Old Wounds: Little Battles Part 12

"She doesn't get high because of you. The girl gets high because it's one of her very few defenses against a world that has shown her nothing but pain, and she's frightened to let it go. Just as she uses her anger as a s.h.i.+eld, she wraps herself in a world where no one can hurt her again." Robin narrowed her eyes at me. "Do you understand? Sometimes we are all victims of our natural instinct to avoid pain and suffering. She's cutting it off at the pa.s.s. A pre-emptive strike, if you will."

I made up my mind right there. I was going to help her let it go. I was going to fill her time with figuring things out with me, as an alternative to doing drugs. I was going to dedicate myself to saving her from my mother's fate. Sophie didn't need drugs to cope. I could help her.

She wasn't a fictional girl. Sophie was real and she meant more to me than anything else in my life. This battle, like the battle to get her to admit she'd been abused by her mother, was going to be one of those defining battles of a long war. The war was to save Sophie. And each little battle won would pave the way to lasting victory.

Even if we'd never be anything more than friends, even if she didn't want to be my friend anymore, I was going to save her. She was worth it.

I hadn't had s.e.x in nine days and it was about killing me.

All I could feel throughout the day was the delicious leftover sensation of Elliott's body underneath me. But he c.o.c.k-blocked himself. What guy does that?

I hadn't meant to get so high, but I'd snorted a line before lunch, and then smoked pot with Jason. That brought down my cocaine high, so I snorted a little more before going into the greenhouse.

Well, I snorted a lot more.

I ended up in the library and not Reese's cla.s.s. It was quiet in there and I found a little spot that was comfortable.

Suddenly there was Elliott and he was comfortable and felt really, really nice, but then he said something about a nurse and it didn't matter how nice he felt, I had to get away because I was afraid my mother would find out.

Of course, it was the cocaine that had me paranoid because logically, my mother wouldn't find out, and even if she did, it's not like she could do anything about it now. Besides, I'd been away from her so long, I didn't have any fresh marks.

Elliott listened to me and instead I wound up smoking enough pot behind his car to stop freaking the h.e.l.l out. Then we went to his house where I laid on his couch until Dr. Dalton knocked on his door to let him know that Wallace wanted to see him.

Dr. Dalton invited me downstairs so that he could take my blood pressure, blood sugar, and whatever the h.e.l.l else he thought about taking. He mentioned that Elliott told him I hadn't been feeling well.

I was definitely cras.h.i.+ng now, so I sat in the Dalton kitchen and let him stick my finger with a lancet and put a cuff around my upper arm while kids started filing in now that school was out.

"Your father mentioned you got a job at the grocery store."

"Yeah."

"Have you started?" He placed a drop of blood on the meter and waited for both the machine and me to respond.

"Yeah. Wednesday. Lots of training videos and papers to sign." I felt like a lump. A tired lump that needed to sleep.

The meter beeped. "Your blood sugar is elevated. Is that normal with the amount of insulin you take?"

I thought for a moment, my brain sluggish. "I've been a little low lately, but..." He quirked his eyebrow as he waited for me. "I can't remember if I took my insulin today or not," I admitted.

"Does that happen a lot?"

I shook my head, wis.h.i.+ng that I hadn't said anything. "Not usually." I'd done a b.u.mp of c.o.ke around four this morning, so I must've missed it.

"Do you feel like your diabetes is being properly managed?"

"Sure."

As he gave me insulin, I knew he had a million doctor questions that he'd keep asking to keep me occupied until Dr. Wallace wanted me, so I took an offensive distracting measure.

"How did you know to give Elliott a guitar?"

Dr. Dalton looked surprised. "What do you mean?"

"He said you got him a guitar even though he'd never played, so how did you know he was going to be good at it?"

"I didn't." His voice was low as he took in the other Screw-Up Club members milling around.

"Elliott used to bite his hands." He frowned, his expression clouding a bit. "Not just his fingernails. He would just bite down on the meat of his hands until he drew blood, and even then sometimes he wouldn't stop." Dr. Dalton paused and pulled off the blood pressure cuff from my arm. "It was clear that he did it when he was upset or particularly stressed. His hands had gotten so mangled I wondered how he could use them in his day-to-day activities."

