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“What’s wrong?”
“My mom,” he said, clutching on to me, his fingers digging into my shoulders so tightly. It was as if he thought that if he let go of me, I would slip away from him. He buried his nose in my hair and tensed. “She was out on Main Street tonight, buying pills. You were right.”
My stomach dropped.
Even though I had seen her, all night, I had wished it weren’t true. I wished that I had been delusional and imagined the entire thing. I didn’t want this to be real. I didn’t want João’s mom to get messed up with drugs, especially if she was the primary caretaker for Ana.
“And …” João tensed even harder, his body trembling. Then, his voice broke. “She brought Ana with her.” He cried into my shoulder, body visibly shaking now, chest heaving heavily. “She fucking brought Ana.”
I pulled him closer to me and rubbed his back, tears welling up in my eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t say anything,” João said, steadying himself slightly. “I don’t want your pity. I want …”
“What?” I whispered when he didn’t finish his sentence. “What do you want?”
João’s body jerked again. “I want someone to love us.”
My chest tightened, pain shooting through my body. I rocked us back and forth slightly, knowing that he didn’t want my sympathy or pity. But that wasn’t what I wanted to give him. I wanted to show him that people did care.
“You have Poison,” I whispered, “who’d do anything for you and Ana.”
“What about …” João suddenly snapped his mouth closed. “Forget it.”
“What about what?”
He stiffened even more and peeled himself away from me. “Nothing.”
Then, that man turned his back toward me, walked down the stairs, and disappeared into the darkness, leaving me alone with his sister and my best friend, thinking that wasn’t the answer João had been looking for.
It was almost as if João had wanted me to tell him that I loved them too.
