and had their phones out and pointed at us. I was dating one of my foxholes at the time but he wasn’t there. I didn’t like bringing my (arguably) fake boyfriends away with us because they got in the way of being close to the boy I actually cared about, but still I didn’t want photos of BJ feeling me up in some club in Paris to be plastered all over The Sun so I went to the bathroom and when I walked back out I saw him. Rolled up €50 up his nose and I burst into tears on the spot.

“Parks!” He ran after me but I ran straight to Henry.