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The dogs stop at another pole, and I turn to him, searching his face, wondering how I can know he's safe, when I was so wrong last time. "How could he do that to me?"
19
NICK
The golden light of the streetlight gives her a halo. The deep blue pools of her eyes are filled with pain and confusion. She's asking a question she deserves an answer to, but I don't have one to give her. "I don't know, Bree. I...I wish I understood why people do shit like that." The dogs stop tugging, seeming to understand how serious this conversation is. "My dad was not a good guy...actually that's an understatement. He was a violent criminal. The best thing that could have happened to me is him leaving me with my Abuelita. But when I was a kid, I didn't understand how bad he was. I just wished he were around more. I realized too late that I should have wished him far, far away."
She swallows heavily, eyes shimmering. "What happened to make you wish that?"
I can't look at her when I tell her. She's shared so much of herself, I won't hide this. But I know this might change everything. That she'll look at me differently from now on. Our friendship might end here. And I wouldn't blame her for a second.
"He came home for my birthday. I begged him too. I didn't see him very often, and I really wanted him there. He seemed so big and confident. I thought I wanted to be him when I grew up." Such a stupid, stupid kid. "Abuelita made me my favorite cake. She was always spoiling me. A bunch of the neighbors came over, and we were all out front of the house cooking out, and a car drove past. I noticed the car because it was too nice for our neighborhood. I learned pretty early when those jacked cars come around, someone bad is driving it. I didn't notice the gun."
Bree makes a choked sound, but doesn't say anything. Her eyes stay locked on me as I finish. "It made like a spitting sound, not the big boom I'd heard in the movies and in the distance in my neighborhood." I absently rub my shoulder, right over the long healed bullet wound. "Abuelita was wearing a white dress, and I remember thinking she spilled Ketchup on herself." Wishful thinking. Even at seven I knew ketchup wasn't that red, and didn't definitely didn't spread that fast.
"She was...killed." Bree says. It isn't a question.
"Yeah. And my dad. And a lot of other people." A Massacre the reporters kept calling it. The news was on in the hospital and I couldn't avoid it. The police even came to me. In my neighborhood, we didn't talk to the police. But I did. I told them everything I remembered about that car, and the men driving it. I couldn't let them get away with it. They needed to be punished for hurting her.
We all did.
"I'm so sorry," she whispers. I nod, throat too tight to speak. People always say they're sorry, but most of the time it feels like a placeholder. Something they say when they feel like they have to say something. When Bree says it? There's pain and understanding behind the words.
I turn away, unable to stand the sympathy in her eyes. I start walking, grateful when she falls in beside me. The dogs' tails are wagging like crazy. "I've spent decades thinking about that night. About why some fucking turf war was worth murdering a bunch of innocent people, and I still don't get it. And I'm still angry about it." And guilty. Let's not forget guilt. God knows I can't.
It's my fucking fault he was there that day.
They were looking for him. Everything I know, everything I read in the official report says so. And I begged her to let him come. He wasn't allowed at her house, not for years. She'd let me see him, but at a park or somewhere else. I always thought she was being mean. Everyone else was allowed at her house. She had an open door to anyone in the neighborhood and most nights we'd have people join us for supper, some of them looking like they hadn't eaten in weeks. Abuelita would never say a thing, she'd just smile and give them another helping.
She was too good. Too kind. Too loving. And in the end, that love she had for me killed her. I killed her. I might not have pulled the trigger, but I'm responsible all the same.
"I wasn't angry," Bree says quietly, pulling me out of my spiral of guilt. It's always there waiting for me, never far from my mind. "Not for a long time. Now? I'm getting there. Some days, I can't contain the rage brewing in my gut. I have these fantasies that he's attacking me, but instead of being so weak, I fight back. And I hurt him...badly. I rewrite it in my head."
I have a big fucking problem with her calling herself weak, but I don't contradict her. Not yet anyway. "Does it help? Pretending it was different?"
"I'm not sure yet. It's something my counselor suggested. Rewriting the traumatic situation. Writing a new ending."
"What's the new ending, Bree?"
She wets her lips. "I saw the footage, you know? The one of Becca, when Holly's husband came to the garage. She destroyed him. My rewritten version looks a lot like that. I fight him off, and he ends up crying on the floor. Then the cops take him away. Cara's never there. She never has to see any of it." She takes a shuddering breath. "She carries too much."
"She doesn't think so. You're not a weight around her neck, Bree. You're her world."
"The world is heavy, Nick. I have to lift some of the burden."
"How are you going to do that?"
She forces a smile. "Funny you should ask. That's where you come in."
"Me? I'm part of your master plan? Should I be flattered? I feel like I should be."
She snorts, turning back toward the shelter, the dogs walking more slowly now. How were they so full of energy a second ago, and now they're walking like they're old and gray?
"You can be flattered. Or not. But I think Declan was on to something. I don't like the way he went about it, but Cara needs to worry less. Or more specifically, I need to give her less to worry about. So you're going to be my beard."
"Wait...what? I'm not sure that means what you think it does...." My stomach drops. "Unless... are you telling me you're...a lesbian?"
Bree stares at me, face slack, long enough for me to spiral into denial and grief. It's not like we'll ever be together anyway, but the possibility of it gets me up in the morning. "It's okay if you are. Yay. But I just thought—“
