Vanishing Girls(41)

“Look.” Parker’s still swaying, and his words are soft around the edges—not slurring, exactly, but like he can’t be bothered to make hard sounds. “Can we go somewhere to talk? Five minutes. Ten, tops.”

He makes a move for the door. But there’s no way I’m letting him inside and risking waking up Mom—or worse, Nick. She never said anything about Parker and me, not directly, but I could read on her face how much she disapproved. Worse. I could read the pity, and I knew what she was thinking. One time I’d even heard her friend Isha say it out loud. They were in Nick’s room and I was climbing down the trellis and Isha’s voice rose up suddenly.

“She isn’t prettier than you, Nick,” she’d said. “It’s just that she shoves her tits in everyone’s face. People feel bad for her, you know?”

I didn’t hear Nick’s reply. But at that moment she’d stood up and her eyes slid across the window and I swear, I swear she saw me, frozen, gripping the trellis with both hands. Then she reached out and yanked the curtains shut.

“Come on,” I say, and take hold of Parker’s arm, dragging him off the porch. I’m surprised when he fumbles for my hand. I pull away, crossing my arms again. It hurts to touch him.

My car is unlocked. I swing open the passenger door and gesture for him to get in. He freezes.

“Well?” I say.

He’s staring at the car as if he’s never seen one before. “In here?”

“You said you wanted to talk.” I walk around to the driver’s side, open the door, and get in. After another minute, he climbs in after me. With both doors shut, it’s very quiet. The upholstery smells faintly of mildew. I’m still holding my phone, and I half wish it would ring, just to break up the silence.

Parker runs his hands over the dashboard. “This car,” he says. “It’s been a while since I’ve been in this car.”

“So?” I prompt him. The car is stuffy, and it’s so compact that every time he moves, we bump elbows. I don’t want to think about what we used to do in here—and what we didn’t do, what we never did. “You have something you want to say to me?”

“Yeah.” Parker shoves a hand through his hair. It immediately falls back into place. “Yeah, I do.”

I wait for a long beat of silence. But he says nothing. He doesn’t even look at me.

“It’s late, Parker. I’m tired. If you just came over to—”

He turns to me suddenly, and the words get caught in my chest: his eyes are two stars pinned to his face, blazing. He’s so close I can feel the heat from his body, as if we’re already pressed chest to chest, hugging. More. Kissing.

My heart shoots into my throat.

“I came to talk to you because I need to tell you the truth. I need to tell you.”

“What are you talking—?”

He cuts me off. “No. It’s my turn. Listen, okay? I’ve been lying. I never told you . . . I never explained.”

In the endless stretch of silence before he speaks again, the world outside take a deep breath.

“I’m in love. I fell in love.” Parker’s voice is barely a whisper. I stop breathing altogether. I’m afraid to move, afraid that if I do, everything will disappear. “Maybe I always was in love, and just too stupid to know it.”

You, I think. The only word I can reach, the only thing I can think of: You.

Maybe, on some level, he hears me. Maybe in some parallel realm, Parker knows, because just then he says it, too.

“It’s you,” he says. And his hands are touching my neck, my face, skimming through my hair. “My whole life, it’s always been you.”

Then he kisses me. And in that second I realize that all the work I’ve done to forget, to deny, to pretend I never cared about him—all the minutes, hours, days spent taking down our memories, piece by piece—has been totally and completely pointless. The second his lips touch mine—hesitantly, at first, as if he isn’t quite sure I’ll want it—the second I feel his fingers tighten in my hair, I know there’s no use in pretending and there never was.

I am in love with Parker. I have always been in love with Parker.

It’s been months since we’ve kissed, but there’s no awkwardness, no strain, like there was with any of the other guys I’ve been with. It’s as easy as breathing: push and pull; give, take, give. He tastes like sugar and something else, something deep and spicy.

At a certain point we break to catch our breath. I’m no longer holding my phone; I have no idea when I dropped it and I couldn’t care less.

Parker brushes the hair back from my face, touches my nose with a thumb, sweeps his fingers over my cheeks. I wonder whether he can feel the scar tissue, smooth and alien, and involuntarily I pull back a little.

“You’re so beautiful,” he says, and I know he means it, which makes me feel worse. It’s been so long, maybe forever, since anyone has looked at me the way he’s looking at me now.

I shake my head. “I’m all messed up now.” My throat is knotted up and the words come out high, strangled.

“You’re not.” He takes my face with both hands, forcing me to look at him. “You’re perfect.”

This time, I kiss him. The knot loosens; once again I feel warm and happy and relaxed, like I’m floating in the world’s most perfect ocean. Parker thinks I’m beautiful. Parker has been in love with me all this time.