All These Things I've Done (Birthright #1)(2)

I took my school uniform from my closet and laid it out on my desk chair for the next day. I organized my bag and charged up my slate. I broke off a single piece of dark chocolate. The flavour was strong and woodsy. I rewrapped the rest in its silver foil and put it in my top drawer for safekeeping. I was glad I hadn’t had to share it with Gable.

You’re probably asking why Gable was my boyfriend when I barely wanted to share chocolate with him. The thing is, he wasn’t boring. He was a little dangerous and, stupid girl that I was, I guess I found that sort of thing attractive. And – God rest your soul, Daddy – it could be said that I lacked positive male role models. Besides, sharing chocolate wasn’t some casual thing: it really was hard to come by.

I decided to take a shower so I wouldn’t have to do it in the morning. When I got out ninety seconds later (everyone’s showers ran on timers because of how expensive water was getting), Gable was sitting cross-legged on my bed while stuffing the last of my chocolate bar down his throat.

‘Hey,’ I said, my towel wrapped around me, ‘you went into my drawer!’

Chocolate was smudged on his thumb, index finger, and the inside corners of his mouth. ‘I wasn’t snooping. I sniffed it out,’ he said in the middle of a bite. He paused chomping long enough to look up at me. ‘You look pretty, Annie. Clean.’

I wrapped my towel tighter around myself. ‘Well, now that you’re awake and you’ve had your chocolate, you should leave,’ I said.

He didn’t move.

‘Come on, then! Out!’ I said this strongly, if not loudly. I didn’t want to wake my siblings or Nana.

That’s when he told me that he thought we should have sex.

‘No,’ I said, wishing very much that I hadn’t been so foolish as to take a shower while a dangerous, over-caffeinated boy lay in wait on my bed. ‘Absolutely not.’

‘Why not?’ he asked. And then he said that he was in love with me. It was the first time a boy had ever told me that. Even as inexperienced as I was, I could tell he didn’t mean it.

‘I want you to go,’ I said. ‘We’ve got school tomorrow, and we both should get some sleep.’

‘I can’t go now. It’s past midnight.’

Not that there were enough cops to enforce it, but midnight was the citywide, under-eighteen curfew. It was only 11.45, so I lied and told him he could still make it if he ran.

‘I’ll never make it, Annie. Besides, my parents aren’t home, and your grandma will never know if I stay. Come on. Be sweet to me.’

I shook my head and tried to look tough, which was somewhat hard to do while wearing a yellow, flowered towel.

‘Doesn’t it count for anything that I just told you I love you?’ Gable asked.

I considered this briefly before deciding that it didn’t. ‘Not really. Not when I know you don’t mean it.’

He looked at me with big, dumb eyes like I had hurt his feelings or something. Then he cleared his throat and tried a different technique. ‘Come on, Annie. We’ve been together almost nine months. That’s the longest I’ve ever been with anyone. So . . . Like . . . Why not?’

I gave him my list. One, I said, we were too young. Two, I didn’t love him. And three, the most important of all, I didn’t believe in sex before marriage. I was a mostly good Catholic girl, and I knew exactly where the type of behaviour he was suggesting would get me: straight to Hell. For the record, I very much believed (and believe) in Heaven and Hell, and not in an abstract way either. More about this later.

His eyes were a little crazy – maybe it was the contraband he’d consumed – and he got up from the bed and walked closer to me. He started tickling my bare arms.

‘Stop that,’ I said. ‘Seriously, Gable, this isn’t funny. I know you’re trying to get me to drop my towel.’

‘Why’d you take that shower if you didn’t want—’

I told him I’d scream.

‘And then what?’ he asked. ‘Your grandma can’t get out of bed. Your brother’s a retard. And your sister’s just a kid. All you’ll do is make them upset.’

Part of me couldn’t believe this was actually happening in my own house. That I’d allowed myself to be so witless and vulnerable. I hooked my towel under my armpits, and I pushed Gable away as hard as I could. ‘Leo is not a retard!’ I yelled.

I heard a door open at the end of the hallway and then footsteps. Leo, who was tall like Daddy had been (six feet five inches), appeared in my doorway wearing pyjamas with a pattern of dogs and bones on them. Even though I had been handling things, I had never been so happy to see my big brother. ‘Hey, Annie!’ Leo wrapped me in a quick hug before turning to my soon-to-be ex-boyfriend. ‘Hello, Gable,’ Leo said. ‘I heard noise. I think you should leave now. You woke me, which is OK. But if you wake Natty that won’t be good, because she has to go to school tomorrow.’

Leo led Gable to our front door. I didn’t relax until I heard it shut and Leo had latched the chain.

‘I don’t think your boyfriend is very nice,’ Leo told me when he got back.

‘You know what? I don’t think so either,’ I said. I picked up Gable’s discarded chocolate wrappers and crushed them into a ball. By Nana’s standards, the only chocolate-worthy boy in my life was my brother.