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“Don’t read it,” Pamela added firmly. “Focus on formulating your response. We’ll say you don’t actually know her that well. We’ll cast blame on the attention-seeking nature of a failed reality star. I’ll put together notes for you once I gather more details. Take care, Gabriel. Wewillfix this.”
I didn’t want to harm Layana. I didn’t want any of this to be true. I couldn’t form words in any meaningful string before Pamela hung up the phone.
Cold air pressed in all around me, but I could hardly feel it. I could hardly hear the sounds of the city or even feel present in my own body.
My hands trembled as I pulled up Layana's site.
Pamela’s warning echoed in my ears, but I had to see the violation with my own eyes. Legs unsteady beneath me, I stared at the site’s brightly colored banner labeledConfessions of a Serial Mood Killer, took a breath, then scrolled down.
The first time I thought the world had ended was in the second grade, when Blake Hornsby grabbed the crooked ponytail sticking off the side of my head in his sticky fist and chopped it off with a dull pair of safety scissors. Why would someone do such a thing? Because he’d never seen black hair before, and he wanted to take some home to show his mommy.
I learned that at any age, men are entitled pricks who take what they want from you, no matter the harm they cause.
The second time I thought my life was over, I was twelve years old when I chanced sliding in at the picnic table at Jennifer Davis’s birthday party next to the cutest boy in all of Cricket Falls. I was trying not to look stupid as I took a bite of my ice cream cake, when a flock of Satan’s seagulls passed overhead and pooped on my face.
I learned that shit happens—literally. And I could laugh at myself, or let someone else dictate my story.
So years later, when I’m leaving work and suffer an accidental collision, the kind of mishap that meet cutes are made of, I know I shouldn’t be surprised that the man onthe other side of the bonk isn’t a charming, bumbling Hugh Grant.
Instead, I find a self-righteous prick in bumblebee-esque spandex, who’d rather rip my head off than ask if I’m all right.
Instead of doing the normal human brush off, a nod or muttered apology, he looks at me like I’ve taken a Sharpie to The Mona Lisa.
His reaction makes soap opera actors look like masters of subtlety. His roar rivals King Kong’s.
I pinchedthe bridge of my nose, my head swirling. I couldn’t believe this was happening. Why would she do this?
I scrolled down, my vision blurry, my pulse pounding in my ears.
I couldn’t see properly, couldn’t read properly, and maybe that was for the best. Pamela was right, I shouldn’t have seen this.
I caught words and phrases here and there:houseplants with a better sense of humility, lemonade at Oma’s, sister Esme over video chat.
With building horror, I scanned for the worst words she could possibly share with the world, the darkest secret I’d confided in her.
Unmarked envelope meant for Esme.
Bile rose in my throat. I couldn’t breathe.
What I’d experienced as moments of laughter, of trust, of tenderness—she’d recorded it all.
Nausea and anguish churned inside me.
A voice called out to me, familiar yet too foggy to register.
I stood paralyzed, staring blindly as reality set in. The closeness we had forged was ash, my reputation threatening tocollapse with it. Layana’s betrayal seared like no pain I'd ever known.
“Call nine-one-one?” Wallace bent his concerned face down so I was forced to look at him.
His words registered.
I shook my head. “No. I’m all right.”
It was a lie, and he could see it. Still, he ushered me into the car and believed me enough that he headed toward home instead of the hospital.
Once I was safely in my own space, completely alone, the tears I’d held inside of me since my father’s death poured forth.
THIRTY-SEVEN
