All Your Perfects(8)

“You just broke your phone.”

He pops a pretzel into his mouth. “It’s full of nothing but pictures and texts from Sasha. I’ll get a new one tomorrow.”

I lay my phone on the bar and I stare at it. It’s silent for a moment, but Ethan calls for a second time. As soon as his name flashes across the screen, I have the urge to do exactly what Graham just did. I’m due for a new phone, anyway.

When the ringing stops and a text from Ethan comes through, I give my phone a shove. We watch as my phone slips over the other side of the bar.

We go back to playing tic-tac-toe. I win the first game. Graham wins the second. Third is a draw.

Graham picks up another one of the pretzels and eats it. I don’t know if it was the shot I took or if I’m just confused by the turmoil of today, but every time Graham looks at me, I can feel the look trickle down my skin. And my chest. Everywhere, actually. I can’t tell if he makes me nervous or if I just have a buzz. Either way, this feeling is better than the devastation I would be feeling right now if I were at home alone.

I replace the piece of pretzel grid that Graham just ate. “I have a confession,” I say.

“Nothing you say can beat the past couple of hours of my life. Confess away.”

I lean my elbow against the bar and prop my head on my hand. I give him a sidelong glance. “Sasha came outside. After you walked away.”

Graham can see the shame in my expression. His eyebrows raise in curiosity. “What did you do, Quinn?”

“She asked which way you went. I refused to tell her.” I sit up straight and swing the chair so that I’m facing him. “But before I got in my car, I turned around and said, ‘Eight hundred dollars on a word game? Really, Sasha?’?”

Graham stares at me. Hard. It makes me wonder if I crossed a line. I probably shouldn’t have said that to her, but I was bitter. I don’t regret it.

“What’d she say?”

I shake my head. “Nothing. Her mouth kind of fell open in shock, but then it started raining and she ran back inside Ethan’s apartment building.”

Graham is staring at me with so much intensity. I hate it. I wish he’d laugh or get angry that I interfered. Something.

He says nothing.

Eventually, his eyes lower until he’s staring down between us. We’re facing each other, but our legs aren’t touching. Graham’s hand that’s resting on his knee moves forward a little until his fingers graze my knee, just below the hem of my skirt.

It’s both subtle and obvious. My entire body tenses at the contact. Not because I don’t like it, but because I can’t remember the last time Ethan’s touch sent this much heat through me.

Graham traces a circle over the top of my knee with his finger. When he looks up at me again, I’m not confused by the look in his eyes. It’s very clear what he’s thinking now.

“You want to get out of here?” His voice is both a whisper and a plea.

I nod.

Graham stands and pulls his wallet out of his pocket. He lays some cash on the bar and then slips into his jacket. He reaches down and threads his fingers through mine, leading me through the restaurant, out the door and hopefully toward something that makes this day worth waking up for.





Chapter Four




* * *





Now


Graham once asked me why I take such long showers. I don’t remember what my excuse was. I’m sure I said they were relaxing, or that the hot water was good for my skin. But I take such long showers because it’s the only time I allow myself to grieve.

I feel weak for needing to grieve since no one has died. It doesn’t make sense that I grieve so much for those who never even existed.

I’ve been in the shower for half an hour now. When I woke up this morning, I incorrectly assumed it would be a quick, painless shower day. But that changed when I saw the blood. I shouldn’t be shocked. It happens every month. It’s happened every month since I was twelve.

I’m standing flat against the shower wall, allowing the spray of the shower to fall over my face. The stream of water dilutes my tears and it makes me feel less pathetic. It’s easier to convince myself I’m not crying that hard when most of what’s falling down my cheeks is water.

I’m doing my makeup now.

Sometimes this happens. One second I’m in the shower, the next second I’m not. I lose myself in the grief. I get so lost that by the time I climb my way out of the dark, I’m in a new place. This new place is me, naked, in front of the bathroom mirror.

I slide the lipstick over my bottom lip and then my top. I set it down and stare at my reflection. My eyes are red from the grief but my makeup is in place, my hair has been pulled back, my clothes are folded neatly on the counter. I look at my body in the mirror, covering both breasts with my hands. From the outside, I look healthy. My hips are wide, my stomach is flat, my breasts are average and perky. When men look at me, sometimes their eyes linger.

But inside, I am not at all attractive. I am not internally appealing by Mother Nature’s standards, because I do not have a working reproductive system. Reproduction is why we exist, after all. Reproduction is required to complete the circle of life. We are born, we reproduce, we raise our offspring, we die, our offspring reproduce, they raise their offspring, they die. Generation after generation of birth, life, and death. A beautiful circle not meant to be broken.