Saturday, March 17 9:06:16 p.m.
FROM: Robert Ellis <[email protected]>
TO: Rev Fletcher <[email protected]>
SUBJECT: Question
Do you ever think of me at all? Or have you been tempted away so thoroughly?
I’m having the most bizarre emotional experience.
There is another e-mail from my father on my phone.
There is a girl walking next to me.
I’m taking her to my house.
It’s pouring rain and we’re holding hands and I’m soaking wet. I’m freezing on the outside and warm on the inside, and I both want this moment to end and go on forever.
I shove my phone into the sodden pocket of my hoodie. I only checked because I thought it might be Geoff or Kristin.
“What just happened?” says Emma.
My movement must have been a little too forceful. “My father sent me another e-mail.”
“Do you write back to any of them?” She looks up at me. Her hair is plastered back from the rain, and her eyes are huge.
“Only the first.” I wince. “I told him to leave me alone.”
She doesn’t respond to that. We walk in silence for a while.
“Do you think there’s a part of you that wanted to talk to him?”
“Yes.” No mystery there. “And I know that sounds weird.”
“No, I think I get it.” She shrugs. “I don’t like my mother, but she’s still my mother.”
“You don’t like her?”
“She doesn’t like anything about me either. She thinks I’m a slacker wasting all my time playing games on the Internet. It’s basically the same way she feels about my father, but she knows she can control me.”
“Your parents don’t get along?”
She snorts. “They must have gotten along at some point, but not now. Mom is all about eating healthy, working out, and spending seventy hours a week at her job. Dad is all about eating nachos, staying up all night, and also spending seventy hours a week at his job.”
“So they’re never home.”
“Not a lot, no. But really, that’s better. When they’re home they snipe at each other. When he’s not home, Mom snipes at me.”
No wonder she doesn’t feel like she has anyone she can tell about the guy sending her those hateful messages.
“So you think your mother is disappointed that you’re doing what your father does?”
“I know she is. And it sucks. I’m good at game design. I love the creativity of it. I write out whole storyboards. I have my own game, and a whole community! But she—”
“Wait.” I use our joined hands to pull her to a stop. “You have your own game?”
Her cheeks turn pink, even in the rain. “It’s nothing. It’s small.”
I stare at her. “Your own game. Like—you built a computer game?”
“It’s nothing. Really.”
It’s literally the most fascinating thing in the world and she says this like it’s nothing. “Emma—I don’t know anyone who can write a computer game. Are you kidding me? Can I play it?”
“No!”
“Why?”
She glances away. “It’s silly. Like I said. It’s ridiculous.”
“It’s not. I want to see.”
“I don’t want you to see.”
Her words stop me in my tracks. I’m not entirely sure how to take them, and my brain is such a twisted, screwed-up place already. “Okay.”
Her blush deepens. “It’s not perfect yet. I haven’t even shown my father. It needs to be perfect before I show it to him.”
“And probably not your mother, either?”
“God, no. She wouldn’t be impressed by any of that. She finds it disappointing. So I spend all my time resenting her but also wishing I could please her. If that makes any sense.”
“Of course.”
“Of course.” Light and shadows play games with the trails of water on her face. My eyes trace her lips, the lines of her face, the soft curve of her jaw. I want to touch her so badly that my hand aches for it.
“Are you stalling?” she whispers.
It breaks the spell. I blink and look away. “No. Come on.” We start walking again.
Are you stalling?
Much like her refusal to let me see her game, I don’t know what to make of that. Maybe this attraction is one-sided. Maybe my head can’t even wrap itself around normal social cues.
Then again, she’s still holding my hand.
Maybe she’s not ready to talk about her mother any more than I wanted to talk about my father.
Maybe I really am stalling.
“Are you sure your parents aren’t going to mind you bringing a friend home this late?” she says. “A friend with a dog?”
“Don’t worry.” I glance down at her. “My parents are used to me doing bizarre things.” As we turn the corner to my street, anxiety has my stomach in knots. My father, my parents, Emma at my side. I don’t know if I can do this.
I wish I could take her to Declan’s house instead.
I have to clear my throat. “I live just up there. The blue house.” Lightning flashes.
Emma shivers. “You sound like you want me to just go tell them for you.”
“Is that an option?” I mean it as a joke, but the words come out too heavy, too serious.
“No.” She peers up at me. “Or … yes? I mean, if you really want me to?”
The scenario plays out in my head. Geoff and Kristin have never flinched at anything I’ve ever done or asked, but this would be a new level.
“No,” I say. “I was kidding.”
I don’t sound like I’m kidding at all.
“Would you have really done that?” I ask her.
“Sure. I mean—I don’t have anything to lose. Any reaction wouldn’t be about me, really.”
My mouth goes dry. “Do you think they’re going to have a reaction?”
“That your abusive father is e-mailing you? Um, yeah, I’m pretty sure they’re going to have a reaction. What other things has he said to you? Does he threaten you?”
The very existence of his e-mails feel like a threat. I stop in the rain again. “Here. I’ll show you the rest.”
We’re on the sidewalk in front of the house now. Geoff or Kristin could look out and see me standing here. It’s unlikely, though. Their bedroom is at the back of the house. So are the kitchen and the family room. I told them I was going to Declan’s, so they’re not going to expect me to come home from this direction. We have time.
Emma reads quickly—but it’s not like his e-mails have a lot of text. It’s the underlying messages that hit so hard. Her hand hovers over the screen as she flicks to scroll.
“I thought his e-mails were going to sound nuts, but they don’t. He sounds pretty lucid. I can see what you mean. It’s almost diabolical.”
Diabolical. That’s such a good word for my father—and one he would hate, because it means devil-like at its root.
