Push(54)

“I am not going to jump,” I say quietly. When we are off this bridge, I am going to sucker punch him. “Let’s just go home, okay? Let’s go make love and forget this whole conversation even happened.” I am starting to feel nauseated. I turn away from him and start to climb back up to the bridge deck, but I feel his hand on my arm, pulling me back down. And then he has a hold of both my arms.
“Jump,” he says, with his hands firmly gripping each of my upper arms. His eyes are loaded, charged with energy. They are telling me he’s enjoying the absolute control he has over this moment. Over whether I live or die. But they are also making me afraid, and I think he likes it.
“I am not going to jump,” I say again, this time with blatant, yet unwelcome, fear in my voice. I am shaking and staring right at him, hoping he will come to his senses when he sees that he has taken this whole thing too far. I try to pull myself out of his grip, but I am balanced on this metal beam and I don’t want my own struggling to cause me to fall. I tell him to let me go.
But instead he tips my body to the side. He is going to push me. He is going to send me off this bridge and into the water. But why? Why would he do that? I don’t understand. Then he smiles. A face-cracking smile. A “happy-as-shit” smile. The kind I have never seen before. He pushes hard against my side, and my feet slip off the truss.
I am flipping off this bridge in a cartwheel. But the trusses are in the way. I feel my hand crack into one, and then my hip. The smack of my head against the steel sounds bright and crisp inside my brain. Then everything is quiet.



chapter Twenty-Four

Emma—Present Day

Oh. My. God. What the f*ck happened last night? My eyes open, and I can only look up at the ceiling, trying desperately not to move. I am terrified that if I turn my head or move my arm, the retching will start again. That is the thing I remember the most. The endless puking. Countless dry heaves. Being put into the shower. And not by David.
Memories come flinging back at me, smacking me with their humiliation. I was shit-faced. Completely shit-faced. Of that I am sure. And David, he was mad at me, but not for long. It was a misunderstanding about Matt and the bathroom, and when it was over, we were okay. Fantastic even. I think I may have told him that I’m falling for him. Not with those exact words but in a different way. Jesus. I hope I didn’t f*ck this up. I am such an ass.
I feel fuzzy and heavy at the same time. My head is pounding, and my mouth tastes unbelievably raunchy. My hair is still damp from the shower, and I am wearing someone’s T-shirt and nothing else. I remember laughing in the shower. Laughing about my blue panties with the black lace being all wet. Who put me in there?
Oh. My. God. It was Matt. Matt put me in David’s shower. Sweet Mother of God! I remember teasing him about his tattoo. About why he keeps it covered up at work. About why a grown man would want a tattoo of a cartoon rocket ship on his forearm. Oh, Christ almighty. I hate myself.
Work! Today is Wednesday. I am supposed to be at work. What time is it? I slowly turn my head to look at the clock, but I’m not in my own bed. Where is the f*cking clock? I can see from the light coming in between David’s blinds that it is easily late morning. That I have missed my first day of work only a few weeks after I started. And it is because I was drunk as shit, taunting one of my coworkers who more than likely saw me in soaking wet underwear. What else did he see? Why was Matt even here? And where was David? Where is David?
I lift my head and look around the room. There he is. Sitting in his bedroom chair, looking at me. Fuck. I think he’s furious. But when he sees me looking at him, he shakes his head and smiles. Not a big smile, mind you, but it’s definitely a smile. Maybe I didn’t f*ck this up. Maybe it isn’t as bad as I think. Maybe David doesn’t hate me.
“Good morning,” he says. I decide to save myself from the torture and cut to the chase.
“Just, please, tell me I didn’t f*ck things up,” I say.
“Fuck things up?” he asks. “No. You didn’t f*ck things up, Emma. You were f*cked up, but things are not.” Thank God. Thank f*cking God. “You were, however, one hell of an inebriated specimen last night. How much do you remember?”
“Not much. Just a lot of puking.” I don’t want to mention the shower. Maybe he doesn’t know about it. Maybe it’s better if he doesn’t know about it.
“Yes, there was whole a lot of that, as I understand.” Does that mean he wasn’t here when I was puking? Why wasn’t he here? Where was he?
“Sorry you had to see that,” I say, offering him a chance to answer my questions without actually having to ask them.
“I didn’t see any of it.”
“Oh.” Perhaps feigning innocence will save me. He looks almost disappointed that I don’t remember more.
“I had a job to finish last night, and I couldn’t walk away. Despite how much I wanted to.” He runs his fingers through his hair and leans forward on the chair. “You were completely f*cked up. I should have been watching you more. I should have been paying better attention to how much you were drinking. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“I’m a big girl, David. I should have been watching all that for myself. But I was having so much fun. I’m sorry if I embarrassed you or made things awkward between us. Or between you and your friends.”
“You don’t have to be sorry. Or embarrassed,” he says with a look of confusion on his face. “What do you remember?”
“I remember Matt.” There. I said it. It feels like a confessional.