He backed up and crossed his arms over his chest as he got a faraway look in his eyes. "So I bought him a guitar as a more peaceful, less painful way to channel his frustration. I lucked out because not only did it work in occupying his hands and helping with his stress and anxiety levels, he was really gifted. It has become a source of peace to him, and it seems to be a preventative measure. He can use it to help stop himself from becoming more anxious."

d.a.m.n. It was hard to imagine Elliott even more on edge than he was now. I did my best to put that information to the side. I didn't want to think about Elliott's hands all b.l.o.o.d.y and torn up. I didn't want to imagine him being the one who did that to himself. Why would the beautiful boy upstairs do something like that?

"Let's talk, Sophie."

I didn't have the energy to do anything but roll my eyes. "I thought that was mandatory."

Wallace smiled at me. "Talking isn't mandatory, but it is helpful. We can write if you prefer, or use sign language. Or since you're a photographer, we can use pictures."

"Are you f.u.c.king with me?" Was she saying that I was stupid?

My mind was like sludge and it did not appreciate this wicked come-down. I'd been too high at school today. Absolutely insanely high. That was something even I knew I shouldn't do again, but I was pretty sure I would anyway.

The more and more bad thoughts I had, the more and more s.h.i.+t I did. And the messed-up part was that I knew I didn't need any more after that first b.u.mp this morning, but I just wasn't high enough.

"I'm serious, Sophie." I put my focus back on Wallace, trying to remember what the h.e.l.l we were talking about. "Not everyone can verbalize, especially when they've been trained not to."

"Trained?" I asked, avoiding her gaze. I wasn't high enough for this s.h.i.+t. I didn't have enough energy to get angry, since I was nothing more than a Sophie-shaped puddle of mud, flowing so slowly that I forgot what the beginning of my own internal chatter was about.

"Yes, trained. Being shown or told over and over until it's ingrained."

"I know what the word 'train' means."

She waited a moment before speaking again. "I know you do." She uncapped her bottle of water and took a sip. "I'd like to see some of your photos some time."

"Yeah." She'd said that s.h.i.+t before.

"Have you given any thought to our discussion from last week?"

Sighing heavily, I said, "I haven't screwed anyone in forever." I ran my hands through my hair, knowing that it hadn't been all that long, but it felt like it.

"Has that been difficult for you?"

I could have lied to her, or said nothing. "Yes," I admitted. I wasn't quite sure when I'd made the decision to talk to her about this s.h.i.+t, but here I was just handing out information about myself.

"Why do you enjoy s.e.x?"

"Seriously?"

"Seriously."

"Because it feels good. It's fun."

She just looked at me.

"What?" I asked, not happy with her just staring at me like that.

"Do you think it's normal or healthy for a seventeen-year-old to have as much s.e.x as you do?"

"Are you saying that in a few months when I'm eighteen, it'll suddenly be okay for me to have as much s.e.x as I want?" This insistence that age had anything to do with anything was ridiculous.

"You indicated that you've had s.e.x with men who were older than you. How many of your partners were over the age of eighteen?"

I sighed. "Why is age important?"

"Were the majority of your partners older than you?"

"I don't know. Why do you want to talk about this?"

"Because it's important. It's not healthy for a young woman to engage in such reckless behavior."

I couldn't suppress my laugh. "Who the h.e.l.l cares?" I was suddenly very energized, and very upset. "Who the h.e.l.l cares if I'm healthy or not? You? Tom? Both of you are just fulfilling your obligation."

"What about Elliott?"

I swallowed hard and looked away from her, all the fire I'd felt a moment before rus.h.i.+ng out of me.

"He cares."

"Well, maybe he shouldn't," I said, my voice deflated. I knew he cared about me, but he d.a.m.n well should've thought twice about that. I shouldn't have given a s.h.i.+t about him either, but that wasn't how it went. No, some unseen force pulled me to him, because like Romeo and Juliet, the stars crossed or some s.h.i.+t.

So now I was stuck wanting to feel good, but I was trying to be good so I didn't hurt Elliott, which was difficult since he wasn't interested in getting off with me.

It really hurt when he basically rejected me completely, and it wasn't fair that it hurt.

Jason almost always wanted s.e.x, and I could have banged him so easily, but no, I let these people mindf.u.c.k me into thinking that not having s.e.x was a good idea.

"Will you answer the question, Sophie?"

Right. The question. "I don't know. A lot of them have been older. Who cares?"

"I do."

I looked up at her. "Whatever."

"You should care, Sophie. What do you get from these men beyond fleeting physical pleasure? Is there some kind of validation or do you feel some sort of love from the-"

I sighed heavily, effectively cutting her off as I hoisted my lethargic body out of the chair. "I'm not talking to you about this s.h.i.+t. Who I do and why I do it isn't your business, so write what you want in your s.h.i.+tty little notebook and leave me alone."

