Burn Before Reading(73)

I hear the smack of flesh-on-flesh, and I see Mark hit the ground, but when I turn to see who did it I don’t fully believe it’s Bee. It can’t be Bee, with her fist raised, her eyes glowing with unholy rage. The crowd goes quiet, all of us frozen in the moment. And then she snaps.

Beatrix Cruz, all five feet three inches of her, pounces on Mark’s chest and beats at him with her fists.

And then Mark does something I’ve never, not in an entire year of knowing him, heard him do.

He cries out in pain.

It’s the cue for the crowd to start moving in outrage, for the ref to blow his whistle and Burn and Fitz to peel Bee off Mark. Mark stands shakily, his nose bloody and his eyes screaming daggers at me. I know that look. He wants more than anything to take this out on me, somehow, any way he can.

Even after two years, he hasn’t changed. I’m still his scapegoat. In my deepest heart I thought he’d change. I thought he’d at least start seeing me as a person after I stood up for myself. But no. The look in his eyes confirms that; a look that tells me I’m nothing more than trash to him.

Someone stands in front of me, arms outstretched. Bee, as short as she is, squares her chin.

“You don’t get to look at him,” She snarls. “Get out of here. Away from here. I never want to see you around Wolf again.”

“I’m here for my brother,” He spits. “So you can fuck off.”

“Enough!” Coach’s voice bellows. “Wolf, you’re on the bench for the rest of the competitions, anyway. Get out, before I charge your friend with detention.”

“He’s the one who –” Bee struggles for words, pointing an accusing finger at Mark. “He’s the one who called him –”

If she stays, if I stay, there’s no telling what I’ll do. Or what she’ll do, apparently. And Burn and Fitz are glaring at Mark so hard it’s like they’re trying to set him on fire.

I put my hand on her shoulder, and make my voice low.

“Bee, come on. Leave it.”

She whirls to face me. “We don’t have to leave! It isn’t fair!”

“And I’m not about to see you get punished,” I say. “For standing up for me. Now let’s go.”

“Ice cream,” Burn agrees, never once taking his eyes off Mark. “My treat.”

“You do know I could have your ISP in under seven minutes, right?” Fitz calls to Mark as we walk away. “I hope you like frozen bank accounts!”

“Fitz,” I hiss. “That’s enough.”

“Oh come on, Wolf! I was just getting warmed up. What’s a few harmless electronic threats between friends, hm?”

“He’s not your friend,” Bee says, hard. “He’s not any of our friends’. Ever.”

Fitz sighs, twirling his black umbrella with flourish. “Okay, miss MMA fighter.”

“I’m not an MMA fighter, dorkwad.”

“Tell that to the punch that decked that biphobic dick flat on his ass,” Fitz smirks.

“I hope she broke his nose,” Burn agrees.

“Alright, enough.” I exhale. “Let’s just go.”

“Where?” Burn asks.

“Anywhere. Anywhere that’s far away from here.”

“How about the Haagen-Daaz store up north?”

“Fine.”

Fitz chants ‘haagen-daaz’ a million times as he slides into Burn’s convertible. Bee looks hesitant, then turns to me as I’m putting on my helmet and shoes.

“Can I…ride with you?”

I want to tell her to ride with Burn. To stay away from me. Mark knows her, now. He’s touched her with his filthy tendrils of hate and vitriol. I wanted to keep her away from that. I wanted to keep her safe from it.

From my past.

I nod. “Yeah.”

I pass her a helmet, and soon we’re on the road, Mom’s bike eating up pavement. At a stoplight, a warm pair of slender arms hesitantly clasp around my waist, and I feel the pressure and heat of her chest against my back.

“Is this okay?” She asks. I wait for the tremors in my hands. They’re small, so small compared to what they were just minutes ago. She isn’t Mark. She won’t hurt me. That much is clear.

I know that much about her for sure.

I nod, and she rests her head on my shoulderblades, the weight and warmth of her better than any spinning rings on my fingers.

****

BEATRIX



A week after what Burn and Fitz and I have been referring to as ‘the pool thing’, Fitz hacks me.

I guess he decided it was a good reward for defending his brother against his abuser, but frankly, I couldn’t understand the logic. Not that I understood the logic of anything that went down that day – I couldn’t understand Mark’s awful, discriminate hate. I couldn’t understand why the pool people didn’t ban him for being so awful instead of asking us to leave. I couldn’t understand why Wolf let me ride on his bike with him again, this time practically hugging him.

But if there’s one thing I learned with Dad’s illness, it’s that maybe I didn’t need to understand. Maybe I just needed to be there.

So yeah - Fitz hacked me. And what did he do with his almighty powers over my computational livelihood? He made my entire desktop background a picture of a pizza with corn on it.