LITMIR.BIZ

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and he considers himself the protector of him and his sister.

      The deep scar across his forehead tells one of many war stories. So does the long one on his arm from a surgery when he was ten. He has black hair, blue eyes and is a good guy to have in a tough spot. My best friend is cool on the outside, but deep down he’s two pieces of uranium always on a collision course. He’s volatile. Too many emotions and nowhere safe to store them. They stew until there’s an explosion, and Dominic hates explosions. He hates fallouts. Most of all—he hates tight spaces.

      But he loves a guitar, loves music, and from all the letters and emails he sent while I was gone, he loves me. Kellen, Dominic and I are more than friends. We’re family, and I’ve missed my family.

      “You let us down,” Dominic continues. “We got beat by some little blonde, and she was a sore winner. And the worst part? I didn’t hit on her because she smiled at you, you smiled at her, and I thought you were settling in and returning to playing the game.”

      “You didn’t hit on her because she would have laid you out flat with her no.” I mock a jab to his jaw. “That girl was fireworks.”

      Kellen smiles at the dig, Dominic snorts, and a heaviness avalanches onto me. There’s a pause they’re waiting for me to fill because that’s what I used to do: announce what’s next, but I don’t have a next. This should be easier than what it is, and I hate that it’s not.

      “Dominic,” Axle calls from a food truck. “Get over here and help.”

      Kellen starts before Dominic does because where she goes, Dominic does, too.

      Dominic steps forward then stops. His shoulder next to mine. Us facing two different directions. It’s the first time we’ve been alone since before I was arrested, and I lower my head as the two million things I’ve wanted to say to him become stuck in my throat.

      With the way he sucks in a breath, he’s feeling the same.

      My heart beats faster at what he might say and what I might say in return. Did he do the crime? If so, will he confess? What about beyond the crime? Will he bring up how he screwed me over the night I was arrested? Does he have the balls to explain how he left me high and dry, and will he apologize for that? If he does, can I forgive him? Because I’ve struggled with that—forgiveness. It’s not something that occurs naturally for me.

      Dominic angles his head so he’s looking at me, waiting for me to lock eyes with him, but I can’t. I watch the blonde as she walks the midway. She’s beautiful. Possibly the most beautiful girl who’s talked to me. When she smiled at me, it was like I was being warmed by the sun, and I was her only planet. What I envy is that she seems to know where she’s going, where she’s headed in life. I’ve never been so jealous of anyone.

      “I’m going to make this up to you,” he says.

      Sharp pain in the chest. Of all the ways I saw this moment playing out, those weren’t the words I imagined. It’s not an apology for leaving me behind. It’s not an admittance of guilt. It’s a promise.

      In my final therapy session in the woods, sitting next to a bonfire I created, my therapist asked what would help me transition back into the real world. I told him I needed the truth. He told me there’s no such thing, but he did tell me that forgiveness was real.

      Forgiveness. In my mind, forgiveness and the truth go hand in hand.

      “Why did you leave me behind that night?” I ask because I’ve waited a year for that answer, and I can’t wait anymore. Not if Dominic and I are going to be friends again. “We had a pact—never leave one of us behind, and you left. Why?”

      “I thought you went home.”

      “I didn’t, and you need to admit you didn’t try to find me. Something big had to have happened for you to have ditched me. What was it?” Or did he really think I was gone from the store and saw that as his opportunity to rob it?

      “Dominic!” Kellen calls, and she’s juggling several drinks. “I need help.”

      Yes, his sister needs help, but I need help, too. I look straight into his eyes, and there’s no way he doesn’t see the plea in them to talk to me, but he doesn’t talk. Instead, Dominic pats my back and heads to help his sister.

      That night, Dominic had walked me to the convenience store, and dared me to shoplift, but then disappeared, and I passed out behind the store. I was too drunk and too high to know my own name, and he left. Disappearing, leaving anyone he loved behind, wasn’t his style, but he was desperate for money. Did his desperation cloud his judgment when it came to me and our friendship?

      And that night, Holiday was closer to the crime scene than I had known. Both of them had something to gain, both of them felt as if they had nothing to lose and both of them had motive.

      But it’s hard to imagine Holiday holding a gun. Dominic, on the other hand, he was capable of aiming a gun, and at the time, he was crazy enough to pull the trigger.

      Good thing that bullet missed the store clerk or I would have been charged with more than robbery with a weapon and attempted assault. Manslaughter would have messed up my day—for twenty years.

      Do I know for sure Dominic did it? No. There’s a chance my sister let her ramped-up emotions control the decisions for her that night and that she talked Dominic into it. But 80 percent of me believes it was him alone—my best friend—and I don’t know how to live with that yet.

      Ratting him out to the police was never an option, because no matter what, I love him. Dominic can’t handle tight spaces, and I could. Dominic wouldn’t have survived. I did. I roll my shoulders, but the tightness in my neck doesn’t go away. How can I forgive someone who won’t admit guilt? How can I forgive when I don’t know who to forgive?

      Axle joins me. “We found a table over by the merry-go-round.”

      Soon I have to announce to the world I’m a criminal, even though I’m not. Sealed records and the truth won’t mean anything once I open my mouth in front of reporters. Guess the therapist was right on the truth. It doesn’t exist.

      “I need a few minutes to myself.” Food doesn’t sound appealing anymore.

      “I’ve got your dress clothes in the car. Meet there in a half hour?”

      “Yeah.”

      Axle returns to our family, and I walk forward, in the same direction as the blonde. Her path has to be better than mine.

       Ellison

      Idiot One and Idiot Two have made a reemergence, and like all things that have died and have been brought back like a zombie, they return more grotesque than before. The dumb duo call out taunts as they follow. Each shout more degrading than the last, each shout causing my blood to heat to the point of melting steel.

      “Are you one of those girls?” one calls out. “The type who needs to be shown what to do? Come here, and I’ll show you exactly how it’s done.”

      They both laugh, congratulating the other for their wittiness. My fists clench, and I glance over my shoulder. Idiot One slides his hand down to his crotch and says, “Don’t you know a guy’s—” ringing of a game next to me “—goes into...”

      His comment is muffled by the screams of people on the Tilt-A-Whirl, but I can read his lips, spot what he’s grabbing at, and tears burn my eyes. I could smack myself. Tears. I’m so incredibly mad my eyes are filling with tears because that’s what happens when I get furious, and that only causes me to get angrier.

      I swipe at my cell and text Andrew. Where are you?

      Andrew: Midway crowded. Still on my way to you.

      More frustrated tears that I lowered myself to asking Andrew for help, but it’s either that or tell the college boys off in a very public way. My instincts are informing

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