I love that Emma used it to describe him. It brings me a measure of comfort. When people dismiss him as crazy, I know they don’t understand. He wasn’t crazy. He was … deliberate. Calculated.
Then she looks up again. “Is Rev Fletcher not your real name?”
I blink, thrown. “What?”
“In his first e-mail, he asks where you came up with Rev Fletcher.” She winces. “Am I not allowed to ask that?”
“No. No, you can ask me anything.” I run a hand through my hair. I’d forgotten that. “Fletcher is Geoff and Kristin’s last name. I took it when they adopted me.”
“And Rev? Is that short for something?”
“Yes. Sort of.” I pause. “When I first came here, I used to jump every time Geoff and Kristin said my name. Because my father would only use it when—” I have to stop. Close my eyes. Take a breath and shake off the memory. “They let me choose a new one.”
“Do you have a brother?”
It’s not the next question I was expecting. “What?”
“A kid just came around the back of your house, saw us, and ran back into your backyard.”
“What?”
Emma points. “You said you live in the blue one, right?”
My eyes zoom in on the house with laser focus. The garage, the trees between our house and the neighbor’s, the shadows along the shrubbery. No motion at all.
“Wait here.” I sprint up the lawn.
“Hey!” shouts Emma. Texas barks.
And then the dog is beside me, and we’re sprinting into the backyard, her leash trailing in the grass. There’s no one here.
Texas bounces on her front paws, panting excitedly. Then she stops, one paw raised. Her ears are trained on the backyard of the house next door.
With a loud woof, she bolts.
I follow her.
She finds Matthew crouched behind an air-conditioning unit. She’s barking like crazy, her tail wagging fiercely.
Matthew flattens back against the siding. He’s already soaked from the rain. He looks from me to the dog and back. One hand is behind him, against the house.
I think of the first night, when I found him with a knife.
Emma appears around the side of the house. She’s panting. “Rev. What’s—what’s going on?”
Matthew takes advantage of the distraction. He bolts.
Texas is not a police dog. She barks and gives chase, but she doesn’t tackle him or anything.
That’s okay, because I do.
We roll to the ground in a tangle of limbs. He goes down fighting. I’m ready for a blade to catch me somewhere, but he either dropped it or he never had one. Matthew hits with power, like he’s learned how. He gets some solid jabs into my ribs. The rain makes his skin slick and difficult to grab.
But I’m stronger than he is. I get an arm around his neck and pin a leg so he can’t get free. He’s got one arm loose, and he’s trying to pry at my arm, but I’ve got leverage and I know what I’m doing. He struggles until I tighten my grip.
“Knock it off and I’ll let you up,” I say.
He tries to drive his elbow into my rib cage in response.
“Rev!” cries Emma. She’s still panting. Rain pours down around us. “Rev—”
“Go to my house,” I tell her, my voice tight with strain. “Tell my parents where we are.”
She turns and runs. I love that about her—no hesitation. No second-guessing.
Matthew finally goes still. His breathing is rough and ragged. “Let me go.”
“Do you have a weapon?”
“Go to hell.”
“Do you want me to let you go or not?”
“I don’t have anything.” He grinds the words out. “Let me go.”
I let him go. He immediately digs his feet into the ground and tries to run again.
I catch his arm. He swings around and drives a fist right into my face.
Stars explode in my eyes. He breaks free.
I’m still faster than he is. I tackle him again, and this time I trap him more effectively. I’ve got an arm around his neck and his lower body pinned. He can’t even struggle.
My jaw hurts. No one has hit me in anger since my father. A dark thought flashes through my mind, that I could break Matthew’s neck right now.
“Rev!” Geoff’s voice. “Rev! Let him go!”
I open my eyes. I don’t remember closing them. Matthew’s fingers dig into my forearm, almost a panicked clawing. Geoff, Kristin, and Emma stand in the rain, staring down at us. Texy is straining against her leash, barking wildly. Emma holds her back.
“Rev, honey,” says Kristin. Concern threads through her voice. She touches my arm. “Rev, let him go.”
I let him go. I fall away into the grass.
Matthew doesn’t run this time. He’s making choking sounds, coughing into the grass.
I did that. I hurt him.
Shame hits me like a sledgehammer.
Geoff and Kristin go to Matthew. I’m glad. I don’t deserve their attention right now. I can’t look at any of them.
“Hey.” Emma speaks right beside me.
I turn my head and find her crouching in the grass. Texas thrusts her nose into my face and starts licking my cheek.
It hurts, and I wonder if I’m bleeding. I push the dog’s muzzle away.
“Are you okay?” Emma says.
“No,” I say. “I’m not.”
Then I get to my feet.
Emma reaches out and touches my hand. “I’m still here,” she whispers.
“I know.” I don’t want to look at her.
She frowns and leans in a bit. “Rev, you—”
“Don’t,” I say. I wish she hadn’t seen any of this. “I’m a mess, Emma.”
“But—”
“Please go home. Please forget this happened. Please—” My voice breaks. I can’t take much more of this.
“Rev.” She says my name softly. “It’s okay. I can stay.”
I force my eyes to open. Geoff and Kristin are helping Matthew to his feet.
I don’t know what they’re going to do.
I don’t know what’s going to happen.
I do know I don’t want her to see it. I run a wet hand across my face. “Please, Emma. Please just go.”
“Okay,” she says softly. “Here.”
She slips out of my coat. It pools in my lap.
It feels warm and smells like her, something fruity, like oranges and sunshine.
The rain pours down to steal the warmth and scent.
“Are you sure?” she says.
I hold my breath. I’m not sure of anything.
I’m always worried I’ve inherited his violence.
I have. It’s always waiting inside me.
I nod. “Go. I can’t do this.”
“Okay.”
And that’s it. She turns and walks out of the yard.