The Art of Losing(80)

Let me at least tell my mom first, I wrote back. She’ll want to friend you.

Nice, he answered. Moms love me. I post a lot of inspirational cat memes.

Armed with coffee and chocolate croissants, I drove to Cassidy’s with a smile on my face. She was outside before I’d even opened my car door. She wasn’t wearing shoes, but she got in the car anyway, pushing her curly hair out of her face.

“I have to stay in here until I’m calm,” she said, “or I’ll be going to jail for murder. You might want to lock the doors.”

“Nuisance?” I asked.

“Nuisance,” she confirmed. “She’s just begging to be killed, slowly and deliberately.” Only her sister could turn Cassidy into a murderer.

I pointed at her coffee and handed her a croissant.

“I think I’ll just drive you around the block until you’re caffeinated and full of flakey pastry. Get some distance between you and Morgan.”

She smiled grimly. “Good idea.” Then she tapped her plastic cup against mine. “Cheers, to sisters who make them hard to love and who we are saints to put up with.”

“Cheers,” I echoed, thinking how lucky I was to have Audrey instead of Morgan as my sister. All Audrey seemed to want was to spend more time with me, not deliberately hurt me. Even cheating with Mike was a cry for my attention.

I was no saint. I never would be. But I could try to be my best self. I would do the work.





Three Months Ago



The sun was high in the clear sky, baking the tops of my thighs to a raw chicken pink, while a cool breeze lifted the hair from my neck. It was an unsettling combination of warm and cool as I sat on the hot wooden planks of the pier with my toes skimming the chilly Chesapeake Bay.

It was April, the week of spring break, and Mike and his friends were swimming despite the frigidity of the water. And, being typical boys, they were splashing and yelling, and threatening to pull us girls into the water.

I sat with the rest of the girls who had been invited: a couple who were girlfriends of Mike’s friends, like me, and a couple who were just friends. I was reading the most recent issue of a comic, and though the other girls would sometimes try to include me in their conversation, which was generous of them, I just didn’t know how to answer. It wasn’t that I had little interest in discussing their friends’ problems or what they were planning to wear to dinner that night. (It hadn’t even occurred to me that I would need to bring multiple outfits; I had brought exactly enough clothes for the two days we were staying at Ryan’s family’s cabin.) It was more that I couldn’t figure out a response that didn’t make it obvious that I had no idea what I was talking about and that I was more interested in reading. So I just read instead. It got the message across, maybe more blatantly than I had intended.

I stood, having decided to go back up to the house and read on the porch in the shade, but Mike grabbed my ankle harder than I think he meant to, and I lost my balance. I slid into the freezing water, clothes and all. When I came up sputtering for air, I could see on his face that he was worried, that he had been drinking, and that he was sorry.

“Come on, Michael,” I whined, shoving him.

Some people might have been pissed about their clothes or their hair getting wet. I was pissed about my book, which was now floating soggily along the top of the water. Ryan fished it out and tossed it back onto the dock, where it landed with a wet thwack next to Connie. He flashed a mischievous smile at her and grabbed her by the ankle. Connie’s grin told me she knew what was coming as he pulled her off the dock.

Around us, the rest of the girls screamed as they splashed into the water.

Mike put his arms around my waist and pulled me toward his bare chest. I pushed back against him briefly, but he held strong. And he was warm, despite being in the water, so I let him hold me, slipping my arms up around his neck. He kissed me with wet lips and the guys in the water around us whooped.

“Sorry, baby,” he said. “I didn’t mean to ruin your book; I just wanted you to stay here with me.”

I tried not to roll my eyes and failed. “Then next time, use your words,” I said. “You’re officially the worst, and you owe me a new copy of Squirrel Girl.”

My instinct told me to get out of the water and run back to the house to get out of the now see-through white shirt I was wearing. But Mike kissed me again, deeper this time, and I wrapped my legs around his waist, enjoying the moment. Around us, his friends splashed one another and played chicken, trying to knock the girls off the guys’ shoulders. I declined their invitation to play, but I stayed in the water until my teeth were chattering.

When I finally climbed back up onto the dock, the rest of the girls followed me, heading to the house to change. And suddenly I understood how they all knew to bring extra clothes.

That night, we were all in the living room of the cabin while a fire roared in the fireplace. Most of us were drinking, including me, and since no one had to be worried about going home to their parents or driving anywhere, everyone was drunker than I’d ever seen them. The night had descended into a contest between some of the guys as they tried to outdrink one another. Mike, unfortunately, was one of them.

As we got older, alcohol became increasingly available at parties. And when it did, at first, it was special, and we were secretive about it. As the availability increased, so did the number of embarrassing incidents involving Mike. But this was only the second time I’d seen him truly blackout drunk.