It was none of his business! If he hadn’t butted in, everything would be all right now. No, not all right. Perfect. She’s angry. She’s angry with him, but angrier with herself. She hates herself. His name can’t seem to come to her lips, but his face is the only thing she sees. His smile with the slightly crooked front tooth. His shocked face in the last days when she swept by him in the hallways.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡLM4pxeKHa8
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQhEfDaVwgQ
He’s the first person she’s ever shown her world. She let him come over and led him to stand under the person-sized rectangle in the ceiling. She jumped up and grabbed the screen, so the panel opened downward and a jagged ladder descended to them. She’d always liked that panel. It was a secret room, her secret.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgdMnOYYIjt
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhmtz6YeJHU
She had to go first, turn on the electricity and see his reaction. She was apprehensive. This project of hers had become such a part of her that any judgment on it was a judgment on her. It turned out she didn’t have to worry.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡd4BodKS1ou
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ96i86K7buN
The lights turned on in minute buildings that she’d carefully made herself. Realistic stoplights flicked from green to amber to red in front of cars that never moved. Electric trains whirred on tracks, through the little town, over miniscule bridges, around plastic trees and Lego people. He stood there, awed, his body still, but his eyes flickering, taking in everything. Then he raised his eyes to hers and smiled.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFSHLHP1LDB
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKU6l5a2xQE
She never would have even done that much if she hadn’t seen him drawing a ninja in chemistry. He wrote neatly over the top “FUTURE JOB.” When she glanced back at his desk, the picture had vanished. In response to her quizzical look, he’d mouthed, “Ninjas don’t stay out in the open.”844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJAEZsrPLyu
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUk4kb1C5qy
And that was that.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7zea4YwTw0
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrpMnx1y2lr
Although they’d gone to the same school since kindergarten, they had never spoken before. They were completely different. Yet after his first time in her house, when he saw her attic, she was filled with him. His butterscotch hair, his eyes like the foggy San Francisco sky. And all he wanted was to be with her.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAHrDz8KH7u
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJlSHtZ2KIO
He was the one who taught her to play the guitar, patiently showing her over and over until his fingers bled. Then he bandaged them and continued with the lesson until she got bored and moved onto something else. He was always doing things like that, just for her.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJxv7KjvMIV
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvTaWEPnFhC
She imagines she’s sitting in her attic, surrounded by her little world. In her mind’s eye she lifts a toy car and passes it between her palms. It was when she was in an airplane that she got the idea to make it – when she saw the sprawling city beneath her, aglow with the light of the setting sun. It’s comforting somehow to have a world that she can control. She’s the God of her own little world.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0HbKiL2m3Q
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGXZXgMpSEe
“Dancing Queen” was written for her, according to him, which has always been strange to her. She listened to artists like Radiohead, Avenged Sevenfold, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and Queen. But then she also started listening to artists like ABBA and Taylor Swift, just to hear what he heard and to try and see herself through his eyes.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡz8KOdA6UZO
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDj3NllNTgz
She was up for everything, afraid to try nothing. He doodled and read literature, inscribing notes into the margins. They complemented each other perfectly, but she wasn’t as wild as everyone saw her and he wasn’t as quiet, especially not when they were in each other’s arms. They could lie for hours just taking in each curve on each other’s faces and speck in each other’s eyes as their breathing synchronized perfectly, their chests rising and falling in rhythm.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡio0GuM8oet
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡANcUZYScOh
He forced her to read the classics. She’d always had a sort of romantic notion about reading, but she was too lazy to do it and she got so easily bored. But he acted out scenes for her, brought in his favorite film reproductions. Her read to her in a British accent, a Scottish one, French, Australian. Or he read in his own voice and still she was mesmerized.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡu4m6j6k1U0
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4aUF6HcLlv
If only he’d kept his nose out her business. She could have dealt. It was just two more years. She’d have been free.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuSheIW1d8n
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2hwZ3sliyI
He was the one who had found her that day and driven her to the emergency room, face pale, eyes lit and frightened.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2sgvoDniog
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQvrS0XMTBS
That had ruined everything.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡoe6EVcpLk8
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsjXNkG8K4y
How did it feel? Did you raise out your arms, begging to be carried away? Did you feel the wind sweep under your arms and lift you up? Did it hurt? Did the headlights blind you? Did you think of me?844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNppEDzi5B4
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQbptcZy9Hu
He’d met her dad once and only once. He had seen what everyone else saw. A mild-mannered single dad who was involved just enough in his daughter’s life.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡc6kBuZecwu
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJmbt8zM2n6
But then he’d seen the bruises on her back. She’d lied about them at first, the way she always had, but it didn’t take long for him to figure it out. When she was rammed into a table hard enough to break her ribs, his suspicions were confirmed.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqay2CC1jVc
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaXiz739AMy
“You need to get away from your dad,” he told her, although she could see behind his eyes that he couldn’t reconcile the polite man he’d met with the purveyor of the bluish-purple splotching her back or stretching across her chest.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡAHuC0Rcwof
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBgEtBoEM4b