As I walked to the door, Wallace didn't give up. "Why haven't you had s.e.x this week?"

Jesus. It wasn't because there was no one bangable around, that was for sure. It took everything I had in me to not screw Jason daily. The real reason was probably sitting downstairs looking all uncomfortable and pained. I didn't know which was worse: not having s.e.x, or not having s.e.x because I liked Elliott.

Instead of answering, I walked out, slamming the door.

I lay on Elliott's couch, my head filled with stupid thoughts spurred by Wallace's questions about the men I'd had s.e.x with, as Elliott fiddled with his iPod trying to find some music for us to listen to. I was no more energetic now than I was an hour ago talking to Wallace, but everything just felt better when I was in his room.

As I looked at the ceiling, I tried to find something else to think about. I had no more pills, so I wouldn't be able to get high until after I got home, and probably not until after Tom had gone to sleep.

"Do you have pictures of your family?" I was about to add, "Your real family," but stopped. Adopted kids were sometimes sensitive about that stuff, and I didn't want to imply the family he had now wasn't real. I turned toward him, immediately l.u.s.ting over his s.e.xy back. He was wearing a gray b.u.t.ton-down today and it was pulled tight across his shoulders and then loosened at the middle. "What was your name before Dalton adopted you?"

Pain swept through me as his shoulders gently slumped forward. Maybe I should've asked those things in an e-mail, but I was here with him now and it seemed like I should be able to ask him something like this now that we were...whatever the h.e.l.l we were to each other.

"M-M-MMMcKay."

"Did you have to change your name?" He shook his head as he turned around, apparently satisfied with this depressing-a.s.s piano music, and went over to his bed. "You wanted to?" He nodded and took a deep breath.

Instead of sitting down, he walked over to his bedside table and opened a drawer. He lifted a million little things before pulling out something small, and then walked over to me.

I sat up and reached for it, s.h.i.+vering a little as our fingers brushed and the usual rounds of chemicals pa.s.sed between us. When I looked at the paper, I found that it was a small photograph of four people. A red-haired woman held a boy with rusty auburn hair. She stood next to a very severe-looking man with his hands very awkwardly resting on a brown-haired boy's shoulders.

Elliott had handed me the photograph face down and moved away before I turned it over. He was currently sitting on the edge of his bed not looking like he owned it, while his eyes were steadfastly fixed on one of his guitars.

He obviously didn't like this picture, or what it represented. I wished I hadn't asked about it. But it was in my hands now and I looked at it closely. Little boy Elliott was amazingly cute with crazy long eyelashes and amazingly bright hazel eyes, and hair that stood out. It wasn't as bright as his mother's, it was more subdued, but the color drew my eyes to it instantly.

The smiles didn't seem right. They were all wrong, like they were fake or forced, and the guy who was apparently Elliott's father didn't even try to smile.

He looked like an a.s.shole.

I studied the younger version of Elliott. He was small and his face was different, but I could see the Elliott I knew in there. I sucked at guessing ages, but he looked like he could have only been five at the time. I wondered what his voice sounded like when he was that young. I wondered if when this picture was taken he'd already begun stuttering.

"Do you miss your brother?" I asked. I hadn't even looked at his brother really, so as I asked the question, I studied the photograph. He seemed fairly unremarkable, but not in a bad way. He just looked like every other kid in the world, and seemed quite a bit older than Elliott. If Elliott was five, he would have been nine or ten.

When I looked back up, he wasn't perched on the edge of his bed; he was standing right next to me. He gently plucked the picture from between my fingers and then silently replaced it in the drawer.

I wished that I hadn't looked up at him in that moment and seen the unmasked sadness on his face, and some kind of fresh fear in his eyes.

So Elliott didn't want to talk about his brother.

"Do you want to do something this weekend?

His eyes suddenly brightened and sparkled like usual. "Y-y-yes," he answered immediately and I couldn't stifle my smile. I was more excited than I cared to admit that he was still so happy to spend time with me.

"You should come over then. Like tomorrow or something. I think Tom has to work. I was going to make a roast, but I work Sunday so we can't hang out until after three." I stood, feeling somewhat overexposed, and crossed over to his bookshelf. Gliding my fingers over the spines of the books, I added, "Or I can come over here if we have to do s.h.i.+t with the Brussels sprouts or whatever."

"W-w-what do you w-want to do?"

I sighed. "I'll come over here," I answered quietly.