Thrown into sharp relief in her mind is the expression when she had collided into him just two weeks ago. Disappointment. Disbelief. Despair. Two weeks ago he had been able to feel all those. Now he can’t feel anything at all.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6t7cq4sk3O
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHinNLaVZFx
He was just trying to help. Was it really possible to love someone and still feel a vicious, vindictive pleasure when her classmates snubbed him? He had deserved it at the time. He should never have interfered.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNGs3qiRtzu
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUyqAK8ykIs
She didn’t need child protection services. She was sixteen, for god’s sake. She would be an adult in two years, go to college, and be free. She would have been able to put up with that bullshit until then. Her dad wanted her to go to Stanford. Every breath he breathed worked toward sending her to Stanford, but that was absolutely the last thing she wanted when she could see the lights of its football field out her window and hear the cheers. It was always more obvious when they were playing Berkeley, the air was more electrified.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡesuLUfB4Oi
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHK5ofZCSxJ
He used to come over sometimes, during the football games and they used to try to guess from the yells which team it was that had just scored.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡYu1TgAZjFv
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡDEhWxXs3FL
She isn’t in her attic right now. She’s in a foreign room in her estranged aunt’s house, feeling out of place. She doesn’t belong here. It isn’t home. There’s no home anymore. And it’s all because of him. It’s his fault – not for calling child protection services, but for being gone.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdkxMs69erx
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡSWHUGPjpXZ
She collapses backwards onto the bed, presses her palms against her eyes. She suddenly wonders if her dad smashed her world in the attic. The thought of that makes her finally begin to cry when she has been too numb to do so all this time.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMoUmqtXTSD
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4yb3AqDAyd
There’s a story she read once in the news about how a man flew home, to be welcomed back by his wife and daughter meeting him on the runway. He swept his daughter into his arms and into the air, only to have her head sliced off by the airplane’s propeller. The story has haunted her ever since she heard it. It comes into her mind sometimes and sits there, an unwelcome squatter. She could never imagine how anyone could live with that guilt. All he’d wanted to do was celebrate being reunited with his beloved daughter and had inadvertently killed her. How do you move on from something like that?844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡnkTOR4xp9K
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKRjz843J66
She was pulled out of class by child protective services, so everyone knew. It happened to be chemistry, so she yanked her backpack and shot him the angriest glare she could muster. She hadn’t spoken to him after that, not once. She hadn’t returned his calls, had pretended he was invisible when he came to her in person.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5byYTAQSiR
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQkLibNKfeb
She had warned him it would happen. He had promised not to tell anyone and she hated broken promises more than almost anything else in the world.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKXsmhmc81p
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4pWkfVFWDd
Since she’d been pulled out of chemistry class in front of classmates, it wasn’t exactly a secret – everyone knew. Everyone also believed her adamant claims that he was wrong, everything was good at home. It was easier for them to ignore her injuries in favor the illusion of perfection. They hissed at him, tripped him, or booed him completely. At least in front of her they did.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRV0kcx7MSM
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxKLtkgTnhJ
She didn’t lift a finger to stop them, didn’t even look his way.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ9IDdvRAniR
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6sbKolaOUV
He stopped calling after a while and she found herself lonely. She had been irked that he dared to call after what he’d done. Now that he’d stopped, she found herself missing his voice, even in the form of firmly non-apologetic voicemails.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ5TzE2daiKt
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbM0MrM1hsI
She didn’t know what bothered her more – that he had the nerve to confront something that many others had probably known about but had averted their eyes from, or that he had loved her enough to risk alienating her completely.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡli4LzyLmxc
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡiNsCuVfdq4
And then – and then the call. He had been hit by train, the conductor had called the paramedics, they were there, it was too late, he was pronounced dead at the scene, taken straight to the morgue instead of the emergency room. His blood alcohol level was precariously high, probably to dull the pain. Which indicated, of course, that he had committed suicide.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQDU2iXI4bX
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡL74TTyLS5M
Suicide, they said, but she knows she might as well have pushed him herself. When the numbness goes away, how can she live with herself? His mother says he didn’t seem suicidal, but his mother wasn’t with him at school. She should have seen it in those eyes instead of looking down and away.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡD9RuYVrmhx
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaxMNpy79GI
It makes no sense to her anymore. Why was she so angry with him? It made sense at first, but then again, he’s the only thing that has ever made sense in her life.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWeIHRUx9Si
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJ8HzZ4CW39
She is so fucking mad. She’s mad at herself for treating him like she did. She’s mad at him for thinking she’d never forgive him.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡl4y4uNx0Uy
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrsfAmVAhVW
She stands up beside a bare desk beneath the window. Other than her textbooks, there’s one thing on it – a frame, tipped over so the picture can’t be seen. She lifts it up and lets her finger slide down the reproduction of a face that she will never see or touch or kiss again.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2OIOAWocn5
844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHtVSQ13kIl
She was wrong all along. This whole time she’s been thinking she lost her home once she was sent to live with her aunt and uncle. The truth was, she truly lost her home the moment he jumped in front of that train.844Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡdS1X0muwmA
Penana
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